Plant 9 From Outer Space

It's been a while since I commented on the impending enslavement of humans by our impending robot overlords (just a matter of time, really), but via Gizmodo, here is evidence that they will infiltrate out lives disguised as houseplants:

plants fixed with a set of these robotic legs would actually be able to walk around and find the light as it moves around the room. So, despite your best efforts to kill them, robo-plants will be stayin' alive

Creepy animation at the link.

Press the Meat

Now, no one likes a good burger more than I do. Well, except for my wife. And some of her friends. Oh, yes, and Captain Johnson. Come to think of it, most people like a good burger more than I do...but this is just silly, and not half nauseating:

It took Brad Sciullo 4 hours and 39 minutes to finish a marathon. A meat marathon, that is. The 5-foot-11, 180-pound western Pennsylvania chef is the first person to eat a monstrosity called the Beer Barrel Belly Bruiser: a 15-pound burger with toppings and a bun that brought the total weight to 20.2 pounds.

The mountain of beef is the product of Denny's Beer Barrel Pub, about 100 miles northeast of Pittsburgh in Clearfield.

I hope one of the prizes was a defibrillator.

I Was Meant for the Stage

I'll post in more detail about the Toastmasters District 53 Conference once I have fully recovered, but suffice to say, I did indeed win the Humorous Speech contest, and against some pretty stiff competition, I might add.

Here is a little travel advisory. If you ever get off the Mass Pike at Exit 2 and take Route 8 down into Connecticut and think to yourself, "Oh, I have at least a quarter tank of gas; surely there will be gas stations along the way" you would be very wrong. There isn't one for about 25 miles. Lovely scenery, though, and for a while it looked like I would be there to enjoy it for a very long time...

And what is it with New England highways and the complete lack of any kind of civilization? Jeepers.

Drood Review

Well, I shall be popping the champagne cork. No, not the Toastmasters speech contest, that's Saturday. Rather, last night I turned the last page of The Mystery of Edwin Drood, thus ending my 14-month project of reading all 15 of Charles Dickens' novels (in order) which, you may recall, began following my August 2007 visit to the Charles Dickens Museum in London. (And there was also the Charles Dickens walking tour Steven H. and I took last April.) I wanted to finish it within a year, but I got bogged down in Our Mutual Friend, which was rather like swimming across the Thames (appropriately). In retrospect, it wasn't so much that it was a bad book, but I think it had more to do with the fact that Penguin tried to save money on paper by printing the type really small (either that, or I need new glasses).

So, then, which was my favorite Dickens novel? Bleak House, by far. My least favorite? Probably The Old Curiosity Shop; Little Nell got on my nerves and I just wanted to slap her grandfather for 300 pages. I liked the evil dwarf, though.

In order, from favorite to least favorite, I would probably rank them:

1. Bleak House
2. Great Expectations
3. David Copperfield
4. Martin Chuzzlewit
5. Barnaby Rudge
6. Dombey and Son7. Little Dorritt
8. Nicholas Nickleby
9. The Pickwick Papers
10. A Tale of Two Cities
11. Our Mutual Friend
12. Hard Times
13. Oliver Twist
14. The Old Curiosity Shop

And since Dickens died exactly halfway through writing The Mystery of Edwin Drood (which I call The Mystery of Edw—), it's hard to know where to rank it, since the entire second half is missing. I would probably put it in the top 10. Anyway, that's the ranking now. I'm sure I shall reread them some day--but not for a while, though!

Great White Snark

Via the Big Picture, a funny list of "new stock market terms" that has apparently been circulating virally:

CEO --Chief Embezzlement Officer.

CFO-- Corporate Fraud Officer.

BULL MARKET -- A random market movement causing an investor to mistake himself for a financial genius.

BEAR MARKET -- A 6 to 18 month period when the kids get no allowance, the wife gets no jewelry, and the husband gets no sex.

VALUE INVESTING -- The art of buying low and selling lower.

P/E RATIO -- The percentage of investors wetting their pants as the market keeps crashing.

BROKER -- What my broker has made me.

STANDARD & POOR -- Your life in a nutshell.

STOCK ANALYST -- Idiot who just downgraded your stock.

STOCK SPLIT -- When your ex-wife and her lawyer split your assets equally between themselves.

FINANCIAL PLANNER -- A guy whose phone has been disconnected.

MARKET CORRECTION -- The day after you buy stocks.

CASH FLOW -- The movement your money makes as it disappears down the toilet.

YAHOO -- What you yell after selling it to some poor sucker for $240 per share.

WINDOWS -- What you jump out of when you're the sucker who bought Yahoo @ $240 per share.

INSTITUTIONAL INVESTOR -- Past year investor who's now locked up in a nuthouse.

PROFIT -- An archaic word no longer in use.

In Space, No One Can Hear You Snore

This week’s Mis-Treatment (formerly Silly Sci-Fi Summary) takes us to stormy Venus—and it is actually two movies in one, for double the pain.

Previous entries in this series are:

The Wasp Woman
The Horrors of Spider Island
The Atomic Brain
The Amazing Transparent Man
She Gods of Shark Reef
Moon of the Wolf
Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
Queen of the Amazons
The Incredible Petrified World

Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet (1965)
Auteur/Perpetrator: Curtis Harrington (credited as John Sebastian, but not the singer-songwriter who was in the Lovin’ Spoonful)
Star of Shame: Basil Rathbone
Monster(s): Guys in lizard suits; flying reptile puppets

In 1962, Soviet director Pavel Klushantsev made Planeta Bur (Planet of Storms), the tale of astronauts exploring a turbulent planet Venus. The original movie was purchased by Roger “I Can Make Any Movie for $99.95” Corman, who reedited it, changed the names of the actors to American-sounding names, and hired director Curtis Harrington to film a few extra scenes starring Basil Rathbone and Faith Domergue, and released it in the U.S. in 1965 as Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet. So if it seems like Rathbone (who appears only on a cheapo set that is supposed to be a moonbase) and Domergue (who sits alone in a spaceship with only her voluminous hair for company) seem like they are not in the same movie as the rest of the cast—well, they aren’t! As a result, all their interaction is done over the radio and they conveniently “lose radio contact” at opportune times, which explains why Basil Rathbone vanishes about halfway through the movie. (Hmm...he could star as Sherlock Holmes and try to find his character.) The result, which has a kind of What’s Up, Tiger Lily feel to it, is more like Planeta Bore.

The original Russian movie hopefully had better dialog than what was dubbed in, but the special effects are pretty cheesy. It’s also damn near impossible to figure out who anybody is—they all sound alike and in their space suits they all kind of look alike.

Judging by the quality of the print that was included in my science-fiction box set, this film was remastered, if by “remastered” you mean unwound from the reel, tied to the back of an ATV, and dragged through a gravel pit.

And we begin with the titles superimposed on some abstract paintings—kind of like bad Picasso. Our stars are Basil Rathbone and Faith Domergue, and she is really the only faith I have in this movie. I have to say, Faith Domergue would be great to have in bed—her droning monotone could cure the worst insomnia. Oh, and it was directed and written by “John Sebastian.” Hot town, summer in the city, indeed.

That done, we cut to the inky redness (huh?) of space. The narrator (there’s always a narrator in these movies) tells us, “The year is 2020.” (“2020: The Year of Perfect Vision.” There could be a movie in that. And it would probably be better than this one.) “The moon has been explored and colonized—and the next space goal is about to be reached.” Well, that’s because the defense sucks. “The first landing on the planet Venus by man.” Oh, that space goal; never mind. An international space agency has sent three ships—the Sirius, the Vega, and the Capella—the 300 million miles to Venus. I didn’t know Venus was that far away; the Sun is only 93 million miles away. Perhaps they shouldn’t have gone by way of Jupiter. And right off the bat there is trouble; the Capella is hit by a meteor and destroyed. Oops.

