Star-Studded Sci-Fi Comedy About Aliens Hidden From New Fans
With so many endless options for movies and TV shows on streaming, it can sometimes feel like every project known to mankind is available at the press of a button. Unfortunately, this is not always the case, as some movies have been prevented from landing on streaming libraries due to contract disputes, industry drama, and other unknown factors. One such casualty of this unfortunate practice is the 2012 sci-fi comedy The Watch, which definitely deserves to be seen if you can dig it up somewhere.
From The Mind Of Seth Rogen
The Watch was written by the genius comedy duo of Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, with some writing assistance from The Internship scribe Jared Stern. For those that don’t know, Rogen and Goldberg serve as the filmmakers behind such classics as Superbad, This Is The End, The Interview, and many other beloved comedies.
The Watch was directed by Akiva Schaffer, who is best known for being a writer on Saturday Night Live, director of many episodes of Netflix’s I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson, and one-third of the comedy music group The Lonely Island.
The All-Star Cast
Obviously, The Watch maintains tons of star power behind the camera, but the real draw of the film is the cast, which includes such A-listers as Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn, Jonah Hill, Richard Ayoade, and The Boys‘ Erin Moriarty. The film centers on a neighborhood watch association headed by Ben Stiller’s Evan Trautwig, who lives in the quiet, fictional community of Glenview, Ohio.
While the neighborhood watch traditionally hassles kids for loitering or skateboarding in the easy-going town, Trautwig and company become crestfallen after a manager of the local Costco is slain in a deeply violent encounter.
An Alien Conspiracy
Determined to drum up some leads for the police, Evan recruits a ragtag crew of local misfits to round out the numbers for the neighborhood watch. Unfortunately, most of the new guys want to treat the group like some kind of social club instead of a genuine detective agency right up until they discover an otherworldly object with seemingly alien origins. As residents of Glenview begin dropping like flies, the neighborhood watch uncovers an alien plot which changes the history of the world as they know it.
Go In As Blind As Possible
I won’t reveal too much of the plot to The Watch beyond that point since the film really benefits from going in blind. Still, it’s hard to be enthusiastic about not spoiling the movie when it isn’t available to stream on any service. If you have any interest in checking The Watch out, your best bet would be to purchase it through digital retailers such as YouTube and Amazon Prime, or try to dust off an old DVD copy of the film somewhere.
Unable To Stream Anywhere
REVIEW SCORE
Personally, I really enjoyed The Watch when it first came out, though the film has received some truly terrible reviews, resulting in a shocking 16 percent critic score on Rotten Tomatoes. Despite what critics have to say about the movie, I found it to be an enjoyable alien-invasion comedy with some over-the-top performances and well-crafted jokes.
While it’s unclear exactly why this film is not available to stream, here’s hoping the studio which owns the IP gets this issue figured out immediately so modern audiences can catch The Watch and make up their own minds about the decade-old film.
