MY NAME IS SCOTT FOY AND I PAID TO SEE
EVE OF DESTRUCTION

As most of you may have noticed, there have only been two new Foyeurisms in the past 5 months and I haven't been as frequent with my writings for Badmovies.net or Creature Corner/now Dread Central. Oh, where to begin?

As many of you already know, much of my summer was sidelined due to gallstones. Unfortunately, this problem was prolonged due to being misdiagnosed twice. I had my gall bladder taken out on August 3rd and spent the next few weeks recovering. Needless to say, when you feel like crap you don't feel much like sitting down and writing stuff, although I did some, but I certainly wasn't as prolific about it as I had been in the past. Unfortunately, my health problem also setback work for Schlocktoberfest 2004. Then, just as we started getting into the swing of things in both the advertising and production standpoint - we pre-produce several things for the show itself - along came Hurricane Ivan and the mandatory evacuation of the entire Gulf Coast area from New Orleans to Pensacola. The Mississippi Gulf Coast was mostly spared from the ravages of the storm but it's impossible to gage how this could have effected the attendance for the show, since a lot of people had to blow much of their spare change escaping the wrath of Mother Nature and, in the case of the Mobile to Pensacola area, had more important things to do than attend a bad film festival, like say rebuilding their lives. This would also cost us a whole week of production too. In fact, it was the day after Ivan that I came to the realization that this year's fest was not going to be well attended and even suggested to others in the group that we may want to postpone. I was talked out of it because, hey, the show must go on, right? Then, there was a co-promotion with a local radio station that fell through at the last minute.

And then came the icing on the cake. Just one week before the Schlocktoberfest, the guy running the server for the website just pulled the plug on the server. It's a really long story and to this day we still have no definitive answer as to why the server was taken offline. But from what we do know it actually sounded like an intentional act of sabotage. Seriously. Like I said, it's a long story. Needless to say we are now have new, more reputable server providers, but this could not be taken care of until after the festival was over with. How the loss of the website for that final week effected the show's attendance we will never really know. This happened one week before the show for which about 99% of the advertising was based around getting people to go to the website for more information and it actually went down on the very day we got a ton of last minute advertising. Whether it was done intentionally or not, to say that these people at PersonalResults.net screwed us royally would be the understatement of the year.

But wait, the fun wasn't over yet. No, now it was time for computer problems galore. John, the webmaster for this sight and main tech guy for the show, experience five complete computer crashes in the last 72 hours before the show. And I'm talking about the kind of computer crashes where the entire operating system has to be reloaded. This was especially bad since part of the festival's programming was being run out of the computer and for a brief period there it was looking like we might have lost the Godzilla Tribute, Roger Corman tribute, opening intro video, Super Hyper Condensed Foreign Film 4500, Sixty Seconds of Santo, and maybe even one or two of the trailer blocks. Basically, a nice sized chunk of the schedule. As we joked, it almost seemed like some of the movie footage was so bad it gave the computer a virus. At one point John basically threw up his hands and declared, "I don't what god I have offended but if taking my life will satisfy him then take me now." The fact that the fest itself went off without any technical glitches was amazing because John got almost no sleep the night before and was literally up until daylight dealing with the fifth and fortunately final computer crash.

The week after the fest was rest and relaxation time for all of us as we recovered from the trauma of the past few weeks. Believe me, I definitely needed it. For the past few weeks, I was getting little sleep and was very stressed out and was still in a period of recovery from having a bodily organ removed. It was taking its toll on me because I could barely eat anything and not throw up. The day after the fest my digestive system started functioning normally again. We finally got the website up and running on a new (and improved) server and just as I was getting caught up on everything I fell behind on, my computer went down due to a hardware malfunction. What first appeared to be a power supply problem and then appeared to a power loss caused by a bad stick of memory turned out to be a defective on/off button of all things. I was able to use the internet at work, although even that has been severely limited for reasons that would take even longer to explain and I've gone on long enough already.

Fortunately, it appears that things are once again returning to normal; at least I hope so. I believe "Now what?!" was my most commonly used phrase over the past few months. I still have screeners people have sent me that I still haven't watched, news blurbs that I still haven't written up, emails that are long overdue for replies, and about three different Foyeurisms I had planned but never got finished with. But I'm getting caught up, slowly but surely, and it starts with the newest and far too long overdue Foyeurism.

ROBOSAURUS COP

Let's pretend for one moment that you are a television executive and someone is sitting in your office waiting to pitch you an idea. I want you to read the following pitch and then give me your honest reaction.

Okay?

Ready?

Here we go.

It's the future. The ozone layer is all but gone. Fossil fuels are all but gone. Law and order is all but gone. An honest cop's son is killed by a crime lord targeting him. He doesn't know who they are and spends the next year trying to solve the crime. All the while he's haunted by weird nightmares of his son's slaying accompanied by surreal images of a toy robot dinosaur that was his kid's favorite plaything and a mysterious man that appears to be trying to send him a message. Soon, he meets the mysterious man from his dreams, who reveals that he is a time traveler that seeks out those that possess a magic power locked away deep inside their subconscious giving them the ability to transform things. Soon the mysterious man helps the cop discover the identity of his son's killers leading to a final confrontation. It is during this confrontation that the cop is finally able to unlock his power, which manifests itself in the form of his son's toy robot dinosaur, now an unstoppable, 40-foot, flame-snorting, car-crunching, mechanical monster that fights for the forces of good.

Your reaction is:

A) Throw the idiot out of your office.
B) Laugh at the moron and then throw him out of your office.
C) Call security and have them toss this nut out of your office for you.
D) Give him $10 million to film it as a potential pilot for a weekly TV series.

If you answered D, then you must be an NBC television executive circa 1992.

Yes, NBC did indeed film this horrible, horrible, horrible concept as a feature length pilot and it did indeed air in primetime, albeit only once never to see the light of day anywhere ever again save for a European video release. I guess I shouldn't be too shocked that a network like NBC would sink money into an idea this bad. We are talking about the channel that gave us My Mother The Car, Manimal, Misfits of Science, Mann & Machine, V: The Series, The Highwayman, Baywatch, the XFL, and a very short-lived show about a talking orangutan with an IQ of 256 that gets a job as a consultant in Washington, DC. Suffice it to say, if you've got a crap idea and FOX has already turned you down, then NBC is the place to go. Case in point, the new NBC dramatic series LAX that casts Heather Locklear as the head of the Los Angeles International Airport. Gee, I can't figure out why that show is dive-bombing in the ratings? Must see TV, my ass!

