Customer Reviews

Inspector Gadget 2

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

in many ways,i thought this movie was not as good as the 1st.yes,it is
truer to the animated show in many respects.in fact,id say it is too
true to the cartoon.in this case,the cartoon does not translate too
well into live action.in the 1st,they veered away from the cartoon
quite a bit and that worked for me.in this movie, "Dr Claw" seemed way
too over the top and not in a good way.the character sounded more
stupid than anything.i think they tried too hard to make him seem evil
and instead made him a caricature.the henchmen were dimwitted,just like
the cartoon,but that seemed to work in this movie.most of the humour is
of the type that young kids would find funny,but most adults probably
wouldn't.as for the title character,i found he was was too idiotic(it
worked in the cartoon,but not here),at 1st,but after awhile he became
somewhat endearing.there are few things a liked about the movie.i liked
the fact that Penny had a bigger role to play,and i also liked the fact
that Gadget had some competition/decent romantic
interest.overall,though,i didn't think this movie measured up to the
original,though it had its moments.for me "Inspector Gadget 2" is a
3/5

A little known tidbit about the history of Philadelphia: Channel 48, once known under the call letters WKBS, liquidated their assets in 1983 due to increasing problems with their transmitter lease. The station signed off on August 29 -- but not before going out with a bang. Using the last of their resources, their final half-hour was used to broadcast the first episode of a never-before-seen cartoon, one that would serve to change, in it's own small way, the cultural landscape of America.

That cartoon was Inspector Gadget. (Incidentally, a Google search of the program's airdates lists the earliest known broadcast of the series as September 5, 1983. Channel 48 may not have bothered to log it's final program to the FCC -- but trust me, I was there. They had it first.)

The continuing adventures of the bumbling cybernetic detective hold a special place in my heart because of this strange and fateful day. Channel 48 was a beloved station -- for many of my school years they broadcast Pink Panther for two hours every day(!) as well as such wonderous cult 'toons as Tenessee Tuxedo. It was a crushing blow to my young heart to bid farewell to that old, treasured friend, but their maverick decision to end with the very first broadcast of Gadget was an fond, fitting tribute.

I watched Gadget on Channel 17, who picked it up the following year, religiously. Often I would rush home from school, determined not to miss the antics of the robotic constable, the case-cracking skills of his behind-the-scenes niece Penny and her dog Brain, and the sinister growl of the menacing Doctor Claw: "I'LL GET YOU NEXT TIME, GADGET!"

So it was with a deep and abiding love that, when I spotted this film on the used DVD rack at my local record shop, I gladly forked over the twelve bucks to revisit my childhood one last time.

But instead, I ended up feeling like my inner child had been spanked and sent to bed without dinner. Dear Lord, this movie is terrible. Really, truly, terrible. Not a single redeeming quality about it. French Stewart may be the worst comedic actor known to humanity, accurately desribed by a friend of mine as "Like Kramer from Seinfeld, except not funny" -- I honestly think Carrot Top would have been a better choice, and I HATE Carrot Top. And though Eliane Hendrix provides that safe Disney level of mildly enticing sex appeal, her patently robotic acting is only barely forgiven by the fact that, well, she's LITERALLY playing a robot. And that incessantly unfunny car! Can we please have a modern comedy which doesn't try to infect some form of satirically cliched, urbanized Chris Rock Lite stupidity into it? Tupac is rolling over in his grave right now!

It's terrible. Disney has once again ruined the beloved characters of literary history, as they did with Hercules, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, and the Little Mermaid. Maybe I'm reaching a little there by putting Gadget in such notable, royal company, but if in my passion I take such liberties, I beg you all to forgive me my indulgence -- certainly it's not nearly as insulting as the liberty that Eisner and company have taken in turning our favorite stories into Technicolored tripe.

