Torgo's Review Thread 2.0

[Torgo]

TEN WEEKS LEFT UNTIL THE NEW SEASON!

Let's do some heavy lifting with the Greek demigod to end all demigods, it's the one, the only, Hercules!

The real Hercules. Not Kevin Sorbo.

Also it's another volume down. The highs are worth partaking in, though the lows are a tad slow. This volume is the uneven but with great material Volume XXXII!

And if you're singing to the tune of "All I Want For Christmas is a Season 5 Overview!" , you're in luck! That's exactly what you get!

Next Week: More intense airport action than San Francisco International!

[Torgo]

[Torgo]

NINE WEEKS LEFT UNTIL THE NEW SEASON!

But until then back to the beginning as we close out the year with an episode about...a deadly virus outbreak. Well poopie. At least it's confined to an airplane! It's SST- Death Flight!

Next Time: It's Star Trek but starring the guy who Leonard Nimoy replaced on Mission: Impossible instead of Nimoy himself.

[Torgo]

Despite the waves it made when it landed, cinephiles may have preferred Gremlins wasn't as impactful as it was as the knock-offs soon began. But the cult fans got a little something for every corner when that happened, including MSTies who would go on to get a fan favorite episode out of the movie Hobgoblins. Personally, while I don't have any nostalgic fondness for Gremlins myself (I watched it once as a lad and didn't care for it, haven't seen it since), I can't imagine my life without Critters. Knock-offs would continue with the likes of Ghoulies and, more relevant, a film produced by Roger Corman called Munchies.

Munchies is a goofy little movie about a little creature found in a Peruvian temple who is taken back to the States by an archeologist looking for links between the ancient civilization and aliens. The creature is put in the care of his care-free, aspirational comedian son and his attractive, independent girlfriend. Shenanigans ensue, resulting in the creature getting kidnapped and chopped up into little pieces, which regenerate Reptilicus style into multiple little hungry and horny creatures who burst onto the town and wreck havoc.

I have no real information as to how successful Munchies was considered as a movie, but the film was pretty low budget and it did spawn a franchise...of sorts. Five years later this movie happened. I don't know what to think about that.

Doing the whole Alien/Aliens thing backwards, this movie scales back to just one Munchie. I guess he's a Munchie. He says his name is "Munchie," even though "Munchie" was just a name that was made up on the spot for a nameless creature in the original and never brought up again. His relationship to the Munchies in the previous movie is a huge mystery, as he seemed to be loose in civilization as early as 1970, while the primary Munchie from the previous movie was trapped in a temple in the late 80's. This Munchie does seem to have some ties to the Peruvian origins of the other Munchies, which is kept pretty vague.

But I digress, the story of this particular movie has a kid stumbling upon this Munchie, who is less just a crazy hungry animal and more of a mischievous magical imp. The boy befriends Munchie, who promises him that with his powers he can change his life for the better, from getting rid of his mom's scummy boyfriend, to dealing with school bullies, to getting the girl of his dreams, even down to just eating pizza for dinner. But as Munchie tries to help out, he begins causing even more chaos.

How we got from Munchies to this movie, I'm not certain. I don't understand it and I'm not sure I want to understand it. Munchies is rated PG, but it's a pretty raunchie PG. Throughout the movie, the young leads have sex, many lewd comments are made and innuendos are referenced, while there's also a very lengthy scene in which the Munchies watch a pair of girls playing miniatrure golf, bend over repeatedly, have their skirts raise up above their behinds and expose their underwear clad booties to the world. I mean...if I heard this movie was a hit with kids, I wouldn't be surprised, but to scale back to a movie only meant for kids seems to destroy why they liked it.

Not to mention the fact is the idea of this being a sequel is a huge question mark in general. The Munchie of this film kinda looks like the original Munchies, just bulked up, made cuter, and given a stupid Dick York haircut, but to say they're the same thing is a bit of a stretch. The original Munchies were small creatures that just tore poopie up because it was in front of them. This Munchie is a bit more sentient and has magical powers. They're both mischievous, but in different ways. If I were to come up with some sort of convoluted headcanon for this movie, it would be maybe this Munchie is a fully grown adult with formed skills while the other Munchies were just adolescents. But that's thinking about this too hard.

