Disclaimer: yes, I know that ticks aren’t spiders. Neither are scorpions. Neither are camel spiders, even though they literally have the word ‘spider’ in their name. But they are all arachnids, and they all have eight legs, so they’re part of the club as far as I’m concerned.
I will be reviewing movies featuring all of them. I previously reviewed The Black Scorpion (1957) and we’ve still got Camel Spiders (2011) to look forward to. But I’ll also keep calling them ‘Giant Spider Movie’ reviews. ‘Giant Arachnid Movie Review’ doesn’t have the same ring to it. I’m sure you understand. It’s a brand.
According to the movie Ticks, ticks are the ‘vampires of the insect world.’ Yeah, except for the fact that they’re not insects, not dead, and don’t live in Romanian castles.
They suck blood, so that’s probably what they mean, but the ticks in Ticks go further than mere biting and sucking (like a few women I know). Some of them burrow entirely into a person’s body and crawl around and cause seizures and death. It’s pretty messed up. Don’t watch this movie if you have a dodgy ticker.
Hoods In The Woods
Ticks is about a group of wayward teens from the Hood or whatever, plus their counsellors, who go on a camping trip to the woods. Alternative title for this movie that I just made up: ‘Hoods In The woods’
Actually, most of them seem like good kids, they’ve just got issues. Seth Green plays Tyler, a ginger kid who’s fine with being ginger but has a phobia of being alone because his dad left him in the woods as a kid. His dad’s solution to cure his kid’s phobia is to send him on a trip to the woods. He sounds old school.
Amy Dolenz, who I had a major crush on as a kid in She’s Out Of Control, plays rich girl Didi. I’m not sure what her issue is, but it might be a vitamin D deficiency, seeing as she spends all her time sunning herself in a bikini.
Didi brings along her boyfriend, Rome (that’s his name). He pulls up in a Mercedes that Didi’s dad bought him, on the condition that he uses it to fuck off back to Mexico, alone. I guess the plan failed because instead, he’s taking his daughter to a log cabin. Also, he’s not Mexican.
There’s Kelly, a girl who doesn’t speak since being raped, and Melissa, who’s only there because her dad Charles is one of the counsellors and she’s being dragged along under duress. I hope he’s paying her.
To make matters worse, Melissa resents Charles’ girlfriend Holly, the other counsellor. At one point, the youths find a quite impressive stash of condoms in Charles’ bag. I’m starting to see his true motivation for the trip.
They Call Me Panic, ‘Coz I Never Do
Wait, I missed the best one. Did you ever watch The Fresh Prince of Bel Air? That sitcom with Will Smith? Remember his cousin, Carlton? That geeky, camp idiot? Why am I typing all these questions?
Alfonso Ribiero! I love that guy! Anyway, he’s in this. He plays a thug from the ‘streets’ called Panic (‘cause I never do’), in a spectacular piece of miscasting that is so bad it is genius. The guy is about as tough as toilet paper. I am not sure what street he is supposed to be from? Sesame Street, probably.
Let’s take a moment to consider Panic’s nickname (his real name is Darrel). He calls himself Panic because he doesn’t panic, which makes no sense at all. It can’t even be considered ironic. Ironic nicknames have a visual element to them, such as Little John being a gigantic fucker. You can see that Little John is big, therefore, you understand the irony.
But how are you meant to understand, visually, that a guy called Panic doesn’t panic? You would just assume that he’s prone to panic attacks, and that’s the last thing a guy from the streets would want anyone thinking about him. And yet he seems proud of his name and is happy to keep having to explain it.
Also, he definitely panics in this movie.
Exposition Overload
The screenwriter spoon feeds us every character’s background and motivation by having Charles explain it into a tape recorder like Captain Kirk, before signing off by saying how he hopes the rebellious kids will bond when faced with a common antagonist – nature.
Or more specifically, ticks. Even more specifically, two ex-Vietnam soldiers called Jerry (redneck stereotype) and Sir (slimeball). They grow marijuana in the woods using a herbal steroid which has the side effect of producing ticks the size of Sylvester Stallone. I’m exaggerating – they’re mostly tarantula size. Mostly…
The rebel teens and their counsellors have to bond together to fight the ticks and also the ex-soldiers, because as we all know, it is mankind who is the real evil in the world.
At this point, you should be holding your chin and nodding sagely.
The exposition continues when we cut to a guy working in a marijuana factory, played by Ron Howard’s brother, Clint. He turns on his radio, where the newsreader just happens to be talking about the problem in the Southern California woods of ex-soldiers growing marijuana using herbal steroids. They say that the consequences of messing with nature like that are unknown, just as the camera pans to a tick egg-sack with the herbal steroid dripping onto it.
