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Grade: D+

Verdict: Unlike "Barbershop," "Friday After Next" just adds up to a bad hair day at the movies.

Details: Starring Ice Cube and Mike Epps. Directed by Marcus Raboy. Rated R for harsh language, drug use and sexual situations. 96 minutes.

See it: Local theaters and showtimes for Friday After Next

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Review: Ice Cube has had Friday on his mind for one too many movies.

"Friday After Next," the third in his series of comedies set on the last day of the working week, is louder and more raucous than its predecessors, but the occasional charm "Friday" and "Next Friday" had going for them is virtually absent.

With the exception of Ice Cube's poker-faced Craig, who remains a steady and engaging presence, the recurring and new characters descend from the quirkiness of the first two movies to cartoonish clowns in "Friday After Next."

That includes Mike Epps as cousin Day-Day, who became Craig's sidekick in "Next Friday" to replace Chris Tucker from the original movie.

Epps' Day-Day was a suitably laid-back counterpart for the prickly Craig in "Next Friday." In "Friday After Next," Day-Day, like most everything else, is ratcheted up to a screechy obnoxiousness, apparently to cover up the reality that nothing much funny is said or done on screen.

Again scripted by Ice Cube, who has gone solo on the screenplays for the last two films after co-writing the first one, "Friday After Next" is set on Christmas Eve.

Now sharing an apartment in south-central Los Angeles, Craig and Day-Day are victimized by a thief dressed as St. Nick who nicks their rent money and holiday presents the day before Christmas.

With a big holiday bash planned that evening and their landlady threatening to kick them out if they don't pay the delinquent December rent by midnight, Craig and Day-Day head off to their new jobs as strip-mall security guards scheming to score some cash.

Ice Cube and director Marcus Raboy try to trim up this scraggly premise with loads of slapstick tinsel. But the sight gags are lame, the dialogue falls flat and the supporting cast is intent on outdoing one another for shrillness, including John Witherspoon and Don "DC" Curry, who return as Craig and Day-Day's bickering fathers, now running a barbecue joint at the strip mall.

Like Ice Cube's witty and warmhearted "Barbershop," "Friday After Next" offers a large ensemble of bit players meandering through a day in the 'hood.

Unlike "Barbershop," though, "Friday After Next" just adds up to a bad hair day at the movies.

— David Germain, The Associated Press