Genre: Action with Fantasy Elements
Premise: A young unlikely hero has to rescue a rare artifact and has a love interest in the cute, pretty girl he sometimes runs into at work.
Writer: W.D. Richter (original Big Trouble in Little China, but also Needful Things-1978's Invasion of the Body Snatchers and the abysmal Home for the Holidays)
About: This has been in development for a very long time and considering it was written by the original screenwriter, I'd think it was just an attempt to capitalize upon the original film's success.
If you've ever see a John Carpenter interview, the odds are very probable he's made a reference to possibly doing a Big Trouble sequel. If he's been planning to shoot off a script like this one, it's a good thing he hasn't. In fact, the more I think about this script, the more I realize the writers just pumped out a sequel quickly in an attempt to live up to the original film's hype. This was a very miscalculated venture, though. There's this idea reiteratted through the scri'ts dialogue that the visible part of Chinatown is just the tip of the iceberg that once you penetrate the facade of store front windows and discount laundries, there's a dangerous underground network. Only this time the ride is a little less enchanting, magical, and unusual. Ultimately, Big Trouble 2 becomes a pretty straight send up of an action film. By the end of the film, I forgot I was watching a series at all or anything distinguished by loveable traits. I thought I was just watching a straight up action film. Also, it seems to have taken the Kurt Douglas storyline and just replaced it with a teenage audience, which if you can't tell is a very cheap gimmick.
Furthermore, there's another much more dangerous element to the film: its inaccurate depictions of Asians which barely slid by in the 1980's and would meet an ultimate certain death if ever done again. This film doesn't even attempt to make a sense, depth or logic to its cast of Asian warlocks and kung fu masters. And while this karate style film was once a genre, it's a genre that died because it's a highly offensive one to certain groups.
Premise: A young unlikely hero has to rescue a rare artifact and has a love interest in the cute, pretty girl he sometimes runs into at work.
Writer: W.D. Richter (original Big Trouble in Little China, but also Needful Things-1978's Invasion of the Body Snatchers and the abysmal Home for the Holidays)
About: This has been in development for a very long time and considering it was written by the original screenwriter, I'd think it was just an attempt to capitalize upon the original film's success.
If you've ever see a John Carpenter interview, the odds are very probable he's made a reference to possibly doing a Big Trouble sequel. If he's been planning to shoot off a script like this one, it's a good thing he hasn't. In fact, the more I think about this script, the more I realize the writers just pumped out a sequel quickly in an attempt to live up to the original film's hype. This was a very miscalculated venture, though. There's this idea reiteratted through the scri'ts dialogue that the visible part of Chinatown is just the tip of the iceberg that once you penetrate the facade of store front windows and discount laundries, there's a dangerous underground network. Only this time the ride is a little less enchanting, magical, and unusual. Ultimately, Big Trouble 2 becomes a pretty straight send up of an action film. By the end of the film, I forgot I was watching a series at all or anything distinguished by loveable traits. I thought I was just watching a straight up action film. Also, it seems to have taken the Kurt Douglas storyline and just replaced it with a teenage audience, which if you can't tell is a very cheap gimmick.
Furthermore, there's another much more dangerous element to the film: its inaccurate depictions of Asians which barely slid by in the 1980's and would meet an ultimate certain death if ever done again. This film doesn't even attempt to make a sense, depth or logic to its cast of Asian warlocks and kung fu masters. And while this karate style film was once a genre, it's a genre that died because it's a highly offensive one to certain groups.
So, I'm not sure how it'd be done, but if John Carptenter ever decided to shoot a Big Trouble sequel, it'd have to be very far removed from this type of storyline, find a way to keep the Chinatown element and not be racially offensive, and still be as wonderous and magical as the original film (which itself seemed to run out of steam about three quarters of the way through). As such, it's no wonder this script has indefinitely hit the Hollywood backburner.
Scooby Doo (Complete Crap)
[X] Atilla (Poor, Few Redeeming Qualities)
Wedding Crashers (Mediocre)
Hot Rod (Good)
Definitely Maybe (Pretty Darn Good)
Isla Roles: No Isla certified roles here!
Tip: This thing is written in 5 Acts. Don't sweat, it's still around a 100 pages. I've never seen this done before in a screenplay, and while it's against formality, I pretty much enjoyed it. By breaking the film into segments it was easier to savor what was happening.
Tip: This thing is written in 5 Acts. Don't sweat, it's still around a 100 pages. I've never seen this done before in a screenplay, and while it's against formality, I pretty much enjoyed it. By breaking the film into segments it was easier to savor what was happening.
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