Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning (2012)

Film Title: Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning
Released: September 22, 2012 (Austin Fantastic Fest)
Directed by: John Hyams
Written by: Jon Greenhalgh, John Hyams & Doug Magnuson based on a story by Moshe Diamant & John Hyams based on characters created by Dean Devlin, Christopher Leitch & Richard Rothstein
Starring: Scott Adkins, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Dolph Lundgren & Andrei Arlovski

Plot: After a man recovers from a severe beating in which his family is murdered in front of him, he goes on a quest to find the one responsible but soon discovers that nothing is what it seems.

IMDb: 5.0/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 51/100
My Score: 3/5

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning is the sixth film in the Universal Soldier franchise but only the third to be recognized as canonical. John Hyams, director of the previous film Regeneration, returns to helm this entry, which he also co-wrote. Also returning are stars Jean-Claude Van Damme, Dolph Lundgren and Andrei Arlovski. In past installments, the main character has been Luc Devereaux, usually portrayed by Van Damme, but his time, however, the focus is on series newcomer Scott Adkins. In the opening sequence, filmed in first-person perspective, Adkins is awoken by his young daughter telling him that there are monsters in the house. At the urging of his wife, he searches the house and discovers a group of masked individuals in his kitchen that proceed to viciously beat him with a crowbar. His wife and child are then dragged into his view and one of the assailants (Van Damme) removes his ski-mask before shooting the woman and little girl in the head. Fast forward nine months and Adkins awakens in a hospital from a coma. He is visited by an FBI agent (Rus Blackwell) that asks him if he remembers the attack and the man who killed his family, showing him a picture of a Van Damme for clarification. Adkins is released from the hospital and proceeds to piece together the gaps in his memory, said to be caused by his head injury, and to track down Van Damme for revenge. What follows is bit of fresh air for the franchise but the results fall somewhat short of the intentions, not quite reaching the heights it aims for. A few decent plot twists, which really shouldn't be that surprising to anyone familiar with the series, a couple of excellent fight scenes (the Adkins/Arlovski fight in the sporting goods store is definitely a highlight) and more blood and guts than the entire rest of the series combined try to compensate for the weaker points of the film. Repeated several times is an almost nauseating strobe effect that should be a concern to anyone who suffers from epilepsy and Adkins and female lead Mariah Bonner, who plays a stripper, have zero chemistry. I mentioned in my review for Regeneration that one doesn't watch a Universal Soldier film for depth. As if in response to that criticism, Day of Reckoning attempts not just to be a action film but also a violently gritty psychological thriller full of conspiracies, dilapidated locations and seedy characters, including prostitutes, governments agents and a memorable disfigured guy who has an office inside of a meat locker. Having now watched every film in the series, I realize that the script recycles many tropes from the previous entries, like cloned soldiers, messianic leaders and sleeper UniSol agents infiltrating the government. Not a terrible entry but also not as entirely new as it would appear at first glance.

Universal Soldier: Regeneration (2009)

Film Title: Universal Soldier: Regeneration
Also known as: Universal Soldier: A New Beginning (Japan)
Released: October 1, 2009 (Austin Fantastic Fest)
Directed by: John Hyams

Written by: Victor Ostrovsky based on characters created by Dean Devlin, Christopher Leitch & Richard Rothstein

Starring: Jean-Claude Van Damme, Dolph Lundgren & Andrei Arlovski

Plot: A group of terrorists, who have gained control of a next-generation Universal Soldier, have taken hostages inside the Chernobyl nuclear reactor. Officials have call Luc Deveraux, one of the original UniSols, back into action to save the day.

IMDb: 5.5/10
Rotten Tomatoes: No score
My Score: 3/5

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

Universal Soldier: Regeneration, known in Japan and Malaysia as A New Beginning, may be the fifth installment in the Universal Soldier franchise but is the first since the original film to be considered canon. A terrorist group has gotten their hands on an NGU (Andrei Arlovski), or Next-Generation UniSol, and have used him to kidnap the teenage children of the Ukranian prime minister. Holding the kids in the dilapidated Chernobyl nuclear reactor, they set up a series of explosives that, if detonated, would release a catastrophic radiation cloud. US troops team up with the Ukranian military to take down the bad guys but are decimated by the NGU. The only solution is to bring Luc Devereaux (Jean-Claude Van Damme) back into service. He's been living in Switzerland for years undergoing rehabilitation therapy with Dr. Fleming (Emily Joyce), who is trying to reintroduce him back into society. Regeneration, while it has some serious flaws, the lackluster script in particular, attempts to make up for many of them with some with some intense and brutal fight sequences, which really are the highlights of the film. The result is the best Universal Soldier film so far, in my opinion. There is some action in the first two thirds of the film but it is mostly mediocre. The opening kidnapping sequence is pretty good but its a car chase, not a fight. There are four Gen-1 UniSols sent in to take down Arlovski towards the beginning but only one actually puts up any sizable resistance, and it's not even John Foo, who is one of the other four! Things don't really heat up until Van Damme is let loose but that doesn't happen until the final thirty minutes of the film. But what a half an hour it is! The fight between Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren (who was literally shredded to pieces in the first film but returns here as a clone) is ten times better than any of their confrontations in the original. They put each other through concrete walls, down flights of stairs and ultimately out a five story window to the ground below. Needless to say they both end up really taking a beating. The fight between Arlovski and Mike Pyle, who is a human army captain in the film, is clearly indicative of their mixed martial arts backrounds, both men having fought in the UFC as well as other MMA promotions. And the final fight between Van Damme and Arlovski is the first time in the film that Arlovski is really given a challenge. There's no denying that this is a piece of action fluff but anyone looking for depth in a Universal Soldier movie is just kidding themselves. You don't come to the franchise for answers to the deep questions, you come for the action, which Regeneration ends up delivering, literally, in the end. Directed by John Hyams, his father, Peter Hyams, who directed Van Damme in the films Timecop and Sudden Death, serves as director of photography.

