‘Zombieland' returns to crack wise, skulls

Tallahassee, the senior zombie-killer played by Woody Harrelson in “Zombieland: Double Tap,” has a catchphrase that's a little too naughty for me to quote. You've probably heard it before, and you might agree with another character's assessment: “That saying is very 2009.” The whole movie is very 2009, which is amusing and puzzling and possibly kind of a relief, given what “very 2019” might look like.

But has it really been a whole decade since “Zombieland,” in which Harrelson joined forces with Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin to crack wise while the skulls of the undead exploded around them? Apparently it has, though part of the charm of this undemanding sequel (directed, like the first one, by Ruben Fleischer) is that it treats 10 years like 10 minutes. During the hiatus, Stone won an Oscar and Eisenberg published a book of stories called “Bream Gives Me Hiccups,” but you'd never know that to see them back again as Wichita and Columbus, shacking up in the Lincoln Bedroom of the White House.

In the post-apocalyptic world, there's no history, and the filmmakers (Dave Callaham, Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick share script credit) wisely refrain from calibrating too many jokes to the present-day world beyond the screen. There's a pretty funny riff about Uber, which is a brainstorm the dumbest character comes up with. Everyone else thinks it's a stupid idea. This is funny on many levels.

“Zombieland: Double Tap” is usually content to be funny on just one. Like the first episode, but even more so, this chapter is aware that zombies are a pop-culture cliché and is content to goof on that fact. There's nothing here to rival the thing with Bill Murray in “Zombieland” - after all this time, it still feels like a spoiler to say much about it - but the performers commit to the silliness in a spirit of well-compensated affability. Nobody works too hard, including the new faces on hand to refresh the franchise. They include Rosario Dawson, Luke Wilson, Avan Jogia, Thomas Middleditch and Zoey Deutch.

Deutch is the principal scene stealer, playing Madison (it's a “Zombieland” tradition that everyone has the name of an American city), who has survived the undead onslaught in the freezer of a shopping-mall frozen-yogurt store. Madison is blond and not very smart, and Deutch brings remarkable energy and wit to a dreary stereotype. Other satirical targets - Elvis, hippies - are about as fresh. But the zombie gore and the verbal pepper is sprayed quickly enough to keep boredom at bay.

“Zombieland: Double Tap” sets the bar low and steps easily over it, which makes it better than a lot of recent big-screen comedies. It doesn't have much on its mind, but it isn't completely brain-dead either.