Fight Back to School 2

The 1991 movie "Fight Back to School" was pretty enjoyable and funny, so of course I needed no persuasion to sit down to watch the 1992 sequel "Fight Back to School 2" (aka "To hok wai lung 2").

And while "Fight Back to School 2" definitely was watchable, it just wasn't fully up to par with the previous movie. It just lacked the comedy elements that were abundant in the first movie. Now, I am not saying that "Fight Back to School 2" wasn't funny, because it was, but it just didn't have nearly enough funny contents to match the predecessor.

The storyline in "Fight Back to School 2" was a bit too tame as well, especially since it was so similar to the first movie. So there wasn't really much of anything new to be seen in this 1992 sequel.

But for fans of Stephen Chow, "Fight Back to School 2" is definitely an adequate movie, of that I am quite sure.

For me, this was a mediocre movie, and as such, I am rating "Fight Back to School 2" a five out of ten stars.

Stephen Chow has to go back to school undercover and brings along his friends he met in the last movie. Funny how part 2 lives up to the title and he really has to fight back to school this time. Him and his girlfriend are going to get married, but he ends up spending all of their wedding money on his undercover job. Deannie Yip has a small role as the Chief Inspector and she is brilliant just like always. And nice to see cameos from Blacky Ko, James Wong, and Mark Houghton.

Fight Back to School part 1 is a great comedy, yet still managed to stay serious for a large portion of the film. Part 2 is a masterpiece in every way. The comedy comes in huge doses and I won't even try elaborate on how funny it is. Only Stephen Chow can pull off not wanting to kiss an 18 year old girl this well. It's a dream sequel for fans of the first movie.

Sadly, the fights are even more sparse than Part 1. That is because there are no real fights. Everything is played for laughs and it works very well. There is a great shootout at the end and it tops the movie off nicely.

In this imaginatively named sequel to the previous year's TO HOK WAI LUNG, Man-Tat Ng has been rewarded with a promotion to special operatives and Inspector Deannie Ip as his girl friend, Stephen Chow with traffic duty. When Ng tells him that his current assignment is undercover at a school where terrorists are threatening the student body, Chow quits and using fiancee Sharla Cheung's bridal money, hires his cohort from the last movie to likewise go undercover.

There are a lot of moving parts in this movie, but they all give way to various high-school antics, with Chow courting schoolmate Athena Chu, and occasionally pausing to beat up Ng under the guise of being beaten up by him. In fact, it's all grand fun and games, until the last twenty minutes, when the terrorists invade the school, and there's only Ng to fight them, which he does effectively.... for a while. How Chow mobilizes a tactical squad and performs general heroics I'll leave to the interested viewer to find out himself.

Personally I felt this one was worse than the original, which at least had, well, originality going for it. Here we get the lamebrained Chow finding himself bored and out of a job, to which end he goes undercover at a school once more. An interesting beginning with the new characters and scenario, and a funny DIE HARD situation making up the climax, but the mid section is long and aimless, made up of a tired romance scenario. Never has a Chow film felt more plotless...

Fight Back To School was a fantastic film, a bit rough around the edges storytelling wise but it was an all around amazing film full of action and laughs, it was a film destined to get a sequel- the premise is fresh for it! So did the sequel do good? Sort of.

Fight Back to School 2 follows the same protagonist as last time, Starry Chow who after a demotion in his work goes to infiltrate a school by force to show his superiors that he still got it. This time there's a terrorist threat on an international school in Hong Kong.

First the positives, somehow Stephen Chow doubles down on his already aggressive character and to see him stretch that out even more in the sequel is hilarious, the returning actors all do a pretty great job and they're all playing to their strengths. The movie is competently shot although I wish there were less shots of the school overall, wish there would've been some other cool locations! Also for what it is this movie kind of delivers in a good way! It also has some very hilarious moments.

And now for some of my problems with this movie... once again, but this time it's even more apparent they don't focus the plot on the actual threat that's going on (the investigation and the terrorist attack) which makes it all seem kind of haphazardly executed- a way to keep on adding intrigue to the film would be if they constantly found out clues and stuff in the school (they do but it's always close to the final) which makes it a bit unsatisfactory when for the big showdown the terrorists arrive at the school with basically nothing moving forward the plot before. It's kind of shocking how much they spent on the romance subplot when it basically didn't lead to anything, which is sad. I wish this movie would've taken those opportunities to try and raise the stakes and add a bit more intrigue.

With all being said I still enjoyed this movie, with my criticism above it might sound as if I didn't like it but it's quite the opposite, even for its shortcomings Fight Back to School 2 manages to bring an entertaining time with wacky moments. It might not be as sharp or memorable as the first one but it's still a fun watch nevertheless.