Universal Soldier: The Return (1999)

Film Title: Universal Soldier: The Return
Released: August 20, 1999
Directed by: Mic Rogers

Written by: John Fasano & William Malone based on characters created by Dean Devlin, Christopher Leitch & Richard Rothstein

Starring: Jean-Claude Van Damme, Michael Jai White, Heidi Schanz & Bill Goldberg

Plot: When the UniSol program gets shut down by the government, the supercomputer that controls them goes rogue. Its up to Luc Deveraux, the original Universal Soldier but now human, to stop it.

IMDb: 4.0/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 5/100
My Score: 1.5/5

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

Universal Soldier: The Return marks the return of Jean-Claude Van Damme to the franchise following his absence from the made-for-television films Brothers in Arms and Unfinished Business, the events of which are completely ignored here. Unfortunately, this movie is nearly as bad as those two. Van Damme is Luc Deveraux, the sole surviving UniSol from the first film. Not only is he human again but he also has a thirteen year old daughter (Karis Paige Bryant). How either one of these things is possible is beyond me, but I digress. He works as a technical expert for the program with scientist Xander Berkeley, creator of the Self-Evolving Thought Helix, or S.E.T.H., a self-aware supercomputer that controls the Universal Soldier units. When the government decides to stop funding the program, S.E.T.H. goes rogue, taking over the compound using the UniSols at his command, led by Bill Goldberg. S.E.T.H. then implants himself into a body enhanced with nanotechnology (Michael Jai White), effectively becoming the UniSol messiah. A fail safe built into the programming requires Van Damme to type a code into the system within eight hours or S.E.T.H.'s memory will be wiped. S.E.T.H. kidnaps Van Damme's daughter in an attempt to coerce him into giving up the code but the whole situation ends up being moot as S.E.T.H. figures it out by himself anyway. Tossed into the mix is a journalist (Heidi Schanz) who was at the facility when S.E.T.H. took over and who ends up being the gal pal and love interest for Van Damme (his wife died years previously). So if my explanation of the plot isn't enough to tell you already, this script is beyond ridiculous. The acting is sub-par by everyone and the fight scenes are pretty unexciting. There are a few good explosions and the heavy metal soundtrack is decent, featuring songs by Megadeth, Static-X, Anthrax, Fear Factory, Ministry, Gwar and Powerman 5000, but very little else of value is to be found. This was the directorial debut of stuntman Mic Rogers and stands as his only credit as a director to date. Along with Brothers in Arms and Unfinished Business, The Return is ignored by the future installments of the franchise and is not considered canon.

Universal Soldier (1992)

Film Title: Universal Soldier
Released: July 10, 1992
Directed by: Roland Emmerich
Written by: Dean Devlin based on a story by Christopher Leitch & Richard Rothstein
Starring: Jean-Claude Van Damme, Dolph Lundgren & Ally Walker

Plot: The military has created a way to revive dead soldiers and turn them into perfect, unstoppable machines. Problems arise when a pair of Vietnam veterans begin to remember their lives from before they died.

IMDb: 5.9/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 19/100
My Score: 2.5/5

Universal Soldier is an 90's action film and it shows. Thin story, mediocre acting, cheesy dialogue and plenty of explosions are the order of the day in this one but at least there's enough action to keep it interesting when the plot fails to do so. Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren are a pair of soldiers who served together in Vietnam. Lundgren went crazy and killed a village full of innocents. Van Damme tried to stop him but they ended up killing each other. Present day, they have both been resurrected as Universal Soldiers, near perfect warriors of the American military who have their memories routinely wiped with drugs to keep them subservient. Problems arise when Van Damme starts regaining his memories and goes AWOL with chain smoking reporter Ally Walker, who's looking for a scoop on the whole operation. Lundgren gives the strongest performance of the principals, particularly once he also regains his memories. He's totally believable as the sociopathic sergeant who has mentally never come back from the war. Co-starring Leon Rippy, Ed O'Ross, Ralf Moeller, and Tiny Lister, Jerry Orbach also appears but in little more than a cameo as a doctor who was part of the original "UniSol" program. Ron Howard's father, Rance Howard, also appears as Van Damme's father. According to the film's Wikipedia page, Universal Soldier was a rejected script for Marvel Comics character Deathlok. The film spawned a franchise consisting of six films, only three of which are considered canon.