Review of Tremors 4: The Legend Begins (2004) by Alexandria M — 04 Mar 2009

It's a Tremors film, so this is funny and littered with references to the previous films. However, did this franchise really need a prequel? Not enough of the characters represent the future generations of the town Perfection for us to be able to care about them, especially the completely pointless gunman character who is only there to drop some Burt-esque catchphrases. However, I thoroughly enjoyed seeing Michael Gross get to play a very different Gummer, as angry gun-toting Burt was never my favourite. But we have to sit through the characters learning about the worms all over again, when we learnt this four films ago. It also means that the story must end with the characters having some kind of pact where this is never mentioned again so it makes sense no one was expecting this in the first film.

Being a prequel, cleverly we get to see the only stage of the worms' lives that we haven't seen yet. The pre-stage, when they have hatched from egg but not grown big yet. But this isn't used for long, as they quickly turn into the huge beasts of the first film. And I have to say it is a welcome return to form, after the pointless walking monsters from 2, and flying ones from 3. Underground is still scarier.

Still, a prequel is never a great idea, and this one is a little too serious at times, and needs more developed or recurring characters. Probably the weakest of the four. Still, more westerns should have giant underground monsters in them.