Reaction & Review | Hellblock 13

Welcome, one and all, to "Full Moon vs. Troma" here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, we're gonna be closing out this marathon by taking a look at a Troma film. And it's also an anthology film that came out in 1999. That movie is "Hellblock 13".

Now the reason why I chose this movie to close out this marathon was simply because of the fact that it was an anthology film. Because almost every other movie that I've covered in this marathon has mostly been a horror movie, with the two exceptions being "Panther Squad" and "Class Of Nuke 'Em High". And while this movie might also be leaning towards horror, it also advertises itself as being an anthology film. And I haven't covered one of those in quite a while. In fact, the last time I covered an anthology movie was way back when I reviewed "Halo Legends" during the "Video Game Movie Marathon". So I figured I would kinda change that by adding this movie to the marathon, and we're finally at that point.

Now, much like with almost every other movie that I've covered so far in this marathon, I don't really know a whole lot about this movie. Like I said, I know it's an anthology film, and it's kind of a horror movie. And from what little I read on the back of the DVD case here, it looks like it's taking place inside a prison. So, that might be kinda interesting. Beyond that, though, I really don't know much else about it. So, I'm just gonna go into this movie as blind as I can here. Because I really want to see if this movie is gonna be any good or not. And the only way I'm gonna find out if this movie is any good at all, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Hellblock 13".

17 minutes later

So, that thing is suppose to be her daughter? I'm going to assume that it IS her daughter, and that she's probably dead. Otherwise, she just looks like Ivan Ooze's long lost daughter. Definitely not a reference I intended to make, but still, I'm kinda proud of it.

30 seconds later

OK, never mind, it was just a dream. Granted, it didn't really make much sense as to how her daughter got all that purple on her face. But at the very least, it kinda makes sense of it being a dream.

9 minutes later

So, guys, we just came to the end of the first story here of this little anthology. And I will say that, despite some questionable acting, the story was actually not too bad. I'm kinda surprised by that, actually. Hoping that the other stories are gonna be just as good, if not better, than what we've seen thus far. So yeah, we're off to a pretty decent start here.

7 minutes later

OK, I'm probably gonna ask a dumb question here, but I have to ask this. So, if she's being abused by her fucking husband or boyfriend, then why doesn't she just go and leave to live with her Mom like she planned earlier? I understand that abusive relationships are kind of a messy subject, but she KNOWS that her spouse hits her! So why the fuck is she still with him? I'm genuinely curious here.

11 minutes later

You know, guys, this plan on how to deal with Heidi Mae's abusive spouse by this alchemist sounds really fascinating and all, but I still think that Heidi Mae should've, you know, gone to her Mom's place and live with her there. Granted, I understand that it probably wouldn't solve everything, but it still sounds like a much better plan than just going through this convoluted scheme on getting all these ingredients and chanting something 3 times in order for it to work. Just saying, it sounds a little bit stupid.

20 minutes later

All right, guys, I've been kinda patient with this third story so far, but now, I have to ask. Is this story gonna do anything interesting at some point? So far, this biker gang dug out Big Rhonda's corpse. And now, we cut to them just...partying, I guess. I'm kinda hoping something interesting happens soon. Because so far, this story has been kinda boring up to this point.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Hellblock 13". Let me go ahead and shut the film off...OK. That ending was certainly...interesting. So, where exactly do I begin with here? Well...I can say that this movie isn't terrible, but it's not exactly good either. It's sort of in the middle when it comes it's overall quality.

So, let's actually get into this thing by talking about the writing. Now, as per usual with most of these anthology films, I have to start with the weakest story of the three short films that are presented here. And unfortunately, I don't really know the title of this third story. Which is a bit odd, considering that the other two stories here actually do have titles. And I tried it looking it up online, but I couldn't find anything that indicates as to what this third story is called. So anyway, this third story here involves our biker gang, whom are making their way towards the southern border on a drug run. And along the way, the biker gang decides to stop near a grave site, where they decide to hold a ritual for someone known as Big Rhonda. Now Rhonda was basically some biker chick to be known as purely badass, and that nobody, man or woman, could ever stop her. And then, somehow, she ends up dying, due to an accident. So, like I said, the biker gang decides to pay their respects towards her by holding a ritual. And by that, I mean that they dig up her corpse, hang it around her cross, sacrifice a little bit of their blood, and pour it down Rhonda's mouth as part of this ritual. So basically, it's your standard cult shit.

Now, the reason why I said that this story was the weakest is simply because of the fact that, well...nothing happens here. Literally, NOTHING of interests happens here. Now I could see that this movie might've been trying to build Rhonda up as sort of a big deal. Because one of the biker members named Chaney, is being told about her via the bike gang leader, who's name I don't really remember. But anyway, Chaney's being told all this about her. And then later on, after they finish their ritual for her, they end just partying at the grave site. Which then leads into one of the biker gang members giving everyone coke (and no, I'm obviously not talking about the drink). Chaney is forced to end up taking it, which then leads into him seeing visions of Rhonda in her physical form. And then, he later passes out due to exhaustion. Now, I could spoil more of it, but I'm gonna try to not do that, because I don't really want to spoil the rest of this story for you guys. But I will say that the payoff for it kinda sucks. Now again, I could see what this story was trying to do, and it does kinda makes sense, if you bothered to pay attention to what was even going on here. But I'm gonna tell you, guys. For me, personally, this story sucked. Mostly because, like I said, nothing much really happens here with this story. It's just them trying to build up something around Big Rhonda, and also Chaney to an extent, but the payoff for it just isn't there. And that's what makes this story the weakest out of all of three stories that are presented here.

Before I get into the other two stories, I should mention this movie's framing device. Which basically centers around our main character, Tara, who is going to be executed at midnight via the electric chair from our executioner. And throughout this movie, she's telling these stories to her executioner from her journal, before her scheduled execution comes up. Speaking of which, let me go over the other two stories real quick before I delve into the acting here. Our second story is called "White Trash Love Story". Which basically centers around our main character, Heidi Mae, who is being abused by her husband, Joe Mark. And rather than doing the sensible thing by just leaving his ass behind, she decides to go to an alchemist, who conveniently lives right across the street from them to see if she can get help on how to deal with him. Which then leads into what I already mentioned earlier, where Heidi Mae is instructed to find a bunch of ingredients by mixing them together, and, ultimately getting revenge against her abusive husband. Now there is a twist here to this story. Unfortunately, the twist is pretty fucking stupid. And I saw it coming from a mile away. So, to even call it a twist is being far too generous with this story.

Now beyond the stupid twist, the biggest problem with this story is that it doesn't really make any logical sense. Now when I say that, I'm not talking about the overly complicated idea of getting all these ingredients she needs to get revenge against her abusive husband. No, I'm talking about the simple idea of just leaving him entirely. Like, what the fuck is even stopping her from leaving him? He's obviously being abusive to her, so there's no need for her to stick around with him. Hell, at the beginning of this story, she's talking with her mother on the phone, and when he gets home, she tells him that she's going to be leaving him to go live with her Mom. The husband, being scared of the idea that she'll leave him, claims that he'll change. And this goes back and forth, and she ultimately stays with him, because she's an idiot that way. But the thing is, she had the right idea to just leave him and go live with her Mom! And it's not like they had any kids or anything, since this story never establishes on how long they've been living together. I'm just going to assume that they've been together for a year or something. So again, there's NOTHING stopping her from just leaving him. Now yes, I totally understand that if she had done the logical thing from the beginning, then we wouldn't have had a story here, but it still makes much more sense then just going through this complicated scheme from this alchemist. Now I will say that the ending to this story is kinda funny in a dark and twisted sort of way. Again, I won't spoil on how this story ends. But I will say that, at least, it is something.

