Overall Rating: 58.4
"Taken 2" seems to find the lowest common denominators from the original film and regurgitate them for the sequel. It's got most of the same players, the same "don't mess with Liam Neeson" vibe, but is missing one key element that made the first film so memorable: a story.
"Taken 2" picks up shortly after the events of the first film, where Bryan Mills (Neeson) has safely recovered and returned his daughter (Grace) home from sex slave kidnappers. However, in getting his daughter back Mills left a trail of dead bad guys along the way, and the family members of those baddies want revenge. While on a job in Istanbul, Mills and his family encounter this new batch of baddies and another all out revenge-war takes place.
Mills uses his standard black-ops bag of tricks to evade, pursue, and defeat the poor schlub who happens to be standing in his way. While in the first film, we learn just how deadly Mills can be and are regularly surprised by just how innovative he is, already knowing all of that makes the second film less exciting and more predictable. The joy of the first film was seeing just how far a man could push himself to protect his family. The main road block for a character in the sequel seems to be the daughter learning to drive (and seriously, how old is Kim supposed to be, 18? Maggie Grace's actual age of 29? So many questions).
Another part of the film that flops miserably is the dialogue and delivery from the actors. Even bending reality to the point where Mills has a chance to call his daughter to deliver another "bad ass I kill people for a living" speech while 6 armed men point guns at him and don't bother to interrupt him at any point (what?), the effort put into the words spoken and the way they play out just feels forced and contrived.
Despite seemingly having nowhere to go after the first film, I still feel that there was somehow plenty left on the table for "Taken 2". It shills itself out as a film shamelessly cashing a few checks from the success of its predecessor, and ends up a pile of rubbish.
Individual Ratings
Enjoyment Factor: 5
Dialogue: 4
Acting: 5
Direction: 6
Audio/Visual: 6
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