Editorials
‘Species II’ Is a Sleazy, Gory, Nutty Creature Feature Masterpiece [We Love ’90s Horror]
The ‘90s often get a bad rap with horror fans. After the numerous successful slashers and creature effects films of the ’80s, the ‘90s offered a different variety of horror fare. Though there were plenty of hits, hidden gems, and misunderstood classics, the ‘90s usually don’t get the kind of love that other decades get when it comes to horror. It’s time to change that.
Recently, I discussed the original Species on my podcast GenreVision and we mentioned how much we love the sequel, Species II. This led me to revisit the 1998 follow-up and compelled me to shift my intended lineup for this column.
Because Species II isn’t just a fun movie. It’s a film that is in dire need of rehabilitation.
Directed by Peter Medak (The Changeling), Species II is not some cheapy made-for-TV quality sequel. With an estimated production budget of $35 million, Species II ran with the overwhelming success of its predecessor and went all out on what it thought audiences liked about the original. And what did Species II think viewers wanted?
Sleaziness and over-the-top effects.
The original Species had an aura of salaciousness surrounding it thanks to its marketing and overall premise – a human/alien hybrid is trying to have sex in order to reproduce – but the finished film isn’t nearly as smutty as its reputation would lead you to believe. That ain’t the case with Species II. This flick is even filthier than you expect!
One of the first big effects scenes is centered around a sex scene involving sisters. Our antagonist goes to a motel that’s specifically for hooking up with prostitutes. A character is killed by what can only be described as an alien penis tentacle. If tawdry and vulgar elements are what you want, Species II delivers in spades.
However, that’s not the category that deserves the most acclaim. Steve Johnson’s FX company returned for the sequel and essentially had free reign over which effects they wanted to do as practical gags. Thanks to this, Species II is a relentless assault of gooptastic creature effects.
Let’s run down just some of the practical effects you’ll see in Species II:
- Alien baby head bursting out of a pregnant woman’s stomach
- Blood tentacle ripping out a doctor’s guts
- 15-foot tendril erupting from a stomach and suffocating a man
- Incredible head explosion from a shotgun blast
- James Cromwell impaled by a tentacle that exits through his throat
- A barn full of pulsing cocoons
- Two Giger-esque aliens that end up having strobe light cocoon sex
- Giant bipedal monster who can split its head in two
- Nipple tentacle
While that list isn’t everything in the movie, it’s a good indicator of how wild a film Species II is as a creature extravaganza. If you’re a fan of gonzo effects and monster madness, you need to give this movie a look.
Still, it’s understandable that some folks might not click with the base pleasures of Species II. If so, I urge them to look at what the story is about. The main villain, Patrick, is a heroic astronaut and son of a senator, Judson Ross. After becoming infected with alien DNA after the first manned mission to Mars, he returns to Earth and begins having sex with pretty much any woman he wants. His father tells him that he doesn’t care about Patrick’s indiscretions as long as he doesn’t let it affect Patrick’s career trajectory, which his father hopes will be the President of the United States. When this scene takes place in Judson’s office, we can see two portraits mounted on the wall in the background. The men in those portraits? John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton.
Species II is talking about how the sordid secrets of men in power are excused or covered up, and this is often at the cost of the integrity of women. Species II isn’t as vapid as its surface would seem. The opening credits feature a spaceship branded with logos from Pepsi, Reebok, Sprint, and Miller Lite. It isn’t subtle commentary but it does prove the movie has more on its mind than just being trashy fun.
It should be noted that very few actors from Species II have anything nice to say about the movie. Michael Madsen returned for the sequel and infamously called it, “a crock of shit.” You can tell that Madsen is less than enthused in the film, but that’s a shame considering the rest of the cast seems game for this bit of drive-in entertainment. Mykelti Williamson takes what is easily a stereotypical characterization for a black role and somehow manages to slay the part. Every time he’s on-screen and being made to say some facepalm-inducing lines, he spins it into comedy gold and totally endears us to his character. James Cromwell can’t help but be magnetic and professional, and he acts as something of a sub-villain by refusing to do what’s right in order to help his son. As Patrick, Justin Lazard can come off as unintentionally comedic at times – his line reading after he’s asked what it was like to walk on Mars is undeniably clunky in the best of ways – but he has a Christian Bale iciness to him that suits the character well. We also get an appearance from Peter Boyle as an institutionalized kook who has all the answers. Any movie with Peter Boyle can’t be all bad. And George Dzunda is a colonel who looks like he stepped out of a Saturday morning cartoon. Bless.
But, the most interesting performances and story come from the lead women, Dr. Laura Baker (Marg Helgenberger) and Eve (Natasha Henstridge), the new clone of Sil from the first movie. Eve is being experimented on to find vulnerabilities in the alien species, and it’s clear that Dr. Baker is trying her best to accomplish this while also caring for Eve. There’s so much to this dynamic that works and that’s due to genuinely solid performances from Helgenberger and Henstridge. There are also really cool sci-fi ideas present in their story thread like a military laboratory that has to be staffed entirely by women in order to decrease Eve’s mating instinct. That is a movie all on its own! And Eve fulfills a much more sympathetic arc than Sil did in the original. While I wish we spent more time with Eve and Dr. Baker, what’s in the movie works.