On the lunar base (Luna 7), Basil Rathbone (Dr. Hartman) is informed and he is not happy. It must have been Moriarty who did it.

Meanwhile, in the Russian footage—I mean, in the Sirius—everyone is green and pasty and they are despondent about the destruction of the Capella. “With a meteorite, there is no fair or unfair. You get hit...and die.” Throughout this movie, these guys are the gloomiest bunch of cosmonauts—I mean, astronauts I have ever seen.

Basil Rathbone calls the Sirius and informs them—and the Vega—that they are to stay in orbit around Venus and not do anything until the Asta (Nick and Nora Charles’ dog?) blasts off and arrives. They all start griping about having to wait. One of them—Andrei (is that his name?)—makes a noise that sounds like a duck quacking. Enough fowl language. Apparently, the original idea was to send down a robot to explore Venus—so why did they need three ships? Anyway, Andrei (?) says he can land on Venus himself and see more than a robot could. The other two are in agreement—but they wonder what Dr. Hartman would think. Oh, he’s not even in this movie so I wouldn’t worry about it. They then discuss the robot on the auxiliary craft. What auxiliary craft? It’s not even five minutes in and I’m confused already.

We then cut to another ship—the Asta? (The writing on the side is in Russian.) Close up of a balding man muttering “Awaken, John.” (It was a bold choice of the sound editor to have all the voiceover actors read their lines with marbles in their mouths.) John is the robot. Is John the best name for a robot? Then again, in Russian it would have been “Ivan,” which would have at least sounded a bit cooler.

The robot speaks in the halting, word-by-word manner we have come to associate with talking robots. “You must be extra precise,” the balding man says to John the robot. Aren’t robots usually precise? I mean, they have computerized brains so they probably don’t just guesstimate things. John is instructed to recalculate the landing details. Let me see if I get this: it will be bald guy, John, and “Sherman” on one ship (hopefully not going through Atlanta) and “Commander Lockhart, Walters, and Ferneau” (oh, that’s Andrei—I had to look this up online; it’s mumbled so incoherently that it takes some replaying and consulting IMDb to figure out who is who and where they are) on the other ship. That is, the guys on the Sirius. “The problem: land on Venus then return.” So why do they need three ships and five guys for this?

There is some random intercutting to some guy (I’m guessing Sherman?) and then to Faith Domergue (her character’s name is Marsha Evans) who for some reason is all alone on the Vega. Does she have cooties? The robot says something unintelligible and seems to think that it should be the one to stay behind. I thought that’s the only reason they brought the robot?

Marsha calls Basil Rathbone and reiterates that “Mumble mumble, Sherman, and robot will land in the auxiliary spacecraft.” Basil Rathbone puts his leg up, which is the only real blocking his scenes have. Marsha explains that she will keep the Vega in orbit to ensure the safe return of the Sirius with all men. But what about the auxiliary ship? Is that the Asta? No, wait: she says there is no need to wait for the arrival of the Asta. So...there were four ships? Where did the fourth one come from? I’m so confused. Help!

On a side note, Marsha’s hair helmet was specially designed by the space agency to store three days’ worth of air, food, and water. It can also be used as a flotation device in the event of a water landing.

Basil Rathbone then leans down to talk into the microphone. “Your plan is very logical.” It is? “But I am concerned about the psychological danger of you remaining alone too long on the Vega.” Well, why did they send her alone? Oy vega. And all the others are not exactly pictures of perfect mental health. Marsha says she’ll be fine, and Sherman’s voice chimes in and seconds it. “Don’t you know women are tougher than men?” Basil’s assistant (not Dr. Watson) then brings over a file folder and Basil consults it. He chuckles. “You’re quite right, Sherman.” They have data on this? So they have been arguing over how tough she is to not go down on the planet and just stay alone in the ship. Is that right? “I’ll call you again at 0400 hours,” she says. Four in the morning?

On the Sirius (I think), Lockhart (maybe?) is shaving while Walters (I think?) its in the bathroom eating. Can that be right? A voice comes over the radio telling Lockhart (?) that the Vega is calling. But the voice (a male voice) says that they just received permission to land, followed by the Sirius. But I thought they were the Sirius. Dah! Who are these people and what ship are they on? “Kern’s robot calculated the details.” Then maybe the robot isn’t being “extra precise.” Who’s Kern? Oh, I think he’s the balding guy. But wasn’t he on the auxiliary ship? But then is that the Sirius? I mean, let’s get serious.

They pan up and Andrei (?) has been watching them thoughtfully. “I’m ready, Skipper,” he says hesitantly. But wasn’t he Mr. Gung Ho a few minutes ago? Or was that yet a third movie? We pan down to Walters (?): “I’m with you also,” he says sadly. Why did they come if they’re so unexcited about the whole thing? Did they run out of Prozac?

Then Lockhart (?) says something that even after five replays doesn’t make any sense: “Sherman, make room for a spaceship.” Where? In his garage? “I’ll join you there....maybe. Good luck.” Then Sherman replies, “I’ll see you on Venus.” What the heck is going on?

There are clouds, which I guess is supposed to be Venus. Marsha rattles off some random numbers, while the folks in the other movie look at various instruments. Andrei (?) sees a red spot; “It could be Hades,” he is told. Um, yeah. Marsha then records her log, “We are gathering all possible data for our landing on Venus.” Hopefully the data includes who the heck is actually landing. The ultimate question: Is there life on Venus? The penultimate question: Who is landing?

Meanwhile, someone (Lockhart?) stares out the window, and says, dourly, “Unlikely, Marsha. That planet is a fire below us.” It is? “Is it a new world, or will it consume us all?” Jeepers, what a downer. Andrei (?) muses about the red spot.

Marsha tells them (on the Sirius) that Kern, Sherman, and “Automaton John” are ready to embark. Ah. “100 hours.” Huh? Someone’s voice (Lockhart’s?) comes over Marsha’s radio and wishes Kern and Sherman good luck, and expresses how envious he is that they will be the first humans to set foot on Venus. Whoever they are.

And they’re off. Apparently. Everyone watches the landing ship as it descends into white clouds. “I don’t like the looks of this.” We don’t actually see anyone in the landing ship; we just hear them over a variety of radios. In fact, the main loudspeaker in the Sirius could very well be the ship’s fourth crewmember. At any rate, it’s the only one I can conclusively identify.

Control is given to the robot who immediately screws things up. “This landing place is strange,” we hear. “This truly is a prehistoric planet.” What? Do uninhabited planets usually have some kind of recorded history? The landing ship lands and gives the Sirius their coordinates. Remember that: they know where the ship landed. They say there is water beneath them, and they are drifting. There is what sounds like the engines firing, and everyone starts getting worried. Marsha calls the Sirius in a panic. Is she sure she doesn’t mind being alone? Commander Lockhart (?) says that the landing ship’s signal was broken by the horizon, and he’s sure they’ve landed. Shouldn’t they have picked a landing spot where they could radio the other ships? Anyway, they can make contact again in an hour.

Sometime later, I think, Andrei (?) is sweating profusely and shouting “Kern! Sherman!” into the radio. “It’s hopeless,” he says. Even he doesn’t know who is supposed to have landed. The others start moping around despondently. Jeez, it’s like a shipful of Morrisseys. They decide to break orbit and go down to Venus to look for the others. Lockhart (?) calls Marsha and tells her the plan. “If something should happen, don’t you be afraid....You can help us best if you stay brave and keep faith.” Well, she is Faith, so that shouldn’t be too hard.

