The second part of the
Back to the Future series of
sci-fi comedies. The plot is partly a rehash of the first movie except set in the future (2015) and an alternate present as well as
1955. The time travel 'theory' behind the plot makes very little sense, and is further stretched by allowing members of multiple generations of the
McFly and
Tannen families to look identical so that they can be mistaken for each other. Most of the cast of the first film get made up to look old or young at some point.
The most incongruous part is that Doc Brown insists that Marty doesn't mess up the course of history (by betting on sports events with the aid of the Sports Almanac), but freely does so himself, and for the first third of the movie attempts to get Marty to alter his own future so that he doesn't become a failure. So it's one rule for the Doc, another rule for everyone else.
As with the other movies in the series, the theatrical release is slightly longer due to the presence of several product placement sequences. These include a Texaco hovercar garage, Pepsi Perfect ($45 per serving), AT&T videophones and electronic locks, a Black & Decker rehydrator oven, Pizza Hut dehydrated pizza, Nike powered trainers, a USA Today robot photographer, and a Mattel hoverboard.
Because the movie was made in 1988, its vision of the future is based on an extrapolated version of the 1980's. Unsurprisingly many elements look out of date now, never mind 14 years in the future. Marty Sr. has fax machines in every room of his house, while his kids watch 6 TV channels at once. Embedded computers are everywhere, but they talk with a Hawkingesque sythesised voice. There is no internet or mobile phones (at least that we can see). The local cinema is playing a holographic version of 'Jaws'. While in the Cafe 80's in 2015 (one thing that the film does get right is the prevalence of crappy 1980's nostalgia), Marty gets dissed by a young Elijah Wood for playing video games with his hands.
We can see that this vision of the future is not even internally consistent: one minute an advertisement proclaims that hovercars mean that traffic problems are a thing of the past*, the next minute Doc complains that the 'skyway' is too congested to get to Marty's house quickly. The hover cars are presumably powered by fusion and yet there is a Texaco (petrol) garage.
The film resembles a Universal Studios ride crossed with a particularly commercialised Epcot Centre attraction. It does prove however that creating a flashy prediction of the near future (even one that makes no sense under close scrutiny) makes for good (and lucrative) entertainment.
*But then I suppose adverts lie in any age.