BIGFOOT VS. MEGALODON (2021)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous* 
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

The "Bigfoot in Space" was only two installments old when the writer-director managed to produce what might be the worst in the series.

True, BVM is just more plotless blather with explicit sexual language added. But this time, BC Fourteen introduces the mutated shark Megalodon, and even troubles to give him an origin of sorts-- but does not actually trouble to produce a face-off, much less a battle, between the two monsters. Possibly I'll see one in BVM 2, though that didn't get foisted upon the streaming public until 2023. Once again, only some vague space-battles make this a combative movie.

The next installment for 2021 took Bigfoot down a Yuletide pathway, BIGFOOT VS. KRAMPUS. If I'm lucky, maybe Krampus will not be capable of speech, and I'll be spared more of Fourteen's rotten dialogue.    

BIGFOOT VS. THE ILLUMINATI (2020)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous* 
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

Given that this film shares the same date as TRUMP VS THE ILLUMINATI, the creator probably never meant to follow up his lame "satire" directly. Thus BIGFOOT VS THE ILLUMINATI stands as a soft reboot of the other film, with no references to the Trump-Clone or his climactic confrontation with Lucifer. All of the other regular characters are in place: Van Helsing (now said to be the clone of a Jack Van Helsing, who as far as I know never appeared anywhere), his suit-clad paramour Kali, the Allies, the Illuminati (whose foot soldiers are now called "Archons"), and the occultist Aleister Crowley, who's been incarnated in the body of a Bad Grey alien. Bigfoot appeared briefly in TRUMP but did almost nothing, so that may have been the director monetizing the animation-work he did in advance of this flick. BVTI may also be the first appearance of "Xterminator," who gets his own feature in 2023, and his appearance in the same film as Bigfoot makes the movie a very minor monster mashup.

This time, Van Helsing goes looking for Bigfoot to help out against the Illuminati, going on the memory that the real VH was acquainted with the hairy monster as a buddy. Their meeting is complicated by the fact that VH is a clone, but Bigfoot eventually gets over his reluctance and joins the space-war effort. Fourteen's sloppy script more or less implies that Bigfoot is a thousands-years-old survivor of the devastated Earth, but how he came to live in the galactic empire is never related. Bigfoot talks tough and uses lots of foul language, but he does very little and most of the combative action here is just spaceships, fighting with the most minor CGI-FX.

Once again, it's a lot of plotless jibber-jabber with a few esoteric references to Crowley's occultism thrown in for no good reason. Oh, and there's also no explanation as to whether Kali's ship-physician "Doctor Jekyll" has anything to do with the original Victorian experimenter. As I work my way through this sludge, I think an explanation is unlikely to appear, so if anyone's a crossover-icon here. Jekyll's probably not one.  

  

TRUMP VS. THE ILLUMINATI (2020)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous* 
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

I've reviewed a couple of the low-budget, made-for-streaming cartoon movies made by writer/director BC Fourteen, and both were pretty dull. I have to assume that Fourteen, whose career is dominantly in CGI animation, keeps getting work because streaming services are willing to buy kilotons of animated flicks. This would make sense if all of Fourteen's movies were designed to keep the kiddies entertained. Instead, the guy has a whole science-fiction series which uses foul language, meaning that someone thinks there are consumers, adolescent or older, who might be beguiled by such films. I doubt that most streaming-consumers are even aware of Fourteen's efforts, and the only reason I decided to explore them further is because I'm deeply into both (a) crossovers and (b) monster-mashes.

TRUMP VS. THE ILLUMINATI seems to be the first of Fourteen's SF-series, also involving such featured characters as Bigfoot, Xterminator, and Jack Van Helsing, a clone of the descendant of the DRACULA slayer, appearing here three years before he gets his own film. In the time of the historical Donald Trump, Earth is wiped by aliens called "Illuminati," who look like the popular image of alien abductors, "The Greys." However, the Chinese clone Trump, and Clone-Trump escapes Earth before it's destroyed. He lands on Mars and lives there, with another lost astronaut, for a thousand years.

At the end of that millennium, the Illuminati face opposition from another band of aliens, called the Allies, who somehow form the idea that only Clone-Trump can destroy the Illuminati, and their devilish master Lucifer. To that end, the Allies' queen Varuna (named for a male Hindu god and claiming to be an "Atlantean") journeys to Mars. Clone-Trump refuses her invitation to battle her enemies, but then Illuminati foot-soldiers, aware of a prediction that the reborn 45th President can destroy them, also show up on Clone-Trump's doorstep. Surprisingly he beats them up, and when reinforcements arrive, Varuna teleports the clone into her ship, where he reluctantly agrees to join them.