Now an atrocious idea needs an equally atrocious title and so they wisely decided to call this guaranteed failure STEEL JUSTICE. Could they possibly have given it a more generic sounding title? The show has a futuristic setting, a time traveler, superpowers, and a giant robot dinosaur and the best title they could come up with was STEEL JUSTICE? As truly awful as the concept was and as impossibly lame as the final product turned out it still deserved a better title than STEEL JUSTICE. On the other hand, I spent about five minutes sitting here staring at the screen trying to come up with some zippy alternative titles for this show and the best I could come up with is the one I used for the title of this article. If anyone has any better ideas, I'd love to hear it. I refuse to believe that STEEL JUSTICE is the best anyone could come up with.

The sole reason that STEEL JUSTICE even exists is because someone at NBC got sold on the idea of building a series around Robosaurus. What is Robosaurus? Well, if you've never heard of it before, Robosaurus is a fixture on the monster truck and car show circuit. Here are a few facts about Robosaurus taken directly from the official Robosaurus website:

· An electrohydromechanical creature of prehistoric proportions
· Stands 40 feet tall (twice as tall as Tyrannosaurus Rex)
· Weighs 60,000 pounds (over 3 times heavier than Tyrannosaurus Rex)
· Lifts 4,000 pound cars up higher than a 5 story building
· Breathes 20 feet fingers of flame that incinerate paint and plastic
· Crushes cars with 24,000 pounds of gripping force
· Bites and rips out roofs and doors using stainless steel teeth
· Throws the mangled morsels to the ground

Robosaurus is still a popular attraction at these shows and there's no question that it is a really cool looking hunk of mechanized steel. However, much like monster truck racing, it's novelty wears out rather quickly. Once you've seen this huge robotic dinosaur roll in, shoot flames, picks up a few cars, crunch and bite them, and then just drop the remains of the wrecked vehicle to the ground then you've pretty much seen the whole act. Not to mention the fact that the actions of this mechanical monster are a bit on the slow side. That may be perfectly fine for its appearances at monster truck rallies but we are talking about a television series here and there's only so much time available for the contraption to go through the motions. It does not move with the gracefulness of The Transformers' Dinobot "Grimlock" or the swiftness of Knight Rider's K.I.T.T. It's a big, slow, clunky moving monstrosity. Surprisingly, this fact would prove to be one of the least of the premise's problems while still remaining a major flaw.

STEEL JUSTICE kicks off with a dream-like sequence, so we're already off to a really bad start just three seconds into the movie. An old black Jedi is explaining via voiceover narrative how he's a special kind of time traveler (As opposed to all those non-special time travelers out there?) that travels through history seeking out those rare few people that possess "the gift", a magical mental power that allows that person to "transform" things. He tells us this while being shown playing Obi Wan to some guy holding a small rock. There's a sudden flash of light and Stonehenge magically appears.

Right then, our humdrum hero abruptly awakens. He's on a stakeout with his female partner, who asks him if he was dreaming about his son's murder again. He tells her that he's been suffering from another recurring dream of late that doesn't culminate in his son exploding. He describes to her his dream where a mysterious black man tells him via voiceover narrative of how he's a special kind of time traveler that travels through time seeking out those rare few people that possess "the gift", a magical mental power that allows that person to "transform" things. Yes folks, that dream-like sequence at the beginning of the movie that was accompanied by a voiceover narrative was actually the lead character's dream. Either this is some of the worst screenwriting ever or we're supposed to believe the guy dreams in prologues.

Our one-dimensional lead character goes on to tell her that the stranger in his dreams told him of how he once taught a Celt to turn a pebble into Stonehenge and Greek how to turn a little wooden horse into the Trojan Horse. I would be demanding to be assigned a new partner by now if I were her. If I was the producer, I'd have beaten the screenwriter to death with a blunt object and had the body tossed into the shark tank at Sea World for handing in something this damn bad. However, if I were the producer of this movie then my previous and future producing credits would include MAC AND ME, THE NEXT KARATE KID, VEGAS VACATION, SOLDIER, and the upcoming remake of OH, GOD!, which will star Ellen Degeneres as God. In that case, I'd be considering a dip in the shark tank myself as a gesture of atonement to the movie going public. On the other hand, if I were the screenwriter (who also directed this stinker), then I could brag to my friends that I was once one of the producers of BJ & The Bear. Suffice it to say this production was damned from the get go.

STEEL JUSTICE is based around the character of police detective David Nash, played by an actor I had never seen before and the fact that this was made 12 years ago and I don't recognize him from anything since speaks volumes as to what became of his career. The guy gave a very bland performance, which only made matters worse because his character was boring enough to begin with. In his defense, everyone in this movie gives a dull performance, except for all the non-time traveling black characters, all of whom deliver their lines like Arsenio Hall auditioning for a role in NEW JACK CITY. The only thing noteworthy about the guy playing Nash is that he clearly had a thick accent - either British or Australian, I'm not quite sure which - that he was trying to not speak with, but it was constantly coming out loud and clear. One moment he sounds like David Nash, all-American cop, and two words later, he sounds Davey Jones of The Monkees.

Nash is shown walking the streets when his own voiceover narrative begins. Or perhaps we'll find out in a few minutes that this is actually part of someone else's dream? Cue Twilight Zone theme music. It's obvious the filmmakers were going for some sort of old-time noir feel, as this will be the first of several voiceover scenes with Nash speaking as if he were a 1940's gumshoe. That sort of thing may have worked fine for BLADE RUNNER, but this is not BLADE RUNNER. Hell, it isn't even LAWNMOWER MAN 2. Trying to go the Mickey Spillane route with a story set in the near future about a cop taught by an eccentric time traveler that he has the power to magically conjure up a giant robot dinosaur to help him fight crime just boggles the mind. But it does once again accentuate just how wrong headed every creative decision going into this production was.