At that point, Basil Rathbone calls. “You should feel free to discontinue the expedition at your own discretion.” But then: “All of earth is awaiting the results of your expedition. Best of success.” What? Anyway, Lockhart (?) tells Basil the plan, such as it is, and adds, “My people are proud and privileged to be chosen members of this expedition.” Take that. “Well, my boys,” says Basil Rathbone to his assistant, “All we can do now is wait.” No shit, Sherlock. (Doh!)

The Sirius then lands...I think. Well, some ship lands. “We’re landed,” pronounces Andrei (?) dramatically, “Voila.” “Don’t begin celebrating yet.” On this ship? Not much chance of that. They stand up and start jumping around. “It sure feels strange to have weight.” Oh, the novelty wears off; trust me.

Outside, they see nothing but clouds and rocks. They turn on the “outside sound pickup” and hear an odd moaning noise, followed by a shrill, piercing whine. For some reason, they think it is a human sound. Lockhart (?) tells Andrei (?) to get his spacesuit on, as they are going outside. “I’ll be right behind you,” he replies. “That’ll be handy in case I slip. Now get popping.” OK, then. It is at this point that they all start turning into the Lockhorns and ragging on each other. Walters (?) says, “It’s 4.7 on oxygen.” What? “That’s pretty close,” says Lockhart (?). Huh? Are they speaking in code?

Outside, Andrei (?) starts walking slowly along the rocks. Meanwhile, Lockhart (?) and Walters (?) explain to each other that Marsha has just called and detected “radar movement,” which may be Sherman and the robot. As they call to Andrei (?) to return to the ship, he is attacked by a weird tentacled plant thing that kind of looks like a giant Outback Steakhouse Bloomin’ Onion. At the ship, they hear Andrei (?) making strange groaning noises. They run and free him from the Bloomin’ Onion. Andrei (?) denies having called out as he was being attacked.

Lockhart (?) calls Marsha and chides her for not having given them detailed information about where the others are. She laughs it off; “I was so glad to hear you made a safe landing, I forgot to tell you.” She’s sure she doesn’t mind being alone up there? They are “across the bay” from them. They couldn’t have landed closer? I mean, didn’t they establish earlier that the landing ship had given them their coordinates? “We’ll have to go by air. Is the car ready?” They apparently brought a hovercar. Here is more snippy dialogue:

“Will the car make it there?”
“It does or we walk.”
“I’d sure like a four-lane freeway.”
“You’d get a flat.”

What? But it’s a hovercar—oh, never mind.

They ask Marsha about the robot. “Apparently, they’re having some difficulty with him. He was loaded aboard the ship partially disassembled. I’m afraid they haven’t been able to reassemble him yet.” But wait— I thought the robot had landed the ship. (That could explain rather a lot.) And how is it that Marsha is suddenly in contact with Sherman, et al.? I thought everyone was worried because no one had heard from them?

You know, it was a bold choice for the screenwriter to have written the American dialogue without actually having watched the original movie.

We then cut to a partially assembled robot lumbering across the rocks toward Kern (?) who is holding its head. Meanwhile, they are attacked by small jumping lizard creatures. Sherman (?) shoots them while Kern (?) finishes putting the robot together.

Good grief: baby got back. That robot has a huge butt. It is not so much a robot as a robutt.

Meanwhile, Kern (?) and Sherman (?) engage in some witty banter of their own:

“I’m wondering if we should be here at all.”
“Why don’t you catch a bus and go home.”
“Don’t think I wouldn’t if I could find one.”

Ah, the great spirit of interplanetary exploration! The two of them and the robutt do...something involving ropes.

Meanwhile, the others are in the hovercar trundling along the rocks. They stop and see a brontosaurus grazing on a barren cliff (?). They get a blood sample from it and find it hysterical. I know I can never draw blood from a giant reptile without laughing my head off. Where did they get these guys?

Cut back to Kern (?) and Sherman (?), who are finished with the ropes. “We have very little oxygen left,” says one of them. Well, maybe they should stop ragging on each other and conserve it. Kern (?) hopes the others are looking for them. “Through this heat?” says Sherman (?). It’s hot? No one else has said anything about heat. One of them has a torn suit; “the infection is getting through.” Huh? “Maybe we should take some quinsulin.” “No, we’d have to rest after.” Ah. “Must...keep...moving,” says Kern (?) in a way that would out-Shatner Shatner. And they lumber onward, the robutt ahead of them. True, the enormous metal ass is a bit of a beacon, I’ll give it that. (One could so easily make a Bender/Futurama reference here. But I shan’t.)

In the hovercar, the trio hears the piercing whine. “That voice again,” says Andrei (?), excitedly. “Almost sounds like a girl.” “Or a monster,” adds Walters (?). It is a fine line, I guess. How long have they been in space? More witty banter:

“That’s a human sound.”
“There are no humans here.”
“We’re here.”

So is one of them making the noise?

Lockhart (?) muses about the possibility that other men have been to Venus before. Walters (?) is having none of it. Andrei (?) goes off excited by the idea that the voice belongs to a girl. Walters (?) then adds, “I can’t imagine anyone in their right mind exploring planet Venus.” Does he realize what he just said? I guess the space program isn’t all that selective about who it lets in.

Kern (?), Sherman (?), and the robutt find a waterfall. The robutt does not like the water and says it is in danger. Kern (?) tells it to look for shelter. The other two are as equally wussy. The robutt finds a cave, and Kern (?) and Sherman (?) stagger into it. They collapse. Kern (?) starts deliriously going on about how useful mathematics is, before he passes out. Sherman (?), meanwhile, deliriously repeats “Marsha, Marsha, Marsha.” What is he, Jan Brady all of a sudden?

“I await your order,” says the robutt. Well, I’m guessing it won’t be a Bloomin’ Onion.

Meanwhile, Marsha gets a call from...someone (not sure who). “Something’s wrong?” the voice says to her. “How can you tell?” “By the tone of your voice.” A remarkably perceptive man, as her voice has been a complete monotone throughout this movie. But she is upset that she can no longer make contact with Sherman. Oh, it was one of the guys in the hovercar. Then, they start losing contact with Marsha as a weird whooping noise drowns her out (it sounds like Curly from the Three Stooges is in Marsha’s ship).

They then make contact with John the robutt, who gives them their position. They then ask about Kern and Sherman. “They do not speak. They do not move.” Well, that’s extra precise, isn’t it? Are they dead? Sleeping? Watching this movie? Lockhart (?) then instructs the robutt to administer some kind of medicine to Kern and Sherman. This takes a while—“You must do this quickly”—and John drops what looks like a BreathSavers into the mouth of an unconscious man (is that a wise idea?), dumps water on his face, then closes his helmet. Oddly, this seems to help.

The hovercar is then attacked by a really goofy looking pterodactyl puppet. They call to Marsha who has suddenly changed clothes and is lying in bed reading. Huh? They try shooting down the puppet but it’s clumsy, awkward, lethargic flying makes it a tough target, and they end up diving into the water instead. Marsha has been watching, and freaks out when they vanish from her radar. She calls Basil Rathbone, “This is Marsha Evans,” she announces. “From the Spaceship Vega.” Oh, that Marsha. Not so elementary, I guess. Marsha admits that she has lost contact with everyone. She asks for instructions to land. (But she can’t—she’s not in the same movie.) Naturally, Basil forbids it (they only have the two sets), but conveniently they all lose radio contact. Marsha then has a voiceover moment where she deliberates what to do. Her droning monologue would make a good addition to the white noise machine I use when I have trouble sleeping.

