Film Summary CCCXIV (Teenagers from Outer Space)

So I was wrong about something in my ''Plan 9 from Outer Space'' summary. The film you get as a reward at the end of Destroy All Humans is not 'plan 9' but is in fact this particular film. Which calls itself 'Teenagers from outer Space' despite the fact that the only character from outer space is our main character Derek. And I mean that when I say character. The guy who played Derek in this movie was pushing 30 at the time. And the girl who would play his ''love interests'' was about 25. Everybody else was significantly older.

So our film starts as a group of aliens dropping down on Earth. And who should come to greet these Travelers on Earth's first interplanetary landing? Why The Lovable little dog known as Sparky.
and unfortunately the first creature to emerge out of the UFO is Thor the jerk alien. Who shoots Sparky turning him into a skeleton. It's a real downer when you think about it, you put in this campy little 50s film and you think you're going to have a gay old time. The first thing you see is a dog get obliterated.

None of the aliens pay the creature much mind with the exception of Derek who walks over to the skeleton discovering a name tag that was currently attached to it. Derek determines that such a item must have been created by an intelligent race. And concludes that this planet is not suitable for his people's purpose. That purpose in question? To infest the planet with a large population of lobster spider creatures (Gargons) who will consume the entire world.
The idea being that these aliens will come back and harvest these large creatures for food. Personally I don't understand why they don't just acquire a good agricultural system or set up some sort of Trade union with the United States government.
Surely there must be an easier way to acquire food. But then these aliens don't seem all that bright. They follow orders without question, they have an absolute monarch who rules over every aspect of their life. And they have absolutely no connection to a family structure. It's the Brave New World but with none of the sex.

Now one would wonder; ''Why doesn't Derek just go along with all the other aliens?''
Where did his integrity and compassion come from? Well it turns out he has a Space-Bible with him. Said Space-Bible has given him strange new insights into how people should live. So he breaks away from the main alien group and runs for the Hills.

Really it's not a very good plan. He had absolutely no idea where he's going, he doesn't know if he can communicate with the people that live on this planet and he only has a vang understanding that the creatures that are supposed to conquer the planet are currently unsuitable for the atmosphere. In fact he runs away so quickly that he doesn't even recognize that the creature has revived and that the protocol to infest the planet has resumed.
Luckily Derek runs into a small 1950s Californian town where everybody lives as if they were on the set of ''Leave It to Beaver''. He comes across a house with a room for rent where an old man and his granddaughter are currently resigning. The daughter takes a fancy to this guy pretty quickly despite his strange clothing. If it was me I'd look at him and say; ''Hey this guy might be a pinko! Better keep a close eye on him and Report any suspicious activities.'' But these people are far more trusting than I.

The character Thor is tasked with bringing Derek back, he's informed that he should try to avoid killing him as Derek is the son of their great leader whom they only discovered recently. But Thor is nothing if not a little psychopathic.
He'll kill at least 10 people in his attempt to recapture Derek. Turning everybody he sees into a skeleton with his magical ray gun. He'll also scuff at the human's for using pitiful projectile weaponry. Really he should know better, The Maxim gun is 200 years old but if I set that thing up right and aim in someones direction I can do quite a bit of damage. But then arrogance is becoming of these space-age fascist.
but then Thor isn't the real problem here. He's just one man with a raygun, the real problem is the space Armada of UFOs coming down onto the United States with an army of lobster spider creatures. Each one with the potential to grow as large as a 4-story building.

Funny enough the bad acting kind of works for the alien people. It creates a disconnect between them and the audience unfortunately the same disconnect exists with all the Regular People Too. Ensuring that nobody sounds right. Not that any of this matters, the main reason to watch this feel this to see what happens to a person when their shot by a ray gun while swimming in a pool.
The story is kind of funny and the dialogue is corny but for the most part it's fairly enjoyable. The pacing is surprisingly well done. Everything moves at a Brisk pace.

There's a part of the movie where Thor drops his laser gun and nobody thinks to take it away from him, but really the only real issue I have with the movie is the love interest between our two main characters. For some reason they become captivated with each other despite the fact that they have absolutely no good reason to. If anything they should learn to become friends but nothing more than that. Unless it's pure hormone. Maybe that would be a decent excuse for the alien but that's not how most people work. Unless there's some sort of medical problem with the girl.

This film doesn't deserve the horrible ridicule that it gets. It deserves comical ridicule, this is an enjoyable film with fun characters and a silly story. As somebody who's seen more than his fair share of b-movies I can tell you that this stands out above most of them.

I get that you have a fake skeleton and you can't make it look too real but for god sakes just move your camera over enough that you cover up the bolt and The Branding label that are clearly visible on the skeleton.