So Nash's voiceover narrative continues and he officially introduces himself to us and goes on to tell us that he lives in this futuristic city; the name of which is never spoken by anyone in the movie. Despite telling us that this city has become a multicultural mecca and one of the last refuges of the damned in the eco-disaster future, this new epicenter of civilization goes unnamed. Just for the sake of argument, I'm going to name this place Dullsville. Believe me, it is.

Nash tells us that the environmentalists we foolishly didn't listen to in the past were right and now the ozone layer is all but gone, leading to environmental catastrophe. We're just going to have to take his word for it because this terrifying fact is never visualized in any way. You'd think this would cause severe skin diseases and such or at the very least, heavy sweating on the part of the populace due to extreme heat, but you get none of that. As a matter of fact, the extras in the movie are all dressed quite snuggly in their tacky, pastel-colored, wardrobe ensembles that appear to have been put together through a mix of rainwear and clothing picked up at the KRUSHGROOVE rummage sale.

Nash informs us that fossil fuels are all but gone. And yet the near complete loss of gas and oil has seemingly no impact on the power industry as the city has no shortage of bright lights and neon and it's impact on transportation only results in people driving around in old, junky, European automobiles. I can't even rationalize what that last part is all about other than to say this movie is loaded with some seriously ugly cars. Getting crushed and eaten by a giant mechanical T-Rex would be a blessing for these hideous rust buckets.

The simple sad truth is that the future in STEEL JUSTICE doesn't look bleak so much as it looks cheap and generic. It's like they took a Hollywood backlot, tossed some junk around, grunged it up, lit up some neon and a lot of backlights, and tried to pass it off as a dark future. Oh wait! That's exactly what they did! The city is just a couple of grungy-looking backlot sets. For a movie with a $10 million budget they certainly didn't invest any of it in the shoddy production design. Dullsville is not a very interesting place and it's even less interesting to look at. Although, if there a glowing shield radiating in the sky then this city could probably have passed for one of the sets in HIGHLANDER II: THE QUICKENING. Anytime one is watching a movie and finds something to compare in any way, shape, or form to HIGHLANDER II: THE QUICKENING, you know the movie is damned and so is anyone watching it.

Nash then tells us how crime is out on control, but it must be out of control in another part of the city that they didn't have the time or money to film. They keep talking about the crime problem in Dullsville but we never really see any random criminal acts, except for some arms smuggling, as it is the only crime the police are ever shown dealing with. Not really sure why gunrunning is such an illustrious business because we never really see anybody getting blasted other than a couple of junk cars and Nash's kid.

I guess I might as well go ahead and deal with this boring aspect of this boring movie's boring main character since I've brought it up more than once now.

David Nash is your standard issue tormented cop; still haunted by the memory of his young son Davey being killed right in front of him. A year earlier, bad guys out to snuff pop the cop didn't take the time to notice that there was only a kid inside the car they blasted with a rocket launcher. Daddy Dave, who was standing several yards away from the blast radius, saw young Davey go boom and ever since he's been an emotional wreck. He still doesn't know who they were or exactly why they were targeting him.

Getting back to Nash's Mike Hammer routine, he now introduces us one by one to his police co-workers, all of whom are gathered outside a dilapidated building preparing for the big bust of an arms dealer they've been tracking for months. I don't understand what the point is of introducing us to these characters that have such tiny roles in the movie. Are we supposed be interested in the token Latino detective that appears in like only three scenes? Are we supposed to care about the token black cop that dresses like Sonny Crocket and has like three lines of dialogue in the whole freaking movie? Only two of the characters we're introduced to here have any real dialogue and only one of them - his female partner - figures into the plot at all. I know this was meant to be a pilot for a TV series but that doesn't mean we need to get a special introduction to characters that factor so contribute so little to the story at hand.

With this, Nash's voiceover finally, mercifully comes to an end. We are now all of five minutes into the movie, which so far has been composed of a voiceover prologue that was actually a dream sequence, about a minute's worth of actual dialogue, and another voiceover narrative designed to introduce us to this futuristic world and a few of its inhabitants even though we will soon come to learn that about 95% of what he's told us will prove to be completely irrelevant to plot of the movie. So with that out of the way, let me quickly summarize what happens in the next one hour and fifteen minutes of the movie.

NOTHING!!!

NOTHING HAPPENS!!!

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!!!

Even with a premise as terrible as this you'd think there would still be the potential to make it into something somewhat amusing if only in a MST3K manner. You would be wrong. Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! No cheese! No schlock! No unintentional laughs! Just 100% unadulterated lameness! This is supposed to be the movie pilot for a potential sci-fi action show, yet there is little sci-fi and virtually no action. The next 75 minutes of the movie are amongst the dullest I've ever subjected myself to. The bulk of this movie consists of Nash's dream sequences and various characters having conversations where they repeatedly cover the same exact material over and over again. I think Nash has the same exact conversation about his son's death with about four different characters. When Nash finally meets the time traveler they go on to repeat the same exact discussion regarding Nash's "gift" about three or four times. It's just stultifying.

Worst of all, STEEL JUSTICE doesn't even have a sense of humor. Everything is played with a deadly seriousness and you cannot play this material with the same matter of fact seriousness as a show like The West Wing or NYPD Blue. This only serves to ensure that the dullness is that much duller. Could you imagine what Knight Rider would have been like if it played itself as straight as Law & Order? For God's sake, even Thunder in Paradise had a sense of humor!

STEEL JUSTICE is not bad in the usual sense. It's not bad in the same way something like HOUSE OF THE DEAD or (shudder) SANTA WITH MUSCLES is bad. It's bad in the sense that you can't believe how incredibly lame this all is. Lame is the opportune word here. The movie is the epitome of lame. Everything about it is lame. The plot is lame. The characters are lame. The dialogue is lame. The action - what little there is - is lame. The direction is lame. The villain… Oh my God! The villain! I haven't told you about the villain yet.

