When we last left headband-clad biker tough Trash at the end of Bronx Warriors, he was wandering the wreckage of his beloved Bronx after firing a grappling hook into Vic Morrow and briefly lamenting the death of the girl who had first caused him to rip off the plot of Escape From New York.

Would that have been the last we ever saw of mighty, overly permed Trash, we no doubt would have been saddened that we weren’t able to share another post-apocalyptic adventure with him, but heartened to have at least had the time together that we did. We would have had to content ourselves to the memories of our hero battling his way through the various gang cultures that had taken over the Bronx and populated by exploitation luminaries like Fred “The Hammer” Williamson, Christopher Connelly, and George Eastman. Surely, enough grade Z Italian mayhem to fill several lifetimes (or at least one moderate length movie).

That Italian impresario Enzo G. Castellari would deliver another chapter in the epic journey of one man’s battle to maintain his luxurious mane’s bounce in a world gone mad (and certainly quite short on good conditioner) is cause for all us of with a little bit of Trash in him or her to strap on the studded wrist bands, jump into our tightest blue jeans, and affect that ugly accent only a dubbed Bronx warrior could manage and wait on tenterhooks to see what sort of tribulations Trash would be subjected to this time around.

And what tribulations this young hood must endure! The anguish of losing his parents. The pain of watching those he counted as his closest gang members, slaughtered by a greedy corporation. The indignity of having to use a dinky little six shooter the whole movie! What happened to his favorite metal spike?

The Bronx that we left Trash wandering around in at the end of the first movie is no different than the one that presents itself this time around. In fact, it may actually be a little worse. By this time, a plan is afoot to raze the entire Bronx and build a gleaming new metropolis over top of it. In an effort to make this come to pass the president and vice president of the company in charge of the project aim to rid the area of its residents no matter the cost.

The public line is that generous financial incentives are being offered as well as relocating residents to lovely solar powered homes in New Mexico. The cruel reality is that guys in silver suits and motorcycle helmets are going around armed with flamethrowers and roasting every Bronxian they can find. I’ll bet that whole dang borough was smelling like a Kentucky Fried Chicken after awhile!

Trash is known to those in charge (probably fans of the first film) and when they see him hanging out on his bitchin’ bike with skull headlamp, they send in the choppers to take him out! This leads to a shootout between Trash and the chopper guys that ends with Trash shooting the helicopter out of the sky with his puny handgun!

Much cursing by the bad guys ensue and they decide that if they can’t get Trash, then they’ll get his parents. Well, I guess that’s a good plan, if you’re looking to give Trash all kinds of incentive to unify the remaining gang members in an all out rebellion that will leave the city a pile of smoldering ruins!

Trash fans (or Trashers as we like to be called – Trashies is considered to be derogatory) have long awaited the moment where we would finally meet the couple who would find the courage in hard times to have a baby and name it after refuse. And just like we imagined, we meet Mr. and Mrs. Trash in the middle of an argument while Mr. Trash is sucking down a Budweiser. Joe Trash (Ratchet from 2019: After The Fall Of New York) is outraged that they are being told to leave the Bronx, while Mom Trash is all about this wondrous new land called New Mexico. But even as they argue, the choice is being made for them!

A team of dirty, no good Disinfestors is standing outside the door listening in on their squabble and once they’ve heard enough, they break in to get some flame throwing practice before going up against Trash himself. I’ll say this for Joe Trash – you can see where Trash got his attitude problem. As soon as these suckers start breaking in, Joe Trash goes for his ball bat and smashes a couple of these jerks right in the helmet faceplate before finally tasting the warm end of their flamethrowers.

Mom Trash cowers in a corner and is fried shortly thereafter. You might also notice the big poster they have hanging up in their shabby hovel. Some folks have pictures of Jesus or JFK or Michael Jordan hanging up, right? The Trash family? A movie poster of their son from the first movie! And dang it, if you saw that first movie, you’d know they had every right to be proud of him!

Trash eventually makes it back to his house and discovers his parents are dead. This elicits something along the lines of a saddened sneer and I can’t remember if he swears revenge, but he does end up underground with the remaining gang members eating soup while everyone else is discussing kidnapping the president of the company doing all these mean things, so I’m guessing that that was some sort of one man wake he was holding.

