Nuclear Leakage

CLASS OF NUKE 'EM HIGH PART II - SUBHUMANOID MELTDOWN

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Some horror comedies get confused with tone. John Landis' "An American Werewolf in London" and "Innocent Blood" focused more on blood and gore than humor, and took the gore seriously which is a death knell in horror-comedies. "Class of Nuke 'Em High Part II: Subhumanoid Meltdown" isn't confused at all - it is equal parts tongue-in-cheek gory horror mixed with subversive humor. A good film of its type (and not nearly as horrendous as other critics have found it) - it is what it is, and either you are with it or you'll hate yourself afterwards.

After a brief recap of the original "Class of Nuke 'Em High" and a flashforward to a squirrel monster that must be seven stories high, we flashback to the start of this sequel set in a college (formerly Tromaville High) that is adjacent to a nuclear power plant. This is no ordinary campus since women run around in lacy underwear or wearing nothing at all, there are gang members who harass each and every student, and every single scene contains said students running around or beating each other to a pulp (oh, and it is next to a nuclear power plant that screams for the TV crew from "The China Syndrome" to be on sight). Roger (Brick Bronsky) is a buff and nerdy student with bad B.O. who works for the college newspaper, the kind that wants to report rumors, not truth. Something odd is happening on campus when selective students and faculty start projectile vomiting green mucus and then turn into a green pile of mush (sometimes a severed head that looks like Sesame Streets' Oscar the Grouch is all that remains). Meanwhile, Roger participates in a sexual experiment that unknowingly involves a subhumanoid woman named Victoria (Leesa Rowland) who has a second mouth in place of her belly button! We also have Professor Holt (Lisa Gaye, who relishes this role with aplomb) who runs the sexual experiments in addition to helping build these malfunctioning subhumanoids. Most pressing question: are all the students, including the unruly gang members, subhumanoids or is Roger the sole human, aside from Professor Holt?

"Class of Nuke 'E High Part II" is manic, unruly, unquestionably incoherent fun. Watching Lisa Gaye's Marge Simpson hairdo adds to the picture's anything-goes mentality (the film often reminds us directly it is a sequel - talk about postmodernist). Tromie, the giant squirrel, appears in the climax and gives the finger to the guards who attempt to take it down. Toxie, Troma films' own mascot, also appears. It is a messy, overindulgent, outrageous oddity, and it has its tongue firmly placed in all of its orifices.