Getting away from trying to figure out what makes the Munchies franchise tick, Munchie kinda bites. It's an oddball kids comedy made for cheap laughs. I'll admit I did enjoy certain scenes, as there's a fantasy funeral scene early on in the film that I actually thought was pretty funny on its own merits, but for the most part the movie plays out like a schlocky version of The Wonder Years with the Great Gazoo as a side character. It's not entirely charmless, it's just devoid of wit.

Munchie himself is voiced by Dom DeLuise, replacing the 80's voice acting legends of Frank Welker and Fred Newman who voiced the characters in the first film. On paper this seems like a lateral decision, but Dom DeLuise without good material is just a large voice coming out of a little puppet. 80's sex symbol Loni Anderson is here as well playing the worried mother of the piece, with her primary storyline being that she's dating a scumbag and slowly learns she's dating a scumbag. Said scumbag is shown to "get his comeuppance" at the end of the movie as he gets arrested by some cops after being trolled by Munchie. I do feel like pointing out that while this guy is a dick, the only actual thing he does to annoy anybody in this movie is try to get into Loni Anderson's pants, and if you could get arrested for that then 98% of the fanbase to WKRP in Cincinnati would be in jail right now. Rounding out this curious cast is a very young Jennifer Love Hewitt playing the young lead's romantic interest. Having grown up in the 90's, it's hard to not have formed crushes on the cast of Party of Five. This kid was just ahead of the curb.

Believe it or not, Munchie has a direct sequel called Munchie Strikes Back, which came out two years later. For whatever reason this was the more successful version of the Munchies franchise and actually formed a direct continuation featuring the same Munchie character from this film. That movie couldn't get Dom DeLuise back to voice Munchie, but it did manage to keep director Jim Wynorski. It's probably hard to lose Wynorski once you get him (he has also directed sequels to cult classics like Deathstalker, Swamp Thing, Sorority House Massacre, and 976-EVIL), though he does win some points for being the helmer of the film Chopping Mall. Munchie is no Chopping Mall. It's not even Munchies.

Next Week:

[Torgo]

EIGHT WEEKS LEFT UNTIL THE NEW SEASON!

Before we all joyously get enraptured by a sure-to-be classic Roland Emmerich movie about the moon falling, let's go back to the 70's with the classic moon-out-of-orbit series Space 1999! Sorry Mario, but our Cosmic Princess is in another castle!

Next Time: "This is my own private Idaho...POTATO!"

[Torgo]

"Based on an original idea by Charles Band."

lol.

Doctor Mordrid is probably a more interesting movie today than it was when it was released. As of this writing, the Marvel Cinematic Universe under Disney has become the indisputable king of the blockbuster of the last decade, with their next release on the slate at this point in time being a sequel to their magical sorcerer superhero Doctor Strange. What does this have to do with Doctor Mordrid? Hold on to your capes, we're getting there.

Since the first Avengers film broke box office records in 2012, it's hard to remember a time in which the yearly top grossers didn't feature at least one property based on a Marvel comic, but there was a time in which Marvel was pawning off its movie rights to bargain bin studios. Their first feature film, Howard the Duck, had huge pedigree in producer George Lucas and distributor Universal Studios, but alas the film wound up a box office disaster while chief competitor DC Comics had already had hits in a handful of Superman films and were about to unleash the pop culture phenomenon of Tim Burton's Batman upon the world. It was hard to convince the big studios to take a leap with their properties after this, but they managed to pay a few bills by making a few low budget films based on The Punisher and Captain America with not so picky producers who just wanted the title more than the property. Hell, at this point there was production by Roger Corman on an ultra-cheap Fantastic Four movie which (unbeknownst to the crew filming it) was never going to see official release. Marvel's most popular character, Spider-Man, was languished in development hell with legendary crap factory Cannon Group, who tried unsuccessfully to make a movie in the 80's before complicating the rights of Terminator director James Cameron's attempt to adapt the property in the 90's before washing his hands of it and making Titanic instead (which was probably the best decision ever made). Eventually that film would get made to Marvel's first massive box office success (no, Blade and X-Men don't compare to the money this pulled in) under Evil Dead director Sam Raimi, who incidentally is directing this year's Doctor Strange sequel.

