Misunderstood Masterpieces 2.09.10: Conan the Destroyer

Posted by Will Helm on 02.09.2010

...or, Featuring Wilt Chamberlain and Sex Education, Which Seems Oddly Appropriate

Last week, I touched on an iconic 20th century character of novels, comics, and movies: Conan the Barbarian. First appearing in the works of Robert E. Howard, Conan debuted in 1932 and was featured in over seventeen different stories in Weird Tales magazine. After Howard's untimely death, the character continued to appear in novels, until Marvel Comics returned the character to prominence with a comic-book series. While Howard created the character, comic-series writer Roy Thomas and artist Barry Windsor-Smith collaborated to flesh out the character further, providing quite a bit of the iconic imagery that would become significant a decade after the series' debut in 1970.

Alternate title: Conan
the Destroyer of Franchises.

That is because, in 1982, the character of Conan finally appeared on the big screen, in the film Conan the Barbarian. Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger as the title character, Conan the Barbarian was a success at the box office, grossing over $38 million, well above the film's $20 million budget. As well, it launched the formal film career – he was in a handful of films previously, but none as significant as Conan the Barbarian – of Schwarzenegger, who quickly became one of Hollywood's hottest properties.

With Schwarzenegger's burgeoning popularity, a sequel was to be expected, and it came to be in 1984 as Conan the Destroyer. While Conan the Barbarian was a grim, gritty, and adult R-rated film, Conan the Destroyer instead was rated "PG," as the violence and nudity from the first film were toned down or eliminated entirely, much to the chagrin of fans and critics. Interestingly, though, despite the disappointment regarding the film's content, Conan the Destroyer still earned a profit at the box office and later became a fixture in heavy rotation on HBO, endearing it to many children of the '70s and early '80s. In the intervening years, however, Conan the Destroyer has been maligned as the death of a franchise, as a planned third film has never come to fruition – and Red Sonja featured a "fake" Conan. Does Conan the Destroyer deserve to be insulted like that, or could it be a Misunderstood Masterpiece? Let's find out!

On the red planet of Mars, some guy has an incomprehensible introductory monologue while a horde of barbarians ride through the plains in super dramatic slow motion. Perhaps this is to highlight the presence of basketball Hall of Famer Wilt "The Stilt" Chamberlain, who leads the barbarians' charge. I guess legendary lothario Chamberlain – who claimed to have bedded 20,000 women in his lifetime – ran out of women on Earth to sleep with, so he's moved on to other planets. Elsewhere, presumably on Earth, Conan (Schwarzenegger) and his fuzzy boots kneel in front of an altar, while his weaselly buddy Malak (Tracey Walter) plays with jewelry.

He's Austrian.
Freud was Austrian.
It all makes sense.

While Conan prays, the barbarian horde stops by for a visit – I suppose after they got back from Mars – and they try to capture Conan, with obviously ineffectual results. As Conan slaughters barbarians and punches horses – which sounds like a violent euphemism for masturbation, Malak hides under the altar and eats diamonds, which is a really bizarre predilection. Eventually, Malak gets captured and Wilt Chamberlain calls off the barbarians so that he and his HOT CHICK queen (Sarah Douglas) can ride up and chat with Conan. The HOT CHICK queen has a proposition for Conan and tells him that she can bring back his dead girlfriend if he goes along with it. Since Malak isn't much to look at and evidently Conan would prefer zombie sex over that, he goes along with the HOT CHICK queen.

The group rides into town, where a camel unceremoniously spits on Conan, so Conan punches it as well. And here I thought usually the spitting happened after "punching the camel." Once at the HOT CHICK queen's palace, the HOT CHICK queen dons some lingerie to distract Conan and then she explains his quest: he has to escort her niece somewhere. Oh great; she's totally going to want to stop at the mall and pick up some stuff at Hot Topic. Conan hates going into Hot Topic. Actually, Conan has to escort the niece to some wizard's lair, where she has to claim a magical jeweled horn for reasons as yet unexplained.

Conveniently, moments after this exposition, the HOT CHICK niece (Olivia d'Abo) has a bad dream and freaks out, but, luckily for her Wilt Chamberlain is there to comfort her. Although it's rather unclear if he "comforted" her the best way he knows how. While Conan stands around with nothing to do, the HOT CHICK queen rushes off to hypnotize her HOT CHICK niece back to sleep. She then tells Wilt Chamberlain that he has to go with Conan and the HOT CHICK niece because she has to stay a virgin for her quest to work. Upon hearing that, Wilt Chamberlain gets this look on his face like "Oh, damn . . . and I almost tapped that chick too! Whew." Of course, it's all because the HOT CHICK niece has to be sacrificed, which means no one gets to tap it, much to Wilt Chamberlain's disappointment. But at least she tells him he can kill Conan too.

