Years after the story in Tremors, Val McKee has moved away and married Rhonda LeBeck. Oh well — Kevin Bacon did Apollo 13 instead and Reba McEntire went on tour.

As for Earl Basset (Fred Ward), he wasted his money on an ostrich ranch. The good news — I guess — is that the monsters haven’t gone away.

A rich man named Carlos Ortega (Marcelo Tubert) is upset that Graboids are killing his men on the oil fields. He offers Earl $50,000 for monster he kills, money that interests the man picking Earle up for this mission, Grady Hoover (Christopher Gartin). He also finds out that he gets $100,000 if they captures one alive.

Along with geologist Kate Reilly (Helen Shaver) and her team of Julio (Marco Hernandez) and Pedro (José Rosario), who are studying the monsters, Earl and Grady use remote control cars with bombs to wipe out Graboids before they get overwhelmed. That’s when they call in Burt Gummer (Michael Gross) to help them wipe them all out.

Well, that seems easy until they meet a new mutation that they call Shriekers. This version of the beasts can replication without a mate when they eat food and while they can’t hear, they can sense through their infrared sensors.

Originally created to be direct to video, this kept getting delayed — for two years — because every time they played it in theaters for test screenings, it did really well. The fans wanted it to be in theaters and it finally ended up playing there — at the TCL Hollywood Theatre, the Alfred Hitchcock Theater and the National Theatre in Tokyo, Japan — before being released on video.

This was directed by S.S. Wilson, the co-creator of the franchise and inspiration for the character of Burt Gummer. He was also the narrator. He also wrote Heart and Souls, Wild Wild West and Short Circuit. He also directed Tremors 4: The Legend Begins and wrote the script with his usual writing partner Brent Maddock.

There’s a reason why they made so many of these movies. They’re fun and filled with great looking kaiju. It’s a perfect video era watch.

The Arrow Video release of Tremors 2 has a new 4K restoration from the original negative by Arrow Films, approved by director S.S. Wilson. There are two commentaries, one by director/co-writer S.S. Wilson and co-producer Nancy Roberts and the other with Jonathan Melville, author of Seeking Perfection: The Unofficial Guide to Tremors.

There are also interviews with special effects designer Peter Chesney and CG supervisor Phil Tippett. It also includes an on-set featurette, outtakes, trailers, an image gallery, an illustrated perfect bound booklet featuring new writing by Jonathan Melville on the Tremors 2 scripts that never got made, and Dave Wain & Matty Budrewicz on the history of the Universal TV sequel division, a double-sided fold-out poster featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Matt Frank, a small fold-out poster featuring new Shrieker X-ray art by Matt Frank and limited Edition packaging featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Matt Frank.

You can get the blu ray from MVD and the 4K UHD from Arrow Video.