As Madonna reminded us all those years ago we are living in a material world, and one where the hankering for the almighty dollar often outweighs lesser considerations such as, say, good taste. 

In this spirit comes Butterfly Effect 2, a straight to video attempt by New Line Cinema to cash in on the markedly superior original.  Released in 2006 and almost universally ignored, the film revolves around four impossibly good looking twenty-somethings on a camping trip.  A subsequent accident results in calamity, and it is left to Nick (Eric Lively) to save the day with a spate of time travel adventures. 

Butterfly Effect 2 isn’t a completely terrible film, but it does lack the urgency and immediacy of the original from which it shamelessly borrows.  Whereas Ashton Kutcher’s Evan Treborn travelled back in time to save his best friend ending up a prostitute or to prevent another friend being institutionalised, at one point Nick goes back in time in order to ensure he gets promoted ahead of a rival colleague.  Lively is a likable lead and a strong actor, as are most of the ensemble cast, but his motivations do occasionally seem a little mercenary, and ultimately serve to keep the viewer at arms length. 

As ever the Blu-ray transfer is flawless, but the disc itself is very much a bare bones affair, with not so much as a special feature in sight.  This is perhaps irrelevant considering one reviewer described the film itself, perhaps with a hint of truth, as ‘a stagnant pool of muck.’  Butterfly Effect 2 does have its moments and the opening half hour is promising enough, but the film fails to hit its mark consistently and is, ultimately, a pale imitation of the 2004 original.