Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice (2026)

Starring: Vince Vaughn, James Marsden, Eiza González, Keith David, Jimmy Tatro, Ben Schwartz, Dolph Lundgren, and Stephen Root
Grade: C+

There’s a lot going on here just to get across the message that people can change.

Summary

Building a time machine while singing “Why Should I Worry?” from Oliver & Company, Symon (Schwartz) is eventually interrupted by Nick (Vaughn) who comes out of the time machine and shoots Symon. Unfortunately, a stray bullet hits the machine, destroying it and the blueprint on how to construct it.

Jimmy Boy (Tatro) has just been released from prison after a 6-year stint, and a huge house party is thrown for him by his adoptive father and mob boss Sosa (David). Stopping the music to do a speech, Sosa talks about how great it is to have Jimmy back and how he considers being a father his number one job and priority. Nevertheless, he lets everyone know that someone in attendance is the reason Jimmy went to prison in the first place. He promises that whoever is responsible will be dealt with. Until then, he tells everyone to enjoy the festivities, and the party continues. Nick eyes Mike (Marsden) from across the room, though Mike is clearly waiting for someone in particular. Nick’s wife Alice (González) walks up to Nick to see if he’s going to the afterparty, though Nick is cold and doesn’t respond. She assumes he knows about the afterparty, so she asks if he’s going to the “after-after-party” and the “after-after-after-party”. Alice comments how it doesn’t mean Nick can keep a secret from her even if the wives aren’t invited. Nick assures her that he’s not going to it. Surprised, Alice says he can if he wants to, but Nick sarcastically laughs off her giving permission. Alice replies that she will be going out with the girls then instead. With zero enthusiasm, Nick tells her to have fun and looks away. Alice kisses him on the cheek and asks if it’s that hard to pretend that he still likes her, but Nick bypasses the comment. Upon exiting the room, Alice makes eye contact with Mike. Following this, Mike heads into his room at the Zenith Hotel with flowers and a bottle of champagne. He answers a call from Alice, as they are excited to see each other since Alice is cheating on Nick with Mike. Mike lets her know that he left a key card at the front desk for her to use for the elevator. After he confirms that he got champagne and she playfully guesses what flowers he got her, Nick shockingly shows up at Mike’s door. Alice can hear Nick from the phone, and she tells Mike to not open the door because Nick will kill him.

However, Nick knows Mike is in there and is knocking over and over again. Mike tells Alice to get out of sight, and he will call her when he can, if he can. After Mike hangs up, he answers the door. Just as Nick asks if Mike is available to talk, he subtly peaks inside. Nick invites him to a coffee shop next door to talk since he hasn’t eaten anything since the morning. Mike questions if he ate at the party. Nick confirms but adds that he still has an appetite. At the coffee shop, Mike puts ice into his hot coffee because he specifically wants it room temperature, something Nick notes. Moving on, Nick says he could use “Quick Draw Mike” tonight, as he needs Mike for a collections job “and some other stuff”. He admits it might be heavy and weird, but he knows they will be done before the sun comes up. Mike brings up Jimmy Boy’s afterparty, but Nick insists this is more important than that and it’s time-sensitive. Mike says he doesn’t have a gun on him, but Nick has him covered. Mike then tries to change the subject to almost bring up Alice, as he has wanted to do so for the last couple of weeks, but Nick cuts him off and assumes Mike is going to leave the organization. Shocked, Mike asks how he knows this, but Nick just replies that he knows things. Content with this answer, Mike confirms he’s leaving. He’s done with the violence, the guns, and the whole “Quick Draw Mike” thing. Nick is fine with it, but he needs Mike for this one last job. Mike can start his new life tomorrow, but Nick needs him tonight. With this, Mike relents. In the alley, Mike finds Nick’s car is already on. Nick is walking behind him and takes his gun out just as the two pass graffiti art on the wall of the Grim Reaper. Finally, Mike asks how Nick knew he was at the hotel. Assuming he’s caught, Mike just tells Nick to get it over with and kill him. Nick plays coy and gives him the gun because Mike said he needed one. However, Mike is firm on his stance in that he’s done with the killing. He is okay with roughing someone up though, so Nick suggests that could be enough but they have to see how the night goes.

Stressing his tight schedule, Nick leads an anxious Mike to the car. During the car ride, Mike texts Alice to update her on the situation and to tell her to wait for him at the hotel. Nick and Mike pull up to Nick’s house, and Nick has Mike open the glove compartment to get the chloroform. Somehow, Mike has no idea what chloroform is. So, Nick walks him through what he’s going to do. He’s going to ring the doorbell, and he’s going to use the chloroform-soaked rag to stuff it in the nose and mouth of whoever answers the door. Once he describes this, Mike realizes he does know what chloroform is. He just never knew the technical term for it, as he prefers calling it “The wet rag thing”. Nevertheless, Nick says he will drive around the block a few times, and Mike is to whistle when he’s done. The chloroform thing will take about 10 seconds. Mike asks why Nick isn’t doing it, but Nick says that the person in the house may freak out if they look through the peephole and see him at the door. His final word of advice is simple, “No matter what you see, wet rag thing”. As Mike exits the car, Nick tells him to not sniff the rag. Annoyed, Mike asks why he would do such a thing, but Nick reminds him that he does stuff “no one knows”. While Nick drives around the block, Mike walks up to the door, rings the doorbell, and applies the chloroform to the rag. The door opens, and the person that answers it is shockingly Nick, only it’s a different version of Nick. A confused Mike still stuffs the rag in Nick’s face for 10 seconds, but Nick doesn’t fall down. Instead, Nick fights Mike off and shuts the door. Inside the house, Nick is feeling the effects but still standing. Outside, Mike finds the bottle of chloroform, and it turns out that it’s expired. He breaks the bottle in frustration and breaks in the front door. Both men spot Nick’s gun on the counter. Just as Mike runs into the house, Nick grabs the gun, though Mike is able to take out Nick’s legs just as Nick fires. After Mike dismantles the gun, the two get into a brawl in the living room.

