Helen Hunt Filmography Part 4: Trancers
Campy, sci-fi noir
Dry hair may be for squids, but 80s hair is forever.
We’re talking about Tancers today…also Trancers 1.5, Trancers II, and Trancers III.
This is a sci-fi franchise from the 80’s and 90s that is campy and weird and fun and not at all to be taken seriously.
Trancers
Tim Thomerson plays Trancer hunter named Jack Deth (yes, Jack Deth).
Trancers are people who have been mind controlled by…well honestly it varies. Each movie there is a new villain who is trancing people, and Jack Deth has to deal with this whole thing again.
Regardless of who is in charge, the mind controller can turn their subjects into violent zombies who attack on command.
It is unclear whether the controller has programmed certain people, like Jack Deth, to be attacked on sight, or whether they are constantly monitoring their subjects and when an enemy is in the vicinity of a Trancer the controller can activate them.
The first version sounds inefficient and the second version sounds exhausting. But I’m not an evil mind-controlling genius, so maybe they have more energy.
What makes Trancers so insidious is that they look like normal people until they are activated and then suddenly Zombies!
On his quest to save the present and the future from Trancers, he hooks up with Leena (Helen Hunt) in both the buddy cop and the Biblical sense.
They team up and search for a washed up Major League pitcher, Hap.
I feel like now is a good time to introduce the formula for determining whether the age difference in a relationship is creepy or cool. This will unfortunately come up a few times during our travels through Helen Hunt's filmography, and we need to establish some things now.
The formula is (Age of older partner/2) + 7 years = minimum acceptable age for romantic partner.
In this case Tim Thomerson is 38, so 38/2 is 19. 19+7= 26 The minimum acceptable age for a romantic co-star is 26.
Helen Hunt is 21.
And hand Helen Hunt an Oscar nom because she does her damnedest to sell the romance, which honestly I think makes it worse.
Fun thing about time travel in Trancers…when you go back in time your body stays in the present and your consciousness can only go back if there is a person with a genetic link to you whose body you can inhabit…sucks for that guys consciousness, but here we are.
This makes for a fun situation where Deth’s partner McNulty has to go back in time, but the only relative he can find is an 8 year old girl.
This makes for some humor if you like watching children swear like hard-boiled detectives at other hard-boiled detectives and leer at Helen Hunt…
…which I guess I do cuz I laughed.
When you kill a Trancer it's called singeing because they spontaneously incinerate. Not sure how that works.
Like all 80s movies we’re really here for the fashion!
This is an unfortunate choice…
We have a blue-haired mall elf…
…who becomes a pink-haired moll to be less recognizable.
#moviehairlogic
Belts and boots and big turtleneck
We have our obligatory 80s punk scene
Is it even an 80s movie if no one has hair spikes?
Big hair, big earrings, big off the shoulder action.
But nothing says “punk energy” quite like hot-wiring a moped…
…and riding it through an old man’s living room…
…on Christmas Eve
(By the rules of Die Hard, Trancers is a Christmas movie.)
Trancers 1.5
This is a 20 minute short film that looks like it was trying to be a pilot for a Trancers TV show. Helen Hunt reprises her role for two scenes, but isn’t really in it.
And, yes, I watched it because this is the life I have chosen.
Trancers II
Nine years later Jack and Leena and Hap are living the good life in LA. Leena and Jack got married and they’re running a PI company together…
…when Trancers come back into their lives.
McNulty comes down the line and is now a 15 year old girl to brief them on the situation. He/She tells them that someone is running a Trancer farm, picking up homeless, and institutionalized people dosing them with super weed called Scrum, and turning them into a Trancer army.
Obviously this cannot go on, so Jack and the gang are back on the hunt for Trancers.
The folks from the future also sent another Trancer hunter down the line (aka back in time) to help Jack and, plot twist, the hunter they sent is Jack’s wife, (what!!!) who died (wait ???).
But they sent her pre-death consciousness (huh ????), so she’s going to die in two days when she goes back up the line (aka back to the future), but she doesn’t know this (damn !!!!), and there’s no way to change that future…Maybe (?????)
Also remember the age calculation we did earlier? Thomerson/Deth is now 46. So 46/2 is 23. 23 + 7 = 30.
Helen Hunt is now 28, so still too young, but closer; and the new wife, Alice, is 22!!! The only thing that makes age inappropriate relationships more creepy is having two of them.
So big surprise, but neither of Jack’s wives is thrilled to meet the other.
And really I think it’s fair to say that the reason Jack’s first wife is introduced is just so our man Deth can have two young, hot chicks to get it on with, which I suppose is the dream for the incels who write sci-fi camp.
I could make some philosophical argument about how this is a metaphor for how Death/Deth steals youth…but my heart’s really not in it, and honestly the movie doesn’t deserve that.
Helen Hunt does get to call him a “Son of a bitch” twice, which is fun.
Honestly, he deserves much worse.
McNulty is back as a cigar smoking 15 year old girl.
There’s an exploding ham.
Overall this sequel is not as much fun as the original.
There’s less 80s punk fashion and energy.
(Though Helen Hunt in glasses doing research on an early 90s computer is a vibe.)
I mean, Jack and Leena argue about buying a house, for crying out loud! Pretty sure Punk just died.
Trancers III
This is more of the same. Someone is trying to build a Trancer army using the actual US military.
Helen Hunt is pretty much out of this one.
It’s 1992, and she has her Jamie Buchman hair and is busy with better things.
Minimal Helen Hunt plus rehashing the same Trancers formula for the third time makes it a pass for me.
I mean, of course, I watched it. I’m an obsessive completist after all, but healthy me would pass or at least not re-watch it to pull screenshots.
Don’t judge my life choices, Helen.