Still with me? Okay, here we have Doctor Mordrid. This movie wasn't always "Doctor Mordrid." It might not shock for anybody to learn that Doctor Mordrid originally was being set up as a Doctor Strange adaptation when Full Moon Features briefly obtained the rights from Marvel during this rough period when they were desperate to get movies made. The rights lapsed before production began and this Doctor Strange film was hastily rewritten to be "Doctor Mordrid" instead.

This film has Jeffery Combs playing the totally-not-Stephen-Strange wizard Anton Mordrid, who has spent the past century trying to subdue his totally-not-Baron-Mordo fellow wizard Kabal from unleashing hell on Earth. Mordrid's hunt for Kabal leads him into the path of a tough but lovely police consultant who happens to live in the building Mordrid resides at and the two connect as they hunt for the deadly wizard while Mordrid keeps his unearthly secrets from her sight. Kabal's power begins to rise with the aid of punk cultists and Mordrid finds that his final battle with Kabal might happen sooner rather than later.

The question at large is exactly how copyright infringing is this movie? Since no legal action seems to have been taken against it, I guess just enough of it is different from the source it's ripping off to not be worth a court case. But if you're a fan of comics at all, you can definitely see Doctor Strange's DNA in this movie. You can tell what characters are supposed to represent comic counterparts and what was always going to be in this movie, including the bullpoopie made up because studios back then were too cowardly to lift from the page. There are more similarities to Marvel's lore in Doctor Mordrid than there are between Pacific Rim and Atlantic Rim, the latter only really taking the robots vs. monsters concept and running with it.

As a movie without knowledge of its ties to any source material, Doctor Mordrid is charming trash. Doctor Mordrid is a playful, low budget, good vs. evil fantasy that clearly thinks all fantasy should be marketed towards children but denies that audience the pleasure by shooting straight for an R rating with a scene of full frontal nudity (which will assuredly be cut or censored in the MST version). Instead it aims straight at that cult audience that just wants a good time. Doctor Mordrid, despite its childishness, is indeed a good time.

A lot of the heavy lifting in this movie is done by the cast, who play this movie straighter and with more effort than the movie probably deserves. Cult icon Jeffery Combs is fabulous as our mystical hero, giving Mordrid the mischievous mystique that only Jeffery Combs can provide. Bit character actor Brian Thompson rocks a blonde mullet and tries his best to resemble Fabio and this is probably one of the most suited-to-him roles I've ever seen him play. I also need to give a shout out to our female lead Yvette Nipar, who is tragically given little to do other than to be the audience's surrogate eyes-of-discovery in the film and be the token love interest, but she does all of this with grace and excellent screen presence that made me yearn for more of her character. Richard Band also needs to be mentioned for his score to the picture, which is actually a quite a good riff on the types of scores Danny Elfman would produce for a movie like this. In fact, there are more than a few cues that sound like Elfman himself lifted for his score for Spider-Man in 2002.

That being said, the movie does feel a bit scant. It runs barely longer than 70 minutes and I was disappointed to see it end. The movie could have used a bigger finale, though I'm not sure how you could top stop-motion dinosaur skeletons wrestling. Maybe it's just me, but it feels like the fact that Doctor Mordrid is only present in this conflict as an astral projection slightly cheapens it, as to while there is peril to reality there is no immediate mortal danger to Mordrid himself. When Kabal is defeated, it feels a bit unearned, as heroic showdowns would have more weight if Mordrid were present in person to deliver the final blow himself. Instead Kabal is knocked the hell over by a mastodon tusk. The movie's most pleasurable climax then comes when Mordrid's lady friend kicks a man frozen in time square in the testicles. Now that's how you should win the day!