The only other story I can briefly mention, which I think is the best story of the three, would have to be the first story entitled "Watery Grave". And the story's basically about this mother named Sherry Simpson, who's trying to find out where her kids are, because they were kidnapped at a park. And according to either her or the police, nobody else saw this kidnapping take place other than Sherry. Which then leads into Sherry having nightmares about her children, which causes her to freak out about her being stalked by her own children. And I really liked this story, mostly because it reminds me of something that I would watch in an episode of "The Twilight Zone", if "The Twilight Zone" was more lenient on blood. Which, as far as I know, they never actually explored any horror stores involving blood. Now I could be totally wrong on that, seeing as how I haven't watched an episode of "The Twilight Zone" in quite a few years, so I wouldn't mind if someone corrected me on that. Anyway though, the first story is pretty fascinating, for the most part. And, like I said, it definitely is the best story of the 3 here.

So overall, the writing here is definitely kind of a mixed bag. There are definitely moments here where this movie will keep you interested, but not all of the stories here are gonna be great. Case in point, that third story mostly sucks. And, for me anyway, it probably would've been better, if they had done something more interesting with that third story, or at the very least, switch it's placement with the second story. Granted the second story isn't great, but it was still better than what he got for our third story. Now with that being said, let's finally get into the acting. Now as much as I liked the first story, the one thing that kinda brought it down for me was the acting. The acting in that first story was kinda shit. The acting ranges from being a bit hammy, to sounding like shit. The latter belonging to anytime that the child actors have to laugh. This shit was almost grating to listen to, because you have to hear this about 5 or 6 different times, and it was just painful to listen to them laugh. The acting from just about everyone else in this story also kinda sucked. The only one who, I think, turned in the best showing was the actress playing Sherry. But that's not really saying a whole lot, because she also kinda sucked, as well. But as for just about everything else, the acting was actually rather decent. And even though I wasn't too much of a fan of that third story, I will say that the acting there was OK. Even if the actors there weren't given much to work with, they still turned in the best showings that they could, given the scripts that they were handed to them. So overall, the acting here is mostly decent, save for what was in that first story.

Special effects in this movie are pretty decent for Troma standards. In fact, I will say that this movie had, probably, some of the most blood that I've seen throughout this entire marathon. Now whether that's a good thing or not is up to certain viewers. But I will say that the blood effects here are really good. The makeup effects also look pretty cool, especially in certain segments involving the first and second story. Now again, I can't go into details without having to spoil it, but they look really cool, and they are definitely some of the biggest highlights of the entire movie. Costuming here is also done fine. So overall, the special effects in this movie are rather decent for what they are.

Camerawork here is pretty good. The lighting here is lit very well. The sound-mix is mostly done well, minus a little bit of a drop in sound quality in "White Trash Love Story". But it's not a huge issue in the long run, so I'm not gonna count it as a negative. And the score here is OK, but it's nothing ultimately memorable.

So, guys, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "Hellblock 13"? Um...hmm...it's a tough call here. Because, like I said, this thing kinda falls into being in the middle of it's quality. Where there are some things here that are definitely really cool, such as the overall premise of this anthology, and the first story. But the writing in a couple of the stories here aren't exactly great, and the acting (at least in the first story) is kinda shit. So, I suppose if you like low budget horror movies, then I think you could find something here to definitely like. Troma fans will probably find something here to like as well. But if you're not into any of that kind of stuff, then there's no reason for you to watch this movie. As an anthology film, for me anyway, it's not the worst anthology movie I've seen, but it's definitely not the best either. I will say, though, that it is, at least, better than "Terror Eyes". Because I still think that "Terror Eyes" really sucked. Granted, that's not saying a whole lot, but at least "Hellblock 13" isn't horrible. It's just kind of an average anthology horror film that I'm not totally sure I would wind up watching a second time. Still though, I did get some enjoyment out of it. But I'm not sure if it would be enough to keep in my DVD collection. Speaking of which, I'm gonna go and watch another anthology movie. I think I'll go and watch "Robot Carnival". It's been a long time since I last watched that movie, so I'm gonna go and do that shortly after I upload this review.

Now, before I conclude this marathon, I suppose I should answer this one remaining question. Which of these two indie film studios came out on top in this marathon? Full Moon Features or Troma Entertainment? And this one's a bit of an easy answer: Troma. While Full Moon did have one movie that I did end up liking, the rest of them were pretty fucking terrible. Especially that last one, "Mutant Hunt", which was god-awful on a bunch of levels. On the Troma side of things, they really only had one bad movie this marathon. And while this movie I just reviewed was sorta average, the first two movies that I covered from them were both really good. So, that by itself, gave Troma the win here. But honestly, I would've never known if any of these movies were good or bad, if I did not end up doing this marathon. And hopefully, this will give both studios a little bit more exposure to any new viewers who might be interested in checking out some of their movies.

And on that note, we finally come to the end of "Full Moon vs. Troma" here on Reaction & Review. And I gotta say, that was a pretty fun marathon. And who knows? Maybe I'll end up doing another round with these two studios in the future. But until then, guys, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Mutant Hunt

Welcome, one and all, to "Full Moon vs. Troma" here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be covering a movie from 1987. That movie is "Mutant Hunt".

Now, I have a little bit of a story about how I discovered this movie and why I wanted to cover it. You see, when I was originally coming up with the concept of this marathon, I wanted to find as many movies as I could from both Troma and Full Moon Features. That way, I would have plenty to work with once I found an opening in my schedule for this marathon. And as a result, I found a little bit more than what I originally planned to find in order for this marathon to work. Now for Troma, it was pretty easy on what I wanted to pick out from them for this marathon. But Full Moon was a little bit different, because there's a quite a few movies of theirs that I bought, and I had a pretty hard time in considering which ones to cover. While I had a couple of movies in mind already, there were still a couple of others that I was still unsure of whether or not they would be good enough to cover for this marathon.

But then I happened to notice one day that Full Moon's official YouTube channel began uploading some of their movies onto their channel. Now I should mention that Troma does also have an official YouTube channel. And they use to have some of their movies that you could watch from their channel. But for one reason or another, they took them down. I'm not totally sure why exactly, but I'm not gonna get into that. So anyway, Full Moon recently began uploading some of their movies to their channel. A couple of examples I can remember were the first two "Puppet Master" movies from the Axis trilogy. But I've already seen them both. And in the case of Axis Rising, I covered that movie a couple of weeks ago for my 150th episode. So those two movies were ineligible.

And as for the other movies that they've uploaded to their channel so far, one movie of theirs caught my interest, which would be tonight's movie "Mutant Hunt". And the reason why I chose this movie out of all the others was mostly because of one cast member. In fact, if I'm correct, he is also the main star of the movie. That cast member goes by the name of Rick Gianasi. Now a lot of you probably have no idea who that is. And in case you don't, he was the star of a popular Troma film that I covered a long time ago. That movie, of course, being "Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D.". Yep, he played Detective Griswald, AKA Kabukiman. And, that alone, was enough for me to cover this movie. I'm curious to see what he did in a movie from Full Moon Features before he went on to star in a Troma flick.

Now as for the movie itself, I don't really know very much about it. I know it stars Rick Gianasi, and I vaguely remember something about cyborgs being in it as well. I don't know what the rest of it entails, because I haven't bothered to read what the plot is about. I haven't seen any trailers or clips from this movie, so I'm gonna go into this thing completely blind. And I'm hoping that it's gonna be good, but I have no idea if it will be. So the only way I'm gonna find out if this movie is any good at all, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Mutant Hunt".

6 minutes later

Guys, this movie's barely started, and I can already tell you that the acting in this movie is fucking terrible. I'm kinda hoping, maybe, I'll get use to this kind of shitty acting, or maybe it'll actually get better as the film rolls on. But as of right now, we're off to a bit of a bad start.

7 minutes later

Whoa, hold on a second here! So one of these cyborgs was handcuffed to a pipe by Riker. And in order to escape, it somehow was able to stretch it's arm like it was Mr. Fantastic, and was able to grab a machete that was hanging on a wall. And then it started cutting it's hand off to free itself. Which would've really cool...except the aftermath was showing the entire hand AND wrist hanging from the handcuff, even though we saw the cyborg was clearly cutting from the HAND area, and the machete was nowhere near it's wrist! Good god, that scene was just terribly edited.

