Despite the fact that Craig R. Baxley’s science fiction action film was released in 1990, it is still difficult to ignore the film’s one-liners. In fact, one could question why films like this, especially ones with such spectacular one-liners, are not made anymore! Most of you are aware that the film’s original title was ‘Dark Angel,’ and that this is how the film was planned to be distributed in the United States. So, here’s a bit of knowledge that might surprise you.
The project was reportedly dubbed ‘Lethal Contact,’ at least according to Jonathan Tydor’s 1984 spec script. However, the film’s production, filming, and international title were all titled ‘Dark Angel,’ and that is how it was released globally, but the title was then changed to ‘I Come in Peace’ to avoid confusion with two other films from the 1920s and 1930s with the same title, ‘The Dark Angel.’ Triumph Releasing Corporation deserves full credit for rebranding the film to what it is presently known as! Despite a limited theatrical debut in the United Kingdom, ‘I Come In Peace’ went on to become an unexpected hit. All owing to some positive word-of-mouth and the fact that it sold well at local video stores. The film actually fell into the top ten rental categories and remained in that position for several weeks.
The film, which was co-written by Jonathan Tydor and David Koepp, stars Hans Lundgren, better known as Dolph Lundgren, and Matthias Hues, who stands 6 feet 5 inches tall. While Lundgren plays a rule-breaking vice cop who becomes engaged in the investigation of a series of strange drug-related deaths on Houston’s streets, Hues plays Talec, a huge, white-eyed blonde bad alien who also serves as the film’s major antagonist.
An absolute 1990 camp thriller, ‘I Come in Peace’ not only boasted every cop-flick action cliché known to B-movie action purists, but surprisingly it also managed to build a rather comprehensive background of a particular alien race along with the political dynamics on his home planet. It would not be wrong to admit that this movie here is more like a cult favorite, especially amongst all the Lundgren fans out there. And as for Matthias Hues, he has certainly been most fondly remembered for his role as Talec in the movie. Not only did the latter perform all his stunts by himself, he has even regarded this film as his best experience as an actor.
Dearest Viewers, gear yourselves up for today’s video where we are not only going to talk about the movie but also explore the alien in detail.
The Movie Plot
Jack Caine happens to be a Houston police officer; one who will just not let the police system stop him from following his goal of wiping out a gang of white-collar drug dealers, who address themselves as the White Boys. The group was responsible for killing Caine’s partner in the midst of a sting operation. Headed by the savage yet suave, the group disguised their illegal drug trade behind rows of flashy designer suits, high-ranking jobs, and luxe sports cars. With the gang pilfering a freight of heroin from a federal evidence warehouse, they hide the evidence of their involvement by simply blowing up the facility, in turn wounding and killing a multitude of people.
This catches the attention of the FBI and Caine is soon assigned a new partner, Special Agent Arwood ‘Larry’ Smith. The duo probes deeper into the matter and also into the murders of many White Boys, by some type of a super-fast spinning sharp disk. While the bodies are found full of heroin, the real cause of death happens to be some kind of a perforating wound on the forehead. Unbeknownst to Caine and the other cops, the deaths were apparently brought about by an alien called Talec. Talec was extracting something from his victims but was also being hunted by another alien like him, called Azeck.
Azeck eventually tracks down Talec to a supermarket, where it goes without saying that an intense battle takes place between the two of them. Azeck gets mortally wounded and makes it on time to sneak into Caine’s car. Meanwhile, Caine and Smith, who is investigating the supermarket massacre, are ordered off the investigation by their superiors. While returning back to the car, the duo bumps into Azeck, who explains to them that he is also a police officer but from his home planet. He explains how Talec shoots his targets with an overdose of synthetic heroin and then, with the help of alien technology, extracts the resulting endorphins which are released from the brains of the victims.
Talec further synthesizes this into a drug known as ‘Barsi’; one that’s very popular amongst addicts back on his planet. Before succumbing to his injuries, Azeck also warns them to stop Talec because if he is not terminated, it will result in an invasion of interminable intergalactic drug dealers in search of Barsi and also lead to the end of humanity. With Azeck dying, his body gets cremated by itself. Smith having retained the powerful handgun of Azeck, plans to hand it over to his FBI superiors just to prove to everybody that aliens do exist. Although Caine tells him not to trust his superiors, the duo has an altercation and they go their separate ways.
Smith hands over the weapon to his boss, Inspector Switzer, who then discloses that they not only knew about the aliens but also have plans of gaining their technological advantages as well as the weaponries of Talec. Switzer even tries shooting Smith but not before getting shot by Caine, who seemed to have arrived just in time to save Smith. Making use of the information that was passed on to them by Azeck, they are able to track down Talec to an industrial compound but get ambushed by the White Boys, who hold Caine accountable for the death of their gang members.
