2018’s “Super Troopers 2” wasn’t so much fan service as fan self-service. Kickstarted with nearly $5 million of crowdfunding after studios doubted the public appetite for a tardy sequel to the 2001 indie sleeper “Super Troopers,” it gave the people what they wanted and not much else: a familiar rehash of the first film’s broad characters and jokes, with a built-in hit of generational nostalgia courtesy of nothing more than time itself. 17 years separated those films; eight years later, along comes “Super Troopers 3,” and any semblance of event status feels duly halved. “Super Troopers 2” wasn’t very good, but its very existence was a satisfying underdog story in itself; made in less time with less resistance from studio brass, the new, Disney-backed film has a more routine, less victorious air of franchise maintenance about it.
For die-hard faithfuls of this proudly lunkheaded series, that might be enough. Continuing the misadventures of its core quintet of inept, resplendently mustachioed Vermont state troopers — played, as ever, by the five individuals making up the Broken Lizard comedy troupe, who also take a collective writing credit — “Super Troopers 3” isn’t obviously a step down from their last outing. The jokes are still wildly scattershot and frequently, knowingly lame; the production is still cheap and cheerfully scrappy; the whole ragged enterprise is still reliant on the evident affection and chemistry between its players to hold it together. None of that really amounts to a persuasive reason to exist on the big screen, however: At this point, perhaps simply turning “Super Troopers” into a running sitcom, like a rural GenX “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” would be a fitting move.
