Hunting Season Continues

Rating: 9/10 (21 September 2018)

Guillermo Del Toro steps into the director's seat and takes over for "Blade II." Seeing has how Del Toto is a visionary; it's not hard to figure out why this sequel is superior to the original "Blade." "Blade" was a rollercoaster ride of high-octane action and gory vampire violence, but "Blade II" takes it to new levels, and we learn a little more about this mysterious hunter they call the "Daywalker."
It about half human half vampire, Blade (Wesley Snipes), who finds himself up against a new mutated strain of vampires called "Reapers." When the vampire lords realize they can't combat the creatures, they turn to Blade for help. Of course, Blade is reluctant, at first, but he decides the Reapers are a greater evil. With new weapons and gadgetry, he strikes an uneasy truce and teams up with his sworn enemies, the Blood Pack, before the Reapers take over and drive humankind and the Vampires into extinction.
It opens in a blood bank in Prague. I sense this is not the place you want to go to give blood. It seems dank and unclean. Not to mention the doctor has what looks like a Freddy Krueger glove. Before everyone in the blood clinic gets slaughtered, a character who remains a mystery looks at the camera, and we get a quick glimpse that he is a different type of vampire before the camera cuts to black. These new vampires called "Reapers" are quite a fresh design. Guillermo Del Toro's imagination knows no limits, and it shows.
Blade prowled the streets in the original film like a lonely warrior but now finds himself against all the odds as he must take on the reapers and keep the vampires on their feet because he is smarter than they think. Wesley Snipes is still convincing as Blade. He's intelligent, aware of his surroundings and cracks jokes in his sarcastic ways but can again blow something up if he wanted to and make the body parts fly. He seems to be much stronger and more prominent than before, and this proves when he puts up a big fight against two vampires that get sent to retrieve him and deliver a message. They tell him - "You have been our worst enemy, but now there is something else on the streets worse than you!"
He was raised from childhood by Whistler (Kris Kristofferson), who trained him to fight the vampires and kept his vampirism in check with an injection of some sorts. Whistler returns in this film, now rescued from a tank harvesting his blood and revived with a retro injection of some sort. Snipes is more agile as Blade this time around. He is older, wiser and still uncertain about himself. With this new threat of the "Reapers," Whistler designs the new UV weapons when they examine a dead Reaper and discover a stake will not piece its heart due to it surrounded by bone. He also gets a lot of flack as being the old hillbilly and berates Blade's new assistant, Scud (Norman Reedus), for screwing up the operation he started years before.
Del Toro crafts a visceral and well-made film filled with gorgeous special effects, high production and, of course, more blood, gore and extreme violence to fill a bucket. Make no mistake, "Blade II" is a brutally, intense film and not for kids. It's twice as violent and disturbing as the original. Usually, I would say something about the violence levels being that extreme, but it works well for the film because most will want to see Wesley Snipes pounding on the vampires and watching them scream or run. It's entertaining to watch the Vampires/Reapers suffer in gory defeat. No one is safe from Blade's new weapons and gadgets when his iconic sword starts cutting through everything in its path and his guns rip everything to shreds.
Most of the second act is Blade chasing after Jared Nomak, the vampire who created the "Reapers." They are quite an exciting concept. They are pale white, have a three-way jaw with sucker-like tentacles, and they feed on both vampires and humans. They also have some sort-of scar running down their chins that turn out to be an opening for their mouth, like a clef. Therefore, Blade's usual weapons do not work as well and use the UV lights to combat the creatures when Blade decides to go into the sewers to take them out.
You can almost bet there will be a "Blade III." I am not sure what kind of vampire they can design, but I am interested to see it because of the high-quality Del Toro brought to this film. He doesn't rely on a lot of computer effects. You can see some are when Blade is climbing on a wall, but for the most part, he delivers a well-made film. Some will be turned off by the extreme violence, but if you liked "Blade," I can't see how you are not going to be thrilled after seeing this. It improves on everything the original did. I left out the Bloodpack Vampires for a reason. There is not much to say with them. One holds a revelation we see coming in the second act. There are two revelations, actually, but it's better to see them, but don't be surprised by it..