Our villain is known as "The Colonel", who may very well be the single lamest villain I've ever seen in any movie or television show. He's played by one of those character actors you see in a movie and think, "I've seen that guy in something else, but I can't remember what it was." He's also one of those character actors that should never ever be cast as the main villain, unless perhaps it's one of those family comedies that star the likes of Hulk Hogan or the late Jim Varney. He could probably pass for one of the stooges of the main villain; in fact, I do believe I've seen this actor in that kind of role before, but never as the primary bad guy, unless it's a comedy. Here he's been cast as a serious villain and it just does not work at all. It's obvious they were trying to make The Colonel a sort of Sydney Greenstreet-type crime boss, but this character actor they've hired doesn't have an ounce of menace in his portly body and his voice is too high-pitched and whiny to be menacing. In fact, if they just changed his clothing he could pass for "The Dragon" from that episode of Turbo Teen I reviewed earlier this year. And when the main villain in your action adventure movie is a futuristic, gun-running, crime lord that looks like a younger Larry "Bud" Melman, speaks in a nasally, effeminate voice, and is constantly shown hugging and making out with the Taco Bell Chihuahua…

LAME!!!

I cannot fully stress the lameness of it all.

The big bust at the beginning doesn't go as planned leading to an uninspired rooftop foot chase and shootout where Nash demonstrates a disregard for his own well being, a fact that is never played upon again in the film.

LAME!!!

The Colonel is preparing for a major arms dealing involving a shipment of rocket launchers. He and another crony test fire the weapon - something they are shown doing twice in this movie proving that the dialogue isn't the only thing that gets repeated for no reason - by blowing up a random truck driving down the street. Despite only causing a minor explosion that doesn't even fully detonate the back of the truck, the police are shown investigating the attack in the very next scene where the truck is now suddenly a huge pile of melted scrap. Uh, say what? Huh? For crying out loud, did the The Colonel come back later and drop some napalm on it?

LAME!!!

When Nash is not working the beat or dreaming in prologues, he's reliving his son's death over and over and over and over. And when he's at home and not dreaming in prologues or reliving his son's death over and over and over and over, he's either watching home movies of his son, all of which revolve around the two of them building that toy robot dinosaur. When he's not staring at a home movie of the two of them building that toy robot dinosaur, he's staring at the toy robot dinosaur, which he keeps in the closet so that it's nearby whenever he needs the inspiration for another flashback.

Oddly enough, the toy robot dinosaur that his son named Robosaurus (What a coincidence!) begins developing a mind of its own, mostly just wheeling around the apartment and getting in the way. Nash doesn't really seem to think this is all that odd, treating it as more of an amusing nuisance. It's also never explained how or why the toy Robosaurus has suddenly developed a mind of its own. The saga of the sentient toy culminates with a staggeringly stupid sequence where one of The Colonel's henchmen breaks into Nash's apartment and plants a time bomb while the cop is asleep in bed experiencing his ten millionth dream sequence. The bomb just happens to be in grabbing range of the little Robosaurus, who promptly snatches it up, takes it to the window, and pitches it out to safely detonate on the usually crowded streets of Dullsville. Nash has been saved, collateral damage is never discussed, and the lameness goes on.

LAME!!!

Believe it or not, both R. Lee Ermey and Joan Chen turn up in tiny roles. Sporting the worst Moe Howard hairdo and Ronald Reagan dye job I've ever seen, Ermey is supposed to be the Chief of Police or something like that. Despite being a name actor and a rather colorful one to boot and was once nominated for an Oscar, he has all of about 45 seconds of screen time where he promptly contributes nothing whatsoever to the story.

LAME!!!

Joan Chen appears in like two scenes and I still have no idea what purpose she served other than hinting at possibly being a future love interest for Nash. There's a brief dinner scene where she appears to be on a date with Nash, but nothing comes of it. That's probably because he spends most of this short scene talking about his dead son, which I'm fairly certain is always going to be a major downer when you're supposed to be on a date. He then just up and abandons her at the table after he spots the mysterious man from his dreams playing saxophone on stage in the club. What in the bloody hell were R. Lee Ermey and Joan Chen doing in this movie in such do nothing throwaway roles?

LAME!!!

Let's talk about our friendly neighborhood time traveler. I've taken too long getting around to him.

The guy keeps invading Nash's dreams as the movie progresses while also popping up on the streets keeping an eye on Nash from a distance. Finally, Nash confronts the guy, who introduces himself as Jeremiah J. Jonas Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt or whatever the hell his overly long and utterly preposterous name was. Note to all time traveling mystics reading this right now: If you want people to believe you then don't immediately begin rambling like a schizophrenic hobo the moment someone starts talking to you. This is just common sense advice. Despite the fact that this guy looks exactly like the man from his dreams and is repeating much of the same mumbo jumbo from his dreams, Nash doesn't hesitate to have him incarcerated. That's what he gets for raving like a loon.

Nash goes on to have yet another dream reliving his son's death and once again Triple J turns up to motion for Nash to look to his left where he sees the logo on a truck involved in the hit. He wakes up and now finally has a lead to go on. Of course, the logo on the truck belong to the company The Colonel uses as a front for his gunrunning and the two have a verbal confrontation that only succeeds in showing us that in the battle of absolute lameness, these two are hopelessly deadlocked.

It also here that The Colonel explains to us why he is known as The Colonel. Answer: Because that's that the nickname he was given by others. So there!

LAME!!!

Nash comes to believe the mysterious Jeremiah J. Jonas may not be crazy after all and faster than you can say "There can be only one!" JJJ starts playing Ramirez to Nash's MacCleod. Well, not exactly. All this really leads to are a series of yawn-inducing discussions about "the gift" Nash possesses and how Jonas sought him out through time and space. These conversations just keep repeating the same material over and over and never really give us any more details on this superpower other than what was already covered in the opening prologue. At no point in these discussions do they ever even attempt to explain the origins of "the gift", why Nash possesses it, exactly where Jonas hails form, how he's able to travel through time, how he knows who has this power, or what the hell was going through the minds of the people responsible for making this awful movie.

LAME!!!

Not happy that Nash is onto him again, The Colonel sends this scrawny psycho twerp to kill Nash. His method of murder - hit and run. Of course, he misses Nash. However, he manages to turn his female partner into roadkill, thus justifying her existence in the movie. The Colonel's thugs really need to stop using motor vehicles when performing assassinations because they never seem capable of getting the right target. Although, based on what we've seen so far, I think the hitman should have tried blasting Nash with a rocket launcher instead. That way even if they only slightly wounded him, by the time the cops arrive he'd be nothing but a smoldering skeleton.

