Didn't go in with high expectations, came out slightly disappointed

Rating: 2/10 (11 October 2012)

Taken, the original was good. This sequel however, was not. It may have been the ~3 year gap since I remember seeing Taken, or that the novelty of chasing through streets and missing people has worn off.
This movie produced more laughs in the theater than expected. Keep in mind that it is release day here in NZ. Parts that were not supposed to be funny, were. To keep this as spoiler free as I can, I'll try not to mention them.
The audience was ready to shout out "PICK UP THE PHONE ALREADY" when the daughter was Skyping her boyfriend poolside, where Bryan was being captured. But lets go on with the movie, and later we find that the mother is being tortured. The scene was dragged out from a soft case which contained a knife, scissors, needles and all sorts of tools, but nope, just cut the fabric on the shirt, that'll make the audience cringe.
Which brings me to the fight scenes. Not enough blood, and the deaths were rather censored. Me, along with the whole audience laughed when Neeson 'killed' an assailant by 'swiping his elbow over the guy's neck'. Some realism thanks. Also, who goes 1v1 man style when you're trying to save your wife? Cue cliché podium fight, hand to hand combat. I wanted to yell "Just take the freaking cheap shot, no one cares".
There was no plot development either, just "I NEED TO FIND SAVE MY WIFE, DAUGHTER, HELP ME BY DRAWING ATTENTION TO YOURSELF WITH GRENADES". Characters were not really developed, so Taken 1 fans understood most parts, whereas the person next to me who hadn't seen it had to ask me about it.
All in all, not a great movie, would probably wait for a DVD copy from the local video rental store if you were going to watch it. The 94 minutes was not worth the money.