Metacritic reviews

This is a movie that strains at the leash of the possible, a movie of great visionary wonders.

It closes the trilogy like a lightning blast followed by the ominous, resonant drone of thunder. Great action sequences crop up frequently today, but great action movies are always few and far between. Beyond Thunderdome is one, every bit as much as its two predecessors.

This middle portion of the picture becomes dangerously preachy, but just before we and Max are bored, director Miller returns Max to his roots, a screaming chase sequence through a desertlike Australian landscape.

This film has showier stunts than its predecessors, and a better sense of humor. It also has Tina Turner, in chain-mail stockings.

Gibson impressively fleshes out Max, Tina Turner is striking in her role as Aunty (as well as contributing two topnotch songs, which open and close the picture) and the juves are uniformly good.

Leaner and meaner, "The Road Warrior" had more nonstop thrills. But Miller was right not to try to top that act: he's opted to expand the moral geography of his funk Wasteland. With crazy and beautiful Mel and Tina backed up by a raging gallery of mutant humanity, only a glutton could complain he didn't get his fill. [29 July 1985, p.58]

The battle between Max and The Blaster in Beyond Thunderdome may be the best the series has to offer.

Its high-bounding excesses of action simultaneously satisfy and satirize the passion for heedless viciousness that so profoundly moves the action film's prime audience, urban adolescent males.

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome isn't a bad movie. It has entertaining sections, decent performances and more than a few provocative images. But it also has a major shortcoming: It's too darned sane.

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome is a rip-off of punk style. It pretends to be about life after we destroy the world -- or about the despair and degeneracy in the world as we know it now. In fact, it's mostly one big fashion show. Science-fiction flicks about contrasting good and bad societies have been done for a long time and done better. If you're 14 and angry, dig it. Otherwise, stay far away. [10 July 1985, p.D6]