User reviews

"Trancers II" is pretty good for a sequel but lacks creativity that the low budget "Trancers" did. It has all the original characters from part one but is basically a retread. Check out the sequel "Trancers III: Deth Lives", it's much better.

The original Trancers is not by any means a great movie. It had massive plot holes and very little in the way of internal logic. However, it was entertaining, better done than most low-budget B-movies, and could be surprisingly witty. Unfortunately, Trancers II is none of these.

Trancers II suffers from many of the same problems of most flop sequels. The plot is thin enough to see through and the writing is insipid. It seems that the people behind this movie felt that bringing the familiar faces of the first movie back would be enough, and didn't bother with anything else. Not even veteran B-grade actors like Tim Thomerson and Jeffery Combs were able to drag this film out of the muck.

A brief plot overview: Jack Deth (Thomerson) is a cop from the future who was sent to 1985 to save the ancestors of members of his government. Trancers II takes place six years after the events of the first Trancers. Jack Deth is married to Lena (Helen Hunt), the woman he met in the first movie, and both live with Hap Ashby, the man Deth was sent into the past to protect. It is discovered that the brother of Whistler (the bad guy from the first movie) has traveled back in time to create an army of Trancers, people turned into mindless killing zombies, to kill Ashby. Complicating Jack's mission is the fact that his first wife, who had died long before Jack traveled to the past, was also sent back to stop Whistler's brother, and now Jack finds himself working with her.

I have two real problems with this movie. One is that the method of creating Trancers in this movie is radically different from the methods used in the first movie. What makes it annoying is that, in a rather poor example of Soviet Revisionism, they act like it was always the technique.

The other thing that annoys me is that the love triangle between Deth, Lena, and Alice Stilwell (Jack's first wife) is given very little screen time. This bothered me particularly because it was much more interesting than the actual plot of the movie. It felt like it was just something that was thrown in to fill space in the movie. Alice's character in particular seems very unconcerned with the fact that she is reunited with her husband only to find he's re-married, making her either very shallow or very poorly written.

The only reason I can think of for watching this movie is if you're interested in watching the entire Trancers series (currently totaling six movies). Otherwise, even if you're a fan of the original Trancers, stay away from this tepid sequel.

I really enjoyed this film it was great, even better then the first one. It was great action,scifi,and even a bit of comedy. this film was done in such an excellent way, well done to all involved. I strongly suggest you see this film if you havent already.

10/10

Having disliked 'Trancers' as much as I did, I'm not sure what prompted me to watch 'Trancers 2'. I shouldn't have...

The narration in the beginning of this film explained 'Trancers' much better than that entire film did. But now, this film is equally bad, if not worse. This ultimate B-movie is badly directed, badly photographed, with bad lighting, and an excruciatingly bad script. Here's just some examples. Beefy Jack Deth overpowers a scrawny guard, yet the outfit fits him like a glove. When Lena is kidnapped, Jack later enquires about her and a guy says "Oh yeah, she left with two guys." What??? He didn't notice they harshly grabbed her and shoved her into a van, for goodness sake???!!! And he was being very calm about it... Oh, wait, so the zombies are regular guys the one second and then zombies the next? Do they change at will?? Jack's (now deceased) wife from the past is brought back, and now he expects his new wife to be okay with him having his way with her again, and justifies it by saying "She doesn't have much time left". Ah, so it's all fine then...

There's just so much wrong with this film in its entirety. It is so badly acted, it's cringe worthy. Good actors (not that there's many in this film) in the hands of a bad director is not a good combination! The characters doesn't act normal, and the actors doesn't act realistic. Jeffrey Combs is a fantastic actor, but here he is so wood-faced it hurts! This is just a very, very bad film. It honestly is still beyond me how they managed to make 6 films in this franchise...

Jack Deth (Tim Thomerson) returns to this time take on Whistler's brother (Richard Lynch) who is running a mental hospital and is trying to recruit numbers to take over the world, meanwhile Deth is aided by his deceased wife who is back as a 20 something woman who falls for Deth all over again, much to the dismay of Lena (Helen Hunt) Deth's current wife. Again the 3 star rating is out of sheer guilty pleasure, because in terms of technical quality and filmmaking this film is not very well made. The first action sequence in particular with the fork lifts are laughably bad, but again Trancers II is more entertaining than it is good. The film is literally all over the map, we have no idea what Richard Lynch wants to do, the love triangle is a cheesy sitcom and yet the mix of such somehow makes it work. Again, the movie is made with a weird vibe that makes the film work better than you would think. I can't imagine anyone who isn't immersed in nostalgia or who never rented these to get the appeal of the movie, but few movies work better than this at 2 am.

