[Lake Placid 2]
Plot:With the baby crocs seen at the end of the first film now all grown up, the sleepy little town of "Lake Placid" now faces a whole new set of problems.

Cast: John Schneider, Cloris Leachman, Sam McMurray, Sarah Lafleur, Alicia Ziegler, Justin Urich, Ian Reed Kesler, Terence H. Winkless, Chad Collins, Joe Holt, Jonas Talkington, Andrea Enright, VJ Kewl, Robert Blush.

My Thoughts: Everything that "Lake Placid" wasn't....and not in a good way.

Review:Call me crazy, call me niaeve, or just call me plain stupid. But even though it was a sequel to "Lake Placid"...the best killer croc movie ever made (in my opinion)...I still should've known that the words "SCI-FI Original Picture" attached to "Lake Placid 2" meant disaster in the making. In "Lake Placid 2"...those pesky crocodiles are at it again, snacking on the locals, eating people alive..you know..the usual man-eating croc hobbies. When a rash of disappearances begin to happen in or around the aforementioned Lake...the town sheriff (John Schnieder) begins to investigate the situation and discovers that a giant croc resides in the lake. But how can this be...when the last time we saw the original crocodile from "Lake Placid" it was strapped to a truck, pumped full of tranquilzers, and being driven out of town? Well for those who saw the first film..you'd know that there were four baby crocs that showed up at the end. Er go, those babies have now grown up and are hungry as hell. The only problem?? They're CGI! Which is exactly where this film went wrong, orshould I say one of the areas where it went wrong. What made "Lake Placid" so awesome was actual fx was used to create this monstrous crocodile and it was quite a sight to see on screen. In the sequel, as with most SCI-FI original pics....total CGI was used to create all four crocodiles. And trust me, this isn't good or decent looking CGI...it's CGI of the worst variety. The crocs barely look real in this picture, that's how bad it is. Then there are the characters, which are basically all carbon copies of the characters from the first "Lake Placid". Schnieder's character is a poor man's version of Bill Pullman's from the first movie. While the films lead actress is a poor woman's version of Bridget Fonda's character from the original. She even has the whole "humanity towards the killer crocodiles" schtick rehearsed pretty well also. Joining the two of them is a professional game hunter and his sidekick. The hunter is even a mix of Brendan Gleeson and Oliver Platt's characters from the original "Lake Placid". You see where I'm going with this right? A total lack of character development period. All of the adult characters of the movie are basically poor takes of the far better fleshed out and written characters from "Lake Placid". There's even Cloris Leachman who plays a way over the top doppleganger of Betty White's character Delores. Only she's alot less heavy on the foul language and alot more heavy on the psychotic behavior which includes luring unsuspecting visitors to her home to the edge of the dock in front of her house as a meal for the crocodiles who she refers to as "her babies". To make matters worse, she's also been feeding them meat full of growth hormones. Although Leachman's character does provide a laugh or two along the way, it ultimately gets annoying really quickly when people keep falling for it. But what would a sequel be without teenagers, annoying, cliche, teenagers. Your typical kids who find themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time and end up croc food in the end. Yep....this extremely subpar followup even has them, and except for one of the girls in the group...you'll be wishing death upon these braindead kids really quick. I know I was, although I wasn't sure whether it was because of the lack of character development, their extremely poor decision making when faced with life or death situations, or the fact that they were just so damn annoying. Maybe it was all of the above. If there's anything good to be taken from this movie it's a few of the deaths (human and crocodile alike) which are so ludicrous and campy you can't help but laugh. I was actually surprised to see John Schnieder in his film though. While I am not an avid watcher of "Smallville"....I know he plays on that show, and you'd think he wouldn't need to lower himself to starring in fodder like this considering he must be getting paid atleast a modest wage for his work as Clark Kent's father. Then again...maybe not? At any rate, "Lake Placid 2" is a must avoid for anyone who values their senses or eyesight. I recommend doing what Liz and Mike did at the end of "Phantasm 2"...tell yourself it's all just a dream, and go watch "Lake Placid" instead.

Positives: A few funny deaths, Leachman's character is funny from time to time.

Negatives: Bad acting, bad script, CGI crocs, stupid characters, I could go on for hours.

Overall:Awful.....simply awful.





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