#30 - Starship Apocalypse

Christmas is coming, the geese are getting… Oh forget it, this isn’t a Christmas review… The next relatively unknown film we’re looking at is Starship Apocalypse.

OK, between this, Antboy and Dragon Evolution (coming soon) I’m not having a great winter. OK, this is a sequel film to another one I’ve never heard of, Starship Rising. Honestly, I was going to look at it when I discovered this but this was so terrible, I couldn’t be bothered to sit through another one just like it. Besides, a sequel should be accessible to those who haven’t watched its predecessor(s)

I did another tweet fest for this one, the highlights of which are shown below

Yes, I’ve blackened out my name on these, sue me

This series is the product of writer/director Neil Johnson, who filmed the entire series in 2012 on his soundstage (and boy does it show, but I’ll get to that later) They were shot in 4k resolution which would be good but I only have an HD TV and I’m watching in SD resolution because I’m using a DVD player via AV cables so I can tell what stage through the movie I am. So let's take a look anyway

We open on what I imagine is supposed to be our recap as John Worthy gives a speech to the audience after about 10 seconds of nothing. Man… this is awkward, this acting thing is kinda knew to him, huh, who is this guy? Darren Jacobs, he’s been in 3 movies including this and its predecessor. Oh boy, that’s the kind of movie we’re in for folks.

So after getting literally nothing from that scene we move to the next scene. 2 guys discuss robots. The guy in yellow has an artificial intelligence whilst the guy in black (who might be John) is kind of reserved. So, this person named the overseer instigated a genocide that sparked a war between man and machine or something. They want to stop the AI from evolving and becoming dominant or something…

We cut to 6 months later, because that scene taught us so much as the crew comes across the body of the guy in yellow. Goodbye whatever your name was! John gives us more awkward ‘exposition’ as we get our title. Also, there’s a Federation in this movie, sound familiar

I don’t even know much about Star Trek and I know that. So, he’s in their prototype vessel with bland chick, dead chick and bland swearing chick. Anyway, the guys are captured by a General Gustav or something but eventually rescues him or something… And brings him back to his ship. The Overseer is apparently returning with some weapon that can bring peace to the universe or something. I add ‘apparently’ or ‘or something’ because one of the big issues is I have no idea what’s happening in this movie, which means it’s going to be difficult to provide my usual plot synopsis (especially since, once again, I don’t have the aid of subtitles) but I’ll try my best

They know the Overseer was a guy who was infected by alien DNA and somehow that means he’s lived for 700 years. Now he’s found the anti-life equation (I know they don’t call it that, but they might as well). They’re heading back to the planet Terminus (the planet from Doctor Who) infecting every planet along the way.

We cut to another bland chick and Torgus played by a guy who only just started doing movies again after stopping in 2003. He’s large, ginger-ish and kinda reminds of me of Foggy from Daredevil. You know, the Daredevil with actual depth not the film. Oh and he hails from the outer-rim. I swear there’s no sci-fi thing this isn’t ripping off.

So, after John and General Gustav are giving contradicting orders because Gustav still thinks he’s in charge because… F*ck if I know. So they attack a space station as it sends out fighters to stop it. They call in to ask the fighters to surrender and they’re about to do so when re-enforcements arrive. John gives a speech about how they’re opposed to both sides. They destroy the station for some reason before warping out

We cut to Terminus where bland villain chick wonders how John managed to escape. Meanwhile the Overseer uses the anti-life equation on a world. Meanwhile, somewhere else there’s some attack going on following the liberation of a city, including the nuking of 13 cities. The General orders ships to cease fire, much to bland villain chick’s annoyance in the next scene. Oh and Torgus’ ship docks with another. Gustav is compromised and leaves with the city with another couple of bland chicks as the bland villain chick orders the city nuked.

Their ship is destroyed and they end up captured. Bland villain chick talks with the Overseer about how they caught the rebels, she wants a public trial whilst the Overseer just wants them dead knowing the anti-life equation will do its work, his test was successful. Torgus and bland chick arrive on the ship and are greeted by an AI. They want a star ship.

