Son of the Blob (aka Beware! The Blob)

(1972) *

A man brings home a piece of frozen arctic blob from the 50s B movie. The thawing blob pops out of its container to consume first a fly, then a kitten, then a human… then more and more humans. The twist: it’s now the early seventies, so the people it consumes are stereotypical hippies and stereotypical establishment types, played by the likes of Cindy Williams, Larry Hagman (who also directed), Dick Van Patten, and Burgess Meredith.

Two birds with one stone: getting my blob on, and getting my bomb on. This is the piece of crap I have been waiting for all ‘thon. As the opening credits rolled in low-budget glory over the ill-fated kitten roaming in the grass, I became hopeful. We are introduced to the kitten’s low-budget black suburban couple, soon to be the blob’s first victims, and I held my breath. The couple becomes blob-fodder, and we are then introduced to the low-budget, young hippie couple (aka the “protagonists”) that no one will believe about the menace to the town. Throughout the rest of the movie I watched intently, for fear that some morsel of good acting, continuity, special effects, gore, scare, nudity, or plot would force me to dole out even half a star. My fears were unwarranted. Son of the Blob is pure 70s dreck, and it is loads of fun to watch.