“Why is it the critical need to know information never gets to Burt Gummer?”
Burt Gummer (Michael Gross) is now a famous survivalist with his own series. When his camera man leaves for a better gig he is replaced by Travis Welker (Jamie Kennedy). The sparks fly. But not in a good way. Burt’s no-nonsense eat nails for breakfast personality clashes with Travis’s casual joke a minute personality.
Burt and Travis are called to a South African Wildlife Refuge. The ministry agents Erick Van Wyk (Daniel Janks) and Johan Dreyer (Brandon Auret) hire Burt to handle an outbreak of Ass-Blasters. Burt flies down to deal with the situation. Once there his weapons are impounded due to the gun laws in South Africa. Erick provides a small amount of guns that he has gotten together. Burt, unhappy with loosing his weapons, complains that the weapons he has are not sufficient to do the job.
As soon as Burt and Travis get situated they hear of another attack. Burt determines that it was a Graboid that killed the latest victims and not an Ass-Blaster. Then they see the fossil of an Ass-Blaster. It’s bigger than the North American variety. And these only come out at night. There is an attack that night. Burt takes Erick and a cage and goes after the Ass-Blaster. Burt finds one in a cave and manages to kill it.
Inside the Ass-Blaster is a Graboid egg. Erick demands the egg. He reveals that he is a poacher and locks Burt in the cage. The next day Travis finds Burt and they go after Erick. When they find him there is a Graboid after him. This Graboid is different. It can detach its tentacles. This one is the biggest Graboid Burt has ever seen. He calls it The Queen Bitch. The Graboid eats Erick. Burt and Travis return to the cave that concealed the Ass-Blaster. Travis goes into the cave and finds a huge cache of Graboid eggs. The problems never end.
"Tremors 5: Bloodlines" was released in 2015 and was directed by Don Michael Paul. This time around Michael Gross is joined by Jamie Kennedy as Travis Welker. This movie was more intense than previous ones. Plus a lot more blood and guts than in Tremors 4. The Graboids were CGI again. That’s OK because there weren’t that many of them anyway. In fact there weren’t that many Ass-Blasters either. There were no Shriekers at all. It was never really explained why.
The African Graboids and Ass-Blasters are different than the previous movies. Burt speculates that it’s because they are more evolved. That doesn’t seem logical since the fossil they found was similar to the Ass-Blaster species in Africa currently. It’s more logical that they just evolved differently than those on other continents but since Burt is the expert I will bow to him.
I could have done without the whole Burt in a cage situation. To me it was drawn out and not funny. On the other hand there were a few nods to other movies that were fun to find. Basically Tremors 5 is better than I expected. Again not as good as Tremors 1 but I didn’t expect it to be. Fans of the franchise should be happy with this one too.