The Toxic Avenger, Part II


Dir: Michael Herz and Lloyd Kaufman
Star: John Altamura, Phoebe Legere, Rick Collins

[2]. The much awaited sequel to their international hit about a nerd who falls into some chemical waste and mutates into a superhero who wreaks revenge on his tormentors and any other bad peole. Even the cut version was superbly tacky and tasteless, with guide dogs getting shot, old ladies dry cleaned and kids run over. Unfortunately, Part 2 has very little of this sort of thing, probably due to it being a co-production with Lorimar (makers of 'Dallas' - or is it 'Dynasty'?), who presumably demanded reducing the blood until it resembles a Saturday morning cartoon for kids. Toxie (Fazio), as our hero is known, is unemployed since he cleaned up Tromaville, and heads off to Japan to seek his long lost father. This leaves the field clear for Apocalypse Inc to move in and turn Tromaville into a chemical dump. Toxie returns, having killed his father after finding him smuggling drugs, mops them up and discovers his real father.

The problem is that the messy splatter of the original has been replaced with funny fight sequences; Toxie is now little more than a Mr. T clone. Even his blind, blonde bimbo, one of the highlights last time, is played by a different actress (Legere) and she's far too twee. Despite a couple of promising moments, the overall result is something that makes you want to stick a mop down your, or Lorimar's, throat. "Toxic Avenger III" has been shot; one glimmer of hope is it's subtitled The Last Temptation of Toxie - surely not a Lorimar co-production with that title!


Toxie-c waste
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