Eventually, Mike is choking Nick on the ground while a confused Nick asks what he’s doing. Mike replies that it was Nick’s idea. Next, Nick flips Mike into the door of another room, breaking it down. Just as Nick puts the gun back together, Mike gets up and tackles him, and they continue to fight. Nick misses several punches and each one breaks a hole in the wall. Nick begins to get the upper hand, slamming Mike into a table and then another before Mike grabs Nick’s bowling trophy and levels Nick in the head, dropping him. Mike goes outside and struggles to whistle, though he gets enough noise out to signal the initial version of Nick, the one who gave him the job in the first place. This Nick drives up and gets out of the car. As Mike questions if he has a twin brother, Nick explains that he’s an only child. The person in the house is also Nick. Nick asks where the other Nick is, and Mike tells him that he’s inside. Unfortunately, he’s not there when they both walk in. Nick questions what happened, and Mike tells him that the chloroform expired. Nick is sure chloroform doesn’t expire, but Mike points out the date on the bottle saying otherwise. Nevertheless, this was not part of the plan. Sosa is going to be there in three minutes, so they have to clean the place up. Additionally, Nick says that Sosa will not be happy to see Mike, so they have to hurry. After the two clean some stuff up and do some rearranging, they hear the knock on the door. Nick has Mike go hide in the bathroom and he goes to answer it. Immediately upon entering the house with his two henchmen, Sosa notes Nick’s redecorating and then asks to use the bathroom. Nick offers Sosa’s henchmen a Capri-Sun while they wait. In the meantime, Mike can hear Sosa coming and hides in the walk-in shower. While Sosa takes a piss, he talks to Nick through the door about how he got a name that might be the rat in their organization. He talked to their guy in the police department, the “guy with the leg”. Nick says he will handle it, but Sosa says he already hired a contract killer, The Barron (Lundgren). The Barron flew in just for this job and landed a few hours ago. Exiting the bathroom, Sosa adds that there is a reason he is telling Nick this in person.

He says the rat is someone Nick has a history with. Though he’s not as close to him as he used to be, it will be shocking news, nonetheless. With this, Sosa states that the rat is Mike. Nick doesn’t think this is possible, but Sosa knows it’s the truth. Jimmy Boy is on the way to his afterparty right now, and The Barron has explicit instructions to make sure the hit is done by the after-after-after party. Playing coy again, Nick asks if he has any idea where Mike is currently, and Sosa believes he’s still at the Zenith Hotel.

Hearing all of this from the bathroom, Mike realizes that Alice is in his room at the hotel still. He immediately texts her to tell her she’s in danger, so she gets out of there. Once Sosa and the henchmen leave, Mike locks the bathroom door and tells Nick that he’s not the rat. Nick knows this. He also knows somebody framed Mike because this isn’t the first time he has lived through tonight. Opening the door confused, Mike asks how many times he’s lived through tonight, and Nick replies that it’s his second. Mike jokingly assumes he’s from the future, but Nick admits this is exactly it. Future Nick explains that the first time they went through the events of tonight, Mike died. However, this is why Nick is back, as this “Nick from the Future” came back to right some wrongs. The plan for tonight is to keep Mike alive. To do that, he needs Mike’s help. The problem is that there is one person who can fuck this whole thing up, and that’s Present-Day Nick. Right now, Future Nick and Mike have to find Present Nick. They run outside to find that the car is gone because Present Nick stole it. At the afterparty, Jimmy Boy greets Dumbass Tony (Arturo Castro) and asks if he’s seen Jackie Napalm anywhere. Tony reveals that Napalm was killed by some Canadians last month (“They’re very violent people”). After they both do some cocaine, Tony asks Jimmy how his dick is. He brings up how people say the ages of 22 to 29 are the best years of their lives, and how you can stay up all night partying until the sun comes up. More importantly however, your dick still works during this timeframe. Jimmy questions if Tony is saying that his doesn’t. Tony reveals that his own dick will start out hard, but he stops himself because he doesn’t want to get into the details. His point is that going to prison isn’t bad. It’s the time in which he spent behind bars being the real crime, as they have robbed him of his best “dick years”. Annoyed, Jimmy questions why he would want to hear some depressing shit like that right now, but Tony just passes it off as him making conversation. After Jimmy calls him a dumbass, Sosa shows up to greet Jimmy.

