5 Years after the original 'Toxic Avenger' tore through cinema screens with its distinctive snark, excessive gore and manic titlation, Lloyd Kaufman and Michael Hertz returned to screens with a second heaped helping of 'Traumatic Toxie Terror' in 'The Toxic Avenger Part 2' A film that, in my opinion was *PAINFULLY* close to surpassing the original. But just falls short of the mark.
The plot opens a few years after the original film and establishes that, since Toxie has been on the scene, crime in Tromaville pretty much no longer exists. Instead all the criminals have either been killed or forced out of the city to do there business elsewhere. But all thats about to change, as we follow a company called 'Apocalypse inc.' as they attempt one of the most fiendish plans that Tromaville has experienced up to this point. They wish to buy up all the vacant lots within Troma and turn them purely into chemical and radioactive dumping sites. Witht ultimate goal being to own enough of Tromaville, that they can basically just invade the bits that ARNT theres and reduce the entire town to radioactive rubble.
Of Course, Toxie is dead against this and fights off an initial take over of a 'home for the blind'. When Apocalypse Inc. boardmembers get wind that Tromaville is protected, they plan to take Toxie out of the picture by getting his freaudian psychiatrist to convince him he needs to go and find his father (Big Mac). After asking around, its revealed that 'Big Mac' is currently living in Japan, and so; Toxie takes up a windsail and travels abroad trying to rekindle his relationship with his dad.
And on landing; as you can imagine, the chaos pretty much continues, as its pretty quickly revealed that Toxie is now living with a lifelong ailment caused by 'Tromatons' an element that surrounds evil-doers which, when Toxie is exposed to, causes him to blindly turn into an active killing machine until the evil is defeated (as you can imagine. Japanese street gangs are on the menu).
While on the other side of the pond, Apocalypse inc. waste no time in sending there agents into Tromaville to seize assets and wreck up the place. With the aim being to dissassemble Tromaville as quickly as possible.
And, realistically; pretty much every aspect of the production here has had a HUGE upgrade over the original film.
The script eases off the aggressive streak that was a heavy influence in the original, and instead leans way more into conventional comedy. Don't get me wrong, the nastiness and excessive gore is still there. But its played more comedically and cartoony than in the previous film where it could actually get really quite dark in places. In some ways I really like the tonal change as it makes the film much easier to digest. But at the same time, that lean into comedy does come with some issues, chiefly that some of the comedy is just plain rubbish for lack of a better descriptor.
The pacing is incredibly nippy, wasting no time in getting us back into the action after a prolonged absence, that high force energy is still raring away under the hood and its nice to see the utterly boundless mania that this film is STILL able to produce given just how hard the first film pushed in getting 'everything and the kitchen sink' into the final production.
However, I will also say that towards the back end, basically from the 2nd half of the 2nd act. Things do start losing momentum a little bit, mercifully; it winds up before things get problematic on that front. but it feels a bit like they didnt quite know how to end this one, or that the ending they had planned didnt translate quite as effectively as they'd hoped to screen...So they just quickly threw something together and stapled it onto the end of the script. Its not a terrible ending, but it does feel rushed.
It also doesnt help that this is the longest 'Toxie' film clocking in at just shy of an hour and 45 minutes long. Which this film absolutely didnt need. it could easily shed 15 minutes and would have felt a lot more solid as a result.
I also feel that the script seems a bit unsure of what to do with Tromaville in this instance, with Toxie away, a lot of the characters we were introduced to in the first film, who've come back for the sequel, seemingly are only there to be terrorized on screen on and off for collectively about 10-15 minutes. Which is a bit of a shame as, at that point Tromaville was still really only just beginning to be properly documented and it would have been interesting to get a bit more of a sense of the towns history.
Outside of these points however the scripts still as razor as ever with quick witted hyjinx, low brow humour, guts, gore and nudity all present and accounted for. But now the production actually has a bit of a bigger budget, its enabled bigger set pieces, grander ideas and more over the top fight scenes than the last entry. I think this one (in my opinion) is more fun than the first one, but I do think it kind of lacks the total and utter conviction and rawness that the original had.
The direction here has also had a big boost across the board. Japans a fairly iconic location for a monster movie, and Kaufman and the Troma team capitalize on that ten fold, really brining the spirit of Japan to this film in a big way. Again much like the first film theres endless opportunities for creative and experimental visualizations, and Kaufman and Hertz really grab every opportunity they're given here and go for it.
But beyond that, the enhanced budget has also enabled a larger crew, meaning scenes are now better lit, have better quality sound, and much MUCH higher quality film stock. It results in some of the best moments in the 'Toxic Avenger' franchise and some of the cleanest nicest looking visuals Troma have ever produced. ts clear everyone involved in this knew EXACTLY what they were getting into and they really deliver on the brief.
Same goes for direction of the cast too, with a format established in the original, this film uses that film as a template to demonstrate the madness in action and the crew have clearly worked VERY hard with the cast to try and capture that sense of aggressive mania that the first film had. Which I think they largely successfully manage. As mentioned they do tone back the aggression a bit (the first film felt like the cast members were about to anurism at any minute) but this scaling back I think actually makes the film a bit more accessable, as its aiming more for laughs than shock.
The cine is crisp, clean and the bigger budget means we have MUCH more scope for creative scene building. that rough and ready pop punk edge of the first film has been really cleaned up. and the end results are a film that still feels pretty anarchic, but better structured, better presented and better managed. the edits a bit more typical of a studio picture, which I think is another aspect that effects the pacing unfortunately, but its clear to see that, at this point in time Troma considered 'Toxie' to be their flagship product, and they really wanted to put a lot of time and care into shoring up and solidifying his 2nd ever appearence.
As for the performances? my thoughts are about the same as the original. we have a really unique over the top hyper campy energy present throughout. its a little more reserved than the first film. But that kind of makes it a bit funnier in my opinion. Though, a knock on effect of that really is non fo the villains truely feel *properly* demented in the same way the villains in the first one did...That and we're dealing with a much MUCH larger active cast in this than the first film too. So its really kind of a miracle the end product was as solid, crazy and enjoyable as it is.
All of this is tied up with a ROCK solid score that leans more into Pop, Rock and J-pop style synth work, It sounds a lot more unique to this franchise than the original films score (which I felt was a little generic) and I think its used very effectively throughout. not being overused, and punctuating key moments perfectly. The sound quality of the on set audio also seems to have had a big boost thanks to the increased budget. so, its nice to have crystal clear clairty on people screeching and screaming their heads off truthfully.
'The Toxic Avenger: Part 2' is a personal favourite of mine, a big daft silly epic that takes the off the wall acidic framework of the original, and dials up the silly. and I really find it quite endearing for that. Its hard to be truely shocked by a work, when its so self depricating and creative in what its trying to do, I think its a quite wonderful comfort watch.
Unfortunatley, by a VERY thin margin, I feel it just misses out on topping the original. if it had been just a tiny bit shorter, a tiny bit more gory and the 2nd act a tiny bit tighter. This would be my overall favourite. As it stands, its a ruddy good sequel. and one that I can definitely recommend.
(Additional: checking out the 4k vs the original Bluray release on this one was astounding. much like the first film, it feels like several layers of murk have been lifted off this edition. The bluray release was overly dark and desaturated. They seem to have corrected this issue for the 4k release and its now vivid, the film stock is crisp with a good mid-level grain, its easily the best this film has looked outside of cinemas and its jam packed with both ported and new features. it was MORE than worth the price I paid for it.)
source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-toxic-avenger-part-ii/
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