Meanwhile (I’m saying that a lot) Gustav, John and the 2 bland chicks. Gustav’s accomplice speaks with him. Apparently his birth is the result of a rape. Movie, you’re well out of your league discussing this subject, stop now! She plans to overthrow the Overseer. Before leaving. He provided absolutely nothing interest there.

So the capture 4 are taken to obviously fake CGI background to stand trial. Meanwhile Torgus and the bland searing chick are doing things, not sure why these things are important for use to see I don’t know. They see the footage of their trial. Use of words like slut, whore and c*nt… Again, out of your league, movie. They’re sentenced to death, apart from one bland chick who’s sentenced to become the next victim of the anti-life equation. (The overseer had sent her a sample)

So they expose bland chick to the virus as she brags but eventually succumbs to it, meanwhile the others are in transit to their execution but as they’re dropped into the inferno they find a cloaked ship ready to catch them, it’s the AIs ship. Erm, transport ship, do something, report it in, open fire, whatever it is you can do, do it. So the rape child (when they bother to give him a character, I’ll let you know, probably won’t need to though) and bland villain woman discover their escape and she’s not happy about it. She decides to have some fun with bland chick, making her slap herself and then kiss her foot before beating her, lesbian subtext, again movie, you’re leagues behind this stuff.

Meanwhile the Overseer effects another planet as John discovers the specs of the ship and of the AI, he allows John the use of his ship in the fight against the Overseer. So and as John and the bland swearing chick flirt and kiss. Bland villain chick isn’t all that pleased with her victim being so boring and isn’t impressed that the overseer wants to rule over people like this.

Meanwhile Torgus shows off an emp thing, a power sword and a staff to the bland chick. John is sent on a mission as his piloting skills are unnecessary on the craft. The victim bland chick sends out a fake distress message luring the others back with Torgus and the AI sent aboard. The AI knows he can monitor events on the ship wherever he is.

The Deliverance (the AI’s starship) encounters resistance but starts firing back from a cloaked position. OK, I can’t hold this in any longer, the effects in this movie are woeful. The green screening is atrocious, the CGI looks weird, often ridiculous and some of the weapon effects don’t match the weapon it supposedly fired. In this scene we hear John order “cloaked missiles” fired but the end result is a few blue shockwaves. Sure, this movie isn’t made on a high budget. But if you can’t include half-decent effects, don’t write a story that relies on them so much!

They find bland victim chick and rescue her, escaping the dark cloud thing, just barely and landing on Earth, a weapons manufacturing station thing… I don’t know nor do I car. In a clearly CG background (seriously, I’ve seen plays with more 3-dimensional looking backgrounds and we are supposed to know they have limited space)

On the planet Pol Maris, Torgus discovers some ancient sh*t, there’s a person there. The bland victim chick reports in to the bland villain chick, they’re creating an army to overthrow Terminus before the Overseer arrives. An inhabitant encounters Torgus and the AI, he easily defeats Torgus but the AI knocks him out in a single uncaring punch. Apparantly he was a clone soldier, his rabid-ness the result of the virus mutating, to the point where it has become unable to spread.

On Terminus, they see that the Deliverence needs recharging, so he attempts to lure the ships closer to the sun, he barely avoids the missile but recharges but General Gustav needs his support. They’ve landed somehow as Gustav and Bland Chick proceed on the ground as Bland victim chick betrays John and bland swearing chick. OK, can we have a woman with personality do something. The AI feels it and takes control of the ship, killing bland victim chick. John checks on Bland swearing chick to find that she is too is dead… Wait, WHAT?! She was on the cover of the DVD, she was so heavily promoted you’d think she was the main character but she’s not even with the main characters in the beginning and does jack for the plot before dying pointlessly.

