I feel like if we someone were to compile a list of franchises that saw their dying installments show up on Syfy, it would look like the weird body count of some cinematic serial killer that was offing struggling titles to put them out of their misery. OK, that may be a little harsh, especially considering that some of those franchises were hardly that frisky even when they were in their prime, but there’s still something both sad and fitting to watch the Species movies finally stop twitching on the infamous channel.
The first film was a spare no expense, erotic sci-fi chiller that saw an impressively starry cast square off against a horny alien and state of the art effects that gave a glossy sheen to its pulpy, trashy story; however, after a genuinely deranged sequel and an inevitable dip into direct to TV territory for the third-go-round, it was time for the Species flicks to go through its inevitable death throes in a grimy back alley in Mexico.
For a series obsessed with evolution and rebirth, behold as the Species films run headlong into its long overdue genetic cul-de-sac.
Miranda Hollander is a college professor who has some fairly impressive traits other than being a shapely blonde. For a start, she has the ability to “read” books just by touching them, but while she’s actually unaware of this ability, it turns out that there’s a great deal about herself that she’s blissfully unaware of, but she starts to get some idea when she’s suddenly found naked in the park one morning covered in creepy blue veins.
The answers lay with her uncle, Tom Hollander (no, not that one), a museum worker who has supposedly raised her after the death of her parents; but after she has a violent interlude in hospital that sees her transform into a monstrous creature with a shabby tongue and kill a bunch of people, the secrets behind her true origin soon come to light.
It seems that after getting his hands on some of that pesky alien DNA that seems easier to get hold of than Toblerone in Switzerland, Hollander and an old colleague, the decidedly amoral Forbes McGuire, screwed around with it and eventually created Miranda whom Tom eventually took and raised as his niece. The only recourse he has to cure Miranda is to go to Mexico, seek out McGuire and try to find a cure, but after crossing the border, he finds that his old buddy has been disturbingly busy.
While previous scientists used the alien DNA to try and unsuccessfully move our species forward (somehow), the skeevey McGuire has seemingly been doodling with it to create a half-alien fuck buddy named Azure and to make a living by creating facsimile pets for bereaved owners. Worse yet, his past experiments has also seen a bunch of random hybrids escape into the city to try and survive on their own despite a greatly truncated lifespan, so even if this sleazy Dr. Frankenputz can turn his libido off for five minutes to help Tom restore Miranda, the cure may end up being far worse than the disease.
So once again the Species franchise sinks even further into the mire of direct to TV ignominy, but considering that the series didn’t really seem to have that much self respect to begin with, I suppose it’s not that much of a surprise. However, despite the fact that these movies have finally hit rock bottom like a sex addict waking up in a strange bed on a Sunday morning with genital warts, there’s still a sense that the fourth installment of Species could have still done something cool with its rather basic premise. You see, while all the usual elements are in place (clothes shedding blonde; jobbing serious actor spouting science twaddle; occasional bursts of funky body horror; people getting killed a lot by tongues), there was the germ here to go absolutely nuts with this premise and deliver something along the lines of Bride Of Re-Animator but with H.R. Giger themed aliens instead.
The key here would have been Dominic Keating’s ludicrously amoral scientist who spends his time mincing around his lab, drawling in a thick Australian accent and fucking his nubile, alien creation like a Lovecraftian Russell Brand. Taken seriously, his character is a grotesquely silly joke that makes no logical sense, however, if director Nick Lyon had some of that crazy juice that 90s horror mentalist Brian Yunza was drinking back in the day, we could have gotten a gooey sci-fi blowout that could have genuinely impressed. As it stands, there is some genuinely strange shit going on here – for some reason, alien-with-benifits Azure feels the need to assassinate Tom when he first gets to Mexico by dressing up as a nun for reasons that are never explained; at one point one of Forbes’ escaped freaks also tries to kill Tom by sprouting a crocodile mouth despite apparently managing to hold down a job as a taxi driver; oh, and let’s not ignore the fact that movie containing numerous literal illegal aliens has just so happened to be set in Mexico – real subtle, fellas.
The cast seems split between attractive women who are unafraid to do nudity (hardly surprising) and characters actors who really should know better – but then considering that Ben Cross has shown up in cinema bypassing sequels such as Behind Enemy Lines II, Undisputed II and Jarhead II, maybe it was Chariots Of Fire that was actually the fluke… – however, while no one was expecting the science to enthrall and the horror to actually terrify, the franchise’s questionable brand of sleazy erotica seems weirdly tame considering one character cannot keep his dick in check and allows himself to fucked to death knowing full well it will kill him. Simply put, Natasha Henstridge may not have been Meryl Streep, but she was perfect for Sil and while Helena Mattsson certainly isn’t squeamish about nudity or body horror, she’s more playmate than predator.
With only thirty minutes to go of the film’s runtime, Species: The Awakening suddenly decides to abandon any original idea it may of had and sharply reverts back to type by having Miranda suddenly turn evil and try and get a potentially world ending bun in her oven as fast as she can. From here things then take predictable turn after predictable turn as the alien lead has another change of heart just in time to have an extraterrestrial cat fight to end things off. While the climactic brawl does feature better than average alien prosthetics (not a patch on Steve Johnson’s original animatronics, but there you go), it’s also sluggish as Hell, features shitty CGI and is essentially a ripoff of how the last film ended which just proves how strapped for ideas the series truly is.
While it’s usually rare for a modern franchise to ever truly die for good, it does seem like Species’ sex drive has experienced a bout of impotence that’s kept it off the dating scene for nearly twenty years. However, considering what the series left us with, Species not being able to get it up is probably a benefit for all mankind. The subtitle may say “The Awakening”, but the franchise has most definitely been put to sleep.
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