The standoff is intervened by Talec, who appears and kills the rest of the White Boys before being coerced to surrender after Smith uses Azeck’s handgun against him. But in due course, the weapon runs out of charge and Talec tries slaying Caine using his drug harpoon. However, Caine is able to lay his hands on a vial of the Barsi drug, and that leads the duo to engross in a hand-to-hand fight over the vial. The end result is Talec getting impaled on a steel spar, Caine gaining possession of Talec’s gun and shooting at the close by drums of fuel, killing Talec in the consequent blast.
Alien From ‘I Come In Peace’ Explained
By now, we all know that the evil alien from the movie is addressed as Talec. The world that he came from is still unknown but what we are quite certain of is that he did come from an advanced species of aliens. There aren’t any second thoughts regarding the fact that he appeared to be energy-based.
As in, he and even Azeck, the good alien for that matter, did erupt in explosions when they died. Coming back to Talec, he did come to Earth in hopes of minting money. Now, whether he had come to Earth before as well is still a question mark, but he did come to Houston with a very specific plan of action – we are stressing on him giving people excessive doses of heroin, sucking the endorphins released from their brains, synthesizing them into a drug called ‘Barsi’ and selling it back at his home planet. Let’s not forget the part where he brutally kills all of his victims with a disc. Yes, you heard that right!
Talec begins his journey by killing four heroin dealers with his killer disc of course and then pillaging about 90 kilograms of heroin from them. He is seen going on rampages plenty of times in the movie. When we say rampage, we are emphasizing him often demolishing a large number of cars. While, the movie does feature another alien; Azeck, the good one, who happened to be a police officer on their home planet, Talec managed to secure an upper hand resulting in the eventual death of the good alien.
Weapons form a very important part of these aliens here. Talec is seen carrying a massive collection of some very advanced armaments from his home planet. Of course, his primary weapon is the killer disc, one that was actually modified to the human pattern of electromagnetic impulses.
This not only made it fly around and seamlessly cut through every living human it could find, but it also continued to do so till it got stuck inside a magnet. Can you beat that? He is also seen in possession of a very large alien handgun, one that quick fires explosives and is quite handy when it comes to destroying cars. Now, add to all of this a retractable blade on his right arm, which he mainly uses to drain out human endorphins. And, on his left hand is his gauntlet that has a large, automatic bladed whip which he mainly used to shoot heroin.
Putting further stress on his powers and abilities, Talec boasts augmented strength and intelligence. He is quite an expert when it comes to his weapons. For those of you who have not seen the movie yet, you are in for a surprise! He is quite capable of shooting lasers from his eyes, transforming his legs into tentacles, and sticking to the walls too. In case you think that we are exaggerating, no we are not, not even the tiniest bit! See the flick for yourself and be the judge.
Is ‘I Come In Peace 2’ Happening?
Well, that was straight from the horse’s mouth and you heard him say it. Since the release of the film back in 1990, there have been many attempts to make a sequel. Even Harv Zimmel got the job of writing the script for a part two in either ‘95 or ’96 but apparently, that did not have any of the characters from the first flick. Zimmel’s script revolved around a down-on-his-luck police detective; one who is probing deeper into the inexplicable disappearances of people in the coastal California town. He is joined by a female Interpol agent who also seems to be working on the same case.
It is eventually revealed that she happens to be an alien who is chasing another female alien; one who is accountable for all the disappearances. While the producers of the movie thought that it was quite a well-written script, they, unfortunately, could not get the budget for it, and apparently, there also seemed to be some problems related to the rights with the first movie. Of course, Craig R. Baxley was also approached for the sequel but he was denied it because of such a shoestring budget.
Anyhow, coming back to Matthias Hues here’s some more information about the sequel. The story has Dolph as the policeman who we all know. He has completely lost his mind as nobody for that matter believes him when he claims that an alien invasion almost happened or may take place again. So, his character gets transferred to Texas, apparently in some small town. He is a lot older, probably 67 years old, and the town sheriff too, who is entirely obsessed with conspiracy theories. Finally, a black site is discovered in Sweden, that the Americans had forgotten about.
That’s where the corpse of Talec is seen hanging; burnt, unrecognizable along with a bunch of other aliens. Dolph’s character soon finds out about it when the monsters escape, posting some kids inadvertently unleashing them. Talec begins his killing spree and that leads to Dolph’s character flying from America to Sweden. Of course, everyone wants him to not succeed as the Government clearly cannot afford this news to come out, but Dolph does what he has to do eventually.
For what’s better, Matthias had even taken to his social media account to announce that a sequel was finally in the making. All good things take time. Guess, we got to be patient for this one!