Critters 4 (1992)

Best movie of this year hands down!

An Exercise In Nonsense

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

The Critters series is my second favorite Horror/Sci-Fi-Thriller series after Scream and Tremors, just above Sleepaway Camp. I grew up watching the first three Critter movies as a kid, and remembered having fond memories of them. After recently reliving them all again, my memories were confirmed. The only entry I had never really seen or heard anything about was this one, and then after reading about how it's just the worst of the series and a bad movie overall, I was more than skeptical because I had been into the Critters series for their balance of fun horror elements as well as fresh Comedy, not leaning towards one genre or the other. The films all scaled the two perfectly, and I was not ready for a film that merely is comedic and just plain bad when it came to this series.Well, while the movie is still my least favorite after all the others, it is nowhere near as bad a movie as everyone makes it out to be, especially since I went in expecting total tripe. I actually found it highly engaging, and exactly what I was looking for on my lazy off day. I'll give the movie all it's props first because it definitely flows like a Critter film, and even though it's set in space, the Critters have a nice, lengthy space station to travel abroad and wreak havoc (ring any bells?), but the setting doesn't become too boring or overused actually. It was a nice element this time around, even though "stuck on a spaceship in space" has been done to death like I said. It's back to the Critters roots, so it works. It's not like Jason or the Leprechaun flying around that have no business being there.Also, another thing that help the movie along are the performances. Everyone was believable and fun to a point. Not one person stuck out as the culprit for "Worst Actor of the Movie". One thing I really enjoyed actually is how Critters 3 was the start of Leo DiCaprio, and here we get to see a young Angela Bassett! Someone who I had no prior knowledge was in the movie. I absolutely loved her too! She was probably the most likable character, being the only woman aboard the ship and having some pretty killer scenes and line deliverance. Another thing this movie has? Some fun critter kills! Especially one of the first deaths early on got a huge belly laugh out of me but also disgusted me a little at the same time, and I loved it! That's usually what all the Critters films bring to me in terms of joy. And above all, this movie was just entertaining.Some downsides are none of the characters are very fleshed out. As much as all the cast tries to bring likability to them, just none of them are really that worthy of caring for except maybe of course Bassett's character and the full-time character of Charlie, but like I said that doesn't stop the cast from hamming it up and having fun in a lot of parts. And it's those character faults that lead to some pretty poor actions though and make the movie have those, "What the-?" or "Why are you doing that?" moments like all Horrors do, but they are few and far between, and course the plot is paper thin, but then again we're talking about the fourth entry in the Critters series here. Anybody expecting Citizen Kane or anybody that just doesn't know how to have a good time with this movie, why'd you view it in the first place?Overall, it's just not that bad, especially when compared to the plethora of other low budget Horror out there. It's just super campy fun, all of the Critters movies are and I have not disliked a single one. The original is an underrated gem in my opinion, and if you are fan of it or the sequels and you are excited and/or skeptical about this film like I was, pop it on now... if you're in the mood now. You won't be sorry!

So, I took forever to get around to watching Critters 4. Big fan of the first two, and despite knowing beforehand this one was only marginally better than the abysmal 3rd entry, I am still disappointed. At the outset, it all looks so promising, the Crites are back in their natural habitat, space, doing what they do best, chowing down on hapless humans. Well, at least that's what the DVD cover would have you believe. But in reality, Critters 4 should have been subtitled, "No Crites on set", as you hardly ever see the Crites and even when you do, their kills and banter is very unoriginal and just not very fun to watch. Critters 4 takes a darker route than it's comedy horror predecessors, but the humour is half the fun of Critters films, in 4, the humour is nullified to non existent levels apart from a few "Insane computer" jokes that fell flat. Once the fun is removed, and the Crite action, you are left with a plodding, dull as dishwater, 1 and half hour movie that has very little to redeem it. Whilst I really dislike the 3rd film, at least that one didn't go out of it's way to ruin already established fan fave characters, such as Ug. Yes, Critters 4 is a turgid movie, even for fans of the series, but worse, it commit's the ultimate sin, it destroys the awesome character Ug, who has been built up over the series into one of my all time fave sci fi characters. In this film, you find out that Ug is no longer a bounty hunter, nor is he generally a nice guy now, now he's a murderous bureaucrat who wants to preserve the Crites for use as bioweapons, instead of kill them. The sudden and unexplained changes in Ug's character leave a bad taste in your mouth. Also, the underwhelming use of the best character in the series, Charlie, leaves a lot to be desired. Once again Don Opper is brilliant as Charlie, but, he has nothing to work with. The characterisation and dialogue is very uneven. Even as a Critters fan, I can't recommend this film to anyone. I hope this is the last. No reboots, no further watered down, below par sequels, unless the Chiodo brothers get back involved. Critters, it's been a fun 30 years, but all good things must end.

