Seth Rogen, James Franco Give Kanye’s New Video A Shot-For-Shot Remake

Kanye West‘s weird, goofy music video for the song ‘Bound 2‘ was crying out for a parody version, and two of Hollywood’s biggest comedic stars have delivered. Seth Rogen and James Franco have created a video on the set of their upcoming movie, The Interview, that lampoons Ye’s new video in ridiculous fashion.

The ‘Bound 2’ video has drawn more than five million views in less than a week, and much of the response has been negative. Viewers have complained about the awkward chemistry between Kanye and Kim Kardashian, the strangely cheap green screen effects, and the (at least at first glance) shallow lyrics.

All of these complaints provided plenty of fodder for Rogen and Franco, who star in a shot-for-shot remake. The obvious highlight is Rogen’s shirtless, flutter-eyed impersonation of Kardashian, complete with the same motorcycle dry humping present in the original video. Check out the bromance for yourself:

Rogen and Franco are currently filming The Interview, their latest collaboration with Evan Goldberg. That fact raises the question as to whether this parody was truly meant as an honest satire and not a slick viral marketing campaign. The latter explanation seems more possible when you consider how Channing Tatum did the same thing last week (i.e. riff on a viral video to draw attention to his new movie) when he released a parody of the Volvo Trucks ‘Epic Split’ video.

Clearly, marketers are realizing that ‘funny actor who will star in an upcoming’ + ‘goofy viral video subject’ = ‘another viral video’. That being said, Rogen and Franco’s parody is awesome, so I don’t particularly care how it came to be. And since Billboard’s new YouTube-inclusive charts will now allow ‘Bound 2’ to rocket up the charts, I don’t think Kanye will be too upset about the video, either.