Jamie
Generally for a BMT film there is some context as to how it has attained a coveted spot in the BMT rotation. Perhaps it was released around the time BMT was created and it’s stuck in our minds as a quintessential “bad movie,” even if it has now been forgotten to the Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. Perhaps it stars an actor we’ve come to know and love during our BMTventure. Perhaps it so perfectly fits an otherwise restrictive BMT cycle that it can’t be denied. But sometimes a movie has none of these things. It just is a movie that we have always heard is bad and so we say “sure why not.” Grease 2 is kinda like that. Did I have a burning desire to watch Grease 2? Not really. In fact, I don’t even really like Grease all that much. I remember seeing it in theaters during the 1998 rerelease and my main takeaway was “boy, that was long,” and it was only 110 minutes. So yeah… it’s Grease 2!
To summarize, Sandy’s cousin Michael has arrived at Rydell and is instantly smitten with Stephanie, the head of the Pink Ladies. One problem, she only dates T-Birds and her recent ex, Johnny, isn’t about to let him into the gang. At the coolest place in town, the local bowling alley (the one thing the movie gets right), the Cycle Lords show up to harass the T-Birds. Michael soon realizes how he can win over Stephanie: become the coolest biker in town. He buys a run down bike and starts training in a big ol’ training montage. In order to get spare parts he helps people cheat on homework for cash. Basically, he’s already the coolest kid around, but still pursues this mysterious biker persona to impress Stephanie. Soon thereafter he is able to crush the Cycle Lords and takes Stephanie out on a date, all as the Cool Rider, a masked vigilante that sounds a lot cooler than it is. The T-Birds are incensed and promise to take out Cool Rider at the big talent show… which I forgot to mention is a big part of the film. When the talent show arrives Cool Rider is chased off by the T-Birds who no joke think they accidentally kill him by running him over the side of a cliff. They all shrug because they are maniacs and go back to the talent show. There Stephanie sings a solo for her dead beau and is crowned queen of the show, with Johnny as her king. At the graduation party later, the Cycle Lords show up, but so does Michael and he’s like… super cool. He defeats everyone with his radness, becomes a T-Bird and smooches Stephanie for sure. THE END
My overall impression of the film is that it’s pleasant enough, but the songs suck. It’s a lethal combination because a pleasant film becomes real boring when 80% of the songs are laughably bad. It’s not without some positive notes, though. My favorite bit is that the T-Birds are legit losers in this one. It gives a better real world impression of the gangs as fleeting high school fantasies. The instant they graduate it will all fade, but in the moment they pretend that they rule the roost (even when it’s clearly not true, like in this case). As for our friend, Class of 1999 is quite a fun film. I’m a well known Keach-head (we talking about The Keach?) and he is in full on “I have to watch every film this maniac made” mode. Much like Brion James there seems to have been a point where The Keach decided that he would never say no and also when he said yes he’d also do whatever the hell he wanted. It’s pretty great. Recommend.
Hot Take Clam Bake! The songs in Grease 2 are good!… JK, not the case. I will say that it’s pretty obvious that Michael and Stephanie will last 3 months at best. He’s a genius. She won’t date him until he is part of a gang full of losers, showing questionable judgment at best. By the time he’s leaving to attend Oxford the romance will have fizzled. He’ll give her a lackluster, “come with me to England,” but like Hardin in the After series she’s going to be asking what there would be in England for her? She just gonna bum around with no friends while he goes off to his friends in the publishing/academic world? No! She’s Stephanie and she looks just like a young Michelle Pfeiffer. You can’t stop that train from rolling on up the street to Hollywood where she becomes the biggest star in the world. One day he’ll show up at her latest premier and say “remember me?” and she’ll say “nope.” Boy, that hot take was a journey. Hot Take Temperature: Truffalo. Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! Grease 2? More like Greasy Poo, amirite? Gross, but yeah, at least from one perspective I’m right. Let’s go!
- If you were to think it through, what is the one thing Grease 2 needs to get right? The songs, right? The songs from Grease are classics. Summer Lovin’, Beauty School Dropout, Grease Lightning, You’re the One that I Want. You see, off the top of my head I can name four of them. So obviously the one thing you’re going to be 100% sure of is that you got some real bangers for the Grease 2 soundtrack, right?
- WRONG. Besides Cool Rider (which is catchy enough I was singing the refrain from it for a week after), none of them are particularly catchy, and most are, in fact, downright terrible. Reproduction is probably the worst of the bunch, although not because it isn’t catchy (it is), but because it is an absurd pseudo-parody of what a Grease 2 should sound like.
- Jamie likes to do hot takes. You want to hear mine? Rock N’ Roll High School is what Grease 2 should have been. You jump forward to a whole other era and thus you jump to a whole other genre of popular music. The film becomes about how classic musicals are out, and what is in is rock n’ roll and casting real life musical artists in films. Temperature: Caribbean Jerk.
- Pfeiffer is actually incredible in this, she is head and shoulders above anyone else in the film IMO. Also some fun stuff with the T-birds which makes them kind of hapless losers once Travolta left. There are bits and pieces where you can see what they were going for, but ultimately the songs let them down.
- I think we have a bonafide Planchet Alert (Who?) for Leif Green as Davey, complete with him riding exclusively in a sidecar the entire film, it is great. I don’t think there is anything else of concern. This film is closest to BMT, it is kind of crazy fun in its weirdness and easy breezy.
- To pair up a future film with Grease 2 we obviously went to a classic in futuristic high schools: Class of 1999. The follow up to the quite good Class of 1984 (we are the future!), this film is one weird exercise in tepid special effects and the suspension of disbelief that Joshua John Miller is some sort of hardcore gangbanger in dystopian Detroit circa 1999. Much like RoboCop, what is the solution to the crime problem in the future where super criminal teenagers kill for fun? ROBOTS! The robot teachers, led by Crichton-esque albino (?) scientist Stacy Keach who compulsively eats bananas (?), obviously decide that murder most foul is the only way to really clean up the streetz. This ultimately leads to a showdown between the gang leaders and this unstoppable force. Seeing Pam Grier is fun. But really, the main thing this film has going for it is Keach in all of his snow-white colored contact lensed glory. What an absolute legend. A, would definitely recommend this as a weird watch, especially if you’ve seen the more self-serious Class of 1984.
Check out the quiz for the mid-credits sequence from Grease 2 (long lost) which explains why there was never a sequel. Cheerios,
The Sklogs
Bad Movie Twins 