Starring: Richard Hatch, Susannah Deveroux, Don Hughes, Christopher Grey, Chad Theroux

Written and Directed by: Jay Woelfel

The Story: This movie really SUCKED!

Damn. I've got to say more than that, don't I? Now I have to relive the whole painful experience.

The movie begins with Richard Hatch  (yeah, Captain Apollo from Battlestar Galactica!) playing Colonel Nelson, and he's grousing about the combat he's seen in his career in the Army. Let me tell you now, that Hatch puts out zero charisma in this movie and its very difficult to understand what he's saying at times. That was a big problem for me, because I had the volume WAY up on my TV and I still couldn't make out some of his lines.

Anyway, Nelson is testing out a new Tank called Iron Thunder. Iron Thunder was created by Doctor Walker and Captain Albright, and its supposedly a revolution in tank warfare. The driver has computer chips surgically implanted in his head so that he can control the tank by thought. This isn't really exhibited...it seems to me that Nelson is driving the tank using the controls, and I can't see what advantage this mind meld would give anyway. Any time the tank does any firing it looks so unbelievably lame that I almost gave up on watching this travesty a half hour into it.

Albright accompanies Nelson in the tank during a live fire test run. But something goes wrong and Nelson's brain gets fried. He starts believing he's trapped behind enemy lines on a search and destroy mission. He also starts believing that Albright is a traitor. Albright manages to (lamely) escape the tank. But the problem now is that Nelson is taking Iron Thunder across the desert towards Las Vegas and has to be stopped. Iron Thunder also has a jamming device so its impossible to track by radar.

Walker sends Albright and two idiot soldiers named Ashton and Theroux to get Major Robinson, a former subject of Walker's tank experiments. Robinson has an unreasonable fear of water because the implant went bad on him. He blames Albright for this since she was the surgeon and he hates Walker because the process has somehow ruined his career. (I don't see how...Robinson claims that his life in the Army is through, but he's still in the f*ckin' army so what's he blabbing about?) There's also a guy named Hess that doesn't speak, another victim of the experiment.

Neither Ashton, Theroux or Hess are given an actual rank and they don't have any on their uniforms so its hard to say what they're grade is. I sincerely hope Ashton and Theroux's annoying banter wasn't supposed to be comedy relief because it was just plain bad. And if you're looking for hot military action you certainly came to the wrong place because none of these characters act like they've spent a day in the actual military. Walker admits to Robinson that he wants Iron Thunder destroyed not because it poses danger to the civilian populace but to save his own ass. I guess. One would think he'd already be in hot water since his mighty tank experiment has at this point caused psychological problems for three men and now its running amuck. Oh, and Walker leads Robinson to believe that Iron Thunder is an unmanned robot tank. This script is something that maybe a six year old would write. Any of those old GI Joe movies leans closer to reality than this turkey. At this point I knew I was in trouble myself. Its only halfway through the flick and I felt like I had been sitting here watching it for 10 hours. And Dear Lord it was painful.

It just gets worse, and I'll spare you a play by play. Nothing, absolutely nothing in this movie is worth watching. You'll be banging your head against a wall wondering why Dr. Walker doesn't have to answer to anyone. You'll cry when you realize that Robinson and his crew could have captured or killed Nelson at least twice if they had any common sense. You'll scream when they actually do capture Iron Thunder only to lose it again when Nelson just walks up and clonks Hess over the head. And you'll weep at the pointless end of it all when pretty much everyone dies offering no resolution or catharsis whatsoever. Don't let yourself get fooled by the cover...there's no "top Combat team" and the tanks on the cover? They ain't in the movie, and neither are the apache helicopters either. Iron Thunder looks more like a track vehicle with a fake turret mounted on it.

This is a movie that just should have never been made, my droogies. It feels a helluva lot longer than it actually is. And its certainly not worth the time. I can never get the hour or so of my life back that I spent with this pile of donkey dung. Don't waste yours with it.

