If you listen to the dvd commentary:
He was tired of doing horror movies. Wasn't even a fan of them. He thought one way out was to make a horror-comedy, because he felt they were never successful. Really strange.
So there was a lack of true passion for the material, combined with a very difficult shoot.
I still think it's a pretty enjoyable movie, though.
One of my favorite zombie movies
shareThe original is a perfect mix of horror and comedy, and obviously the producers and filmmakers were swayed a little too much regarding this and went a bit too far into the comedy for the follow-up, but I think its a decent enough sequel.
I agree Wiederhorn sounds WAY too negative, forelorn and indeed strange in his commentary. I think he should have been far more grateful for the job, the place of the film he was making and its overall value than he seems.
Let's face it, HE will always be remembered for this movie whther he likes it or not... it's just a bit of a shame it appears he would rather not be!
There's an indie film follow up to the first "Return of the living dead" which I found on YouTube.
It's called "Return of the Dead" and by far is better than part 2! There's tons of Easter eggs and references to the original!
Damn.
He was a good horror director. Shock Waves (1977) and Eyes of a Stranger (1981) are both fantastic. Return of the Living Dead Part II (1988) is decent too, that's a good little trio of horror films he made.
This does seem to happen sometimes though, where directors start out in the business making horror films then want to move onto 'bigger' things and see horror as being beneath them.
I thought he overdid the comedy. It's like the actors were playing it as a comedy whereas the first one they played it as a horror movie with zombies doing the comedy. Weiderhorn wanted to make his 1977 movie Shock Waves a comedy, too, but the people paying for it wanted a straight horror movie.
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The PG13 rating and the watered down horror to gain the rating spoiled it.
The first was a dark comedy directed and written with a deft hand, lots of great gore, hard hitting horror and performances that took the threat seriously, balancing the fine line between comedic performance and genuinely scared.
It's hard to downgrade the horror on the follow-up movie. People expect one thing, then get something lesser.
The 2nd was like the Monster Squad, with lots of buffoonery and over the top vaudeville performances, and the threat, horror wasn't hard enough to be taken seriously.
Just missed the mark.