The Mangler 2 features a different story that makes it either a spin-off from the previous movie or just a different movie that only bears the title. It leaves aside the supernatural thing to bring us something more focused on science fiction. What we have here is a virus that infects a school's computerized security system and unleashes a disaster. It does pretty much the same thing as The Lawnmower Man, which is take a Stephen King story and turn it into something else. The only theory that could connect this movie to the previous one is that the virus is possibly the same entity that possessed the machine from the previous movie and was transcended into a virtual medium. As a movie it's another one of those cheap movies you could find in video stores during the 90s and 2000s. A generic home movie that didn't invest a lot of budget, since instead of using digital effects, everything here is practical. What attracts the most attention is the veteran Lance Henriksen who went from participating in large productions to low-budget films. The original soundtrack is pretty good with that electronic style and that includes the songs. The soundtrack is perhaps the best thing of the entire movie. The Mangler 2 is one of those bad sequels that have been made to take advantage of a well-known title, even though The Mangler was a flop at the time, but this sequel has a certain charm for those who grew up watching this type of film. My final rating for this movie is 6/10.
Review of The Mangler 2
