Not as good as the original, but not awful either

Rating: 5/10 (6 January 2013)

Bryan Mills' life seems to have taken an upswing after the events that unfolded in the 2008 hit 'Taken'. He has a better relationship with his ex-wife and daughter, his career seems to be picking up better, and he seems happier than he seemed in the beginning of Taken. However, the relatives of the villains he took out in France plans to take revenge. This plan comes to fruition once Bryan brings his family to Istanbul for a vacation. Bryan and his wife are kidnapped, and he has to instruct his daughter to locate him using improvised plans and improbable mental calculations.
When I first heard that the movie was around Bryan talking his daughter through to tracking him down, I was disappointed. Taken was a highly improbable, but thoroughly gripping movie about Bryan's shoot-up- everyone-and-follow-the-body-trail-to-his-daughter strategy of investigation, and Liam Neeson is able to portray the hidden bad-ass like few others. But pushing the action to the daughter just took my interest down by several notches. Also, the reviews I got from friends were very negative. But I have to say that I enjoyed the movie well enough. It didn't have the pace or grip of the original movie, but it does decently well on its own. It's not a brilliant movie, but it doesn't qualify as a bad movie. It's worth a watch. (Hey. not making sense doesn't make it a bad movie, does it?)
One nitpick - The first poster I saw for 'Taken 2' had the tag-line "They want revenge. They chose the wrong guy". No, if they want revenge, they definitely chose the right guy. They can't call for revenge against Bryan Mills and choose someone else to target. But I think that would be a decent premise. You know, some group of radicals are taking up revenge against a common man for... I don't know, something petty like cutting the villain off at an intersection. The villains mix it up and accidentally targets Bryan Mills for revenge. Of course, among rapidly piling bodies, they find out too late that they bit off more than they could chew. They can call it "Taken 3: MisTaken". Hollywood - consider that one a gift.