Back to the Future 2: You're All Insane

[Anderson]

Where's Matt? I'm feeling combative.

[Matt]

right here.

[B_Metal]

Where's Matt? I'm feeling combative.

Probably in the alternate world where fun is bad.

[Matt]

for the record, I saw this in the theater with a crowd that really hated it.
I saw it a few times on VHS in the early 90s when we'd marathon all of the films.
I hadn't seen the film in at least 12-15 years when I saw it again last November (along with BttF3).

Seriously, guys...it sucks.

[Anderson]

for the record, I saw this in the theater with a crowd that really hated it.
I saw it a few times on VHS in the early 90s when we'd marathon all of the films.
I hadn't seen the film in at least 12-15 years when I saw it again last November (along with BttF3).

Seriously, guys...it sucks.

No, it's the central piece of the most intricate American film trilogy of the last 40 years. You're like Pauline Kael shitting on Empire for not being standalone.

[Matt]

1 and 3 are cohesive movies where the STORY and the CHARACTERS matter. 2 is all about the gimmicks, STORY and CHARACTER be damned. It's the first Zemeckis film to get overwhelmed by technology, and it suffers because of it.

[Matt]

And I could care less that it doesn't stand alone. It's simply not a quality film.

[Captain Russ]

Matt has been banned.

[Ed Hocken]

I admit, I laugh when Marty tries to pick up clothes that are "50s appropriate".

[Anderson]

1 and 3 are cohesive movies where the STORY and the CHARACTERS matter. 2 is all about the gimmicks, STORY and CHARACTER be damned. It's the first Zemeckis film to get overwhelmed by technology, and it suffers because of it.

Not really. If you're going to make the argument about Zemeckis overdoing it with tech, that goes to Roger Rabbit. But, like Roger Rabbit...it's a tool and not the story.

With the structure of 2, it has to exist to facilitate the direction of the trilogy. If you've ever had to chance to read Gale and Zemeckis's original drafts for 2 and 3....you can see the bitch of a time they had in laying everything.

A trilogy in the truest sense where every action, plot advancement, character motivation and literary structure was planned to co-exist among three films in development from 1981 to the final film's release in 1990.

It all matters. You can't have 3 without 2. You can't have the trilogy without all the pieces.

[Ben Thomas]

Few popcorn films can touch the original, so BTTF2 had little chance (anyone claiming 3 is the best chapter is on cheap crack), but at least they tried something interesting. When I was a kid I LOVED the future - now I think its awful. But our time there is thankfully brief and then the rest of the film is the goods for me.

Grim, Biff-run 85 is surprisingly fun and the final 20-30 minutes might be the most intricate plotting of the series. Its the best sci-fi film of the bunch, tackling paradoxes to keep the nerds happy before getting on with having fun in part 3.

Seriously, once we get out of the future (and I agree, nearly every aspect of the future is dreadful, form the character makeup down - though the kid in me still loves the flying cars and the hoverboards) its not that bad, Matt.

[Matt]

...the final 20-30 minutes might be the most intricate plotting of the series. Its the best sci-fi film of the bunch, tackling paradoxes to keep the nerds happy before getting on with having fun in part 3.

Agreed 100% here. Like I said, the wild finale of BttF2 is really, really well done. It's choreographed really well and is fairly entertaining. It kinda belongs in a different film...the rest (especially the future) is indefensible.

[B_Metal]

Beginning to think Matt's trolling. Seriously I just don't see the hate. Like at all.

[FilmNerdJamie]

Speaking of that, I would have enjoyed seeing Reagan show up as the mayor of 1885 Hill Valley. Never came to pass.

It's funny that both Zemeckis/Gale and the Simpsons staff during the early 90s got letters from Reagan saying, "Thanks, but no thanks" and it turned out he actually did write a lot of those letters himself.

My sister wrote him a letter when she was around 5-6-ish and got one back which also may, or may not, have been written by Reagan himself.

[Matt]

With the structure of 2, it has to exist to facilitate the direction of the trilogy. If you've ever had to chance to read Gale and Zemeckis's original drafts for 2 and 3....you can see the bitch of a time they had in laying everything.

A trilogy in the truest sense where every action, plot advancement, character motivation and literary structure was planned to co-exist among three films in development from 1981 to the final film's release in 1990.

It all matters. You can't have 3 without 2. You can't have the trilogy without all the pieces.

I GET all of that...really, I do. I understand that they needed part 2 to go in that kind of direction. On paper, it sounds great...it's just incredibly poorly executed in my opinion.