Before I got over my hesitation and actually sat down to watch this direct-to-video sequel a couple of acquaintances and myself took to calling this "Feces 3", it's just too bad that our bad play-on-words pun turned out to be quite true.

Natasha Henstridge (the murderous alien "babe" from the first two films) returns to make a brief cameo appearance in the opening scenes for a gooey birthing sequence before it introduces us to the all-new alien creature, Sara (played by newcomer Sunny Mabry, who spends a good portion of the film naked), who's been taken in and raised by a college professor who's trying to use her alien powers for good instead of evil.

It's then that Ben Ripley's non-sensical and often confused script introduces a sub-plot involving half-breed creatures (both alien and human in make-up) trying to kill off Sara, another lame sub-plot involving internet dating gone deadly (for which Amelia Cooke gets to don leather and act all bad-ass, in the process doing a better job than Mabry), and eventually a creature-filled finale which by the time it rolls around you'll have long stopped caring.

Species III is quite a chore to make it through due to being an overlong, badly written, and pretty shoddy sequel. The main offender here is Ripley's writing which throws out tons of dumb plot twists and manages to be so disorganized that you'll eventually give up on trying to figure out where he's going with it - and why it's so retarded getting there. Plus due to a lower-budget we get fairly shoddy effects (although a few gooey scenes like the autopsy and "guard split" are okay) and some really poor CGI that includes a horrible looking alien "lovemaking" moment.

There are people out there that didn't enjoy the first Species movie, but I found it to be an entertainingly mindless time with lots of blood and skin. I didn't care too much for the second entry, but even that one is head and shoulders above this piece of trash. In fact, I'm willing to say that Species III is one of the poorest sequels I've seen in quite some time - not an easy feat. Review based on unrated version. (Chris Hartley, 5/10/05)

Directed By: Brad Turner.
Written By: Ben Ripley.

Starring: Robin Dunne, Robert Knepper, Amelia Cooke, J.P. Pitoc.