Son of Flubber (1963)

A poor follow-up to <em>'The Absent-Minded Professor'</em>. <em>'Son of Flubber'</em> is inferior in every department. I praise the original for its amusing humour, but this film manages to lose it almost entirely. There are a few smirk-worthy moments, but it's mostly stale. A large reason for that is the lacklustre plot, which isn't ever interesting. The Flubber itself is rarely used, as they instead focus of its "gas". The conclusion is, like with the 1961 film, rather dull and adds little. Fred MacMurray, to his credit, is again good in the role of Prof. Brainard. Nancy Olson (Betsy) and Keenan Wynn (Alonzo) are both involved again, while Tommy Kirk (Biff) is shoehorned into a bigger part; not sure why. Speaking of forced characters, James Westerfield and Forrest Lewis again appear in the roles of officers Hanson & Kelly; they were, in my opinion, only funny in <em>'The Shaggy Dog'</em>, which these films evidently share the same universe with. Surely this sequel needed to be bigger and grander than the earlier film? Instead it practically follows the same path without setting the world alight. Still, I'm intrigued to see where the story goes for the Disney Channel produced sequels - though I'll have to wait to view, given they oddly aren't on the studio's streaming service or anywhere else. Overall, this isn't worthy of a watch.