Bad Issue is a new regular feature where Jose Cruz combines his love for cheesy genre films and the paneled pages of comics to create macabre movies-in-a-minute.Today's cinematic wasteland is a weedy vignette that shows the dangers of growing plants in the house... especially when the plants have a nasty habit of drinking human blood. Fetch the lawnmower, because by the end of the day we'll all witness the manure-perfumed horror that will culminate in The Revenge Of Dr. X!
Our story begins one busy afternoon, a day where the hours are long and the booze is distressingly short. Dr. Bragan, the head honcho who keeps busy by screaming at his hapless underlings, pieces of paper, and other inanimate objects, has just received a disheartening phone call at the space station base where he works...
But poor Dr. Bragan's mind is unhinging under the stress of his work. The mental stamina it takes to sign documents, push big red buttons, and trying to find the remote to his plasma screen TV has finally taken a toll on his martini-soaked brain...
Seeking relief from his day-to-day toils, Bragan boards a classy flight to the wilds of Japan to concentrate on his favorite habit: horticulture! On the way, he meets a dishy flight attendant and lays on his scientific charm to demonstrate his prowess at speaking the international language.
Five gin and tonics and twenty slaps in the face later, Bragan disembarks in the Land of the Rising Sun. There he meets his ever-faithful escort Noriko who suffers from a small case of complete and utter insanity.
Things only get better when they arrive at the decaying mountainside mansion where Bragan shall carry out his infernal experiments in flower grooming. Their dramatic entrance into the domain is accented by the soothing tones of a hunchback performing the works on a jazzy pipe organ.
Finding no time to fully appreciate Quasimodo's nightclub sensibilities, Bragan immediately sets to work. As the night hours burn away, his hideous machinations begin to come to full, horrible fruition.
At long last! After the arduous months of reading hundreds of Home and Garden back issues along with several editions of Weekly World News he found in the outhouse, Bragan has gotten his first demonic seeds to sprout and make their unholy mission known to the world.
Not satisfied with the harmony of his barbershop trio, Bragan heads for a day out on the beach to seek the knowledge of learned marine biologists. However, Bragan's request to Noriko somehow gets lost in translation.
But finally during one dark and stormy night, Bragan devilishly manipulates his singing seeds into his most terrifying creation yet! From the decaying earth rises an abomination that no man can behold without succumbing to madness. It is Morty, The Inflatable Vegetable Man Of Death!
As much as Bragan and Co. are horrified by Morty's appearance and insatiable thirst for human plasma, Morty's true dream is to light up the world as a supreme vocalist. He spends his lonely hours by rapping through his sorrow and busting out mad verses.
In order to silence Morty's incessant rhymes and beatboxing, Bragan steals into the night and sneaks into the local Days Inn to fill up his chemistry set beakers with frothy virgin blood. No need being coy with introductions.
Morty, however, is very impatient for his midnight feeding. In an effort to get the sustenance he so needs, he gets his hands full... of Quasi's screaming face!
After a strenuous round of manslaughter and general mayhem, Morty decides to look deep within himself for inner strength and to relax during these trying times.
Oh no! Now with an extreme case of the munchies, Morty heads into the neighboring Village of Peasants™ to ravage for some good eats. The townsfolk, however, don't take too kindly to Morty's appetite and promptly put together the requisite angry mob. Heartwarming reunions ensue.
But upon finding the generous baggie of mushrooms that Morty left in all their fireside stockings, the villagers forget about the dozens of innocent lives lost and retire to their cottages. Bragan, being the intrepid do-gooder that he is (and vying for more screen time), seeks to destroy Morty himself. He tries appealing to the plant man's sentimental side.
The situation goes horrendously wrong though. Morty, his mind still clouded from his own fumes, mistakes Bragan for a hell-spawned purple dragon in a chef's hat and promptly attacks him. The scuffle ends with both Morty and Bragan toppling headlong into a boiling pool of molten MAGMA. Alas, the deer lives.
And thus ends the terrible saga of Dr. Bragan and his misunderstood creation. Their story shall forever echo down the annals of... whoa, wait a minute. Who the hell was Dr. X anyway? And what was he so vengeful about?!
Somehow I feel they must've recycled that suit on a sentai series after filming...