Hobgoblins (1988)
Malicious Alien Critters
A pitifully cheap copy of Gremlins about alien creatures locked in a soundstage and now accidentally unleashed. One of the worst films ever made.
Film Series and Sequels
Bates Motel (1987)
Psycho TV Pilot Spinoff
Not the tv series, this is an unsold earlier tv pilot that attempted to spin a series off from Psycho, An ill-conceived disaster, the film’s clumsy
direction could not be further away from Alfred Hitchcock if it tried
Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare (1991)
A Nightmare on Elm Street Sequel
The sixth of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films, sold with the gimmick of a 3D release. New director Rachel Talaly refuses to take the material seriously and turns the show into an absurd cartoon
The Neverending Story III (1994)
Adventures in a Fantasy Land
Abysmal third entry in the series. The creatures lack any conviction and everything is wrecked by taking the story out of Fantasia back to Earth amid hip contemporary jokes
The Babysitter (2017)
Satanic Babysitter
McG has now become the new inheritor of the title of worst director currently at work in Hollywood, as amply evidenced in this ridiculous film starring Samara Weaving as a Satanist babysitter
King Solomon’s Mines (1985)
Adventure Film
Cannon Films’ remake of the H. Rider Haggard adventure novel was made to exploit the success of Raiders of the Lost Ark but that does not excuse what an awful film it is where everything is played up for excruciating camp humour
King Kong Lives (1986)
Giant Ape
Everybody hated the 1976 remake of King Kong but Dino de Laurentiis has the chutzpah to produce a sequel and the results are absolutely awful, full of scenes guaranteed to have an audience rolling in the aisle
Teen Wolf Too (1987)
Teenage Werewolf Comedy
Feeble sequel to the unexpected Michael J. Fox comedy hit where Jason Bateman plays his cousin who discovers his inner wolf as he heads to university
The Robot vs the Aztec Mummy (1958)
Classic Bad Movie/Revived Mummy vs a Robot
A bad movie classic. As the title explains, we get a revived mummy pitted against an actor in a ridiculously clunky tin man suit. Third in the Mexican-made Aztec Mummy series, the biggest ripoff is that 3/4 of the film consist of footage recycled from the preceding films
Murderers Row (1966)
Spy Film
An excruciating copy of the James Bond films, the second of the Matt Helm films starring Dean Martin as a drunken lounge lizard spy
The Bare Wench 3: Nymphs of Mystery Mountain (2002)
Softcore Blair Witch Spoof
Another in the interminable softcore Blair Witch parodies with a group of minimally talented and clothed bimbos wandering around the woods and failing to take proceedings seriously
The Bare Wench Project (1999)
Softcore Blair Witch Spoof
Following the success of The Blair Witch Project, this was an excruciatingly lame softcore parody with a group of girls tramping in the woods finding almost any excuse to undress and conduct sex-related takes on Blair Witch
Munchies (1987)
Malevolent Alien Critters
Painfully cheap and badly made ripoff of Gremlins about a horde of malevolent alien creatures. Produced by Roger Corman
Journey to the Center of the Earth (1988)
Underground Adventures
Ostensibly as a teen version of the Jules Verne novel made by Cannon Films. However, this started under one director and finished under another with totally incomprehensible results
The Toxic Avenger (1984)
Mutant Superhero/Bad Taste Splatter/Troma Film
The film that launched the name of Troma Films. The world’s first superhero splatter film, this readily dives into bad taste just to see what kind of offence it can get away with
Night of the Demons 2 (1994)
Campy Supernatural Retribution
Sequel to a film that few people remember, this is all campy one-liners and gory set-pieces conducted with a silliness that boggles the mind
Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966)
Backroads Sinisterness/Undead Warlock
Regarded as one of the worst films ever made, more than anything this is just dull and boring. The plot concerns a couple straying into a desert home where a warlock is about to be resurrected
Cyborg Cop III (1995)
Killer Android
A completely ridiculous action film (that features no cyborg cops) and instead concerns the attempts to create an army of cyborgs using insect DNA
The Crow: Wicked Prayer (2005)
Resurrected Avenger
The third of The Crow sequels, starring a miscast Edward Furlong as a resurrected trailer park kid. This has a bad movie ridiculousness that killed the series off
Karate Cop (1993)
Post-Holocaust Action
A really cheap and unconvincing post-apocalyptic action film starring forgotten martial arts star Ron Marchini as a lawman fighting off mutant crazies to obtain a power crystal
Beach Babes from Beyond (1993)
Alien Beach Bunnies
Prolific low-budget hack David DeCoteau directs what feels like a very softcore version of a Gidget film crossbred with Earth Girls Are Easy (albeit with the sexes reversed). A film that quickly sinks into awfulness
Return of the Living Dead Part II (1988)
Zombie Comedy
Dan O’Bannon’s Return of the Living Dead came with a cheerfully black cynicism that was a wonderfully fresh alternative to George Romero amid the 1980s zombie fad – this sequel has a painfully unfunny lameness that could not sit at more removed extreme to that
Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2008)
Bird Attacks/Cult Bad Movie
The new contender for the Worst Film Ever Made, this fully lives up to its reputation, full of astounding technical ineptitudes, bad acting and hilarious one-liners. A blatant ripoff of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds
Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time (1991)
The Beastmaster Comes to L.A.
