Rating of
1.5/4
An Unnecessary Prequel
ZJW - wrote on 05/16/09
Tremors 4: The Legend Begins is a prequel to the previous three Tremor films, as well as the short-lived TV series. The film attempts to give a further explanation of the Graboids as well as the town of Perfection, here ‘Rejection’, Nevada. Michael Gross is the only star of the previous films to make his return for another go around.
You might be wondering how Michael Gross can make a return in a prequel set 100 years before the original film. Easy – he is no longer Burt Gummer, but instead his great-grandfather, Hiram Gummer. In the original Tremors Burt tells us that he settled in the region for geographical isolation although this indicates his family wasn’t unfamiliar with the region. O well – they needed to fit him in somehow, or it just wouldn’t be a Tremors film.
The films story is fairly simple, of course, as a silver mine needs to be shut down after several mysterious, and coincidently, Graboid related incidents. Hiram Gummer, who owns the mine, arrives to solve the problem but is unwelcomed by the townspeople. Hiram is not the Gummer we’ve come to know from the previous films and upon arriving has never fired a weapon. He eventually comes around though as the residents of the town make a final stand. The final showdown is interesting enough but like much of the film has a feeling of déjà vu.
Compared to the previous Tremors film this is a slight improvement. It doesn’t rely so heavily on CGI and the story is once again about the worms. The soundtrack however is brutally repetitive. Hiram Gummer also isn’t nearly as interesting as Burt Gummer. The film isn’t much more than another go around at what we’ve already seen. Of course many franchises do resort to a prequel as a last resort to spark interest but this certainly won't do the trick. A prequel to film with so little back-story as Tremors though is hardly necessary. It’s an improvement on the third but nowhere near as good as the first two.
