Maniac Cop 2 (1990)

Maniac Cop 2 is an American horror action film and the sequel to Maniac Cop (1988), directed by William Lustig and written by Larry Cohen.

The film was released in 1990 and received mostly positive reviews on release, not like it's predecessor film.

Plot
The undead ex-officer Matthew Cordell has come back again from his watery defeat in the previous film. Acquiring a police cruiser, he intervenes with a robbery-in process by killing the store clerk with the robber's shotgun. He leaves the robber behind and disappears before the robber is subsequently killed by responding police. Jack W. Forrest Jr. and Theresa Mallory are both put back on duty by police commissioner Edward Doyle (who secretly had a hand in Cordell's framing). The two have conflicting feelings about what happened: Forrest Jr. believes that Cordell is dead and gone, while Mallory believes that Cordell is still out and plotting his revenge. Later that night Forrest Jr. visits a newsstand run by a blinded war veteran named Harry and is slain by Cordell, who leaves Harry alive. He also murders a traffic officer while he was giving a man a parking ticket, and that man is later arrested under suspicion of murder. Susan Riley, a police psychiatric therapist who was giving both Jack and Theresa therapy, talks to Harry and questions him about Forrest Jr's murder.

He relays to her how he was blinded by a grenade explosion and was trapped alongside many dead soldiers, as well as how touching Cordell's flesh during the murder reminded him of it. Mallory is horrified and grieving over Forrest Jr's death, which promptly leads her to appear on a television show. But, she never arrives, as Cordell stalks her and later attacks on the way to a hotel. He kills the cabbie and engages her and Riley (who was accompanying her) in a vehicular battle, which he wins. He forces her car to a stop and kills Mallory after she briefly attempts to fight back with a chainsaw. He then handcuffs one of Riley's arms to the cab's steering wheel and pushes it down a hill. Riley is nearly killed while attempting to stop the car, but eventually crashes, breaking her arm but not killing her.

Meanwhile an exotic dancer named Cheryl is attacked by Steven Turkell, a serial killer who has killed at least six other strippers. She is nearly strangled to death when Cordell bursts in and murders two officers Cheryl called earlier. He helps Turkell escape and the two form a mostly one-sided friendship. Cordell even says his name to Turkell, his first speaking line in the trilogy. Turkell hunts for another victim after Cordell leaves and is arrested after Cheryl identifies him. While incarcerated at the police station Riley interviews him for information about Cordell and he eerily taunts her about "his friend" and how he'll bust him out. Turkell proves correct as Cordell breaks into the police station and slaughters nineteen officers (including Clancy from the first film) before freeing Turkell, another prisoner named Joseph T. Blum, and several others. Turkell believes that Cordell wants to free the prisoners from Sing Sing to create an army of criminals to spread mayhem, even giving him Blum's transfer papers. This point is even further proven when Cordell kills an inmate who disagreed.

Cordell and his 'squad' hijack a prison bus and go on a deadly drive to Sing Sing, which is very similar to the chase scene in the first film. They eventually arrive to the facility and bluff their way inside, with Sean McKinney, Doyle, and a police squad waiting outside. Cordell kills a guard and they enter the same wing Cordell was housed at. Doyle, who was earlier convinced by McKinney, talks to Cordell over the prison's PA system, admitting that he was framed and offering to reopen his case and reverse his conviction. Cordell's real plan was to murder the three inmates responsible and abandons Turkell and the others to do so. He is lit on fire by a Molotov Cocktail but this doesn't stop him and he finally kills the inmates who killed him (and another unrelated one in the process). Turkell, realizing he had been used, tries to fight Cordell, but he rushes both of them out of the wall and fall on a prison bus, which explodes and kills both of them. Cordell is buried in a police cemetery with full honors, but as everyone leaves, his hand bursts through the lid and grabs his badge.

Cast

 * Robert J. Z'Darsky as Matthew "Matt" Cordell/Maniac Cop
 * Robert J. Davi as Detective Lieutenant Sean McKinney
 * Bruce L. Campbell as Officer Jack W. Forrest Jr.
 * Claudia A. Christian as Officer Susan Riley
 * Michael Lerner as Commissioner Edward Doyle
 * Laurene L. Coughlin as Officer Theresa Mallory
 * Clarence Williams lll as Joseph T. Blum
 * Leo Rossi as Steven Turkell
 * Paula Trickey as Cheryl

Production
The film was produced by the following
 * Fadd Enterprises
 * Medusa Pictures
 * The Movie House Sales Company
 * Overseas FilmGroup

Reception
The film was met with mostly positive reviews after release, unlike the first film. It received an average of 5.1/10 from critics and got positive reviews from 60% of critics.