Some random partygoer bumps into Sosa while he makes his way over to Jimmy, and Sosa acts like it’s not a big deal. Then, he turns the guy over to his henchman, and they beat the shit out of the guy. Right after, Sosa hugs Jimmy and asks if he likes the party. Jimmy tries to relate his love of the party to Winnie the Pooh liking honey, but Sosa has no idea who Pooh is. As Jimmy just explains that he loves the party, Sosa tells him there are still two more parties to go to and there will be a surprise at the end of the night. Someone who wronged Jimmy is going to get their well-earned comeuppance. Jimmy doesn’t know what “comeuppance” means but goes along with it, as he assumes its good. Sosa replies that he doesn’t know cartoons and Jimmy doesn’t know big words, but who cares? Sosa tells him to enjoy the rest of his party and then tells the henchmen to get rid of the body of the other guy before it stinks up the place. Meanwhile, Mike wants to know how Future Nick is from the future. Future Nick explains that he steps into a time machine six months from now, referencing Doctor Who to try to get him to wrap his head around things, even though Mike isn’t getting a lot of Future Nick’s references. Future Nick reiterates that he stepped into a time machine. When he stepped out of the time machine, it was this afternoon. He reminds Mike of Symon, specifically “Simon with a ‘Y'”. Mike knows of the “nerdy, inventor guy”. This is enough for Mike to realize that Symon was the one who created the time machine. As Future Nick breaks the window of a parked car to break in, we go into a flashback where Symon is at a bar waiting for Alice. They sit down at a table where Symon talks about how he heard Alice ran off to the courthouse and got married. She shows off her ring to confirm it. Symon asks if it’s true what they say about Nick in that he’s a gangster. Alice also confirms, adding that her mom didn’t know. Trying to downplay it, Alice says that Nick loans money to people. If they don’t pay him back with interest, then an enforcer breaks their legs. If they still don’t pay, she implies they die. When Alice first met Nick, he said he worked in sanitation.

At first, she really thought Nick was driving garbage trucks until she realized that he was just killing people. Nevertheless, she thought he was fun and exciting and suggests they can forgive their partners for at least one thing. Symon agrees, bringing up how Alice used to date a guy who was into close-up magic, referring to himself. He flings up a card as he says it with a smile. Alice takes the card from him and moves the conversation back to Nick. She talks about how the one thing she was forgiving with him turned out to be a lot of things. She admits Nick was cheating on her all the time and begins laughing over it because of how constant it was. Symon is confused but smiling with her. Once she stops, she says she really wants to leave Nick but is stuck. She wants to know a non-dangerous way to leave a super-dangerous guy, but Symon admits he doesn’t really know what to do off the top of his head. Changing the subject, Symon says he was asking the question for selfish reasons. He needs a loan because he’s working on a project that needs financing, and it’s something traditional investors can’t wrap their heads around. Alice is sure that getting money from Nick will end up very poorly for him, and Symon hilariously responds that he can’t think of one way this could go wrong. Getting out of the flashback, Mike realizes Alice’s inventor friend Symon built a time machine with the money Nick and Mike loaned him. As Future Nick hotwires the car he broke into, he brings up how Symon has been dodging them both lately over payments, and Mike is well aware of this. Future Nick says this issue doesn’t change over the next six months. Eventually, Nick has to track Symon down to his garage/laboratory to see if he will cough up the money. However, when Nick got there, Symon wasn’t home. Looking around, he sees the time machine and steps in. The door closed behind him, and a message showed up on the screen asking if he would like to travel to another time and if so, when. The one day Nick thought about a lot was today, the day Mike died. Turning the nobs, Nick was able to figure it out easily and it transported him back in time.

Unfortunately, they can’t use the time machine anymore because Nick reveals he may have accidentally blown it up, though he insists it wasn’t intentional. Mike questions why Symon can’t fix it, so Nick tells him what happened. When the doors to the time machine opened, there was all this smoke and bright light, and he saw someone pointing a gun at him as soon as he stepped out. This was Symon, as it was the opening to the movie. As they shot at each other, one of the bullets hit a tank of some sort and destroyed the machine and then he shot Symon (“Well, this fucking sucks ass”). Nevertheless, Nick hot wires the car and is able to turn it on, so Mike joins him. Nick reiterates that they don’t have the time machine, and Symon is dead. They have one chance to do this right. There are no do-overs. Now, they have to brainstorm a way to find Present Nick. Mike can’t believe he doesn’t have a plan for this, but Future Nick did. His plan was to knock out Present Nick and put him in the trunk. Mike questions if Future Nick has a GPS tracker in his car in case of it being stolen, prompting Future Nick to ask Mike if he can use his phone. Knowing his texting with Alice is on his phone, Mike asks why he has to use his phone. Future Nick isn’t sure if two phones can exist in the same timeline but is sure his own phone gives them nothing. As Future Nick is explaining this, Mike deletes his conversation with Alice from his phone and hands the phone over for Future Nick to all him to report his car being stolen. At the gas station, Present Nick is on the phone detailing the incident of Mike showing up at his house and how they got into it, with Mike using Nick’s bowling trophy to hit him in the jaw. Sosa is on the other line and tells Present Nick that The Barron thinks Mike is at the Zenith Hotel. He asks where Present Nick is, so he tells Sosa he’s at the gas station but will be at the afterparty. Once Present Nick walks into the gas station, Future Nick and Mike pull up and spot him. Strangely, Present Nick asks the cashier (Dylan Playfair) for sugar-free candy. Once the cashier stresses that it doesn’t exist and insults him, Present Nick points a gun at his face. From the car, Future Nick and Mike see this and know they have to work fast.

