Mad Max 2 (released as The Road Warrior in the United States) is a 1981 Australian post-apocalyptic dystopian action film directed by George Miller, who co-wrote it with Terry Hayes and Brian Hannant.

The film stars Mel Gibson reprising his role as "Mad Max" Rockatansky and follows a hardened man who helps a community of settlers to defend themselves against a roving band of marauders.

[6] Mad Max 2 was released in Australia on 24 December 1981 to widespread critical acclaim, with particular praise given to Gibson's performance, the musical score, cinematography, action sequences, costume design and sparing use of dialogue.

[8] Former policeman Max Rockatansky, haunted by the death of his family,[a] drives around the desert Outback of what was once Australia, scavenging for food and petrol with his dog.

Max overpowers the man with his dog's help, sparing his life in return for being led to a working oil refinery the pilot has discovered.

Max offers his own deal: he will bring them the semi-truck he saw earlier so they can try to haul away their tanker full of oil, if they return his car and give him as much fuel as he can carry.

His support consists of the Gyro Captain, Pappagallo in a separate vehicle, three of the settlers on the outside of the armoured tanker, and the Feral Kid, who jumps on the truck as it is leaving.

The marauders pursue the tanker, allowing the remaining settlers to flee their compound in a caravan of smaller vehicles after rigging the refinery to explode.

Following the release of Mad Max, director George Miller tried to develop a rock and roll movie, the working title of which was Roxanne.

After working together on the novelization of Mad Max, Miller and Terry Hayes teamed up in Los Angeles to write Roxanne, but the script was ultimately shelved.

"[14] Inspired by Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces and the work of Carl Jung,[15] as well as the films of Akira Kurosawa,[3] Miller recruited Hayes to join the production as a scriptwriter.

For the majority of American viewers, their first inkling of The Road Warrior being a sequel to Mad Max was when they saw the black and white, archival footage from the first film during the prologue of the second.

While Ebert pointed out the film does not develop its "vision of a violent future world ... with characters and dialogue", and uses only the "barest possible bones of a plot", he praised its action sequences.

[10] Writing for Newsweek, Charles Michener praised Mel Gibson's "easy, unswaggering masculinity", saying that "[his] hint of Down Under humor may be quintessentially Australian but is also the stuff of an international male star".

[33] Gary Arnold, in his review for The Washington Post, wrote: "While he seems to let triumph slip out of his grasp, Miller is still a prodigious talent, capable of a scenic and emotional amplitude that recalls the most stirring attributes in great action directors like Kurosawa, Peckinpah and Leone".

[34] Pauline Kael called Mad Max 2 a "mutant" film that was "sprung from virtually all action genres", creating "one continuous spurt of energy" by using "jangly, fast editing", but criticised Miller's "attempt to tap into the universal concept of the hero", stating that this attempt "makes the film joyless", "sappy", and "sentimental".

Scheib stated that the film transforms the "post-holocaust landscape into the equivalent of a Western frontier", such that "Mel Gibson's Max could just as easily be Clint Eastwood's tight-lipped Man With No Name" helping protect "decent frightened folk" from the "marauding Redskins".

[5] Christopher John reviewed The Road Warrior in Ares Magazine #13 and commented that "Its taut scripting, exceptional performances, and pulse-pounding pacing, which leaves an audience breathless, combined to make it one of the best SF films of the year.

Mel Gibson's portrayal of Max is hard, bitter and realistic; he is neither hero nor coward, but a man caught up in a mad future which he confronts unafraid.