Horror Bound Revisited: Screamers 2 - The Hunting
What the bloody hell did I just stumble into…? Well……
Screamers 2 (aka Screamers - The Hunting) is a science fiction/horror film that serves as the sequel to the Peter Weller cult classic Screamers which is about a planet where civil war has broken out between miners and scientists and yadda yadda, killer robot thingies are made that scream when they rip you to pieces. Well, that was part one. Part two introduces us to a group of soldiers from Earth who are there to evacuate any survivors before a massive…uh…space storm…(I honestly forget exactly what it’s called because they mentioned it like four times and I checked out after the second time they mention it…) that’s going to completely obliterate the planet and everything living on it. Including the screamers. Yeah. So…
The film was directed by Sheldon Winston and stars a wacky group of Canadian actors including Gina Holden, Stephen Amell (yes, Green Arrow from the CW…), Greg Bryk, Christopher Redman, and even had the guts to include a surprise appearance by Lance Henriksen (but don’t get too attached…he had like five minutes of screen time…)
So what did I really think about this movie? The first time out, when it was first released…direct to video…I hated it. I thought it was bland, boring, didn’t have the same appeal or charm or grit or amazing performances that the first film had. But, since I’m a completionist, I saw this on sale at Vudu and just had to purchase it. I finally sat down for a re-watch and man…was I wrong the first time. This movie, despite having an insanely stupid plot that makes zero sense logistically…which I’ll get into in a bit…and having some truly terrible acting and CGI…actually did have some really awesome gore effects thrown in. Like, kudos to the make-up department, because the gore and blood looked phenomenal. When a character gets “turned” into a screamer too? DAMN! Like, this is really the only reason you should see this movie. The gore effects are top notch to the point I wanted to see more people get torn apart by these screamers (I think I may need to seek professional help here…).
Aside from that, the plot was meh and logistically made zero sense. They have six days to get these people off the planet, waste one to check out a mine, then another to find the people, then another day to be accepted by the survivors, then another day to realize “oh, shit, our ship has no power, what to do?” then another day to trek to a station that MIGHT have a power supply…and I’m sitting here like “Isn’t time up already? Where’s this crazy storm…?” Anyway, that’s not why we’re watching this movie, so I can’t fault it too much.
The acting is what you’d expect from a low-budget direct to video film, which is to say it’s competent enough to keep your attention. Lance Henriksen as always is a treat to watch, Gina Holden carries the film as the hero quite well, and Stephen Amell…bro…I was expecting you to say “YOU HAVE FAILED THIS PLANET” or something at least a dozen times.
In the end, it’s a fun little movie you can have on when you’ve got nothing else to watch on a Saturday night. The gore effects are great and I thought the make-up for the half-human half-screamers looked pretty awesome. Check it out!
FINAL SCORE: 3/5
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