Future Nick says that when he called it in, they would have notified the cops. This means they have a 20-30 minute response time. Funnily enough, the cops show up almost immediately to the gas station. Just as Present Nick tells the cashier to not say anything when he puts his gun away, the two cops enter the gas station. One of the cops is Samantha Sheer (Emily Hampshire), a female cop Present Nick is friendly with. Sam brings up how he reported his car stolen, but Present Nick denies this. Future Nick can’t believe the luck. He tells Mike that they’re fine because it’s Sam. When Mike asks if he knows her, Future Nick replies, “Well, it’s Christina Aguilera featuring Redman. Dirty”. When Present Nick and Sam both pass off the call as a prank, Sam and the other cop go to leave, but the cashier blurts out that Present Nick pulled a gun on him. Immediately, Sam tells the cashier how Present Nick is a pillar of the community and would do no such thing. The cashier is sure of it and brings up how he has it on video, but Sam tells him that he doesn’t. When he assures her does, Sam responds, “People who don’t have things on video don’t have lifelong problems”. Finally, the cashier understands and says he will delete all the footage from the evening to which Sam replies that it’s a good idea. Sam goes to leave with the other cop, and Present Nick thanks her while also telling her to greet her husband for him. She reveals she’s divorced now and for him to just say hello to her instead. Once they leave, Present Nick turns to the cashier and brings up how he did the exact opposite of what he told him to do. Then, the cashier comments that he needs to stop drinking while he’s on edibles, as he sees Future Nick walk in. Present Nick turns around, and Future Nick hits him with a fire extinguisher. Mike walks in to ensure Present Nick is out, but Present Nick wakes up and attacks both guys. Present Nick sprays the fire extinguisher at both of them and hides. Next, he surprise attacks them near the fridges while the cashier starts smoking. After destroying the entire place, Future Nick and Mike are able to knock out Present Nick.

Mike comments that this is why he’s quitting. It’s not even about the killing. He just doesn’t want to do this stuff anymore. Future Nick understands but gets things back on track because they need to tie up Present Nick and throw him in the trunk. When they get back in the car, Mike asks about the contract killer, as he’s never heard of The Barron. Future Nick says it’s a good thing he hasn’t heard of him. The Barron is an “A+ killer” and he eats his targets. He’s a cannibal assassin. Future Nick then tells Mike to text Alice to meet them in the parking garage at 556 McClintock Boulevard, Downtown. At some point, Sosa is going to figure out Future Nick is working with Mike, and he wants to make sure Alice is safe. Mike acts like he’s not sure what Alice is number is, but Future Nick doesn’t have Alice’s number memorized. He asks if Mike is sure he doesn’t have Alice’s number, so Mike stalls by looking through his phone and acts like it’s hard to find. He then “finds” it and says the contact name was under “Nick’s wife”. They get to the parking garage and await Alice’s arrival. Once she gets there, she tries to understand what’s going on, as she rattles off how a nightmare fuel assassin has Mike in his sights and Future Nick is trying to help Mike survive the night. She asks if this is it, so Future Nick and Mike open the trunk to show her Present Nick. Connecting the dots because of Symon, Alice immediately turns to Future Nick to ask if he’s the Future or Present Nick. Future Nick explains that he’s from six months into the future. Once he begins to ask how she knows, Alice brings up how Symon wanted the money from Nick and she just thought he was crazy, but she’s excited to see Symon figured out time travel. Mike is let down by her reaction because he was excited to see her freak out. Even so, Future Nick wakes up Present Nick and tells him that he’s coming with. In the elevator, Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice stand there, as they let Present Nick in on the fact that Symon built a working time machine. Future Nick comments how it’s obvious since he exists.

Present Nick thought he was a clone, but Alice is quick to reply that clones aren’t real. This prompts Present Nick to sarcastically comment to her that time machines are grounded in reality. Present Nick then looks over his shoulder to tell Future Nick that Mike and Alice are fucking, but Future Nick already knows. He knows it’s shocking to Mike and Alice, but Future Nick reminds Present Nick that he knows everything Present Nick knows. Alice questions when he found out, and Future Nick replies that it was the day before Jimmy Boy’s party, which means yesterday in terms of the present timeline. Mike then assumes Present Nick is unbelievably pissed about it in the present, prompting Present Nick to sarcastically reply, “No, not at all. I mean, personal betrayal just fills me with immense joy”. Getting the hint, Mike turns to Alice and tells her that his life is on the line because Sosa thinks he’s the rat and he’s just figuring out who framed him. Alice realizes it too. They did. Future Nick comments that it was technically Present Nick who did it. Future Nick is here to fix it (“We are fucked”). Getting out of the elevator, Future Nick leads them out and points a gun at Present Nick to get him to go. Future Nick talks about how they have all made mistakes and they are trying to put it behind them, and they are going to try and keep Mike and Alice alive. Now, the four of them are going to lie low together. Future Nick leads them to a place no one knows about, the Nicks’ apartment. Not even Alice knows about it. Present Nick says it’s a place where he goes for space, but Future Nick tells him not to lie. Once they get to the door, Alice assumes this apartment is a “love shack” where Nick would go to cheat on her. She can’t believe he would go there and he had the audacity to still frame Mike to get killed (“… By a fucking cannibal”). Alice angrily tells him how Mike didn’t want to sneak behind Nick’s back, but she told Mike not to Nick because he’s impulsive and Nick is proving her right.

