In the first Breakin’ movie, they rocked down to Electric Avenue. In Breakin 2: Electric Boogaloo, they will take it even higher. The 1984 movie Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo has the rare honor of being a movie that is only famous for its name. This is a shame because it should be remembered as Ice-T’s big acting break. 

The movie stars Adolfo 'Shabba-Doo' Quinones as Turbo, Michael “Bugaloo Shrimp” Chambers as Ozone, and Lucinda “Smart Enough Not to Have a Nickname” Dickey as Kelly. 

The movie starts with the gang getting back together, or at least I assume so, I haven’t seen Breakin 1: Manual Booglaoo, but it doesn’t seem like I’m missing much. Anyway, Ozone and Turbo, who aren't Transformers or even Gobots for that matter, but instead break dancers are working at the local community center and asking Kelly to help them out. This community center is essential to the community because this is where the community goes to learn to break dancing, where they go to teach break dancing, where they go to watch break dancing, and where they go to watch people teaching break dancing, and where they watch people being taught break dancing, and where they teach people how to watch people break dancing, and where they watch people teaching people how to watch people break dancing. And apparently, occasionally, there’s some arts and crafts. 

But in classic 80’s movie style, a developer wants to raise the community center to build a supermarket. But our heroes can save the community center by raising $200,000 in 30 days. They first try by collecting painfully looking fake money from people via car wash and bake sales. When that doesn’t pay off, they have a telethon to raise the money. No, wait, that’s UHF. They decided to have a dance recital to raise the money. Is dance recital the right word for break dancing? I don’t know. 

While they plot and plan the recital, Kelly’s rich dad tries to bribe her into attending Princeton or getting a dancing job in Paris. The rival 60-person dance crew from Jacksonville, Dance Dance Resolution, keeps intruding on their turf, so they have an impromptu street dance-off. The good guys win, of course, but I think it was entirely because Turbo intimidated them with his marching band uniform.  No one has more street cred than a drum major. 

The biggest issue with this movie is that they treated it as a movie musical, but instead of breaking out into song and dance, they just break out into dance. This creates a lot of confusion because it’s almost always unclear if this is regular break dancing or we’re movie musical dancing. Are we supposed to suspend disbelief as this dude suddenly starts dancing on the ceiling, or are we witnessing this person having a complete mental break? If he embraced his inner Lionel Richie and belted, “Oh, what a feeling, we’re dancing on the ceiling,” we’d have that answer. But instead, it's just some Nightmare on Elm Street confusing shit. Wait, now are we dancing with a sex doll or a real person? I have no idea.

With literally 100’s of dancers in this movie, some do a little extra to try to stand out and get noticed on film. The mime, for example, seems like a flawed plan, as even if he did get noticed, he wouldn’t exactly get any lines in the movie. And then there’s the short dancer wearing a Tor Johnson mask with aviators. It’s a look that, yes, attracts attention, but no one can see your face. 

The highlight of this movie for me is Ice-T showing up in the club looking like Detective Tuteola has gone undercover as a Road Warrior Hawk. Oh, what a Rush! 

If you decide to watch this stinker, look for the handcuff belt that keeps jumping from character to character. It was a little game I played with myself to stay awake. 

Turbo takes a tumble down the stairs and winds up out cold in the hospital with a broken leg and arm. The gang visits and his girlfriend surprises them by emerging from the locker next to the bed. No explanation as to why or how she got there or why all her lines in the movie have been dubbed. She kisses Turbo like Princess Charming, and Turbo emerges from the Coma. Which means it's the perfect time for a dance number. Or a coma hallucination. Or maybe it’s them celebrating him being out of a coma. Either way, the surgeons are leaving that dude to die on the operating table so they can pop and lock. 

So, the big day of the dance recital comes, and the bulldozers show up, so it's the perfect time for another dance number. But the evil wealthy developer tells the bulldozers to go ahead anyway, and the crowd scatters. But Turbo, still in a hospital gown, tells the bulldozers to “Get out of here, man. What’s up?” And the bulldozer operator is like, ‘yeah, you make a good point, we’re going home.’ Literally that easy. 

The dance recital goes off without a hitch. The rival dance crew even pitches in to help at the suggestion of Jason Mendoza. When the fundraising falls short, Kelly’s rich daddy sees the light and the value of the community center and writes a big check, thus saving U62. I mean the community center. Everyone’s happy except for the developer, who would have gotten away with it if not for those meddling kids. 

If you can't beat the system...break it!