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BAT-TY BOOP

New York Post

28 October 2005


By LINDA STASI

October 28, 2005 --

"Vampire Bats"
Sunday night at 9 on CBS/Ch. 2

Lucy Lawless on Vampire BatsFRESH from their riveting roles in that TV movie classic, "Locusts," Dr. Maddy Rierdon (Lucy Lawless, "Xena") and hubby Dan Dryer (Dylan Neal) are back to battle more revolting creatures in a soon-to- be-classic,  "Vampire Bats."

I'm happy to report that yes, we're saved once again. But that's because luckily for the earth, not to mention CBS, as long as this entomologically muscular couple continue to live, work and teach together, they will always find the right way to kill off whatever disgusting larvae, rodent and crawling/flying things mutate in our lifetimes.

On Sunday night, it's mutant vampire bats that will be threatening all the good (looking) people in Louisiana. Unfortunately, they made this movie before the good (looking) people of Louisiana were blasted by a real enemy — Hurricane Katrina — but that's another story.

Anyway, there are man-eating bats on the loose in the local college town where Maddy and Dan have moved — the vampire bats mutated because of the toxic waste being dumped illegally into the water.

But Dr. Rierdon and Dan didn't know that when they took their new gigs as the best-looking college professors in the history of education. But make no mistake — they aren't there to fool around — they are there to teach bug science and environmental studies.

All is well until, well, their first day of class when one student's throat gets ripped out after a rave. Even though this happens late at night (or the bats wouldn't be out a-hunting), we are fortunate to see the bat attacking the kid because the only thing lit in the swamp primeval is his neck. That's either amateur lighting or incredibly good luck for the bat — not to mention the viewer.

The cops think his friends killed him, but it's not until all the academicians are on a riverboat cruise while the students are at yet another rave and the bats start swarming — and start eating the revelers — do they realize that it's murder by bat!

And may I add, they are some fine and dandy-looking, disgusting bats. Scary even.

Despite the neck-ripping, blood-sucking, and extra set of fangs these mutant bats display, they also have a wonderful, if totally unmentioned terrific mutation: No matter how many thousands of them swarm, there's never a drop of guano! (You don't know what that is? Look it up, it will be good for you.) Now that's a bat worth breeding, I say!

Dr. Rierdon and her students go bat hunting (why they go at night when the bats are about to wake up instead of looking for them in the day when they are asleep I don't know — I mean you don't hunt Dracula at night, right?). They find the bats, but are hindered every step of the way by the evil fish-and-wildlife ranger (Craig Ferguson of "The Late
Late Show").

But the person who steals every scene is Brett Butler as the sister-in-law.

Yes, humanity is saved again. But who knows what could come next for Maddy and Dan. Baby-stealing scorpions? Giant, man-eating moths? Angry, mutant glow worms with large teeth? The return of Harriet Miers?