½ Species II
(R)Caution: spoilers.
This came out in 1998, but I didn't see it until 2015 (a couple years after I saw the first Species movie). I probably never would have bothered seeing this if I hadn't gotten both movies in a 2 DVD set, because I wasn't wild about the original. And in fact, the general consensus seems to be that this movie is far inferior to the original, but personally, I think I preferred the sequel. I mean, I can't say for sure, because I barely remember the first movie, so if I watched it again I might prefer it over this one... but I really have no desire to do so. I don't even have any interest in ever watching this one again (and certainly none of the direct-to-video sequels, ever). But if I had to pick one of the two to watch a second time, I mean, you know... gun-to-my-head... I'd pick this one. Probably. Here's the thing: the first movie was sci-fi/horror. But the second movie, as far as I can tell, is sci-fi/horror/comedy. (If there was any humor, even unintentional, in the first movie, I don't remember it.) But this movie was just redonkulous, and I got the feeling that the writers and actors and everyone involved knew it, and embraced it. Maybe I'm wrong about that... some bits were obviously thrown in for comedic effect, and other bits might have been unintentionally funny, but that's hard for me to believe. Of course, most of the movie seemed as serious as the original, but a great deal of the sequel just seemed totally tongue-in-cheek, to me. Certainly, if the movie hadn't made me laugh, I would think it was inferior to the original, but it did make me laugh. So it's superior. ...Just not by much.
Anyway... the human/alien hybrid, Sil (Natasha Henstridge), was killed at the end of the first movie, but in this one, there's a duplicate of her, named Eve (also played by Henstridge). But I'm getting ahead of myself. The movie actually starts with a mission to Mars. There are three astronauts: Patrick Ross, Dennis Gamble, and Anne Sampas. The first clue I had that the movie was at least part comedy was the fact that their spaceship had a bunch of familiar corporate logos on it. (Actually, the logos were on what seemed to be a space station, which housed both a landing module and a shuttle... but the station itself also seemed to be mobile.) Gamble and Sampas remain on the station, but Ross takes the module down to Mars, where he collects a few soil samples. Back on the station, one of the samples seems to thaw itself, and some ooze comes out of the canister, and then... the three astronauts black out for like seven minutes, before waking up and returning to Earth. (There will later be some speculation about the ship's temperature thawing the sample, but the other samples remained frozen, so I maintain that the sample thawed itself.)
Meanwhile, Dr. Laura Baker (Marg Helgenberger, reprising her role from the first film) is the head of the research facility where Eve was created, in order to do tests in the hopes of learning how to kill the alien species, in case it ever returns. It's very odd that Baker seems to actually care about Eve (who is, as we are occasionally reminded, half human), and wants to be as humane as possible in the testing... when there is no denying that the whole point of the testing is to kill Eve. But anyway, there's this Army guy, or whatever, named Burgess, who doesn't get along well with anyone. And um... there's a doctor named Orinsky who's studying Patrick Ross's blood sample, I guess, but the sample... gets loose, and kills Orinsky. And there's another scientist named Dr. Cromwell (played by Peter Boyle) who's in a mental hospital, and who I guess was the former teacher of Orinsky, or something. Meanwhile, Ross's mind seems to occasionally be taken over by the alien species, which infected him back on the space station. And he has sex with several women. (Which is a major difference from the first movie, where it took forever for Sil to manage to have sex with anyone. Part of me thinks this difference between movies is sexist, but another part of me writes it off as just... you know, different plot requirements for different movies.) Anyway, he impregnates each partner he takes, and gestation takes about a minute after sex, then the horrific alien baby bursts out of the woman's stomach, which kills all the mothers in a very gruesome way. Then Ross takes the offspring (who very quickly mature into young children) and hides them in a barn.
So... I guess it was the death of Orinsky that made the military start an investigation, and Burgess recruits a reluctant Press Lennox (from the first film) to lead the investigation, along with Dr. Baker. They go to the asylum to talk to Cromwell, the last person Orinsky tried to call before he died. Cromwell's whole role seems to be providing a bit of exposition that explains why going to Mars was such a bad idea, and why (in theory) the whole plot of the sequel makes some kind of sense. But personally, I feel like the exposition wasn't particularly necessary, because it is clearly the only attempt in the entire movie that the writers made to try to have the plot make sense. So why bother? But whatevs, it's always nice to see Peter Boyle, so I don't care. Um... anyway, they realize they need to find and test all three astronauts for alien DNA. They can't find Ross, but they do find Sampas... too late. She had sex, got pregnant, had an alien baby that killed her and her partner, then Baker and Lennox killed the baby. Then they find Gamble, who hadn't been infected by the alien DNA like the other two astronauts, so he joins the team as they continue to search for Ross. (Ross, btw, is the son of a senator played by James Cromwell, which I hesitate to mention for fear of confusing him with Dr. Cromwell.)
Um... what else? For most of the movie, Eve was docile, and friendly with Dr. Baker, but they discovered that she had a telepathic connection to Ross, and Burgess ordered Baker to enhance the connection by "awakening" Eve's dormant alien DNA, to help them find Ross. This, obviously, was a horrible idea. I mean seriously next level stupid. It leads to Ross becoming aware of the connection, after which he and Eve become obsessed with getting together to mate and produce a full-on alien baby. (Which doesn't really make much sense, considering they're both half human, so any offspring they produce would also be half human. But I guess it's preferable to quarter alien babies?) Meanwhile, Baker comes up with an idea for how to kill the aliens, which was inspired by the reason Gamble hadn't been infected, though I really think it's something she should have thought of a long time ago, especially if she's ever read or listened to or watched or even just heard of "The War of the Worlds." (Or, you know, if she'd done any critical thinking about the first movie.) But whatevs. Anyway, lots of bad stuff happens, but the aliens die in the end, but there's also a sequel hook, but I'm not going to watch the damn sequel.