When none of the original actors return to make a sequel except the voice of a talking car, you know something has to be wrong with the script. In this case, you'd be correct. French Stewart does not have the same boyish charm of Matthew Broderick in the original and the highly vaunted special effects are nothing more than pure cheese. The original had tremendous holes and seemed to be rather careless with plot and character development, but compared to its sequel it is nearly in the neighborhood with the Godfather and Casablanca.

My family and I watched the first Gadget and really liked it. We thought the second one was extremely painful to watch. We give it a definitive thumbs DOWN!

A straight to video live-action movie based on a cartoon? It sounds like a forgettable idea, but "Inspector Gadget" is actually masterful for its harmlessness - no gadgets or people were harmed in this flick. Here, the glitch-ridden Gadget inexplicably manages to keep Riverton so safe, that he's got nothing to do. With the evil Dr. Claw behind bars, Gadget is stuck pulling over speeders - including one who (of course) turns out to be Chief Quimby's mom. When Claw escapes - leaving hints that he's got a big job planned - Gadget goes on the case. Unfortunately, the Chief gives the job to Gadget's replacement - an all-woman, all-robot enforcer called "G2". For Gadget, it's love at first scan, but G2 has no interest. Gadget manages to only get in the way while Claw grows ever nearer to his goal of robbing the federal gold supply locked away in Riverton.

If it's not a laugh a minute, it's still fun for your kids, and it won't put you to sleep either. The FX aren't quite cutting edge, but they're not horrible either. In short, "Gadget 2" looks like it was more fun to make than to watch, but still fun to watch anyway.

Inspector Gadget is bored. He's been so effective at fighting crime, there's no more crime for him to fight in the city of Riverton. He's been so effective, that the police department is proud to unleash G2, a new, all robot upgrade in the form of a female detective. While smitten with love at first sight, Gadget is crushed when G2 is assigned the case of the escaped Dr. Claw. With Penny's prodding's, he conducts his own investigation, but his glitches keep ruining the day. Will he keep his job? Will anyone ever catch Dr. Claw?

With all new actors (except D. L. Hughley as the voice of the Gadetmobile), this movie feels completely different from the first live action movie. On the plus side, they stuck more to the conventions of the cartoon series, such as hiding Dr. Claw's face. However, this movie doesn't have the humor of the original, relying mostly on slapstick to get laughs. While it works, adult fans of the original will be disappointed. The villain's plan is one of the most original means of committing a crime, and I loved watching the results once I finally figured out what they were up to.

Kids were obviously the target audience of this film, and they'll love watching Gadget bumble into one mess after another. Adults will be entertained as well, even if not to the extent that the first film led us to hope for.

I saw this for the first time on the weekend, and while it's not really as bad as some would have you believe, it isn't that great, either.
To start with, it's hard to equate Matthew Broderick's Gadget, with the character played by French Stewart. Broderick put real life into Gadget, where Stewart played Gadget purely as a 2 dimensional cartoon character for 90% of the movie. The only time he came to life was near to the end, when Claw kidnapped Penny.
Just for the record, I thought that was a nice throw-back to the original cartoon. Penny was forever getting caught by MAD agents, though she was usually rescued by Brain, and not Gadget.
The emphasis on the glitches in Gadget's circuitry was a little confusing. In the cartoon, the so-called glitches were usually his gadgets doing the thinking for him. The Inspector was such a lame-brain (and I mean that in the fondest way) that he inevitably called on the wrong gadget for whatever situation he was in. So whenever a gadget popped out that was different to the one he called for, you could be fairly sure it was the right one to do the job.
In this movie, the glitches were just that - glitches.
And then, there's Claw. Rupert Everett did a fantastic job of playing Claw in the first film. It didn't matter that his face wasn't hidden, as was the case in the cartoon. It was pointless that they tried to do that in the second film. Aside from the shockingly awful voice, what they ended up with was an 'evil' version of Wilson from Home Improvement. It was just plain sad, given Everett's deliciously wicked performance in the original.
I'm not totally sure what to think of Elaine Hendrix's performance as G2. I suppose it was fine when you consider that she is basically supposed to be an emotionless android who slowly comes alive as the film progresses, but how can you feel anything for a character that is little more than a piece of wood for most of the movie? Like French Stewart's Gadget, she only came alive towards the end of the film, and by then it was too late.
There are positives to the movie. Unfortunately, there just aren't enough.
One is the fact that Penny is given considerably more importance in this movie. In the first, she was more of a sidekick than anything else, and that rankled the hardcore fans quite a bit.
The special effects were okay, but I'm afraid that's all I can say.
As an Aussie, it was interesting to see two Aussie actors hamming up the roles of Chief Quimby and the Mayor (Mark Mitchell and Sigrid Thornton, respectively), but even they didn't give the film much of a lift.
As another reviewer commented, one blessing was that the voice of the Gadgetmobile was the same. Unfortunately there just aren't enough other redeeming features to save what could have been a wonderful movie.