Bland villain chick orders one of her bland chick officers to kill the Overseer. Meanwhile the AI finds some kind of tomb, Torgus is surprised that there’s a body in it, idiot. Meanwhile child of the rape stands there and walks off… That scene was pointless. The skull faced thing (another thing that’s on the cover of the DVD rises from the grave) child of the rape alerts the Overseer to him being his father. Meanwhile bland villain chick opens fire on the overseer, the overseer responds by blowing up their ship.

Gustav and the bland chick jump back to Earth where they share more of that incredibly awkward dialogue. Child of the rape takes off in a ship as the Overseer fires a double warhead at terminus. Child of the rape arrives on Earth to meet with Gustav. This is the last surviving stronghold and the overseer is heading their way. Meanwhile the AI reveals their history: they were once masters with human slaves, they created a virus when their slaves became rebellious. Torgus just kills him as the plot says that John arrives.

The overseer has called in re-enforcements on this planet. Gustav leads a resistance force against him. If anyone has a clue what the f*ck is going on in this battle, would you please not bother to tell me, I have a feeling I prefer blissful ignorance. The overseer fires more anti-life bombs as the Deliverance heads into battle. Gustav blows up the moon in an attempt to create some debris but that failed. Earth is f*cked in so many ways now, thanks for that. Earth is hit by the anti-life equation but because child of the rape is his son, he’s immune somehow.

Child of the rape comes aboard the ship as Torgus and John are given inoculations by the AI against the anti-life equation. With the shields lowered earlier so child of the rape could dock, John and Torgus easily board this ship. Man the lighting is awful. Torgus and John sabotage the ship’s coms with the intent of crashing the ship, but they’re discovered and captured by this robot that barely appears armed.

With the staff in his hand he wipes the floor with both of them, critically injuring Torgus’s ability to have kids, if you get my drift. John gets free from his shackles and with child of the rape’s help they wound the overseer. And with 15 minutes of the film still to go. So John drags Torgus back to the ship for yet more ‘he’s fat’ comic relief and he’s put in a healing chamber. The overseer is locked in an escape pod and launched into the sun. Meanwhile the AI works to destroy planets with the mutated virus and cure any planets with the pre-mutative virus, such as Earth.

He drops off John and Torgus, saying he’s destroyed any space travel abilities of the remains of the human race. He abandons them, hoping they’d avoid wars and ‘foolish religions’ *ahm* and refocus their efforts on other things. John is angered that everything was for nothing as the AI just leaves, what a dick. 5 years later a very much the same (aside from the hair) looking John is narrating to us about how they’ve somehow received contact from other worlds about robot armies enslaving them so they can’t turn to war. They received a summons from the AI who’s here to deliver the now alive bland swearing chick. The AI had healed her.

THIS MOVIE GIVES ME RAGE ISSUES!

Admittedly, this movie was better on this second viewing, the plot was more comprehensible

But the rest of this movie. Good grief. The character writing is bland, particularly of the women, the acting ranges from nothing special to atrocious, the special effects are abysmal, it touches on subjects it’s nowhere near clever enough to touch upon. It’s still confusing, it’s slow paced, the between scenes cuts are jarring as hell, the space battles look sh*t, the villain is easily defeated, and the ending isn’t satisfactory to me.

Look, this movie was a pet project for the guy, why leave this at this kind of open ended way? It was not likely you were coming back for a sequel. So the end is robot conquers galaxy to end wars. Is John supposed to be in the wrong here, because I actually would sympathise with him if I’d made any sort of emotional connection to him whatsoever. I know there had been foreshadowing with questions as to how AI could choose to evolve. Fine, but leave the cr*p out of it.

Torgus – he’s unfunny comic relief, and otherwise very bland, even General Gustav didn’t feel like a very realised character. Rape child barely came into the plot until the last third and he served then as a quick ending.

There’s nothing impressive about this movie, it’s way too overambitious for its own good, it’s not memorable, it steals from whatever sci-fi it could find and did I mention the woeful special effects. This movie is 2-dimension in both plot and looks.

Avoid this movie folks, I reckon Starship Rising is likely more of the same

Rating: 200%

Next: Dragonball Evolution

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