Jackass: Best and Last, the reported final instalment in the long-running stunt franchise, has arrived in cinemas — and while it delivers every bit of the chaos fans expect, it is also drawing an unexpectedly emotional response from those who have followed the crew for more than two decades. The film blends new material with clips spanning 25 years of the franchise's history, arriving at a moment when its ageing cast and complicated personal journeys have given the whole enterprise a surprisingly sentimental weight.
For the uninitiated, the premise is difficult to defend. The film features a man receiving a mock "colonoscopy" from a humanoid robot using peanut butter for lubrication, cast members being electrocuted for entertainment, and more than one unobstructed view of Steve-O's anatomy. It is, by any conventional measure, the most confronting cinema experience available right now. And yet, for fans who have grown up alongside this group — watching them navigate addiction, grief, sobriety and the general complications of getting older — it plays as something far closer to a heartfelt documentary than a simple gross-out reel.
A Franchise Built on Chaos and Unlikely Brotherhood
Jackass first aired on MTV in 2000, instantly becoming both a cultural phenomenon and a lightning rod for controversy. Almost immediately, reports emerged of young viewers attempting to replicate the stunts, with some sustaining serious injuries. Despite — or perhaps because of — the uproar, the show was a runaway hit, tapping into a skate culture that was rapidly entering the mainstream and a millennial appetite for anarchic, unscripted content at a time when the internet was still in its infancy for most households.
The franchise traces its origins to Big Brother, a skateboarding magazine from the 1990s. Johnny Knoxville — real name P.J. Clapp — initially pitched the publication a story built around him testing self-defence equipment on himself. The resulting footage, which showed Knoxville being pepper-sprayed and tasered, helped form the pilot of the MTV series after director Jeff Tremaine, then the magazine's editor, recognised it had greater potential. One segment — in which Knoxville shot himself in the chest at close range while wearing a cheap bulletproof vest stuffed with pornographic magazines — was deemed too extreme and never broadcast.
The core crew was assembled largely from Tremaine's existing circle. Chris Pontius was a magazine writer; Steve-O (Stephen Glover), a trained clown, was performing stunts for the publication; and Wee Man (Jason Acuna) worked in subscriptions. Bam Margera and Ryan Dunn were recruited after Tremaine saw similar videos they had been producing under the name CKY (Camp Kill Yourself). The show was co-created with filmmaker Spike Jonze, a childhood friend of Tremaine's who was directing music videos at the time and brought valuable industry connections to the project. Despite its enormous popularity, the series ran for only three seasons — 25 episodes in total.
Why Best and Last Hits Differently
What elevates Best and Last beyond a simple clip show is the passage of time and everything that has come with it. Frontman Knoxville has reportedly promised before that certain instalments would be the last, so scepticism around the "final film" label is understandable. But for viewers who have followed the cast through very public battles with addiction, the death of loved ones, and the slow physical toll of decades of self-inflicted punishment, watching a group of men now in their fifties still kicking each other in the groin carries a peculiar warmth.
The film functions, ultimately, as a living document of a particular generational experience — the Gen X and millennial intersection of misspent youth, male friendship, and the strange profundity that can emerge from doing genuinely stupid things together. Much like public figures reckoning with the end of a long chapter, there is something genuinely moving about watching this crew take stock of what they built — even if they built it out of peanut butter and chaos.
Jackass: Best and Last is in cinemas now.
