I’ll contribute to the collective answer to the million-dollar question: is Twisters as good as 1996 masterpiece, Twister? The short answer is, it’s not. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t absolutely rad.

2024’s not-quite-follow-up and maybe-not-a-remake either, Twisters is gracing early summer silver screens begging to be the blockbuster that drags audiences into theaters with the promise of jampacking the room with enough bombastic sounds that we can all munch our popcorn freely. Where it faulters in story and character, it succeeds in action chemistry, doing it’s best to compete with 1996’s alchemy. 

Most nothing can mimic the magic of the original cast braving the wrath of the ultimate movie monster (weather), but Glen Powell and company are going to do their best. Twisters differentiates itself by not quite slotting new actors into the same roles. It, instead, chucks them all into a blender (which isn’t quite wordplay, but I’ll leave it to your imagination to give me credit for a twister, blender, vortex gag) and creates new character hybrids where each is a mashup of some bits of characters we’ve seen before. (Is The Fly a better reference? Whatever). Daisy Edgar Jones stars as Kate, a storm chasing natural with a traumatic tornado backstory and an uncanny talent for reading the weather. So a bit of Jo and a bit of Billy. She’s pulled back into the field from her cushy New York desk job by Javi (Anthony Ramos), who needs her to assist his shiny corporate real estate company in tornado research and because he might love her, like a bit of Jonas and a bit of Jo. Interrupting their polished scientific adventure is Tyler (Glen Powell) and his scrappy gang of merry men who wrangle twisters for YouTube, fanning the flames of internet hobbyists looking for a thrill and crowding the road. Taken by the newcomer, Tyler becomes preoccupied with Kate and her instincts, sending the rival factions in and out of storms and taking in the damage their muses do to small town Oklahoma. Loyalties change, crushes form, and spooky clouds break through the sky and flick houses off the map.

With intentionally flimsy connections to the original (save for a reference to the same real-life science inspiration), this feature doesn’t directly connect the films in any way to warrant an easter egg hunt nor to force them to or away from any repeated beats. Dialogue and moments are lifted and referenced, the film treading much of the same territory, but making it bigger, louder, and with even more fire. That’s where it’s most successful, when it sends our leads with their broad arms and fitted shirts into storms, having them shout over explosions with varying levels of ecstasy and fear. That’s what makes Twisters an enviable and rip-roaring summer hit. The rest of it is mostly science bologna.

There’s something about polymers and rainwater, and more about the scant and valuable data all part of the elusive goal of understanding and killing tornadoes. Its these lofty goals that bond the leads and has them clunking heads in barns and trucks as brief relief between action set pieces. Though Maura Tierney’s introduction as Kate’s mother is welcome respite (with her unmatched natural comedic timing), it serves as a catalyst for Kate and Tyler bonding over notebooks which has far less electricity than a chanting Philip Seymour Hoffman. At the risk of continuing to belabour the comparison, the core palpable different between the two films is that where one leaned on various genres successfully, Twisters is more simply an action film, one much more in the vein of road trip action like Civil War than of the goosebump inducing horror of Billy stating, “it’s already here.”

The 2024 film about increasingly alarming weather and new technology democratizing many careers is touched upon but not explored, it not interested in tackling climate change or floods of internet hobbyists who think they understand complex science. Javi and co are minorly perturbed by the rise of the YouTuber but it’s never a barrier for them and serves only to prop up Tyler as a hollow hero. It’s somewhat preferable, this movie succeeding as a popcorn thrill ride not concerned much with conflict beyond “there is a really big tornado coming,” despite how noticeable it is when someone casually notes that tornado frequency seems to be increasing.

Emotional beats are not the strength of this bad boy, it missing something in the score (which is slightly different but reminiscent) and lacking the awe of ruthless mother nature. No one is acting at the top of their game, Powell’s outstretched arms clutching steering wheels doing a lot of the work to create some character energy. Twisters isn’t that movie, it’s the high-heat blockbuster that leaves audiences shouting wrangler slang riding the high of seeing hot people yeehaw over fireworks being shot up the funnel of a superstorm.  

Twisters hits theaters July 19, 2024.