We watch several movies a week. Every Friday, we'll talk a little about some of the movies we watched that we felt were Worth Mentioning.
Aliens, dinosaurs, ticks, and Wonder Woman.
ALIEN: ROMULUS (2024)
Ridley Scott wanted to make a trilogy of prequels to his 1979 sci-fi horror classic Alien, and even though I didn’t like what he was doing with those films as he kicked off the trilogy with Prometheus and continued it with Alien: Covenant, I still figured he might as well be allowed to finish the story he got 66% of the way through. Who am I to say a creative shouldn’t tell their story just because I’m not enjoying it? But Alien: Covenant was poorly received by more viewers than just myself, Alien franchise home 20th Century Fox was acquired by Disney, and the plan to finish the trilogy was set aside... paving the way for something much more interesting than another Ridley Scott prequel would have been: a film that ditches Scott’s idea that we need to know how the xenomorphs came into existence and instead is a straightforward attempt to make another scary Alien movie. As a bonus, it comes from a filmmaker who has already made some brutal, unrelenting horror films (Evil Dead 2013 and Don’t Breathe), Fede Alvarez. I would have been hesitant to watch another Scott prequel. I was on board to watch an Alvarez-directed xenomorph horror movie as soon as it was announced. Things got even more intriguing when it was revealed that the story Alvarez and his frequent collaborator Rodo Sayagues had crafted was set between the events of Alien and James Cameron’s sequel Aliens – and while that made me wonder if it was going to offer an inside view of the downfall of the Hadley’s Hope colony from Aliens, it turns out that Alvarez and Sayagues had a very different idea. One that was indeed inspired by the quick glimpse we got of Hadley’s Hope in Aliens, but involves a different colony. And the xenomorph from the original Alien.
Alien and Aliens both ended with xenomorphs being ejected into space, but Alien: Romulus is here to confirm that drifting in space will not kill a xenomorph. Instead, it will just ball up in a cocoon and go dormant. That’s what the xenomorph from Alien did – so Weyland-Yutani, the unscrupulous company that has been lurking throughout this franchise, was able to come along and scoop up its cocoon to take it back to a two-part space station called Romulus and Remus, where they started conducting experiments on the alien. That situation went about as well as could be expected, resulting in a lot of dead people. The space station is left to drift through space, on course to crash into the rings surrounding the Jackson’s Star mining colony planet.
We meet some people who work in the mines and find out that Weyland-Yutani isn’t just questionable when it comes to decisions concerning xenomorphs. They’re also terrible employers who refuse to let miners leave the colony. To earn a travel permit, employees have to reach a quota that requires many years of work. Otherwise they’re trapped in this bleak hellhole known as Jackson’s Star. Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny) and some of her acquaintances want out... so they decide to ride up to that drifting space station so they can steal the hypersleep pods and head out on the nine year journey to a nicer planet called Yvaga. To pull off this heist, they’ll need the help of Rain’s adopted brother Andy (David Jonsson), who’s actually a broken-down android her father plucked out of the trash and reprogrammed to be her devoted companion – and to deliver some bad jokes. Andy may not be “a real boy,” but he is the best character in the movie.
Of course, boarding this space station goes as badly as heading out to a cabin in the woods went for the characters in Evil Dead, and as badly as deciding to rob a blind man went for the characters in Don’t Breathe. Soon enough, this batch of hapless humans and their android accomplice are dealing with facehuggers and xenomorphs. And when bad things happen to them, Alvarez proves to still be just as dedicated to showing his characters no mercy and delivering brutal, gruesome violence as he has been since the start of his feature directing career. Don’t expect him to spare someone just because they happen to be pregnant.
Alvarez was also dedicated to staying true to all of the films within the Alien franchise proper, wanting to make it clear that this existed within continuity with all of them, while making his film a mixture of elements and styles from both Alien and Aliens, the films it slots in between. Within a week of the movie’s release, this is already causing some fans to give the movie grief, as they felt it didn’t add up to anything more than fan service, while other fans loved the fan service. One major divisive point is when Alvarez works in elements from Scott’s controversial prequels, which were all about an off-kilter android messing with xenomorph DNA. Alien: Romulus is also about an off-kilter android messing with xenomorph DNA. There’s a damaged android aboard the space station that has the face of the android Ash from the original film (who was played by the late Ian Holm, so his face is re-used here with unconvincing digital trickery) but is called Rook, like Alien: Covenant had identical androids with different names. Rook has been experimenting on the alien. He has brought back that black goo substance that was such an annoying part of Prometheus and Alien: Covenant. And this black goo causes trouble that’s reminiscent of the prequels, as well as the climactic sequence from the least popular sequel, Alien: Resurrection. So it makes sense that that isn’t going over well with some viewers. I could have done without it myself.
