Universal Soldier: The Return (1999) – What Happened to This Sci-Fi Action Movie?

In 1992, the now acclaimed director Roland Emmerich, alongside action superstars Jean Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren, created Universal Soldier. A movie that was maybe under-appreciated in the golden age of action films but nonetheless a highlight in all of their careers. Regardless, financial issues loomed for the studio that created it. This resulted in rights being sold and two mostly horrendous television movies being released on Showtime starring Gary Busey and Burt Reynolds. Seven years later, in 1999, the franchise would attempt its big screen comeback with the legendary Jean Claude Van Damme desperate for a career win on a project no director seemed willing to touch. Would the result be a resurrection of not only the franchise but its leading man’s once unstoppable career? Or one of the final nails in the coffin of both of their big screen futures? This is What Happened to Universal Soldier: The Return.

Though moderately successful, it wasn’t long after the release of the original Universal Soldier that Carolco pictures went bankrupt. Though the company had several successful action hits such as Cliffhanger and Total Recall, years of losing money due to financial setbacks such as the ill-fated Cutthroat Island left the studio in shambles. In the shake up, the television rights to Universal Soldier were sold, resulting in two straight to TV sequels in the franchise: Universal Soldier II: Brothers in Arms and Universal Soldier III: Unfinished Business. The quality of both films were rather forgettable and the entire time Universal Soldier Producer Craig Baumgarten was itching to give the franchise the legit sequel it deserved. The rights eventually made their way to Baumgarten-Prophet Entertainment alongside TriStar Pictures (who distributed the first film) as well as Sony Pictures Entertainment. Jean Claude Van Damme was no doubt looking to return to box office domination after some rough outings with films like Maximum Risk and the Dennis Rodman team up Double Team. It seemed as if a sequel to one of his classic films could be the solution. Unfortunately the muscles from Brussels had burned a lot of bridges at this point in his career making a return to possible franchises like Timecop unlikely. However, a multi picture deal with Sony had the studio willing to take a chance on the actor once more despite the previous box office disappointments such as the underrated Sudden Death. They greenlighted a Universal Soldier theatrical sequel with one caveat: the film had to remain under a budget of $35 million.

A script for an original project written by Another 48 Hours and (later) Darkness Falls writer John Fasano was found and adapted into a sequel for the franchise. Much in the same way 10 Cloverfield Lane had been changed to fit its respective franchise years later. This alongside the help of The Return’s original director William Malone. Malone secured the job on the sequel after his work on horror projects such as Tales from the Crypt and Freddy Krueger television series Freddy’s Nightmares. He had hopes to create a more reserved, horror laden sequel to push the franchise forward. Unfortunately, Jean Claude Van Damme was keen to make the type of high flying, action packed film his audience perhaps expected of him. Despite the films modest budget. This impasse ultimately led to Malone leaving the project and instead going on to work on the surprisingly entertaining horror remake House on Haunted Hill instead. With the preproduction process taking longer than expected, the studio reached out to multiple other directors, including Roland Emmerich, with none of them showing interest in the project. This led them to Mel Gibson’s long time stunt double and first time director Mic Rodgers. Rodgers had a history in action films due to his succesful stunt career working on films such as Braveheart and Lethal Weapon. But had no experience directing whatsoever.

In the final script, the events of The Return would predictably ignore the events of the two previous sequels, instead directly following up the original film. We’re now fifteen years past the events of the original and Luc Deveraux has now been converted back into a normal human being. You just kind of have to ignore the fact that this somehow means the Unisol program basically solved the issue of HUMAN DEATH and go with it. Not to mention Deveraux is now working for the very company that put him through Hell, helping to refine the new generation of Unisol’s. The company’s moral focus is no doubt much more developed and they are now solely focused on reducing human casualties of war with their updated breed of soldiers. All this with the help of a futuristic AI computer program known as S.E.T.H., connected to each of the UniSol’s via neural implants. SETH can do everything from control the Unisol’s to babysit Deveraux’s daughter. When budget cuts promise to shut down the program entirely, SETH picks up on the betrayal and goes full blown Skynet. The computer program unleashes a group of Unisol’s to do its bidding, attempting to kill Deveraux as he is the only one left alive with the code that can shut its system down.

All this leads to Deveraux surviving the attack of a group of new and improved Unisols while trying to keep his daughter alive alongside his new and attractive reporter friend caught in the crossfire. At one point Deveraux drops the honestly pretty cool line, that “the only way is to blow them all up and hope the pieces don’t continue fighting us”. Meanwhile, SETH has managed to put his super computer essence into the brain of the most dangerous of all the UniSols… a body inhabited by none other than actor Michael Jai White, who we saw perish in the opening to the original film. Which, despite this wacky plot is a pretty cool callback.