However this movie came about, and whether you consider it an honorary Marvel movie or not, Doctor Mordrid is fun for fans of low budget silliness and is well worth watching if names like "Charles Band" or "Jeffery Combs" tied to a movie excite you. I know they do excite me, personally. Doctor Mordrid is a flick that does the bare minimum of what a hero movie should do: entertains for an hour then disappears into the night.

Next Week:

[Torgo]

After a delay because of a personal illness, off the back of its VOD release I have now completed my review of the new Rifftrax Live show Amityville Horror: The Evil Escapes! You've never had this much fun screaming at a lamp!

[Torgo]

SEVEN WEEKS LEFT UNTIL THE NEW SEASON!

Until then, we get squishy with sex, drugs, violence, Keanu Reeves, a potato, and Tom Servo's new baby face. Let's all turn our cranks to Frank and watch The Violent Years!

More Reba! Brooks & Dunn! Winona!

Next Time: Mike flies away with the Angels.

[Torgo]

There's this Jack Black movie from a while back called Be Kind Rewind where he and Mos Def are video store employees (remember those?) who accidentally erase every tape in their store. To try and save the impending disaster of customer service they decide to "home brew" remake every movie they have starring themselves using a home camcorder. The results of their "remakes" are about what you would expect, but the people of their little community absolutely love them and they become an unexpected hit. To be blunt, I always thought that movie was kinda dumb. In some weird way however, Demon Squad made me appreciate its premise a bit more.

Demon Squad in several ways reminds me of the type of movie Jack Black and Mos Def would make in Be Kind Rewind, only maybe by people who look to be a bit more professional. This movie certainly wasn't made by two dipshits with a VHS tape, though by indie filmmaking of 2019 standards this film is very low tech. Maybe on the same level of money Kevin Smith made Clerks on? Can't say, this is just speculation based on what's onscreen. If it is in that cash range, this movie is more ambitious than Clerks so it stretches that money pretty thin. If I were to compare Demon Squad to any film featured previously on Mystery Science Theater it would be Final Sacrifice, and I mean that as a favorable comparison, mind you. That movie was made by film students who had access some equipment and went out and made something. Demon Squad has that same vibe, as if they could be filming on their local street and the director is telling all the actors "Okay, say your lines quick and let's beat it before the cops come." In spirit I'd say it's also close to Time Chasers, where it's clear the filmmakers have a very specific movie they want to make, don't have a lot of money to do it, but decided "flapjacks it, we'll do it anyway, and have fun making it."

The film's story does come off like it was adapted from fan fiction lying around for the TV show Angel or the comic series John Constantine: Hellblazer that has been reformatted with original characters to avoid getting sued. Demon Squad tells the tale of supernatural detective Nick Moon and his assistant Daisy who are recently visited by the wealthy and beautiful Lilah Fontaine who hires them to search for her missing father. As the duo dig deeper into the mystery, things become more nefarious than initially appear.

Surface level, there is a lot that can be dismissed about Demon Squad. The cinematography is low rent, the music is barren, the sound quality is both inconsistent and often trashy, and its story feels more like a riff on pop entertainment than anything with artistic merit. But that's only if I approach this movie like a film critic, which I pride myself in not being because flapjacks that noise. Demon Squad isn't a normal movie and I feel shouldn't be judged like it is. It's a movie with certain limitations and resources made by people who got their hands dirty and took the time to put together something with what little they had. They even had the audacity to put in make-up, puppets, and special effects, sometimes crude ones, but this is an example when bonus points for effort should be awarded. This is a movie where it seems like its own existence is a reward for the people who made it.

What probably crosses Demon Squad over into its own level of enjoyability is its cheekiness. Everyone involved in the production knows this whole thing looks and feels kind of silly, so there is a level of taking it just serious enough to make it feel like a narrative but goofing around just enough for them to feel like they're admitting to the audience "We know what this is, just play along." And for a movie this low on the totem pole of cinema, I'd actually say that there's a good argument that can be made that the acting in this movie is pretty solid. Everyone has charisma and charm, and they play to their strengths even when delivering clunky fantasy babble. The big drawback to the actors is that they feel like they're at war with the sound equipment, which drains out their line delivery to the point where sometimes it sounds garbled up. It's cool that this movie has as much make-up effects as it does, but maybe they could have saved on one or two to buy a boom mic?

