‘Twisters’ Chases Monster Tornadoes With Plenty of Blockbuster Absurdity

Alci Rengifo

For 28 years moviegoers seemed pretty content to live without a sequel to “Twister.” The fun 1996 blockbuster was the second highest grosser for that year, but its premise was so precise and self-contained that continuing it raised many questions. When your arch nemesis is literally a natural, albeit terrifying, phenomenon you can only go so far. How many new ways can you present tornados in a plausible form? Lee Isaac Chung seems to have figured it out in “Twisters,” a rip-roaring standalone sequel that’s really a reboot. Chung, an arthouse darling, aims to give it some bits of depth, but by the laws of nature, the real attraction here are the massive storms lashing at the screen. 

Daisy Edgar-Jones plays Kate, a young scientist who endures a horrifying event as a teenage student when her friends are literally sucked up into an F5 tornado, while attempting a groundbreaking experiment. Even her boyfriend is devoured by the beast. Five years later, she’s working for the National Weather Service in New York when one of the survivors, Javi (Anthony Ramos), reappears. Now running his own company, Javi wants Kate to help his team develop 3D models of incoming tornados back home in Oklahoma, presumably to develop better data and warning systems. Of course, she comes along and witnesses the local rise of amateur storm chasers, personified by Tyler Owens (Glen Powell), a cowboy “tornado wrangler” who drives his modified truck right into the “Suck Zone” with his social media team. 

The original “Twister,” directed by Jon de Bont, premiered in a summer that in hindsight was quite crucial to the development of modern popcorn filmmaking. 1996 was when the contemporary blockbuster came into its own with releases like “Independence Day,” “Mission: Impossible” and “The Rock.” What gave “Twister” its charm was a premise that combined scientific jargon (thanks to a concept by “Jurassic Park” author Michael Crichton) with rom-com elements. A weatherman (Bill Paxton) was swept back into storm chasing while trying to get his spouse (Helen Hunt) to sign divorce papers. Along the way we got to see some impressive tornadoes with classic, campy moments like the famous cow that gets spun around a water twister. The only link to the original story in “Twisters” is in the beginning, when Kate is using the Dorothy machine for gathering data from inside the funnel, invented by Paxton and Hunt’s couple (though they are never referenced).

It is no surprise that the screenplay by Mark L. Smith began with a concept by Joseph Kosinski, who wrote “Top Gun: Maverick.” Like that legacy sequel, this one is trying to keep the spirit of the original while pretending to elevate it, though not as successfully. Lee Isaac Chung began as a notable arthouse name with personal, eloquent movies like 2020’s great “Minari,” about a Korean immigrant family trying to set down roots as farmers. Chung doesn’t have it in him to go full camp, so he tries to find a balance between the big summer popcorn material and funny attempts at pathos. Kate is some kind of storm whisperer who can grab a dandelion and know where the tornado will land. While speeding down a road with Javi, a sudden gust of wind across wheat fields speaks to her like the Force. It is also odd, at first, how Javi nonchalantly waltzes into her office offering adventure, without acknowledging the lingering trauma of having seen all their friends eaten by a twister. Unlike de Bont, Chung films this all straight, lighting it with cinematographer Dan Mindel like a serious independent drama.

Where the movie picks up speed and turns into silly summer fun is in the tornados and the character of Tyler, played by Glen Powell (also a “Top Gun: Maverick” alumni) like a gloriously cocky cowboy selling t-shirts with his face, going live on YouTube when entering the Suck Zone and bringing along a hilariously out-of-place English journalist, Ben (Harry Hadden-Paton). Tyler’s tornado wranglers have the most personality in the cast, including Lily (Sasha Lane), Boone (Brandon Perea), and Dexter (Tunde Adebimpe). They are Oklahoma outlaws who boast about not needing fancy PhDs to know their stuff, which they do. A ride with Tyler includes country music blaring through his truck’s speakers and fireworks getting shot up into the tornados they speed into. There is going to be obvious attraction between Tyler and Kate, though Chung keeps the passion at such a low simmer you wonder if Tyler is leaving the Suck Zone for the Friend Zone.

All these characters and semblance of a plot are decoration for the main attraction. “Twisters” eventually does its title justice by giving us wall-to-wall killer storms, raging funnels and cascading debris. In 1996, the CGI used for the Oscar-nominated effects in “Twister” were innovative, so the movie used energetic banter and its love triangle plot to fill space before we got to see tornados, eventually building up to the famously monstrous behemoth at the end. Now in an age of CGI dominance, “Twisters” can throw a monster tornado at the audience every three minutes. The few “smaller” twisters are like little pit stops between moments where a monster tears into a rodeo or Tyler and Kate evade crashing trucks, flying windmills and explosions. You could argue there’s a climate change message here when it comes to how extreme weather is becoming more constant, but Chung clearly doesn’t want to rile up potential Bible belt audiences. Just look at the soundtrack. The first movie is a time capsule of ‘90s pop, grunge, and hard rock. This time around, it’s mostly all country tracks with Miranda Lambert’s “Ain’t in Kansas Anymore” turning the end credits into a cheerful romp.

If you shut off any expectations for greater character development or stock up on snacks for the meandering moments, “Twisters” delivers a satisfying escape for the summer season, one where you can chuckle at its blatant absurdities. Glen Powell is the best of the humans, who goes all-in to bring back the ‘90s hero energy. He knows he is tasked with doing things on screen that would kill any real storm chaser. We can forgive this cast for not being able to compete with Bill Paxton, Helen Hunt and Phillip Seymour Hoffman. The real stars are the tornados, and they really deliver. You can’t fault this movie for delivering exactly what its title promises you. There are loud, swirling, windy twisters galore and you can feel Chung wanting so bad to make it all a little bit “deeper.” But that’s not what we are walking into the theater for. The point of “Twisters” is to take you on a ride, and at its best it does just that. If the box office forecasts another sequel, then how they pull that off will be a storm to see.

“Twisters” releases July 19 in theaters nationwide.