So it's sometime in the distant future, we're not told exactly when. The film opens with a shot of a desolate looking planet, accompanied by some of the worst 80's synth music ever. We're then shown the interior of a spacecraft where a guy is being chased by an invisible force (invisible is cheap). Oh yeah, this bit is accompanied by even worse 80's synth music. Anyway, the invisible thingy finally gets him and he dies.
We're then shown another planet where some old bag introduces herself as the "interpreter of the signs" and "the oracle of the game". Confused yet? I know I am. She says she plays at the bidding of the all powerful one "The Planet Master". The Planet Master is a bloke with a red lava lamp where his face should be. Honestly, it's one of the cheapest, shittiest effects I've ever seen. The old bag and The Planet Master are playing some sort of futuristic space game, although to me it just looked as though they were playing an old Pac-Man table top arcade machine. Then one of The Planet Master's minions appears on the view screen. He says they've lost all contact with the spacecraft we saw at the beginning. He says he has no idea why they landed on the desolate planet. The Planet Master says they must send a ship to the planet on a rescue mission. He tells the old bag to leave him. He says "The waiting is over". And "I play alone". Honestly, I'm still none the wiser.
Cue our rescue ship and its crew. We have Tom Selleck moustache guy, a guy that looks like Ming the Merciless, the woman captain who looks like Captain Janeway after a rough night, moody perm guy, blond boob woman, wuss guy and two old guys. One of the old guys is the cook, the other is the mission commander. Oh, there's also Joanie Cunningham from Happy Days. By the way, that last one is actually Joanie Cunningham from Happy Days, not someone who looks like her. Yes, Erin Moran is in this, looking very similar to a certain female character from a certain film about a certain alien that came out the year before this, but the name of that film escapes me just at the moment. There's a few other characters, but this is getting confusing enough already and they all die anyway (spoilers).
After some "hyper-jumping" and some crappy special effects they arrive at the planet, where they're promptly pulled towards the surface and have to make a crash landing. So our team head outside for a stroll. There's a breathable atmosphere so they don't need space suits. That's handy. What's also handy is that even though they crash landed, they did so only a few minutes walk from the other ship. They go on board the ship and find that all its crew are dead. The wuss guy is being a wuss, and very annoying with it too (I hope he dies soon). Wuss guy is grabbed by a load of tentacle things and dies. They go back to the ship for a while and then back outside again to find where the force that pulled them down to the planet emanated from. They find a deep hole in the ground, so the old commander guy descends down on a rope to take a look. He has his brain sucked by an alien snake thing and dies.Back on board the ship the captain is beginning to suspect that the old guy cook has been sent by The Master to keep an eye on the mission (maybe his culinary skills are lacking). We also learn that the captain was the lone survivor from a mission that went tits up many years ago. Back on the surface the remaining crew make it to the entrance of an alien building. The door begins to open and Ming the Merciless throws these crystal nunchuck things he has to wedge the door open and prevent it from closing again. Blond boob woman makes some random comment about hating worms (hmm, I wonder if that becomes relevant later). The crystal nunchuck things break but by that time they've blasted the door open anyway. Ming the Merciless is told to guard the entrance. He's handed a gun but he says "I live and die by the crystals". Wow, that's subtle. I have no idea what could possibly happen next. The others venture on a bit further, but then moody perm guy tells blond boob woman to go back and make sure Ming the Merciless is okay.
Meanwhile at the entrance Ming sees his shattered crystal nunchucks magically put themselves back together again. One flies at him and hits him in the arm. He pulls it out, but a shard has broken off under his skin. The shard begins moving up his arm. So Ming cuts his own arm off. His lopped off arm then picks up one of the nunchucks and throws it at him. It lands in his chest and Ming is dead. Blond boob woman makes it back to the entrance to find the dead Ming and his arm, crawling with maggots. As she's trying to call the ship we see one of the maggots transform into a giant uber-maggot. The uber-maggot attacks blond boob woman, tears off all her clothes, has sex with her (wtf?) and covers her with slime. Eventually blond boob woman's sexual arousal is so great that she dies as a result. Um... moving on then.
