Blade 2 (2002)

Just as Blade was Marvel’s first foray into big budget Hollywood movies, Blade 2 was Marvel’s first foray into bigger budgeted sequels, and it showed. Another important factor of this movie was the inclusion of director Guillermo del Toro. While this wasn’t his first American movie (that being the easily forgotten Mimic (1997)) it was a movie that made a lot of people take notice.

Picking up shortly after the end of the first movie, it opened just as the first one did with a fight scene. Though not nearly as cool as the rave fight, it was still very nice to have it open like this. Very quickly it became obvious that the budget for this movie was jacked up remarkably with the vampires’ lair and even Blade’s base of operations being incredibly complex compared to the predecessor. Del Toro, with help form Mike Mignola (Hellboy) as a visual consultant, and again David Goyer writing, crafted a world of stark shadows and creepy atmosphere that looked perfect.

As its own movie, Blade 2 was good, even though it was incredibly predictable that the super vampires would turn out to have been created by the vampires and what not. To me the only real plot hole was that even after Nomak succeeded in his mission, and after he claimed that he and Blade were on the same side, they still had to fight at the end instead of Nomak simply letting Blade kill him to end his suffering. They did however do a good job of not necessarily creating a romantic relationship for Blade so much as a counter point to his obsession with his mission of wiping out all vampires when Nyssa points out and honestly lives by the idea that those born as vampires didn’t have a choice to be what they are. Cheesy, yes, but also well done.

Comparing it to the first Blade however it’s a drastically different movie. The bigger budget, bigger story, bigger special effects (including costumes and weapons) moved it from looking gritty and realistic to dark and a bit sci-fi-ish. This actual alienates it from any relation to the first movie in terms of watching them back to back but does not ruin it on its own merit.

Marvel Movie Scale = 8.5

Why That?: While becoming a little more unbelievable and strange, it’s a gorgeous looking movie with again great fight scenes. It’s a fun ride, at many points not taking itself seriously and just having fun (Blade gives a soldier a stalled suplex while giving Ron Pearlman a dirty look) while at others being very serious without being overwhelming, and all without ruining each other.