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THE SATAN BUG is a pretty good thriller of its era, one based on the novel by Alistair MacLean and scripted by SHOGUN novelist James Clavell. This one's all about the visuals, from scorched desert landscapes to soaring helicopters and high-tech germ laboratories. The plot is about a madman who steals the titular plague, and there's a certain amount of overlap with the later, better ANDROMEDA STRAIN. The thriller tropes are handled well here, from Maharis as the stalwart hero to seasoned players like Ed Asner, Dana Andrews and Richard Basehart in support, and overall there's very little to dislike about it.

EVIL BONG 666 is yet another production in Full Moon's never-ending series, and sadly it turns out to be much, much worse than the preceding instalments. They're really short of ideas for this one so they jettison most of the characters and have some returning actors come back to play different roles instead. Here we have a new female villain who opens her own weed shop and brings the titular creation back to our world, but as usual the film just consists of endless bad jokes from kooky characters and the usual weed humour. Robin Sydney's blue-haired weirdo is the most annoying of the series yet, and only the arrival of a new 'gingerweed' man raises a few laughs.

TOTAL REALITY is a very low budget science fiction flick that marked one of the last screen performances for the short-lived martial artist David Bradley, who started out by appearing in AMERICAN NINJA 3. This one involves a totalitarian future where a couple of bad guys travel back in time to the present day to change history and are pursued by a ragtag team of prisoners who have to stop them. Bradley stars as the chief prisoner and is adequate enough in the role, playing against screen favourite Thomas Kretschmann as the villain of the hour. The sci-fi elements are acceptable and the present day storyline works well to a degree, although it's never quite as interesting or indeed suspenseful as it perhaps should be.