318 - STAR FORCE - FUGITIVE ALIEN II

Genre:  Japanese Sci-Fi (1978/1986, Color)

Synopsis:  The continuation of Fugitive Alien (ep #310).  After a brief recap of the first movie, the Star Force spaceship, Backus-3, is heading to the planet Sayzar of the Colonel they rescued from prison in the first part.  They plan to, with his help, sabotage a weapon there that can destroy an entire planet.  The crew doesn’t trust the Colonel, so they throw him into a room and lock the door.  They then get stuck near a star that’s about to explode and somehow incapacitates the human members of the crew. So the Star-Wolf Ken releases the Sayzar Colonel and they both save the ship by testing some electric connections and turning on the engines.  Next, they get to the planet Sayzar, where everyone has blue-faces, and find out that the Colonel is now viewed as a traitor (he’s the Fugitive Alien II of the title, I guess).  So, after fending off an attack by spaceships, they secretly land the Backus-3 in a desert.  Everyone onboard, except constantly drinking Captain Joe and Spunky Tammy, goes out to sabotage the secret weapon.  They succeed, but the Colonel suddenly feels patriotic when he hears Sayzar’s Handel-like anthem over a loudspeaker, and is killed when he runs back to prevent the secret weapon from being destroyed.  During the escape by the others, one of the unimportant guys is captured and tortured with an electric razor, so super-human Ken must go back and rescue him.  Now they all get out and return to the Backus-3, which takes off just before the sabotage bombs blow up.  The next part of the movie seems to come from a different episode of the show, as it shows the crew of the Backus-3 go to another planet for another weapon, one that can destroy the entire universe.  But this story is soon forgotten when Ken sees someone who looks exactly like his mom.  It turns out to be a trap to kill Ken set by the Kabuki Darth Vader guy, ruler of Ken’s planet Valnastar (or just Valna for short), who was last seen in the first movie.  Ken and the Kabuki Darth then fight it out, both on the ground and in spaceships, and the Kabuki Darth is (apparently) killed when his spaceship crashes.  So the Backus-3 now takes off again, but Ken tells the rest of the crew that he is leaving to return to his planet of Valnastar and change it into a better place for all the Kens in the universe.  The End.

Don’s Review:  This is the conclusion of the Star Wars rip-off Japanese TV show convolutedly edited into a two-part movie by Sandy Frank, first seen in ep #310.  Like the first part, there’s more great riffing, as J&tBs simply continue from where they left off.  And there are some good host segments, such as the Captain Joe drunken action figure and the Fugitive Alien Medley, although the Rescue 911 spoof is too silly and not very funny (it reminded me a lot of the later too silly host segments that, unfortunately, would dominate the show during its final few seasons).  As a fan of the goofy Japanese movies, this is an experiment I rate highly and after seeing it, I can’t help but hum the song “He Tried to Kill Me with a Forklift.”
Trivia Notes:  This is the second time that this movie was featured on MST, the first time was during the KTMA days of the show and, hence, this is the only one of the “Lost Three” KTMA movies that was redone on the show.

Don’s Rating: 

Forrest’s Review:  This is the most underrated MST3K episode of them all.  So many MiSTies give this episode a bad review, but as you can tell from both Don and me, we have a weakness for Japanese movies.  So for me, a Japanese experiment will get A+ marks from me no matter if the riffing was terrible.  The riffing in this, takes a different approach than in any other episode, it has an hectic feel to it, and this episode, for me, flies by very fast.  The host segments are hilarious, though I’ll agree with Don about the Rescue 911 host segment wasn’t great, I still like Tom Servo’s joke at the end of that host segment.  Also, the Captain Joe action figure is great, and hilarious, I especially like when Joel holds the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle action figure next to Captain Joe, and he says: “I don’t want you to cowabungal your life away.”  That made me laugh so hard I cried.  The riffing is in very different style than in most episodes, it seems to be more of Season Four in quality, with a bit of the Sci-Fi years mixed into it.  I was laughing all the time in this episode, the riffing has many more technical riffs than in most earlier episodes, the host segments are a scream, and the movie is so cheesy, that it would get laughs from me without any riffing at all, especially since I’m a huge Star Wars fan, and the similarities are there, only the similarities between Star Wars and Fugitive Alien II are, one’s very well made, and just an excellent movie, and the other is cheap and cheesy.  I love this episode, the riffing is great, the host segments are great, and the movie is so enjoyable (for me), I really think that this is one of the very best episodes ever made!

Forrest’s Rating: 

Related Link:
   (1) Mighty Jack’s MST3K Review (Episode Review)