The Nosferatu Slayers

Rating: 10/10 (29 March 2013)

Actress N'Bushe Wright didn't reprise her role as Karen in director Guillermo del Toro's "Blade II," but Wesley Snipes and Kris Kristofferson are back for this blood-drenched, action-packed vampire slaying epic. The vampires exploit their own in this surprise-laden tale of complicity, duplicity, and heroism. The opening moments of this ramped-up sequel recount Blade's creation. He begins his narration of the past with the line: "Forget what you think you know." Blade has been searching for Whistler, the man who raised him and taught him how to control his affliction and live with it. Whistler was beaten up by the fangsters in the original "Blade" and he has become one of them in this pugnacious but swiftly-paced sequel. "Blade II" is comparable to "Aliens" in franchise terms. "Blade: Trinity" followed and qualified as a major disappointment, with few of the surprises and cool action scenes of the previous "Blade" outings.
This time around, for the sake of brevity, the Vampire Nation approaches Blade to establish a truce. The ruling Vampire Overlord, Eli Damaskinos (Thomas Kretschmann of "Wanted"), offers a truce because they have identified a greater enemy than Blade. The new enemy are called 'Reapers." Jared Nomak (Luke Goss of "Death Race 2") has started a one-man war on the fangsters. Worse, when a Reaper (whose elaborately lethal jaw splits into three pieces when it strikes) attacks, its poison doesn't kill the victim. Instead, it turns them into Reapers. As one of the vampire leaders points out to Blade, "These things are like crack addicts. They need to feed daily." The always suspicious Blade decides to team up with the Vampire Nation and joins a unit known as 'the Bloodpack." Moments later Blade is informed that the Bloodpack was formed to destroy him. The Bloodpack consists of Priest (Tony Curran of "Gladiator"), Asad (Danny John-Jules of "Red Dwarf"), Snowman (Donny Yen of "Iron Monkey"), Chupa (Matt Schulze of "The Fast and the Furious"), Verlaine (Norwegian actress Marit Velle Kile), Lighthammer (Daz Crawford of "Snitch"), Reinhardt (Ron Pearlman of "Hellboy"), and Nyssa (Leonor Varela of "Texas Rangers"), and they've been training for two years to take on Blade.
Del Toro stages some exciting action scenes in the sewer of Prague. "Blade II" looks great, and it takes the franchise to a higher level that "Trinity" couldn't rival. Snipes was born to play Blade!