Varuna's subordinate Princess Kali may be the one who gathered at least two other clones of Earth-entities: Doctor Jekyll and Bigfoot. Fourteen devotes no time to explaining either one, though he would later use Bigfoot in half a dozen other similar productions. Van Helsing, though, is the only clone with whom Kali is sleeping. Kali may not be a Grey, since she and Van Helsing, like Clone-Trump, are never seen outside of a heavy spacesuit-- which suggests that the director knew his CGI couldn't make credible human beings. Yet another historical figure is apparently reincarnated as a Grey: the 20th-century occultist Aleister Crowley, who communes with the Egyptian god Anubis but serves the unseen Illuminati lord Lucifer.

All of this folderol does align BC Fourteen with other bad-movie makers, such as Ed Wood and Jerry Warren with respect to erratically raiding history and pop culture to buttress their grab-bag universes. Fourteen's version of Donald Trump is as stupidly executed as all his other borrowings, with all the usual Liberal triggers included, so it seems a given that he only used Trump's name as a means of getting attention. From what I can tell, this was Clone-Trump's only appearance in the Fourteen-verse, and most of the installments that followed would focus upon his not-much-less-stupid iteration of Bigfoot. FWIW, I judge Clone-Trump to fit the persona of "monster," since in his confrontation with Lucifer, he's more of an unleashed force of nature than a hero.              

SWAMP THING (1991)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous* 
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological*

By 1991, both Alan Moore and Rick Veitch (and artist collaborators) had turned the SWAMP THING into an opus dedicated to metaphysical and psychological speculations. But as far as other media were concerned, there'd never been any Swamp Thing but the two live-action movies, loosely based upon the original 1970s comic series. 

The 1990 live-action teleseries, budget-restricted though it was, at least stayed in tune with the dramatic feel of the first movie. This cartoon series-- consisting of just five "tryout" episodes-- sometimes resembles the overtly comedic RETURN OF SWAMP THING, but without enough jokes for the cartoon to register as a comedy. So I have to deem the 1991 show an "adventure" series, since the emphasis is on turning plant-mutated scientist Alec Holland into a swamp-dwelling crusader, complete with a bunch of crime-fighting gadgets (some of which certainly must have made it into the SWAMP THING toy line).

This swamp-hero also has a small coterie of friends: a couple of kids, a young woman named Abigail (with no romantic angle attached), and two diverse but still bland adult action-guys, Tomahawk (Native American) and Bayou Jack (Black). I think the animators could have switched the dialogue-tracks for the two guys and no one would have noticed any difference. Since the two movies featured mad scientist Arcane as the Thing's only opponent, he appears in all five episodes as Swampy's regular enemy, complete with a gang of mutated henchmen, one of whom is named "Weedkiller." The voice-actor for Arcane gets the short serial's one good line: observing the fall of a radioactive satellite into the swamp, Arcane says, "I love radiation-- it's so INTENSE."

          

SPY KIDS: ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD (2011)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous* 
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *sociological*

Robert Rodriguez's attempt to reboot the SPY KIDS franchise eight years later was not a box-office success, but it's the only one I mildly liked. It's not something I would have watched again except for purposes of review, but it does exemplify what I said in the previous SK review: that the writer-director finally did learn the difference between "stupid-wacky" and "clever-wacky."

The opening setup for SK4 alone is far more inventive than anything in the other films, suggesting to me that Rodriguez managed to improve his talent for the absurd in movies like ONCE UPON A TIME IN MEXICO and the first SIN CITY movie. This time the mother of the eponymous kids-- specifically, "step-kids"-- gets equal time, as embodied by lady spy Marissa (Jessica Alba, reunited with the director after both SIN CITY and MACHETE). Marissa is the hitherto-unmentioned sister of Gregorio Cortez, and thus the aunt of Carmen and Juni (who both make minor crossover appearances to support the new franchise). And this time Marissa keeps her spy-dentity secret from both her husband (Joel McHale) and Rebecca and Cecil, his kids by his first (and deceased) wife. Marissa is first seen capturing a super-villain named "Tick Tock" even though she has to endure labor pains while driving a super-fast car and battling henchmen.

A year later, Marissa has stepped down from her duties in order to raise her toddler, as well as trying, not successfully, to bond with her stepchildren. Her hubby, just to add to the faux-irony, is a TV "spy-hunter," who of course has no idea he lives with a secret agent woman. Then time begins to run backward, albeit in slow increments. A new villain, The Timekeeper, has unleashed a secret doomsday weapon, though the genesis of the time-stopping device is muddled at best.  

The Timekeeper's forces attack Marissa's house for some doodad, and this provides the justification for Cecil and Rebecca to learn that they are "step-spy-kids." After various twists and turns, it's up to Marissa, her three kids and the original (now twenty-something) heroes to foil the Timekeeper. Oh, and they have a robot dog voiced by Ricky Gervais, and yes, Rodriguez works in another cameo for Danny Trejo. The director's design sense is no better than it ever was, and the two new kids are no better or worse than the originals. But both the humor and the pacing is better overall. Alexa Vega gets to fight in one scene, but Alba has more presence in her two scenes. The Timekeeper has a better than average motive for his destructive actions. though calling him the best villain in the series is faint praise.          