Another direct-to-video sequel to the original "Inspector Gadget" is exactly what you expect. We have no Matthew Broderick, but French Stewart (imagine young Nathan Lane) as Inspector, and another one, a female version "G2" is added now. The concept of police detective with cartoonish gadgets to solve the case is not changed, and the story is again as corny and non-existent as before, but that we don't care.

I liked the first one, but not this one. One of the reasons is that in this sequel Inspector becomes the "last-year's model" which means here that he suffers humiliation because of many "glitches." That is, when he says, "Go go Gadget, Helicopter," something differnet appears from the top of his head. And the film seems to believe that it can make us laugh. We may if we are all very small kids.

To make matters worse, parents beware, some scenes are very annoying. Just one example. Somehow one famous fast-food compamy agreed with production placement, and at some party sequence this unlucky Inspector again and again experiences silly mulfunction (manupulated by the villain The Clow), and he sprinkles the fried potatoes all over the floor, and moreover, stomps on them spilling yellow mastard all over the place. Now if that's your idea of funny, see this one.

In short, besides the conventional ideas you have seen in this kind of films such as Nancy Drew-like girl or fast-talking car, the film only offers the tired ideas of comedy that was used in the silent film era, like the Keystone Cops. The difference is, THEY are funny.

The CGIs are suitably cartoon-like, I don't know whether its cheezy effects are intentional or not. (I see the name of Stan Winston in the end credit.) Some effects are certainly great, like the Matrix-like "freeze" shots, which is used in last year's "Clockstoppers" in which, by the way, the star of this film French Stewart can be seen.

Finally, G2, the female Gadget. I don't know what they wanted to do with this idea, because what she does is nothing remarkable. Actions are introduced, but badly shot with undoubtedly bad CGIs) and badly edited, killing any moments that could be interesting with her presence.

The film's ending suggests another sequel, which I politely decline to see. So, what's next? "G3: Gadget Kids"?

I enjoyed Inspector Gadget 2. I watched the first one with
my grandchildren and we got together again for # 2. It was
a fun time for all, as we watched Inspector Gadget try to
outshine his new lady love.
Full of great special effects, lots of gadgets and action, this
movie held the attention of the children, which is a plus in my
book. If you just want to relax, giggle a little, and not have to let our brain work overtime to figure out a movie, this one is
for you and your entire family.

When I was a little tyke, I loved the "Inspector Gadget" cartoon show, with it's clever animation and slapstick.

I missed the first Inspector Gadget, but I saw plenty of trailers and commericals for G2.

And from those trailers and commericials, I pretty much figured out the whole movie.

Goofy Old Cop blows something, gets replaced by the New Cop. New Cop is aloof to Old Cop, who is trying to get back into the graces. Old Cop finds New cop attractive. Big Bad Guy comes in. Sweet Innocent is kidnapped, and Whole City at risk of Big Bad Guy's new weapon. New Cop and Old Cop team up, defeat Big Bad Guy, Sweet Innocent saved, and they live happily ever after. New Cop and Old Cop have a Sweet Kiss.

Yeah, adults really won't be too impressed, but their kids will love it, until they figure out simple-minded movies like this too.