Blade II Review
by Tim Wick
I think that the most important question that we as science fiction fans
must ask is exactly how many good comic book movies to we have the right to
expect?
With X-Men being a definite hit, Spider-Man looking awesome and Blade
having been altogether entertaining if not great, how many more can we
reasonably hope for? Given that projects for The Hulk, Daredevil and Batman
Year One look promising, we may have passed through the valley of lame-ass
comic book movies and into a new golden age. And into that fray jumps
Blade II.
Personal bias alert: I don't like horror films. I've said this before and
it is still true. Don't like the scream, blood, people die in creatively
gruesome ways kind of thing at all. I think that vampires are cool but
don't watch Buffy or Angel with any regularity and have never worn black
lipstick. I though the first Blade was decent but not great. I don't own
a copy and have no plans to (since I'd almost never watch it). The movie
essentially falls into the standard good guy origin/bad guy origin/they
fight/bad guy is dead format.
Sorry - was that a spoiler?
Anyway, this is a movie I am practically incapable of presenting with the
coveted five beaker rating. Even if I really enjoy it, there is the scream,
blood, people die in creatively gruesome ways factor.
With all that said, I really enjoyed Blade II. I would classify it as one
of the few sequels that actually surpassed the original in quality. Of
course I just got done saying that I thought Blade was not a great movie
so improving on that film might not be considered a monumental task.
So we all know the basic premise of Blade, right? No matter, even if you
don't there is a three minute plot synopsis at the beginning of the film
that fills the Blade neophyte in quite nicely. Although I typically find
this sort of thing rather annoying, it worked for this film because the rest
of the movie (correctly) does not rely on what came before. By providing a
quick summation of who Blade is and why he is running around executing
elaborate combat maneuvers that cause his enemies to disintegrate, the
uninitiated (if there are any in the audience) are quickly assimilated into
the story.
Every super hero must have a super villain to be his foil. The film
cleverly provides us with more than one super villain to fill the void by
creating a completely new breed of vampire that is immune to just about all
of Blade's regular tricks. These guys are so nasty that the vampires are
afraid. So afraid, in fact, that they enlist Blade to help them deal with
the threat.
You have to figure that anything that might get vampires to enlist the help
of a vampire hunter is a pretty nasty animal and you'd be right. The
Reapers are clearly inspired by the most frightening of all cinematic
vampires - Nosferatu. Vampirism is inherently sexual but there is nothing
arousing about these things. They are like heroin addicts with blood being
their drug. Their faces distort and split open when they feed. Silver and
garlic are nothing more than mild annoyances. Worst of all - if they bite
you, you become one of them frighteningly quickly - even if you are already
a vampire.
Now about the time we find this out, we would expect The Deadly Disease
Movie (TM) to give us a computer screen showing us how long it will take for
the Deadly Disease (TM) to wipe out humanity. Huge kudos to the writers of
Blade II for providing us with the simple instruction "you do the math."
So the reapers are nasty but the vampires that Blade is teaming up with have
been specifically trained to - guess what - kill him! We can pretty much
assume that the moment he deals with the more pressing threat, he'll have a
bunch of fangs/swords turned his way. Even his best buddy was almost turned
into a vampire so we're not even sure whose side he is on. Talk about a
rock and a hard place.
But the inherent coolness of Blade is that he is inherently cool. He shoots
a reaper in the head with a silver bullet and it doesn't die and he simply
tries a different technique. He keeps his sunglasses on even when he is
getting his butt kicked. He just looks like a bad ass. Wesley Snipes
really makes Blade the kind of guy you wouldn't want to meet even if he was
on your side. He'd just make you a little bit uncomfortable.
The fight sequences are well done if possessing the quick cut edit
techniques I have grown to despise. At least director Guillermo Del Toro
recognizes that you have to cut the fights in such a way that the audience
can actually follow what is going on. Would I have appreciated a few more
tracking shots and static shots so I could watch the fights? Heck yeah -
especially with Donnie Yen (Iron Monkey) playing one of the vampiric "good
guys." Chalk that one up to personal bias from watching too many Kung Fu
films.
The major issue with the film in my book is not the horror elements (which I
didn't particularly like although they were well done). The major issue is
that the film doesn't recognize some basic rules of comic book structure.
I'll list the rules I mean, but I warn you that there will be spoilers.
Serious spoilers. Don't read them unless you really want to know some of
the stuff that happens in the movie spoilers.
I warned you.
The main rule that should be followed is the rule of bad guy conservation.
If the bad guy is cool, keep him around! I, for one, would love to have
seen Blade go at it with the blood pack in Blade III. Alas, it is not to
be. What is the inherent problem with Batman? The Joker is dead! Don't
kill off a cool bad guy.
Rule number two is the rule of ill fated romance conservation. That whole
you-are-my-enemy-but-I-love-you is a great dynamic in the comics. Why this
is relevant to Blade II is something I'll let the reader find out. Again
in reference to Batman I note that Batman Returns had the forethought to
keep Catwoman alive.
Those are the major rules I don't think should have been broken. The film
also mired itself in rather broad foreshadowing that meant a great many
moments that should have been a surprise were blatantly obvious. Minor
quibble but something that keeps a good movie from becoming a great movie.
But still, this was a good movie. I really enjoyed myself and I think the
story and acting was a lot meatier than it was in the first film. I plunked
down my money with the intent to enjoy a reasonably entertaining thrill ride
and came out feeling like my money was well spent.
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