To simulate the astronauts being under the water, the director placed an aquarium between the camera and the actors to give the illusion that they were underwater and surrounded by fish. Yeah. “That’s a shark’s tail,” says Walters (?), pointing to what looks like a minnow. “With the head of a dolphin,” adds Lockhart (?). No, it really isn’t. Andrei (?) bounces about and has a brief run-in with an octopus puppet. I want that puppet! Andrei (?) or Walters (?) finds a cave that he thinks was carved. He finds a weird rock that looks like one of those elephant ear pastries. Lockhart (?) then finds an idol, which Walters (?) thinks is just a petrified tree. Lockhart (?) pulls some seaweed away to reveal a ruby—and it does look like the eye of some kind of reptile bird thing. They all insist that there was some kind of civilization. “And I’ll bet there still is,” says Andrei (?).

Meanwhile, Kern (?), Sherman (?), and the robutt are fully recovered. Sherman (?) finds some kind of volcanic residue “that absorbs oxygen.” Huh? The robutt uses some ropes to pull down a large tree, which they then use to cross over a large chasm. Kern (?) asks the robutt to play some music as they cross, and it sounds like the only music the robutt has available is the collected works of Zamfir, Master of the Pan Flute.

Meanwhile, after their underwater odyssey, Lockhart (?), Walters (?), and Andrei (?) pull the hovercar onto the shore. Every part of the hovercar is perfectly dry except for the radio (of course). “I’ve tried everything,” says Walters (?). “Have you tried a long string and an oatmeal box?” Is he Wilford Brimley all of a sudden? Lockhart (?) is still obsessed with the idea that there is a civilization on the planet surreptitiously watching them. If there is, they must be bored out of their minds. “Let’s face it. They built a city that is now under the sea.” Oh, right: one reptile bird statue and suddenly it’s an underwater city? That’s a bit of a reach, even for this guy (whoever he is). The shrill whine starts up again. “Beautiful song and a beautiful girl,” says Andrei (?). No, and...probably no. Andrei (?) then goes off and talks to the rock he found.

Lockhart (?) and Walters (?) are then about to drive off without Andrei (?), but they beckon him into the hovercar so they can rag on him about being in love with a Venusian woman.

Meanwhile, Kern (?), Sherman (?), and John the robutt are hanging out on some rocks. Kern (?) says “That’s strange. It’s suddenly gotten dark.” Um, could it be night? “There’s an ash cloud above us.” Oh, it’s—HUH?! They look out and suddenly see an erupting volcano. They are amazed by it. “No one on Earth has seen such a sight.” Tell that to the people of Pompeii. Or Krakatoa. Or... They want to get a better vantage point, which can only mean one thing: they will be trapped by lava flows. They busily collect samples...while the whole time the robutt just stands there and does nothing. A fine analytical tool it is.

As the lava covers the only path to safety, they climb on top of the robutt, which then wades through the lava. Oh, so a few drops of water would destroy it, but it can walk through molten lava with no problem? Well, only for a short while: as the temperature approaches 7500 degrees, the robutt announces that it’s self-preservation mechanism will force it to toss off the extra weight, which it proceeds to do. Kern (?) wastes no time in instructing Sherman (?) to yank out the robutt’s self-preservation mechanism. He is unable, however, and John grabs Kern (?) and tries to chuck him into the lava. The robutt suddenly goes dead, just as the hovercar shows up and rescues them. They leave the poor robutt standing in the lava, until it slowly tips over and falls face forward into the lava. “I never thought I’d see your ugly face again,” says Sherman (?) to his rescuer. Good one. They should have saved the robot instead. To Kern’s (?’s) credit, he does gaze on the remains of the robutt sadly. “As he knew his destruction was imminent, he called my name.” But did he get it correct? In this movie, that’s no easy feat. It takes a long time for the lava to completely cover the robot’s giant ass.

The guys all loaf around as they fix the hovercar (or something). Walters (?) or maybe Sherman (?) shows the others a picture of his children, triplets whom he has named 1, 2, and 3. He jokes about it. OK. Lockhart (?) is still on the “there must be a civilization here” kick, using as evidence the fact that on Earth humans once lived in the water when the air was toxic—uh, when was this? (Yeah, and humans lived at the same time as dinosaurs. Uh huh.) Kern (?) brings up the lizard people. “They may look like lizards, but couldn’t they be people?” Wow, that’s like, so deep. “They saw the ship, then put on their lizard costumes, and jumped up and down to spook us away.” Actually, now that you mention it... They argue about this for a while. “Here, you two. Have some coffee and rest your voices.” Coffee?

Andrei (?) then launches into an internal monologue about the so-called “woman” he keeps hearing. One of the others jolts him out of his reverie by donning some vegetation and pretending to be the Bloomin’ Onion creature. They all laugh. Isn’t this over yet?

They take the hovercar back to the ship. There is a strange shot of the sky, which seems to portend something. Actually, it portends a montage erupting, featuring the dorks collecting samples amidst cutaways to decidedly Earth-based lizards perched on rocks, looking bored (I know how they feel). After the montage has abated, they arrive back at the ship. “I think we’ve done a job we can be proud of.” Not in this movie!

They unload all their crap from the hovercar. They suddenly realize there is a recording from Marsha on the automatic recorder. The spaceship has an answering machine? She monotonously explains how she is about to come down to the planet to rescue them, but then the tape runs out. Doh! “This is a mess now,” they say. “Marsha’s mistake was the worst. The worst.” Jeepers, heap shame on Marsha, why don’t you? “We’d better make a plan. A good one.” What’s the problem—they don’t want a girl in their clubhouse?

Outside, it starts raining.

Lockhart (?) has a plan. Some of them will blast off and look for Marsha. No word on what the others are supposed to do. Hang out on the planet? And, hey, I thought what’s his name—Kern or Sherman—was running out of oxygen an hour ago. Kind of a dopey plan, but it’s rendered moot when it turns out that the spot of land the ship is parked on is breaking up and is being turned into a new waterway by an onrush of water. They are apparently too heavy to take off, so they unload as much of the crap they just collected as they can. They somehow figure out that Marsha didn’t land after all, and they call her to see what happened. Wait...shouldn’t they have tried that before coming up with their dippy plan? It turns out she had actually made contact with Basil Rathbone and was talked out of landing.

Meanwhile, Andrei (?) takes out his elephant ear pastry, chips away at it, and reveals a carving of a woman’s face. There is life on Venus after all! He implores them not to leave, but they do anyway.

And as they ship disappears into the sky, we cut down to a still lake, where we can see in the water the reflection of a female form approaching and apparently making that piercing whine. Wow. Didn’t see that coming.

Come on, narrator, bring it on home: “And so man’s search for intelligent life on other planets and in other galaxies will continue.” And I think this movie proves what Eric Idle sang in Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life: “Pray that there’s intelligent life somewhere up in space, ’Cause there’s bugger all down here on Earth.”

The end.

It is to our credit as a species that we learn from the mistakes of others, so after this movie, I think I pretty much know what not to do if I were ever organizing an expedition to Venus (or any other planet). The first is to avoid taking three (or possibly four) separate ships. That’s like when a bunch of friends all try to meet up someplace and they all take separate cars. It’s no wonder that someone inevitably gets lost, and then someone has to go look for them, and then they get lost, and so on. Secondly, I’d avoid using a robot whose operating software was still in beta. No wonder things went awry. And if I were to put the robot in charge of landing the ship, I’d probably make sure its head was attached. Thirdly, while exploring the planet, I’d avoid standing at the base of an erupting volcano. (Plus, I’d also make sure I was familiar with Earth geology before becoming amazed by the same things on another planet.) Oh, and finally, I’d make sure everyone on the expedition wore one of those “Hello My Name Is” tags.