LAME!!!

As hard as it may be to believe, these are the highlights of the film from the opening five minutes up until the hour and twenty-minute mark when the full scale Robosaurus finally appears. Like I said...

NOTHING HAPPENS!!!

Watching STEEL JUSTICE I couldn't help but be reminded of the movie FUTURE WAR, which many of you may remember from its appearance on MST3K during its final season on the Sci-Fi Channel. That movie also had a premise that was guaranteed to fail. I mean we're talking about a movie that dealt with Borg-like aliens using cheap-looking dinosaur puppets to hunt down a marble mouthed, kickboxing, extraterrestrial refugee that goes on the run with an ex-junkie hooker turned wannabe nun. And that movie also featured a completely unnecessary voiceover narrative too. Yet I'm still willing to bet one could watch FUTURE WAR and laugh at it even without the help of Mike and the Bots. As bad as it was, things actually happened worth watching even if you what you were watching was so bad it was unintentionally funny. The same cannot be said for STEEL JUSTICE. Do you realize that I'm telling you that FUTURE WAR is actually a more entertaining movie than this? Can you possibly fathom what that says about this film? I simply cannot comprehend how any producer in their right mind could have read this script and believe it would make an entertaining movie let alone one that would wet the audience's appetite for more in the form of a weekly television series. Part of me wonders if they originally started out with a script for just an ordinary hour-long pilot, which would have clocked in around 45 minutes in length sans commercials, but then the order came down to make it as a feature length pilot and thus they had to pad it to double that length and did so by tossing in numerous scenes that go absolutely nowhere, are loaded with repetitive dialogue, and feature dream sequences out the wazoos. Even at a shortened length it would still be atrocious but at least it would be shorter and possibly more watchable. As it stands, STEEL JUSTICE is simply not fit for human eyes.

Finally, after an hour and 20 minutes of achieving lameness on a spiritual level, the whole reason why this movie exists gets some damn screen time. You'd think the much-delayed appearance of Robosaurus would provide some entertainment value. You would think wrong. Oh sure, watching it scare the crap out of the bad guys is entertaining, but only in comparison to the nothing happening first two-thirds of this dreadful movie. Let me repeat something I said earlier about Robosaurus. It's a big, slow, clunky moving monstrosity. There's only so much you can do with this thing and keep in mind this was made before CGI became commonplace.

Nash has learned of a major arms deal The Colonel is orchestrating. He and Jonas arrive on the scene and see heavily armed thugs standing guard in front of the building, which has a huge spacious area in front of it except for a gimpy chain link fence and a small guard tower that looks like it was built for a children's playground. Boy, that wide open area will really come in real handy if a humongous motorized dinosaur were to show up.

Amazingly, yet another discussion of "the gift" ensues only this time Jonas tells him to actually try using it. Hey, might as well, there's only about 10 minutes left in the movie. Jonas tells Nash to focus on the one thing his son loved more than anything else. This leads to the revelation that the Robosaurus toy is the key to unlocking his power because that is the thing his son loved the most.

Really? The one thing that young Davey Nash loved more than anything else in the world is that dang toy robot dinosaur? What does this say about David Nash that he doesn't even get top billing in his son's affection? Alright, maybe Jonas meant that David should focus on the non-parental flesh and blood thing his son loved more than anything else, but he did not specify that so I have no choice but to declare David Nash's single parenting an abysmal failure.

Jonas tells David to concentrate on the image of the toy dinosaur and that "the gift" is found "in the underused part of the brain where dreams come from." Not to be confused with the unused part of the brain where this screenplay came from.

Nash closes his eyes and starts making the same orgasm face he usually makes when he's dreaming in this movie and just as before, there is no climax. Jonas is disappointed and deduces that Nash must need a little extra incentive to get the power to activate. So Jonas puts himself in harms way by approaching the armed guards, including the psycho twerp, and annoys them until the psycho twerp decides to kill him. Nash starts making faces accompanied by superimposed images of the toy robot and flashes of light. This goes on for nearly a minute, which doesn't sound all that long unless you consider the psycho twerp has been standing there with a shotgun up to Jonas' head the whole time. Logically speaking, Jonas should already be dead and his body being tossed into a dumpster about now. That psycho twerp should be in the Guiness Book of World Records for longest hesitating movie villain. On top of that, we're supposed to believe that the meree possibility of Jonas getting murdered would be stressful enough to Nash that he would suddenly be able to be unlock his power, but I'm just no buying that at all. And yet it works. Nash finally opens his eyes and before him is his son's toy robot dinosaur, now a 40-foot, flame-snorting, cybernetic dragon. As Robosaurus rolls towards the building, the armed thugs are terrified, Jonas smiles, and Nash really looks like he could use a cigarette.

How fortunate is it for David Nash that the thing his son loved most was a toy that would prove to be perfectly suited for super-sizing into an instrument for justice? Man, he really lucked out there. Just imagine, what if instead of the toy Robosaurus his son's most beloved possession had been a Hokey Pokey Elmo doll? Would a 40-foot Elmo have appeared before Nash ready to crush this gang of armed thugs while singing and dancing the hokey pokey? Would they have renamed the movie PLUSH JUSTICE? Or what if his favorite item had been his baseball glove? Would a giant baseball glove have appeared and started crawling around, capturing bad guys in its mitt? Or what if he really loved the game Uno Attack? Would a 40-foot UNO card dispenser have materialized and begun firing giant, possibly flaming, UNO cards that decapitate the bad guys? Or what if Nash's kid was a devout Christian? Would a 40-foot, flame-snorting Jesus have suddenly appeared to vanquish the forces of lawlessness? Actually, all of that might have proven to be more amusing. Robosaurus may be cool looking but it's also severely limited in what it can do, as you'll be able to tell from reading the following breakdown of the film's less than thrilling final showdown. Sit back and envision the non-excitement.

The Colonel's heavily armed goons runaway while firing at the seemingly unstoppable Robosaurus.