Wilt's answer when asked
how many chicks he boned
in the past hour.

The next day, Conan, Wilt Chamberlain, Malak, and the HOT CHICK niece set out on their journey and the HOT CHICK niece uncomfortably asks Wilt Chamberlain if he thinks that Conan is hot. Umm . . . I don't think Conan is Wilt Chamberlain's type, silly girl. Nonetheless, the HOT CHICK niece uses the opportunity to insult Wilt Chamberlain's manhood, which has to be a first in his lifetime. Later, the HOT CHICK niece, since she's young, impetuous, and a HOT CHICK, bosses Conan around, but he doesn't listen because he knows they need reinforcements. To that end, Conan finds some natives barbecuing an Asian guy (Mako), so Conan rides in and slaughters the natives, while Malak rescues the Asian guy. After the natives are safely slaughtered, Conan hires the Asian guy for the journey, as he's a wizard and only magic can truly compete with magic.

Farther into the journey, the heroes find a village where a chained up Grace Jones fends off some angry villagers intent on murdering her. The HOT CHICK niece, who seems oddly interested in Grace Jones, tells Conan to rescue her, so Conan rides in triumphantly and frees Grace Jones, who responds by beating up the villagers. While Conan and his crew ride off, Grace Jones spits at the villagers and rides off as well, eventually catching up with Conan. Before Grace Jones can introduce herself, Wilt Chamberlain rides off to chat with her – and probably give her the key to his trailer. Of course, it's all under the guise of not wanting her to join the team . . . because he wants her all to himself. Grace Jones isn't into that, though, as she beats up Wilt Chamberlain until Conan breaks up the fight when Grace Jones' vagina seemingly pops out of her costume. Either that, or it's a really bad choice of color palette for her panties. Grace Jones, thankful for Conan sparing her more embarrassment, swears allegiance to him and joins the group.

Almost too quickly – as the movie is going way too fast to get where it's going, Conan and his associates find the evil wizard's castle in the middle of a lake. The HOT CHICK niece, who's in a hurry, tells Conan that they should go there now, but Conan would rather rest, so everyone rests. Conan's decision proves to be unfortunate, as the evil wizard, Toth-Amon (Pat Roach), transforms into an animated dragon and flies over to kidnap the HOT CHICK niece. The next morning, Conan wakes up to find the HOT CHICK niece gone and he has the Asian guy divine the HOT CHICK niece's location: in the evil wizard's castle! Dum-dum-DUM!

She may not have knelt
before Zod, but she
definitely knelt before Wilt.

Conan and his crew steal a boat and row off to the castle and they arrive there with no problems at all. Once there, the heroes go for a swim to break in to the castle and, yet again, they accomplish that feat without incident. For being an evil wizard, this guy sure is pretty lax on his security systems. Inside the castle, Conan and his team climb a giant spiral staircase, where Malak slips a little bit, probably just to make the evil wizard feel good about himself as if the giant spiral staircase was a great obstacle.

Eventually, the heroes find a giant door, which Conan and Wilt Chamberlain push open. Inside the bowels of the castle, Conan discovers a diamond and he goes off to claim it; in the process, Conan is trapped in a room by a sliding glass window. Ooh . . . doomed by interior design! With Conan captured, the evil wizard finally does something evil and wizardy, as he unveils his Evil Hall of Mirrors, featuring mirrors which produce magical clones of the evil wizard. After the hooded clones wander out of their mirrors, they amble around the room for a bit before joining together to form an Evil Rubber Monster!

The Evil Rubber Monster, after making me crack up with its unmoving face, wrestles Conan and, in the process, busts out a GIANT SWING! After getting tossed across the room, Conan tries to fight the Evil Rubber Monster, but it's all for naught until Conan accidentally smashes one of the mirrors, injuring the Evil Rubber Monster. The Evil Rubber Monster, hurt but not yet thwarted, responds by locking a bearhug onto Conan, which he then transitions to a Canadian backbreaker! Workrate! Conan breaks free from the submission hold and attempts a backslide, but he thinks better of it and starts smashing mirrors. I have to say that Conan vs. Evil Rubber Monster is already better than most TNA matches nowadays. Eventually, Conan smashes enough mirrors that the Evil Rubber Monster curls up into a fetal position, allowing Conan the opportunity to stab the evil wizard through one of the remaining mirrors. The mortally wounded evil wizard then hobbles into the Evil Hall of Mirrors and blows himself up.

