Bound 3 Is Better Than Whatever Kanye Thought He Was Making

Kanye West’s Bound 2 video asks a lot of its audience. It asks you to watch Kim Kardashian look vaguely sedated on a motorcycle against a green-screened mountain range while Kanye raps about love and his own genius, and to receive all of this as a tender romantic gesture rather than an accidental comedy. Most of us failed that test.

James Franco and Seth Rogen, mid-production on The Interview, apparently felt the same way and did something about it. Their shot-for-shot recreation, titled Bound 3, is an act of perfect deadpan charity—Franco playing Kim, Rogen shirtless in Kanye’s role, both of them committing to the bit with a seriousness that exposes exactly how absurd the original is. The fact that it’s funnier while being demonstrably made for less money in an afternoon says something pointed about self-regard and its consequences. Heavenly.