Robosaurus snorts flames into the air as it continues to approach, completely unphased by the gunfire. The heavily armed goons continue to shoot at it as they fallback.

Robosaurus snorts flames into the air as it knocks down a fence and continues to approach. The heavily armed goons continue to shoot at it as they fallback.

Robosaurus snorts flames into the air as it knocks over that dinky guard tower and continues to approach. The heavily armed goons continue to shoot at it as they fallback.

Nash follows closely behind with his shotgun, which he will never have to use or even point at anyone.

Robosaurus snorts flames into the air as it continues to approach. The heavily armed goons continue to waste ammo while running away from it. You'd think it would become obvious by now that bullets aren't going to stop it.

Running out of room to fallback to, the heavily armed goons scatter to either side while still firing at the flame-snorting Robosaurus. Moments later, they are never seen or heard from again, seemingly vanishing into thin air.

The bad guys inside the building begin to stir. Despite being arms dealers, no one ever thinks of trying to use some of the heavy weaponry they have stockpiled in the building on the robo dino.

Robosaurus rolls right up to the building as close as it can and rams one of its giant mechanical claws through a window knocking an armed goon over a second story railing. The goon's DNA must have been composed of nitroglycerine as his impact triggers an explosion.

A series of unexplained explosions begin to go off causing the bad guys to begin running around in a state of panic. Again, nobody bothers to try shooting at it with a rocket launcher or something. What exactly was the point of wasting time showing us the kind of damage those rockets could do earlier if they're never used in the finale? Is the actual Robosaurus so delicate that it couldn't even handle have some pyrotechnic used on it for one quick shot?

The Colonel, who waddles like The Penguin, escapes through a back alley with Nash in pursuit.

Robosaurus nabs that psycho twerp pulls him out of the window dangling by his jacked. Apparently, he must ran into the building, climbed the stairs, went right up to that second floor window, and decided to stand in front of the giant claw with his back turned.

Nash continues to pursue The Colonel, who continues to waddle like The Penguin.

Jonas taunts the dangling psycho twerp, who is forced to apologize to him or else get dropped from high in the air by Robosaurus. The psycho twerp apologizes, but what becomes of him is anyone's guess as he is never seen or heard from again.

The Colonel, who is still waddling like The Penguin, runs out into traffic and carjacks an old, large, beat up limo just as Nash emerges from the back alley.

The Colonel begins swerving through traffic for about 15 yards only to find Robosaurus rolling right into his path. Hey, how'd it get there so fast? Terrified people run screaming from the scene as if Godzilla were attacking Tokyo. Nash just stands there and watches dispassionately.

The car comes to a halt and The Colonel just sits there and screams hysterically while looking up at Robosaurus, which is just standing there motionless snorting fire into the air.

All of a sudden, Robosaurus is shown leaning down and moving forward with its claws open scooping the car up like a forklift. I'm guessing they didn't actually show Robosaurus moving into this position because it would have taken the robot way too long to do so. Oh, and The Colonel continues to do nothing but sit there screaming hysterically.

Robosaurus is suddenly shown standing upright again as it lifts up the car lightly crushing the engine and trunk sections of the car with its claws. It then lightly bites into the passenger side of the vehicle. All the while, The Colonel is leaning his head out of the driver side window screaming hysterically.

It appears as if Robosaurus is supposed to be lightly roasting the rooftop with its flames but from the way its shot the flames appear to be a few feet above the roof and not actually touching it. And yet The Colonel continues to scream hysterically.

Finally, Robosaurus clumsily drops the car. It drops awkwardly to the ground with more of a mild thud than any sort of hard impact. Nonetheless, the trunk section explodes on impact. The trunk must have been loaded with the same phantom explosive that caused the trunk of that car that landed in the swimming pool in THE LAST BOY SCOUT to detonate. As the car burns, Robosaurus poses over the smoking wreckage and snorts flames into the air. Dave continues to just stand there watching the proceedings dispassionately. Moments later, there's a flash of light and Robosaurus is gone, having returned to that underused part of the brain where dreams come from.

Wait a minute... Or was Nash using the power that lurks in the underused part of his brain where dreams come from to teleport the toy Robosaurus from his apartment to wherever he needs it and transforms it into a 40-foot flame-snorting robot in the process? They really haven't done a good job clarifying that. They haven't done a good job clarifying anything. I'm just going to go with the former and say it has returned to his mind because if it isn't then when he gets home he's going to find a burnt out limo with the charbroiled corpse of The Colonel in his living room.

For reasons that I am 100% positive even the screenwriter could never ever adequately explain, the wreckage of the car containing the limo vanishes right along with Robosaurus. This means that not only does this guy have a giant robot dinosaur lurking within the nether regions of his psyche; he's also now using it as a morgue for those that Robosaurus has killed in the name of justice. STEEL JUSTICE!!!

Sorry. I couldn't resist.

Why on earth did that wreckage with The Colonel's honey roasted carcass disappear with Robosaurus? This is one of those mind-boggling moments that really deserves an explanation of some kind. But we ain't gettin' one! Nope! Uh, uh! Time to just move on.

As soon as Robosaurus and The Colonel's deathmobile vanish, Jonas comes walking towards Nash, who still just stands there blank stare and all. Jonas congratulates him on a job well done.

Next thing you know it's daylight and the police are everywhere investigating the previous night's happenings. Nash talks to his non-R. Lee Ermey supervisor, who asks him how he got the tip about this arms deal and how he was able to single handedly thwart a small army of heavily armed goons. Nash kind of ducks the question with quick quips about a hot tip from an informer and good police work. Nash gets the guy to believe there was a gang war and he arrived just in time to mop up the crime scene. This explanation satisfies the supervisor, who is clearly the dumbest man to ever be issued a police badge. Are we supposed to believe that all these guys were so terrified by the big robot dinosaur that they finally tossed down their guns and sat around waiting for the police to arrive so they could be taken to the safe confines of jail? Good lord!

And it still isn't over yet. There's still time for one final place kick to the cerebrum.

The supervisor then asks Nash what he thought of all the "stories" about a giant mechanical monster. Nash shrugs it off as silly talk. The supervisor, though still puzzled, concurs.

