YMMV / Airplane II: The Sequel

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• Contested Sequel: Driven hard by the fact that no member of the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker production trio has any desire to watch the sequel.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The scenes involving airport security after news reports involving inappropriate behavior or ineptitude by the security officials (what would now be the TSA).
  • The Catholic priest is reading a magazine called "Altar Boy", which is implied to have erotic content. This was already dark humor in 1982, but after various revelations of child molestation committed by the Catholic clergy, the joke becomes much darker.
  • The crack about President Reagan going senile, since he ultimately did end up with Alzheimer's disease.
  • The plot involving a bomb on a Pan Universe shuttle became a little less funny a few years later when a Pan Am flight fell victim to the same thing.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • One scene shows a scanner generating naked pictures of passengers...similar to the scanners of today.
  • The Rocky XXXVIII poster (done in the style of the Rocky III poster) in light of all the Rocky sequels and three Creed movies. And, Stallone is still making movies, and in great shape!
• Memetic Mutation: When a TV interview guest goes off on a completely irrelevant political rant, the station's sign-language interpreter rolls her eyes and starts making a "jerk-off" motion. A clip of this bit is sometimes posted on internet forums in reaction to similar (perceived) diatribes.
• One-Scene Wonder:
  • Numerous people pop in for quick cameos.
  • William Shatner essentially plays Zapp Branigan a decade before Futurama with Buck Murdock. Many people believe the movie would have been dramatically improved if they'd made him the star instead.
• Retroactive Recognition: George Wendt has a small bit part at the start of the film as a baggage handler.
• Sequelitis: Neither Jim Abrahams nor the Zuckers were involved; many of the jokes and plot were recycled. In the commentary for the first film, they admit they have never even seen this one.
• So Okay, It's Average: Besides some genuinely funny moments, such as the courtroom scene and William Shatner's performance, there's really not much that sticks out compared to the first film.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: With Leslie Nielsen not returning as Dr. Rumack, John Vernon was cast as the similar Dr. Stone. Like Nielsen, Vernon was a Saskatchewan native, and he also had a knack for being Comically Serious, which led him to also transition from drama to comedy later in his career. Their voices sound remarkably similar as well.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: While Airplane II: The Sequel spends most of its time simply rehashing the first film's zany tone and famous jokes, when it gets into a rhythm and style of its own, it has quite a few funny, clever moments. If only the studio had let Ken Finkleman put his own stamp on the material rather than have him try to copy ZAZ.
• Unintentional Period Piece: Where to start? From the complete lack of security checkpoints to smoking on airplanes to airlines that actually serve meals. Flying to the moon sure has changed.

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