Some questionable decisions and bad effects went into Alien: Romulus, and I’m not sure why filmmakers have been so hesitant to let xenomorphs and facehuggers carry entire movies on their own for so long, but Alvarez did manage to make something that’s better than several other entries in the franchise. It’s a decent creature feature with some nice character work and gruesome moments.
WONDER WOMAN 1984 (2020)
Some unexpected choices went into the plotting of the Wonder Woman movies that are part of the now-defunct DC Extended Universe. Since the Wonder Woman character was created in 1941, many fans expected the 2017 Wonder Woman movie to be set during World War II – but director Patty Jenkins and the writers pulled a fast one on us, deciding to set the story during World War I. Which is certainly better than producer Zack Snyder’s idea of having it take place during the Crimean War, with a title character who walks around carrying decapitated heads. Thankfully, she doesn’t collect heads in Jenkins’ WWI movie – and the decision to set the story during the First World War rather than the Second worked out, especially when it gave our title heroine (played by Gal Gadot) the opportunity to show off her heroism by making her way through the battleground known as No Man’s Land. A sequence that’s considered by many to be one of the best sequences in the modern comic book movie era.
While Batman v. Superman and Justice League (both versions) saw Wonder Woman, a.k.a. Diana Prince, in modern day, another unexpected decision was made when Jenkins teamed with writers Geoff Johns and Dave Callaham to craft a story for her solo sequel: they decided to set the story in 1984. And I get it, because I have a strong fondness for the ‘80s, and I assume Jenkins does as well. I know you’re not supposed to talk about a woman’s age, but this is relevant: Jenkins was born in 1971, so she got to experience the ‘80s in a way I wasn’t able to, having been born in the midst of the decade, so she probably loves the ‘80s even more than I do. And she decided to mix her appreciation of the decade with some Wonder Woman action.
The setting is a bit jarring. Jenkins takes a light-hearted, somewhat goofball approach to the ‘80s setting, which is definitely not what most fans were thinking they’d get from the second Wonder Woman movie. And that’s part of why it didn’t go over well. This is a silly movie, with Pedro Pascal chewing the scenery as villainous, power-hungry oil man Max Lord and Kristen Wiig playing secondary villain Barbara Minerva, who becomes as strong as Wonder Woman and takes on a cheetah-esque appearance, much like she plays the average Wiig character. There are, as fans have pointed out, shades of the Batman Returns version of Catwoman in there as well. I guess it fits, since she is another cat woman.
The troubles begin when an ancient artifact called the Dreamstone shows up at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., where Diana and Barbara both work. This thing grants wishes; it will give someone their heart’s desire, but there are consequences. For example, Barbara makes her “I want to be like Wonder Woman” wish, but ends up transforming into a cat person. Meanwhile, Max starts using the Dreamstone to become a dominant force around the globe, and Diana wishes she had more time with her lost love, World War I pilot Steve Trevor – which gives Jenkins a way to bring Chris Pine back as Steve for a while.
There is some decent action as Wonder Woman and Steve set out to thwart Max Lord’s schemes and Barbara lurks on the periphery, but it seems most viewers are too busy being put off by the many questionable decisions to get much entertainment out of this one. I ended up liking it more than I expected to, having seen many negative reactions, but it’s definitely a weird one and I wouldn’t be eager to watch it again.
TICKS (1993)
I remember crossing paths with Ticks multiple times in the early-to-mid ‘90s, whether it be because I rented the VHS as soon as it hit store shelves or because there were cable airings that were promoted with the clip of a clearly-not-well Clint Howard screaming, “I’m infested!” So I was pretty hyped to watch the movie again, thirty years down the line... Unfortunately, despite it getting off to a positive start, my enthusiasm for Ticks had worn out well before I reached the end of its 85 minute running time.
