Twisters review: Plenty of old-school blockbuster nonsense as Daisy Edgar-Jones stars alongside Daryl McCormack

The first Twister had Alan Ruck and Philip Seymour Hoffman; this one has Paul Scheer (you’ll know him after you Google him).

Is it the same? Of course not. Should we stop comparing these two films? Maybe.

You can, if you like, trace a line from Jan de Bont’s 1996 disaster thriller all the way through to Lee Isaac Chung’s gargantuanly budgeted standalone sequel. But you won’t find much in the way of a storytelling connection.

The film borrows themes, gadgets and lines from the original, and imagines a new generation of yappy adrenaline seekers running riot in Oklahoma.

A bumpy yet largely satisfactory ride, Twisters occasionally tricks us into thinking that at least one of its brainy leads might have a famous mother (you’ll see what I mean). Sadly, nobody ever mentions the Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt dream team from the first chapter. A missed opportunity? You betcha.

Just like last time, we begin with a tragedy. Kate (Daisy Edgar-Jones) is so much more than your average cloud chaser. Born with a good heart and a magical storm detector (don’t ask), Kate isn’t in this game for the thrill or the spectacle. She just wants to help people, to better understand the inner workings of a tornado.

It’s why she and her scientist buddies – including boyfriend Jeb, winningly portrayed by our own Daryl McCormack – conduct a dangerous experiment to try get inside a twister to see if they can stop it. No prizes for guessing how that plan turns out.

Handsome Powell is this film’s greatest special effect

The years pass, and eventually, one of the surviving pals (Anthony Ramos’s Javi) visits Kate at her National Weather Service job in New York. Javi has done well for himself and it seems he’s acquired the money, the tools and the team to make Kate’s dream a reality. All he needs is for her to join him for a week in Oklahoma, where a once-in-a-generation tornado outbreak is occurring.​

But wait, what’s that coming over the hill? Is it a monster? A hurricane? A tsunami, perhaps?

Nope, it’s Glen freakin’ Powell, and guess what? Handsome Powell is this film’s greatest special effect. He knows it, too.

Powell is Tyler Owens, an internet famous “tornado wrangler” (quiet down the back, please) who loves nothing better than chasing treacherous twisters across America. He has his own crew, his own YouTube channel, and his own T-shirts.

People love these guys and their flashy tornado fireworks (seriously, don’t ask), but Kate isn’t so sure about their cocky cowboy leader.

Javi, meanwhile, is hiding a secret, and though you’d need a degree in big-screen technobabble to understand what everyone is talking about, you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to predict where this story will end up.

The first film was refreshingly simple. A cocky storm chaser returns to Oklahoma so his meteorologist wife can sign their divorce papers. Chaos ensues, and it’s only after chasing a band of earth-shattering tornadoes that our hapless leads realise they were really chasing one another.

In contrast, this visually spectacular yet disappointingly knotted follow-up opts for the more-is-more approach.

The first act is clean, focused, in on the joke and ready to entertain. The middle section is too cluttered, too melodramatic, with too many dodgy country tunes. By the time we reach the disorganised third act (replete with a wobbly finale that looks as if it was plucked from a different universe) Twisters has completely lost the run of itself.

How much you enjoy it, then, depends on your capacity for old-school blockbuster nonsense – where thrilling set-pieces do most of the heavy lifting. And sometimes that’s all we need.

Twisters director admits cast and crew battled real tornadoes during filming

Powell, a fine actor and a better movie star, is his usual tremendous self. He’s handy with catchphrases (“If you feel it, chase it!”), smooth with romantic drama (he and Daisy deserve their own rom-com). Most of his co-stars struggle to keep up – so, too, does the stormy weather.

But there comes a point where you might wonder how an Oscar-­nominated director like Lee Isaac Chung ended up here.

Perhaps we shouldn’t think too much about it. Fun for a while, and that’s all that matters.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Three stars