Excruciating sequel to The Beastmaster that transports Marc Singer’s Dar to contemporary L.A. The whole film is wrecked by an attitude that seems unable to take the proceedings seriously.
Beverly Hills Chihuahua (2008)
Talking Dogs
One of the most inane talking animals film ever – the tale of a spoiled Beverly Hills dogs who has to make her way home after being abandoned in Mexico. Filled with excruciating slapstick and animals spouting smartass one-liners
Birdemic 3 – Sea Eagle (2022)
Bird Attacks
At one point, Birdemic had a bad movie cult that rivalled The Room. Whether we asked for it or not, this is a third film in the series. James Nguyen seems to think everybody has come for a lecture about Global Warming.
Happily N’Ever After (2006)
Animation/Fairytale Deconstruction
Another in the spate of animated fairytale parodies that came out in the wake of Shrek, this subjects Cinderella to an excruciating barrage of pop-culture jokes and one-liners
Birdemic 2: The Resurrection (2013)
Bird Attacks
Birdemic was a cult bad movie – incredibly, despite the better budget that must have come his way, James Nguyen has gone and made the same thing filled with laughably flat dialogue and the worst effects ever seen on screen
The Turkish Star Wars (1982)
Planetary Adventure/Bad Movie Classic
A strong contender for Worst Film Ever. Rather than create any effects, it has simply uplifted footage from Star Wars, while the score is a mismash taken from popular films of the era. The dialogue is so bizarrely surreal it makes the brain hurt trying to understand it
Friday the 13th Part III in 3D (1982)
Slasher Film
Third of the Friday the 13th films, shot in the brief fad for 3D films in the early 80s. This is also the one where Jason adopts his trademark hockey mask
The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid (1979)
Child Alien Visitor Slapstick Comedy
The late Bud Spencer and his compatriot Terence Hill appeared in seventeen badly dubbed, slapstick comedies in the 1970s/80s … Spencer went it alone for this excruciating slapstick take on Close Encounters of the Third Kind in which that film’s kid Cary Guffey is an alien found by Spencer’s sheriff
Highlander: The Source (2007)
Immortal Quest
The fifth of the Highlander films. It is hard to believe people could actually make a film worse than Highlander II but this is akin to Edward D. Wood Jr on a multi-million dollar budget
Sharktopus vs Whalewolf (2015)
Giant Hybrid Monsters
Third of the Sharktopus films from Roger Corman, an entry in the series that is making no longer making any effort to take itself seriously
Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007)
Singing Chipmunks
The squeaky helium-voiced Chipmunks are brought to life via CGI in this live-action film, featuring the chipmunks causing chaos, cracking smart-ass one-liners and lots of pee and poop jokes. The results are excrutiating
Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel (2009)
Singing Chipmunks
The first of the sequels to Alvin and the Chipmunks. Marginally less grating than the first film but that’s being relative – all the things that one hated the first time are back
Weekend at Bernie’s II (1993)
Resurrected Corpse Comedy
The first Weekend at Bernie’s had the lame concept of two jerks forced to pretend that their boss’s body was still alive. For the sequel, the body is resurrected by voodoo
Gnaw: Food of the Gods II (1989)
Giant Rats
An incredibly bad Canadian-made sequel to Food of the Gods about a scientist who devises a growth hormone that accidentally creates a horde of giant rats
The Hitcher II: I’ve Been Waiting (2003)
Psycho Hitchhiker
The Hitcher was a classic of 1980s horror. This is a cheap and indifferently made sequel that brings back C. Thomas Howell but misses all of the seat-edge suspense of the original
Amityville: The Evil Escapes (1989)
Cursed Lamp/Haunting
The fourth and one of the worst of the numerous Amityville films. This reduces everything to a series of crude and increasingly more preposterous, eventually laughable, shocks
Godzilla vs Gigan (1972)
Japanese Monster Bash
The twelfth Godzilla film. Under director Jun Fukuda, a juvenile inanity had by now come to dominate the series by this point. The special effects, often recycled from previous films, are very cheesy
Megiddo (2001)
The Biblical End of the World
Sequel to the Biblical End Times/Antichrist film The Omega Code, this dispenses with preaching faith but still slips into absurdity
Dr. Dolittle 3 (2006)
Teenager That Can Speak to Animals
