The stars finally aligned at Netflix for this long-gestating legacy sequel that sees an older and slightly wiser Axel Foley colliding with 80s/90s action tropes for a daft but reasonably entertaining ride. Starting with a couple of mindless vehicular action sequences and necessary fan-favourite character revisits, the film perks up with the arrival of a slightly-underused Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a modern-day detective and Taylour Paige as Foley's estranged lawyer daughter. Nostalgia fans should not worry, as the film is totally unafraid to mine its past, to the extent that The Heat Is On and Faltermeyer's Axel F theme both appear in the first five minutes. The fractious relationship between Foley and his daughter works well, with Murphy faring much better with his recent mature-actor persona rather than resorting to his old-school comedy schtick (which does occasionally intrude). The actual police story is perfunctory and almost irrelevant, and the relatively low-key action set pieces are a little underwhelming, but seeing Axel Foley in action once again is the real draw here, a little more subdued but still just about entertaining enough.
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