Deathstalker II

Saddle up your dragons because it’s SWORD AND SORCERY Month at Mondo Mondays, featuring a B-movie barrage of beefy barbarians, plucky princesses and sinister sorcerers!

“Twice the action. Twice the passion. Twice the adventure.” Deathstalker returns (by popular demand?) to lay waste to all he sees in this high-camp, high-cheese comedy/adventure sequel filled with tons of action, nudity, dumb jokes and gratuitous wrestling, and that may actually be a parody of ‘80s Sword and Sorcery flicks, but who knows? In Deathstalker 2, which has almost literally nothing to do with the first film, the Bruce Campbell-eqsue John Terlesky (Valet Girls) hams it up as our wisecracking hero (as opposed to the stoic barbarian Rick Hill, who played the original Deathstalker), whose very name, “Deathstalker,” elicits snarky comments from his adversaries. He’s a soldier of fortune in leather pants who decides to help a damsel in distress, Princess Evie (‘80s B-movie queen Monique Gabrielle, Evil Toons), and her magically-created clone, Reena the Seer (also played by Gabrielle), battle the evil sorcerer Jarek (John Lazar, aka “Z-Man” from Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, who really seems to be enjoying himself here) who is trying to seize Evie’s throne with his B-movie black magic. Amidst all the bared flesh, swordfights, and goofy comedy that ensues, we get gruesome goons, rampaging Amazon women and an actual professional wrestling match between Deathstalker and “Gorgo,” the vicious Amazon wrestling champion. A fun campfest with both intentional and unintentional humor galore, Deathstalker 2 is a medieval blast from producer Roger Corman and director Jim Wynorski (Chopping Mall). (Dir. by Jim Wynorski, 1987, USA, 85 mins., Rated R)