1978's Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes was an unexpected cult gem that despite looking ridiculous actually managed to entertain with it's Naked Gun (1988) style humour.With the sequel set a decade later and following on from the events of the first I expected more of the same so was disheartened to see they had gone in a different direction.The style of humour is the same though not as quickfire, but the content simply isn't Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes! Instead of rampaging killer vegetables we instead have a sinister plot that involves Tomatoes in human form.Starring the original Gomez Adams John Astin and a young George Clooney this silly but still likable comedy doesn't provide the laughs alike the original but still has enough about it to be entertaining.You may have to wade through some unfunny stuff to get to them but the jokes are there and most are delivered by Clooney who demonstrates once again that he has a natural affinity for comedy.It's hard to believe this franchise was born at all let alone that it spawned 4 movies across 3 decades and even a television show! The Good:George Clooney is hilarious The Bad: Doesn't have the novelty value or charm as the original Things I Learnt From This Movie: Big Breasted Girls Go To The Beach should have been a real film Anchovies go great on pizza with gummy bears Rasberry Jam Calzone should be a thing A teddy bear yelling rape is one of the most traumatising sounds imaginable I want a FT doll If the movie was remade the confederate flag would probably not be on the good guys uniform Big Breasted Tomatoes go to the beach and take their tops off should also have been a real film

I just find this film so incredibly funny with every watch. as a fan of B movies and trashy horror films, this film hits the spot with it's tremendous humour and just daft situations.I love the fact that film even spoofs it's own budget half way through and so many scenes stand out, the mime artist, the restaurant scene( the interview with the woman is hilarious) the list goes on.The jokes are daft but work, Karen Mistral is stunning and the whole thing works so well. One of those films I still stick on play when little worth watching and it never tires. I truly RELISH this film ( sorry).

Part Two of the infamous comedy horror series is the best one insofar as it's the least bad. It was made in 1988, ten years after the ultra-low budget original. Anthony Starke is very game in the role of Chad Finletter, nephew of Wilbur (Steve Peace), hero of the Great Tomato War of '78. Chad works in his uncle's pizzeria – where tomato coverings are now outlawed because they're evil – along with his buddy Matt (a magnificently mulleted George Clooney). Meanwhile, gene-splicing Professor Gangreen (John Astin) is creating an army of tomato people, hoping to conquer the world. One day one of his creations, Tara (Karen Mistal), escapes and seeks sanctuary in the arms of Chad. Gangreen sends his henchman Igor (Steve Lundquist) to retrieve her. Chad and Tara fall hopelessly in love, but Gangreen will stop at nothing to retrieve his test tube babe. Chad, Tara, and Matt must band together, along with Chad's uncle and his troop of weirdos, to defeat Gangreen and save the world from the "red menace". You might as well skip the dreadful first movie because we get a full recap here. Return is far more watchable thanks to a vaguely coherent script and less of a chaotic sketch show structure. Most of the best stuff happens early on, where there's a ton of fun in Tara's fish-out-of-water flailing bumping up against Chad's bumbling charm. And there's great bro-chemistry between Starke and Clooney. The film is pure spoof, falling somewhere between the Mel Brooks and Zucker brothers camps: the fourth wall-breaking elements of the former and the cringeworthy puns of the latter. (At one point a character opens a China closet… and finds the Great Wall of China inside.) It's not upper Zucker by any means, but somewhere around the Top Secret range in terms of gag hit rate. There are also countless references to horror film contemporaries. We get a bit of Weird Science; the mad lab of Reanimator; the gene-mashing horror of The Fly; and the dead-eyed hottie-on-the-loose of Frankenhooker. It's all powered by some fantastic synth-rock music which doubles down on the echo-snare. Plus a Bacharach-styled ballad as the lovers prance on the beach whilst being bothered by a creepy mime. Eminently good natured and low on gore, Return emphasises the comedy over the horror, making it more accessible than its title suggests. There really isn't much killing at all. The problem is that, beyond the first act, it's not consistently funny either, so as far as cultdom goes it is niche. Set expectations to moderate though and it's a fun, screwy ride.

It's funny, sort of, that Return of the Killer Tomatoes actually lives up to (err, goes to the depths of) the original parody of schlock horror Z-grade movies it's coming from. It knows what it is in its bones, and still has a hell of a lot of fun getting to where it's going- which is almost nothing. I couldn't help but laugh through much of the flick though, especially after having seen the first one. After starting off the picture (and reminding me for a moment of Python's Holy Grail) with a whole other picture (unintentionally?) with girls taking off their tops on a beach, we get right into it full-throttle. John Astin, usually a very professional theater actor, plays Professor Gangreen in the other wild over-the-top horror comedy of 1988 (the other is Don Calfa in Chopper Chicks in Zombietown), and he's got a plan- create killer tomatoes again, but this time not REALLY tomatoes, but just regular tomatoes that can turn into killing machines Rambo style! But the professor also makes a woman (sexy Kara Mistal) for himself, and she strays away with her little fuzzy tomato, or FT, and meets Anthony Stark's Chad, a worker in a tomato-sauce-less pizza parlor with his friend Matt (George Clooney, yes, half a decade before ER if you can think back to them). Things then start to get a little wacky...Well, actually, wacky is such a little word to use. Return of the Killer Tomatoes, a movie that does not feature one real killing tomato (though potential quasi-killers they may be, and once in a while suicidal), is by and large one of the funniest horror-movie parody type sequels of the 80s. It takes itself about as seriously as you might expect, which is not at all. In fact the tongue is so placed firmly in cheek, it comes out the other end during scenes when writer/director John DiBello breaks the 'fourth wall' as the shooting of the movie (and massive, continuous, "elaborate" product placements are put in at every turn after a while, years before the gag was used in Wayne's World). I probably had bigger laughs during moments like these- with some random outbursts of ninjas fighting cowboys in a diner- than I did during the first Killer Tomatoes flick. While the original still does garner points for being as audacious with its stupidity and with a smaller budget (not that the sequel doesn't make fun of the budget at every other turn), the zany spirit of the first film remains strong here, and deliriously so at times. When you got the doctor's assistant of Igor looking like a wrestler, you get the idea.It's a wild and crazy ride, with a 20-something Clooney with a full head of dark hair and basically in a role that requires him just to act as himself to a much more condensed range (i.e. ladies man, which includes a great gag involving him getting girls to go on a date with him, though saying as if he's Rob Lowe). Its got plenty of stuff for fans of the first flick, including the Ewok of the series with FT, who has his own sort of merchandising going towards the end too. By the way, stay through till the end of the credits- it's not just because the director's mother said so!