The sequel stars a teenage Sophie (Chloe Coleman), who goes on a school trip to Italy with J.J. (Dave Bautista) as her burly chaperone.

Near an underpass, a teenage girl wearing a hooded sweatshirt and jeans holds binoculars and points, standing next to a tattooed man in a dark work shirt and jeans. Chloe Coleman and Dave Bautista in “My Spy the Eternal City.” Credit…Graham Bartholomew/Amazon

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Watching the new teen comedy “My Spy the Eternal City,” the attentive viewer may begin to wonder about the role of Anna Faris. The endlessly inventive performer spends the first half of the movie smothering the light of her comedic virtuosity under a bushel of a part as a humorless high school principal.

It turns out there’s a legitimate and mildly amusing plot-twist rationale, since the film has bigger aims. Directed by the screen comedy veteran Peter Segal (“The Naked Gun 33 ⅓: The Final Insult,” “Get Smart”), the movie is a sequel to the 2020 film “My Spy,” in which J.J., a C.I.A. operative played by the brawny Dave Bautista, had to protect a girl named Sophie (Chloe Coleman) and winds up as her stepdad.

In the sequel, Sophie’s choir goes on a field trip to Italy, for which J.J. will do duty as a chaperone. (There are a lot of shots of Venice and Rome which, while pretty, have that impersonal “second unit” feel.) The trip quickly ensnares the characters in a plot to nuke the Vatican.

There are agreeable moments, but also many labored ones, as when Kristen Schaal’s data analyst character advises Sophie on what to do when she starts kissing boys, telling her to “use your tongue like a cleaner shrimp in a shark’s mouth.” (When speculating on what the Vatican’s Wi-Fi password might be, Schall actually lands real laughs.) But too often this muddled movie, which never really settles on a tone, plays its espionage plot points with a dour seriousness that’s at odds with a teen comedy.

My Spy the Eternal City