Black Scorpion II: Aftershock

What can you possibly say about "Black Scorpion II" other than that it was much worse than the first. The dialogue was banal, the action minimal, the plot barely existent. Even the camera shots, especially when the director chose to go into shaky slo-mo for the "action" sequences, was gawd-aweful!

I hope Sci-Fi does a better job with it's Black Scorpion TV series (debuting this Friday, 2/9).

Just as in its prequel, this film shows a superheroine who is a sexy female copy of Batman. There is a black mask, there are gadgets, there is a special car, there is a dubious status of an ally of the police or of a criminal, the superheroine fights crime to avenge the murder of her father. If on one hand there are no scenes in this film so obviously copied from Tim Burton movies like in the prequel, on the other hand the first supervillain, Gangster Prankster, is a hybrid of the Joker and Two-Face. Argyle, the guy who fixes the Scorpion- mobile, though, came a decade before Morgan Freeman's Lucius Fox in "Batman Begins". The film is nice enough for a B-movie, but visual effects are often worse than could be and action scenes are always awful. The whole movie is very cartoon-like and campy, more than Joel Schumacher's Batman movies from those years, closer to the 60's TV series. The mayor's henchmen, for example, are dressed like mobsters and always say the same thing at the same time. The street gangs (they were so recurrent in the movies from the 90's!) have youngsters with swastikas painted on their faces or necks. Sexploitation, what was in the core of the prequel, with amazing footage with Joan Severance, reappears in this sequel in more characters, like the Asian bombshell Giggles (Prankster's "harley quinn"), the model in jail in the unnecessary scene at 20'40'', the mayor's secretary Babette (played by Lara Harring!), and villainess Aftershock. Villains are campy but more interesting and less ridiculous than in the prequel, which was curiously more violent (though, Black Scorpion is much more violent against criminals, killing them when they are not a danger, in the second film than in the first, reminding more Judge Dredd than Batman even in his darkest versions). Though, the special electric attack of Aftershock may make male spectators feel as if it were with them.

I actually got this movie under the mistaken impression I was getting a Fred Williamson movie (which I believe is titled Black Cobra). Instead I got this direct to video Batman knock off. We've got a clear Joker rip-off villan, who's scenes are very over the top, and somewhat racist. The female protagonist and her lover who have no chemistry what so ever. The laughable female villan and the paper thin, Batman t.v. series plot, all played almost completely seriously even though this whole mess is very campy. The best part of this is Garrett Morris, who's actually pretty amusing as our heroine's mechanic. He's got to be an amazing one, since he's able to make/fix a car that can transform into an another one at the touch of a button. Overall, it provides a few laughs, even if its mostly boring.>

A sexual anti-hero female batman ripoff Background I have watched both Black Scorpions (I & II). The 2nd one is better than the 1st one. But you must watch both films in order to understand the bi-logy. I havent seen the series yet. Roger Corman has made a lot of b-movies that tried to make parody of "mainstream" films.

Potentials The Black Scorpion had a lot of potentials either as introducing a new sexy female hero, or a dark movie of heroes & anti-heroes or as a parody of batman or creating a highly erotic universe of heroes and villains. The film is failing to fulfill any of these aims.

Is it worth to watch it?

It depends. The filmmakers did not make any try to hide that they didnt care for scenario, or developing any depth of characters/events. Highly erotic anti-hero universe with revealing cosplay costumes, high heels, with good closeups, good naked boobs, some clever dialogues, good makeup with quality camera shots and good artistic sceneries simply do not exists in quantities. It is a rarity. And Black scorpion had a lot of potentials. Black scorpion films had all elements of success except depth of everything and connecting the dots.

What I Liked: 1) Sexy revealing female costumes 2) The potential of an universe of heroes without hiding their sexuality and erotism 3) Good (quick-changing) camera shots 4) fast clever dialogues 5) most of characters were very unique 6) nice erotic scenes and boobs 67 The potential to become something more...

What I didnt like: 1) To try to parody Batman in a fail way 2) Smoking - a lot of smoking!

3) Black Scorpion not doing much as female super hero (i think thats was one of the aim of the film) 4) The non-existence of depth of characters and events.

5) The quick and violent way to finish with villains.

If you've seen or are planning to see this film, chances are you've already seen the first. If not, I suggest you go see that, even if you only have the chance to see one of them. It's better and it basically lays the foundation for this film. This has more silliness and less style than the first, and one will be hard pressed to find someone, somewhere who wouldn't rather have seen the first, if given the choice(if the popularity-based ratings are anything to go by, at least). The plot is, much like the first, very simplistic and formulaic. It's pretty much ripped straight out of a 60's superhero comic book. The characters, most of them returning from the first film, continue to be comic relief and clichés, and a few of them, as little development as they have(in the first) actually go backwards as far as that goes. The villains both lack the originality of the one of the first film; both are rather obviously rip-offs of famous superhero villains(or super-villains, for short). The humor goes more towards the silly and campy, something the first one started nicely on. Fewer one-liners, unfortunately. The action is decent enough... it's slightly larger in scale than that of the first, but its uninspired filming costs a lot of intensity. There is more direct T&A in this installment, to appease the young males in the audience. Most of it is just there, for no actual reason, making it stand out embarrassingly. The dialog is poor, both as far as writing and delivery goes. The script has its share of clichés, but judging from the overall tone(and my experience with films that Roger Corman is involved in making), I would wager that it's fully intentional. All in all, an entertaining and fairly worthy followup to Black Scorpion. I recommend this to fans of the first and of comic book movies in general. I urge anyone to watch the first before trying their luck with this, though, and if you don't like what you see in that one, don't bother with this one. It's just more of the same. 5/10