Ten years is a long time between sequels, which made me wonder “why do this at all?” Somebody must believe there’s money to be made, especially with the Memorial Day weekend release.

          And the answer is, there probably is, if you hang in there. For me, this one was a slow slog for a movie that literally saves it all for the ending.

          We start in present day, where Agent J (Will Smith) and Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones) are still with the secret government agency which monitors and, if necessary, protects us from the extraterristrials. Yes, the space aliens, many of which live amongst us disguised as humans. Most of them are benign, some are thugs, but some could be world ending threats. Want a sample – looks like Lady Gaga, Yao Ming and Beckham might not be human…and all models.

          I always liked the silly concept and the special effects and the fun of the first film fifteen years ago still stick with me. You know, the “neuralizer” gun that wipes your memory of any stuff you saw that you weren’t supposed to – goofy, yet almost believable.

         The threat this time is from an escaped bad alien creature named Boris the Animal, who travels back to 1969 to change the future. His “life” was altered in a bad way by Agent K. When he succeeds, Agent J goes back in time to undo what he has done. Don’t dwell on the usual time travel nonsense, you’ll get a headache if you over think it.

         I enjoyed the trip to New York City circa 1969, although it takes almost forty minutes to get there (see what I mean about the slog, but the set up I guess was necessary to explain the whole story and get us to that very sweet ending I can’t talk about any further). There you get the usual outfits and hairdos and cars and especially nice for me, the 1969 World Champion New York Mets. Oh, and there’s also that moon landing thing, which is actually far more important to the story than the Mets.

       Agent J meets the 1969 Agent K, played in fine fashion by Josh Brolin, who studied the first two “MIB’s” to capture that Tommy Lee Jones thing.

       The tough part here is that the movie is not nearly as entertaining as I expected and the fun Agent J is replaced by a very nervous and serious Agent J because there’s so much at stake. I felt the alien humor and outlandishness was missing and for a current day movie, where were all the cool special effects to update everything?

       One good addition was an alien named Griffin played by Michael Stuhlbarg , who can see the future, but what he gets is a message that depends on so many variables, the future could go in many different directions. That was amusing and actually thought provoking.

       Too bad he doesn’t show up until two thirds through the movie, because the villain Boris wasn’t cutting it for me. The running gag is that he hates “The Animal” part and will kill anyone for calling him that. “Men in Black III” crawls up to a “6” with a very nice ending that is worth waiting for.