Mike is still worried about The Barron, but Future Nick defends their side because they didn’t know Sosa was going to hire The Barron. They were expecting a snappier death, a one shot to the head type deal. Though it’s startling to hear, Mike admits this does make him feel a little better (“See? That’s a great attitude, Mike”). With this, Future Nick leads the three into his beautiful high-end apartment to lay low. However, laying low with all of these people out to get them will be no easy task.

My Thoughts:

There is a lot to like with Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice. Unafraid to try some new things in its editing and plot details to add to its fun time travel hook, the ambitious science fiction action comedy manages to fit a lot into its world of gangsters, a time machine, a cannibal hitman, and two Vince Vaughns. With a sleek aesthetic and some cool visuals, its direction and cinematography make up for a lot of shortcomings and missed opportunities in a movie full of them. Despite how great the premise sounds and the collective in front of the camera, Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice unexpectedly underdelivers. It has a great hook and is solid for a one-time watch, but it’s ultimately underwhelming, which is shocking to a degree because they have a lot going for themselves.

It starts with the humor, what was expected to be the film’s calling card. Casting Vince Vaughn is a good start, and James Marsden has made a career out of making fun of himself to the point of undermining his status as a leading man. The inclusion of veterans like Ben Schwartz and Keith David and naturally funny supporting actors like Jimmy Tatro and Arturo Castro are also good enough choices to add comedic heft to the interweaving “B” story. Unfortunately, they are let down by BenDavid Grabinski’s script. It doesn’t give the talent much to work with at all. The basic plot at hand is tightly wound, but all the in-between stuff where we see the personalities of the characters involved and how they interact in this odd environment of weird nicknames and terms specific to their world of organized crime is the letdown. Sometimes, a use of pop culture references can aid a movie in making the characters more relatable to the audience and show how amusing some of their likes and preferences are. However, you can’t overdo it. If you rely on it too much, it’s effect is dulled, and it’s no longer quirky funny. It’s just lame. Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice overdoes it to the maximum to where it stops being funny entirely and early for that matter. Even then, they go back to it a few MORE times just to beat the dead horse until the animal is unrecognizable. It gets to the point where the viewer begins questioning if what they came up with was really the intended punchline they were building up to. Once the conversation comes to a stop, they will find themselves asking, “Wait, that was the joke?”. They milk the gag until its dry. For example, at the afterparty, Sosa says he doesn’t know who Winnie the Pooh is and Jimmy doesn’t know what the word “comeuppance” means and Sosa just replies, “Who cares?” and tells Jimmy to enjoy himself. What the fuck did this accomplish? Apparently, the humor was supposed to be their lack of knowing things and their confused reactions, but it just wasn’t funny.

It told us nothing other than the already established fact that Jimmy is a doofus, and the payoff of Sosa not understanding pop culture references doesn’t factor into the story whatsoever outside of this scene. Did they really think this conversation was too funny not to include? The only time it worked was Future Nick describing Sam’s status as a corrupt cop by referencing the forgotten “Dirty” song by Christina Aguilera and the four lead characters arguing and taking sides over their overall thoughts of all things Gilmore Girls (“Okay, Richard Gilmore worked super hard for his money, and he wants to spend it on somebody that he loves and when they offered to pay for Yale, Rory insisted that it would be a fucking loan, Mike”). Even so, the latter went on for a little too long, this fact becomes even more evident for those who have never watched Gilmore Girls, and the dialogue in general never gets to the level of amusement it should regardless of if one is familiar with the show considering the talent involved. Also, the “Jess Argument” is acknowledged as the moment Alice knew it was over between her and Nick, but when they go through their arguments for specific show details and character relationships, Alice ultimately sides with the Nicks on 95% of what is said besides the Jess thing and everyone disagrees with Mike’s conclusions. So, why is the “Jess Argument” the day Alice realized it was over between her and Nick? Everything they talked about directly contradicts this. There’s also the major plot hole of the setup involving The Barron. They have Future Mike wait across the building with a sniper rifle to shoot The Barron when they lead him off the elevator to the parking garage. Present Nick questions why they don’t just shoot him in the parking garage, but Future Nick explains that nobody knows what The Barron looks like nor does anyone know his age. Clearly, he’s given this line to explain this to the viewer, but this is an apartment complex, not a shopping a mall. Plus, it’s in the middle of the night. There is little to no traffic happening to where they have to guess between more than two people.

