Characters / Tremors 4: The Legend Begins

Tremors Character Index
Tremors | Tremors 2: Aftershocks | Tremors 3: Back to Perfection | Tremors 4: The Legend Begins | Tremors 5: Bloodlines | Tremors 6: A Cold Day in Hell

Hiram Gummer

Played By: Michael Gross

A dandy British gentleman who owns a silver mine in Nevada, around which is formed the mining town Rejection. Forced to confront the Graboids when they are accidentally unearthed, he eventually assists in saving the town, which becomes Perfection. He is the ancestor of Burt Gummer.

• Does Not Like Guns: At first, due to being an overly civilized dandy. He's certainly an awful shot. It's implied they start to grow on him after he kills a Graboid with a Punt Gun and Christine Lord gives him a Gatling Gun as a present for saving the town.
• Identical Grandfather: Michael Gross plays Burt's ancestor.
• Instant Expert: Downplayed. He still can't hit what he's aiming at after a lesson from Black Hand Kelly, but he has his consistency down pat which is impressive for someone with no experience shooting guns.
• Took a Level in Badass: Slowly progresses. During the feud with the Graboids, he ultimately wields a firearm and leads the townspeople into a fight for survival against the monsters.
• Took a Level in Kindness: He treats the people of Rejection like garbage at first, but becomes more compassionate as he gets to know them.

Christine Lord

Played By: Sarah Botsford

The local schoolmarm, determined to save her town of Rejection. She and Hiram Gummer are implied to become a couple, making her a maternal ancestor of Burt Gummer.

• Action Girl: Carries a pistol of her own and knows how to use it.
• Wasteland Elder: Fifty-ish hotel owner Christine Lord is the de facto leader of the Dying Town Rejection, a mining community plagued by monster attacks.

Black Hand Kelly

Played By: Billy Drago

A mercenary gunslinger that Hirum Gummer hires to try and track down & kill the "Dirt Dragons" that have been killing the workers in the silver mine. Unfortunately for him, by the time they find them, the Dirt Dragons have grown up into full-sized Graboids, and his weaponry isn't designed for it. He gets killed because of his jangling spurs.

• Bait-and-Switch: One of his first scenes involves him asking Fu Yien to toss him an apple, with most of the cast expecting him to shoot it. He just catches and eats it instead, only to shoot down an ornament in the store and then hit it again on the way down.
• Do Not Go Gentle: Even while being Eaten Alive by a Graboid, he's unloading his pistol into the beast's mouth.
• Foreshadowing: He refers to setting off to find the "Dirt Dragons" as "jangling some spurs", which prompts a "No. Just… No" Reaction from Hiram and Juan. He later gets killed because his spurs allowed a full-grown Graboid to find him easily.
• Improbable Aiming Skills: He's known for these in-universe, and displays them, along with a lightning-quick draw, in his introductory scene.
• Mentor Occupational Hazard: For all of his nastiness, Kelly tries to encourage Hiram to become more assertive and teaches him how to shoot. He ends up eaten well before the final scene.
• Only in It for the Money: And he manages to wheedle most of Rejection's collective wealth out of them, as well.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: His job is to kill people, and when first hired, he assumes it's either Juan or Tecopa, or "the injun or the Mexican", as he puts it.
• Psycho for Hire: He enjoys being a professional gunman a little too much.
• The Worf Effect: In-universe. His death causes Hiram and the rest of the town to face a Despair Event Horizon... if he didn't stand a chance against the Graboids, how could they?

Old Fred

Played By: J. E. Freeman

A crusty old wagon-driver who is found killed by the "Dirt Dragons".

• Cool Old Guy: Old Fred is a gun-totting old teamster who is fond of folksy sayings (such as suggesting that they hire a gunman who can "shoot the nuts off a squirrel at a hundred paces").
• One-Steve Limit: Considering the first movie has an Old Fred.
• Sacrificial Lion: Old Fred sticks around as a member of the ensemble of townspeople for a large part of the movie before being Killed Offscreen.

Juan Pedilla

Played By: Brent Roam

A Mexican miner, the first surviving witness to the "Dirt Dragons" and one of the few miners who refuses to leave despite the killing.

• Ambiguous Situation: Given his desire to start a ranch and his Mexican heritage, it's possible but unconfirmed that he's Miguel and Rosalita's ancestor.
• Sidekick: He's the one who first shows Hiram where the attacks went down and accompanies him for a lot of the movie.
• Sole Survivor: The only miner present during the initial baby grabbed attack to survive.

Tecopa

Played By: August Schellenberg

An elderly Native American who works as a handyman around Rejection.

• Indy Ploy: Tricks a Graboid into killing itself by thrusting a long-saw down a hole he had been digging for a flagpole and banging on the saw, causing it to slice itself open.

Pyong Lien Chang

Played By: Lydia Look

The complaining matriarch of the Chang family, who runs the general store of Rejection.

• Chinese Laborer: Before saving enough money to buy a market, Pyong and her husband worked on the Transcontinental Railroad after emigrating from China and are determined to keep their son from experiencing that.
• Nostalgia Filter: Pyong is constantly making comments about how certain dangers and misfortunes weren't present back in China, with her husband disputing this. However, near the end of the movie, she claims that she was the one to talk him into leaving China in the first place and doesn't really want to go back, implying that she doesn't mean it when she makes homesick comments.
  Pyong: In China, no one shoots in wall!
  Lu Wan: In China, no one has gun.

Lu Wan Chang

Played By: Ming Lo

The polite and even-tempered owner of the Rejection general store.

• Henpecked Husband: For most of the film, Pyon Lien seems to stand over Lu Wan, but he is capable of putting his foot down when it matters.

Fu Yien Chang

Played By: Sam Ly

The Chang's only son, who makes swift friends with Hiram Gummer and has a rickshaw. A probable ancestor of Walter Chang from the first film.

Shooters/Grablites

The baby graboids.

• Evil Smells Bad: Not evil, but they smell terrible. Their stench was how Juan was able to recognize them after they reach adulthood.
• Gigantic Adults, Tiny Babies: The newborn shooters are the size of melons, compared to their absolutely gargantuan adult forms. One of the Shooters is even killed by a pick swung by one of the humans.
• Glass Cannon: Much like their Shrieker form, they are highly dangerous and capable of killing a man in seconds but are far more vulnerable then their Graboid stage. Juan manages to kill one with a pickaxe, something their adult form would consider a nuisance.
• Nothing Is Scarier: According to Juan not seeing them in the mine as they're killing people is this.
• Our Dragons Are Different: They're being called Dirt Dragons.