He definitely has a story
about Wilt being
disappointed by working
with a guy named "Tracey."

With the evil wizard defeated, the HOT CHICK niece, who was sleeping peacefully in the other room, wakes up and freaks out and calls out for a little bit of Wilt Chamberlain's special "comforting." Wilt Chamberlain stays strong, though, and just wakes up the HOT CHICK niece enough that she can grab the evil wizard's diamond. After the HOT CHICK niece claims the diamond, the castle starts falling apart, but the heroes escape just as easily as they got in, because they just happened to face off against the worst evil wizard ever.

Later, in the forest, Wilt Chamberlain looks askance as a few of the HOT CHICK queen's barbarians ride up to kidnap the HOT CHICK niece. Wilt Chamberlain also almost heel turns on Conan, but Conan and his team are too busy fighting the barbarians to notice. While the rest of the heroes fend off the barbarians, Conan rides off to rescue the HOT CHICK niece by fighting a giant barbarian on horseback. Conan succeeds in defeating the barbarian, but Wilt Chamberlain, not happy with being upstaged, tries to kill Conan, but he lies about it when it doesn't work out the way he expected.

That evening, in camp, Conan gets hammered while Malak hits on Grace Jones, though she isn't terribly receptive to it. Meanwhile, the HOT CHICK niece, perhaps taking a cue from Malak, puts some salve on Conan's wounds, since I guess that passes for romance back then. Conan, sensing the HOT CHICK's attraction, pretends it doesn't hurt and then he starts rambling about having a kingdom and a queen in the future, preferably his dead girlfriend, much to the HOT CHICK's dismay, as she would rather be his queen. Conan, before he has a chance to take advantage of the HOT CHICK niece's offer, passes out.

She has the look of a woman
satisfied by "The Stilt."

With Conan unconscious, the HOT CHICK niece wanders over to chat with Grace Jones about being a female warrior, probably because the HOT CHICK niece wants to learn a thing or two to impress Conan with her mad skillz. Grace Jones, therefore, shows the HOT CHICK niece some moves, but Conan wakes up and interjects himself to give the HOT CHICK niece a private lesson on how to handle his sword. Literally. Sometime later, the HOT CHICK niece asks Grace Jones for dating advice, but, after not finding Grace Jones' answers to her liking, she defers to Malak and asks him how sex works, which is really, really awkward.

Did this movie really need that? Evidently someone, somewhere thought so.

Perhaps to give the film some Freudian imagery after that last scene, the HOT CHICK niece leads Conan into a narrow canyon and Conan, strangely, complains about it. Maybe he's still too busy pining for his dead girlfriend to be interested in the HOT CHICK niece's narrow canyon. Although, at the end of the canyon, Conan does happily open up a mysterious temple for the HOT CHICK niece – literally, not figuratively, perverts – and, once inside, Grace Jones freaks out at a mouse. OK, this is column is going to strange places I never intended it to go.

Deeper inside the mysterious temple, Conan and Wilt Chamberlain open another door – because this movie needed more red hot door-opening action – and Malak sneaks inside the room to lock open the magical garage door. Once inside the room, the heroes discover the Temple of the Fish Monster, where Malak eats more jewels and the Asian guy reads hieroglyphics about the HOT CHICK queen's mission. While the Asian guy discovers the HOT CHICK niece is doomed, she's busy opening up the maw of the Fish Monster, where she walks through fire to claim a magical jeweled horn, much to Conan's amazement. The Asian guy, meanwhile, tries to warn Conan about what's going to happen to the HOT CHICK niece, but he's too interested in getting back his dead girlfriend to care about the HOT CHICK niece.

His greatest magic trick:
conjuring extreme flatulence.

As the heroes leave the Temple of the Fish Monster, some old guy and his troops block their path. The Asian guy argues with the old guy, as they're both wizards, presumably, but Conan's getting tired of all the yammering so he starts killing the troops. Eventually, Conan and his allies retreat into the Temple of the Fish Monster, where he and Wilt Chamberlain slaughter more troops until Wilt Chamberlain once again tries to turn on Conan and, once again, it doesn't work. Wilt Chamberlain: worst henchman ever.