Best Lines:  “So now you need us poor screwed up bastards to stop your solution which is this robot tank!?” - Major Robinson wants mission details from the Doctor Walker.

 “I don't wanna talk about it” - The only words spoken by Hess which thankfully signify the end of this pointless movie.

 Are you kidding me?

1.) So this multimillion dollar experimental tank's test run is manned by....four people. Right.

2.) The uniform mistakes on this movie are some of the worst I've seen. Any servicemen or women out there? Take a gander out of this picture see how many problems you can pick out. Then Click this link to see if you noticed the same ones I did.

3.) When Captain Albright escapes from Iron Thunder and runs away, she's not running very fast. As a matter of fact you can call it a spirited walk. Not only does it look stupid, its infuriating! People running for their lives don't move that slowly!

4.) Oh great...crackpot militia guys. And really stupid ones, too. Even though several of them have weapons trained on Nelson they don't react until he's killed one guy with his bare hands (the old twist your head till your neck breaks maneuver) snatched a weapon and runs away.

5.) The scene where Albright and Robinson rehash their old love affair seems forced...like it was quickly written into the script just so we could get a glimpse of  her gazongas. First of all, I can't believe that these two would decide to screw in an abandoned and open aired building while on a serious mission, and secondly its kind of distasteful that they intercut the scene with Ashton getting shot.

6.) Don't expect any great tank battles. Iron Thunder looks pretty lame and the battles are really stupid. I'm not sure of the range of fire of a modern tank but I'm sure its greater than 100 feet. So why do these bozos get all close and personal firing at each other? Too make it worse its claimed that both tanks are impervious to each others fire...so the battles are pointless in the first place!

Nudity and Sex: Robinson and Albright have sex....Albright's tig old bitties are seen.

Huh?:

Nelson says "These things  make you harder to kill" to Ashton supposedly talking about a Kevlar vest. But Ashton isn't wearing a Kevlar vest! Unless its under his shirt, which, frankly is impossible. Those things are just too damned bulky for that and besides wearing it that way would be mega uncomfortable!

Why exactly did the helicopter explode? Nelson shot the pilot so I guess she was made out of dynamite.

Hess pulls the implanted computer thingies out of the back of his head and they're all bloody, but when he turns around there's not a mark on the back of his skull. If its that easy to remove why didn't he do that long time ago? He even pulls the stuff out of Nelson's head. Hess speaks shortly after doing so, and Nelson seems to regain his normal mind. So all of the problems the men that were implanted have are solved by simply tugging some wires out of the back of their heads, why didn't Hess and Robinson just do this earlier....especially Robinson!

When we first meet Nelson he's a bitchin' and a groanin' on what a miserable experience he's had in the army...so why is he still in the army then? And would someone like that, clearly with a few screws loose at the start be a suitable candidate for the Iron Thunder experiment?

Why does Albright have an aussie accent?

The Final Judgment: There's absolutely nothing nice I can say about this movie. Hilariously someone sent a comment on the IMDb about it claiming that it "packing lots of bang per buck. Hatch proves he can be more than the teenie-bop hero of Galatica era". They must have been watching a different movie, because this movie packed nothing but goat droppings and Richard Hatch is probably ashamed of himself for being in it.

The Sentence of the Inferno is Thus: Iron Thunder, or "Iron Clunker" as it shall be now be known will be placed on the Firing Range of the Infernal Hordes where it will be used for Target Practice by the Infernal Riflemen till time itself comes to an end.

Addendum: I received an Email from Jay Woelfel, the director of this movie. He tells me that none of the explosions were super imposed and that there is no stock footage used, so I deleted those lines from the original text. Mr. Woelfel also explains that any uniform errors (my big pet peeve, as long time readers will know) are minor. I've said it before as I will again, if you're gonna make a movie about the army check out 670-1 Its not too hard to find (its not classified or anything) and this link I've provided was discovered with a few mouse clicks.