But it’s not like he’s so wrapped up in his own grief that he can’t offer a suggestion when someone wonders how they would get around above ground to snatch the president with all the security present. “Uh, dat would be hard, but you could do it under da ground, right?” I’m paraphrasing Trash here, but we know a good idea for a low budget movie when we hear it! I feel about forty minutes of run down sewer scenes coming on!

Okay, so the plot involves kidnapping the president so that the corporation will have to negotiate with the residents of the Bronx. If this doesn’t sound exactly like the sort of plan that Trash or the gang leader Dablone (Antonio Sabato, Sr. in pirate clothes) would come up with, you’re even smarter than Trash! It’s the idea of nosy reporter, Moon!

She’s a Bronx resident who is outraged at what is happening and is determined to make a difference. Later on, during the actual kidnapping, she would be determined to get her ass shot off as a diversion so that Trash and Strike could kidnap the president. You have to be a pretty sharp cookie to concoct a scheme that involves getting shot at a press conference, while a guy named Trash doesn’t.

By now you’re wondering who the hell Strike is. Strike (Scorpion from The New Barbarians) would be the only man who can carry off the plan. He’s the brains behind that big underground bank robbery job and the underground job that cleaned Tiffany’s out. He’s pretty much retired with his young son (Junior) to an underground lair and if you meet up with him, you better hope he’s in a good mood because if he isn’t then blah, blah, blah. We know he’s going to take the job, so why bother trying to establish his “psycho-rogue” credentials?

And does it make me a bad person that I laughed out loud when Junior first met Trash and called him a “fag?” Trash got a little payback later when he made a comment to Strike about whether Strike was going to help out or just sit there and “scratch your balls.” You just don’t get movies anymore that use such banal vulgarity as the primary form of communication. (Henry Silva’s first word in the movie is the f-word!)

Henry Silva? You better believe it! Taking over the spot of “embarrassed actor you’ve probably heard of picking up a paycheck in a movie they hope no one ever sees” from the late Vic Morrow, Henry plays the part of Wrangler, the expelled warden who is now in charge of the Disinfestors’ plot to kill Trash and then to rescue the president once he’s kidnapped, and then to kill the president once the vice president asks him to.

Truth be told, Henry doesn’t do much more than hang around the silver command post van of the Disinfestors looking alternately bored and pained by being anywhere near a movie directed by a guy named Enzo and starring Enzo’s brother as the president. Come on Henry! The vice president was played by the star of The House by the Cemetery and Demons III: The Ogre! He must have had some good stories to tell between takes!

You get a lot of running around sewers and guys shooting at each other as well as stuff blowing up (Junior is a demolitions expert) and there’s even a scene where Strike slides down a rope with one hand while shooting Disinfestors with the gun in his other hand. And we all know that guys sliding and/or swinging on ropes is never bad.

Just for a change of pace, Enzo has the end of the movie take place above ground (the Disinfestors gassed the gang members out of their sewer home) and this involves model cars blowing up, Henry shooting Enzo’s brother, winging Trash and driving over dead bodies in his van before it gets blown up. Strike and Junior go back to their underground home leaving Trash standing around the smoldering ruins looking a bit dumbfounded.

The final part of this review where I tell you to sell your kid, donate your wife’s kidney, or fake your own death to get this DVD to complete your Trash collection is naturally quite superfluous since this movie pretty much sells itself. The only knock against it would have to be that it just isn’t quite the first one. While it easily outclasses its Italian brethren, it doesn’t have the crazy quilt of whacky characters of the first one or the wide variety of weaponry used.

It also didn’t have much in the way of Trash. For some reason, he wasn’t doing much more than running around shooting his peashooter every now and again. He hardly had any dialogue (I think the ball scratching comment was the highlight) and Enzo seemed more than satisfied to treat this as an ensemble piece and play down actor Mark Gregory’s weaknesses (everything but his hair). That suits the film just fine though, because it all ends up smelling like mid-eighties cheese however you slice it, so go on and take this Trash out. You know you want to.

© 2008 MonsterHunter