Word Press 2

This month's free monthly downloadable crossword puzzle now available here. As always, comments are appreciated.

Financial Bracketology

For those of us who can't wait until March, via The Big Picture, here is the financial equivalent of March Madness—in September. Pick your bracket! (Click image for larger version.)

Madonna of the Wasps

You could hear the wheels turning. In 1958, the movie The Fly was a big hit; audiences in the 1950s couldn’t get enough of human/insect mutants. Legions of writers, producers, and directors throughout Hollywood began brainstorming other species of insects they could merge with humans. Ants? Termites? Gnats? Mosquitoes? Monarch butterflies? Grasshoppers? And then it hit them...wasps! A human/wasp hybrid! It’s just so crazy, it...just...might...work. What director was brave enough to take up the challenge? Why, Roger Corman, of course. So, in 1959, every expense was spared to bring The Wasp Woman to the silver (or at the very least zinc) screen.

Welcome to this week's Silly Sci-Fi Summary. Previous entries in this series are:

The Horrors of Spider Island
The Atomic Brain
The Amazing Transparent Man
She Gods of Shark Reef
Moon of the Wolf
Santa Claus Conquers the Martians
Queen of the Amazons
The Incredible Petrified World

The Wasp Woman (1959)

Auteur/Perpetrator: Roger Corman
Star of Shame: Susan Cabot (who?)
Monster(s): Half-woman (bottom half)/half-wasp (top half); some day, I’d like to see a human/animal mutant divided lengthwise

The Wasp Woman is a Roger Corman film, so you know several things going into it: it will have been produced extremely cheaply, using community theater-quality sets, carpet remnants and black pipe cleaners that are meant to be the head of the wasp woman, and stock footage that only gives a vague sense of place. All that said, I actually kind of liked this one, but then after last week’s Horrors of Spider Island, perhaps even Plan 9 from Outer Space would seem like Citizen Kane. But it has that certain je ne sais quois that embodies really bad but fun cheesy movies.

By the way, last month Wasp Woman was released as part of Joel Hodgson’s Cinematic Titanic, a Mystery Science Theater 3000-like direct-to-DVD project that reunites MST3K alums Hodgson, Trace Beaulieu (Dr. Forrester/Crow), Frank Conniff (TV’s Frank), Josh Weinstein (Dr. Erhard/original voice of Tom Servo), and Mary Jo Pehl (Pearl Forrester). Cinematic Titanic is every bit as funny as prime MST3K, I hasten to add. Highly recommended.

Anyway, on to The Wasp Woman.

I suppose it would be picayune of me to point out right off the bat that under the main titles we see a swarm of bees, not wasps. But I’ll keep my peace...

It’s a Corman movie so you know there will be long walking scenes, and, sure enough, we start right off the bat with several minutes of Dr. Eric Zinthrop walking slowly across a pasture. He is dressed in what is either a beekeeping outfit or a short-lived fashion craze that was even more freakish than most other fashion crazes. It was a bold choice by the sound recordist to put the microphone inside his overalls. He climbs up a tree and puffs some of that anesthetic beekeeping smoke at what I guess is supposed to be a wasp’s nest but looks like a clumsy pizza chef tossed the dough a little too high and it draped itself over a tree branch. Zinthrop then starts talking to the insects; “No need to get nasty. Your poppy [?] isn’t going to hurt you.” He then snaps the branch off, climbs down, and stashes the wasps’ nest in a suitcase. (I always end up behind this guy at airport security.) He then starts shambling back from whence he came.

Cut to Beekeeping Central, where a lone beekeeper is pulling out those wooden honeycomb things. They are covered with bees, and the guy is not wearing any gloves whatsoever. Maybe you just get numb to bee stings after a while.

Dr. Zinthrop walks up. “I brought some new friends,” he proclaims. He’s a lonely man. “Wasps?” says the other guy. “They can sting a man to death.” Unlike bees, which are as gentle as kittens. “They know who their friend is,” says Zinthrop. “They can tell.” Sure they can.

Zinthrop ambles off, and a pickup truck pulls in. It is Mr. Barker, from the head office. Funny, everyone wears gloves to shake hands with him, but not to handle live bees. Well, he is from management, so perhaps that’s wise. “How are things at the front office?” asks Renfro. “Smooth as honey,” says Barker. Ha ha ha. Hopefully not as sticky. Barker says that they just turned in 1,000 pounds of orange blossom honey last month. Wow; that’s quite an operation they’ve got going, especially when you consider that it’s basically three guys in a field. It also looks like the bees are kept in those cardboard file boxes you get at Staples. Barker congratulates him, and Renfro expresses his thanks, adding, “I try to take my inspiration from the bees: always busy, busy, busy.” Memo to Renfro: end your conversations one sentence sooner. Barker looks at him oddly, as you can well imagine. Barker then says, “What about this guy Zinthrop?” To which Renfro responds: “What a nut. Him and his bees.” Oh, unlike Renfro who just said that he modeled his entire life on bee behavior. Zinthrop is apparently being paid to conduct research on royal jelly, and Barker is concerned that there has not been a progress report in some time. He then heads towards Zinthrop’s “lab.”

While walking through the field, he sees a wasp. “Wasps! How did this happen?” Um, it’s an open field. It’s kind of hard to cordon it off from other insects (trust me). I guess they can’t read the “No Wasps” sign that was posted. Zinthrop is fingered as the guy behind the wasps.

And we go to Zinthrop’s lab. Interesting that a major honey company’s R&D lab is a rundown wooden shack. “What’s all this nonsense about wasps?” barks Barker. Zinthrop has apparently been experimenting with extracting royal jelly from the queen wasp. “According to my figures, you’re better at extracting funds from the company.” Ba-bing. Zinthrop points out that he has learned how to slow down the process of aging, although it’s apparent that he has not used it on himself (or if he has, I shudder to think what he originally looked like). He then points to two dogs, one of which is a puppy. Or looks like one. Zinthrop says that both dogs are exactly the same age, the puppyish one having been treated with his wasp extract. Barker then fires Zinthrop. Zinthrop commiserates with his wasps. Cuckoo! Cuckoo!

Cut to stock footage of New York City; why is there a Packard stopped at a traffic light? Is it the 1930s? Inside Janice Starlin Enterprises, we cut to a board meeting. This was a time before PowerPoint (i.e., the “good old days”) so we see a close up of a bar chart mounted to an easel. It’s not labeled in any coherent way, but it apparently indicates that sales of the company’s cosmetics have been dropping. The meeting is led by Janice Starlin herself, and she asks for suggestions as to how to boost sales. The head of Public Relation, who looks like the guy from the Monopoly game board after falling on hard times (or after the past couple of weeks), is clueless. Bill Lane, obviously unconcerned with his job, has the answer. He somehow twists the sales chart data to prove that the decline in sales is because as of last February, Janice Starlin became too old to be an effective image for the company. She had been advertising her own products for 16 years and now her face has officially gone over to the dark side. Funny how he could easily date that to February. Mr. Monopoly, who is easily 800 years older than her, is conspicuously silent on the ravages of age.
Arthur Cooper, who has a bigger obsession with a pipe than Captain Black, applauds. Janice is chagrined, but admits, “Not even Janice Starlin could remain a glamour girl forever.” Got the premise? Good.