Alongside physical specimens JCVD and Michael Jai White, the film casts wrestler Bill Goldberg as the most morally bankrupt Unisol, Romeo. In a role they originally had Stone Cold Steve Austin in mind for. Though Goldberg, who the director called “an Energizer bunny on steroids” was over the top and honestly corny throughout: physically, he was a fun and formidable physical opponent for Van Damme, who always thrived as the underdog. The love interest, reporter Erin Young is played by Heidi Schanz but was originally intended for the return of Ally Walker, who left the project early on due to other scheduled commitments. They instead killed her character off between films, leaving Deveraux as a single parent to their daughter. Terminator 2’s “Todd”, actor Xander Berkeley, plays one of the good guy geniuses responsible for the creation of SETH, who is dispatched a little too early in the film. Robocop 3 and Super Troopers actor, the late Daniel von Bargen plays an Army General trying to help stop SETH. Character actor Brent Hinkley rounds out the cast as a cartoonish and over the top guy in the chair cyber punk who listens to Gwar and helps SETH find his human form while eating cereal with a giant wooden spoon.

The ambitious script for The Return notwithstanding, the film is merely an action packed science fiction fight movie with various metal songs blasting off in the background. Not only was Goldberg’s WCW entrance song “Crush Em” by Megadeth featured at the wrestler’s request, but so were songs from everyone from Static-X to Anthrax. In another metal tie in, the Texas filmed flick even featured a strip club called “The Clubhouse” which was, in real life, owned by Pantera’s Vinnie Paul and Dimebag Darrell.

We’re not talking Citizen Kane by any means. But Universal Soldier: The Return still makes for a nonstop action rollercoaster with a plethora of fun fight scenes. The now human Deveraux has to repeatedly take on a semi-scary, mostly cheesy, Goldberg. Who is constantly resurrecting and appearing around every corner in pure Michael Myers fashion with the persistence of a Terminator. His prize? A final showdown with SETH’s ultimate Unisol in Michael Jai White where they repeatedly throw each other through a buffet of glass structures. Like it’s a goddamn fun house. The film walks a thin line between forgettable straight to video action fare and a fun 90s action movie with no fat left on the bone.

Jean Claude Van Damme seemed healthy, in prime physical shape, and far more committed than in recent films such as Street Fighter. During promotion he even mentioned that he had been training hard for a film that required him to be quick and in good shape for copious amounts of action scenes within.

Regardless, a lengthy pre-production and reshoots ended up ballooning the budget to around $40 million dollars and disastrous test screenings led the studio to take control of its editing. All told, The Return ended up with a running time of only an hour and twenty three minutes in the hopes that more screenings would provide a better box office return. This proved to be an unsuccessful endeavor.

Universal Soldier: The Return would finally release domestically on August 20th, 1999. The results were dismal. The film would only make just over $10 million domestically, with less than $3 million internationally. The reviews were even worse. As of today, The Return sits at a 5% Rotten rating on the review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes, with a not much better Audience Rating of 24% Rotten. Reviews were savage and called the film (perhaps unfairly) idiotic, derivative, mind-numbing, and disappointing. The unfortunate result of all this for our beloved Jean Claude Van Damme was equally hurtful. Apart from a voice acting role in 2011’s Kung Fu Panda 2, the actor wouldn’t be seen on a big screen again until 2012’s The Expendables 2 in a rare villain role where he’s pitted against Sylvester Stallone. Though that movie did end in a pretty cool final fight scene between two action legends.

Villain Michael Jai White isn’t exactly fond in his recollection of the film, either. In a long after the fact interview the martial arts actor stated that he remembers the movie being “dumb as hell” and one of the worst movies he’s been in throughout the entirety of his career. Which, to be fair, is saying a lot. Jean Claude at least felt positively about it all at the time, saying he felt it The Return was all in all a good movie with a lot of rollercoaster-esque action scenes. That it featured actors in prime physical condition resulting in believable fight sequences.

In reality, director Mic Rodgers would never direct another film. The subsequent sequel a decade later, Universal Soldier: Regeneration, also starring Van Damme and bringing back Dolph Lundgren, would again cut this film out of franchise canon; deeming itself a direct sequel to the original.

Though Universal Soldier: The Return turned out to be a disappointment both financially and critically, it might be fair to say it’s a little better than given credit for. Sure, there are some questionable choices, dialogue, and acting moments. No doubt some bargain bin, music video quality cheese sprinkled throughout its brisk running time. But it also features a script with some interesting ideas about the Unisol program being led by a malicious AI powered computer. More importantly it’s a fun, turn your brain off, action movie with a ton of go for it action sequences and extended fight scenes. It’s an entertaining movie with a brisk running time and non-stop action featuring a handful of actors in amazing shape, beating the living hell out of each other. Universal Soldier: The Return is at its best a fun throwback to the action days of old and undoubtedly a far better entry in the franchise that the two television films that preceded it. And most importantly….long live Jean Claude Van Damme. And that is what happened to Universal Soldier: The Return.

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