Diagonaldi Very well executed

Cathardincu Surprisingly incoherent and boring

FeistyUpper If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Claudio Carvalho In Brooklyn, New York City, Randall Thomasson (Christopher Cousins) is murdered while attempting to avoid a carjacking. His brother Karl Thomasson (Treat Williams), who is a veteran mercenary, attends the funeral and meets his estranged niece Anya (Susan May Pratt). Karl decides to pose as history teacher to replace his brother at the high- school and investigate his death. Karl also teams up with the also mercenary Joey 6 (Angel David) to investigate the gang The Brotherhood that is blamed for the murder. The teacher Kara Lavelle (Michael Michele) helps Karl in the investigation and he is hired by the school. Karl finds violent and disrespectful students in class and protects Anya, while has a love affair with Kara. He also befriends a school janitor that is also a war veteran. Soon Karl discovers that The Brotherhood is using the school to disassemble stolen cars to sell and that the school's auto-repair teacher Warren Drummond (BD Wong) is one of the leaders of the gang. The school becomes no mans land."The Substitute 2: School's Out" is a brainless and shallow action B- movie full of clichés. The storyline (a substitute teacher comes to a high-school at the outskirts where he finds violent students and a gang) has been used several times by the cinema industry. Karl, Kara, Anya, Joey 6, Warren among others are one-dimensional characters, indeed stereotypes, and there is no explanation why Karl has forgotten his brother and his niece; or why Karl and Kara have a love affair so soon; or why Warren is a member of a dangerous gang. There are shootings at school and no police appears in the area. Last but not the least, there is no message for the students and only a revenge. My vote is four.Title (Brazil): "O Substituto 2" ("The Substitute 2")

zardoz-13 The murky conclusion of director Steven Pearl's straight-to-video sequel "The Substitute 2: School's Out" undercuts an otherwise okay sequel that goes to enormous ends to establish itself as the follow-up to the Tom Berenger original. Treat Williams plays an entirely different character who knew Shale, and "School's Out" concerns his search for the person who gunned down his brother in cold blood in broad daylight. Williams is suave but decisive as Karl Thomasson who masquerades as the new substitute teacher. B.D. Wong is superb as the slimy villain. The Miami high school in the first film, the school here is a zoo with abrasive students who play their boom boxes in class and tote around deadly weapons like ice picks. Unlike the villains in the predecessor who were trafficking in illegal drugs, the bad guys here are operating a chop shop for stolen cars that nets them a $100-thousand-a-month. Like the original, the most considerate character turns out to be the source of the trouble. During the first three-fourths of "The Substitute 2: School's Out," the scenarists of the first movie--Roy Frumkes, Rocco Simonelli, and Alan Ormsby--establish the reason for the sequel, neatly place the characters in the context of the original, and do a good job of integrating Karl into the action. The action scenes themselves, when Karl has to practice his expertise on the disruptive students as well as the adult villains, are fine, but everything collapses in the last quarter hour when the fatherless daughter discovers who killed her father. The filmmakers never have a confrontation scene between the hero and this villain. Moreover, the disruptive students in the classroom who should go down as hard as their counterparts did in the first movie are never shown receiving their just comeuppance for their crimes. The yo-yo scene where Karl explains the use of a yo-yo as a weapon is well-done as is the 'compromise' scene when he toss Mace's purloined boom box out the second story class room. Presumably, Mace is supposed to be the Jerome character here. The single character who doesn't have a counterpart from the first movie is Michael Michele; she plays a sympathetic school employee, Kara Lavelle, who is attracted to Karl. Initially, she met him at his brother's funeral. Not surprisingly, Karl's niece (Susan May Pratt of "Drive Me Crazy")doesn't trust Karl at first, but she breaks down and gets to like him. The only character here that is truly exceptional is the high school custodian, Johnny Bartee (Daryl Edwards of "Arthur 2: On the Rocks"), who has an unique way of entering and exiting through the tunnels in the walls. He is a former Vietnam soldier who specialized in going into tunnels to flush out the Viet Cong. One of the things that the filmmakers do that looks cool is that the car-jacking gang wears their cotton windbreakers backwards so the hood covers them faces and they have slit eye-holes to see. One of the survivors from the first movie, Joey 6, reappears here but he is played by a different actor.

Comeuppance Reviews "The Substitute 2" is decent but not as good as the third one. Treat plays Karl Thomasson, a mercenary who infiltrates a school full of ruffians and drug dealers. It's just like the predecessor but cheaper.I'm one of the biggest Treat Williams fans. I will watch basically anything with him in it (except "Miss Congeniality 2"...) This is a good showcase for him, but the DTV-style script lets him down. B.D. Wong plays the shop teacher....who's evil. His role is uneven and underdeveloped. There's one scene with a deadly yo-yo! This is a great idea, and a movie highlight. But unfortunately there's no funny lines like "No Talking In The Library." A good tagline could be: "Class Dismissed....Permanently" If like you DTV Treat, this a good start, but "Substitute 3: Winner Takes All" is the best one.For more insanity, please visit: comeuppancereviews.com

Sherazade Okay, take out the Latino gangs from part one and replace them with Black gang bangers. Switch the bad principal and make it a bad teacher instead. Take away the premise of drugs, and make it about guns and carjackings, then instead of the hurt girlfriend who creates and easy entrance for THE SUBSTITUTE, replace her with a dead brother of a former (you guessed it) mercenary (played by Treat Williams) and basically, you've got your SUBSTITUTE 2 - School's Out. It was a good time-passer but nothing as riveting as the first part which starred Tom Berenger as the mercenary-turn-substitute teacher. Telly alums Michael Michele and B.D. Wong co-star.