Not even 10% of the original's genius

Rating: 4/10 (3 January 2011)

The original Back to the Future is a perfect movie. Brilliantly written, paced, acted, directed, and edited. There's never a dull moment, the story is great from start to finish, and the fantastical elements are never so far fetched as to break the suspension of disbelief.
Not so with the sequel.
Taken as a stand alone film, it's complex, very silly, but still entertaining. However, taken as a sequel to such a masterpiece, it's a borderline mess. The story is all over the place, needlessly complex, and incredibly silly. Michael J Fox plays himself and his kids in multiple ways, rendering several scenes as little more than ridiculous farce. The lack of the brilliant Crispin Glover as George McFly is obvious throughout too, with the various out of focus stand ins looking just awful. The movie also fails to build to any sort of climax, with it feeling throughout like a collection of random, often bizarre and unrelated sequences which seem to exist purely to show off prosthetic or split camera effects. Compared to the perfect storytelling and character arcs of the original, it's truly staggering that this script ever got approved.
If for some reason you've never seen the Back to the Future films, just see the first and skip the awful sequels.