Directed by Hellbound: Hellraiser II’s Tony Randel from a script by Brent V. Friedman, the film (which was executive produced by Brian Yuzna of Return of the Living Dead III and the Re-Animator franchise) stars Seth Green, Ami Dolenz, Virginya Keehne, Dina Dayrit, Ray Oriel, and Alfonso Ribeiro – whose character introduces himself by saying, “They call me Panic ‘cause I never do!” - as a bunch of inner city teens from Los Angeles who have headed out into the woods as part of a wilderness project headed up Holly Lambert (Rosalind Allen) and Charles Danson (Peter Scolari). The problem in this particular cabin in the woods horror film is the fact that the wilderness project’s cabin isn’t far from the drug harvesting set-up of Jarvis Tanner (Clint Howard), who has been using steroids to boost the strength of his marijuana. When the local tick population is exposed to the steroids Jarvis has been using, they grow to a very large size and become insatiably bloodthirsty. And if one of these things latches onto someone, it can also cause them to have hallucinations... which is one of the downfalls of this movie, because I didn’t like the hallucination aspect.
I also didn’t like that this isn’t a straightforward “teens against ticks” story, because there are two other drug dealers – Barry Lynch and Michael Medeiros as Sir and Jerry – out in the woods, causing trouble for the teens, taking attention away from the ticks, and really dragging the movie down for every moment they’re on the screen, which was too many moments for my taste.
On the plus side, you get two Howards for the price of one in this movie, because Clint Howard’s dad Rance Howard shows up as the local sheriff, and there are, when the drugs dealers aren’t in the way, some fun tick survival horror sequences. Enhancing the fun of these sequences is the fact that these juiced-up ticks will literally explode if they’re touched by fire, so when the teens arm themselves with torches we get to see ticks explode all over the screen.
Ticks didn’t hold up as well as I hoped it would, but it has its charms and its good scenes. I’m not sure I need to see it again before another 30 years goes by, but it was fun to see it again and be reminded why it didn’t keep a place in my viewing rotation.
PREHYSTERIA! (1993)
In the early 1990s, Charles Band had just launched his company Full Moon, which had the backing of a major Hollywood studio, Paramount, and specialized in horror and sci-fi. With their projects aimed at adults proving to be successful, Band decided to branch out into producing films aimed at a younger audience as well, creating the sub-label Moonbeam for family friendly entertainment. And since the first Moonbeam movie was released in 1993, the same year Steven Spielberg gave us Jurassic Park and Roger Corman cashed in with the mockbuster Carnosaur, it was a no-brainer that Moonbeam would get started with a dinosaur movie. And it’s absolutely on brand for Band that his dinosaur movie wouldn’t be about full-sized dinosaurs, but rather miniature ones.
The movie was titled Prehysteria!, and it’s one that I have wanted to see ever since 1993, when I was a nine year old kid with dinosaur bedsheets and curtains... but for some reason, even though I did watch both Jurassic Park and Carnosaur that year, I just never got around to watching Prehysteria!... not until this month, thirty-one years after its release, when I decided to check it out on the Full Moon Features streaming service. As I was watching it, I was wishing I had seen it in ‘93, because I’m sure I would have enjoyed it even more when I was nine years old.
Directed by Charles Band and his father Albert Band from a screenplay crafted by Peter Von Sholly, Greg Suddeth, Mark Goldstein, and Michael Davis, Prehysteria! stars Brett Cullen as Frank Taylor, a raisin farmer who raises extra money to support his children Jerry (Austin O’Brien) and Monica (Samantha Mills) by digging up rocks and fossils on the farm, then selling them to a local museum run by an unscrupulous fellow named Rico Sarno (Stephen Lee). Rico has just returned from a trip to South America, where he stole some sacred, preserved dinosaur eggs... and when his cooler gets mixed up with Frank’s, Frank’s dog – who is said to have been heartbroken when Frank had to recently give her litter of puppies away – takes the eggs, hatches them, and sees the tiny dinosaurs that emerge as her own children.
Jerry and Monica take to the tiny dinosaurs immediately, giving them names: there’s Elvis the Tyrannosaurus, Paula the Brachiosaurus, Jagger the Stegosaurus, Hammer the Chasmosaurus, and Madonna the Geosternbergia. Jerry even manages to make Elvis a fan of the old school rock ‘n roll he loves. Frank has been very against the idea of the family having more pets to feed, but at the encouragement of his love interest / museum employee Vicki (Colleen Morris), he agrees to keep the dinosaurs safe from Rico... who, of course, ends up hiring a couple of henchmen to help him steal the little creatures.
Prehysteria! is an entertaining little movie; one might even describe it as “cute.” The miniature dinosaurs are cool critters that were brought to life through the use of the sort of animatronic puppet and stop-motion work that Full Moon was well known for at the time. (Voice acting legend Frank Welker also helped out by providing the sounds the little dinos make.) They’re not entirely convincing, but it’s fun to watch them in action and, yeah, they’re cute.
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