This review may contain spoilers.
Making my way through the 4K disc set. I remember loving this installment as a kid—mostly because the self-lacing Nikes and hoverboard suggested a future that was cooler than the one we got. Watching it now, though—it relies a lot on overlaying the action on scenes from the (superior) first movie, a gimmick that feels tired now that the special effects aren’t as novel.
The conservative politics of this series continue to stand out to me: when they “return” to the alternate-timeline with Hill Valley rendered as a squalid, dangerous place, it’s connecting blackness to poverty, danger, and (when Marty mistakenly climbs into a house that is no longer his) a grotesque caricature of rage. The women in this one are even more of a sideshow, too—hi Elizabeth Shue! (Now go to sleep.)