Dr. K's Waiting Room

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January celebrates two notable dates in science-fiction history: “National Science Fiction Day” on January 2 to coincide with the birth of world renowned sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov, and 12 January being when Arthur C. Clarke’s HAL 9000 was created. Accordingly, I dedicate January to celebrating sci-fi in all its forms.

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Quick Facts:
Following David Cronenberg’s celebrated body horror reinterpretation of George Langelaan’s 1957 short story, Mick Garris repeatedly tried to pen a sequel to the 1986 hit under incredible studio pressure. Chris Walas, who created the gruesome special effects for the first film, helmed the sequel, and Keanu Reeves reportedly turned down the lead role. Though The Fly II was widely criticised (despite its impressive effects) and a third film fell through, the story continued in a 2015 comic book.

The Review:
If you thought watching a nightmare sequence of Veronica “Ronnie” Quaife (Geena Davis) suffering a gruesome childbirth in the previous film was bad, The Fly II doubles down by depicting another, very real birth, which convinced Davis to skip the film. Despite everything, Ronnie (Saffron Henderson) opted not to have an abortion, presumably out of her love for the tragically doomed Doctor Seth Brundle (Jeff Goldblum) and also because the deceptive Anton Bartok (Lee Richardson) gave her some assurances about the birth. As Brundle worked for Bartok Industries, it makes sense that Bartok would claim the miraculous (if flawed) Telepods, but he reveals his true colours early on when he has Doctor Jainway (Ann Marie Lee) remove the distraught Stathis Borans (John Getz) from the birth and watches on dispassionately as Ronnie dies delivering a ghastly little larval sac containing her son, Martin. With his staff watching behind two-way mirrors, Bartok observes Martin’s rapid growth, the result of his father’s unique genetic malformation, which also sees his DNA contain dormant mutated cells. Young Martin (Matthew Moore) grows at an accelerated rate and boasts a photographic memory and advanced intellect, though he never sleeps and the staff quickly become exasperated with him. Bartok encourages Martin to think of his as his dad and has Dr. Jainway and Doctor Frank Shephard (Frank Turner) administer regular placebos to placate him while they monitor his development. Even as a youngster, Martin (Harley Cross) questions these shots, which are clearly haphazardly administered, and is infected by an insatiable yearning for knowledge and curiosity. Martin constructs a fun little helmet for himself that foreshadows his later fly form and reprograms his access to the Bartok laboratory as easily as he solves mazes.

While exploring, Martin befriends a Golden Retriever (Unknown) and shares his fears of dying comparatively young because of “Brundle’s Accelerated Growth Syndrome”. Martin also sees his father’s Telepods for the first time. However, while Seth solved the issue that caused the machines to rip living tissue inside out, the Telepods are damaged and they destroy everything sent through them. Despite the best efforts of Doctor Trimble (William Taylor) and the others, the Telepods are next to useless and Martin is horrified when his dog is reduced to a rabid, grotesque monster by the process. On his fifth birthday, the physically adult Martin (Eric Stoltz) finally gets his privacy when a seemingly remorseful Bartok gifts him a home off site and asks him to help with the Telepods. Though reluctant, Martin’s won over by a deleted scene of his father, who talks about how the Telepods “improved” him. While working late, Martin seemingly solves the problem on a whim, successfully teleporting a telephone, and excitedly searches for some organic material to test. He bumps into beautiful data filer Beth Logan (Daphne Zuniga) and is inspired to teleport her cactus, though is ashamed and embarrassed when the machine still struggles with organic matter. Luckily, Beth’s won over by Martin’s boyish looks and awkward charm and agrees to help with the problem. Martin finally feels a human connection after five years in a clinical environment, only to be taunted by Bartok’s depraved head of security, Scorby (Garry Chalk). Beth encourages Martin to come out of his shell and invites him to a party elsewhere in the office, where he overhears talk of a malformed creature kept under observation and is distraught to find it’s his dog. Heartbroken, Martin lashes out at Beth, assuming she knew of the animal, and mercifully puts his friend out of his misery in a truly heart wrenching scene.