* * * out of 4-(Good)

Needlessly convoluted plot that has a HUGE hole in it ie) if you send Jack back to the future then he never has the babies that are his own ancestors... so he wouldn't exist in the first place! Also the tight close ups of actors looking at the camera are super off putting and the constant fade outs get annoying fast. Big let down after the first one.

I just thought this one had a better plot and better pacing and there were more Trancers in it than there were in the first one. I can remember everything about it, mainly that Jack Deth is back and must protect some politician or something. For a movie by Full Moon though it had a nice array of stars in it. Granted some of them you would expect to be in a "b" movie, others not so much. Once again, this movie just shows you that Full Moon Studios at one time actually put some effort into their films. The studio was rather good in the late 80's and early 90's then at a point it just seemed to turn out really bad movies. It went from films like this, to movies like the "Shrieker" and "The Dead Hate the Living" two rather bad movies that were somewhat enjoyable to movies that were even worse that were not so enjoyable to watch. I think they are pretty much gone now as I have not seen a movie by them in a long time now. Still, this one had good action and picked from the first movie and became the more superior flick in my mind.

I really enjoyed this movie, it had action, plot and some funny one-liners, what I liked the best was the amazing cast: HELEN HUNT, JEFFREY COMBS, BARBARA CRAMPTON, MEGAN WARD, MARTINE BESWICKE, and TIM THOMERSON. I think this is one of the best movies that Full Moon did in the 90's. Its a fun film, watch it.

Since the 70s, writer/producer/director Charles Band has been responsible for literally hundreds of science-fiction, fantasy and horror B-movies. Some of them are wonderful examples of how to use a tiny budget to maximum effect; many of them are pretty bad. Trancers (1985) was one of those rare gems.

A Terminator style tale of time-travel and action, Trancers saw Tim Thomerson playing Jack Deth, a future cop given the task of tracking down bad-guy Whistler, who travels into the past by inhabiting the body of an ancestor. Whistler is capable of controlling other humans with his psychic powers, converting them into obedient zombies (the 'trancers' of the title), and attempts to alter the course of history by killing off the ancestors of the leaders of the future. Jack follows him to 1985, determined to stop him.

In this 1991 sequel, Jack is still living in 1985. Having destroyed Whistler, he has settled down and married Leena (Helen Hunt), the young woman who helped him succeed in the first movie. But, for Jack, things don't stay calm for long, and trouble appears in the form of Whistler's brother, E.D. Wardo, who is trying to build a trancer army.

Trancers II lacks the charm and simplicity of the original and is a huge disappointment considering how good the original was. The story is difficult to pick up if you haven't seen the first film (or at least not for a long while), and there is loads of unimpressive action and a few poor special effects. Gone is the inventiveness and wit that made Trancers so much fun; instead we get some cheesy one-liners and a script that feels like it was written on-the-fly.

About the only reason I can give for recommending this film to fans of the genre is the cast, which boasts many names that will be familiar to followers of sci-fi and horror movies: Jeffrey Combs, Barbara Crampton, Richard Lynch, Martine Beswicke. Unfortunately, most of them seemed to be having an 'off day' whilst filming Trancers II, and performances are mediocre at best.

The Trancers series obviously has its fans; four further sequels have since been churned out. Unless the quality has taken up massive upward swing, I can't imagine them being any good.

