Movies That Prove Adam Sandler Doesn't Care Anymore

Let's face it: Adam Sandler was never going to be in the running for an Academy Award. Still, there was a time when his movies, however gross and low-brow, were actually kind of funny. That, of course, was a very, very long time ago. Nowadays, Sandler's movies are equal parts offensive and unfunny, oftentimes churning on the same recycled jokes and gags. Where did it all go wrong? We've pulled together seven movies in which Sandler seemingly gave up on the creative process.

As the debate over whether to legalize gay marriage in the United States continued to brew, Adam Sandler had a chance to say something smart and poignant in I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry. The titular characters two firefighters who agree to pose as a gay couple to help find a loophole in a life-insurance battle. Sadly, "smart" and "poignant" are about the last two words one would ever associate with the final product, which turned out to be stereotypical, generalized, and, well, just downright bad. (And we haven't gotten to Jessica Biel's stock role as The Pretty Love Interest.) Oh well. At least love eventually won.

A handful of critics—including, famously, the late, great Roger Ebert—actually liked Sandler's wacky movie about an Israeli counterterrorist agent who flees to New York to become a famous hairstylist. But in the end, they were just praising (enabling?) lazy behavior that Sandler had relied on for years. There were offensive jokes about other cultures, ridiculous sex gags (at one point, Sandler sticks a piranha down his speedo...you can guess what happens next), and, worst of all, Rob Schneider. Missing was the charm and emotion featured in the early Sandler movies like Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison. Instead, what we were left with was a whole lot of gross humor that wouldn't even elicit laughs in a frat house.

Clearly, we all must have done something terribly wrong in the years leading up to 2011. How else can you explain why Hollywood decided to release not one, but two awful Adam Sandler movies in the same year? The first was Just Go With It, a sloppy, misogynistic and, yep, culturally offensive romantic comedy that dragged A-list stars like Jennifer Aniston, Nicole Kidman, and even Dave freakin' Matthews through the mud. The second was Jack & Jill, a gender-bending comedy in which Sandler played both a powerful ad exec and his obnoxious twin sister. Seriously—even Eddie Murphy would have passed on this one. No matter what he was starring in, by the end of 2011, Sandler had essentially transformed into the big-screen version of a troll, scraping the bad-joke barrel for laughs while he himself laughed all the way to the bank. Sadly for all of us, the worst was yet to come.

Grown Ups 2, a sequel to the Razzie-nominated Grown Ups, opens with a deer sneaking into the home of Sandler and Salma Hayek (because of course Salma Hayek would be married to Adam Sandler) and peeing all over them. To paraphrase Forrest Gump: That's all we have to say about that.

For all intents and purposes, 50 First Dates, the second collaboration between Sandler and his Wedding Singer co-star Drew Barrymore, was actually kind of cute. So, in a way, it made sense for them to re-team on a third romantic comedy. What didn't make sense is why it had to be Blended, yet another lazy romcom that takes all the lowbrow gags Sandler enjoys and simply transported them to Africa. As one critic so aptly put it, "Hasn't Africa suffered enough?" Though we wouldn't put it past him, here's hoping a fourth collaboration between Sandler and Barrymore never, ever happens.

The Ridiculous 6 hasn't even been released yet, and it's already causing controversy for the way in which it treats other cultures. In April, members of the cast and crew reportedly walked off the set of the Netflix-exclusive movie after taking offense to its script. With characters named Sits-on-Face and Beaver Breath, who could blame them? Netflix has since defended the project, claiming it's simply a "broad satire of Western movies." But one glance at an excerpt from the script proves that, if the bad gags continue, movie audiences are likely to walk out, too.