Janice’s secretary announces that a Mr. Zinthrop is there to see her, and that she has an appointment with him. Ah, I think I can see where this is going. Rather than retain an ad agency which will rebrand the company and perhaps hire a professional cosmetics model to be the public face of the company, she will instead turn to a nutty scientist with a wasp obsession. Funny how this case study always seems to be missing from marketing textbooks.

But first, Janice asks Captain Black into her office, which is lavishly decorated (well, lavishly for a Corman picture). I like the fireplace. Wait— Fireplace? How do you put a fireplace in an office building in midtown Manhattan? We never get a clear idea of what it is that Captain Black does for the company aside from smoke a pipe and look fey, but she asks him if he has ever done work on royal jelly. Does royal Jell-O count? He points out that no two people react to royal jelly in the same way, but queen bees like it. (I’m guessing this guy’s an expert on queens, all right.) She mentions royal jelly from queen wasps. (Actually, there is no such thing as royal jelly from wasps.) Captain Black wryly points out that the queen wasp is on a par with the black widow spider. “They’re both carnivorous, they paralyze their victims, and they take their time devouring them alive. They kill their mates in the same way, too. Strictly a one-sided romance.” He sounds jealous. He tells her to forget the whole business, and puts his lit pipe in his breast pocket. Is that a good idea?

Out in the reception area, kooky wasp guy is ushered into her office. As he passes the receptionist, she answers the phone with a voice that is supposed to be sexy, I guess, but sounds like she is speaking while stifling a yawn. Zinthrop is carrying a blanket-covered cage. He tells Janice, “It is I who give you time. I give you 10, 15 years I will.” Why does he sound like Yoda all of a sudden? Zinthrop had written her a letter outlining the results of his research on a youth potion derived from wasp enzymes. She demands proof. He pulls out his cage and says he will provide it.
They go to the company’s lab, and he pulls the blanket off the cage to reveal two guinea pigs. “They look terrible,” Janice says. Oh, you’re one to talk, Miss Getting-Too-Old-And-Dragging-The-Company-Down. Jeesh. Anyway, Zinthrop pulls out a hypodermic needle, fills it from a vial, and reaches down and grabs a guinea pig.

Okay, just a little pinprick. There’ll be no more “Ahhh!” but you may feel a little sick. Can you stand up (stand up...stand up...stand up)? I do believe it’s working; good. That’ll keep you going through the show. Come on, it’s time to go. The guinea pig has become comfortably numb.

Anyway, we cut to a close up of Janice’s face as she looks into the cage and the music conveys a transformation. We cut back out and the guinea pig has now become a small white mouse. Zinthrop is a little too eager to repeat the demonstration on the other guinea pig. Janice is convinced that he’s on to something, and she asks for his terms. She says she’ll have the legal department draw up the contract. There’s a document I’d like to see. He says he doesn’t need an official contract. I guess when you command armies of wasps to do your bidding, what do you need a lousy piece of paper for? He then points out that he has not tested his formula on human beings yet. She volunteers herself to be the next guinea pig. He doesn’t try too hard to dissuade her.

She then introduces Zinthrop to the company’s board, but does not go into details. There is then a montage, mostly of various people smoking and casting awkward glances at each other, as well as Zinthrop poking guinea pigs with long needles.

That over, Bill Lane is sitting next to Mary the secretary’s desk. They have some kind of budding romance going. Or something. Anyway, they are suspicious of Zinthrop. “Women!” says Bill, apropos of nothing. “Men!” responds Mary. Zing! “Every time you search for an answer, you always come up with ‘women’.” Bill then mention’s “male intuition.” Is there such a thing? “The only thing that’s missing is a genie with a lamp.” Ah, so the answer would be, no. They then go out to dinner. Captain Black intercepts them in the hall and thinks Zinthrop is a dangerous. He then laboriously describes the difference between a con man and a quack, and how Zinthrop likely falls into the latter camp. There’s no chance he could be both?

The next day, Maureen the receptionist is talking to another woman, complaining about her husband Irving, which she pronounces as “Oyving.” Oy vay. The phone rings, and she answers so incredibly not sexily, try as she might. “I got two words for you,” she says over the phone. “Drop day-ed...twice.” It was Oyving. “Calling to tell me Dr. Cyclops is on Channel 9 tonight.” God, I hope that isn’t a euphemism for anything. “I’ve see it twice already.” Boing.

Zinthrop shows up looking for Janice. He leers upsettingly at the women, and they heap shame on him behind his back. “What a charactah. A regulah two-eyed Dawktah Cyclops.” That’s supposed to be some kind of Brooklyn accent. It so isn’t. “He’s a real weirdy.” Weirdy?

Meanwhile, Zinthrop is in the lab, or actually out on the lab’s terrace (?), tending to a colony of wasps. Oddly, he has it placed right under a large hanging plant, so there is no way he can stand up without banging his head on the plant. There had to be a better place to put that. Janice comes by, and Zinthrop shows her a kitten that he reminds her she had seen as an adult cat a week earlier. When you’re a busy executive, it’s difficult to keep track of the cats you see. She is gaga over this. “Do you see what that means?” she asks the kitten. “You’re a kitten again. Your whole life to live over.” What a horrifying thought. Zinthrop then gives Janice her first injection. She sits down and rolls up her sleeve. On the wall behind her is a framed college degree. Huh? It certainly can’t be his. Whose is it?

Some time later, Janice receives a phone call from Accounting, and she stresses that Zinthrop can order whatever he wants and the company will pay for it. Mary is listening in. She calls Bill and tells him, giggling, that Zinthrop paid $2,300 for enzyme extract. I guess she knows where he could have gotten it cheaper; maybe Duane Reade was having a sale.

Three weeks later, Zinthrop is poking at Janice’s face. There is only a small amount of change. “Why is it taking so long?” “There’s more to you than a little kitten,” he responds. I would like to think there would be. She suggests upping the dosage. He says no. He muses that the product they create would be better as a lotion. Yeah, intravenously administered cosmetics may not go over all that well. “Janice Starling Enterprises will be world famous!” he pronounces. I thought they already were?

Meanwhile, Mary is going through Janice’s desk and finds the letter Zinthrop originally wrote. She takes it and calls Bill. She, Bill, and Captain Black go out to lunch and they read the letter. Captain Black wryly says, “He claims he can stimulate the rejuvenation process using enzymes extracted from wahsps.” Well, tah. “Janice Starlin[g] had built her whole career on youth and beauty and now that she’s losing them she’s scared to death.” Well, we have the theme of the movie.

Now, wait a minute. She runs a cosmetics company. Cosmetics, as I understand them, are designed to make people look more attractive. So if she herself can’t make herself look attractive using her own cosmetics, then doesn’t that imply that her company’s products, um, suck? But I digress... And why do characters sometimes pronounce her name “Starling?” Is she for the birds?

Bill and Captain Black wonder what they can do to get rid of Zinthrop. What do these guys actually do for the company, anyway? Captain Black takes the letter and will try to see if Zinthrop has some kind of record. “Come on, young lovers,” he adds wryly. Huh?

Nighttime in the Big Apple. Janice is alone in her office, smoking. (Man, this movie has got a two-pack-a-day habit.) All the lights in the rest of the building are out. She goes into the elevator, which is so not an elevator (in the wide shots you can see that there is no gap between the elevator car and the floor it is parked on). The elevator doors look like Star Trek doors. Too bad they don’t go shhh when they open and close. Anyway, Janice sneaks down to the abandoned lab and fixes herself a dose of the wasp enzyme. A big dose. A dose that looks like it’s about two pints. She doesn’t use a hypodermic needle so much as a turkey baster. Is that really wise? And surely Zinthrop will notice that so much liquid is missing. As she leaves, there is an ominous close up of the cat which has some strange lumps on its back.

