Oh God! You have no idea how long I've been trying to hold this off with reviewing other movies. But the time has come. So let's just rip off the band aid.
Howard the Duck is a comic book movie based on the Marvel Comics' character of the same name. It was produced by Lucasfilm, yes, the same production company that made Star Wars, with Universal Pictures distributing. This was written by Gloria Katz and Willard Huyck, who also had a hand in writing the story.
The story is, Howard was just minding his own business when suddenly he's transported from his world to yours. Now he must find a way back to his dimension, but he soon finds out he's not the only thing that came through. Only the other creature isn't so friendly.
My Thoughts
Now I do wanna touch on one positive. That being the Howard the Duck costume. It's not half bad, sure it could've been better but for 1986 it's still good.
Alright with all of the good out of the way it's time to get into the garbage, and oh boy is there a lot of it. The movie starts off with Howard's world where everybody is a duck and that world is filled with duck puns. No I'm serious everything has some sort of duck pun in it. There's Breeders of the Lost Stork, Rolling Egg, Splashdance, and this.
Your eyes don't deceive you! This is actually in the movie! And it gets worse!
Once again, your eyes aren't playing tricks on you. This is real.
So after that a sudden quake (surprisingly Howard doesn't call it a "quack") happens, then out of nowhere Howard is pulled and crashes through walls surprising his neighbors and we see this.
Now you're probably wondering, "why am I tormenting you by showing duck tits?" Simple, I was tormented with this imagery so now you're gonna feel my pain as well. Oh and another thing, this was marketed as a family movie. Let that sink in for a bit.
Afterwards, Howard saves and befriends a struggling musician named Beverly. And she very very quickly just accepts him as a friend and is totally calm about him being a talking duck. A matter of fact throughout the movie almost everybody isn't taken aback by Howard. Sure he gets into fights with humans in a couple of scenes, but 97% of the time nobody is shocked. Hell, one part of the movie shows Howard having a job as a janitor for a romance spa. That means Howard was interviewed and the guy who runs the place wasn't shocked by an anthropomorphic duck. Even the customers in the romance spa weren't shocked. Does this sort of thing happen more than usual in this universe?! WHY IS NOBODY FREAKING OUT!?!
Beverly takes Howard back to her apartment and throughout this scene it's just over long exposition dump about Beverly's problems and how she and her band have a scummy manager (why doesn't she just fire the guy in the first place is never explained), and just on and on. So Howard falls asleep and Beverly goes through his wallet. Because that's the polite thing to do when you let a guest crash at your place. Invade their personal belongs. Unsurprisingly Howard's wallet contains and you won't believe this...more duck related jokes, oh and this.
I know George Lucas is a flawed filmmaker, but between the duck boobs and now this I gotta wonder why didn't he bail out of producing this? Was the paycheck really worth it?
So once that new piece of disturbing was over, Beverly takes Howard to a scientist named Phil Blumburtt, and he is so annoying! Not one line or antic from Phil is funny. He's a terrible comedic relief and I was hoping he wouldn't pop up again, but no. He plays an important role which means we're stuck with him!
Later it's revealed Phil is only a lab assistant, Howard is pissed about this, rejects Beverly's help, and gets a job at the previously mentioned romance spa...but then quickly goes back to Beverly. So what was the point? Why did the writers have this big emotional fallout only for it to be quickly resolved. You might as well have kept them together without the big fight. Howard later finds Bev and her band performing, where he confronts their terrible manager, which leads to this.
They got their asses kicked by a three foot talking duck...those guys can never show their faces out in public ever again.
Then we're finally at the movie's most infamous moment.
Mr. Lucas, I ask yet again, was that paycheck really worth it? I also came to ask another big question. That being why is this movie so weirdly sexual with Howard? First duck knockers, then the condom, and now this love scene! Did Gloria Katz and Willard Huyck want to the fuck the duck?! What the hell is going on?!?
So if you're still watching after that, Howard, Beverly, Phil and another scientist named Dr. Walter Jennings go to the lab and plan to send Howard back but find out the machine is broken. The reason being something else came through, and that something else has possessed Dr. Jennings and refers to himself as the "Dark Overlord of the Universe". Howard and Beverly later take him to a diner and they don't believe in what he's saying. Even though his skin is clearly changing and clearly not using his voice to talk. Then after some customers try to kill Howard, and sadly not succeed, the Dark Overlord kidnaps Beverly. Which he really doesn't need to do. Sure later on he says he wants to use Beve's body to have another one of his kind possess her but why? All he and his species want to do is annihilate everything not secretly takeover.
So after Howard and Phil (I told you we were stuck with him) evade capture from the police, they're back at the lab and Howard is ready to do battle with Dark Overlord. Who stops possessing Dr. Jennings and transformers into his real self. And I present to you a small snippet of the special effects for Overlord.
Yeah, I almost forgot to mention. But whenever the movie isn't doing puppeteering or suits for Howard, the effects dip in quality.
To make this last part short, Howard successfully defeats the Dark Overlord, closes the portal, and even though that means he's stuck in a different dimension, he can still be with Beverly and be the manager for her rock band. I didn't know Howard had experience in such a thing but apparently he does.
So that was Howard the Duck, and wow was it bad. Not only was it not really exciting but it could just be plain stupid, and not in any sort of fun way. Also, exposed duck tits, condoms, and coming this close 🤏 to seeing a human woman have sex with a duck. I want to remind you this was marketed towards families.
My final rating is, DESTROY IT!
That's all for now. Come back on Monday, Apr 21st, for the last part of my Road to Karate Kids: Legends with my review of The Karate Kid (2010). Hopefully that'll be better than what I just reviewed, until then enjoy the rest of your day and I hope on Sunday you have a very Happy Easter 🐰.
No comments:
Post a Comment