Key Movies Of My Life: Subspecies 4: Bloodstorm (1998)

There were key movies in my life that helped to make me who I am today. Movies that I have loved from the moment the opening credit rolled and still love now. This blog series is about those, My guilty pleasures, my favorites, my escapes. Some were very popular, others not so much. Some of these will have some real life take-aways, others are just for fun. Today we discuss the final entry into the original Subspecies saga, Subspecies 4: Bloodstorm.

Today’s Key Movie:

Radu returns once again after his ‘love’ Michelle is discovered to have possibly found a way to cure her vampire cravings. Teaming up with Ash (from the Vampire Journals), Radu seeks to finally put an end to Michelle once and for all. Starring Denice Duff as Michelle, Anders Hove as Radu and Jonathon Morris as Ash, this is Bloodstorm.

Why this movie and, is it really any good?

Promising to be the final entry to the Subspecies franchise there was no way we were going to miss Bloodstorm. So, when it arrived on VHS, we had to jump on it immediately wondering just how Radu could come back after being burnt to a crisp by the sun. Of course, he wasn’t fully burnt to a crisp and the Bloodstone just happened to be nearby where he landed so, he came back one more time for….bloody vengeance! (Although interestingly it heavily implied that his blood imps would be the ones that brought him back in the previous film…yet they aren’t even mentioned…)

What follows is a return to the original story line, pulling in elements from each of the films including plot points from the ill-conceived Vampire Journals, as we are treated to one final battle between Radu and Michelle. Sadly, it seems Michelle’s sister and friend don’t make it long in this film as they are killed outright with Michelle surviving a car crash because, well, she’s a Vampire of course! When she is taken to a doctor who promises to cure her, things get really interesting in a way only a direct to video horror can. Filled with Mad scientists, Vampirical vengeance and, of course, classic 90’s gratuitous nude scenes, Bloodstorm is the epitome of horror camp through and through.

I will be honest, I remember this movie being FAR better than it is and, with two of the cast members returning to carry on the story, it should have been. However, it feels like writer/Director Ted Nicolaou couldn’t quite translate his ideas to film the way he did with his previous entries and what we end up with is an extremely low budget schlock fest that honestly should never have been made. I hate being this brutal but, this one is bad and not the good kind of bad either, it’s painfully bad especially with how solid the earlier films in this franchise were. Sadly, both Denise Duff and Anders Hove really do their best to carry this film but everyone else in it just seem to be playing along instead of carrying their own weight causing a terrible imbalance creating a strange hybrid of campy horror with some decent moments. This unfortunately only manages to make Bloodstorm more of a tragic experience other than the classic horror it was meant to be.

Overall, there are moments in this film that are fun and visually appealing but not enough to make this a worthy sequel in the Subspecies franchise. My recommendation, just stop after part three. Sure the third entry isn’t the best, but it is far better than Bloodstorm in every way.

OK, where do I get this movie?

You can get this one directly from Fullmoon Video here, if you want to… me, I’d just still with the original trilogy.

Thus ends the Subspecies saga, Until next time…

Late To The Game 12/9/2021

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