So I finally got around to watching this for the first time and I will say that it wasn't completely horrible. I did find myself laughing at Jack Black mostly and Kevin Hart a little. They both did a good job of embodying the real life people they represented. The Rock and Nebula did a good job as well, except their real life characters had little to no personality so it would have been nice to see them embrace their avatar more than they actually did. Most of the time it felt like they embraced their avatar when the script said to. It didn't feel real or organic, mostly haphazard.
The story was on the weak side and the CGI makes Black Panther's CGI look like a masterpiece. The movie is slow to start as it has to set up the young characters and how Jumanji is now a video game and not a board game.
I did like the concept of the NPC characters in the video game that repeat themselves over and over again just like they would in a real video game, unfortunately that left all the heavy lifting concerning acting to a weak underdeveloped villain. The whole time it felt like there weren't any stakes save for the stupid way they lost their lives - they each have three lives established by three hash marks on their arm - and we never got to see what happens when you game over.
Spoiler alert - they get out of the video game and small the console with a bowling ball. I was hoping for a little stinger at the end of the credits, but all you hear is the ominous drum beat when something bad is about to happen so if the board game can magically transform into a video game, I'm sure a smashed one can transform into something else. (At the time of this review, I just read that Jumanji 2 has been greenlit for a December 2019 release, so it's definitely coming back.)
Lastly, I did like that the characters were staying in the same hut that Alan Parrish stayed in when he was trapped in the jungle in the original Jumanji. It was a nice little touch, but since the characters didn't and wouldn't know who that was, it would be a throw away line for anyone not familiar with the original.
So is it worth a watch? If you're curious enought, you've probably seen it by now, but if you haven't, I wouldn't spend more than a Redbox rental amount on it.
