151 Proof Movies Hangover: Air Bud: Seventh Inning Fetch

Wanted to space these out just a bit, even though we did both World Pup and Seventh Inning Fetch in the same night. Seventh Inning Fetch, sadly enough, isn’t the 7th film in the Air Bud franchise, instead it is the 4th film in the series. In this movie, we discover that the super pup is also able to play baseball. Oddly enough, after 3 movies and a variety of sports, I find baseball to be the biggest stretch yet! But let’s head on over to the scoreboard!

Movie- 2.5

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This incarnation of Air Bud would have been a standard one if not for three key points: the villains, the announcer at the games and the umpire. The villains were hilariously stupid, ex referees turned mad scientists out to capture Air Bud and his children to extract the Super Sports Gene to sell to pro athletes as a new type of steroid. Yeah, that happened in an Air Bud movie. The announcer was fantastic, every time they show him he would be in a different state of excitement and he was just a blast to listen to. And then their is the umpire, who was so over the top. I swear that every shot of him was a close up, wide angle lens shot. I can’t describe his calls because they were that amazing. I recommend youtubing it if you can.

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As I sit here, less than a week after having watch the movie, I can honestly say I don’t remember much of it. The thing that stands out is that this is the movie that transitions Josh (main character from the first 3 movie) into a smaller role with his sister taking over the lead. But to steal a phrase, it feels like the movie is telling us to ask “Where’s Josh?” when he isn’t around.

Though that actually makes this the most refreshing movie since the original. In the original, Josh was a new kid in town who didn’t really fit in and just lost his father. Basketball and Buddy allows him to kind of cope and begin his life. The rest of the movies, kind of had to try and force that heart. This one focusing on his sister, who is a lot more green in sports than Josh and having her naturally miss her brother makes it feel like a proper sequel. And its really where the movie shines.

Not really related, but a fun note is that Josh’s stepdad is played by ANOTHER new actor in this movie (Al from Home Improvement), which was just odd. Though the mom from the first two movies returns so there’s that.

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A very slow movie for drinking, I believe our first drink of the movie was 18 minutes in and that was for him getting a basket….In a movie about baseball. I think we had to wait another 15 minutes before we drank again. Through the middle of the film was probably the most drinking with montages, points and speeches but the end slowed down quite a bit in the drinking category.

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As noted at the start of this recap, we watched 2 Air Bud movies in one night. In the span of 3 hours, we maybe had a handful of drinks. There just wasn’t a lot of ground to cover in this movie. After 3 successful sports endeavors, Buddy is no longer seen as a special attraction, really he is treated like a star. No one questions a dog playing baseball (or any of his kids playing other sports to be honest) in this movie. There aren’t as many dog puns either. Though, we get a lot of fun montages finally!

If this movie had the budget of Golden Receiver, it would have been a much better movie. It has the second best plot of the series to date, but it is held back a lot by being DTV and being the 4th in the series. It just feels really formulaic at this point.