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Don’t you just hate it when your favorite flicks age poorly? Back when Blade II first came out, it was a visual thrill ride. Now it’s simply a solid movie with a double handful of solid scenes, some corny dialogue, and some of the worst CGI you’ll ever see as rubber band people have sword fights and fly through the air. But when it came out, this shit looked alright. Damn you CGI for raising the bar and actually looking realistic!

In Blade II, Blade must band with his mortal enemies to combat a new menace, a race of super vampires who are impervious to silver, garlic, and other shit and who feed like a bunch of junkies… they also hate wearing shirts and appear to have hair genes like Jason Statham. Blade hooks up with a nice group of vampire fighters that go by the name The Blood Pack… which features the badassness of Ron Perlman. Blade and his enemies must put aside their differences if they are to defeat the new threat to humanity.

This sequel does what few films ever actually do, especially movies based on comic books; it improves upon the original in so many ways. For one, the film doesn’t rely solely on the dubious acting talents of Wesley Snipes. Secondly, the new vampires introduced into the film are wonderful and a nice change of pace from the typical Eurotrash vampires that dominate the majority of vampire flicks.

Director Guillermo del Toro puts together a solid flick full of action-packed scenes and a little more fun than was evident in the first Blade film. The imagery is sleek, blood-fueled and contains some stellar production values. The pacing of the film is a little off in the film’s second half, after the zombie-like menace of vampires is stopped and it begins to focus on the subplots of the film, namely an unimpressive romance between Blade and a vampire chick and some familial disturbances within the ranks of the vampires. It’s a shame that the meat of the film isn’t focused on the new vampires, because they are far more interesting and more terrifying than the other vampires in the film.

The acting in the film is pretty bad. Wesley Snipes is his typical over-the-top self and he does nothing to not make his character look like a douche bag. Honestly… do you have to do a little dance before you do anything? How hard is it to put away a sword? Does it really require an extra twirl that makes the character look like a showboating dandy? Ron Perlman is his typical badass self and he gives pretty much the same performance that he gave in Alien: Ressurection, that of the quick-tempered dumbass. But hey, I’m not knocking it, because the bastard is perfect at it. The rest of the characters within The Blood Pack are fairly weak, with the weakest of the bunch being Leonor Varela, who plays Nyssa, Snipes’ unconvincing love interest. Varela doesn’t have much in the way of acting ability, but she does at least make Snipes look better by comparison. The rest of the cast is average-ized by run of the mill performances from Kris “Grizzled” Kristofferson and Norman Reedus.

The special effects in the film, which should be the strongest selling point of the movie, are actually one of the film’s weak points. The CGI in the film looks like it was ripped off of a video game. Example #1: The sword fight between Blade and two vampires in funky outfits looks like it was filmed with Gumby versions of the characters. Example #2: Blade gets tossed around by Jared Nomak, the super vampire. I could go on and on, but when it comes down to it, several scenes in the film are ruined by the CGI. The sad thing is that they had the ability to get it right, because some of the vampire effects are pretty cool, especially the new vampires who have some amazing anatomy adaptations.

Blade II is still a cool flick, but it is infinitely less cool than when it first came out. It still packs a solid punch and will be mildly entertaining if you can turn off your brain and your inner-critic for an hour and a half. Unfortunately, it’s will not capture the badass feel that the film first had when it came out… it’s kind of like the first time you have sex with a chick… it’s never going to be that awesome the next time… especially if you have a cheesy CGI cock.

Final Synopsis: Blade II is worth checking out, but it’s not a buy anymore, unless you really love vampire flicks. Give it a watch and decide on your own.

Points Lost: -1 for cheesy CGI, -1 for bad acting, -1 for the lame love story that makes the one from Rambo II look deep.

Lesson Learned: Never trust a dude who watches The Powerpuff Girls.

Burning Question: Does anyone else feel like these movies would be even better if Blade wasn’t in them?

Blade II
7/10 or It’s like getting a hooker’s clothes off for free; you’re satisfied with the peak, but you’re not going to buy anything.

Tags: 2002, blade, Comic Book Movie, daz crawford, donnie yen, Guillermo del Toro, horror, horror movie, kris kristofferson, latest movie review, leonor varela, Luke Goss, matt schulze, norman reedus, recent2, ron perlman, sequel, Thomas Kretschmann, tony curran, vampire, vampire movie, vampires, wesley snipes, wesley snipes sucks