The 2000's were the heyday of direct-to-video sequels from almost every studio, not mattering how long it's been between films. That being said, this film has the hallmarks of your typical direct-to-video sequel, on the technical level such as basic and simple lighting and cinematography setups and the special effects are a good meh. As well as having little to no continuity with the original movie. However, this film does stand out above others of its kind and it shows within the writing, directing, and the acting.
It's not unusual to have known actors, typically B or C-list, in these types of movies but Jason Scott Lee and Thomas Ian Griffith really make this film engaging and, more importantly, watchable. The martial arts displayed is spread out so it's not relied upon too much, which makes it work and feels effective. Especially when we only get hand-to-hand in the climax between Lee and Griffith.
One thing that really surprised me was that we got to see about six different time periods. Usually with a direct-to-video movie with this concept, or any sci-fi concept, they'd want to keep it as simple as possible for budgetary reasons. Like imagine a space adventure movie on a limited budget, they'd show a very small portion of space travel and have the rest take place on Earth or an Earth-like planet to keep the budget down. But here we manage to see 1895, 1929, 1940, 1988, 2002, and 2025. Although the 1929 and 1988 periods are brief as they are ultimately part of a chase scene but the pacing of the movie made them feel significant and felt like we were there just as much as the other time periods.
Also included is a trope of time travel movies: alternate timelines that the main character goes to when going back to their present time. Neat to see but doesn't really add to the overall story. Its only purpose is getting Lee to the next time jump and giving him a new time watch to help him follow Griffith through time waves. Those scenes could've been re-written to not include alternate versions of characters because it just leaves us with questions of how it got that way and how everything got reverted back to normal in the end. But at least they were quick like time blips, perhaps that was the intention.
It really seems like the filmmakers truly tried their best with what they were given and whatever constraints they had they worked around and were creative about it.
I say this is worthy of standing on it's own. I would definitely even do a double feature with the original Timecop. Both are equal to me.
It's not unusual to have known actors, typically B or C-list, in these types of movies but Jason Scott Lee and Thomas Ian Griffith really make this film engaging and, more importantly, watchable. The martial arts displayed is spread out so it's not relied upon too much, which makes it work and feels effective. Especially when we only get hand-to-hand in the climax between Lee and Griffith.
One thing that really surprised me was that we got to see about six different time periods. Usually with a direct-to-video movie with this concept, or any sci-fi concept, they'd want to keep it as simple as possible for budgetary reasons. Like imagine a space adventure movie on a limited budget, they'd show a very small portion of space travel and have the rest take place on Earth or an Earth-like planet to keep the budget down. But here we manage to see 1895, 1929, 1940, 1988, 2002, and 2025. Although the 1929 and 1988 periods are brief as they are ultimately part of a chase scene but the pacing of the movie made them feel significant and felt like we were there just as much as the other time periods.
Also included is a trope of time travel movies: alternate timelines that the main character goes to when going back to their present time. Neat to see but doesn't really add to the overall story. Its only purpose is getting Lee to the next time jump and giving him a new time watch to help him follow Griffith through time waves. Those scenes could've been re-written to not include alternate versions of characters because it just leaves us with questions of how it got that way and how everything got reverted back to normal in the end. But at least they were quick like time blips, perhaps that was the intention.
It really seems like the filmmakers truly tried their best with what they were given and whatever constraints they had they worked around and were creative about it.
I say this is worthy of standing on it's own. I would definitely even do a double feature with the original Timecop. Both are equal to me.