‘Another Simple Favor’ Is Another Terrible, Useless Sequel

Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick star in the follow-up to “A Simple Favor.” We simply didn’t need it.

This piece includes spoilers for “Another Simple Favor.”

Nothing about “Another Simple Favor,” the sequel in the unfortunate and unnecessary “A Simple Favor” franchise, makes sense. But, to be fair, the 2018 film didn’t have that much going for it either. The main draw for the original movie, which is based on Darcey Bell’s novel of the same name, is the unexpected pairing of Blake Lively (and her striking wardrobe) and Anna Kendrick.

To refresh your memory — or save you two hours of your life if you haven’t watched it — Lively and Kendrick are frenemies brought together by their 6-year-old sons in “A Simple Favor.” Kendrick plays Stephanie Smothers, the suburban mom who makes every other mom in the class look bad with her homemade food and extra volunteer shifts. Between her over-the-top parenting, hypervigilance and mommy vlog, she’s also the mom the other parents make fun of.

This makes it especially surprising when she becomes friends with Lively’s character, Emily Nelson, who works a high-profile PR job in the city and makes martinis at 2 p.m. while wearing outfits that are supposed to be glamorous. Emily’s outfits — the costumes were once again designed by Renee Erlich Kalfus — would be perfect for a grown-up and edgy Serena van der Woodson (Lively’s character in “Gossip Girl”), but they are completely impractical for supervising a playdate.

Despite their many obvious differences, the friendship seems to work because they both have dark pasts that they share with each other between sips of martinis while their boys play. Stephanie’s secret involves sleeping with her half-brother after her dad’s funeral, which earns her the moniker “brotherfucker” (it’s as cringe as it sounds) and is meant to show that despite her beatific appearance, engaging in incest makes her a little twisty, too. (She can be a fun mom!) But not nearly as twisted as Emily, whom Stephanie comes to realize she knows absolutely nothing about.