Ju-on 2 [2000]

ha-HAA!! Ju-on week continues! (ಠ ◡ ಠ)
After going through the first, its remake and the remake of that remake we now come to the sequel of the original, entitled Ju-on 2. Confused? Yeah, I'm not surprised. Here's a handy cheat sheet of what we've covered so far.
A Recap of the Ju-on Film Series Timeline
1998 'Katasumi' and '4444444444' appear in the horror film Gakkou no Kaidan G
2000 Ju-on + Ju-on 2
2003 Ju-on: The Grudge
2004 The Grudge (American remake)
Released in the same year as Ju-on, Ju-on 2 gives us a little more information and a bit more footage around the curse and the characters. Sadly a good 40% of the movie is actually just recycled footage from the first film. Yeah. WHAT A RIP-OFF. ( /ÒmÓ)/╧╧ *table flip*
The first 20 minutes of the movie is simply Kobayashi's portions of Ju-on, the Toshio chapter and the Kayako chapter, put together. Then we get the realtor agent and his psychic sister. Another 10 minutes of recycled footage before starting in on new stuff. I will say that it dovetails nicely between the first and second movie at this point but taking up almost half the movie with what can only be called a prologue is kind of lazy. This movie originally aired as a TV movie and I would understand laying out the previous movie for newcomers but it was such a hit. Why not assume most people would know the story at this point? A mere 40 minutes of actual new movie....
What you get out of this movie:
1) The extended story of the realtor agent and his family.
2) You get a little peek at how Takeo killed Kobayashi's wife.
3) You see more of Izumi's story, the group of schoolgirls who snuck into the house in J:TG.
And that's about it. This movie wasn't any kind of good, as much as I like Ju-on. This movie didn't have to exist. It's a cash grab as far as I can tell. Skip it. Just skip it. (- -_______)