Review by Ian Keogh

Despite comedy action thriller Big Trouble in Little China featuring an ending that opened the door to a sequel, it’s unlikely that John Carpenter always had it in mind, as the movie wasn’t a great success in 1986. It took word of mouth spreading among the then new video rental market for the mishaps of truck driver Jack Burton to be regarded as a comedy classic. Over 25 years later, though, the sequel arrived as comics, spread over three editions beginning with The Hell of the Midnight Road & the Ghosts of Storms.

Carpenter supplies the general plot, but it seems writer Eric Powell had considerable leeway with the direction, and much that is good about this sequel is down to his extremely funny dialogue. It picks up immediately after the film’s ending when the Wild Man stowed away on Jack’s truck, necessitating his return to San Francisco, so ensuring almost all the original cast appear again. Despite his death in the original film, it’s not sorcerer Lo Pan that’s absent, but Gracie Law, only seen for the single page, although it’s funny.

Death has proved more of an embarrassment than impediment to Lo Pan, who’s stuck in the Hell of Those Killed by Idiots, and wants out. We learn about Jack’s assorted marriages, and in theory a comic artist can bring to life scenes too expensive to film.

There’s certainly no lack of these, starting with Jack’s visit to the Seven Faced Widow, but the spectacle is consistently undersold by Brian Churilla’s rudimentary cartooning. There are problems with foreshortening, heads too big for the bodies, and only in rare cases is there more than a minimum of effort made with surroundings and backgrounds. A caricature of Kurt Russell as Jack is just about recognisable, but there’s not much enthusiasm on show, and busy action scenes have the life sucked from them by Churilla’s cartooning.

This is such a shame as Powell makes the effort. There’s a viable plot only stretched thin toward the end of twelve chapters, consistently funny dialogue capturing Jack’s boastful idiocy, and a highly refined sense of the ridiculous. You could imagine this filmed as an official sequel.

The ending also disappoints, though. It’s certainly a finish, but more concerned with setting up what follows in Legacy Edition Book Two than completing the story told here. Any fan of the original film will get their money’s worth from the script, but the art is basic.