Rocky and Winky return, along with the rest of the gang, for another space-farin' adventure beyond imagination. My most recent disc of Treeline's sci-fi box set concludes with Rocky Jones, Space Ranger: Menace from Space, another serviceable feature film created by stitching a couple episodes of the Rocky Jones television show together. This time around, someone from one of the moons of Jupiter is taking pot shots at the Earth, and Rocky and Winky must refuse to take along a competent crew and instead populate their ship with a chick in a mini-skirt (good decision), a senile old professor, and an irritating kid as they investigate the matter. There's a pretty funny scene where a big, strapping space ranger says he's been chained to a desk too long and would love to go on the mission. Rocky turns him down, then says the useless little kid can come along instead -- all this right in front of the sad sack desk jockey.

Speaking of the little kid, Bobby, he has his irritating mannerisms cranked up to eleven, including lots of "Rolickin' rockets, Rocky!" and a positively creepy scene where he tries to get Rocky to take him along on the mission by flexing and, in his flat, unaccomplished child actor delivery, goes on and on with stuff like, "I'm getting so big and strong, Rocky! And my muscles...gosh!" And what makes it even creepier is that the kid's delivery comes out sounding very similar in intonation to the infamous "Me so horny!" speech from Full Metal Jacket. Oh Rocky! Let me take off my little boy checkered shirt so you can slather me with space froth! The writers of these episodes must have sensed that sidekick Winky was behaving pretty normal -- almost like a grown man, despite still being called Winky -- so they decided to ratchet the Bobby quotient up considerably.

Still Bobby aside, this is a pretty good little adventure. Rocky and crew trace the missile back to a society of people in jangly headwear who make their women dress like belly dancers. In other words -- advanced morally and socially far beyond us humans, who only require a small percentage of women to dress like belly dancers a small percentage of the time (and then, some of them are flabby hippies, so they don't even count). The moon men of Jupiter are being advised by a nefarious human professor who wants to use the fabulous energy sources of the moon to threaten Earth. But these aliens are basically good guys, so they aren't falling for the evil professor's tricks, at least not easily. Introducing them to Bobby probably helped the cause of obliterating the Earth, but then, we also gave them Rocky's hot babe in a mini-skirt and cape (who is aghast that the increased gravity on this moon makes her weigh over 200 pounds! Ha, ha, ha, -- women!), so things are even.

Rocky is still too cautious for my taste, but this is a pretty good space thriller never the less, with some fist fights, old rocket effects, and guys in funny sparkling headdresses. I like it better than Crash of the Moons, but not for any particular or tangible reason -- I just had more fun during this particular entry into the series.

Labels: Set: Sci-Fi Classics