While the heroes try to escape, the old guy attempts to use magic to catch up with them, but the Asian guy fends him off by frying his brain, Scanners style. Just without all the messy head exploding, unfortunately. While the Asian guy is busy scrambling brains, Wilt Chamberlain and the HOT CHICK niece make their way out of the Temple of the Fish Monster, and Wilt Chamberlain finally traps Conan and the rest of the heroes by caving in the back tunnel. Way to go, Wilt Chamberlain . . . took you long enough.

A few minutes after Wilt Chamberlain and the HOT CHICK niece escape and ride off to the HOT CHICK queen's palace, Conan and his fellow heroes escape and, once outside, Conan finally realizes that there's been a grand conspiracy going against him the whole time. Conan, who's not big on grand conspiracies, wants REVENGE! The Asian guy and Grace Jones are totally into it, but Malak is reluctant, until he realizes he's screwed if he breaks off on his own.

Wilt loved seeing what she
could do with that big stick.

Back at the HOT CHICK queen's palace, Wilt Chamberlain and the HOT CHICK niece arrive, much to the HOT CHICK queen's amazement, probably because Wilt Chamberlain has proven himself to be pretty hapless throughout the quest. Meanwhile, outside, Conan and his remaining allies have to break into the palace via a waterfall behind the building and they slowly do so. Inside the palace, the HOT CHICK queen drugs the HOT CHICK niece and the ritual begins. Elsewhere in the palace, Conan and his strike force slaughter their way through the place, but not quickly enough to stop the HOT CHICK niece from placing the jeweled horn into some sacred statue, waking it up.

Just outside the palace's throne room, Conan meets up with Wilt Chamberlain and they face off as Conan tells his associates to rescue the HOT CHICK niece. To that end, Grace Jones kills a high priest just before the HOT CHICK niece is to be sacrificed, which angers the sacred statue, as it really wanted to see a HOT CHICK die when it woke up. And now it's pissed. Great.

Meanwhile, after a totally anticlimactic brawl, Conan kills Wilt Chamberlain while, in the adjacent room, the HOT CHICK queen tries to kill the HOT CHICK niece to appease the sacred statue. Conan stops her, though, so the sacred statue, who didn't wake up just to watch people almost get killed, gores the HOT CHICK queen with its horn. The sacred statue, now imbued with bloodlust, freaks out, so Conan fights it, with Grace Jones and Malak helping out a bit. Eventually, the Asian guy tells Conan to rip out the sacred statue's horn and Conan does so, which causes the sacred statue's brain juice to leak out, allowing Conan the chance to kill it for good.

Coming next week.
No pun intended.

In the aftermath, a bunch of nameless, thankless servants clean up the throne room, so that it's all bright and shiny when the HOT CHICK niece becomes the new HOT CHICK queen. After she takes the throne, the HOT CHICK niece hires Grace Jones to captain her guards, Malak to be her jester, and the Asian guy to be her resident Asian guy. With a full compliment of associates, the HOT CHICK niece then asks Conan to marry her, but he spurns her since he's still into his dead girlfriend. They make out anyway, just because she's enjoying this whole HOT CHICK queen thing. After the make-out session, Conan leaves to mope on a throne during an epilogue as the film promises a third movie that will never come.

Though it may have been a staple of mid-'80s HBO programming, the years have not been kind to Conan the Destroyer. A film that may have seemed cool to the average elementary-school kid back in the day, now Conan the Destroyer is nothing but a lackluster, badly paced sequel. Conan, who was such a grim badass in the first film, here is just kind of goofy, still tough, but silly. As well, Wilt Chamberlain's "Bombaata" may be one of the most ineffectual and non-threatening villains to come along in a film in a long time. He doesn't really do anything right anywhere in the film, he doesn't prove himself to be a proper foil for Conan – after all, he's almost bested by Grace Jones' "Zula," and his final showdown provides little suspense. Even worse than these character foibles, every obstacle in the heroes' path throughout the film is conquered way too easily, undermining any sense of peril in the film. Conan the Destroyer plays out like a Cliff's Notes version of a true Conan movie, as if all the flourishes are taken out, leaving just bullet points for the film. Hopefully my little treatment filled in the blanks and, at least, elevated the film to the status of Misunderstood Masterpiece.

Join me next week as, for a belated Valentine's Day, I feature the most important adult film in the history of forever! See you then!
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