Blade II (2002) review

Part two of the Blade trilogy has "The Daywalker" (Wesley Snipes) saving his old friend Whistler (Kris Kristofferson) from imprisonment in Europe and then forming an alliance with a group of vampires named the Bloodpack - who are led by Dieter Reinhardt (Ron Perlman) - to fight against genetically-modified creatures called "Reapers" that are immune to garlic and silver ... but not sunlight.  It's easy to see what drew famed comic book and horror aficionado Del Toro to the project - it allows for him to indulge in closeups of metal piercing flesh, a monster being autopsied and stylized violence - but the screenplay (by David S. Goyer) is just one long action sequence with an absence of character development that pauses every so often for some banal dialogue.  There's also supposed to be a "love story" with Blade and Nyssa (Leonor Varela), but neither the hero nor the director has much time for romance: it's all about bodies exploding.  The only decent exchange (among so many bad ones): "You're human."  "Barely, I'm a lawyer."