Sequel to the Eddie Murphy Dr Dolittle films without Murphy where the title role is inherited by Kyla Pratt as his teenage daughter. The humour is pitched at an excruciating level of inanity
Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid (2004)
Giant Snakes
A sequel to the Jennifer Lopez-starring Anaconda that manages to be even more ridiculous and cliche ridden than its predecessor to the point you frequently laugh it off the screen
Octopus (2000)
Giant Octopus
B-budget mix of giant animal film and submarine drama with impoverished effects and a script only notable for its ludicrous improbabilities
The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)
Star Wars Variety Show
The tv special that George Lucas would have all copies destroyed, a work of legendary badness – a Star Wars Thanksgiving special featuring most of the original cast and a series of variety performances that are mind-boggling in their ineptitude, not to mention complete and utter fumbling of everything that Star Wars was
Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning (1985)
Slasher Film
The fifth and arguably the worst of the Friday the 13th films. Jason is resurrected and engaged in much butchering, before an end reveals it was someone else altogether
Highlander II: The Quickening (1991)
Immortal Combat/Dark Future
Probably THE worst sequel ever made. The script’s treatment of continuity to the first film is utterly incoherent, while director Russell Mulcahy and most of the cast go at it with unrestrained OTT excess
Godzilla vs the Cosmic Monster (1974)
Japanese Monster Bash
The fourteenth Godzilla film, noted for the introduction of Mecha-Godzilla, a robot copy of Godzilla that became a recurring nemesis. By this point in the series, the effects and quality of production had become very shabby
The Stepford Children (1987)
Android Teenager Replacements
The second of three sequels to The Stepford Wives. I found the original implausible on any level and this is quadrupled when you get to replacing their children with android duplicates. A film that has been generated without anybody sitting and thinking about the premise on a practical level
Prehysteria! 2 (1994)
Baby Dinosaurs
The second and worst of Albert and Charles Band’s dinosaur films made for children, this suffers from the most pitiful and immobile effects of any film of the era
Hercules (1983)
Greek Mythological Hero
An incredibly bad Hercules film from Cannon Films made in Italy by Luigi Cozzi. This was the immediate aftermath of Star Wars so we get a bizarre attempt to rework Greek mythology as science-fiction
V: The Final Battle (1984)
Alien Invasion
Follow-up to the popular V mini-series, this is an absurd melodrama that is made up of incredibly bad science-fiction writing and directed with zero plausibility
Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992)
Cheerleader Vampire Hunter
An unfunny comedy about a cheerleader vampire slayer. This should have been quickly forgotten but instead it surprisingly became the basis for a much superior hit tv series several years later
Universal Soldier: The Return (1999)
Undead Super-Soldiers/Action
Sequel to Roland Emmerich’s Universal Soldier, this brings back Jean-Claude Van Damme but otherwise substitutes a brain dead plot that has him facing an evil A.I.
Superman III (1983)
Comic-Book Superhero
The nadir of the Christopher Reeve Superman films, one where the desire to add a comedy element in the form of Richard Pryor overtakes and wrecks what is already a random and unfocused plot
Scanners II: The New Order (1991)
Psychic Powers
The first of a series of poorly made sequels to David Cronenberg’s Scanners. Cronenberg’s ideas have been stripped down to no more than a series of head-exploding effects
Scanner Cop II: Volkin’s Revenge (1995)
Psychic Powers
The fourth and last of a series of low-budget sequels to David Cronenberg’s Scanners, also the worst of the bunch featuring a series of absurd head-exploding effects
The Astro-Zombies (1968)
Mad Scientist Creates Zombies/Classic Bad Movie
A real Grade Z film. A mind-boggling stew involving John Carradine conducting mad science experiments, technical gaffes aplenty, spy capers featuring Tura Satana and even M.A.S.H.‘s Wayne Rogers on script
Batman & Robin (1997)
Comic-Book Superhero
Possibly the worst film ever made on a big studio budget, Joel Schumacher’s follow-up to Tim Buton’s standout Batman films where he turns everything into an absurd Day Glo realm with a script for two year-olds, campy puns and badly overacting super-villains