Director Lee Isaac Chung keeps it tight, working from a screenplay by Mark L. Smith, story by Joseph Kosinski, and characters created by Michael Crichton & Anne-Marie Martin.
Benjamin Wallfisch's exciting score can be streamed on Apple Music, though you will probably better remember the kick-ass country songs, available on Apple Music's official playlist.
Enormous visual effects and stunt departments were utilized and we're hoping that, after The Fall Guy brought attention to it, stunts get their own Oscar category.
I recommend the trivia list on imdb. Here are a few. Due to delays from COVID and the writers' strike, some scenes were shot just a few months before the July release and post production was still working in June. The references to the Wizard of Oz in the first movie (storm vehicles called Dorothy I-IV) and this one (theirs were called Lion, Tin Man, Scarecrow, and Wizard) inspired a credit that reads, "The Wizard of Oz is still licensed by Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc." The word "twister" is never uttered in this movie. And I don't need to tell you not to click on the spoiler section of the trivia, do I?
Powell was last blogged for Hit Man, Ramos for Dumb Money, Tierney for Beautiful Boy, Chung for Minari (he was Oscar-nominated), Smith for The Midnight Sky, and Wallfisch for Blade Runner 2049. Edgar-Jones starred in all twelve episodes of Normal People, Kosinski is better known as the director of Top Gun: Maverick, and Crichton and Martin (now ex-spouses) wrote the first Twister script.
Rotten Tomatoes' critics were not blown away by this one, averaging 75%, but its audiences were, at 91. Stick around for scenes at the end of the first round of credits. We rented this on Apple TV on August 16.
