Danny DeVito makes everything better. He did it with It’s Always Sunny, and Detective Pikachu, and senior prom, and a terrifying room inside a college bathroom. He was also the only redeeming part of Disney’s awful Dumbo remake. Now, the guy’s is about to do the same thing with the new Jumanji, apparently. On Monday, Sony Pictures released the first trailer for Jumanji: The Next Level, the sequel to last year’s soft Jumanji reboot starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and, yes, it looks like Danny DeVito has joined the cast this time around—except, uh, The Rock will be playing him for most of the movie?
Please allow us to explain. Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle changed the original 1995 film’s premise about a magical board game that invades our world and turned it into the story of a magical video game that sucks you into its world. And when you get sucked into the game, your consciousness enters the body of your game character—so the nerdy guy in the first one gets stuck in The Rock’s body and the popular girl turns into Jack Black and whatever.
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With us so far? Great. Well, according to the trailer for The Next Level, it’s not the nerdy teen who turns into The Rock—it’s his grandfather, played by none other than Danny DeVito himself. The whole thing is monumentally befuddling, not just because of its convoluted body-swap premise, but because, uh, why? Why does this exist? Why is there an entire movie where The Rock will pretend to be an old, whiny Danny DeVito? Who asked for this? What is happening?
Unfortunately, the whole thing will likely be even more confusing once the film hits theaters next Christmas, because it will probably wind up being way better than it deserves to be. Until then, watch the trailer above and marvel at the strange cultural artifacts that late capitalism has given us.