The worst thing I can say about Demon Squad is that it's a movie that will provoke a cynical reaction from cynical viewers who will dismiss it immediately. However, and I cannot stress this enough, it is not a cynical film itself, which is something I can't say for a lot of films on Mystery Science Theater 3000. It's people with a camera having fun, and they can't guarantee that the audience that stumbles upon their creation has a good time but they're clearly of the attitude "If you get it, you get it." There is something innocent and pure about that, and I'm personally in favor of it.

Next Week:

[Torgo]

It's a new year and in 2022 I'll be making an effort to keep up with recent RiffTrax releases as they release! Come watch me fail in real time! First up is a trip to women's prison WITH A VENGEANCE! It's Fugitive Rage!

In our first bonus short of 2022, we're in the middle of winter so obviously we need an educational short teaching Bridget and Mary Jo how to Play in the Snow!

[Torgo]

SIX WEEKS LEFT UNTIL THE NEW SEASON!

It's time to say goodbye to the great Mike Nelson, and his final entry sees him soaring with the Angels. Charlie's Angels knock-offs that is. Shuh-shine, shine my love with Angels Revenge!

Backing the Angels up are another group of seven, seven shorts that is! It's an overview of Shorts Volume 1, hosted by Tom Servo!

This completes another volume full of fan favorites, but I only like one of them! Which one? Check out my review of Volume 2 and endure my bitching!

Speaking of physical media, let's go even more archaic than DVDs. Let's talk about the most important format in the show's history. That's right, I created a page devoted to the VHS Collection! You're welcome!

One last thing, it's time for another season overview! This time I get frank about Frank and a whole lot of rough movies. It's the one-of-a-kind Season 6!

Next Time: TURTLE POWER![/URL]

[Mighty Jack]

Jan 10, 2022 8:56:29 GMT -5 Torgo said:

After a delay because of a personal illness, off the back of its VOD release I have now completed my review of the new Rifftrax Live show Amityville Horror: The Evil Escapes! You've never had this much fun screaming at a lamp!

Okay, I'll trust you, but if you lead me astray, that's it, never again...



actually, there's a sale, so I was going to grab it anyway. I also added Baby Ghost to the cart, Lord knows why after all the pain Rollergator caused me. My good streak (consisting of Copper Mountain, Dancin' It's On, and Fugitive Rage) has to end sometime, so if it's to end, let it end with Joe Esteves - (he says with tongue in cheek, you never know, it might be funny).

[Torgo]

Note:  I watched this movie with the AIP dub rather than it's original Japanese audio track, since that will be the version featured on the series.



A Gamera movie without a Sandy Frank dub? What is this nonsense?

Like most of the original Gamera movies, Gamera vs. Jiger was originally imported to the US by American International Television, which it played under the title of Gamera vs. Monster X. The Sandy Frank imports happened over a decade later, and Gamera vs. Jiger was one of the titles overlooked by the producer (along with Gamera vs. Viras and Gamera: Super Monster). That's why this film wasn't on the original Mystery Science Theater, because their deal was with Sandy Frank and he didn't have the rights to this movie. It's a little bit of a shame, because Jiger is one of the more enjoyable Gamera entries. Like any of the original Gamera movies, it's not a great movie but it is a solidly goofy execution of its formula with some fun expansions upon it to put it ahead of the pack.

Gamera vs. Jiger was somewhat scripted around the anticipation of Japan's Expo '70 in Osaka at the time, working it into the storyline to show off locations of the grounds. The movie sees a mysterious totem being removed from its site on Wester Island (get it?), which unleashes the monster Jiger from its slumber. Gamera appears to try and subdue the monster, but Jiger proves to be a powerful opponent for the turtle, finally bringing the mighty Friend to All Children down by planting an egg in Gamera's lung with her stinger. The only way to help Gamera is by venturing inside his body, and the two new Kennies of the movie, Hiroshi and Tommy, take the charge by getting into a minisub and piloting it straight down Gamera's throat and curing the big lug.

