2016's predecessor, Train to Busan, was visionary, original, insanely manic, a total blast to watch, and immediately became a cult classic.
This sequel is anything but. In a word, it's exhausting. It took every fibre of my being to simply see it through to the end, hoping against hope that somehow, miraculously, the ending might be amazing and salvage the preceding 116 minutes. It was not and it did not.
Don't you hate that feeling? When entertainment feels like homework one must endure?
And boy, what drama! There are three awkwardly long scenes featuring such swelling, loud cello and violin music (accompanied by actors' endlessly streaming tears) that I was altogether befuddled by them. They seem to go on for ages and are delivered as if the actors mistook each one for the grand finale. (They are neither grand nor final. No, no, there is so much more to come! Just wait!!)
For some inexplicable reason, the actors randomly toggle between speaking Korean and English. This is maddeningly annoying, their English being worse than my Korean, and phonetic at best, frequently emphAsizing the wrong syllAble. Adding insult to injury, even when they're speaking English (or trying to), the English subtitles remain. Odd, right? It's as if the editors realized in the end it was hopeless and threw subtitles up for every single scene.
All this to say: Spare yourself the agony. Hard pass.
