“I feel I’ve not been privy to critical most needful information.”
The Silver mine in the tiny town of Rejection, Nevada is the biggest employer around. It’s 1889. Pyong Lien Chang (Ming Lo) and his wife Lu Wan (Lydia Look) along with their son Fu Yien (Sam Ly) run the general store. Christine Lord (Sara Botsford) runs the local inn. On this day a hot spring causes a clutch of four Graboid eggs to hatch. Miners start dying. Seventeen of them. No one wants to enter the mine.
Hiram Gummer (Michael Gross), great grandfather of Burt Gummer, is the owner of the mine. He arrives in town from Philadelphia to assess the situation and get the mine running again. Hiram Gummer is a pansy. While camped out one night with his guide Juan (Brent Roam) and whatever miners they could get together they are attacked by baby Graboids that can shoot out of the ground. Juan manages to kill one. The rest of their party doesn’t make it. They walk back to Rejection over the rocks of the foothills to tell the remaining towns people about the monsters. Chang calls them Dirt Dragons.
Hiram is a city slicker and not comfortable around firearms so he advertises for a gunslinger in the Carson City paper. Black Hand Kelly (Billy Drago) arrives to save the day. Kelly, Hiram and Juan ride out to find the Dirt Dragons. By now the Dirt Dragons have grown into full fledged Graboids. Nobody knows what they are in for. They end up cornered at a mill. Kelly gets eaten. Christine arrives just in time to spirit away Juan and Hiram.
By now Hiram is ready to head for the hills and leave the town to its fate. Before he goes the town blackmails him into giving the town the mine. They tell him that if he tries to sell it to anyone they will tell them about the Dirt Dragons. Hiram goes to Carson City. While he is there he hears of a telegram from Rejection begging for help and stating that the Dirt Dragons have gotten through the pass and are headed straight for the tiny town. Hiram has a change of heart and decides to return to Rejection and make one last stand against the Dirt Dragons.
“Tremors 4, The Legend begins” was released in 2004 and was directed by S. S. Wilson. It is the fourth in the Tremors series and a prequel. The plot is a little thin and the budget a little lower. If this was a stand alone movie and there were no Tremor movies before it, this would be one of the weirdest Westerns ever. Michael Gross would still be over acting. Although I thought he got better as the movie went along. I especially liked the patter back and forth between Hiram Gummer and Black Hand Kelly.
Again as with the previous movies no one really cares that much about the acting or the dialogue as long as you have Graboids and this one really delivers. The puppets are back in all their glory. If you can’t get enough Graboids then put this one on your list because they are front and center. No Shriekers, no Ass-blasters just hatchlings and Graboids.
Shooters" is the unofficial fan name for the baby graboids, and they are dubbed so in the Tremors encyclopedia. However, being a non-canon site, it is not their official name. In fact on the stampede entertainment site they are frequently called "Grablites", short for Graboid "Lite". The most agreed-upon name is "Dirt Dragon", although this was also used to refer to the full-sized Graboids. As the Dirt Dragons have not yet been encountered in the modern day, it is unknown what their name would be.