I'm extremely wary of sequels as they invariably disappoint. (okay there are a handful of exceptions: e.g. Mad Max, The Godfather, Cleopatra Jones). 'Trancers 2' (known as 'Future Cop 2' here in Australia) follows this trend - it's a pretty lame follow up to the silly but fun original. The one thing that saves it from complete dismissal is the outstanding supporting cast which includes Martine Beswick ('One Million Years BC'), b-grade horror legend Jeffrey Combs ('Re-Animator'), Combs' occasional co-star Barbara Crampton ('Space Truckers'), and the hugely underrated Richard Lynch ('Open Season', 'God Told Me To', 'Scanner Cop'). The extremely likable Tim Thomerson returns as Jack Deth and he is always good no matter how weak the material he has to work with. Thomerson is joined by several faces from the original movie, such as Helen Hunt, and his comedian buddies Biff Manard and Art LeFleur. The plot this time concerns the brother of Whistler (the baddie from the first movie), played by Lynch, who using the cover of an environmental group tries to take over with his "trancer" army. Jack Deth must stop his evil plans while trying to rescue his resurrected first wife (cutie Megan Ward - 'Joe's Apartment'), stop his jealous current wife (Hunt) from leaving, and make sure former ball star and future of the world Hap Ashby (Manard) doesn't a)get drunk, and b)get murdered. Yes, it's a hard job being a time traveling cop, but it's nothing some hair gel and a few wise-cracks can't help you deal with. There's no way I can disguise the overall naffness of this movie, but it's some dumb fun for a boring afternoon at least. Check out the original 'Trancers' though, it's much better than this.

Jack Deth (Tim Thomerson) has lived happily with new wife Lena (Helen Hunt) in L.A. for six years after he sent Whistler back up the line without a body. Whistler's brother E.D. Wardo has gone back to old California. McNulty is given two days to go back to capture him with the help of Jack Deth. Jack's future body is too damaged and he must return in the TCL Chamber. He's been offered a seat on the council. In the present, drunken baseball pitcher Hap Ashby has cleaned up his life and made a fortune from investments. Jack, Lena, Hap, and McNulty in the body of a girl face off against Wardo and his organization Green World which is turning the insane into trancers. Then Jack's deceased wife Alice (Megan Ward) shows up after he helps her escape from Green World.

Trancers is one of my favorite sci-fi B-movies. The world is a fun mash up of sci-fi concepts. There's time-travel, time-dilation, and the zombie-like trancers. There is real charm to the lower budget B-movie. The sequel should be bigger but it's still the same level. They try to change it up by sending down Jack's dead wife. It's a wrong move. It makes Lena look bad. It's badly complicated. The rest is a retread of the first movie. This is disappointing.

Trancers II (1991) is another entry in the series that I recently watched on Tubi. The storyline picks up six years after the first film, with Jack now settled down with Lena and running a struggling private eye business. His quiet life is disrupted when his deceased wife reappears, along with a scientist creating Trancers on Earth.

Directed by Charles Band (Puppet Master), the film stars Tim Thomerson (Dollman), Helen Hunt (Twister), Megan Ward (Encino Man), and Art LaFleur (The Sandlot).

With Tim Thomerson and Megan Ward, the film has a bit of a "poor man's Rutger Hauer and Phoebe Cates" 80s vibe. The storyline is somewhat uneven, as are the writing and character interactions, leading to a mixed sense of chemistry and tone. Still, there are some enjoyable moments, like the opening scene at the landscaping site and the pitchfork sequence. Overall, it's a fun watch and an above-average addition to the sci-fi genre. I'd rate it a 6/10.

If you have seen the original and liked it and said to yourself Hey, there are a bunch more of them. sweet. I'm pretty sure they are going to be as good as the original. Nah. You can tell that this sequel even has less money then the original because most of it was shot in and outside of some mansion and "The Future" looks like an empty warehouse. But anyways, this time around Jack Deth has to stop Whistlers ?brother? from making trancer soldiers and taking over the world. The only redeeming factor in this one is that Jack Deth's long lost dead wife returns (played by a very attractive Megan Ward) and that causes problems with Jack and his current wife (played by Helen Hunt). The love triangle is funny and Tim Thomerson was a stand up comedian in his early days and you can tell because he has good comedic timing. The ending is kind of ridiculous but you do not hold it against them because the type of movie it is. It is a low budget B movie straight to video sequel from a low budget b movie film. For what it is, it is a solid B film with a solid B cast (even though Helen Hunt is about to get huge). Good action, simple story, enjoyable time, what more could you ask for.

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Why review good movies when you can review "Trancers II?"

Ooh, this film is soooo lame. I can just picture the cast and crew driving around L.A. with a camcorder, hurling extras in silly monster make-up at poor, long-suffering Tim Thomerson. The stars' families actually turn up to play cameos, probably because Full Moon couldn't afford "real" extras. Lame effects, lame sets, and a script so convoluted it would take eons to untie all the knots - this must be classic Trancers!

