When you hear the word “kaiju,” the first name that will definitely cross your mind is Godzilla. That will be followed by King Kong, Gamera, Mothra, Rodan, Ghidorah, Biollante, Hedorah, Smaug, and maybe the new dinosaurs from the Jurassic franchise (because they are not really dinosaurs, but dinosaur hybrids). That’s about it, though. Sure, genre experts will be able to fill up this whole article with the names of all the kaiju that exist across all forms of media, but the general populace’s knowledge will be limited to Godzilla and Kong. As someone who has watched all the Godzilla and Kong movies, I never really saw that as an issue. However, after watching Pacific Rim, Underwater, and The Sea Beast, I realized that we really have a scarcity of long-running kaiju-centric franchises outside of the poster boys of this subgenre. So, when Troll arrived on our small screens, I welcomed it with open arms and loudly celebrated its unique blend of Norwegian lore, religious commentary, pro-environmental activism, and classic kaiju shenanigans. I don’t know about everybody else, but I was extremely excited when I learned that a sequel was on the way. Well, did Troll 2 live up to my expectations? Let’s find out.
Roar Uthaug’s Troll 2, written by Espen Aukan, reunites us with Nora, who has moved into her father’s cabin in Steinbudalen, where she spends her days reading books about communicating with animals and collecting evidence of Jotun (that’s what the trolls are called) activity. Why, though? Along with Kris and Andreas, isn’t she one of the heroes of the battle with the Jotun in Oslo? Well, yes, but she wanted to hold the royals responsible for sitting atop the bones of the family of the Jotun King who died for humanity’s sins. When the royals refused to admit fault, and the government decided to soldier on with their project of preparing for future Jotun altercations, Nora decided to step away from the limelight. However, when that project hits a speed bump, Andreas brings Nora on board so that she can help the government make some breakthroughs by analyzing a hibernating Jotun nicknamed Megatroll. And on her first day at the job, Nora ends up waking up Megatroll, who commences his revenge quest against Saint Olaf, the medieval king of Norway who ordered the extermination of Jotuns. Since Megatroll is much meaner and more destructive than the king of Jotuns, Nora gets desperate and ropes in the king’s son, nicknamed Beautiful, thereby setting the stage for an epic clash of the titans.
Kaiju movies have always been about humanity’s relationship with the planet. Godzilla is seen as a by-product of our experimentation with nuclear weapons. Kong is a stand-in for colonization and monetizing “the exotic” in the form of spectacle. And most decent-to-good kaiju flicks that followed in those titans’ footsteps have tried to talk about their respective monsters through the lens of environmentalism and the planet’s inherent need to set things right through any means necessary. But Troll went a step further and layered that commentary with the Christianization of Norway and even treated the Jotuns as an indigenous population that had been wronged by the humans. In Troll 2, though, these topics get a little muddled, because Aukan tries to deliver an odd twist centered around Saint Olaf, which then leads to a finale where the heroes have to use the tools of religious fanaticism to kill a guy whose entire tribe has been wronged by said religion. Since this is a franchise whose themes are probably going to evolve with each entry, I am going to give Aukan the benefit of the doubt and say that maybe the heroes’ reliance on the weapons born out of fascism is intentional. It’s possible that he is showing that dealing with the repercussions of our actions, especially when it comes to ethnic persecution, isn’t always easy, and we end up making the same mistakes that we sought to correct.
Troll 2 has the same runtime as its predecessor, but it’s relatively fast-paced. So, there’s a good chance that you might miss some of its emotionally poignant beats. I won’t hold it against Uthaug, because this is a problem that every action-oriented sequel in existence faces. There’s this need to up the ante by making the action sequences bigger and louder, because the makers think that if they don’t deliver in the action department, the audience will be disappointed. What they forget is that it’s not only the set pieces that make these kaiju movies tick; it’s a healthy balance of spectacle and character work that gives them that “memorable” tag. To Uthaug’s credit, he does try to punctuate every single jaw-dropping Jotun sequence with scenes of human-troll coexistence, Norwegian lore, and these pangs of existential crisis about where the planet is heading. Is it enough? I’ll let you be the judge of that. Coming to the action scenes themselves, yeah, they are awesome. They have a great sense of scale and weight. The Jotuns feel heavy and hence, really intimidating. The lore-based excuse that the Jotuns can’t go out in daylight saves VFX and CGI artists from the headache of recreating sunlight. Illuminating these giants with UV lights, disco lights, street lamps, and explosions can’t have been a walk in the park though. So, kudos to Uthaug and his team for bringing blockbuster-level filmmaking directly to our small screens. With all that said, since Uthaug intends to make more Troll films, I hope he puts some more focus on shot composition and camerawork because, in comparison to the first film, the visual storytelling did take a hit in the sequel.
Despite the flaws in the narrative and the action, one of the main reasons I have rated Troll 2 positively is because of the cast. Ine Marie Wilmann does an incredible job of serving as the audience surrogate while also expressing how Nora is sort of coming apart at the seams because she can’t find an ethical way to deal with the latest Jotun problem. Kim Falck is the most relatable out of the lot, and the payoff that his character gets had me in tears. I know that it’s manipulative, but we are watching a movie; everything in it is manipulating us to get a certain emotional response out of us. Hence, if I reacted exactly how Falck, Uthaug, and Aukan wanted me to react, it’s a win for them, I am afraid. Mads Sjogard Pettersen’s portrayal of the jarhead is surprisingly nuanced. Instead of making him all militaristic and “macho,” he is allowed to be vulnerable. I don’t know how everyone else will feel about it, but I loved Sara Khorami’s addition to the cast. She managed to hold her own beside the returning cast, and her chemistry with Mads was quite electric. Karoline Viktoria Sletteng Garvang and Anne Krigsvoll’s cameos are solid. All the party-goers should be applauded for perfectly showcasing how this generation reacts to any sort of unprecedented situation. Also, kudos to the animators and the performance-capture artists who have brought the Jotuns to life; that’s really some awards-worthy stuff right there.
Do I recommend giving Troll 2 a watch? Yes (and that’s a very enthusiastic “yes”). Sure, it suffers from the usual problems that any sequel in the world does—the unscientific term for it is “sequelitis.” But, as a fan of kaiju movies, I can’t help but support it because it offers some much-needed variety to this subgenre. Godzilla and Kong are great. Regardless of what the snobs say, I like those goofy movies because they get more and more ridiculous with each installment. The MonsterVerse franchise is doing pretty well on the small screen too. However, don’t you want to see something other than that massive lizard and monkey? Also, it’s not like Roar Uthaug is just mindlessly substituting those mutated animals with the Jotuns and calling it a day. He and his team are trying to give us a peek into Norwegian history and mythology while critiquing everything that’s wrong with technological “advancements” and societal “progress.” Yes, activism in and through movies rarely translates to real-world change, but I think trying to educate people about where we are going wrong as a species is better than doing nothing at all. All in all, I think that Troll is perfect, Troll 2 is not as good as the first one but still enjoyable, and based on what’s been promised for Troll 3, I am hyped as hell.
