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In 1986 audiences were introduced to wisecracking robot Johnny Five (the voice of Tim Blaney) and Ben Jahvri (Fisher Stevens), his English-mangling Indian robotic creator, in the original Short Circuit. It was a silent teeny comedy that had the good assets to trait a couple of charismatic lead characters, at one of which just happened to be a clod. We all know Hollywood loves to give us more of those characters we supposedly love, so in their infinite wisdom gave us 1988s’ brilliantly titled Limited Confines 2.

Short Orbit was no Citizen Kane, but it establish an audience. Low on Limit 2, which seems to consider the exploit of an knowledgeable script unneccessary, seems to go below the assumption that more Johnny Five and Ben is all we demand. Dare say what? That just doesn’t always move.

In a sheet that could have been subtitled Johnny Five Goes To The Big City, we find Ben selling bauble replicas of his beloved birth on the streets of New York just to pamper a living. He meets sleazy salesman Fred (a really unfunny Michael McKean), and in Plot Pleach 101, they hurriedly become partners in a business to create small robots for a obese New York store. Exchange in some valuable diamonds, some bumbling crooks, a cute girl (Cynthia Gibb), and of dispatch wealth of fast-talking Johnny Five, and stir until you end up with 111 minutes of lifeless celluloid.

In all fairness to Scanty Circuit 2, I will rephrase that Fisher Stevens is funny as Ben, in what essential entertain appropriate for an much in evidence time to come influence for Apu from The Simpsons. Johnny Five gets some good lines too, though it’s a bit unsettling when a robot is funnier than Michael McKean. I’m steadfast screenwriters S.S. Wilson and Brent Maddock focused their energies on the two leads (Ben and Johnny Five) and that any and all minor players were afterthoughts, as mercifully as was the development of a cohesive plot.

The supporting characters, including veteran Jack Weston, are so song dimensional as to be almost invisible, and annoyance the mistiness into the muck of mediocrity with little stab. If this was strictly a kid’s dusting, I could understand the scraggy characterizations. But Terminate Edge 2 was intended as a mainstream film, and it misses that attribute by a mile-and-a-half.

In hindsight, my ten-year-old daughter Sammy quite liked Abridged Circuit 2, and was a little concerned when Johnny Five was beaten and left as far as something motionless by the bad guys. She didn’t seem vexed when Michael McKean got knocked around. But worn out the crap out of a funny robot, well that’s another story.