Night of the Comet

“What are your plans, you fiend?” I asked glaring at the Goose Lord. Edwige, my kangaroo companion from my misadventures in North America, was tethered between the conducting rails of a mass driver. She wriggled to get free, but it was no use. The Goose Lord squeezed my cheeks with his black leather gloved hand. 

“I have a very large piece of tungsten that’s laced with fentanyl,” the Goose Lord said with his crazy eyes bugging from their sockets. “I’m going to send it hurtling straight toward that Star Wars hotel as Disney’s Galaxy Edge. That’s right. Kiss Disney World goodbye!”

— To be continued. 

Tonight’s movie is 1984’s Night of the Comet from director Thom Eberhardt. I’ve been meaning to watch this one for years, but I just never got around to it. I’m assuming it was made in reaction to all of that Halley’s Comet hullabaloo that was going on in the mid 80s. I think I was too busy watching Diff’rent Strokes reruns to bother. The folly of youth. That’s okay. It should come around again in 2061. 

Our protagonist is Reggie (Catherine Mary Stewart), an eighteen year-old usher at a local movie theater who’s only concern in life is getting the top score in Tempest. That’s an old Atari game for those of you not in the know. Reggie hooks up with a sleazo named Larry who likes to bootleg movies from reels he gets his hands on. Since the room they stayed in was lined with steel, neither Reggie or Larry were affected by the cosmic rays coming from a visiting comet that so many people were clamoring to see.

I just don’t get it. Didn’t our ancestors hide in caves when weird stuff like comets or eclipses were happening in the sky? Didn’t they see such things as bad omens? Now people want to gaze at eclipses even if they go partially blind as a result. I’d rather just stay inside and play Nintendo. Avoid all that nonsense. 

Larry leaves Reggie after his one night stand only to get killed by a mutant on the outside of the theater. It seems that the comet wreaked a lot of havoc while Reggie and Larry were spending the night in the projection booth. Direct exposure to the rays will disintegrate humans into a pink powder. Less exposure will kill you in the long run, but you get to be mutant with a craving for human flesh before you disintegrate. I don’t know. I’d still rather be a ghoul than a pile of pink powder just waiting to get washed around with the next heavy rain. 

Reggie goes home to find her sister Sam (Kelli Maroney) perfectly fine and oblivious to this disaster. She had gotten into a fight with their evil stepmother the night before and decided to bail on the comet watching. Later, they run into a trucker named Hector (Robert Beltran) who spent the night in the back of his steel truck. Will these three survivors be able to navigate such an apocalyptic event? Yes, and they even manage to get some mall shopping done along the way. There are some mutant store clerks, but Reggie and Sam waste them with automatic weapons.

I love this movie!

Jeff Shuster (episode 47, episode 102, episode 124, episode 131, episode 284, episode 441, episode 442, episode 443, episode 444, episode 450, episode 477, episode 491, episode 492, episode 493, episode 495, episode 496, episode 545, episode 546, episode 547, episode 548, episode 549, episode 575, episode 596, episode 597, episode 598, episode 599, episode 642, episode 643, episode 644, episode 645, episode 670, episode 686, episode 687,  688, and 689) is an MFA graduate from the University of Central Florida.