Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time

During the closing credits (at least in the version that hit theatres), the Beastmaster can be seen running into the sunset. This sunset is actually a painted backdrop, and after a while, you can clearly discern that the guy is actually running in place for almost two minutes as the credits roll! A perfect end to a perfect movie!

Truly bad as part of the series, stupid in almost every way. If you're gonna watch it, just pretend it has nothing to do with the other films. It sucks less that way. It even has some charm, so I think it deserves more than one star.

The film breaks fundamentally with the tone set in the original. That was primarily an adventure film, though not without its lighthearted fun/silly moments. This one is just comedy, and not very good.

Two examples of how bad it is (minor spoilers):

1. The language in Dar's world turns out to be LA American English! They actually speak the exact same accent as the LA characters in the story.

2. The nukes in the US are extremely badly guarded, anyone can just walk in and grab one, if they're willing to knock out a guard behind a desk. And when they're stolen, it is is a local LA police department that handles the case.

A middling sequel to the original, not as good as that but far better than the third. This one does actually have a budget, albeit a B-movie budget, and starts off with the usual low rent heroic action before moving the action to then-modern day L. A. where the usual fish out of water action takes place. A typical mix of CONAN and DR DOOLITTLE here, a far cry from THE ICEMAN COMETH but reasonably entertaining if you're in the right cheesy mood. The cast includes genre standby Wings Hauser, a young Kari Wuhrer, and Uncle Phil himself.

...and all from the script. That's because this isn't a sequel, it's... more like an overgrown tongue-in-cheek fan-fic film that just happened to lure Singer in for the ride.

There's a lot to laugh at here, and unfortunately the "plot" is most of it. The players are fairly game and give some effort to their portrayals, but the writing just is never serious. Sadly, sometimes it pretends to be, but always returns to campiness before long. The dialog is very dated, too, as others have noted. Prepare to wince.

Taken for what it is -- cheesy, spoofish fun -- it actually isn't too bad, IMO. 4/10 for being brisk enough to carry me along to the end and make at least a few actually funny jokes. (My favorite was the line about the 2 guys she'd met in Mexico.) Kari's character annoyed me a lot at first but she got better later. Wings actually surprised me; I thought he made a serviceable villain (at least for this sort of camp), and I was expecting him not to fit well. Then again, I was expecting a real sequel....

One thing that needs pointing out is that Lyranna vanishes near the end of the film. The character just isn't seen any more, with no explanation of what happened to her. Oops.

So... If you don't allow it to be what it is and instead hold it up to the first movie, it stinks, as most reviewers have pointed out. If you're going to watch it, don't make that comparison. Just mostly forget the first movie, relax, and laugh at the intentional and unintentional humor here. Throw stuff at the TV when the cheese gets too thick. That way you should be able to enjoy it well enough.