And yet...and yet...it rules. Note this is the same thing I say about "Trancers IV." I say it because it's true. What can beat watching an old guy in a trench coat mow down zombies, then bust out with quips like, "Don't worry ladies, they're bio-degradable"? Well, lots of things could be better, but anyway this is still good stuff.

My only significant reservation is Megan Ward, who really stinks up the joint. She's a lousy rival for Helen Hunt's character - they're both young pieces of eye candy, and it would've been more effective if they actually contrasted a bit more. Oh well, you can't have everything. At least the wonderful plot device of the "long second watch" is back in place, and we've got more of Hap Ashby, the least-convincing athlete in the history of cinema (oh, wait a minute - he's got a rival in the form of David Ogden Steirs in "Creator").

I haven't seen this lately, but I do seem to remember that Martine Beswick runs away twice during the final battle. Hooray for lousy continuity! Just one of the many highlights in this fine film.

A nice sequel that follows the original quite well with some returning characters written by Jackson Barr and based on story by Barr and director, producer Charles Band.

It is now six years later and Jack Deth (Tim Thomerson) and Lena (Helen Hunt) are married. Deth seems to be enjoying the past, that is until he is told that Whistler has brother named E.D. Wardo (what a name!) played by Richard Lynch. He has gone back in time or to the time Jack is in to create a trancer farm. Thing is the first wife of Jack, Alice Stillwell (Megan Ward) has been sent back in 1991 as well before her death to help Jack singe some trancers. Now Jack has to deal with two wives who understandably do not want their man shared with someone else.

If you enjoyed the original give it a watch you might like it. If you did not like the original I would steer clear as it is much like the original. Production values seem to be a little higher here. Maybe, because there was a higher budget.

Also starring some familiar B Movie faces like Martine Beswick, Jeffrey Combs and Barbara Crampton.

I really enjoyed Trancers (1984) & after that one i watched this sequel & it was a fun flick.

Trancers 2 is very low-budget like the first film but with a very early 90's cheesy charm & a cast of awesome B movie stars.

Both, Trancers & Trancers 2 are fantasy sci-fi B movie fun & both earned a solid 7/10 in my opinion.

I'm not bothered about all the other sequels as they look very bad in quality.

Anyway Trancers 2 is set six years after the original & hard-boiled future cop Jack Deth has been living in 80's turned 90's Los Angeles with his now wife Lena, played once again by a fun Helen Hunt. So nice having Helen Hunt back & a treat as she didn't have to at all as by the early 90's she was a fairly big star. This time old enemy Whistler is back, well his brother is. Yes Whistler had a bad brother know one knew about & he wants to continue his brothers evil plan to take over the world with his Trancers.

Things get complicated even more so for Jack when his wife (Megan Ward) returns to Los Angeles from a different time period before she was killed by Whistler. So we get some fun with Jack mixed up trying to please each wife whilst keeping everything cool. There's almost a fun cheesy situation comedy feel to the flick at times. The budget seems very low so we get more comic bits for our heroes. Like the first film Trancers 2 could've done with more action but for the low budgets of the films they are decent entertainment for what they are. I really enjoyed Trancers 1&2 but I'm not bothered about the rest of the sequels because the quality dropped massively.

Tim Thomerson is great once again as Jack Deth & his chemistry is still great with Helen Hunt.

This time the main base of evil is an insane asylum where the head of the place is Whistler's evil brother played by Villain expert Richard Lynch as Dr. Wardo. There's a bunch of B movie familiar faces scattered throughout the film, there's Jeffrey Combs, Megan Ward, Barbara Crampton & more, all game for some fun in this crazy cheesy fantasy action comedy.

Trancers 2 is simply a fun Video era B-movie piece entertainment with a nice Nostalgic feel to it with it's early 90's time period.

Charles Band made another good Trancers movie.

Trancers 2 really reminded me of the better times of the video stores & the gems you would discover there.

This is a big step down after the surprisingly enjoyable original. This sequel isn't nearly as fun as part one, and it instead spends too much time on plot development. Tim Thomerson is still the best thing about this series, but his wisecracking is toned down in this entry. The performances are all adequate, but this time the script lets us down. The action is merely routine and the plot is only mildly interesting, so I need lots of silly laughs in order to stay entertained during a "Trancers" movie. Unfortunately, the laughs are few and far between, and so, this film is watchable at best.