Yeah, that's it! Dozens of witnesses running for their lives as giant flame-shooting robot comes rolling down the street must have been hallucinating. Dozens of criminals they arrested, all of who are telling the same story of being attacked by a giant flame-shooting robot must be lying for no particular reason.

No, nothing to see here, folks! Just swamp gas! Please move along!

My God, this screenplay doesn't just insult your intelligence, no, it insults it, gives it a wedgie, dunks its head in a toilet, and then grabs its arm and starts making it hit itself in the face while saying, "stop hitting yourself" over and over. That's how I was feeling by the time this movie was over - like I had spent an hour and a half punching myself in the head.

Nash then walks over to Jonas, who tells him that he's decided to stick around in this time for a while because he has more to teach Nash about using his "gift". The two go walking off into the sunset followed by a fade to the toy Robosaurus in Nash's apartment and then the unparalled lameness that is STEEL JUSTICE finally comes to an end.

And somewhere in the underused part of David Nash's brain where his dreams come from lurks a 40-foot robot dinosaur and a crushed car containing the honey roasted corpse of a dead fat man. That's the kind of thing that's guaranteed to wreak havoc on one's psyche, much like watching this movie from beginning to end.

$10 million? $10 million? This crap cost $10 million and keep in mind that we're talking about $10 million in 1992 funds when $10 million went a lot further than it does today. I read the blurb on the Robosaurus website about this film's budget was dumbfounded. This movie looks like it cost only slightly more than your average Don "The Dragon" Wilson flick. What the hell could they have possibly spent $10 million on? Did they pay a fortune for all the world-weary looking cars in the film? Did they spend millions trucking in junk to dump around one of the Universal Studios backlots where this crapfest was filmed? Did Joan Chen and R. Lee Ermey demand such high price tags for their combined screen time of less than five minutes? Does Robosaurus guzzle millions of dollars worth of gas, oil, and propane in a single night of use? Personally, I think that if this thing really did cost $10 million then STEEL JUSTICE was either being produced as a tax shelter (although if that were the case it most likely would have been shot in Canada instead) or somebody in an executive position was either embezzling funds from the production or using the production as a front in order to embezzle from the network itself. There is absolutely no way anyone could ever convince me that this film really did cost that much money. If it did, then this is a case of the worst money management I have ever seen. I wanna see the books on this thing.

I don't know what is harder to believe - that this movie actually cost $10 million to produce or that it actually got produced and aired on network television. It's hard to believe a script this bad got out of the development stage to begin with but this movie had to have been screened in advance by NBC television execs and they had to know this was one of the worst things they had ever seen. Think about all the scripts out there in Hollywood that never get financed. Think about all the rejected television pilots that did get filmed but never actually got any sort of public broadcasting. Now think about everything you've read hear and realize that this not only got filmed but it aired in primetime on the network that I do believe was #1 at the time.

Worst of all, I actually paid somebody $25 for a copy of this awful, awful, awful movie. I found out the hard way why this film is so very hard to come by.

And remember, STEEL JUSTICE was meant to be a pilot for a weekly network program. It simply boggles the mind. Would every week have seen David Nash pursuing some criminal and in the last 10 minutes he conjures Robosaurus, which then proceeds to take out the bad guy and then returns to David's subconscious, possibly along with the villain's corpse. All the while, Jonas would be prattling on with these lame anecdotes about his dealings with some of history's most famous figures. Is that what they had in mind? Honestly, what else could they have done with this pathetic premise?

Indeed. What could they have done? Hmmm...

Well, I thought about that prospect. What if it had become a weekly television show? What if...? Let's imagine for a moment that NBC did indeed pick up STEEL JUSTICE as a weekly television series. Using my vast knowledge of crappy network television produced action adventure/sci-fi/cop program plot devices; knowledge that I gained through much personal viewing experience (a fact I'm not especially proud of), I sat down and conceptualized what a full 23-episode season run of the STEEL JUSTICE TV series would have been like. If it had ever existed, it would have most likely debuted in the Fall of 1992 and I mapped the show out with that fact in mind. So here it is, submitted for your approval, the season that never was and never should have been of Steel Justice: The Series.

STEEL JUSTICE: THE SERIES
OFFICIAL EPISODE GUIDE

EPISODE 1.01 - Nash tracks a husband and wife team of monster truck driving criminals (special guest stars Randall "Tex" Cobb and Judy Landers) culminating in a metal crushing showdown with Robosaurus. Meanwhile, Jonas wins a bundle on a TV quiz show before losing it all by answering a historical question incorrectly despite insisting he was there and knows what really happened.

EPISODE 1.02 - The Colonel's crazed psycho twerp escapes from prison and holds the Mayor of Dullsville (special guest star Chris Lemmon) hostage unless Robosaurus steps into a car crusher to be destroyed. Also, R. Lee Ermey returns for a 30 second cameo.

EPISODE 1.03 - A violent gang leader (special guest star Stoney Jackson) leads a street gang in stealing an experimental death ray that they then use to blackmail the city with until Nash and Robosaurus save the day. Also, Nash romances a plucky female reporter (special guest star Heather Thomas) investigating the Robosaurus sightings and Jonas discovers the joy of dog racing.

EPISODE 1.04 - While using Robosaurus to take out some bad guys, Nash gets conked on the head and slips into a coma. Robosaurus is stuck in the real world and the police try to destroy it. Meanwhile, Nash is being held captive in his own mind by the charred remains of The Colonel. Jonas must use his magic mojo to enter Nash's unconscious mind and rescue him.

EPISODE 1.05 - An obnoxious radio talk show host (special guest star Sherman Hemsley) labels Robosaurus a menace to society. After Nash uses Robosaurus to save him from a psychotic Neo Nazi (special guest star Richard Lynch), the talk show host becomes Robosaurus' #1 fan. Meanwhile, Jonas uses his first-hand accounts witnessing the Civil War and Civil Rights Movement to lecture a group of street kids on the importance of racial tolerance.

EPISODE 1.06 - Nash must use Robosaurus to thwart some corrupt cops led by his former mentor (special guest star Tom Wopat) planning a major armored car heist. Also, Jonas gets hooked on video poker.