SPY KIDS 3D: GAME OVER (2003)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous* 
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *sociological*

Robert Rodriguez meant this to be the final flick in the SPY KIDS series. I said before that he must have known he couldn't keep the franchise going as the two main actors aged out of their roles, but what he cobbled together for his finale was even less compelling than the first two films in the series.

I have dim memories of having seen part of this movie in a theater, sans 3D glasses-- and since I can't believe I would have paid even Dollar Movie prices to see this, I must have "theater-jumped," possibly to see what Sly Stallone was doing in a particularly- insipid kiddie flick. I mention this to say that I did not experience the movie's 3D effects, though I've read that they were not well-regarded.

This time Rodriguez discards all attempts to ground things even in "superspy reality." A super-villain named the Toymaker (Stallone) has been incarcerated in the real world, possibly thanks to the efforts of Valentin (Ricardo Montalban), grandfather of Carmen and Juni. But the evildoer has constructed a virtual game that has some capacity to take over everyone's 's minds, so the OSS sent Carmen Cortez's virtual self into the game to investigate. Carmen disappears, so the OSS appeals to her brother Juni-- who left the agency for contrived reasons-- to come back and find his sister, and to save the planet. After a handful of VR adventures, VR-Juni gets a lifeline to the real world for one assistant, and he calls up Valentin-- who, though wheelchair-bound in the real world, can become a virtual superhero in cyberspace. Then Juni and Valentin have various adventures, find Carmen halfway through the movie, and Valentin confronts the Toymaker. who is responsible for Valentin losing his legs. Will Grandpa take bloody vengeance upon the Toymaker? Yeah, rhetorical question.

The difficulty of all three of the original three movies is that Rodriguez thinks he's being "clever-wacky" when he's really being "stupid-wacky," and plainly he didn't know the difference. Since he made his film debut in 1992, he'd never done a full-fledged comedy, and his lack of ability to script a good one shows. He also was overly indulgent to performers he liked. While Stallone was nominated for a Razzie due to his mugging performance, actors like Sabara and Montalban were worse, delivering their dopey dialogue with no charm whatever. Gugino, Banderas, Marin and Trejo are barely in the movie. But at least Rodriguez could justify bringing them into the chaos, whereas it's obvious he just included other characters from the first two films because he liked them and/or the actors.

However, something good (in the view of this not-kid viewer) finally came of this tedious, cringe-worthy franchise-- as I'll address in the next review.  

    

SPY KIDS 2 (2002)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous* 
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *sociological*

Robert Rodriguez didn't let any grass grow under his feet once the first SPY KIDS made bank: the next one came out the next year. Apart from striking while the iron was hot, the producer/director/writer faced a certain limitation as to how long his central characters could fill the role as "kids." 

Plot-wise ISLAND OF LOST DREAMS is more of the same as #1, even to sending Carmen and Juni Cortez to an island full of weird things. (In interviews Rodriguez cited Harryhausen as an inspiration, but Roidriguez would have to work much harder to come close to Harryhausen's unique charm.) I did think the visuals looked more vivid than they did in the first film, particularly in an opening carnival scene, and I assumed the director had spent more money. Instead, cost-conscious Robert made ISLAND for the same money but reached out to startup effects-houses. This resulted in the carnival-ride "The Juggler," a completely improbable device that throws its riders (encased within compartments) into the air like juggling-balls. I'll at least remember that visual better than all the CGI monsters on the lost-dream island.

ISLAND moves faster thanks to having dispensed with the superficial setup of the first film, and goes the extra mile by claiming that, in the space of a year, Carmen and Juni so impressed the OSS that now the agency not only employs other spy kids but have also instituted a "Spy Kid of the Year" tradition. Though this is even sillier than the Juggler-ride, it gives the mediocre kid-heroes a pair of age-appropriate professional opponents, Gary and Gerti Giggles-- though I deduct points for using the name "Giggles" for characters who are not specifically humorous. Gerti (Emily Osment) is a pre-teen like Juni, while Gary (Matt O'Leary) is in the middle-teen range of Carmen, and becomes her first crush as well as a professional rival. When it comes out that the two rival spy-kids are implicated in the world-conquest plans of their father (Mike Judge in an underwritten villain-role), Carmen has one funny line: "I think I can change him" (the boy, not his dad). But as performers I still found Vega and Sabara charmless.

This time, Vega is the only "fighting female" in the house-- albeit only briefly-- because her mom and dad, as played by Gugino and Banderas, are stuck in a tedious side-story, where the mother's parents (Holland Taylor and Ricardo Montalban) tag along and interfere with the parents' efforts to rescue their kids. Rodriguez had already shown in the first movie his tendency to load the series with performers just because he liked them (Danny Trejo, Cheech Marin), and as memory serves, the third flick in the series gets even worse in that department.