Writer/Director Paul Feig (Bridesmaids, The Heat) teams up with Melissa McCarthy (Susan Cooper) yet again, this time in an uproarious spy comedy.

Spy opens with a Bondesque scene, where McCarthy’s timid character, a CIA Intel operative, guides Bradley Fine (played by Jude Law) through an earpiece escape a gunmen-lathered party as he attempts to retrieve intelligence about the sale of a nuclear bomb. The subsequent mission first introduces Raya Boyanov (played by Rose Byrne) as the femme fatale character we’ve been waiting for. She ostensibly murders Law and blows the cover of every top CIA operative. The CIA director, Elaine Crocker, (played by Allison Janney) is then forced to accept Cooper’s request to be put out into field work to retrieve the necessary intelligence, despite Rick Ford’s (played by Jason Statham) hilarious request to have the Face/Off procedure.

 Jason Statham as Rick Ford

Throughout the film McCarthy is more than willing to make jokes at her own expense and yet (for the most part) the audience is never put into a position to directly laugh at her. She is frequently given frumpy aliases, first as a cat lady and then as an Avon Saleswomen both ‘coincidentally’ unmarried. She also receives gadgets a cat lady might possess such as chloroformed hemorrhoid wipes and fungal cream that acts as mace. In addition, Byrne constantly bashes her for her dowdy outfits and her resemblance to Byrne’s Bulgarian clown mother and is also the subject of a horny CIA operative Aldo’s (played by Peter Serafinowicz) frequent groping.

 Melissa McCarthy as Susan Cooper

In a recent interview with Carson Daly, Feig mentioned that he didn’t want to make a spoof on the spy genre or cause the “greasy cheeseburger effect,” where in watching it is enjoyable at the time, but ten minutes later you wish you hadn’t done it. Yet, some bits definitely went overboard, particularly after a brief empowering moment when McCarthy’s character fends off a criminal as he falls off a balcony to his demise. She then subsequently becomes nauseated and shoots vomit down said 50-foot balcony and pukes all over his dead body.

 Paul Feig on ‘Last Call with Carson Daly’

Some of the casting choices also seemed fairly out of place. Incorporating 50 Cent as a potential lover to McCarthy’s sidekick character Nancy Artingstall (played by Miranda Hart) seemed more placed to attract a wider audience or greater diversity than it helped further any sort of plot or worthwhile joke. Furthermore, the master criminal behind it all, and the film’s ultimate antagonist Sergio de Luca (played by Bobby Cannavale) seemed to be a very out-of-place choice as his persona never really seemed to fit well into the film.

Overall, the pacing seemed slightly off. The two hour long buddy film could have been easily under an hour and 45 minutes and there were plenty of fairly predictable twists, particularly in the third act.

Feig’s new film certainly is not anything extraordinarily original, but if you’re willing to forgive the film for its lack in plot, sound realism or originality, for more than a few belly laughs along the way, particularly McCarthy’s spot-on improvisation and Statham’s rants satirizing his usual tough-guy persona, then be sure to check out Spy in theaters now.