Critters 4 looked like it would be the best of the franchise. The poster showed the critters overlooking a moon or a comet or a planet or something, but it had that "Lost-in-space-no-one-can-help-you" feel and you hope for a movie that is a lot like alien. However the critters are not seen that much and they don't do a lot of eating in this film. In the third film, Charlie was instructed to place the 2 remaining eggs in a pod, which would be launched into orbit. Charlie messes up, and ends up locking himself in the pod along with the eggs. In 2045, 54 years later, a space ship study crew finds the pod and takes it onto their ship. And take it to a space station who supposedly "lost it". Arriving at the station, they find it abandoned, and out of greed and curiosity, the captain opens the pod, releasing the critters and Charlie from their cryogenic nap. The critters then run around the ship, and set a course for earth. The crew try to wait them out, but encounter several problems with the station. Ug and a group of stormtroopers show up and search the ship to destroy the critters. Unfortanately, the critters had more eggs, which, using scientific technology, cause the eggs and the babies to hatch and grow at a speedy rate, and then they breed and do it over again. So now we have a lot more critters, which devour the storm troopers, but are later locked in a room. Ug is now a complete jerk, only wanting to get the last few eggs, going as far as threatening to kill some of the crew. In the end, all of the eggs are destroyed, Ug is killed by Charlie, and the crew escapes from the station on the ship Ug came in. The station is blown up due to a nuclear reactor meltdown, and the critters are all destroyed. This was weak writing, and the series could have continued after this if it had been written better. But the critters are well done, and fun to watch and seeing Angela Bassetts butt compensate for a mediocre film. If you're a fan, it's worth seeing, but just so you know, it's not as good as the others...

Critters 4 was a complete disaster. It takes place immediately after the third one and this time they invade space about 50 years in the future. A space ship unknowingly brings the critters on board not knowing the danger of the little monsters. I'm not really sure of the plot, or why the space ship is roaming around space. I;m not even sure if Earth exists in this fourth Critters. Perhaps I wasn't paying attention, but I don't think much of what is going on is ever explained in the film. About 50 minutes in, we see three critters. For a Critters movie, that is a major disappointment. The other three films were actually funny and had some good "scares" and special effects. The scares in the Critters movies were never bone chilling, but they were fun scares. This fourth one skips all that and is about 90 minutes of nothing.There are no comical moments in this at all. The Critters' personalities from the first three are all but gone. And they kind of make Ug a bad guy. If you watched the first two, you would know he would never try to hurt Charlie. They completely ruined that character which is also disappointing. The whole movie just didn't feel like a Critters sequel. That's the problem when they take horror films and put them in space.Putting a horror franchise in space to create a sci-fi vibe almost never works, especially for a comedy horror series. You have to spend so much unnecessary time explaining about how the ship works, what the mission is, all sorts of technical and downright boring information. It's Critters for Pete's sake! Have the fur balls roll around a hotel for all I care, just don't put them in space. Well they did, and the movie wasn't very good.Disappointing last entry to a pretty good series overall. The appearances of the Critters were far and few between and the story of part 4 was a complete mess.3/10