FAQ

Ben Jahveri (Fisher Stevens), one of the creators of Johnny-5, a robot prototype who gained sentience when struck by a lightning-induced power surge, is selling toy replicas of Johnny-5 on the streets of New York City when he meets Sandy Banatoni (Cynthia Gibb), a toy buyer for a large department store, who is so charmed by his robots that she orders 1,000 of them to be delivered in 30 days in time for the Christmas sales. Working out of the back of van, Ben has no way of fulfilling the order, so neighboring vendor, con artist Fred Ritter (Michael McKean), seeing a chance to make a profit, sets Ben up in a dilapidated warehouse and even hires workers to fulfill the order in time. To help, Newton and Stephanie, who moved with Johnny-5 to a Montana ranch (at the end of Short Circuit), send #5 to help. However, the warehouse is also the base of operations for a group of thieves hired by bank teller Oscar Baldwin (Jack Weston) to steal the Vanderveer jewels, worth $37,862,000. Meanwhile, Fred learns the value of Johnny-5 (over $11 million) and believes the real profit is not in the toy robots but in Johnny-5 itself.

Short Circuit 2 is the sequel to Short Circuit (1986), both of which were based on screenplays by S.S. Wilson and Brent Maddock.

Tim Blaney did the voice for Johnny-5 in both Short Circuit and Short Circuit 2.

Although severely damaged, bleeding battery fluid, and about to disassemble-breakdown-expire-die, J5 (Johnny 5) is so irate at Oscar that he goes in pursuit of him. With less than four minutes until his memory ceases to function, J5 hooks himself onto a large crane and, like Tarzan on a vine, swings down to pull Oscar out of his motorboat. Ben, Fred, Sandy, and the police arrive but, with less than a minute left, J5 says, "Goodbye...Ben," and expires. Frantically, Ben grabs the cardiac defibrillator from the EMT and uses it to shock J5. Suddenly, sparks can be seen flickering on his circuitry, and J5 opens his eyes. "Ben...ja...min...my friend," he says, while they hug and kiss him. A series of newspaper headlines than show that J5 is alive and "kicking bank robbers." In the final scene, Ben and a gold-plated J5 are among a crowd of people being sworn in as U.S. citizens. Sandy congratulates Ben with a kiss, and a reporter asks J5 how he feels. "I feel alive!", he replies and leaps into the air.

The theme is a nod to Taxi Driver starring Robert DeNiro. In which, when taxi driver Travis Bickle (DeNiro) decides to go vigilante, kill Senator Palatine and rescue Iris Steenma from her pimp, he gives himself a Mohawk haircut. (That is to say, Johnny 5 is emulating Bickle; in a sort of serious parody kind of way.)