When Deadpool came out in February, you couldn't swing a baby by its ankles without clubbing some fanboy gushing in his pants about it.
Finally, an R-rated superhero!
What's so great about an R rating anyway? A secret committee of prudish schoolmarms paid by the movie studios counts the number of times people say "fuck" and issues a certificate that says it's OK to show the film to the people the studio wanted to show it to anyway.
How about an unrated superhero? How about a superhero that stops an armed robbery by ripping a perpetrator's arm off and beating him with it, then deep frying another perp's hands? How about a superhero that stops a drug dealer in a gym by crushing his head with weights?
This week's Thursday Thriller is The Toxic Avenger.
The 1984 film was directed by Michael Herz and Lloyd Kaufman. It's about an archetypal 98-pound weakling named Melvin (Mark Torgl) who works as a janitor at the Tromaville Health Club. Some jocks with a penchant for vehicular homicide decide to play a cruel prank on Melvin and -- you know how the old saying goes: "It's all fun and games until someone falls into a vat of negligently stored toxic waste." Melvin runs home, skin a'bubbling and on fire.
In an especially cool transformation scene, Melvin's muscles bubble and bulge until he emerges as a muscle-bound monster with a Spidey-like sense of when evil is afoot.
With his mop in hand, the monster hero (Mitch Cohen) sets out on a rampage of maiming, mauling and mutilating evil-doers wherever he finds them. He seeks to clean up Tromaville, NJ, and get his revenge on those that did him wrong. In the process he finds love. There's lots of gore and tits.
The Toxic Avenger has spawned three sequels, a children's cartoon series called The Toxic Crusaders, and a Broadway Musical. It streams on Amazon Prime and YouTube.
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