If it came to this, there’s a good chance they could sense who the hitman is from a mile away, especially one who EATS PEOPLE. You have to assume they move or look different. Even if they would consider this too risky, why do they even have to stage Future Nick across the street. Once The Barron knocks on the door and enters to introduce himself, why can’t Future Nick just be hiding behind the couch to blast him right then and there? Why can’t Alice and Present Nick just shoot The Barron as soon as he enters? This elaborate setup is frustratingly unnecessary and illogical.

One thing that could have helped in the humor department was Vince Vaughn playing his role a little bit looser. He didn’t necessarily have to be Raji from Be Cool, but having Vaughn’s dual Nick performance being something closer to the argumentative, fast-talking quotable characters he was known to play in all those 2000s comedies could have made scenes focusing on banter, Present Nick talking shit to everyone, and Future Nick trying to go back-and-forth with Mike hilarious. Though it would go against Vaughn’s shift into the more serious work he’s done over the last decade in an effort to change his onscreen persona with movies like Brawl in Cell Block 99 and Dragged Across Concrete, reverting back to it for this film in particular could have completely changed the comedy of the movie from average to genuinely funny, which was the only thing truly stopping the movie from being more than just passable. To be fair, if Vaughn did do a version of his famous comedic style to play Nick instead of the intimidating gangster the character is written to be, it definitely would have changed the cool energy of the film, and neither Nick would have the presence he has as it stands. It would have been an entirely different type of character and movie if Vaughn added his Wedding Crashers-personality to it. On the other hand, it would have been a hell of a lot more entertaining if he did so. Had this been both Nick’s talking with the classic Vince Vaughn motormouth, and the two are arguing or complimenting each other’s styles, they would have had comedy gold on their hands. Moments like Future Nick denying he’s a bad “cat dad” to his pet to Alice by replying, “Not a bad cat dad. Bad cat vet? Maybe, but great cat daddy, right?” and Present Nick smiling and giving him the nod of approval was funny. More of that, please. It’s not like the rest of the film was so perfect that they couldn’t have risked letting Vaughn loose in the dialogue. It’s simply what Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice needed.

It’s just nowhere near as funny as the viewer is led on to believe based off the movie’s energy and how it comes out hot in the introductory sequence of Nick killing Symon after he’s done singing the theme to a Disney movie. The banter is massively disappointing too, which is crazy since this is Vince Vaughn’s specialty. They give him nothing to work with, and he plays it way too cool in an effort to adhere to how the character’s written. The screenplay’s handcuffing of the actor would be fine if someone could hold a candle to him comedically or make up for the more serious Nick character, but no one steps up to the plate. James Marsden tries his best with his facial expressions and random comments throughout, but it doesn’t garner the belly laughs one would expect with the talent involved. Considering the friendship Nick and Mike have and the business they are in, having them bounce off each other in conversation while detailing some exposition should have been a sinch, but if the film’s trajectory were charted on a heart monitor, it would be a flatline. It would be a middle-of-the-road flatline rather than at the bottom of the screen but a flatline, nonetheless. The comedic chemistry between the leads isn’t there. Granted, they are playing their roles firmly, with an anxious Mike on the verge of retirement hiding the fact he’s sleeping with Alice and Nick being the scary gangster who will kill without hesitation, but there are specific scenes where the banter is supposed to carry the humor and energy of the movie and it fails nearly every time. For example, they milk a few minutes out of the chloroform joke, but it falls on its face because it’s hard to believe Mike has no idea what Nick is talking about, especially considering the line of work he’s in. He passes it off as not knowing the “technical term” for it, but chloroform seems like a universally known word. It’s not like Nick is referencing the scientific terms for some random prescription drug. Had Mike been a civilian, maybe you could make this “joke” believable, but it’s not in the way it’s presented.

The same can be said about Alice having the audacity to say “I don’t think that’s how it works” when Future Nick mentions how he can’t kill Present Nick because they would both die. What? How could she possibly question this? That’s EXACTLY how it works. Everyone knows this! If she has indulged in any movie or book with a time travel premise, she would have to know this very basic rule of time travel. Again, it’s pretty universally understood. It’s not Alice not being into “nerdy” things. It’s as simple as knowing what time travel is and looking at the situation with logic. If you were to go back in time and kill or physically harm the original person, of course his future self would deal with the consequences because they are the SAME PERSON! Once could argue that this is so well known today, characters shouldn’t even need to have this conversation anymore in modern science fiction productions because it’s understood as the baseline for all time travel-based stories. Now, we’re supposed to believe Alice not only has never heard of it but doesn’t think it’s true and needs to test the theory? If she was messing around just so she could stab Present Nick in the leg, that’s one thing that could be played up for laughs. However, Alice legitimately doesn’t believe it and uses the moment as an excuse to test it while hurting Nick at the same time, lessoning the humor of the moment with idiocy in a character who is supposed to be relatively intelligent. In addition to this, Future Nick is also right in that even if it weren’t true, why risk things just to see if Alice or him ends up being right? This whole situation is dire, and it’s made known there are no do-overs, so why is she fucking around? It doesn’t seem necessary. The banter that the audience is expecting between the two leads is only truly capitalized when Future Nick tries to challenge Mike on his love for Alice. After Alice looks for the liquor in Nick’s fuck-den, Future Nick asks if Mike is truly in love with “Stabby Lady”, and he confirms while adding that Future Nick hasn’t been in love with her for a long time.

