As I was revisiting my Eight Legged Freaks review after rescuing it from the obscurity of my old site archive, I began to ponder: why don’t we get giant killer bug movies anymore?
Now, before you begin to point out the very existence of the SyFy Channel (or whatever it might be nowadays), let me clarify. Big-ish budget, some known names, and theatrical releases are sorely needed in the subgenre. Arachnophobia, the 1990 movie that launched a thousand spider-filled dreams in young Puck’s mind, had an okay $8 million opening weekend and gave John Goodman something to do in between Rosanne seasons. Also that same year, Kevin Bacon fighting underground wormy monsters called graboids in Tremors.
In the years since, there’s been a smattering of non-DTV or cable release monster movies like Eight Legged Freaks or Monsters that scratch the big “bug” itch but there are far more SyFy originals to tarnish the notion like Razortooth or Komodo vs. Cobra. I don’t begrudge SyFy and their frequent partner The Asylum the need to make cheesy movies as cheaply as possible but how many more eyeballs would be attracted to something like Ice Spiders if it starred Jennifer Aniston and was released on 2000+ theaters?
In no doubt inspired by that era’s fear of nuclear testing and annihilation, the 1950s were lousy with giant insect movies like Them!, The Deadly Mantis, Tarantula, and The Giant Gila Monster! That’s a murderer’s row of cheeseball monster movies that would be more than welcome today. Things aren’t that much different after all.
Horror movies are the rage now, so the time to strike is now. Get on this, Hollywood!
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