SCANNER COP
Rarely has an ending let down a movie so badly


Holy shit, did the ending to this otherwise fine movie suck. Loaded with more stupidities and gaps in logic than I've ever seen in a single MOVIE (and I've seen Armageddon), let alone just the ending, it makes you wonder just how it can be attached to such a surprisingly effective and smart little movie. I'm gonna list all this shit at the end, with a spoiler warning beforehand. 

It starts out kind of poorly, with a "heads popping out of heads" effect that brings Freddy Krueger, unbidden, to mind. Fortunately, things improve. Ordinary people are killing cops all over L.A., and only one man has an insight into just why...he's a Scanner, and just what that means, you should know by now. He's just coming to terms with his abilities now, because he's stopped taking his Scanner suppressant, Ephemerol. What unfolds is a pretty damn interesting plot, as the Scanner cop is brought in for his own unique insight.  

Die-hard fans of the first film might want to imagine that this isn't really part of the series, since this guy manifests a number of abilities not even hinted at in previous installments. He speed-reads like mad, can leave his body, and mind-melds with computers and, to a lesser extent, the dead (which gives rise to a grisly, intense chase with fascinating implications which I wouldn't dream of giving away here). 

Performances are mostly good, although Daniel Quinn, in the lead, is one of the most uncharismatic leading men I've ever seen and seems to lack a jaw. Of any kind. And Richard Lynch doesn't seem to realize that damage to the right side of your brain will affect the left side of your body. It also features Boggs from The Shawshank Redemption, although he doesn't rape anybody in the ass in this one. 

Just once in my life, I want to see a scene involving Tarot cards that doesn't pull out the ol' Death card. (however, I am grateful that in this film, FOR ONCE, we're not given alaborious explanation of how that card means "change", and not necessarily death) This is the kind of film that begs to be made into a TV series. Hey, I'd give it a look. It could have an exploding head every week. And it's refreshing to see a movie of this kind that genuinely takes itself - and its audience - seriously. For the most part, it works VERY well. 

Okay, it's spoiler time, people. Damn, what a lousy fucking ending. You've been warned; sweep below if you dare.


-if you had your Scanner enemy strapped into a chair, you'd shoot him up with Ephemerol first, wouldn't you? Not this guy. 

-how can the titanium plate in your head prevent you from being scanned when it only covers half your head? What if you turn around?  What if the Scanner is standing behind you?

-if you can't scan the guy, how is it you're preventing him from cutting into your dad? 

-Revenge? That's it? That's the motivation? Revenge against ONE GUY? Than how does making a mess of the entire police department lead to that?  

-how does a rookie get assigned another rookie as a partner? 

-after going through the enormous trouble to brainwash all these people to kill cops, the final stroke in his plan for revenge is to dress up as a doctor and stab him with a scalpel? 

-if you're going to run out to kill a guy's dad, a guy who's showing just about enough Scanner talent to bust out of the meager prison you've made for him (strapped to a chair), do you tell him you're gonna kill his dad, and just go do it? Without, say, tying him down tighter? Or killing him? 

Christ. I could go on for days. What the hell happened to this movie? 

I guess I'd recommend this one, for most of its running length, but beware; you will be disappointed in the end.

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