I’m sorry, Tom Cruise, but I choose Tim Robinson

How did a studio let ‘Friendship’ become a reality? PLUS: Netflix saves ‘Sesame Street,’ new trailers for ‘Jurassic World’ and ‘Zootopia 2,’ and the ‘Avengers’ sequels shift to Christmastime.

Tim Robinson and Paul Rudd in Friendship. / A24

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Tim Robinson in Friendship. / A24

Friendship is Tim Robinson in his purest form

I purchased my ticket for Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning weeks ago when showtimes went on sale. Who doesn’t love a Mission: Impossible movie? Tom Cruise running as fast as he can. The confusion as you try to figure out if you’ve forgotten what happened in the previous movie. A villain just called “The Entity.”

At the same time, I had been waiting for tickets to Friendship to become available in my area. Despite the movie hitting theaters two weekends ago, it had been playing in limited release. I’m not sure whose idea it was to have the Tim Robinson movie go wide the same week as when The Final Reckoning and the live-action Lilo & Stitchremake were being released, but I don’t make the rules.

Once Friendship did pop up in my area, I bought a ticket for the showtime that best worked for me, and ... well ... see if you can find the issue here.

Yeah, it was time to make a choice.

And that choice was obviously Robinson and Friendship.

If you love I Think You Should Leave but have thought What if this was more cringey?and What if this went on for almost two hours? then Friendship is the movie you should be seeing this weekend. I can’t believe a studio let writer/director Andrew DeYoung and Robinson make this film. It feels like a practical joke that got out of hand, and — whoops — Friendship was actually in theaters.

I saw it at 9 p.m. on Thursday (a much better choice than embarking on Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning for three hours at roughly that same time). There were maybe a dozen people in the theater, but I got the sense that everyone knew exactly what they were in for with Robinson. The dude next to me was legitimately on the edge of his seat the entire second half of the movie as the film starts forcing you to question what exactly you’ve gotten yourself into with Friendship. The cheer that Connor O’Malley got when he appeared on screen was proof that the people in the theater with me were definitely I Think You Should Leave/Detroiters people.

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