Beyond The Room: 3 more so-bad-it’s-good cinematic subgenres

If indeterminately European auteur Tommy Wiseau is to believed, every plot hole, flubbed line (“Oh hi, Mark”), and football game played in ridiculously close quarters in his cultishly adored/reviled romantic tragedy The Room was intended for maximum yuks. Assuming he’s telling the truth (and he’s definitely not), Wiseau’s singularly awful film is even more one-of-a-kind: It’s a pioneer in the heretofore uncovered cinematic subgenre “horrible movies about tragic love triangles passed off as intentionally humorous by their directors.” Whether Wiseau’s intentions were satirical or, more honestly, just inherently flawed, The Room now joins a USA Network programmer’s booty of movies that are “so bad they’re good,” a lineage that stretches from Ed Wood’s days of wine and angora to whatever Lorenzo Lamas is working on right now. In honor of the Esquire Theatre’s midnight showings of The Room this weekend, here are three other types of undeniably awful, yet compulsively watchable crap-fests, broken down by their identifying marks, classic examples, and suggestions for further study. 

Sub-genre: Things vs. things
Characteristics: Mythical beasts, the suggestion of boobs, and the ability to kill two hours on the SciFi Channel.
Classic example: Dragon Wars: D-War (2007)
A huge hit in its native South Korea, and a tremendous flop in the U.S., D-War concerns the reincarnated guardian of a reincarnated woman, who, if eaten by the evil serpent Buraki, will cause Buraki to transform into … an even more evil serpent? That will go on to fight other dragons? Despite clocking in under the 90-minute mark, Dragon Wars doesn’t know when to stop, piling on incomprehensible exposition and CGI monsters until it all but implodes.
Key scene: Clearly unfamiliar with the “look both ways” rule, the shape-shifting bad guy gets hit by not one but two cars (one of which is driven by The Office’s Craig Robinson).

For further study: Boa Vs. Python (2004)
At the turn of the century, the SyFy Channel decided it should spend less time on Wonder Woman reruns and more on fare like the Casper Van Dien vehicle Python. Giant creatures munching on a parade of has-beens and never-wases proved to be a ratings boon, and thus Python spawned a snakesploitation franchise that culminted in Boa Vs. Python. The film centers around multi-millionaire Broddick (an anti-hero who you’ll love to hate and pretend to root for) who arranges a hunt for the world’s most dangerous game: giant python. When it gets loose, mankind’s only hope (of course!) is an equally large, genetically engineered boa.  
Key scene: The python heads to a rave for some DayGlo snacks, where Broddick goes completely unhinged and torches the place with a flamethrower.      

Sub-genre: Kids’ movies that are actually commercials
Characteristics: Magic, overt product placement, fishes-out-of-water, and really overt product placement.
Classic example: Mac And Me (1988)
A family of wannabe-E.T.s crash-lands in a small American town to teach its citizens the value of Coca-Cola and McDonald’s. Like The Room, Mac And Me has benefited in recent years from the magical touch of Paul Rudd, who, rather than bring a clip of whatever he was promoting at the time, preferred to augment appearances on Late Night With Conan O’Brien with this Mac And Me clip of a mannequin in a wheelchair falling into a river.
Key scene: A McDonald’s dance contest between Mac in a bear suit, some well-choreographed extras, and the local professional football squad foils the government’s attempt at capturing the alien. (That kind of shit happened all the time in the ’80s.)

For further study: Flyin’ Ryan (2003)
If you can judge a movie by its DVD cover, then Flyin’ Ryan’s cheesy tagline (“The sky’s the limit”), Photoshopped dog-in-a-backpack, and knock-off Jumpman logo indicates that it’s going to be awesome. The small semblance of a plot concerns a dognapping, but that’s just so much padding to string together footage of kids getting EXTREME!!!!!!! on skateboards and Heelys, the “skate-shoe” manufacturers who just so happened to fund the film.
Key scene: Protagonist Andy Weiss—who the cover reminds us is ”Flyin’ Ryan”—discovers his flyin’ powers at the climax of a chase that starts in a park, ends at a bucolic bluff, and at one point involves a fleet of ATVs.  

Sub-genre: Pale imitations
Characteristics: Elderly mentors, confrontational musical performances, and plot devices that bear a striking resemblance to those in more successful films.
Classic example: Troll 2 (1990)
The only thing standing between Tommy Wiseau and the top of the cinematic trash heap is Troll 2, and the anti-vegetarian, in-name-only (there’s actually not a troll to be seen here, only “goblins”) sequel to Gremlins rip-off Troll is likely to stay there until someone makes Best Worst Movie 2: The Room. Until then, Wiseau can enjoy his whatever-the-opposite-of-reflected-glory-is just as long as he doesn’t go against the admonitions of Troll 2 patriarch George Hardy and piss on the film’s hospitality.
Key scene: Darren Ewing discovers what the goblins have planned for him and unleashes an “OMG” that memes are made of. 

For further study: Hobgoblins (1988)
Hobgoblins director Rick Sloane could actually get away with the Wiseauian “I made it bad on purpose” argument: Every time a cast member is wrestled to the ground by the film’s titular fuzzballs, what we’re really seeing is the director winking at his audience. Sloane might have offered Hobgoblins up for a Mystery Science Theater 3000 skewering only in hindsight, but the film’s increasingly ludicrous wish-fulfillment sequences suggest that he, the cast, and the crew were in on the joke the whole time. 
Key scene: Diet Andrew McCarthy saves Jon Cryer Lite from a grisly death at the hands of a severely Lycra-ed fantasy woman (named Fantasia, natch) by whacking a hobgoblin with a rake.