6 minutes later

Wait, so that chick that Riker was in bed with a few minutes ago turned out to be a "pleasure droid"? So...basically, they're sex robots. OK. And yet, even though she just died, she was the best actor in this entire movie so far. That is pretty sad, guys.

19 minutes later

I didn't think this was possible, guys. But the acting has gotten steadily worse since the movie's started. Jesus Christ, I'm REALLY hoping that I'm gonna find something decent out of this movie sooner rather than later, but I'm not really sure if I'm going to at this point.

6 minutes later

So, one of these cyborgs just ripped off a woman's head from her body. You know what, that was sorta cool. Probably would've been better if we didn't just see it from a shadow's point of view. But at the very least, we did get a little bit of blood splatter from it. So...I guess that's sort of a positive.

14 minutes later

So, guys, not only have I learned that the acting is still terrible, but our villainess, Domina, is fucking retarded. She basically removed the implant bomb from Riker's head, after he promised to tell her where to find Darla, who is the scientist's sister. And once he made sure that the bomb was removed, he knocked Domina's lights out and escapes. Don't know where the fuck her cyborg was when this all happened, but I guess the cyborg didn't fucking care enough to go after him after Riker knocked his boss out. Guys, this movie is getting worse with each passing minute, and there's still more than a half an hour left into the movie! Something of interest had better fucking happen soon, because I am becoming rather impatient with this film's horrendous writing.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Mutant Hunt". And apparently, this version of the movie on YouTube doesn't have any ending credits. It just has the standard copyright text info from Full Moon Features. So, I can go ahead and shut the movie off now...OK. Holy shit, that was almost a chore to get through. You guys have no idea how happy I am to see a movie end. It's not often I say that about a movie, but this is one definitely an exception here.

So, let's start this all off by getting into the writing. And I'm gonna start with pacing, because, my god, this movie has some of the WORST pacing I have ever seen from any movie in a long, LONG time. And I would normally attribute most of that stuff into the actual writing itself. Because if a movie is not telling it's story at a consistent pace, then it brings the entire movie down. But this movie is a bit of a special case. Because this movie has pacing that is just atrocious from a multitude of different levels. We have scenes here that extend for far too long. Whether it's pointless scenes like the one involving Domina and Riker, which I'll talk about later. We have fight scenes that are slow, boring, and really poorly choreographed. And the movie's only about an hour and a half long. Which, you would think that with that kind of runtime, the movie would just speed on by as the story progresses. But no, this movie feels so god damn long, that it ends up becoming boring as shit! I was struggling to stay the fuck awake, in hopes that this movie would actually do something that would be considered partially interesting. The closest thing to that was when we get to see a cyborg rip a woman's head off her head. But aside from that, nothing else of interest happened. I can't think of a single positive when it comes to this movie, and I haven't even talked about the actual writing itself yet. 

So I may as well just get into the actual writing that this movie has, and...well, to put it simply, guys, there is no fucking writing here. We have a story that is not doing anything new or special. The only kinda interesting thing that happens with this movie is that our villain, Z, injected a drug known as Eurphoron into these cyborgs known as the Delta 7's, that was able to turn them into killing machines, and they'll basically kill anyone for pleasure. And then he holds one of the scientist's hostage named Paul, as he originally wanted both him and his sister to be detained. But his sister, Darla, manages to escape, which then later leads into her finding Riker's apartment. Z then later admits to Paul that he wants to sell this Eurphoron drug to terrorists, dictators, etc. So that way, he can turn it into a profit, while also creating an army of these killer cyborgs with this drug. So basically, it's a little bit like "The Terminator", mixed in with a drug film. Now I would probably be OK with this kind of story if, for starters, we actually had any characters who were worth caring about. But that's not the case. And I am not kidding when I say that NOBODY in this movie has any depth or personality to their characters. I mentioned Domina earlier, but she and Z are suppose to have some sort of conflict that really doesn't go anywhere, and the payoff for it sucks. Our heroes are not all that better. Matt Riker is suppose to be our main protagonist of the movie, and he has all the charm of a wooden stove that stopped working ages ago. Elaine is described as being a private op, bounty hunter, dancer, etc. And her character is also fucking lifeless. Felix is just the friend of the group, that's also suppose to be the tech genius of the group. Darla is the scientist I mentioned earlier, and her brother, Paul, is also a scientist, whom we barely see for a majority of this entire movie. And that's kinda it. So like I said, nobody has any depth or personality to their characters.

There is one thing I want to mention involving a scene that I touched upon pretty late into the movie. So Riker gets captured by one of these mutant cyborgs that's working for Domina at gun point. Which then leads into him being bound, while Domina interrogates him. And she says to him that she's implanted an exploding device on the back of Riker's skull. And she explains to him about how Paul and Darla work for Inteltrax, which is Z's company that's also producing these cyborgs. She also tells Riker that she wants the Eurphoron drug that Z has from his company. So in order for her to do this, she wants Riker to tell her where to find Darla. That way, Domina can use her as a bargaining chip, in exchange for the Eurphoron drug. Now, here is where it gets REALLY fucking stupid. Riker decides to give in to what she wants, but ONLY if she deactivates the bomb from the back of his skull. So after making sure that he would tell her, Domina decides to deactivate the bomb, as promised. And after Riker asks her exactly 3 times that she has deactivated the bomb, he decides that he's going to have to trust her. And by trusting her, I mean that he knocks her out cold, and was able to get himself out from his crisis with no problems whatsoever, thus ending the scene. I have just one question, and it's something that I hinted at earlier. But where the fuck was Domina's cyborg at when this was all happening?! Her cyborg was the one that captured Riker, so why wasn't that thing on standby whenever Domina was interrogating Riker? The only explanation I can think of is that she ordered it to stand guard outside somewhere in case any intruders came by. But you see, that would require somebody with a functioning brain to write that kind of effort. Granted, it's not a good explanation, but at least it would explain where that thing was, especially after Riker's escape. And even then, it makes her a fucking retard, because she didn't have the common sense to actually think that Riker would be able to escape from his position so easily and NOT worry about getting herself knocked out. But hey, I could just attribute that to what little writing was actually put into this movie.

Guys, I cannot think of a single thing that was even a remote positive when it comes to the writing for this movie. Because there is almost no writing here. And little writing IS here is just poorly, poorly thought out. Speaking of things that are done poorly, let's talk about the fight choreography, shall we? Oh boy, the fight choreography! It's not often I talk about the fight choreography in a sci-fi movie, but this one is definitely an exception. As I mentioned earlier, the fight scenes in this movie are slow, boring, and really poorly choreographed. The first one is definitely the worst of the bunch. So, about a third into the movie, there's a fight between Felix and one of the cyborgs. And as the fight scene was going on, we get about 3 cutaway scenes involving Darla at Riker's home, showering. And it also focuses on one of the fucked up-looking cyborgs that Riker beat up early on in the movie. Now the reason why these scenes are terrible is because it ruins the flow of the fight scene that is currently going on between Felix and the cyborg. If they were focused AFTER the fight between Felix and the cyborg, then these scenes wouldn't be that bad. But because they are in the way of this fight scene, it brings the flow of the fight down to a screeching halt. And mind you, the fight scene itself was not very good either, but it would've been paced better had those scenes not gotten in the way there. And the fights themselves are so poorly choreographed that it makes the shit you see in modern wrestling look like fucking Shakespeare. The only movies I can think of that had worse fight choreography than this were "The Russian Ninja" and "Panther Squad". And that is fucking pathetic on a whole host of levels.