After having grieving, Martin invites Beth back to the lab to apologise and impresses her by showing that he cracked the Telepods in very much the same way his father did: by admiring the “beauty of the process”. Relieved to make amends with Martin, and to be gifted a cute little kitten (Unknown), Beth takes their relationship to the next level (a somewhat questionable act considering Martin’s still technically five years old…) However, Martin’s puzzled when a wound from a routine injection gone wrong becomes alarmingly infected and explores options to cure his condition with the Telepods, discovering (much like his father) that he can substitute his mutated genes for healthy ones by sacrificing a life. While working, Martin’s confused when he suddenly can’t reach Beth and she’s transferred to another building. Thanks to his genius, Martin patches through to Beth’s boat house and is infuriated to learn that Bartok deceived him again and placed cameras in his home. Oddly, Scorby reveals this by handing Beth video footage of them having sex, something he really didn’t need to do but then The Fly II isn’t exactly subtle about how devious and evil its antagonists are. Dr. Jainway and Dr. Shephard are constantly scowling at Martin or talking down to him and Bartok openly discusses his plans to study Martin once his transformation kicks in, which happens at an alarming rate once Martin discovers the hidden cameras. Upon viewing footage (that shouldn’t technically exist) of his father’s deterioration, Martin confronts Bartok, hurt to see the man he loved as a father figure so cold-hearted and dispassionate about encouraging his transformation and using his unique genetic material (alongside the Telepods) to be at the forefront of a “new age” for the world.

Enraged, Martin showcases superhuman strength and speed as he flees the complex, his face noticeably growing tumours that are disappointingly second rate compared to the first film. After begging for Beth’s help, Martin seeks out Stathis, who has become a drunken, cantankerous, crippled recluse who vehemently refuses to help them and openly mocks Martin. When Martin forces his way into his home (an opulent abode I assume Bartok paid for to keep Stathis quiet), Martin learns of his father’s fate and adamantly refuses to utilise the Telepods to cure himself at the cost of another. Stathis begrudgingly sends the two on their way and, despite him experiencing bouts of despair, Martin’s demeanour turns to spite and arrogance as his condition worsens. As a natural born genetic anomaly, Martin’s transformation is far less ghastly than his father’s (though he still pops out his eyeball for some fun body horror) as he forms a cocoon, one Bartok gleefully watches over after Beth calls him in desperation. Bartok’s elation turns sour when Dr. Trimble reveals Martin boobytrapped the Telepods and things go even worse when “Martinfly” bursts from his cocoon and goes on a rampage. Bartok’s intentions couldn’t be more explicitly evil. While he talks of ending concepts like surgery with the Telepods and advancing science and medicine with the machines and Martinfly’s unique biology, it’s clear he’s primarily interested in profit and power. He visibly scoffs at Martin’s affection for him during their confrontation and thinks nothing of manipulating the boy-man into doing his dirty work, focused entirely on the big picture and willing to sacrifice anyone, even his closest supporters, to get what he wants.

While Martin’s physical transformation is nowhere near as gruelling or disturbing as Seth’s, with the make-up effects being more subtle and oddly incorporating webbing, his demeanour noticeably changes much like his father’s. Martin goes from rage to anguish to smugness across a few scenes, embracing his transformation even as Beth is horrified by it. It’s quite rushed as most of the film prior depicts Martin as an aloof and unique but otherwise healthy young man, so I think it might’ve been better to start his metamorphosis a bit sooner just to see how it changes him physically and emotionally. Martin forces a large cocoon to expediate his transformation and emerges not as a sickly, asymmetrical monster wracked with pain and struggling to survive but as a monstrous, four-armed brute at the peak of his strength. Martinfly is large, powerful, and quick, easily manhandling his prey, fleeing to the rafters, and navigating the facility’s ginormous ventilation shafts. Like his father, Martinfly retains a degree of intelligence, certainly enough to tell friend from foe and to drag Dr. Shephard’s dead body around to unsuccessfully use his key card. While the Martinfly puppet and animatronic are impressive, The Fly II abandons all the subtlety and emotional nuance of the last film to present a monster movie finale, with Martinfly strangling Dr. Shephard to death, breaking Scorby’s spine and tossing him like a sack of potatoes, and absolutely wrecking a poor, unassuming security guard (Pat Bermel) with his projectile “vomit drop”. The corrosive “fly vomit” melts this dude’s face to a screaming, steaming, skeletal mess (“Medical emergency”, indeed!) and leaves him shrieking on the floor as a barely breathing corpse. Another security guard (Andrew Rhodes) gets his head (and body) crushed by an elevator thanks to Martinfly, meaning The Fly II certainly focuses more on gore and a hefty body count by the finale.