Back on the ship the captain has been mulling over the tits-up mission from long ago. She goes a bit mental trousers and grabs a gun. We see her on one of the monitors as she opens the airlock and busts into flames. I've watched this bit a few times and I'm still not sure what happens. The airlock definitely opens and the captain definitely goes up in flames. Whether she shoots herself or not I don't know, but anyway the main point is she's dead. Meanwhile the remaining crew out on the surface head back to the ship. The cook says that when they venture out again he'd like to go with them. Moody perm guy agrees as they're getting a little low on numbers.
They venture back into the alien building and all head down this slide/tunnel thing. We discover at this point that Erin Moran is claustrophobic, but eventually Selleck moustache guy persuades her to follow the others down. They make it to the centre of the alien building and find a massive honeycomb like structure that looks like a transmitter. Moody perm guy gets separated from the others behind a door. He rather predictably gets chomped by an alien. At this point they manage to lose the cook somewhere. Another guy ends up fighting with, um... himself. He shoots his double but quickly realises that there's no blood or guts. He concludes that his clone can't be real. As soon as he realises this his clone vanishes. Meanwhile Erin Moran has to go through another tunnel/slide thing. But half way through she's grabbed by tentacles which constrict and she is squished to bits.
Selleck moustache guy finds the cook. Suddenly the red lava lamp thing appears over his face. Yes, the cook was The Planet Master all along. I know. Shocking isn't it? Moustache guy tries to shoot The Planet Master but the laser has no effect. Moustache guy says he will find a way to kill The Planet Master for what he's done. (I really hope that's soon. We're an hour and 10 minutes into this and I don't think I can take much more). The Planet Master tells moustache guy that he's already won the game. Moustache guy asks what game. The Planet Master explains that the alien building is in fact a children's toy, built by an ancient race that lived on the planet. The building/toy allowed the children to face their deepest fears and eventually overcome them. The Planet Master knows this because apparently this is where he became The Master. (Christ this is bollocks).
Aliens/monsters then appear but moustache guy successfully fights them off, accompanied of course by more dire 80's synth music. An undead Erin Moran shows up. She tries to strangle moustache guy but he fends her off and shoots her. She then turns back into The Master. This time moustache guy is able to shoot him. The Master says "It is done". The old git proclaims that moustache guy is now The Master, then he dies. The red lava lamp thing now appears over moustache guy's face. There's more crappy synth music. But more importantly, it's also the end.
Thank fuck for that. I don't have the words to convey just how bad this film is. Oh wait, I've found a few. This film is utter shite. The plot reads as though it was shat out of some random plot device. It's so convoluted. It's utter drivel. This film was released in 1980, the year after Alien. It's so obviously an Alien rip-off, but it's such a dreadful one. The acting is non-existent, the special effects are poor, the plot is off its tits bonkers. Everything about this film is horrendous. It's not remotely gripping, engaging or entertaining. The fact that it took me four separate sittings to get through it can attest to that. And the music. Oh god the music. Crappy 80's synth all the way through. I think the guy that "composed" the music for this must've just let his cat sit on his Korg synthesiser for an hour and a half and recorded that.
I hope this review has helped to give you an idea of just how awful this film is. It has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. There are films I've written reviews for that although bad, with the right medication (and therapy afterwards) I could probably bring myself to watch again. But there's no way I could watch this again. It's going to take long enough to get this out of my system as it is. This film has no business existing. Everyone involved in it should hang their heads in shame.
Inexplicably this film currently has a rating of 5 out of 10 on IMDb. I have no idea why it's rated so highly. Maybe it's highly rated by guys perving over the nude blond woman in the frankly bizarre sex scene. I think I'm clutching at straws. I really don't know what people who even remotely like this film see in it. I must clearly be missing something. I am genuinely baffled. If seeing a giant maggot have sex with a nude blond woman is your thing then you're going to love this film. Anyone else should avoid this at all costs. If I ever see this film again it'll be too soon.
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