So, with all that, what else can we add on top of the all the problems that this movie has? Oh, I know! The acting. Oh, fuck me dead, the acting in this movie. Guys, I was hoping, and I mean GENUINELY hoping, that the acting was going to get better after what I first said when I started watching the movie. Well, surprise surprise, that didn't fucking happen. The acting in this movie started off poorly, and it only got worse as the film went on. This is some of the most stilted, wooden, lifeless acting that I've heard in a movie in a long time. Almost nobody in this movie tried. The only one that actually did, somewhat, try was the actress playing the pleasure droid near the beginning of the movie. Which is pretty fucking sad, especially when you consider someone that was supposing to be playing a sex robot did a better job than most of the cast in this entire movie. Hell, I don't even believe that most of these actors have ever been in a movie before in their lives. The only exception to all this is Rick Gianasi. And he's been in movies before, and after this. Most of them I've never even heard of, with the one lone exception being "Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D." And he was really good in that movie! At least, when compared to this shit heap. Because he also phones it in here, too. Now I think that's mostly because when you're given a script such as this, you can only do so much with a god-awful script. And it shows. I'm just surprised, and thankful, that he was able to get a better role later on in his career, because this is probably the worst performance he has ever given in a movie such as this. Granted, I've only seen 2 movies with him in it, so that's not saying very much, but still. Overall, the acting in this movie is fucking terrible from across the board.

Special effects in this movie are, probably, the one and only thing I can say that this film did OK on. Mind you, none of it is great, and it's certainly not going to win any awards, but it still looks OK for low budget standards. There is one effect that I want to mention, and that would be the fucked-up cyborg I mentioned that ruined the flow of the fight between Felix and the other cyborg. And I will say that the puppeteering on the fucked-up cyborg actually looks pretty decent. And the way it talks is when you see a small bulb blinking from it's exposed neck area. Now most of everything involving that puppet looked fine, except for one moment. So, it's during the final portion of the movie and the cyborg has our villain, Z, being held up by it's arm. And one thing I mentioned early on was that these cyborgs have the ability to stretch out their arms longer than normal. And I want to say that, for the fucked-up cyborg, it would've looked really cool. However, when you see it's arm that's stretching out, you can see that it was mostly wrapped around in duct tape. I understand that they were trying to go for a mechanical route with it's arm, but it honestly looked really cheap, and came off as looking like shit in the process. However, almost everything else here looks OK. The blood effects, what very little is used here, is OK. The makeup effects are OK, as well. But they're honestly nothing to write home about. So, as I stated earlier, the special effects in this movie are the only slight positive I can give this thing.

Camerawork here is decent, but I have to mention editing for one particular scene. I mentioned it way early on, but it bears repeating. So, shortly after Darla first meets Riker, the two cyborgs that follow her end up there as well. Which then leads into our very first fight scene. And as it's going on, Riker ends up handcuffing one of the cyborgs to a pipe. The cyborg is trapped, and is trying to get loose. And it notices a machete and uses it's stretching arm to grab it and cut himself loose. Now, I want to make mention that the cyborg was cutting around the hand area when it first starts to chop it's hand off. And as it's doing so, it's bodily fluids start to flow out of it's hand, to which it finally frees itself from being handcuffed. Now, that would've been sort of cool...except, as I mentioned before, it shows both the hand AND the wrist area. Even though the scene CLEARLY shows the cyborg cutting the just hand, and the machete was nowhere near the wrist while the cyborg was cutting. And to show that the filmmakers did not care at all is when you actually do get to see the entire hand dangling there, you'll notice that the cut mark that first appeared when the cyborg went to chop it's hand off is completely gone. And it just looks like a normal hand prop with no injuries to it whatsoever. Which again, tells me that the filmmakers did not care at all when trying to be consistent with their own fucking movie.

So anyway, the camerawork here is decent, save for that one terrible bit in editing. The lighting here is pretty dark. In fact, I noticed that the picture quality also looks kinda like shit, because most of the footage looks a little bit blurry when you are viewing this movie. And I have no idea why that is. And what makes this even stranger is the fact that this movie was put out on Full Moon's official YouTube channel. I have no idea if this thing came from it's DVD format, or if that was just a technical issue on my end. But either way, this movie looks ugly as shit to watch on YouTube. And considering the fact that it, once again, came from Full Moon's official YouTube channel, makes them look incompetently amateurish. Now again, maybe it's just how it looks like on my end, but if it's not, then it makes me question why Full Moon uploaded it in this way? I would've that, maybe, they would've cleaned up some of the footage, so that way any viewer watching this movie would've been able to see this thing in a clearer way. But again, I could be just complaining about something on my end, so who know? Anyway, the lighting here is kinda dark. The sound-mix here is kinda shit in a couple of scenes, but it's not the worst thing I've heard. Music, however, is total shit. Why? Well, because there's this one guitar solo that you will hear about 3 or 4 different times in this movie, and sometimes, it will play that one solo on a loop during some fight scenes. The first time, I didn't mind it. But as the movie went on, it played that particular part of the song about a few more times afterwards, and it just got grating to listen to after a while. Not only that, and also going back to the sound-mix, the audio for the music seems to be pretty loud in some areas of the movie. It probably would've helped if they had balanced some of the audio within some of these scenes, so that way the movie could've sounded better. And also, find other music to play that's not the same, tired guitar solo that just got irritating to listen after a while. So yeah, the music here is total shit.

So, guys, when everything is said and done, can I recommend "Mutant Hunt"? What the hell do you think? No, I cannot! This movie is fucking garbage on almost every conceivable level. The only thing that this movie does halfway decently on is the special effects. But that's not even enough to make you want to watch this movie, unless if you just have some morbid curiosity, and you're curious to see how bad it really is. And if you REALLY are that curious, I might even post a link to this movie at the top of this description for you guy's to check out. But I assure you, it is NOT worth your time. It is boring as shit, the story is almost non-existent, the acting is atrocious, the fight choreography is also garbage, there is just nothing here that you will make you want to go and watch this movie for yourself. This movie is almost unwatchable. And the fact that I even had interest in watching it makes this thing even worse than it already is. I'm just thankful that I didn't buy a physical copy of this movie, because I know the mini-mall that I go to is carrying this movie on one of their shelves, next to a bunch of other horror movies. And I don't even want to know how much they're selling it for. But I can definitely say that it's not worth purchasing at ANY price whatsoever. And seeing as how this movie starred Rick Gianasi, I'm gonna go and watch the only other movie that I've seen that I know he's good in, which is, of course, "Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D.". Because, good lord, I need to watch something better after sitting through this crap that I had to go through for about an hour and a half.

So anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Graduation Day

Welcome, one and all, to "Full Moon vs. Troma" here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be checking out a slasher film from 1981. That movie is "Graduation Day".

Now, much like with a lot of movies I've covered in this marathon so far, I don't really know a whole lot about this movie. I found it at one of my local video stores, and I bought it, mostly because it had Troma's name on it. But it also advertised a couple of the cast members on the front cover for the DVD. I'll talk about those cast members in a bit, but first, I should probably tell you what little I do know about the film itself. From what I read on the back of the DVD case, the plot is about a high school track team being killed off by somebody, and it could be someone related to this track team. So basically, it sounds like a murder mystery combined with a standard slasher film. Which, admittedly, isn't entirely new or different. But it could still prove to be interesting.

Now, I should probably mention those cast members I brought up a moment ago. One of them goes by the name of Linnea Quigley. Who, at the the time that I bought this movie, I had no idea who she was, other than being advertised as a "Scream Queen B-Movie Legend" on the front of the DVD case. But then I happened to remember that she was one of the stars in another movie that I covered for this marathon a few weeks ago, which turned out to be "Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama". And that movie kinda sucked. At least, to me, it did. Mind you, she was one of the only few cast members who even tried in that movie, but that isn't saying a whole hell of a lot, because even she still kinda sucked in that thing. However, I am not gonna let one questionable performance get in the way here, because she could still be pretty good in this movie. Granted, I don't know what her role is at this time. But I will find out eventually once I start watching the movie.

