I just finished it. Yep, it is just as bad as the last two, basically.
Spoiler
By this point I think everybody knows much I love the Tremors franchise. Or, at least, how much I love the Tremors franchise as it was through to the release of 2004's Tremors 4: The Legend Begins.
After an eleven year hiatus, Tremors returned in 2015 with Tremors 5: Bloodlines. I couldn't have been more excited for the return of my favorite childhood movies... until I learned that Universal had forced the original creators, who had been behind every prior installment, out of the picture. What resulted was a bland retread with godawful new creature designs. Michael Gross returned at Burt, but he was the only familiar face in front of or behind the camera, and despite Michael Gross always giving it 100% when playing this character, the writing had him feeling more like the kind of characters that Burt was originally a rebuttal to than like Burt himself.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. After pre-ordering Bloodlines on Blu-ray and being so disappointed, I knew better than to make the same mistake when Tremors: A Cold Day in Hell released in 2018. I chose to watch it on Netflix, which wound up being the right choice, because A Cold Day in Hell wound up being more of the same; the terribly redesigned creatures were back, Burt's son Travis (a frustrating character in both conception and execution) was back, the original creative team was still gone, and there was Gross, still trying to put his all into the role, and having a blast doing so, despite everything else going against him.
I told myself that I would only continue to power through these modern sequels so long as Michael Gross remained part of them, if only for his enthusiasm for the series. That brings us to today's release of Tremors: Shrieker Island. Foregoing the Blu-ray release again, I booted up Netflix and gave this one a watch this morning. The Shriekers are back (and wouldn't you know, the redesigned creatures continue to falter in comparison to designs from nearly three decades ago), Don Michael Paul is back to direct, Burt's son Travis is thankfully gone (and his departure is perhaps the only thing that made this one a hair more watchable than the last two), and Michael Gross returns as Burt... for what turns out to be the final time.
At the end of this movie, Burt dies in a scene seeking to recreate the finale of the original Tremors. As a kid, I would have been devastated by this. These days I am also devastated, but more so over the fact that the franchise was ripped from the hands of the people that created it in order to make these three installments on the cheap instead.
The montage paying tribute to Burt that ran over the credits was nice, if only because it reminded me of how much fun I had growing up with those first four installments, and how much fun Gross had with the role over the past thirty years. With Michael Gross now out of the picture, the last thing keeping me tethered to these modern entries in the franchise has left the scene and I feel as though I can now finally cut ties cut ties from any future installments.