The next morning, Maureen the receptionist is filing her nails and Janice walks in. She looks about 20 years younger. Well, I should say, she removed all the thick makeup she had been wearing. At the board meeting, everyone is agog. Mr. Monopoly is drooling over her like he had two hotels on Park Place and she just landed on it. Captain Black can barely puff his pipe. Alone with Mary, Janice asks her to tell her how old she looks. “23, maybe 22.” “That’s how old I was when I started Janice Starling Enterprises....I’m back where I started, 18 years ago.” I thought it was 16? Well, when you reach the ancient, decrepit age of 40, I guess it’s hard to keep these things straight.

Zinthrop walks into his lab, changes into his smock, then checks on all his animals. Uh oh: the cat is missing; he hears a strange, buzzing meowing noise, but can’t figure out where it is coming from. Ah, there it is! Directly in front of him. It is the cat, with some odd tufts of fur attached to its back, and looking quite feral. It leaps on him and tries to bite him. He strangles it and then dumps the body in some kind of oven. I’d skip lunch in the office cafeteria for a few days.

Meanwhile, in a restaurant (the same one they were in before) Captain Black is telling Bill and Mary, “Years ago, quacks were treating people with monkey glands.” They were? “Then deterioration set in.” Captain Black wants to break into the lab and find out what specifically Zinthrop is using. He again puts his lit pipe in his breast pocket.

After disposing of the cat, Zinthrop absentmindedly ambles out of the lab and into the non-elevator. Captain Black is suddenly there, hiding in the shadows. If you’re going to sneak around without anyone knowing you’re there, is it helpful to be puffing on a pipe? Or was everyone numb to the smell of tobacco in the 1950s? He notices the lab door open and walks inside. He closes the door. Note that there is no lock on the inside of the door. Captain Black looks into the wasp colony, then breaks into a locked desk. He finds what is supposed to be Zinthrop’s lab journal, but it looks more like his passport. And it only has about three pages, so I guess he wasn’t big on documenting his experiments.

There is a knock at the door. It is Janice. The door is apparently locked—but how? Granted, the knocking gives Captain Black a chance to hide out on the terrace. Janice is desperately searching for Zinthrop, but gives up after walking two feet into the room and calling his name twice. Well, that was thorough! She leaves, obviously not detecting the smell of pipe smoke.

Outside, we see a close up of a curb, and feet stepping into the street and waking off-camera. There is the sound of screeching brakes, a thud, and Zinthrop’s bloody body rolls back into the frame. Corman!

In Janice’s office, she is concerned about Zinthrop having gone missing, and a police inspector reassures her that he will find him. “Sooner or later, we find them all.” They do? What about Judge Crater? Or D.B. Cooper? He points out that she has absolutely no information about Zinthrop, such as a home address or a telephone number. “Mr. Zinthrop wasn’t a conventional employee,” she says. You got that right. I guess mad scientists rarely go through HR. Then she remembers the letter he had sent...but which Mary had taken. Doh! Janice realizes it was Mary who took it. Janice will call Mary. “It might be better if I busted in on her cold,” says the inspector. Huh? Did he previously work for the East German Stasi? Jeepers, I didn’t know New York City was such a police state in the 1950s. Giuliani wasn’t mayor then.

Before long, Mary is in Janice’s office. “I made a duplicate copy of Zinthrop’s letter. I was going to take that to Mr. Lane and Mr. Cooper,” but then I guess she remembered that the copying machine wouldn’t come on the market until the mid-1960s.

The inspector then instructs his minion to search the city for Zinthrop. It’s no wonder they don’t find him, as the streets they are driving on are not in New York. The officer heading up the search must be really new at it; the first two places he goes to look for a 75-year-old scientist are a root beer stand and a beauty parlor. It is only as a last resort that he checks the hospital (maybe it’s just me, but I probably would have started there)—and even then it is just to use the phone. But, serendipity has paid off: Zinthrop has been found, in a coma with a head injury. The inspector and Janice head to the hospital.

Sure enough, Zinthrop is lying unconscious, although the emergency room gave him some really festive-looking pajamas. “There’s definite brain damage. Just how much, we can’t tell yet,” says the doctor. I wonder how much was caused by the accident.

Three days later, Zinthrop is still in a coma. Captain Black wants to carry on...doing something. Janice says if Zinthrop doesn’t recover in another four days, Captain Black can take over the laboratory. Oh.

Later on, Janice is injecting another turkey baster full of wasp extract. At the same time, Captain Black is sitting...someplace (his office? the lab?) reading the thin pamphlet that was supposed to be Zinthrop’s lab journal. “Right under our noses....Incredible....he can’t have used it all...If I could run a qualitative analysis...” He is so flummoxed he leaves his pipe on the desk. Gasp!

Captain Black is breaking into the locked lab using a tire iron. A tire iron? Are there many of those lying around the offices of a mid-Manhattan cosmetics company? Captain Black prowls around the lab and retrieves a set of vials from the refrigerator, and begins examining them. Janice charges in from the terrace, and she now has the head of a wasp—or I guess that’s what it’s supposed to be. She is fashionable to the last; the chain around her neck nicely sets off the bent pipe cleaners jutting out of her head—er, I mean her antennae. Captain Black gazes longingly at the pipe cleaners, but brandishes the tire iron as the wasp woman charges at him. She grabs him around the neck with her hairy paws (say what?) and pulls him to the ground. As they tussle, she squeezes a packet of ketchup over his neck (oh, that’s supposed to be blood coming out of his neck), then digs in. You know, wasps actually paralyze their prey using stingers located at the end of their abdomens. Think about that, and how much goofier this movie would have been if the wasp woman attacked her prey in a similar fashion.

Their struggling does not attract the attention of the night watchman (I guess that’s what he’s supposed to be), played by the very large, porcine Bruno Ve Sota, a frequent member of Corman’s regular troupe, whose appearance is accompanied by whimsical circus music.

In the lab, Janice has dewasped after getting her injection. Wait—why does she turn into a wasp after the wasp enzyme wears off, but then turns back to a human when she injects more of it? Maybe logic isn’t the best thing to be searching for here. But I do wonder where Captain Black’s body went. Did she eat the entire thing? Is it hidden somewhere? Does she now smell like pipe smoke?

The next day, Janice unveils their new advertising slogan to the board—that is, for the new youth medicine. Mr. Monopoly points out that they need to be careful: cosmetics are one thing, medications another. They might end up going directly to jail, without passing Go and not collecting $200. Janice gets a headache, and she’s cranky. “I don’t intend to be stopped by the timidity of my own staff.” Well, that and the FDA.

Some time later, out in the reception area, the Algonquin round table of receptionists is comparing their atrocious Brooklyn accents. “This is Mawreen yaw’re tawkin’ to.” Shudder. They are musing about the fact that Captain Black missed the board meeting. My first guess would be that he put his lit pipe in his pocket one too many times and set himself on fire. That he was eaten by a human/wasp mutant would be my second guess.

The non-elevator opens and two deliverymen enter wheeling a fold-up bed. “Hey, pretty puss,” one says to Mawreen. Pretty puss? Were people actually like this in the 50s? He asks where Miss Starlin’s office is. “Suite number one,” she replies. This rankles the deliveryman more than it really should. “Well la-di-da. The Duchess of Flatbush herself.” What? “How would you like to have this phone wrapped around your ear? Wise guy.” Mawreen responds. “That’s more like it, sister.” He seems mollified. They wheel the bed into Janice’s office without further ado. What the heck was that all about?

