Wednesday, November 03, 2021

Creepshow: Drug Traffic (S3 ep6)


Director: Greg Nicotero (segment)

First aired: 2021

Contains spoilers

I’m watching this season of Creepshow as they drop and, to be honest, I thought ep 5 was a tad weak and, of course, that can colour how you view following episodes. Well, this was not coloured by that weaker episode. In fact, it was blooming good – both segments in fact were bob on but it was the first segment that really interests us.

The episode begins with Evan Miller (Reid Scott) a congressman seeking re-election and a campaign advert that is standing on the platform of making prescription medication affordable. As you can imagine, it eventually comes out that the platform was provided by his PR company and is not something he actually cares about but, be that as it may, he has pitched up with a camera crew and coach of people who have been to Canada to buy medication.

Michael Rooker as Beau

The border office is staffed by Beau (Michael Rooker), truly a left winger (thus his assignment to a low-level crossing point, he suggests) who smells his way through Miller’s BS from the very beginning. However, he does have a job to do. Before they enter the office Miller makes a speech and we notice a very ill-looking Mai (Sarah Jon) who is with her mother (Mai Delapa). She notices Mai staring at a young boy and gives her a pill. She tells a concerned passenger that Mai is just very hungry.

mother and daughter

They get in and have to go through an automated passport check but Beau notices something off with the mother – she is clearly carrying more medication than is allowed. He takes her off, telling all the others to wait in a waiting area. The mother protests, suggesting she needs to stay with her daughter – becoming more frantic when Mai throws up, expelling several pills (which clearly haven’t been properly dissolved up to that point). Miller smells a publicity opportunity, citing racial profiling.

opportunist politicians

The thing is Beau is actually setting Miller up. His plan was to be seen doing his job and then let the mother leave with her medications, in order to avoid being used in the campaign. However, as things develop, Miller has an outburst when she cannot read the Chinese on a pack and says she is not that sort of Asian; Miller immediately retorts, asking what sort she is – this is on camera and Beau is satisfied that the congressman has made a political gaff and he is not going to be used as a political pawn.

krasue

However, the young lad Mai was looking at goes wandering off, as has Mai. He stumbles across a headless body, blood on the floor. Mai emerges from behind a counter and as she rises we realise it is her body, she is a head with dangling viscera. Yes, she is a krasue and the pills were to try and repress her natural hunting instincts. The other main bit we note is that, as in the folklore, she does at times seem to have a light floating with her (the fact that it doesn't appear to be within the viscera would seem to be a production error, but I didn't pick up on that during the viewing). There are other bits of lore but they are too much a spoiler to list.

the krasue's light

This was great – the segment did not shy from some lovely gore levels, and we do see the krasue fly into a secret service man and attack. The presence of Michael Rooker helps a lot as he is a great on-screen presence and the banter/bickering between him and Reid Scott was excellent. I’ll also mention the second segment – as it was excellent too, a really interesting story angle, shot in black and white, during the timeframe and universe of Night of the Living Dead. 7.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

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