Trancers 5: Sudden Deth

• Directed by David “I-Went-On-To-Work-On-Game–Of–Thrones” Nutter
• November 9, 1994

Jack Deth must find his way home from the magical world of Orpheus where trancers rule.

Trancers 5: Sudden Deth opens with very nearly a beat-by-beat recap of Trancers 4. A short recap of a kind is good if not necessary when a movie is a direct sequel, but going over every little bit is a bad way to start. Reminding the audience should mostly be done with in-film dialogue and not a lazy info dump.

A distinctly fantasy world is an ill fit for Trancers. The original Trancers was no drama but certainly no fantasy either. More importantly it was distinctly science fiction even if there was no real explanation for the purpose of the Trancers or even how they were created until the third movie. The villain was making them but why?

Jack Deth (Tim Thomerson) is much less a driver of the story and more an observer of events. He is not a fighter or even a Philip Marlowe-esque detective. Others are teaching/leading him rather than he teaching/leading them. I don’t need to lead a character to be perfect or always right but when the lead is not in charge or being dressed down regularly the film doesn’t work. Tim Thomerson was always a pleasure to watch. He was either in on the joke or just gave a style of characterization that drew you to the part whether the character was major or minor. You could buy what he was selling. That magic works here but not enough to overcome the aforementioned issues.

Not only does Jack not really drive events he’s significantly less the hero if you can think of him as the hero at all of the story. He doesn’t defeat the evil wizard Lord Caliban (Clabe Hartley). Jack’s story is just about getting home and not saving the day. He needs to get a magical jewel called the Tiamond from the Castle of Unrelenting Terror to get back home that Caliban is all hot to get in Trancers 5 and always wanted even though the item is brand new to the story.

The business in Topeka, Kansas that originally caused Jack to be lost in space and time? Totally forgotten about. It was kind of vague and they didn’t have much information but it doesn’t matter at all to the plot here. Writer Peter David is gifted but really dropped the ball as did others involved. Thomerson reportedly regrets his involvement In Trancers 4 and 5. Poor quality is what you get when you dump everything on people unfamiliar with the material they are handling.

As I’ve said many times before Trancers movies were not strong on logic but it irks me when you drop a plot point and never use it. I could even overlook it if this was more of a science-fiction movie than a supernatural fantasy film. There is nothing that makes this too different from any number of horror movies other than the unique Thomerson.

This is kind of forgettable like Trancers 4. The wizard/seer/whatever Farr (Alan Oppenheimer) died off screen during Trancers 5 I guess. For all I know he could’ve died in the last movie. It’s only been a few days since I watched it and I’m already forgetting what happened. Point is he shows up as a vision/spirit and hands off his duties (whatever those wee) to Lyra (Stacie Randall) and that’s it. Lyra goes from being a slave to being a spiritual advisor with all this knowledge and stuff just, well,  because.

It’s revealed Lyra has the same powers as Farr even though there’s not much of a hint of magic if any at all in the character. It would be something if Randall was more than a pretty face. She has no range here. At no point does the movie hint at an explanation for the similarities for the two Lyra characters. How are they in both universes but nobody else is? They couldn’t get any of the previous actors to fly over for a cameo?

Lyra in both universes is supposed to be a love of Jack but the two actors have no chemistry perhaps because Randall demonstrates no talent. That would be less of a problem if this romance let alone romance in general was not so central to the story. Randall makes Gal Gadot look classically trained and a talented performer.

Trancers 4 implied that wizards could not really be killed but all it takes is Caliban’s son Prospero (Ty Miller) shoving a sword through his pops to end the threat. Jack did not even save the day! Duties were handed off to the so-stiff-he’s-petrified Ty Miller who is in love with the equally wooden Terri Ivens as warrior maiden Shaleen. How did Thomerson outclass everybody? Thomerson as always is a standout and just enjoyable to watch. The rest of the cast just does not measure up.

The story is just slow and boring. It doesn’t even have the charm of feeling like it was written by a kid. While the castle had been used to great effect in other Full Moon Entertainment movies here it’s a blatant in your face cost saving measure. The dialogue and characterization is just awful. As I said before Peter David is responsible for a great many excellent comic book stories and has some idea of how to write a script yet had no idea what to do here. Either this was his first bit of work or his just his laziest.

I was hoping for an enjoyable end to Jack Deth’s adventures with Trancers 5: Sudden Deth but I was not so lucky. It’s boring and feels like a bad riff on Full Moon Entertainment movies rather than an actual Full Moon Entertainment production. I think you can skip this one like Thomerson wishes he had.