ALIEN NATION (1988)

Buddy cop movies were all the rage in the 1980’s.  Back in 1988, the police couldn’t even throw an innocent minority (then plant drugs on them and falsely accuse them of a crime) without hitting an aspiring screenwriter trying to come up with a fresh take on the already over-saturated genre. At the same time, alien films are always popular, so, it’s not surprising that somebody decided to mash-up the two genres. Unfortunately, that endlessly promising mash-up idea ended up being the tremendously average ALIEN NATION.

The story, two LAPD homicide detectives (one alien, one human) conducting a murder investigation, has potential to be interesting, but it's not.  Not even close.  First off, the murder itself isn't very intriguing: the victim was shot to death during a botched convenience store robbery.  Yawn.  Secondly, there's very little backstory about the aliens or their technology: they were originally slave laborers on their home planet, they escaped and landed on Earth three years ago.  So, has mankind used the technology found on that spaceship to advance our own technology in the last three years?  Damn sure doesn't look like it.  Is the home planet still there?  Is there anybody hunting these migrants?  Thirdly, the aliens are boring!  They literally look just like humans except with a spotty bald head.  They act like humans, dress like humans, do all kinds of normal human stuff.  I mean the only real differences are they like different foods, their organs are arranged differently and they hate salt water because it is like an acid and will melt them.  Which brings us to the next subject...the big reveal is if the aliens take this certain alien drug it will give them above average strength to the point they have to be shot like 15 times to die.  Okay whatever, but they are still susceptible to salt water, so why not just fight the roided out aliens with salt water guns in addition to high-powered automatic rifles?  It's not like the drug turns them bulletproof or something!  I don't know, maybe I'm just overthinking the entire thing because I was so goddamn bored.

Average acting, unimaginative story, underutilized Los Angeles setting, boring action scenes, lame chase scene, hammy dialogue, zero nudity, zero blood, zero gore, heavy-handed message that goes nowhere, disappointing ending.  As far as eunuchly amazeballs buddy cop / immigration allegory films go, ALIEN NATION is a solid 5/10.  It's just entertaining enough to keep you watching the entire film and just disappointing enough that once the movie is over, you wish you had taken a power nap instead.  Skip it.

If you need me, I'll be in my room writing a fan fiction story about Dirty Harry being teamed up with Willie from V and Willie doing Freddy Krueger cosplay on the weekends.

Part 2 - Alien Nation: Dark Horizon (1994)
Part 3 - Alien Nation: Body and Soul (1995)
Part 4 - Alien Nation: Millennium (1996)
Part 5 - Alien Nation: The Enemy Within (1996)
Part 6 - Alien Nation: The Udara Legacy (1997)

SPIRAL: FROM THE BOOK OF SAW (2021)

'ello, guvna. After cranking these fuckers out one installment per year between 2004 and 2010, the makers of the Saw franchise took a break before returning with the fresh, silly and exciting JIGSAW in 2017. Unfortunately, something stinky this way comes and shit all over the bed because this next Saw installment isn’t very good.  Which is disappointing, cause the posters looked promising in a True Detective, season 1 kind of way.

Anyway, the story, set in an unnamed metropolitan area that looks a lot like Toronto, is about a homicide detective, Chris Rock, who is on the trail of a Jigsaw copycat.  Meow.  Rock's style of investigation appears to be yelling a lot, letting people borrow his phone and scrunching up his face like he just walked into the fart cloud of somebody who eats a lot of plant-based meat covered in Tiger Sauce.  Stuff happens and I found myself straight-up not giving a shit.  Slow pace, overly complicated story, ugly photography, uninspired acting, boring kills, unscary killer and worst off: SPIRAL didn't feel like it had any kind of real connection to the actual Saw Universe.  The whole thing felt like a poorly written fan fiction.

And speaking of poorly written fan fiction...

Jigsaw "Grrr."-d to himself as his latest intended victim escaped from yet another game!  This is the fifth trap this guy has escaped from.  And then, once he's free, he just stands there talking about boxes of chocolate.  I should have never kidnapped this guy.  Looking into the dingy B&W video monitor, Jigsaw presses the speaker button to communicate with his victim.  "Why did you solve that puzzle so quickly, Gump?"  "You told me to, Jigsaw!"  Jigsaw lets go of the button and slams his head down onto his desk.

Part 1 - Saw (2004)
Part 2 - Saw II (2005)
Part 3 - Saw III (2006)
Part 4 - Saw IV (2007)
Part 5 - Saw V (2008)
Part 6 - Saw VI (2009)
Part 7 - Saw 3D (2010)
Part 8 - Jigsaw (2017)
Part 10 - Saw X (2023)