Review: Blood Storm ;Subspecies 4 (1998)
By William Pattison
For Horror Bob's Blog...
This time I have the the fourth and what was supposed to be the final film in the series at the time.
I did not like this installment of the series as much as the earlier three films, even though it was a crossover to Ted Nicolaou’s The Vampire Journals.
One of the main problems was that this film was done after Full Moon and Parmount’s distribution agreement had ended and Full Moon was having to drastically cut the budgets of it’s films. Also, because of budget cuts the FX and makeup budgets were butchered. It is the main reason the Subspecies doesn’t appear, because the had no budget for the stop motion for the little minions. It can also be seen in the makeup work for Radu. In this film Radu no longer slobbers blood because the had todudget the use of fake blood. Also he doesn’t have his custom teeth. In fact all the vampires look to be stuck sharing vampire teeth. As well budgetary restrictions also was the reason why all Michelle’s associates and her sister died at the beginning of the film. Only the character of Marrin survived, but he was only saved by being made into a vampire. Oh, and best of all they had a very cheap looking Bloodstone in this film. Supposedly the original Bloodstone had gotten lost between films so they had to make a replacement one. This one looks like a fan made model of it. It is too big and just plain looks wrong. Amusingly a few years ago Full Moon out out a Bloodstone model and this one is the right size and looks amazingly like the original from the original three film. What a joke.
Johnathon Morris is back as the music loving vampire from Vampire Journal,Ash. But this time we find out that Radu is his master. Also that Radu has claim to everything he has built. Also we have Mihai Dinvale back from Vampire Journal as the vampire trying to cure himself but remain immortal Doctor Blood.
The best addition to the cast is Floriela Grappini as Ash’s apprentice Seriena.
All in all even though this is not the best of the Subspecies series I found it entertaining. And if you are a completeist you won’t was to miss the conclusion of the story of Michelle and Radu.
You can watch this film for free on Fawesome…
Keep on Creepin’ , Horror Bob’s Blog…
