ascinated by the sheer power and beguiling mystery behind tornadoes, aspiring meteorologist Kate Carter (Daisy Edgar-Jones) becomes the driving force of the “Tornado Tamers,” a gang of Oklahoma youths determined to gather data and decrease the severity of the weather phenomenons, all while winning a few science fairs and university grants in the process. But when the over-ambitious and under-prepared students encounter an EF-5 tornado, the results are catastrophic. Five years pass, and Kate now works for the National Weather Service in New York, far from the action but still close to the science and her ultimate goal of attempting to save lives with earlier detection and enhanced understanding of the deadly storms. When a friend from her past, Javier Rivera (Anthony Ramos), offers her a job at Storm Par, a heavily-financed operation with state-of-the-art radar technology designed to capture a three-dimensional view of a tornado, she agrees to assist them for one week. But once back in Oklahoma, it’s not long before Kate becomes entangled in the thrilling world of storm chasing with her new team of experts and a rival group led by the charismatic Tyler Owens (Glen Powell).

At the start, the twister hunters this time around are tremendously annoying, insufferably precocious, eco-warrior children, which doesn’t help when it comes to this sort of hazardous scientific endeavor. Shouldn’t there be at least one adult among them? And so, when their seemingly middle-school science project task is approached with the conduct, attitude, and precision of flippant kids, it’s both not surprising and unmoving when deadly tragedy strikes. It still feels awfully stupid for anyone to drive straight into a tornado; here, it’s the cinematic equivalent of watching toddlers play on railroad tracks. “Don’t lean out the window!”

Although a few years pass, the leads age only in the sense that they have adult careers. And yet, with all of the tropes of impossible-mission movies, the main characters reunite to continue their reckless passions. “I can’t do this without you!” Even though countless other more-qualified, less-traumatized scientists could absolutely fill the role, it takes one coffee meet-up and one text for Kate to come aboard, though she is, of course, not psychologically prepared for the first trek back into a tornado’s path. Adding to the blandness is questionable funding for limitless resources, competition from obnoxious storm chasers who cockily stream their exploits like the worst of online influencers, and a love triangle that only serves to heighten the dislike of all those involved.

As the tornado whisperer flirtatiously clashes with the tornado wrangler, the film tries way too hard to be exciting, resulting in exceptionally dull dialogue and interactions, which weirdly mirror the original “Twister” so closely that this essentially in-spirit-only sequel actually works pointedly as a remake. The soundtrack has been modernized alongside the cast, who miraculously grow more annoyingly juvenile and unsympathetic as the picture progresses, trading cheesy barbs and jargon-filled explanations while treating everything as if it’s a game (perhaps never more apparent than with the fantastical parting shots). But with character insincerity in the face of danger comes a lack of concern by the audience; no one will care if anyone here survives.

“Don’t let it get me!” A few sequences of tornado violence offset the interminable chasing and schmoozing and hypothesizing eating up time between CG-derived funnels of destruction, but the visuals aren’t striking enough to sit through two hours of dreadfully generic, low-stakes drama. It’s probably already trite to say that this film feels like it was written by AI, prompted to update the same plot from 1996 (switching a maturer theme like divorce with youthful, coy smooth-talkers), but it’s definitely not a positive quality for “Twisters’” narrative mediocrity to encourage viewers to root for the storms to win, as if the preternatural killer in slasher franchises.

– The Massie Twins