Beast of Yucca Flats redux...

Rating: 4/10 (9 October 2008)

Far be it from me to point these things out (my own RATMAN is a cross between The Shadow, Zorro, and Batman), but this latest version of THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS isn't much better than the previous one. In Coleman Francis's original (which quite clearly inspired Stan Lee and Jack Kirby), Tor Johnson ("a prehistoric beast in the Nuclear Age," according to Francis himself) limps arthritically through the desert ("a hundred and ten in the shade- and no shade," Francis the narrator intones- no doubt remembering those long, hot days in the desert getting it all on film) after having been transformed by a nuclear explosion into a lumbering Hulk. Time had clearly taken its toll on Johnson, but there he was, lurching around in his ragged shirt, making inarticulate growling noises. At one point, vice-presidential wannabe (and real life Stepford Wife) Sarah "Six Pack" Palin puts in an appearance. It didn't save the movie (nor will it save the Republican Party), but at least THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS was an honest attempt at telling the story of THE INCREDIBLE HULK OF YUCCA FLATS.