Twisters, the standalone sequel to the 1996 movie Twister, is a must-see! As a fan of the original Twister, I was a bit nervous going into the theater. I knew I wouldn’t hate it; it’s a disaster movie starring Daisy Edgar-Jones and Glen Powell after all. But I was worried I would leave the theater feeling underwhelmed. But all that worrying was for naught because this movie was an instant favorite. Twisters was fun, it was exciting, and it was captivating! A perfect summer blockbuster.
Daisy Edgar-Jones did an amazing job (no surprise there) playing Kate, a storm chaser with an amazing intuition. The movie opens with Kate and her team chasing a storm, hoping to gather data that will help with their research. Kate and her group are hoping to find a way to make tornadoes dissipate, minimizing their destruction. Things take a turn for the worst when the storm quickly evolves into an EF5 tornado, the most destructive tornado on the EF scale. Kate and her team take shelter under a bridge, but only Kate and Javi, played by Anthony Ramos, survive. The original Twister’s opening scene is very similar to this movie, with the father of the main character, Jo, being killed by a tornado. But while these scenes are very similar, each with their heartbreaking deaths, the new Twisters’ opening is haunting in a way that the original never seemed to be. If you love the trope of characters haunting the narrative like I do, this movie is definitively for you.
The movie then jumps to 5 years in the future where Kate has a desk job at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and has traded in her storm-chasing gear for a suit and briefcase. Javi, who has been working for a mobile tornado radar company called Storm Par, tracks Kate down in New York City and offers her a short-term position to test a new tornado scanning system, only convincing Kate to return storm chasing after sending her a video about the destruction of a town caused by a recent tornado.
Kate returns home to Oklahoma with Javi and is introduced to the rest of the Storm Par team. They are a buttoned-up, well-funded group of storm chasers with state-of-the-art technology. Meanwhile, YouTube star Tyler Owens, played by Glen Powell, arrives, seemingly to make money off of the predicted tornado outbreak that Kate and Javi are planning to study. Powell, Hollywood’s newest it-boy, does an amazing job of playing a somewhat douchebag who is still so charming and lovable.
After Tyler is introduced, it is clear that Storm Par and Tyler (along with his YouTube Channel crew) have beef, or rather Storm Par has beef with Tyler’s group. In Twister, there are two similar groups in competition when it comes to storm chasing. There was Jo’s team which, like Tyler’s team, was an unconventional group of weather enthusiasts. Then, like Javi and Kate’s team, there was a well-funded corporate company. Unlike the original, the protagonist is on the corporate team, which makes an intriguing difference.
As Kate, Javi, Tyler and their teams chase tornado to tornado, they are met with the destruction each twister leaves in their past. Leveled houses, destroyed companies, people who are injured or worse. The storm chasers try to help the survivors as much as they can, but some have ulterior motives. Kate must decide where her allegiances lie and she has to do it fast. The next tornado could touch down at any time.
Twisters is full of amazing special effects and thrilling scenes, two musts for disaster films. With fireworks set off in the middle of a twister and a tornado made of fire, this film has it all. There is romance (I was screaming, giggling, and kicking my feet), there is comedy, and an amazing soundtrack. This is an absolute must-see for fans of fun. A story of passion, self-acceptance, love, and grief, Twisters will make you laugh and it will make you cry, all while sitting on the edge of your seat.
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