The Curator of Schlock #407: Morgan |

The Curator of Schlock #407 by Jeff Shuster

Morgan

Scientists are stupid

I woke up. I was lying on the floor of a strange apartment and reeling in pain from getting my arm dislodged from its socket by the Revenging Manta, the ninja vigilante of downtown Orlando. I felt like I was going to die.

“Don’t you ever sneak up on me,” the ninja said. “I could have killed you.” He clapped his hands together three times before grabbing my arm again to pop it back into its socket. I cried out, “Edwige!” And then I passed out.

— To be continued.

_______

This is Science Gone Wrong Month on my humble blog. Tonight’s movie is 2016’s Morgan from director Luke Scott, son of Ridley Scott who is also listed as producer. The movie stars Kate Mara, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Paul Giamatti, Michelle Yeoh, Toby Jones, and Anya Taylor-Joy among others. You even get a cameo from Brian Cox. What a cast! And they star in a movie about a test tube baby that goes on a massacre in an isolated estate in the country. This is a B movie with an A cast.

A woman by the name of Lee Weathers (Kate Mara) gets dispatched to a research compound deep in the country. This is one of those near future movies where corporations are now messing around with genetic engineering. It seems that there was an incident that happened at the lab involving an experimental creature named Morgan. It seems that Morgan repeatedly stabbed a Dr. Kathy Grieff (Jennifer Jason Leigh) in the eye. Morgan has no gender, but the scientists keep switching between her and it. Morgan is played by the lovely Anya Taylor-Joy, but she looks like a monster here with grey skin and slicked back hair.

Dr. Simon Ziegler explains to Lee how Morgan was created using synthetic DNA and nanotechnology and a bunch of science gobbledygook that I can’t make heads or tails of. What I find disturbing is how much this staff of scientists love Morgan and treat it/her as one of the family. The scientists even threw Morgan a birthday party. They’re very proud of their experiment and hope risk management will ignore the whole incident concerning the eye stabbing. Lee informs them that a psychologist by the name of Dr. Alan Shapiro (Paul Giamatti) will be stopping by to make the final assessment.

Dr. Shapiro shows up and acts like a perfect ass. He takes one look at Morgan and states that it’s already failed the psych exam. He also insists on speaking to Morgan directly inside its cell. The scientists don’t think that’s such a good idea and Dr. Shapiro tells them not to tell him how to do his job. Dr. Shapiro’s psych evaluation of Morgan involves him constantly trying to get a rise out of the patient. He tells Morgan that it has no friends. Dr. Shapiro threatens Morgan with permanent imprisonment and possible termination. Morgan doesn’t like this so it rips out Dr. Shapiro’s throat.

With Morgan failing its psych exam, the scientists are ordered by corporate to put Morgan to sleep. They refuse to do this and make arrangements to flee the lab with Morgan. The scientists lock Lee in Morgan’s cell so she won’t interfere. At first I thought Morgan had some kind of psychic hold on the scientists, but they’re really just this stupid. It’s around this time that Morgan goes on a killing spree, murdering the very scientists that were trying to help it. There’s a twist ending that I won’t spoil here. Until next week.

_______