Critters 2: The Main Course (1988)
When the first Critters film did well in the box office, making 6 1/2 times its budget, a sequel was planned pretty quickly. Sadly, there is not much info out there on the making of this series, so there's not much I can say. The budget this time would be over twice as much as that of the first film, coming in over $4 million. This meant that more money could be spent on special effects. However, the well-known actors from the first film are mostly gone. Only 4 actors from the first movie return for this one. The boy from the first film is back, a little older now being a young teenager. The space bounty hunter Ug, using his hair metal look from the first film is back as well as Charlie, the town oddball who joined the bounty hunters at the end of the first film. Oh, and Lin Shaye is back as the town gossip/secretary.
So somewhere between the first film and this one Brad, the redheaded main character from the first film, has moved out of town. It seems the town didn't like being known for man-eating aliens and sort of threw his family out of town. (They voted out the sheriff too.) Well, now he's coming back to town to visit his grandmother. About time he gets back the town the Crite (critters) eggs secretly laid by the ones from the first film, are about to hatch. Meanwhile, Charlie and Ug, just coming back to their ship from some bounty hunting, get an assignment to go back to earth because it's been learned that the Crites weren't fully eradicated two years ago. All this happens during Easter break (guess I picked the right time to watch this one), and of course the Crite eggs are found and painted like Easter eggs to use for the church Easter egg hunt. And just as Easter Sunday services are going on, the Crites hatch and kill the guy dressed as the Easter bunny. (Somehow he manages to fly through the church window dead, scaring the congregation pretty badly.) It doesn't take long for the Crites to spread around town creating mayhem. They kill people, animals, and... well they basically try to eat everything in their paths.
Even though the first film didn't take itself very seriously, this one is even more of a comedy. Things happen like a Crite deciding to bite into a truck tire. When it does that, his body inflates to epic proportions. (He is still attached to the tire when the truck drives off, squishing the poor Crite.) A Crite gets the hair on the top of its head shot off. It looks in a mirror and says "bitchin!" in it's own language, which is of course translated for us all to see. If the first movie was a lot like Gremlins, this one is more like Gremlins 2: The New Batch, which wouldn't come out for another two years, actually. There's even a Freddy Kreuger joke in this one. Don't start watching this expecting any scares or mystery. This is a fun comedy with a bit of gore and nudity thrown in. Speaking of nudity, one of the bounty hunters (the one who in the first film didn't transform into anyone) chooses to transform into a Playboy centerfold here. Complete with bare breasts at first. After the first scene she's covered up, but still, pretty daring for a PG-13 film. The gore, too, is surprising for such a film. I guess it was decided the gore was so fake-looking and in good humor that it wasn't really that offensive. There's also the fact that the PG-13 rating in the 1980s was still finding its footing. Heck, even PG films back in 1988 would allow the F word once or twice and non-sexual nudity, both of which would give you an R right away now. (Ratings creep, my ass!)
I must say, the special effects here are just okay. One of the main effects in this one is all the Crites getting together to form a big ball and rolling and eating at the same time. (Getting it to go, as it were.) You can always see the wire that's pulling the big fluffball. And even when rolling as just one Crite, you can tell these were simply rolled or thrown where they need to be. Still, if you can overlook such things like I can, you should have fun watching this. Most fans of the series consider this film to be the best of the bunch. I'm not sure I agree so far. I find it equal with the first film, but they are quite different. This one is set mostly during the day with the not-so-great special effects shown bare. It's a full-out comedy. And the direction isn't as good. Mick Garris directed this, and I've never been much of a fan of his. He's mostly known for directing Stephen King miniseries adaptations like The Stand (which I did like), The Shining (really boring and doesn't hold a candle to the Kubrick film), Desperation, and Bag of Bones. This was his first theatrical film. In fact, he only had directed an episode of Amazing Stories before this. The point is, he's an old-fashioned TV director. He's there to keep things on budget, to be done in a short amount of time, and that's about it. He doesn't have a great eye for camera angles, character direction, or anything to make the movie stand out. And for some reason, someone thought Eddie Deezen should be in this movie. You know, the geek from Grease and Wargames. He plays the manager of a restaurant called The Hungry Heifer. And one of the bounty hunters turns into him for a few minutes. I don't know why he was needed here, or for any other movie for that matter. (Okay, maybe Laserblast just for the MST3K jokes.)
Sadly, the movie didn't even make back its budget in theaters. It made just over $3 million dollars, making 2/3 of that its opening weekend. The movie wasn't liked by critics, but as I said earlier, a lot of people like this better than the first film. Siskel and Ebert obviously didn't agree, but I can empathize with Ebert's reasons for his thumbs down. His main problem is the quality of the effects and Garris's direction as well. But don't let that make you think I didn't like the film. I thoroughly enjoyed it as much as I did the first film, which was a great deal. Both films have faults. They aren't Alien or Gremlins, but I do think they are just as much fun as Gremlins... Yeah, they don't even touch Alien.
However, even though the movie lost money, two straight-to-video sequels were made just 3 years later...
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