my plans to rewatch the fly with my good friend who hasn't seen it yet were foiled by the movie rental's trick, which gave me what i thought was a dvd including both the original and its sequel but only ended up having a dvd for the fly 2. i think as far as horror sequels go, this is a decent one. the monsters resemble the grotesque machinations of cronenbergs other films, and the practical effects for them are good despite their age. really liked the larva from which the monster of the second part of the film grows, can't believe those scientists didn't have that thing in better quarantine.

beyond that, i think this sequel is only okay. it hits all the notes it needs to; but the visuals and narrative carry too little of their own substance. martin's only distinction from seth is that he retained his sense of ethics after transforming. this would be interesting if we got to see martin struggling to grasp what was really happening to him as his humanity sheds from his skin. there's a more interesting film there, in beth's struggle to keep him on his goal as he succumbs more and more to the mutations in his dna. there's only a scene where this happens with martin, compared to many escalating episodes with seth in the original.

the climax of the original is so memorable because seth's drive for the prestige of changing the world culminates in his attempt on the life of the only one who respected his ambitions. seth's efforts not only fail, they result in a condition so abhorrent that even he knows his only way of fixing himself is death. it's a grim, tragic look at how the ambition to better our world makes monsters out of good people. the fly 2 ends with the vindication of martin's struggle by allowing him to survive at the expense of his terrible "dad", but i can't help but feel the conclusion is too clean given the disgusting circumstances that precipitated his birth.