1994’sTimecopwas the first true worldwide blockbuster for martial-arts action starJean-Claude Van Damme. Under the direction ofPeter Hyams(Outland,2010: The Year We Make Contact), the Muscles from Brussels found a role inthe Dark Horse Comics film adaptationthat allowed him to show dramatic range while throwing fancy high kicks and splits. Rather than capitalize on its success with an immediatesequel, Universal Pictures went the straight-to-video route without its star in 2003’sTimecop 2: The Berlin Decision.
Following the release of Timecop, directorHyams had no interest in a direct follow-up. There was simply no further story for Van Damme’s Time Enforcement Commission Agent Max Walker, who reversed the murder of his wife (Mia Sara) at the hands of greedy Senator McComb (Ron Silver). After an ill-fated run as a television series for ABC in 1997, theSteve Boyum-helmed sequel withJason Scott Lee(Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story) replacing Van Damme as the TEC hero tries andfails at expanding the original film’s dark themessurrounding the repercussions of time travel.
What Is ‘Timecop 2: The Berlin Decision’ About?
Written byGary Scott Thompson(The Fast and the Furious),Timecop 2: The Berlin Decisiontakes place in the future of 2025, two decades after Agent Walker changed his history. Without directly acknowledging the events of the 1994 film, a new organization called the Society for Historical Authenticity (SHA) enacts a law prohibiting TEC agents from changing the past. Such a law sets the stage for Brandon Miller (Thomas Ian Griffith), a historian and high-ranked member of the SHA who wants to fix history’s mistakes with a plot to usetime travelto assassinate Adolf Hitler duringWorld War II. Only one man stands in his way: TEC Agent Ryan Chang (Lee).
Though Agent Chang prevents Miller from succeeding, his society sympathizers are following in his footsteps by targeting other historical figures such as Andrew Carnegie. When Miller gets out of prison due to an ill-fated TEC agent’s failure to capture one of the sympathizers, the manic historian seeks revenge by going after every agent’s family to erase them from existence. With Chang as the only living TEC agent left, he will have to track Miller down in time while course-correcting the damage he leaves in various periods.
The entertainment value of the originalTimecopcomes down to two elements: Van Damme as a charismatic action star and Silver’s compelling performance as McComb. The Muscles from Brussels was able to overcome his acting limitations, with Hyams emphasizing his humanity and charm. Similarly, Silver’s power-hungry senator was a breathing real-world omen for politics in the future. Unfortunately forThe Berlin Decision,Lee lacks theVan Damme charismaand Griffith comes off as a rip-off of his signature role as Terry Silver fromCobra Kai.
‘Timecop 2’ Suffers From Its Straight-To-Video Budget
AsTimecop’s premise is aTerminator-like revenge tale,The Berlin Decisionplays like an episode ofStar Trek. Considering Miller’s obsession with changing history for his definition of good rather than self-attainment like McComb, the sequel dives into deeper themes aboutthe moral implications of altering history. Such themes are instilled in Chang, who inherited his views on preserving history from his lecturer father who was against time travel. As one might find Miller’s actions to assassinate pure evil like Hitler sympathetic, it is at the expense of doing harm to those who enforce the law.
Even with a far more dense story than the Van Damme film,The Berlin Decisionsuffers from its straight-to-video budget. It should have surpassed the original by having Chang time travel to more time periods than Van Damme, including 1940s Berlin, 1890s Atlantic City, 1800s Texas, and more. But the vast majority of the locations clearly look like soundstages shot for a television show, lacking Hyams’ masterful use of low-key lighting and shadows that made the original look thrilling. Even the visual effects of TEC agents entering liquid portals are reduced to TV-level composites. The worst of them all is the poor, grotesque makeup of the TEC agents physically merging into each other upon returning from time.
Timecop 2: The Berlin Decision’s well-thought-out concepts on time travel, combined with a layered villain, could have had serious potential with the right director and a large budget behind it. But without the charismatic star power of Van Damme — and with a focus on philosophical debates over the original’s fast-paced action — the film fails to live up to its predecessor, try as it might.
Timecop 2: The Berlin Decision
