Cyborg 2 (1993)

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

The greatest movie ever made..!

Disappointment for a huge fan!

It's funny watching the elements come together in this complicated scam. On one hand, the set-up isn't quite as complex as it seems, but there's an easy sense of fun in every exchange.

In the year 2074, two rival companies, Pinwheel and Kobayashi, vie for supremacy in the cyborg-making biz. By this point in the future, cyborgs have reached amazing levels of sophistication and humanity, including having emotions. Pinwheel decides to get the edge in all this corporate intrigue by creating Casella Reese, known by the nickname Cash (Jolie). In her design, her superiors programmed in the directive to go to Kobayashi Corp. and detonate herself, wiping out the competition - permanently. A higher-up named Mercy (Palance) sees what's going on, and allows Cash, and her human love interest, Colt (Koteas) to escape. Pinwheel doesn't like this, so they send a psychotic bounty hunter named Danny Bench (Drago) to track them down. But will human-robot love conquer all in this treacherous world? The filmmakers behind Cyborg 2 decided to take a different tack from the first one, thankfully. Despite the fact that the cyborg Cash has some sort of implanted memories of Van Damme from the first outing, this particular cyborgian opus has a much different vibe than the first one. We applaud the fact that there are actually some interesting ideas at play here, not the least of which is the nature of humanity. While our normal mode of pondering such weighty questions about life would come from re-watching T-Force (1994), the injection of some much-needed intelligence scores the movie some points. As does the set design and overall look, which is relatively upmarket for a DTV sequel to an Albert Pyun-directed Van Damme movie.On the bad side, it could have used some more action. The museum fight with Karen Sheperd was way too brief and didn't live up to its potential, but overall we do get a decent amount of Jolie-Fu, which was nice. All the best scenes in the movie feature Jolie front and center, and it's easy to see why - she has an almost mesmerizing effect on the audience. That doesn't stop the pace from becoming slow at times, of course, and a lot of the cooler imagery is undercut by the dinginess of the "future". So the audience gets yanked in a bunch of different directions, which maybe was on purpose (?) - but, on top of everything else, they found time to have some Punchfighting between Koteas and Billy Drago, which moved things in the right direction.  As for Jack Palance, we're glad he's here, but for 90 percent of his "screen time" it's just that: a close-up of his mouth on a TV screen. When he does show up in the flesh, he gets by far what is the best line in the movie, so it all pays off. Why visions of him looking forlornly at his lost love were intercut with the Koteas-Jolie sex scene and not placed somewhere else isn't known, but it's oddly similar to when David Warner was intercut with a Pamela Anderson sex scene in Naked Souls (1996). That aside, there's only so much of Palance's teeth that any normal audience would want to stand.As per usual, Billy Drago is the baddie, Sven-Ole Thorsen is on hand as "Doorman" , and the computerized corporate intrigue certainly seems modeled after the Apple and Microsoft battles. Maybe one day they'll use deadly cyborgs to one-up each other. There's even a Cyborg dog - a cy-dog if you prefer - and we felt that could become a movie in its own right. Tailor-made for the pay channels of the day, this could have played on Cinemax in the mid-90's right before Nemesis (1992) and right after American Cyborg:Steel Warrior (1993). It all comes to a surprisingly sweet and touching ending. I guess you never know what to expect from the Pinwheel Corporation.Director Schroeder also was the man behind Damned River (1989) and went on to do the third and final Cyborg movie, Cyborg 3: The Recycler (1994), the following year. Yes, there is a cyborg trilogy. As the main star, a young Jolie is certainly easier to look at than Van Damme, and we appreciated a lot about the overall production, but, as usual, a little more action in the mix would most likely have given the reputation of Cyborg 2 a brighter future.

For some reason I never got around to watch the first "Cyborg" movie, the one from 1989 starring Jean Claude Van Damme. It just always reeked of low budget, and thus I avoided it as if it was on fire. I didn't know that they had made a part two and three to the movie, before I stumbled upon "Cyborg 2: Glass Shadow" by sheer random luck, and now saw that there is a "Cyborg 3: The Recycler" as I looked up "Cyborg 2: Glass Shadow" here on IMDb.If the first movie is anywhere near as catastrophic as this second movie is, then I have been avoiding it for a good reason. Because, while this sequel has Elias Koteas and Angelina Jolie in it, as well as the iconic voice of Jack Palance, then the movie was a shambled mess of a chaotic movie trying to make sense.The story is about cyborg Casella Reese (played by Angelina Jolie) whom is carrying a high-explosive compound inside her, as she is designed to be the ultimate espionage cyborg. With the assistance of Colton Ricks (played by Elias Koteas), the renegade cyborg is freed into the chaotic world outside the confines of the PinWheel corporation.Right, well I am sure that the storyline worked well enough on paper and for the ones who wrote it. But it didn't really translate all that well on the screen. I found the movie to be a somewhat cluster of random scenes put together in order to achieve a wholesome end result. But it wasn't successful.I felt my interest in the storyline dwindle quite shortly into the movie, and director Michael Schroeder failed to lead me back on track, because the movie never progressed into something that had any real interest in terms of an attractive storyline.The acting in the movie was actually good, despite the talents having virtually nothing to work with.As for the special effects, which are quite important in order for a Sci-Fi movie to prove effective, then the special effects department that worked on "Cyborg 2: Glass Shadow" didn't really achieve anything worthwhile, impressive or memorable. And for a futuristic movie, then I was really amazed with what had to be a very antique phone booth with a rotary wheel dial standing in a junk yard, fully functional and operational, and requiring no coins or other payments to use.After having seen part two, then I still feel discouraged from actually sitting down and watching the original 1989 "Cyborg" movie, despite having it in my DVD collection. And I am even less interested in watching part three after this disastrous movie."Cyborg 2: Glass Shadow" scores a mere three out of ten stars here from me, and I do feel very generous with that rating.

It's the year 2074 and corporate warfare dominates. The PinWheel corporation creates cyborg Casella 'Cash' Reese (Angelina Jolie) to infiltrate the rival corporation and self-detonate using a new explosive called Glass Shadow. Colton 'Colt' Ricks (Elias Koteas) is her human trainer. The mysterious Mercy (Jack Palance) helps them escape. PinWheel leader Martin Dunn is a double agent who intends to get Cash for the Japanese. He sends Cyborg Tracker Danny Bench as well as Japanese cyborg Chen.At least the original has Van Damme fighting. It was still not a good movie. This has even less. Jolie is hot but limited in action. The whole style is a cheesy vibe with a disembodied Palance on the TV screens. There is a lot of overacting. It's pretty boring with a feel of cheap futuristic sci-fi.

This low-budget movie attempts to cash in on the "cyborg" fad created by Terminator 2 a few years before it. Okay, so I am a big fan of Jack Palance. I've seen City Slickers 2 and Tango and Cash (see username) at least 100 times. This movie isn't quite as good, but it still has ol' JP in it, and is therefore worth seeing. Three best parts of this movie:Angelina Jolie is a smokin' hot 18-year-old cyborg. The guy that plays Casey Jones in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movies is in this. Jack Palance is in fine form, being weird, and saying weird stuff (insert *irregular breathing* here).Other than that it's really cheesy - which I hope you expected, watching a movie called "Cyborg 2."Two questions about this movie: 1. Who is the Asian guy with vampire teeth who yells and holds money during the fighting scene? 2. What the hell happens in the end? Where are they? Is that a house? And who is the old guy in the last shot of the movie?4/10