Commander Steve Krieger (Marc Singer) and his robot companion Tinpan (Rodger Halston) are traveling through space when they receive an SOS from a planet called Phabon. Before they can respond they are attacked by several unknown spaceships, most likely pirates. Steve and Tinpan manage to destroy the ships but sustain damage.
When they get to Phabon they are told that there is no emergency, but they are welcomed and given quarters to rest in. Phabon is a high security research facility. They do experiments on deadly viruses that are outlawed on Earth. The scientists are trying to create a virus to combat a deadly plague. In essence, to combat a deadly virus, they have created an even worse virus.
Unfortunately, one of the experiments creates a mutant virus that can alter its own genetic structure creating a monster that attacks those in the research facility. The scientists think that they have the virus under control; however, it gets out and infects one of the people in the facility, Devon Latham (Liz Rogers), who happened to be the last survivor of the original plague. Devon ends up morphing into a monster that attacks the others on the station.
Steve and Tinpan try to kill it, but their weapons are not effective enough. As the creature rampages through the facility killing everyone, Frank believes that the only way to combat the creature is to attack it with another bioweapon.
“Dead Space” was released in 1991 and was directed by Fred Gallo. It is an American science fiction movie. The executive producer of the film was Roger Corman.
The film is a sort of remake of Roger’s 1982 film “Forbidden World” but with less boobs. In essence, a watered down and even lower budget version of the 1982 film. For some reason Corman redid some of his earlier films but not necessarily any better than the originals had been. Some of the outer space battle scenes are from Corman’s previous film “Battle Beyond the Stars” 1980.
The actual creature is supposedly a guy in a suit, but it looks more like a giant puppet that vaguely resembles the Queen Xenomorph from “Alien” 1979 and a dragon. At least what you can see of it among the perpetual fog that always manages to develop whenever the creature is on screen.
The acting is OK, and it was interesting to see Bryan Cranston in an earlier role. He does OK considering there isn’t much to work with. Marc Singer also did OK as a hunky space ranger type person. The robot sidekick, Tinpan, is played by a guy in a suit, Rodger Halston, credited here as Rodger Hall. It’s fine as your basic space opera but not better than the original. I’d recommend it for Cranston or Singer fans or Roger Corman completists.