Though he insists on capturing Martinfly alive for further study, Bartok’s not a complete fool. He has the Telepod lab sealed, keeps Beth as leverage, and orders Scorby and his men to cover every possible entrance. Naturally, Martinfly easily gets the drop on them and murders them in gleefully disturbing ways, pausing only to pet a dog (Unknown) and share a glance with the horrified Beth. While Beth showed some moxie when they first met and is a pretty face who offers Martin nothing but love and support, she’s easily overpowered by even Bartok when she wrestles with him over Scorby’s pistol and is basically here just to look good and scream when heads burst like water balloons. She has a touching romance with Martin but it’s a shadow of what Ronnie and Seth had in the first film. Martinfly dwarfs Brundefly, though, being a hulking, malicious monster driven to avenge himself on those who’ve wronged him and cure his condition. While Bartok threatens to shoot Beth and even blasts Martinfly a couple of times, the guy’s one monologue away from being a moustache-twirling James Bond villain and completely underestimates Martinfly’s durability and cunning. Martinfly grabs Bartock, forces him to input the Telepod code (fittingly enough, “DAD”), and muscles him into a Telepod, encouraging Beth to initiate his gene-swapping program. Despite Bartok’s protestations, Beth complies just as Bartok’s back-up arrives, successfully achieving what Seth couldn’t and swapping Bartok’s healthy genes for Martinfly’s mutated ones. This sees Bartok reduced to a misshapen, maggot-like mess and Martin fully restored (if covered in disgusting goop). Fittingly, the Bartok-Thing is placed into the same dungeon as Martin’s dog and left to endure an agonised existence as another failed experiment of the Telepods.

Final Thoughts:
I feel like I’ve ragged on The Fly II a bit more than I intended. It’s not as good as the last film, that’s for sure, but I think it’s better than many realise. Much of the plot is essentially the same, with a genius scientist struggling with a genetic abnormality trying to perfect teleportation, embarking on a romance along the way and transforming into a hideous creature by the end. However, The Fly II is definitely much more of a monster movie, especially in the finale, and has little of the same disturbing subtext of the last film. I guess it could be read as an AIDS allegory as Martin suffers for the sins of his father much like someone who’s HIV positive, but much of this subtlety is swept aside in favour of a deception so obvious it’s almost explicit and some delicious gore. Eric Stoltz does his best, portraying Martin as brilliant but shy and awkward, but pales in comparison to Jeff Goldblum and only really shines during his “I’m getting stronger!” speech. I majorly crushed on Daphne Zuniga as a kid and she’s still gorgeous now, but there’s not much for Beth to do here, meaning the villains steal the show with their smarmy, conceited, and unashamedly evil depictions. The late Lee Richardson seems to be relishing the role, tackling it was a theatrical glee that makes Bartok a truly despicable character. While I found Martin’s transformation lacklustre compared to the last film (the cocoon, especially, feels very cheap and rushed), I do have a soft spot for Martinfly. A powerful and nigh-unstoppable man/fly monster, Martinfly is the stuff of nightmares and yet seems more ungainly than Brundlefly as the creature is perhaps a bit overdesigned and veers too far into the monstrous. Still, The Fly II is a decent enough epilogue to the first film (if you can forgive the plot hole concerning Ronnie’s abortion) and has a lot of gruesome moments for gore fans even if it is a much weaker film overall that Cronenberg’s masterpiece.

My Rating:

Great Stuff

Do you also consider The Fly II to be under-rated and unfairly forgotten? Did you enjoy Eric Stoltz’s performance or do you agree that he struggled compared to Jeff Goldblum? Were the villains a bit too obvious and one-dimensional for you or did you like seeing them be unapologetically awful? Are you a fan of the monstrous Martinfly or do you think it was over designed? Would you like to see another film set in this continuity? How are you celebrating sci-fi this January? Leave a like and comment below with your feedback, check out my other sci-fi reviews, and donate to my Ko-Fi to suggest other sci-fi movies for me to the site.