Revenge of the Creature is a Universal Horror film from 1955.
One year after the events of Creature from the Black Lagoon, another group of people arrive at the Black Lagoon to catch the Gill Man. They are successful, and the creature is taken with them to an oceanarium for study. As Gill Man is subjected to various tests by animal psychologist Clete Ferguson and ichthyologist Helen Dobson, he becomes interested in Helen. Sure enough, Gill Man escapes his containment and later kidnaps Helen in typical fifties monster movie fashion.
Features the first film appearance by Clint Eastwood, as the lab technician Jennings.
After one more sequel, The Creature Walks Among Us, the franchise came to an end.
For the Mystery Science Theater 3000 version, please go to the episode recap page.
Tropes:
- Artistic License – Biology: One of Prof. Ferguson's displays is a demonstration of how a well-fed cat won't kill mice. This is true of many predators, but cats (sometimes) kill things for fun.
- The Cameo: Ricou Browning (Gill-Man's underwater actor) appears as a lab technician.
- Chekhov's Skill: Gill Man is taught to stop moving on command. It comes handy in the ending.
- Damsel in Distress: Helen after the Gill Man kidnaps her at the end of the film.
- Death of the Hypotenuse: Joe, Clete's rival for Helen, is killed when the Gill Man first breaks free from his chain and escapes his tank.
- Decoy Protagonist: Either Hayes or Johnson as can be looked at as the protagonist until Ferguson shows 15 minutes into film.
- Developing Doomed Characters: It takes a significant amount of time for the Gill Man finally to snap and break out the whoop-ass....
- Evil-Detecting Dog: Helen's dog Chris detects Gill Man's presence before it comes inside her apartment.
- Fake Cutie: Probably an unintentional example, but the sweet golden haired Helen has no issues brutalizing and inflicting agonizing pain on the Gill Man, who is rendered practically defenseless while contained in a tank.
- Fish Person: The Creature, obviously.
- Flare Gun: One is fired when Gill Man and Helen are found.
- Foe-Tossing Charge: At one point he waddles out to sea upending cars about in anger. Tossing foes is also a favored tactic of the creature.
- For Science!: It's never really explained how exactly torturing and abusing the Creature with an electric cattle prod is beneficial to science.
- Friendly, Playful Dolphin: Featured at the oceanarium where the creature is taken.
- How Did That Get in There?: Said by the lab technician Jennings when he accuses a cat of eating one of the test rats. Then he puts his hand in his pocket and finds the rat there.
- Ignored Expert: At various points, saner people point out that putting the Gill Man in a petting zoo and trying to teach him to be human are not safe bets.
- Jungles Sound Like Kookaburras: The kookaburra is heard during the opening scenes, in the Amazon river basin of South America.
- Obliviously Evil: As pointed out in Mystery Science Theater 3000, Helen and Clete see no harm in tormenting the Gill Man in the most cruel and sadistic fashion for some vague "scientific research". And then they're all shocked when the Creature gets fed up with the abuse and breaks out of its tank to wreak havoc.
- Revenge of the Sequel
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Gill Man is caged, experimented on, and tortured under the guise of training him. Then he finally escapes and wreaks havoc.
- Screaming Woman: Helen is a surprisingly subdued example. She only screams twice: once when the creature kidnaps her from the café terrace, and once when she wakes up on the beach after being kidnapped, with the creature looming over her.
- Spinning Paper: Shown after Gill Man escapes.
- Then Let Me Be Evil: The Gill Man is shown being abused by electric shocks several times For Science! by the "heroes". It's only after this mistreatment that he makes a serious effort to escape and kill whatever humans he runs into on the way.
- Too Dumb to Live: Gill Man has escaped into the sea, and what do the woman he’s in love with and the man who’s been electrocuting him with a cattle prod the entire movie decide to do afterwards? "Let's go swimming!"