Now the other cast member I wanted to bring up is somebody that you may remember if you're someone who watches game shows. That cast member's name is Vanna White. And if that name does sound familiar to you, she is the one who turns the letters on "Wheel of Fortune". A show that I use to watch a LOT as a kid, and that show holds a lot of memories for me. And she's been doing that job for over 4 decades. Which is insane, mind you, and she's still doing it to this day, at least at the time that I'm writing this Reaction & Review. Now some of you might be thinking why in the hell would you cast somebody who's barely acted, and that her only real experience is turning letters on a game show? Well, that's not really fair, because she's had some acting credits in a few movies and TV shows. Aside from showcasing prizes on "Wheel of Fortune", she had a cameo appearance in that kinda shitty "Double Dragon" movie, and she was also a guest star on an episode of "Married...With Children". And that last one, I'm gonna tell you, she was fantastic in that episode. And if you have never seen it, go find that episode somewhere and give it a watch. Like I said, she was great there, and it gives me enough confidence that she'll hopefully pull off something decent here in this movie.

But then again, I don't know really know if this movie is going to be any good at all. I'm hoping for it to be good, but I could also imagine this movie sucking on a whole host of levels. I'm hoping that's not the case, but it could still happen. So the only way I'm gonna find out if this movie is going to be any good at all, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Graduation Day".

4 minutes later

You know, guys, that would win probably would've been more convincing if the editing during that scene wasn't noticeably shit. I'm going to assume that was meant to be intentional. Still wasn't really that funny. I'm gonna give this thing a chance, though, in hopes that it will get better.

20 minutes later

All right, guys, I'm kinda curious about something. Is this movie gonna get interesting at some point? We are almost a half an hour into the film, and, aside from one kill, nothing of interest has happened. I'm genuinely hoping it's gonna get more interesting as the movie continues. But as of right now, I'm starting to have my doubts.

20 minutes later

So, a couple of these students were pranking this music teacher with a tape recorder that they played down near the pipes. And as soon he finds it, the two ran off and closed the door behind them. Possibly locking him in there, too, but I have no idea if that's the case or not since he never bothered to go after them like a sensible teacher would. Guys, I normally wouldn't be asking for too much from a movie, but I would, at least, like SOME kind of explanation as to what's been going on. And so far, this movie's not really giving me much of one. It's just leaving me more lost and confused.

9 minutes later

OK, you know what? That was actually sort of a creative kill. Just attach a football to the back of a blade and then throw it at the football player's stomach, impaling him in the process. It's not a great kill, mind you, but still, it is sort of creative. So, at least, there is that.

2 minutes later

I just saw a drawn picture of Prince John from Disney's "Robin Hood" on one of the walls of this room sucking his thumb. I have no idea why that's there. I will say, though, that it definitely caught me by surprise.

2 minutes later

Holy shit, this guy's singing REALLY sucks. I know you guys can't hear this for obvious reasons, but this rock song that's playing right now fucking sucks. And that mostly attributes to this god-awful singing that this guy is giving out. It is just PAINFUL to listen to.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Graduation Day". And thank Christ, this fucking movie is over. Let me go ahead and shut this thing off...OK. Dear god, where do I even start? Well, before I actually talk about the movie itself, I have to address a minor thing first. I didn't think I'd have to do this twice in one marathon, but I have to in this case. You guys remembered when I bitched about "Panther Squad" having a false runtime? Well, "Graduation Day" follows suit. Because this movie is not 90 minutes long, despite the fact that the back of the DVD case states it as approximately 90 minutes long. The real runtime, according to what I looked up, is 97 minutes long. There's about 5 minutes of extra footage, followed by about 2 minutes worth of credits. I know it may sound trivial to some people for when I complain about a movie's runtime, but I hate being lied to, especially when a movie such as this states that it's about 90 minutes long, when it's actually off by about a fraction of it's official runtime! So, to anybody who wants to put their movies out on DVD and Blu-ray, please more honest about your movie's runtime, otherwise, you get movies like this where it's not even close to what it's suppose to be advertising as their official runtimes.

Now...fucking hell, I haven't even talked about the movie itself yet, and I already have stuff to complain about. Holy shit...OK. Let's move past that bullshit, and actually delve into the movie itself. Let's start with the writing. So, I mentioned earlier about this movie playing itself off as a murder mystery, while also being a slasher film at the same time. I will that, at the very least, it does live up to being a slasher film, as we get a ton of kills in this movie. And all of it centers around this track team. Because at the very start of the movie, one of the track team members named Laura ends up winning a race. But shortly after she wins, she ends up collapsing on the ground, and she ends up dead due to a blood clot in her artery. And then it leads into everyone involved in the track team later being killed off, because of reasons that I won't try to spoil...though I may end up doing so later on. I'll get more into that in a bit. But anyway, this leads into two months later, where our main character, Anne, is coming back home from Guam, because she is a member of the U.S. military. And she's back home to attend graduation day, but mostly because she's trying to find out the circumstances of her sister's death and who might've been responsible for it. Which we barely get any information about up until around the 50 minute mark of the movie, mostly because of this film's terrible pacing.

In fact, let's actually get into that problem, shall we? This movie's pacing is just shit. To start with, most of, if not all of the kills in this movie are just spaced out. Where within the first, I'd say, 10 minutes or so, we get our first kill from our killer. And then we have about 25 minutes worth of padding, because nothing of interest happens within that time frame until the next victim, and then the football player, and so on so forth. Now when these kills do happen, they are sorta cool. But it's just that getting to these kills is sort of a chore to get to because of all this unnecessary padding. The worst case in this has to go this one scene involving a music teacher. So, he's playing music to several of these female students, two of which are being played by Linnea Quigley and Vanna White. The one played by Linnea Quigley, I guess, has a thing for the music teacher because she starts removing her shirt and begins to kiss the music teacher. And then the scene just...ends. He tries to get her to stop this, because someone could come in and catch them in the act, but she ends up locking the door before she continues advancing on the music teacher. I don't know what this scene was suppose to serve, other than the fact that Linnea Quigley has tits, I guess. I don't know, but it was fucking pointless. But that's not who I want to complain about, I want to complain about the music teacher. So after all that happens, we come back a little later involving him where he's just playing the piano. And then he hears a noise. First time he hears it, he does nothing. Second time, still nothing. And by the third time, he gets up to go check out where the noise was coming from. Which then leads him into a dark room involving pipes. He tries to find out who's making these noises, which then leads into some people talking. In reality, it was just a tape recorder playing. Now, I already mentioned this scene earlier on, but like I said, after he discovers the tape recorder, two of the students. run off and shut the door behind them, leaving him there, thus ending the scene. So...what exact purpose did that entire scene serve? The answer is fucking nothing! It NEVER gets brought up again, and it only exists in order to pad the movie out, which is fucking disgraceful in and of itself.

Now, let's get into the other problem with this movie's writing by talking about the killer in the room. Guys, I have a bit of a pro-tip for anyone who wants to write a mystery story involving a killer. You see, it's perfectly fine to have red herrings. Because that's a basic common trope with mystery stories involving killers. But DON'T make your red herrings too fucking obvious. Otherwise, you get movies like this where they're basically coming out and saying that THIS person is suppose to be the killer, when they're actually really not. So, like I said earlier, I may end up spoiling who the killer is here. And if I end up doing so, then I'm sorry. But since this movie is not trying to be clever with it's writing, I'll probably have to end up spoiling it anyways. So, this movie is basically coming out and saying that coach Michaels is the one who is responsible for Laura's death. And when Anne confronts him about what happened to her sister, he tells her that he had no reason to kill her because she was one of his top track team members. He also implied earlier that he loved her, which doesn't really go anywhere. But then Anne points out that he pushed her like a machine, to which was the reason why Laura died of a blood clot because coach Michaels supposedly pushed her too far into becoming the best. Which then gets Anne the idea that she knows who killed her sister. And like I said earlier, this movie does a really poor job in making you believe that it's coach Michaels who is responsible for Laura's death, and the recent killings of the track team members, but it obviously wasn't him. Now I knew in the back of my mind who the killer already was, but I was still interested to see how the movie was going to play itself out. But then I remembered reading the back of the DVD case for this movie, and it basically comes out and describes 4 possibilities as to who's been doing the killing. It's either Anne, which makes no sense since she just came home as soon as the killings started to happen. Coach Michaels, who I already talked about in great detail. Some campus policeman, who's seen as a bit shady, but is also barely in the fucking movie. Or it might be Kevin, who is the boyfriend of the deceased Laura, and is also one of the track team members. And judging by my descriptions, if you don't figure it out who it is by the time the movie reveals the killer's identity, then I'm sorry, but you're about as stupid as this movie is. Because this movie is just so bad at trying to pass itself off as a mystery. Which may or may not have been this movie's intent, but it just does such a half-assed job of presenting it's killer.