EPISODE 1.07 - Nash romances a pop singer (special guest star Vanity) while protecting her from a crazed stalker (special guest star Willie Aames). In the end, Robosaurus crushes the stalker in a tour bus and Jonas gets a chance to jam on-stage with special musical guest star Clarence Clemmons.

EPISODE 1.08 - Halloween episode where an evil entity takes possession of Nash and uses Robosaurus to wreak havoc. Jonas joins forces with an old priest (special guest star Meadowlark Lemmon) to exercise the demon from Nash's body. Also, R. Lee Ermey appears for 46 seconds on a date with special guest star Elvira.

EPISODE 1.09 - A scheming vixen (special guest star Morgan Fairchild) kidnaps Jonas and blackmails Nash into using Robosaurus for her evil bidding. Joan Chen returns briefly and rescue Nash before completely disappearing again.

EPISODE 1.10/1.11 - Special two part episode where a power mad businessman (special guest star Marc Singer) discovers the truth about Robosaurus and injects Nash with a dream suppressing drug preventing him from being able to summon Robosaurus just as he unveils his master plan to takeover Dullsville. Also, R. Lee Ermey appears in both episodes for a combined total of 1 minute 13 seconds.

EPISODE 1.12 - Christmas episode where Nash uses Robosaurus to save an orphanage from a greedy developer (special guest star Joe Piscopo) who will stop at nothing to run them off their property. Also, Jonas plays Santa Claus to the children using money he won from playing video poker.

EPISODE 1.13 - An evil time traveler (special guest star James Hong) arrives in Dullsville, finds a lowlife criminal (special guest star Jackie Earl Haley) also possessing the gift, and helps him to conjure up an evil goateed Robosaurus.

EPISODE 1.14 - A disfigured weapons designer (special guest star "Rowdy" Roddy Piper) builds a robotic battlesuit and goes on a rampage against government installations in Dullsville. Robosaurus actually proves to be outmatched, but fortunately Nash gets the madman's terminally ill child to convince him to surrender.

EPISODE 1.15 - Jonas finds romance with a sassy social worker (special guest star Marla Gibbs) whose life is in danger after discovering that a mad scientist (special guest star Larry Drake) is kidnapping the homeless and turning them into mindless zombie assassins. Nash and Robosaurus come to the rescue. Episode also features special cameo appearances by Mr. T, Fred "Rerun" Berry", Jimmy Walker, Emmanuelle Lewis, Willie Tyler & Lester, Todd Bridges, and William "The Refrigerator" Perry.

EPISODE 1.16 - Nash and Jonas have to protect an obnoxious, fraidy cat accountant (special guest star Curtis "Booger" Armstrong), who is about to testify against a major crime syndicate led by a sinister politician (special guest star Joseph Camponella). Also, R. Lee Ermey returns for a 42 second cameo.

EPISODE 1.17 - The evil time traveler returns (special guest star James Hong) to settle the score by zapping our heroes to ancient China where Nash romances a beautiful Chinese peasant that looks just like Joan Chen (special guest star Joan Chen) while Robosaurus is used to save her village from a horde of Mongols and Jonas has it out with his old rival once and for all before returning to the future.

EPISODE 1.18 - A very special episode no parent should miss where R. Lee Ermey accidentally gets himself trapped inside an old refrigerator that was just sitting around and Robosaurus has to rescue him before its too late.

EPISODE 1.19 - An alien arms dealer (special guest star Jesse "The Body" Ventura) lands on Earth looking to sell an extraterrestrial doomsday device to Dullsville's highest bidder. In the end, Robosaurus forces the alien to flee the planet, but the doomsday device unknowingly gets left behind in a garbage dumpster. Meanwhile, Nash gets a visit from his bickering grandparents (special guest stars Ruth Buzzi and Charles Nelson Reilly).

EPISODE 1.20 - In a tongue-in-cheek episode, two of Nash's co-workers - the black cop that dresses like Sonny Crockett and the Latino cop with virtually no dialogue - come to believe that Nash has something to do with Robosaurus and try to prove it through a series of bumbling misadventures. Meanwhile, the toy Robosaurus leaves the apartment and sets out to rescue some neighborhood canines from the pound run by an evil dogcatcher (special guest star Ed Begley Jr).

EPISODE 1.21 - It's off to the beach where Nash and Robosaurus have to thwart drug smuggling hovercraft pilots (special guest stars Adrian Zmed and Parker Stevenson). Meanwhile, Jonas is introduced to the wonders of boogie boarding. Plus, special musical guest stars Buckner & Garcia perform their timeless classic "Pac-Man Fever".

EPISODE 1.22/1.23 - In the two part season finale, the alien doomsday device turns up again in the hands of a paranoid schizophrenic garbageman (special guest star Garrett Morris), who thinks wiping out Dullsville is the only way to defeat the imaginary forces he believes are out to get him. Meanwhile, a rift opens in time and space that would allow Nash to travel back and prevent his son's murder, but doing so will change history ensuring he never meets Jonas or gains the power to use Robosaurus, which will be needed to save Dullsville from certain destruction. Plus, an elder time traveler (special guest star Dick Van Patten) arrives to order Jonas to return home to his own time. What decisions will they make?

I won't it matter what decisions they make because the show gets canned after only one season and that's assuming it would even last a full season before getting yanked from the schedule. I'd be amazed if this show would have even aired six episodes before getting axed.

As much as I've prattled on trying to truly convey what a complete waste STEEL JUSTICE is, the truth is that words cannot accurately describe just how dull, witless, unimaginative, disjointed, pointless, and downright lame it really is. Earlier I called STEEL JUSTICE the epitome of lame. I must correct myself here. STEEL JUSTICE is not the epitome of lame. It is lame itself. STEEL JUSTICE is so lame it actually achieves metaphysical lameness.

IN MEMORY OF THE COLONEL
HE MAY BY GONE BUT HIS LAMENESS WILL GO ON FOREVER... IN THE UNDERUSED PART OF DAVID NASH'S BRAIN WHERE DREAMS COME FROM

MY NAME IS SCOTT FOY AND I PAID TO SEE
AMERICAN CYBORG: STEEL WARRIOR