In all honesty, I can’t conceive of someone not enjoying the master level trashiness of Species II. It’s one of the sleaziest, nastiest, goriest, nuttiest studio sci-fi/horror movies ever made. The audacity on display in this mainstream marketed feature film is beyond impressive. We will never see this kind of movie get released by a major studio ever again. It’s a pageantry of practical effects, its pulpy approach to obscenity is so out of fashion that it reaches ridiculous heights, and it’s a clear love letter to bold sci-fi/horror creature features.
It’s time to grade Species II on its own B-movie merits, and from my perspective, it receives a resounding A+.
Due to a complex series of anthropological mishaps, the Wayans Brothers are a huge deal in Brazil. Around these parts, White Chicks is considered a national treasure by a lot of people, so it stands to reason that Brazilian audiences would continue to accompany the Wayans’ comedic output long after North America had stopped taking them seriously as comedic titans.
This is the only reason why I originally watched Michael Tiddes and Marlon Wayans’ 2013 horror spoof A Haunted House – appropriately known as “Paranormal Inactivity” in South America – despite having abandoned this kind of movie shortly after the excellent Scary Movie 3. However, to my complete and utter amazement, I found myself mostly enjoying this unhinged parody of Found Footage films almost as much as the iconic spoofs that spear-headed the genre during the 2000s. And with Paramount having recently announced a reboot of the Scary Movie franchise, I think this is the perfect time to revisit the divisive humor of A Haunted House and maybe figure out why this kind of film hasn’t been popular in a long time.
Before we had memes and internet personalities to make fun of movie tropes for free on the internet, parody movies had been entertaining audiences with meta-humor since the very dawn of cinema. And since the genre attracted large audiences without the need for a serious budget, it made sense for studios to encourage parodies of their own productions – which is precisely what happened with Miramax when they commissioned a parody of the Scream franchise, the original Scary Movie.
The unprecedented success of the spoof (especially overseas) led to a series of sequels, spin-offs and rip-offs that came along throughout the 2000s. While some of these were still quite funny (I have a soft spot for 2008’s Superhero Movie), they ended up flooding the market much like the Guitar Hero games that plagued video game stores during that same timeframe.
You could really confuse someone by editing this scene into Paranormal Activity.
Of course, that didn’t stop Tiddes and Marlon Wayans from wanting to make another spoof meant to lampoon a sub-genre that had been mostly overlooked by the Scary Movie series – namely the second wave of Found Footage films inspired by Paranormal Activity. Wayans actually had an easier time than usual funding the picture due to the project’s Found Footage presentation, with the format allowing for a lower budget without compromising box office appeal.
In the finished film, we’re presented with supposedly real footage recovered from the home of Malcom Johnson (Wayans). The recordings themselves depict a series of unexplainable events that begin to plague his home when Kisha Davis (Essence Atkins) decides to move in, with the couple slowly realizing that the difficulties of a shared life are no match for demonic shenanigans.
In practice, this means that viewers are subjected to a series of familiar scares subverted by wacky hijinks, with the flick featuring everything from a humorous recreation of the iconic fan-camera from Paranormal Activity 3 to bizarre dance numbers replacing Katy’s late-night trances from Oren Peli’s original movie.
Your enjoyment of these antics will obviously depend on how accepting you are of Wayans’ patented brand of crass comedy. From advanced potty humor to some exaggerated racial commentary – including a clever moment where Malcom actually attempts to move out of the titular haunted house because he’s not white enough to deal with the haunting – it’s not all that surprising that the flick wound up with a 10% rating on Rotten Tomatoes despite making a killing at the box office.
However, while this isn’t my preferred kind of humor, I think the inherent limitations of Found Footage ended up curtailing the usual excesses present in this kind of parody, with the filmmakers being forced to focus on character-based comedy and a smaller scale story. This is why I mostly appreciate the love-hate rapport between Kisha and Malcom even if it wouldn’t translate to a healthy relationship in real life.
Of course, the jokes themselves can also be pretty entertaining on their own, with cartoony gags like the ghost getting high with the protagonists (complete with smoke-filled invisible lungs) and a series of silly The Exorcist homages towards the end of the movie. The major issue here is that these legitimately funny and genre-specific jokes are often accompanied by repetitive attempts at low-brow humor that you could find in any other cheap comedy.
Not a good idea.
Not only are some of these painfully drawn out “jokes” incredibly unfunny, but they can also be remarkably offensive in some cases. There are some pretty insensitive allusions to sexual assault here, as well as a collection of secondary characters defined by negative racial stereotypes (even though I chuckled heartily when the Latina maid was revealed to have been faking her poor English the entire time).
Cinephiles often claim that increasingly sloppy writing led to audiences giving up on spoof movies, but the fact is that many of the more beloved examples of the genre contain some of the same issues as later films like A Haunted House – it’s just that we as an audience have (mostly) grown up and are now demanding more from our comedy. However, this isn’t the case everywhere, as – much like the Elves from Lord of the Rings – spoof movies never really died, they simply diminished.
A Haunted House made so much money that they immediately started working on a second one that released the following year (to even worse reviews), and the same team would later collaborate once again on yet another spoof, 50 Shades of Black. This kind of film clearly still exists and still makes a lot of money (especially here in Brazil), they just don’t have the same cultural impact that they used to in a pre-social-media-humor world.
At the end of the day, A Haunted House is no comedic masterpiece, failing to live up to the laugh-out-loud thrills of films like Scary Movie 3, but it’s also not the trainwreck that most critics made it out to be back in 2013. Comedy is extremely subjective, and while the raunchy humor behind this flick definitely isn’t for everyone, I still think that this satirical romp is mostly harmless fun that might entertain Found Footage fans that don’t take themselves too seriously.
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