Guys, there's no way for me to come around without saying that the writing in this movie is fucking terrible. There are no characters worth caring about, the story here is just poorly, poorly done. And the pacing here is also kind of a deal breaker as well. I honestly can't think of any positives when it comes to the writing, because it's just that bad. Now as for the acting, well...I can't say it's horrible, but it's not great either. I will say that Linnea Quigley, when compared to her role in "Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama", actually does turn in a better performance here. Her acting is nowhere near as wooden as she was in that movie, so I can at least give her some marks here. Vanna White is BARELY in the fucking movie, so I can't really gauge an opinion as to whether or not she was any good. Now, there is one other member of the cast that I do need to make mention of. And in order for me to explain this, there's an introduction video at the start of the movie presented by Lloyd Kaufman. And he talks about the most of the noteworthy cast members that are in the movie. One of them he mentions is an actor by the name of Christopher George, who plays coach Michaels in this movie. Kaufman also mentions that you may remember Christopher George from his performance in "El Dorado" starring John Wayne. And when he mentioned that movie, I had to look it up, because I wasn't sure about what role he played. Well, it turns out that he played Nelse McLeod, one of the antagonists from that movie. And my mind just blew up, because "El Dorado" is one of my favorite Westerns of all time. And I didn't even know about his name up until Lloyd Kaufman mentioned "El Dorado". So...yeah, that was something of a revelation. But anyway, as for Christopher George's performance in "Graduation Day", it's fine. I really couldn't find any faults with his acting. I will say, though, that from between the 14 years from "El Dorado" and into this movie, he apparently gained quite a bit of weight. Which, I don't know if he was required to gain weight for this movie, or if that's just how he naturally looked like when aging. I don't know, but the point is, he turned in the best showing in this entire movie. Everyone else ranges from being kinda hammy, to being sorta wooden. It's not the worst acting I've heard, but it's nowhere near the best. So the acting here is barely above average here.

Special effects here involving blood and everything looks decent, especially coming from a low budget movie. Now obviously, none of it is great, but considering that this movie had a budget of around $250,000, we're not really aiming for the stars here. And also, you have to consider that this movie came out in 1981, so $250,000 was probably a pretty big budget for it's time, unlike nowadays. But anyway, blood effects in this movie are decent. The makeup effects involving certain dead bodies are OK, but they're nothing to write home about. So overall, the special effects here are kinda decent at best.

Camerawork here is OK, save for a bit of shoddy editing that happened at the beginning of the movie involving Laura's win. So, I mentioned earlier that the editing during that bit was shit. And that's mostly because they just reused the same footage of Laura coming towards the finish line, but not crossing it. And not only did it make that scene look kinda like shit, but it also contributed to the unnecessary padding that this movie already has. Lighting here is decent, but it could've been fine-tuned in some areas involving darkly-lit rooms. So, it is something that you have to take for what it's worth. The sound-mix here is mixed fine. The music here is really good, save for one song. And, oh my god, this song is just shit. Not only was this song shit, but it ALSO was responsible for padding the movie out. So, during this part of the movie where this song plays, we get treated to Linnea Quigley being one of the next victims for our killer. And from before that happens, we get this song that plays during a dance party, and this song SUCKS major balls. Mostly because the people singing it don't know how to fucking sing. Not only that, but it goes on for FAR too long, because, like I said, it plays during the dance party, and it also transitions to Linnea Quigley's character, who is being stalked and later killed by the killer. It lasts for about 6-7 minutes long, and it is fucking grating as shit, because of how bad that song really is! And even before that, we actually had a rather decent soundtrack for this movie. But that one song almost overshadows all of the other songs in this movie because of how ungodly bad it was. And that it lasted way, WAY too fucking long. So yeah, overall, the music here is pretty good, save for that one shitty, fucking song.

So anyway, guys, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "Graduation Day"? No, I can't. Because this film is just so poorly written, and the way that it handles who our killer is is just so fucking obnoxiously bad that it almost hurts to watch. I honestly can't recommend this film to anyone who is a fan of Troma's films, because this one almost has no charm to it. The only thing that is sorta charming is getting to see the guy who played Nelse McLeod to be in a Troma flick. But that's more of a personal bias than anything else. And even then, it's not enough to make me want to rewatch this movie again just for him alone. This movie is just terrible based solely on it's fucking writing. Now admittedly, it's nowhere near as bad as something such as "Vegas in Space", which is the worst Troma film that I've ever seen. But that's not saying very much, considering that "Vegas in Space" was the only other bad Troma film that I had seen at the time. And it looks like I can add "Graduation Day" to that list of bad Troma films that I've seen so far. Again, not the worst Troma film, but it's also really fucking bad, too. So, I guess you win some and lose some in this scenario. And unfortunately, that is the case with "Graduation Day". Now...I gotta find something better to watch. And seeing as how Christopher George was in this movie, and that he was in "El Dorado", I'm gonna go and watch "El Dorado" right now. Because that movie, to me, is a classic Western that I never get tired of watching. So, I'm gonna go and do that next. And as for this movie, well, it can go graduate itself into being traded off, because I have no desire to ever watch it again.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Puppet Master X: Axis Rising

Welcome, one and all, to "Full Moon vs. Troma" here on Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, we are celebrating a milestone for this series. This is the 150th episode of Reaction & Review. I am astounded that I have made it this far with, I guess you could call it a reboot of Emer Prevost's Reaction & Review YouTube series, except it's on Deviantart, and it's much less successful, too. I am not afraid to admit that. However, regardless of whether or not it's popular, I'm still having fun writing this series, and I'm thankful to anyone who has stuck around to read these reviews.

And for this kind of milestone, I wanted to find a movie that would do two things for me. One, it would have to fit in with the current marathon that I'm still in the middle of doing. And also, it would have to be something that I would be very interested in watching. And since last week's movie was from Troma, I now have to shift it over to Full Moon tonight. And tonight's movie is definitely one that I've been wanting to watch for quite a few years now. It's a movie that came out in 2012. That movie is "Puppet Master X: Axis Rising".

Now, I'd like to start off by saying that I have been a fan of this franchise since 2018. I say that, mostly because I came into contact with this franchise when I found the first 9 movies on 2 DVD discs that came together. I gave them all a watch, and minus the 6th movie and 8th movie, and even "Retro Puppet Master" to a certain extent, I've greatly enjoyed most of these movies. In fact, I watch most of these movies every year around Halloween, because, to me, that is the perfect time to be a horror movie fan. So yeah, I love this franchise, and it ultimately made me interested in checking out more of Full Moon's movies.

Now you probably noticed, just basing off the title there, that I'm gonna be watching the 10th entry in this franchise. And some of you might be curious as to why I'm reviewing the 10th movie, and not, say, the first "Puppet Master" movie? Well, like I just stated a moment ago, I've seen the first 9 "Puppet Master" movies, so I can't review any of those, because the rules for Reaction & Review must be that I cover movies that I haven't seen before. So those movies are out of the running. The other reason is because, while I have seen most of the early "Puppet Master" movies many, many times already, I never got around to watching any movie beyond the 9th entry. Mostly because, I didn't own a copy of any of them at the time. But thankfully, I finally managed to get a copy of both this, and the 11th "Puppet Master" movie thanks to a sale that Full Moon was running on their website. So I managed to snag both of those movies, and the rest is history. Now I should quickly mention that I'm not gonna be reviewing the 11th "Puppet Master" movie for this marathon, because I already have the other Full Moon movie scheduled for this marathon. But I will definitely end up covering that movie at some point, though.

