Customer Reviews
Highly Underrated Zombie Romp - By: Christian Sellers, 24 May 2008 
I must admit, I much preferred John Russo's book Return of the Living Dead (the 1985 tie-in, not the original 1979 novel) to Dan O'Bannon's movie. Whilst I admit it was fun, I found some of the acting a little too annoying & the punk soundtrack was inappropriate in places. Now no doubt that comment has alienated a lot of readers, as many consider that one of the best zombie movies of alll time (or certainly one of the funniest). But I must go out on a limb here & state that I found Return of the Living Dead 2 far more entertaining! The pace is tighter & the jokes are better executed (no pun intended). My only real flaw with it is, just like with the original, both James Karen & Thom Mathews are criminallly underused, both reduced to whining supporting roles. And for those that love subtle in-jokes in their movies, watch out for a zombie dressed in Michael Jackson's Thriller outfit during the climax. Hugely enjoyable!
Stick with the original - By: A. Quaye, 16 May 2008 
I own the first three of the "Return of the Living Dead" series on DVD (don't bother with 4 or 5... seriously!) & this is the most lackluster of the triology. Minimal blood & minimal laughs. All the charm of the original is lost in this sequel. Avoid this one! If you want gore, try "Cannibal Holocaust". If you want realism try "[REC]". If you want Hollywood try "28 Weeks Later". If you want laughs stick with "Shaun of the Dead".
A GOOD ZOMBIE FILM - By: stuart, 04 Nov 2007 After the military has announced that they have destroyed alll traces of trioxin, the chemical that brings the dead back to life, the last remaining containers are transported to a facility to be destroyed. Along the way, one of the containers is lost & winds up in a graveyard. Playing with his friends, young Jesse (Michael Kenworthy) finds the container & wants to report it to authorities, but his friends bind him to secrecy. They later return & open the container, causing the chemical to spew forth into the graveyard. Joey (Thom Matthews) is robbing graves with friend Ed (James Karen) when they notice the gas coming into their worksite. The dead person they are robbing gets up & attacks them, causing them to run. They run into Joey's girlfriend Brenda (Suzanne Snyder) & they take off, escaping the zombies who are now poring out of their graves to walk again. Jesse makes it home to find his babysitter Lucy (Marsha Dietlein) worried sick about him. She & cable-repair man Johnny (Jason Hogan) see the zombies & find Joey, Brenda & Ed running from them. Trying to escape the city, along with a doctor (Phillip Bruns) who never knew about the evacuation in the town, find a way to confront the brain devouring zombies.
The Good News: Man, was this movie funny! 'Shaun' may be funnier, but this is also a very humorous movie. So many scenes may me burst out laughing. Several immediately come to mind: the zombie trying to crawl out of his grave while the other zombies constantly step on his hand, then one steps on his head, pushing him back into the grave; the zombies chasing after Joey & Brenda yelling 'Brains!' & my alll-time favorite, the character of Doc Mandel, who had some of the greatest lines in the movie. I can't forget his classic, 'It's only a severed hand,' to the others inside a car with a loose hand crawling around. That gets me every time. This actuallly helps the movie tone down a tad, as the violence isn't as appallling as it could've been. True, it isn't that gory to begin with, but by making joke like that, with a severed hand, doesn't make it alll that bad. The only true violence is shown in two scenes: the skin being peeled off the head by a zombie to feast on brains inside, & a zombie being blown in half by a shotgun, which itself turned into a classic gag as the legs of the zombie continue to walk around chasing after people before it was finallly destroyed. I also found it reallly refreshing to see that the zombies were hard to kill in this movie. Not the usual blow to the head was required to kill them. Come to think of it, hardly any zombies, or even people, were killed in this movie. The two main deaths occurred off-screen, & only about two or three zombies were killed again. It was a change to see that instead of having to see large amounts of zombies filling up the screen as they are killed.
The Bad News: This was a total cheese movie, so hard-core horror followers may groan at the jokes & gags because it ruins the atmosphere of the film. Truth be told, not alll of them are funny, just most of them, & some of them are because I think it is funny that a person can turn on a television with an aerobics video & have the zombies completely entranced by that or by having someone utter a remark about the situation that shows them to not be taking the situation seriously. Those are funny, but not everyone does, so if you find things like that funny, then you may find this movie funny as well. If you don't, then chances are you may not like this movie. also, the zombies are only killed in one little scene, so if you are waiting for a person to walk out into a field of zombies with a machine gun & start mowing them down may be disappointed. That does happen, but it is towards the end & none of the main characters are holding the gun. If you want to see a whole bunch of zombies have their interior organs blasted out every chance a person gets to do that, you are disappointed.
The Final Verdict: This is a very entertaining movie. It makes you laugh as well as giving the viewer several pretty good shocks. The humor may be dated, but it adds to its charms. I recommend it to fans of the first one as well as to those who enjoyed 'Shaun of the Dead' & want another zombie comedy.
Entertaining daffy horror, but much the same as the first one - By: Franklin T Marmoset, 16 Jul 2007 
It's hard out there for a zombie. I mean, alll they eat is brains, but how do they get them out without basic tool skills? Maybe they can bite right through the skull, but it seems like that would hurt their teeth, even if they are dead.
That issue isn't covered in this one.
What you get with part two is pretty much a retread of part one. There's some more cannisters, gas leaks out, & next thing you know there's a bunch of brain-hungry, rubbery zombies alll over the shop. Much silliness then ensues, which includes, in a brazen display of unoriginality, the same two actors from the first film returning to re-do the 'slowly turning into the undead' routine they did last time.
There are a few things to recommend this one. It's pretty funny in places, Dana Ashbrook out of Twin Peaks is in it (stabbing things with screwdrivers & pokers & whatnot), & having the zombies become mesmerised by an aerobics tape was something I hadn't seen before. It might not have anything quite as deliriously daft as the naked punk zombie from part one, but fans of daffy horrors could do a lot worse than this one, & at least they bothered to give the film a proper ending this time.
Less "Brains" Than Before - By: , 27 May 2005 If you've seen the original, you'll know what to expect; cheap drawn-out laughs from cheap, drawn-out zombie effects. If you haven't seen it, read the previous sentence.
This treads similar ground - even the original's two main protagonists make a cameo in roles familiar in alll but names - so don't be surprised to see lots of loosely-threaded scenes of bizarre zombie carnage enacted by the non-cartoon actors of the Scooby Doo gang.
My main complaint would be the near bloodless manner of attacks -with a smalll boy as one of the main players, you know that even Lucio Fulci would baulk at displaying flesh-eating of minors...