Future Nick questions where he came to this conclusion, and Mike quotes him, “You said me and Alice are done. I said are you sure? And you said I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life. I said really? Forreal? And you said, do you have a hearing problem, fuckhead? I said, hey, I’m just making sure, and you said I cannot possibly be more clear here. I have zero romantic feelings for Alice. I don’t care what she does, who she fucks. I don’t care about any of it. We’re done”. Future Nick tries to downplay it by comically replying, “Yeah, now that you’re saying it out loud, I remember parts of that”, but Mike tells him these are his words verbatim, so he took him literally. Finally, Nick concedes that he remembered it was after a fight and then comments, “My God, you have a hell of a memory”. Again, more of this and less of stupid shit like confetti getting shot out at the after-after-party and Jimmy Boy yelling how much he loves confetti. There is just a sliver of the insane amount of humor that extends the running time but doesn’t land. There’s plenty of other stuff like all the talk of Jimmy’s dick potentially not working and he just gets mad at Dumbass Tony before saying, “Let me tell you something, Dumbass Tony… You’re a fucking dumbass”. After all that buildup for this strange conversation, that was the punchline they came up with? Both Tatro and Castro have funny auras about them, which is why the viewer sits and wait for the big joke to happen in their interaction, but a punchline like this is the movie in a nutshell. Throughout, the viewer finds themselves shrugging and questioning if that really was the payoff or not. The film tends to hang onto its profanity too much to make the joke happen when in reality, the joke just isn’t there. The irony they go for never lands either. It’s just flat. The “sugar free candy” bit was a waste of screentime, and the inclusion of Nick’s cat Kingpin did nothing other than the two Nicks agreeing that they thought it was cool the cat pissed directly into the drain in the bathtub.

Then, there’s just inexplicable stuff like the after-after-party having a crop of guys there getting in workouts while wearing dress clothes, Jimmy blaming Mike for not being able to fuck (“I’m not sure I know what that means, Jimmy Boy”), and Alice having all the time in the world to react to the grenade, pick it up, and throw it at The Barron’s henchmen in a serious action sequence, but Mike using a grenade in the climax at the after-after-party and it blows up instantly instead. What was up with that? Besides this, the recurring gag of calling Jackie Napalm “a real one” was a massive, missed opportunity to say something more clever.

The red herring with Stephen Root’s Chet was a decent scene to break open the mindset of Present Nick and make his arc a more layered one than expected. Actually, this part of the screenplay is handled well. The viewer can sense the regret in the clearer headed Future Nick, and it resonates when Present Nick finally comprehends the guilt he was talking about after the Chet switcheroo, realizing that the revenge just turned into self-loathing. By the time we get the emotional drive to the hospital powered by the four singing Oasis’s “Don’t Look Back in Anger”, you realize that there are some flashes of greatness in the writing when it takes itself seriously. The darker moments are smooth and very well done, and the dialogue is quick, snappy, and gets right back to the point when they don’t try to force in the humor. Though there is a lot of re-explaining things due to the time travel plot, this is needed to a degree for science fiction movies, as the world-building is crucial. Because of the balance not being figured out however, the film’s comedic potential and its marketing being in this direction is middling at best and unfunny at its worst. Once Alice joins the other three in the action, everything after becomes the actors working off character dynamics, and it strengthens the development of their respective personalities and relationships. Due to this, it adds a serious amount of weight in the emotional climax of the movie, which was the film’s highlight that was so good, it felt underserved because of everything that came before it. Still, the desire to satisfy the comedy crowd with unamusing gags and a slap-in-the-face ending undermined its best attribute. Had it taken itself a bit more serious and doubled down on the fantastic ending they had, it may have been something special. Nevertheless, this wasn’t the goal, and it hurt the final product. Again, every time the movie tries to go back to being funny, it’s chuckle-or-miss. It’s why the overall production is as uneven as it is because it can’t quite hit on both sides of the coin.

The visuals, the creativity in the shots, the black-and-white flashbacks, and the cinematography align with the science fiction and gangster blend nicely, as does Vaughn’s performance as Future and Present Nick. Sadly, they just ruin it by trying too hard to be ironically funny like Jimmy relating Dumbass Tony’s phrasing of “A tale as old as time” to Beauty and the Beast and right after, Tony talks about his dick rising like a phoenix and Jimmy asks if he’s talking about the city in Arizona. By that point, you can’t help but note how often they rely on references for humor, as it becomes maddening. Now, Jimmy flipping out on Tony for making him spill his smoothie and Jimmy yelling about how he likes thick drinks as his explanation as to why he’s even drinking a smoothie at a party, but the pina colada machine was broken was funny. Dumb humor like that or Jimmy having to remind Roid Rage Ryan that he missed his wedding because he was in prison works. Going back and saying the only rat that he likes is the “one from that movie where it was cooking stuff” in reference to Ratatouille in the middle of a shootout isn’t amusing when it’s the 50th Disney reference made up until that point. You have to pick and choose your spots.