But getting back to this movie, I should probably tell you what I know about it going in. And the one thing I need to make mention of is that this movie is a direct sequel to the 9th movie, which was called "Puppet Master: Axis of Evil". And that movie was kinda sort of a prequel/sequel to the events of the first movie shortly after Andre Toulon kills himself before the Nazi's could get to him in order to get his secret formula that's able to help Toulon's puppets move freely without strings. I won't spoil the entirety of the 9th movie to you guys, but long story short, this guy named Danny ends up finding Toulon's puppets shortly after he committed suicide. Later, Danny ends up discovering the secrets of Toulon's formula, while also dealing with the Nazi's that were after Toulon's secret formula to begin with. Then he finds out that the Nazis and this Japanese woman are trying to destroy an American weapons plant to try and disrupt the efforts going on during WW2 at that time. Which then later leads to his girlfriend, Beth, getting kidnapped. And at the end, Danny ends up saving his girlfriend, with the help of Toulon's puppets, but one of the puppets ends up getting taken from them, thus leading into this movie. And I'm very curious to see how this is going to play out from here.

So, I should probably quit stalling right now, and find out if this movie is going to end up being any good. And I hope that it is good. However, I know for a fact that these movies aren't invulnerable from being terrible, as is the case with "Curse of the Puppet Master" and "Puppet Master 8: The Legacy" have proven that this franchise can produce duds. So, I'm going into this movie with a bit of caution, but I'm also hoping for it to be pretty good, as well. So with that lengthy introduction out of the way, it's finally time to dive into this movie. So, for the 150th time, it is time to kick back, relax, and check out "Puppet Master X: Axis Rising".

2 minutes later

OK, I need to comment on this. So, this is suppose to be the same Japanese woman that was one of the antagonists from the previous movie. And for some reason, the white makeup that was on her face from the previous movie has completely disappeared here. I understand that this movie was made 2 years after Axis of Evil, but you would think that someone would've at least obtained some consistency and kept the white makeup on this woman's face, since she had that makeup on her face the entire previous movie. Granted, it's a somewhat trivial thing to be complaining about, but still, some consistency would've been nice.

15 minutes later

Guys, I'd like to say right now that this lady's German accent REALLY sucks. I think it's probably because that it keeps disappearing when it's not suppose to. Mind you, the other people that are suppose to be German soldiers DO sound legitimately German. But this female General's accent isn't really that good. Just thought I'd let you guys know.

9 minutes later

Well...I think I can safely that this resurrection project turned out to be a complete failure. I mean, it was a sound concept, but perhaps maybe it would've worked better had this General had gotten a better test subject for this project. But hey, maybe that's just me.

19 minutes later

OK, hold on a second here. So, one of the little holes that are needed to inject the secret formula into these puppets was found in Tunneler's chest area. Except, in the previous movie, the little hole was found in the back of Tunneler's neck when Danny first gave it the serum. You know, guys, I understand that the "Puppet Master" franchise isn't the best with it's continuity, but I would still like for it to TRY to be more consistent with it's own continuity. Even if it's just for minor stuff such as this. You know what I mean?

11 minutes later

So, Bombshell can shoot bullets from her mechanized tits. Well...I can't say that it isn't creative. I could question what this scientist's thought process was going through when he was creating this puppet, but then again, I think I already know what that thought process is, given what we saw from that female Nazi General from earlier. So, I guess that would render my own question kinda pointless.

20 minutes later

You know, guys, I will say that my favorite new puppet in this movie that I've seen up to this point is Blitzkrieg. Blitzkrieg is, basically, just a toy tank. But I still think it looks really cool, considering that the other new puppets, aside from Bombshell, haven't really done very much in this movie so far.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Puppet Master X: Axis Rising". Let me go ahead and shut the film off...all right. So...what to even begin with here? I guess I should start off by saying that, even though I have complained about a couple of things here in particular that kinda bugged me a bit, I still really enjoyed this movie. Now admittedly, it's nowhere near as good as the earlier "Puppet Master" movies, but it's certainly nowhere near the bad levels of something such as "Curse of the Puppet Master". That, to me, is still the lowest point of all the "Puppet Master" movies, though "Puppet Master 8: The Legacy" does come in at a close second.

Now with that being said, let's get into the writing itself, shall we? And I should start off by saying that this movie, as I mentioned before, is seen as kinda sort of a sequel/prequel to the very first "Puppet Master" movie. In which, it starts off shortly after Toulon kills himself before the Nazi's could get to him to surrender his secret formula to them. And then after the Nazi's leave after failing to find the puppets, Danny ends up going to Toulon's room, and manages to find the puppets that Toulon had hidden inside one of the walls of his room, thus kicking off the events of the 9th movie. Now how this all leads into "Puppet Master 2", continuity wise, is a completely different story altogether. And it's admittedly one that I have no idea at this point in time. It may have been answered in the next entry after this movie, which is called "Puppet Master: Axis Termination". But I have no idea until I eventually get around to watching that movie at some point. Which is gonna lead into a little bit of a problem, which I'll talk about a little bit later when discussing this movie's writing. But one thing that I think you should guys know ahead of time is that if you have any interest in watching the "Puppet Master" movies, I would advise you in not trying to figure out what entry in this franchise goes in what order. Because like I mentioned earlier, the "Puppet Master" series timeline is kinda all over the place. And if you were to try and figure out the complexity of Puppet Master's continuity, then, chances are that, you would be totally lost on all of this. Granted, it's not as confusing as something such as the Zelda timeline that use to be a hot debate back in the day, but it could be seen as pretty damn confusing to new viewers. Mind you now, as someone who has seen the first 9 movies quite a few times already, I have a pretty good idea as to where most of those movies take place in what order, but I could totally imagine new viewers going into these movies for the first time, and they could be totally lost on a lot of this.

Now since I just talked about the Puppet Master's continuity, let's kinda segue way into this by talking about a couple of inconsistencies that this movie runs into. The first one, and this was one that I brought up WAY early on in the movie, has to involve the Japanese woman, who was one of the main antagonists from Axis of Evil. For those of you who have never seen that movie, she was dressed up as a geisha the entire movie, and one of the things that made her stand out was that she had white makeup on her face, which is most geisha's wear. However, in between the ending of Axis of Evil and the beginning of Axis Rising, someone got their wires crossed, because the white makeup that she had on in the previous movie doesn't exist when she first appears on screen in this movie. Not only that, but she looks to be played by a completely different actress, too. I'll get into that later when discussing the acting, though. Now admittedly, this one is a bit of a minor complaint, mostly because, a bit of a spoiler here, the Japanese woman gets killed within the first few minutes of the movie. So it's not really something I'm gonna harp on too much there. However, one thing that does kinda bug me is the placement of how the puppets are suppose to come alive. As I mentioned before, the secret formula that Toulon created helps his puppets move without strings. And in order to make his puppets come alive, he has to inject the puppets with his secret formula in order for them to move around. Now, in Axis of Evil, Danny was able to inject the puppets through the back of the neck in order for them to come alive. But for some reason, in this movie, it is shown from this German scientist that was checking out Tunneler's mechanisms that Tunneler's hole is from his chest area and NOT the back of his neck. And that kinda bugs me a bit, because it seems like when this movie was being made, apparently, nobody bothered to look back on Axis of Evil and realize that the holes came from the puppets neck and not the chest area. I would've thought that Charles Band would've noticed this, since he produced most of these movies, with the exception of the 8th movie. But, I guess that didn't happen, and these inconsistencies were just left unchecked by him and the person who wrote this movie.