All the Gamera movies surrounding this one features the turtle squaring off against cosmic threats (Gamera vs. Viras, Gamera vs. Guiron, Gamera vs. Zigra, Gamera: Super Monster), which is a lot of outer space to tangle with. It's almost refreshing that Gamera vs. Jiger not only chooses to keep its story earthbound, but also tackle inner space as well. The wacky premise of "going inside Gamera" makes Gamera vs. Jiger a bit of treat for this franchise because it allows the filmmakers to do something different. Noriaki Yuasa isn't a daring enough director to take full advantage of the situation, as he doesn't entirely seem to comprehend that there is a whole world of setpieces open to him with this new opportunity of exploration. He even sets up the idea that the minisub might see danger if it ventures into Gamera's stomach but instead of exploring that idea they just veer away from it. Instead the kids just play around in Gamera's lung (which looks like a cluster of artichokes) and get chased by a mini-Jiger. Yuasa is playful enough to make the situation fun but with this scenario the audience almost yearns for it to go a bit further. But in a series this formulaic, one takes innovation however they can get it.

The kaiju action is amusing in that traditional absurdist Gamera style and there is quite a bit of it this time. Gamera fights Jiger a grand total of three times throughout the film, almost punctuating each of the film's three acts with a brawl between the two beasts. The first happens when Jiger is unleashed, where Jiger sticks pins in each of Gamera's limbs ensuring the turtle can't retract into his shell and fly away. After Jiger rampages through Osaka, Gamera is back for round two but meets Jiger's stinger leading to the Fantastic Voyage twist of the movie. As Gamera revives, he takes the totem and impales it straight into Jiger's forehead.

Children's entertainment, folks.

It's actually fascinating to me that Gamera films are squarely aimed at kids but they're so nonchalant about death and destruction as they are. One could probably make the same claim about the Godzilla series but even as Godzilla became a bit more self depreciating and catering to younger audiences, it always seemed to embrace the weight of the circumstances in which it was portraying. Gamera vs. Jiger features a scene in which Jiger incinerates the entire middle of Osaka and everybody with it, and the movie just plays it as...



This is also a movie in which Gamera plugs his earholes with telephone poles to block Jiger's deadly sound waves.  Yup, that's a thing.

While Gamera vs. Jiger is held back by limitations, the truth of the matter is all Gamera movies are held back by limitations. They're made cheap and fast with ideas so wild that it's hard for them to unearth potential without certain resources at their disposal or maybe fresh blood behind the camera. Yuasa makes movies with spirit, you got to give him that, and one can't say a Yuasa Gamera film isn't distinctly a Yuasa Gamera film (the one non-Yuasa Gamera film of the original Showa series, Gamera vs. Barugon, is distinctly non-Yuasa). Gamera vs. Jiger is what you'd expect from a Gamera movie but, based on what formulas it has established for itself, it's playing more outside the box than usual. Gamera vs. Jiger may not offer much more than the traditional Gamera film with a few new flourishes but it's probably my favorite of the original series.

Next Week:

[Torgo]

It was bound to happen, I finally got a review up of the Mads! After constant delays and excuses, I sit down and learn telephone courtesy, how to date, how not to waste time, and how to blame the neighbors. It's A Night of Shorts 6!

And as if the Mads' shorts weren't enough, that doesn't prevent me from adding a BONUS SHORT into the mix! RiffTrax tells us the magical tale of The Shoemaker and the Elves!

[Torgo]

Quiet! My stories are on! Tonight I sit back watch all the drama and sexual tension that happens in what I assume happens in every hospital staffed by beautiful people, and Mike and Bridget are there with me. It's a RiffTrax review of Grey's Anatomy!

I imagine it's much harder to get a job in a hospital, but today's BONUS SHORT makes it seem like it should be a snap. Just go out and Get That Job!