Twisters
review by Bobby Blakey
In 1996 fans were caught by surprise by the hit film Twister that should have been just another disaster film, but with a great soundtrack, awesome effects and a fun story managed to kick all kinds of butt. Now we are headed back into the world of tornado chasing with the sequel Twisters starring Daisy Edgar-Jones, Glen Powell, Brandon Perea, Sasha Lane, Daryl McCormack, Kiernan Shipka, Nik Dodani and Maura Tierney from Minari director Lee Isaac Chung. Could this new entry into the tornado chasing series keep the winds going to the franchise or will it be a storm not worth chasing?
Twisters follows Kate Cooper, a former storm chaser haunted by a devastating encounter with a tornado during her college years who now studies storm patterns on screens safely in New York City. She is lured back to the open plains by her friend, Javi to test a groundbreaking new tracking system. There, she crosses paths with Tyler Owens, the charming and reckless social-media superstar who thrives on posting his storm-chasing adventures with his raucous crew, the more dangerous the better. As storm season intensifies, terrifying phenomena never seen before are unleashed, and Kate, Tyler and their competing teams find themselves squarely in the paths of multiple storm systems converging over central Oklahoma in the fight of their lives.
I am a massive fan of the original so the idea of getting to return to this world was exciting even if we couldn’t have the always awesome late Bill Paxton back. When doing something like this you hope for connections or at least nods to the previous film, and they only really have one thing outside of Paxton’s real-life son making a cameo as a complaining hotel guest. The upside is as much as we might want these things, the type of story lends itself to do its own thing while
being familiar territory in tornado chasing.
The film wastes no time getting us right into the action with the new team to fully remind you why we are here. I was ready to chase the storms with them and they sucked me right in. Once it jumps time after this initial sequence it had me worried for a bit as the pace slowed way down and felt like it was losing steam or direction. Thankfully this only lasts a short time before we are back in on the fun of it all and on the hunt. It plays up with the same formula of the original film of corporate greed, intuition and trauma too much success.
I enjoyed the cast here and thought they all did a great job with them giving us an interesting cast of supporting cast that get plenty to do alongside our leads. None of them pack the same punch as the original group, but they aren’t trying to. They are carving out their own path of destruction and doing a fine job with it. I did enjoy the different dynamic between the groups this time around and getting some unexpected ideals instead of just the good and bad.
For this film to work obviously the effects need to work. We are in a time that is just expected to deliver and does in every way. Part of the charm of the original was the new and unexpected visuals that we were in the face with. Here they don’t do anything overly as innovated as this is just part of filmmaking options today, but still exciting and delivers the tornado chaos we expect from the series.
In the end I had a good time with it and would love to see more films in this world in some capacity with or without returning casts from either film. In addition to the film, this release offers up bonus content including gag reel, commentary, deleted scenes, featurettes and more. Find cover and grab your copy of Twisters available now on digital and then on 4K, Blu-ray and DVD on October 22nd from Universal Home Entertainment.