So, with the problem of the inconsistencies shown in this movie, what about the rest of the writing? Well, despite my problems I had with those inconsistencies, the movie still has some pretty good writing here. Now again, I wouldn't say that it's as strong as what was shown in Axis of Evil, but what we do have for writing here is still good enough to where it can carry it's own weight. And it carries off right after the events of Axis of Evil, where Tunneler gets taken by the Japanese woman, which then gets taken from some Nazi soldiers, who in turn kill the Japanese woman. Danny and Beth are reunited together with the puppets, as they try to figure out how to get Tunneler back from the Nazis. Which then leads them to be taken by some officials from the U.S. Army, who thanks them for stopping the destruction of the weapons manufacturing plant. They are then assigned to a bodyguard, AKA Sergeant Stone, to look after them while also awaiting someone named General Porter, where they will get a medal for their success. Which later leads to Danny to convince Stone to help them get back Tunneler from the Nazis, and thus that plot kinda kicks off from there. On the Nazi side of things, we have this German scientist being blackmailed by a Nazi General named Moebius, to help build his resurrection project, which is to, basically, create undead soldiers that wouldn't be killed in battle for his army. So, in other words, zombies, if you will. And there's also this female Nazi General that, I think, is suppose to have a thing for our German scientist, although that part is not entirely clear. I wasn't totally sure if the scientist was suppose to be attracted to our female Nazi General, and the way that whole subplot ends is kinda rushed and doesn't really get developed all that much.

Speaking of which, let's get into the characters, shall we? Now, seeing as how this movie is a direct sequel to Axis of Evil, we do have our two main characters back for this movie, which would be Danny and Beth. And their characters were pretty well established in that movie. So, if you go into this movie without watching Axis of Evil first, then you would be kinda lost as to who these characters are and why we should care about them. So just a bit of a heads up, you might want to watch that movie first before you dive into Axis Rising. In fact, I'll mention more about both of those movies later on when I get to recommendations. But anyway, as for our villains, well, they're basically just Nazis, with the exception of the German scientist. Speaking of which, it's stated in the movie that the German scientist has a daughter, but we never actually see her in this film. Maybe she's in the 11th movie, but I have no idea at this time. And as for our puppets, well, we do have our main cast of puppets such as Blade, Pinhead, Leech Lady, Jester, and Six Shooter, who kinda sorta makes his first debut within the Axis trilogy. I say kinda sorta, because his first appearance was, technically, in the 3rd movie, but I gotta keep the timeline of these movies within the frame of mind here when discussing this series. We also have 4 new puppets in this movie that were created by the German scientist. The first one is Bombshell, who I mentioned earlier. Blitzkrieg, who's more of a toy robot rather than a puppet, but that's just me being nitpicky. Weremacht, who's basically just a werewolf in a Nazi uniform, and probably the least memorable puppet of the group. And then there is Kamikaze. Now, I do have to warn some viewers ahead of time that Kamikaze, as the name implies, is a suicidal bomber. And the reason why I bring this up is because the design of the puppet could be seen as ridiculously offensive to some people. That being said, you also have to understand that this movie's story takes place during a time where all of that was acceptable. So, just to warn those that are prone to being offended rather easily ahead of time, you might take offense to the design of this particular puppet. Me personally, I think it looks really fucking hilarious. But then again, it also takes a lot to genuinely offend me. So, make that of what you will.

Now beyond all of that, the writing here, like I said, is still pretty good for what it is. And for me, personally, I really think this holds up pretty well, at least as far as sequels to the "Puppet Master" series go anyway. Now, with that being said, let's get into the acting. One thing I need to make mention of real quick before I talk about the acting itself is that the actors who played Danny and Beth from Axis of Evil are replaced by completely new actors in this movie. Now I have no idea as to WHY the original actors were replaced in this movie, but I will say that the acting from them in this movie is not too bad. I mean, granted, it's not great, but it's certainly not as bad it could've been. That being said, I want do to talk about the accents certain actors have in this movie. When it comes to the Nazis, the male actors sound convincing enough, but as for the female Nazi...not so much. I brought it up earlier, but her German accent really sucks. And it's mostly because her accent has somewhat of a habit of disappearing when it wants to. And it comes off as rather flaky, overall. And it's not just her either. You remember the Japanese woman I kept bringing up earlier? Well, her accent is also pretty damn bad. To a point where her acting is just stilted and really wooden, too. Granted, the original actress who played her in Axis of Evil wasn't great either, but at least she was sorta tolerable for the most part. This actress, though, was kinda shit. Now admittedly, the accents don't bring the entire movie down, but some of it doesn't sound very convincing either. So really, it just comes to whether or not you can tolerate the questionable accents on a couple of these actresses. But like I said, the rest of the acting here is decent, and it's certainly nowhere near the bad level of "Retro Puppet Master" when it comes to terrible acting. So, at least, we have that.

So now, let's get into the special effects. And unfortunately, this movie's special effects are, once more, a step down from the previous movies quality. And when I say previous movies, I'm talking about the first 5 "Puppet Master" movies. Because for those of you who have never seen the first 5 movies of this franchise, one of the things that made those movies stand out were the AWESOME-looking stop motion effects that went into the puppets. They felt like they were real, and you could totally buy that they didn't move like normal puppets did. And the last time that those effects were being used was all the way back in 1994, back during "Puppet Master 5: The Final Chapter". So, come 18 years later, the special effects have definitely taken a nosedive from quality. There is no stop motion for the puppets in this movie, and they all just move like normal puppets, if just barely. The digital effects and CG, what little is used here anyway, are cheap and kinda shit. The only one of them that stands out, at least when it comes to the puppets, is Blitzkrieg. And that's mainly because, like I mentioned earlier, it doesn't function like a normal puppet. It was either remote controlled, or it was an animatronic. And while that looked OK, it's definitely not as impressive as was seen in the first 5 "Puppet Master" movies. And I totally understand that I shouldn't be comparing special effects from almost 20 years ago to effects that were made in 2012, but it's something that I think is definitely the most disappointing thing about this movie. Now, who knows? Maybe the effects will get better in "Puppet Master: Axis Termination", but I'm not gonna hold my breath there. Anyway, the effects here are definitely disappointing. But I will say that it's not as shit as it was in "Curse of the Puppet Master", where most of that movie reused stock footage from the first movie out of desperation. But again, I'm probably just comparing apples to oranges, so I'll try to move on from there.

Camerawork here is really good. The lighting here is also lit fine. The sound-mix here is also pretty good, too. There's not I can say about the music, aside from one thing. There's a scene in this movie where the puppets open a music box at Danny's home, and the song that's playing is the "Puppet Master" theme song. Which I thought was pretty cool. And if Full Moon ever wanted to, they could release these kinds of music boxes on their website for sale, and I would totally buy it for a reasonable price. I don't know if they ever did that, but if not, then that's really a missed opportunity, because that music box would definitely sell well in my opinion. However, I'm getting a bit off track here. The music here is fine, with the minor bonus of that music box playing the theme song.

So ultimately, guys, when everything is said and done, am I able to recommend "Puppet Master X: Axis Rising"? If you watched "Puppet Master: Axis of Evil" first, and you really enjoyed that, then go for it. I would say, at least for me anyway, that these movies are pretty good. In fact, I should mention that the first two Axis movies are both free on Full Moon's official YouTube channel. So if you got any time on your hands, and you want to check these movies out for yourselves, go right ahead and check them out. I'll even put a link to both of these movies at the top of this description for you guys to check out. And if you liked both movies enough, then go ahead and buy physical copies of them, be it on DVD or Blu-ray. I think you would definitely find something to like here. However...I would say, personally speaking, that you should go watch the first 5 "Puppet Master" movies first, because I think those are mostly better, at least when it comes to the special effects anyway. And if you really have to, then I guess, MAYBE, you could go and watch the 6th and 7th movies, though I personally think they both suck. I'm not recommending the 8th movie, because it's just a clip show. But anyway, guys, check these movies for yourselves if you are a horror movie fan. And who knows? Maybe you'll really end up liking the 6th and 7th movies, but I can't guarantee that. And as for myself, I think that, despite some obvious flaws, this was a really good way to celebrate 150 episodes of a series that I'm, somehow, still doing. And I can't wait till I get to episode 200, since I already know what I want to watch for episode 200. But in the meantime, I think I'm gonna go and marathon a couple of the "Puppet Master" movies right now, since I just finished talking about them.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of the 150th episode of Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.