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1994 - 86m.

Years ago I got the bright idea in my head that I wanted to review all of the Bloodfist movies. Given that they always seemed to jump out at me when I was younger and apt to rent any low-budget martial arts flick I could find and that there were nine(!) entries in the series, I felt it was my duty to cover them. I actually managed to get the first five done before my inspiration dissipated. This has happened before, like the time I considered watching all of Larry Cohen's movies, but my recent kick to watch sequels and get franchises reviewed brought me back to the fold. And it just so happens that, back in the day, this sixth entry was the last one I happened to see.

Don "The Dragon" Wilson finally gets a chance to bust it out John McClane Die Hard style even yanking off his shirt in the finale to machine gun down some baddies. As yet another sequel totally unrelated to the ones before it, Wilson plays soldier Nick Corrigan who is seemingly just a courier but (surprise!) actually has Special Forces training. This, of course, happens to come in handy when prior to his arrival a group of terrorists, led by the American hating Arab Fawkes (Jonathan Fuller), have attacked the desert missile silo he's delivering to in order to get launch keys and use the nuclear warheads within to destroy various U.S. cities.

And what a way they break their way in, too. Pulling up to the guard post in a beat-up R.V. (driven by the awesome Bert Remsen, I might add), they massacre the look-out and storm their way underground into the command centre with guns a-blazing and many showings of over-the-top testosterone - which is especially evident in our token Asian henchman who spends most of his shooting time screaming at the top of his lungs. This sequence is, by far, the most awesome thing here if mostly because of its over-the-top ridiculousness.

Soon Fawkes and his cronies have taken Major Tillman (baseball legend Steve Garvey) hostage to try and get the launch keys while the government looks helplessly on. Enter Corrigan who soon takes out their replacement gate guard (I guess his Spidey-sense was tingling) and proceeds to dispatch numerous terrorists on his way to a final showdown with Fawkes in order to try and stop the missile launches.

With chintzy production values and the expected wooden turn by Wilson, Bloodfist VI: Ground Zero is the best entry since the prison-themed third one. Of course, if you're not able to tolerate low-budget, low-intelligence action flicks you're not the audience for this. However, if you're down with "The Dragon" and are able to turn your brain off and get easily distracted from the lame script and (mostly) bad acting by the abundant action sequences you'll probably get some mild entertainment from this. I don't even think it's possible to dislike something where our sensitive hero's first appearance has him wildly swerving his jeep to avoid running over a cute bunny, our main villain wears a beret the entire time, and our personality-less thugs spend most of their time yelling.

Even though he's had six movies to try and show some form of acting skills Wilson turns in the same old stilted performance. This is okay because he's no worse than Steven Seagal usually is and we're only here to see him kick some ass. In that sense, he delivers. He might not do the wise-cracks of a McClane but he still performs lots of karate mayhem with a side of gunfire. Fuller is definitely not taking things seriously and is forced to spout a lot of Anti-America jargon (let's just say this doesn't give a glowing impression of Arabs) and Cat Sassoon makes her second appearance in the series here with a topless shot starting things off right. This would actually mark her last acting role with the Cirio H. Santiago helmed revenge actioner Angelfist wedged in between the two Bloodfist flicks.

If you're a fan of Wilson or the series then you're not going to listen to me and watch this anyway, otherwise this is just another skippable time for anyone but the most ardent fan of junky DTV martial arts fare. Director Rick Jacobson would return for the eighth entry and does a decent job staging the action here and would deliver the old school feeling Bitch Slap fourteen years later. (Chris Hartley, 7/3/13)

Directed By: Rick Jacobson.
Written By: Rob Kerchner, Brendan Broderick.

Starring: Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Cat Sassoon, Robin Curtis, Jonathan Fuller.