Chattanooga Film Fest 2025 Review: NoClip 2: Return to LunchChattanooga Film Fest 2025 Review: NoClip 2: Return to Lunch LandLand

Lunch Land returns in a chaotic swirl of VHS static, food fights, and cafeteria trauma.

NoClip 2: Return to Lunch Land – A Glitchy Sequel That Runs on Empty

★★☆☆☆ (2 out of 5)

By Travis Brown

NoClip 2: Return to Lunch Land is the cinematic equivalent of pouring chocolate milk into a school computer and calling it performance art. Directed with the same chaotic energy as its predecessor, this sequel returns us to the glitchy, nostalgia-soaked world of Lunch Land—where childhood memories, cafeteria mayhem, and analog horror aesthetics collide in a swirl of pixel puke.

There’s ambition here, sure. The film throws everything at the wall—bad puns, janky animation, VHS effects, food fights, existential vending machines—and dares you to find meaning in the noise. But where the original NoClip felt like an inspired descent into liminal madness, this follow-up feels more like a padded detention sentence. The charm wears thin quickly, and the film too often mistakes randomness for wit.

Narratively, it’s all vibes and no velocity. The central plot—if you can call it that—follows a group of returning characters stuck once again in the digital purgatory of Lunch Land, trying to escape a realm built from outdated software and cafeteria trauma. There are flashes of humor and visual inventiveness, but they’re buried beneath layers of repetition and inside jokes that feel increasingly inaccessible.

That said, credit where it’s due: the team behind NoClip 2 commits. Every lunch tray, static burst, and shrieked line delivery is done with full-send sincerity. It’s just hard to stay invested when the film feels like it’s more interested in trolling the audience than entertaining it.

Final Score: 2 out of 5.

A loud, lo-fi descent into cafeteria-core chaos that starts weird, stays weird, and never quite finds a reason to exist beyond the meme. For fans only—and even they might tap out early.