Mary is in with Janice. Apparently, Zinthrop is being transferred to a room in the building, and Janice will be sleeping in her office. Hmm. Logically, she should be chewing off bits of her wooden desk and using her saliva to pulp the bits of wood into paper to fashion a nest. I mean, if she were really a wasp. “Oh, Mary, before you go see if you can work that...thing.” She points to the bed that was just wheeled in. She doesn’t know what a bed is? “Oh, sure. I’ve seen lots of these,” says Mary. Were beds a novelty in the 1950s? She unfolds it in about two seconds. “Oh, that was simple,” says Janice. Was she expecting it to be complicated?

In a short while, Zinthrop is wheeled in. He is conscious, and still wearing the festive pajamas. He is accompanied by a nurse who resembles Lilith from Cheers. He struggles to remember something “important.” Something about a feral cat that was turning into a wasp? I mean, that’s pretty easy to forget, even without a head injury.

Back in reception, Bill says, “Sure is funny about old Coop.” (That would be Captain Black.) Yeah, getting eaten by a half-human, half-wasp. Hilarious when you think about it. Janice wanders in; speak of the devil. Bill points out that no one has heard from Captain Black all day. “I wouldn’t worry about that. Mr. Cooper has been here a long time.” Where is “here”? In her stomach? Then Bill starts leering at the young-looking Janice. “You think Zinthrop would give you any of those treatments?” he says to Mary, his girlfriend. Aw, he always knows just the right thing to say. She hits him, but not nearly hard enough.

That night, Bruno Ve Sota is back on the job and is futzing with a transistor radio. He hears a weird noise coming from inside the lab. Oh, man, if Janice eats him, she’d better mix in a lot of Lipitor with her wasp enzyme. He draws his gun and enters...

In Zinthrop’s room, he and Lilith the nurse hear Bruno Ve Sota scream from several floors away.

The next morning, Mary is discussing the missing security guard with Janice. So, again, what happened to the body? Did she eat all of it? If she keeps this up, age and beauty are going to be the least of her worries as she gains 900 pounds. And if she didn’t eat him, where is the body? How do you hide Bruno Ve Sota’s body anywhere?

That night, Bill and Mary are out at dinner...in, again, the same restaurant, at the same table. What is this, Seinfeld? “There’s something going on in that building,” says Bill. He plans to snoop around, starting with “Cooper’s lab.” Cooper had a lab? Sure enough, Mary and Bill are breaking into Captain Black’s desk.

In Zinthrop’s room, Janice is trying to get him to explain what is happening to her. Back in Captain Black’s office, Bill and Mary find the skimpy lab journal and read about the experiments on Janice. Then they see, on the desk...dum dum dum...Cooper’s pipe. “Don’t you get it?” says Bill. “He’d sooner go out without his pants on than leave that pipe behind.” Of that I have no doubt. So now they know he’s somewhere in the building. Bill says, “He’s dead. And the night watchman.” Cooper is the night watchman? Oh, I see; the night watchman is also dead. A little awkward phrasing there....

Janice is pleading with Zinthrop to make more of the extract; she is running out and is jonesing big time. There is a zoom into Zinthrop’s face and the music perks up. Ah, that can only mean one thing: Janice is turning into a wasp. Zinthrop screams and Lilith the nurse comes into investigate. Janice the Wasp attacks her, forces her down on the couch, and tucks in to her neck. Again, she should have a stinger in her butt. Someone has confused wasps and vampires, but never mind.

A short time later, I guess, Bill and Mary are in Zinthrop’s room, and he is asleep. “Don’t touch him!” exhorts Mary. Why? Will he get old person’s germs on him? While Bill ignores her warning and touches Zinthrop, Mary notices a bloodstained rag of some kind on the couch. She points it out to Bill and they react very slowly.

In the lab, Janice has used up the last of the enzyme extract, but has at least dewasped. Once again, I ask, where is the nurse’s body? She gazes longingly into the wasp colony, and there is a closeup of a swarm of bees. (Huh?)

Bill and Mary are also wondering what happened to the nurse. Zinthrop wakes up and warns them that Janice shouldn’t take any more injections. Well, the toothpaste is out of that tube, isn’t it? Mary calls up to Janice’s office, and Bill immediately grabs the phone. Janice chides them for still being in the building. Zinthrop is struggling to get up. Bill will go up to Janice’s office. Zinthrop yells, “The insect! the insect!” Ah, that clears everything up. He is such a help. Bill then sends Mary up to Janice’s office and says to call the police, as the phone in Zinthrop’s room doesn’t have an outside line. (Of course it doesn’t.) She runs off to what is sure to be her waspy doom.

Janice is pacing back and forth, obviously thinking, “Which of them should I eat first?” Janice has locked herself in her office and Mary begs to be let in. They struggle, and Janice slaps Mary. “I’m sorry I had to do that.” Then why did you?

In Zinthrop’s room, Zinthrop is even more incoherent. Bill is trying to get something out of him. “You do not understand! You do not understand!” Sounds like John McCain during the Presidential debate. Mary is in great danger. “You fool, you fool! Miss Starlin will kill her and tear her apart into shreds....Miss Starlin is not a human being any longer." He adds, “She will destroy the girl, as a wasp will destroy her enemies and devour the remains.” Sounds like Nixon. But is that what wasps really do?

Meanwhile, Mary has been telling everything to Janice—finding the lab notebook, etc. We close in on Mary’s face...I guess Janice is changing again. Yep. Mary screams, and there is a struggle. Bill and Zinthrop hear the scream (noises do carry very well in that building), and they charge out of the room. Bill waits for the elevator, then decides to take the stairs. They notice that the elevator has stopped on the laboratory’s floor. The lab door is locked, but Bill kicks in the scored glass, which makes it pretty easy. (He works for a cosmetics company; how butch do you think this guy is, anyway?) Zinthrop lurches in behind him. While Bill is fending off Janice the Wasp with a stool, Zinthrop grabs a bottle of carbolic acid that just happens to be lying around. You know it’s bad stuff because it even has a skull and crossbones hand-drawn on it. I guess sometimes even a professional scientist needs to be reminded that some things are poison. Zinthrop throws the bottle and it beans Janice right on the top of the head. The bottle breaks, and Janice starts smoking as the acid eats into her—and she then plummets off the balcony to her doom. Twas beast that killed the beauty. Or, as they said in Cinematic Titanic, “Twas beauty killed the bees.” Mary is okay, Zinthrop not so much.

The end.

Not many people realize this, but The Wasp Woman was actually a loose adaptation of one of business management expert Peter Drucker’s least known books, Management Challenges for Freakish Half-Insect Mutants (an expansion of his article for the Harvard Business Review, “They’re Not Employees, They’re Food”) which laid out essential advice for running a company when you have the tendency to turn into a giant wasp. As with most adaptations of books, they changed some fundamental points; Drucker had explicitly stated that managers and owners should not eat their own employees; that’s what the competition was for. Well, Corman had a small budget and a limited cast, but did what he could.

Still, for most of us in the workplace, we face bigger management problems than a boss who randomly turns into a man-eating wasp. Corman tackled other management challenges and adapted Peter Drucker’s Concept of the Corporation for the other film he directed in 1959, which was retitled A Bucket of Blood.

On a sad note, actress Susan Cabot who played the titular wasp woman, met her own tragic end. I am not making this up; via IMDb: she was bludgeoned to death in 1964 by her son, Timothy, a weight-lifting dwarf, which could have been a Roger Corman film in and of itself (or an only slightly loose adaptation of Charles Dickens’ The Old Curiosity Shop).