Keith David’s Sosa is neither funny nor a good villain, and his dialogue is lackluster for a main antagonist. If a mob boss details how in the morning, everyone in his organization will have the one responsibility to kill Mike, it should be a movie-defining and character-defining moment, but David lacks the gravitas needed for the viewer to take him remotely seriously. He even says the line “He will be found and he will FUCKING die” with a corny B-movie delivery and a botched inflection. Usually, the actor can be funny, but the moments where the viewer is supposed to laugh fall below expectations like him revealing to Jimmy Boy how he found him lying under a dumpster when he was a baby. None of it garnered a laugh outside of Jimmy Tatro’s aloof facial expressions. It was just a stretched-out story to lead to his two gifts of a golden shotgun and his reveal as to who the rat was, but they did so in the most boring way possible. It’s why the typical villain-has-a-gun-to-the-love-interest’s-head climax was more or less, nothing noteworthy. Eiza González’s delivery is dry, and they give her these scene-ending stamps quite a few times, but the line is never anything special and she doesn’t go into it with the right energy like her action hero line of “It’s us or them. Time to crash a fucking party” when she wasn’t even involved, her strangely complimenting the decoration in Nick’s apartment and then following it up with a blank “I can’t believe my friend just died”, or the movie-ending line joking about how if Nick somehow figured out the time machine, they could too. The only time she truly shines is in the black-and-white flashback at Roid Rage Ryan’s wedding, with Alice openly talking about her failed marriage and flirting with Mike. The moment where the music stops, Mike says it’s nice to meet her, the sequence ending with her saying “What took you so long”, and it transitioning to her smile in the present once she shakes out of the flashback was expertly done. Love was in the air in that moment.

Eiza González didn’t have much chemistry with James Marsden outside of that scene, but it was a nice moment.

Along with Future Nick talking in private with Alice over his implied future relationship with Samantha and Alice subtly giving him her blessing (“I wouldn’t want to get between you and you”), Dolph Lundgren walking in rocking the smaller Le Corbusier glasses as The Barron was a cool scene. Very rarely do people get to see him in a mainstream film not related to Sylvester Stallone nowadays, so this was a nice treat, and he fit the bill of this insane cannibal hitman (“A meal fit for a king”). On a side note, it was funny that Alice was worried about Present Nick’s cat before The Barron walks in because she assumes he might eat it, prompting Present Nick to reply, “The Barron eats people. He’s not ALF”. The shootout where the Nicks bust into the party and “The Boys Are Back in Town” is played was a fun moment, and Vaughn did a solid job in the action sequences. It was no Brawl from Cell Block 99, but it did the trick. Had they avoided the hyper-editing from the first half of the movie with its odd use of slow-motion and wide shots in the awkwardly handled fight scenes, it would have looked a lot better too. It was also nice to see Marsden finally get in on the action in the climax, so we can see “Quick Draw Mike” in action. Him moving like a tactical secret agent didn’t fit the bill for someone who is a gangster though, but the film is riddled with so many missteps, it’s whatever at this point. The party in the climax has people doing coke lines off of a bench press bar while working out and using a sauna in the middle of the night. For how ridiculous the movie turns out to be in the second half compared to the first half, you’re telling me the old Vince Vaughn wouldn’t have shot this movie through the stratosphere comedically? Yeah, this whole thing might be a missed opportunity.

Furthermore, they include more mid-credits scenes than a Marvel movie and none of them are worth a damn. It felt like a filmmaker loving his movie too much and refusing to cut stuff, finding a place in the end to just throw it all in regardless of if it was worth saving or not like Jimmy Boy’s “I’m Back” black-and-white video. Why even include that? What they should have done in the final cut of the film was remove a few of Sosa’s phone conversations that went nowhere to extend the scene where Jimmy Boy runs into his gift of whores in his room to include the mid-credits scene of him asking them all if they are there “for the sex” and awkwardly leaving to get waters. Had they included this in the final cut, the shot of Mike being wrapped up with an apple in his mouth for The Barron once he’s told he was previously taken alive, and Dumbass Tony bringing up Jackie Napalm at the strip club to Roid Rage Ryan (“Fight the real enemy, in here bro”), the film would have been MUCH better off.

Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice throws everything at the wall. They blend a few genres, try different camera and editing tricks to make the movie visually stimulating, and they try some unique spins on the time travel premise with some odd humor and gangster elements. It’s refreshing to some degree, it’s mildly entertaining, and the ambition is appreciated, but it fails way more than it succeeds. The humor is inconsistent, the villains are boring, the heroes aren’t interesting outside of the Nicks, there’s a severe lack of chemistry between the principal cast, there’s a boatload of missed opportunities from the joke writing of the screenplay to the character-defining moments, and its creativity from a visual standpoint is bogged down by what ultimately is an overall letdown of a final product. It’s sleek in a lot of ways, but it doesn’t do anything special, despite so much promise. That’s more frustrating than anything.