“Y’know, it’s hard to fight with yer longjohns on an’ yer tallywhacker hanging out!”

Drake’s rating: A new Molly for a new movie. Get used to that…

Drake’s review: When we last saw Molly, she was fifteen years old, going to private school by day and walking Hollywood Boulevard by night, and had just helped to end the threat of a sadistic serial killer who was stalking the streets of Los Angeles. Now, a mere four years later, Molly has not only finished high school, but is on the verge of graduating college! And with a law degree, no less!

I’m starting to think that continuity might not be a strong point in the Angelverse.

So Avenging Angel generally glosses over Molly’s past as an underage sex worker, which was of course the theme of Angel, in favor of gunfights, action beats, and odd attempts at slapstick humor. That might have you wondering if the creative team had radically changed over the course of the single year between productions, but writer/director Robert Vincent O’Neill actually was back for the second go-round, as were several of the supporting actors. In fact, the one big name change was that of the starring role, as Donna Wilkes gave this flick a pass which led to Betsy Russell (Tomboy) slipping into the role of Molly for the sequel.

That’s a big change, as Russell is a very different actress than Wilkes. Russell is by no means imposing, but she has more physical presence on the screen and plays the part with much more confidence. But for all that, she also lacks the vulnerability which was key to Wilkes’ portrayal of the character. This is very much a Molly who looks more comfortable shooting a gun than walking the streets.

Which is good, since Avenging Angel tries very hard to be a straight-up action flick. There are shootings and gunfights galore here as a criminal enterprise starts moving into Hollywood Boulevard, buying up properties, and forcing long-term residents out. Now none of this would really be a problem for Molly, except for the fact that her friend Lt. Andrews (now played briefly by Robert F. Lyons) gets caught up in their activities and is ruthlessly gunned down. Determined to find out who did it, Molly returns to Los Angeles and starts getting the gang back together again. Or what remains of it, at any rate.

Sure, Yo-Yo Charlie (Steven M. Porter, Best in Show) is still out there doing magic tricks and Solly (Susan Tyrrell, Cry-Baby) is still her old, weird self, but the man they really need is Kit Carson (Rory Calhoun, Hell Comes to Frogtown) and he’s been locked away in a sanitarium. Which of course means that the other three are going to have to bust him out in an outlandish plan that combines silly costumes, an antique getaway car and an accompanying music soundtrack that wouldn’t have been out of place in an old Jerry Lewis film.

But Kit knows where a street performer named Johnny Glitter hangs out, and since Glitter is the sole witness to Andrews’ killing, Molly wants to find him. As do Andrews’ killers, which makes things a little awkward when both groups show up at a rundown flophouse. Still, that’s nothing that a little gunfight won’t solve, right?

The unexpected success of Angel made a sequel a veritable certainty. But the problem became, what do you do now? Because that first movie pretty well covered Molly’s arc and ended with the idea that she would be moving on to a better life, thanks to Andrews and the other responsible adults* around her.

And she does, but a sequel means that something has to drag Molly back to Hollywood Boulevard, since that location gave the first flick its visual personality, and that something has to get the other characters involved again. So Andrews is sacrificed on the altar of bad movie clichés and Molly rushes back to L.A., taking just enough time to pack her suitcase full of tube tops and mini-skirts. Because there’s just no way that Molly can pretend to be Angel again while wearing sweaters and jackets.

Avenging Angel just never quite knows what to do with itself. As an exploitation movie, it’s a dismal failure, since the exploitation elements were already dealt with in the first movie and the sequel treats any remaining ideas as nothing more than window dressing. And as an action flick it’s nothing special, with no key scenes to make it stand out from any other low-budget B-movie. It just kind of flounders around looking for an off-ramp, then sputters to a halt once its body count hits Die Hard levels.

Honestly, Betsy Russell does her best to take over the role here, but Molly is so changed from the first film that she’s barely recognizable, and exchanging street level drama for gun-blazing action doesn’t do the film any favors. Still, although Avenging Angel is a fairly anemic follow up to the first film, I have the feeling that this still might be the best of the sequels. And that kind of scares me.

*So, not Solly.

Intermission!

• Throwing glitter in the air gets a round of applause. This crowd is pretty easy to please.
• Quite the synth soundtrack this time around.
• So if it’s four years later, does that mean the first movie took place in 1980, or does this movie take place in the near-future of 1988? Or am I just overthinking this?
• Shootout! Who saw that coming?
• Angel gets pulled in on a mass arrest but she knows law stuff from her fancy law college.
• Betsy rocks the pink lip gloss. That’s SO ‘80s.
• Ah, the old sliding on the slippery floor and crashing through the window and falling to your death trick. That never gets old.
• Click. Click. Click. Bang! Sometimes a gun just needs to warm up.
• Shooting at a car can make it turn over. The things you learn from the movies!