{"id":15367,"date":"2018-11-14T17:04:00","date_gmt":"2018-11-14T22:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jru.twr.mybluehost.me\/second-act-2018-review\/"},"modified":"2025-05-27T19:47:51","modified_gmt":"2025-05-27T23:47:51","slug":"second-act-2018-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/second-act-2018-review\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Second Act’ (2018) Review"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Second Act Synopsis:<\/strong> A big box store worker reinvents her life and her life-story and shows Madison Avenue what street smarts can do.<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Second Act<\/i> is being touted as Jennifer Lopez\u2019s<\/b> \u201creturn to romantic comedy,\u201d her last venture in the rom-com genre having been the mediocre 2010 film, The Back-Up Plan<\/i>. And while I can understand why the studio wants to market Second Act<\/i> as a rom-com, it\u2019s more than a little misleading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yes, Second Act<\/a><\/i> is a comedy, but the romance it\u2019s touting is maybe a total of twenty-five minutes of the movie from start to finish. Essentially Second Act<\/i> is meant to be a movie about female empowerment, where street smarts should mean just as much in the corporate world as book smarts do, something Lopez\u2019s character Maya sets out to prove after she is passed over for a deserved promotion at her job of fifteen years due to her lack of a college degree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her opportunity to do just that comes after her best friend\u2019s son creates a fictional online persona where Maya has that college degree and job experience, along with some awe-inspiring achievements like climbing Mount Kilimanjaro and befriending the Obamas. The falsified resume and new online identity land her in a job interview with a corporate cosmetic company, where she is hired as a consultant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s here Maya meets Zoe Clarke (Vanessa Hudgens<\/a><\/b>), daughter of the CEO Anderson Clarke (played by Treat Williams<\/b>), who is in charge of the beauty care line that Maya diplomatically criticizes during her interview while giving some advice on how to improve the product to consumers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At this point, you expect Zoe to become the typical \u2018threatened female co-worker\u2019 who plots to ruin Maya\u2019s success as the two women are pitted against each other in a work-related competition. Thankfully Second Act<\/em> avoids that particular \u2018mean girl\u2019 trope, and shifts into something of a family dramedy for the remainder of the film.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While I thoroughly enjoyed the female-centric cast, namely Leah Remini<\/b> and Annaleigh Ashford,<\/b> who carry the comedic weight, I felt like the male characters fell short of feeling even remotely necessary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Milo Ventimiglia<\/b> felt miscast as Maya\u2019s love interest, Trey, a prop used to bookend the film for Maya to find herself, and a desire for a family (it should be okay that she doesn\u2019t want a family, but well, you know\u2026). Dave Foley<\/b> was sorely underused, and Freddie Stroma\u2019s<\/b> Ron, a colleague of Maya\u2019s, is essentially your typical rom-com villain who spends most of the movie working to unravel Maya\u2019s lies and expose her, but even he fell short of adding any tension or conflict. Honestly, the movie doesn\u2019t even need him, as Maya\u2019s growing inner conflict is more than enough to drive the plot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It has a few laughs and a touching if a bit contrived, storyline about family, biological and otherwise, and Jennifer Lopez certainly won\u2019t disappoint her fans with this performance. But while Second Act<\/i> is a pleasant enough movie, it\u2019s certainly not memorable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Watched:<\/b> 10\/14\/2018
Notable Song:<\/b> Push It by Salt-N-Pepa<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rating:<\/strong><\/div>
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Second Act Synopsis: A big box store worker reinvents her life and her life-story and shows Madison Avenue what street smarts can do. Second Act is being touted as Jennifer Lopez\u2019s \u201creturn to romantic comedy,\u201d her last venture in the rom-com genre having been the mediocre 2010 film, The Back-Up Plan. And while I can…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":58930,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[526,1],"tags":[425,975,976,977,978,979,980,981,3652,982,754,983],"class_list":["post-15367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews-s","category-reviews","tag-425","tag-annaleigh-ashford","tag-dave-foley","tag-freddie-stroma","tag-jennifer-lopez","tag-leah-remini","tag-milo-ventimiglia","tag-peter-segal","tag-3-stars","tag-second-act","tag-treat-williams","tag-vanessa-hudgens"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15367"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15367\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58938,"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15367\/revisions\/58938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58930"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theromcomcatalog.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}