Escape Room: Tournament of Champions (2021)

Escape Room: Tournament of Champions ramps up the intensity from the first film with more elaborate puzzles and higher stakes, but it stumbles when it comes to logic and storytelling. The rooms are undeniably impressive, showcasing creative designs and traps that keep the tension high, but the movie leans too heavily on the spectacle, often at the expense of coherent decision-making and dialogue. There are moments where the characters’ actions feel forced, making you question their intelligence, which can pull you out of the experience. The pacing is relentless, but it doesn’t leave much room for deeper character connections or meaningful plot development.

While it’s fun and engaging in the moment, the movie struggles with its balance, offering a visually captivating experience but leaving you frustrated with its many plot holes and lack of resolution. It’s entertaining if you focus on the thrill of the escape rooms and don’t think too hard about the logic, but as a sequel, it feels more like a flashy setup for another installment rather than a solid continuation. Worth watching if you enjoyed the first, but don’t expect it to tie up loose ends or make much sense.

Escape Room: Tournament of Champions is the 2019 sequel with two very different versions: the theatrical cut and the Extended Cut, which offers a completely different storyline featuring new key characters in the Minos organization. This review focuses on the Extended Cut, which provides a more coherent and engaging continuation from the first film.

The film opens with a recap of the original and dives deeper into Minos, introducing new characters who strengthen the plot despite limited exploration. The escape room challenges remain creative and tense, with characters playing more active roles and the pacing flowing smoothly.

The ending provides satisfying closure for the main characters and Minos, though without major twists. Acting and visual effects are strong, though minor inconsistencies exist, like unrealistic car scenes and laser trap behavior. Overall, the Extended Cut offers a fuller, more exciting story but is less known than the official version.

Read the full review here: (Indonesian version : alunauwie.com) and (English version : uwiepuspita.com)

64/100

Survivors of a previous game suddenly find themselves playing it again. This review is on the Extended Cut. I've read the Theatrical Cut is different. The movie was exciting with lots of twists and turns and the escape room puzzles featured some clever tricks. For me, the problem was the acting and directing. The acting wasn't bad but is wasn't great either making them shallow generating little empathy. The directing had them solving puzzles by basically screaming at each other. Methodical cooperation would have improved things. It was still fun. -- DrNostromo.com