Yeah, thanks for beating me over the head with stuff I could have figured out for myself, even if I had lived in a cave all my life and had never seen a movie and was born with no brain.
It’s not a local radio station either, but the BBC World Service. Was nothing more important happening on planet Earth that day? And how is it messing with nature if the steroid is herbal? I thought herbal meant natural. Ah, forget it, my head is starting to hurt.
Infested
Where was I? Oh yes, Clint Howard. I love that guy! It’s always good to see him getting work outside of Ron Howard movies and Gentle Ben.
Alas, he becomes the first tick victim (ticktim?) when a giant tick burrows into his leg and crawls around under his skin. He runs about screaming, steps in a bear trap, grabs a gun, and tries to kill the tick by repeatedly shooting himself. Then he falls over, and a slimy tick egg-sack lands on his face. Awesome.
Later on, Didi discovers the factory and Clint is still alive, and still dragging the bear trap around. His cheek pulsates, and a tick bursts out of it. The practical special effects are great – all gooey and slimy.
Clint falls on top of Didi and asks her to shoot him, while pointing the gun at his own head. He then utters what has become one of my favourite lines of dialogue ever:
‘I’m infested.’
Wait, I didn’t do that justice. It goes more like this:
I tell you, he really sells that sucker.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Panic’s dog, who I would have assumed was an emotional support dog for Panic’s crippling anxiety if he hadn’t explained that he’s called Panic because he doesn’t panic, gets a tick buried in him and dies. It’s the worst dog death scene this side of Alien 3 (theatrical cut).
Panic’s response to his dog’s death goes a little like this:
He runs away.
Return of the Howard family
The next day, Charles shows the dead dog to the local Sheriff, played by Rance Howard. Wait, is that another of Ron’s relatives? Quick IMDB check: it’s his dad.
Tyler and Charles take the dead dog to a vet and discover that the tick inside it is very much alive. They hunt the tick in the doctor’s office while it hides behind table legs and stuff. Smart bugger. I also love the clickety-clack sound of the tick’s legs as it moves. Very effective.
Not much is going right for the campers at this point. Holly struggles to get anyone interested in outdoor activities. She persuades Melissa and Kelly to go fishing, but they only thing they catch is the Sheriff’s dead body. He’s been shot by Sir and Jerry, the drug-growing soldiers.
Didi has her aforementioned encounter with Clint Howard and gets bitten by the tick that bursts out of his cheek. It doesn’t burrow into her, but another side effect of steroid-infused tick bites is their hallucinogenic properties. She keeps seeing visions of Clint Howard saying he’s infested. It’s a really interesting idea that is used a few times to good effect.
Queen Alien syndrome
Unluckiest of all is our dear friend Panic. Despite having had the good sense to leave after the first sign of trouble, he doesn’t get very far. A tick burrows into his leg, and he starts to hallucinate. Then he gets beaten up and shot by Sir and Jerry, before getting caught in a forest fire. He quaffs a load of steroids he stole from Rome and makes it back to the cabin, but has a seizure, dies, and a giant tick the size of an armchair bursts out of his dead body!
That’s right, an even bigger tick than normal shows up at the end, in true Queen Alien style. But whereas the alien queen represented an elevated threat to our characters, a tick the size of a Volkswagen is just plain stupid.
Wait, are we into act 3 already? It seems so. The forest fire drives the ticks towards the cabin where everyone holes up. They let Sir and Jerry take shelter too, but Daryl tells Charles they shot him right before he dies.
Sir shoots Charles in the leg (he’ll be fine) and sends Jerry out to get the van at gunpoint. Jerry has been bitten a number of times and hallucinates that Sir is the dead Sheriff, who he killed offscreen earlier. So he runs him over with the van and smashes through the wall of the cabin.
Sir somehow survives that, so Rome stabs him. Sir somehow survives that too, and that’s when the giant tick emerges and eats him. Everyone else escapes, and the cabin explodes.
There’s a sting in the tail in the epilogue. Upon returning to the city, a tick egg sack drops off the bottom of the minibus, setting up a sequel that hasn’t been made. But we can dream.
Overall, this is a competent movie, with some surprisingly well-drawn characters. The good set up ultimately comes to nothing, with a rushed third act that sees no payoffs for any of the characters, very few deaths, and a severe case of Queen Alien Syndrome, but for a while this little movie punches above its weight.
It’s far from perfect, but this movie ticked a lot of the right boxes for me. It’s not worth having a ticker tape parade over, but I look forward to the inevitable legacy sequel, which I’ve already subtitled City Tickers or Ticks in the City.
Rating: 6 spider legs out of 8
