CATEGORY 7

AUDIENCE O

It's over. We have a winner.

I hereby declare the ongoing race by the various television networks and movie studios to create the most preposterous disaster film of them all to be over. CBS has won. Oh, they've won alright. With CATEGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD they've scored the winning touchdown, spiked the football, done the Icky Shuffle, dumped a cooler of Gatorade on the coach, started playing "We Are The Champions", held a victory parade, been invited to the White House to meet the President, retired the jersey, and been inducted into the hall of fame. CATEGORY 7 isn't just preposterous; too paraphrase a line from The Tick comic book, it's nigh-preposterous. Look no further than the film's opening sequence.

CATEGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD begins it rampage in Paris where the night sky turns ominously dark, the wind picks up, lightning strikes all over, and topping it all off, a gargantuan tornado magically appears. People run screaming, landmarks are destroyed, and two rowdy European soccer fans (one that looks disturbingly like Uwe Boll) up in the Eiffel Tower practically start behaving like the bomb-riding bomber pilot from DR. STRANGELOVE as the colossal funnel cloud levels the iconic landmark and sucks them to their doom. The average tornado (even the small ones) sounds like a continuous roar, much like a train or jet engine. Can you imagine the deafening noise one big enough to dwarf the Eiffel Tower would make, especially combined with the sounds of destruction its wreaking and the ruckus from people running and screaming in every direction? I bring this up because meanwhile across town, an American official is briefing the Parisian consulate about the possibility of just this sort of catastrophic meteorological event; doing so with all the passion and conviction of an advertising executive pitching a new slogan for a brand of margarine I might add. The American gets a frantic phone call from the Extreme Weather Lab in Washington D.C. He then goes to open the window shades and only then do he and the others in this room realize that the City of Lights is pretty much being annihilated mere blocks away. This in a nutshell is the absurdist mentality of CATGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD.

Seemingly set only a few short weeks following the events of the miniseries' predecessor CATEGORY 6: DAY OF DESTRUCTION. In that one, a trio of cataclysmic storms, including a highly unlikely hurricane that formed over the Great Lakes/Canada region, converge to lay waste to Chicago while Randy Quaid chases tornadoes, Nancy McKeon tries to get the story of a lifetime, and Brian Dennehy collected an easy paycheck as the old fart at the National Weather Service that knows better than his superiors but since he's an old fart the superiors chose to doubt his knowledge until the last minute. Mr. Dennehy no longer needed a paycheck and thus he is nowhere to be found in this one. The only returning cast member from the previous miniseries is the most unlikely of all, Randy Quaid. He sorta died toward the end of that one. Now whereas the original placed the fate of the Mid-West on the shoulders of Brian Dennehy, this even more overblown sequel introduces Gina Gershon as Judith Carr, the new head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Eat your heart out, Michael Brown.

I can only guess that Miss Gershon took this role in a desperate attempt to play someone other than the vixenish sexbomb she's usually cast as since this is the frumpiest I've ever seen her, but even a frumpy Gina Gershon is hotter than pretty much any other beaurocrat you've ever seen. Nobody is going to confuse her for Madeline Albright, that's for sure. Her character is almost like the disaster movie version of Ally MacGraw's LOVE STORY character. The worse things get, the more destruction that occurs, Gershon's physical appearance grows increasingly hotter.

Judith's father is played by Robert Wagner, who has officially entered into William Shatner territory, and by that I mean he really can only play varying degrees of his own persona as opposed to an actual character. He's Senator Ryan Carr and he helped to get her the new gig, but the main reason she's been chosen is because the powers that be, namely the Head of Homeland Security played by Forever Knight's partner Schanke. He's in the back pocket of D.C.'s most evil energy corporation douchebag (Coincidentally played by the very same guy that played the Dick Cheney look-a-like in THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW) and the reason they chose her to be the new head of FEMA is because they believe they can "keep her in line." This is code language for "someone that wouldn't dare point the finger at the evil energy corporation douchebags that have polluted our planet's atmosphere for so long that the sky has literally begun to fall." Something they're especially concerned about in the wake of the three superstorms that helped devastate Chicago and most of the Mid-West in CATEGORY 6. Now the nation's emergency resources are stretched to the breaking point, the devastating meteorological anomalies are continuing all over the world, and Judith Carr has to deal with needless red tape and politicians that are obviously trying to stonewall her.

More destruction: George Washington gets "too much water on the brain" and crumbles off of Mount Rushmore. A 45-year old Boy Scout perishes in the process. On the plus side, now there's room on Rushmore to add Ronald Reagan's face as so many conservatives have been pushing for.

Even more destruction: The Mall of America in Minnesota is destroyed. We see footage of the devastation on a television set; footage that looks suspiciously like recycled footage of the mall from CATEGORY 6 being destroyed. Waste not, want not.

Yet more destruction: A superstorm forms in Egypt eradicating the Great Pyramids and killing several extras from the local community theater production of The Mummy Returns.

Judith realizes there's only one person that may have a handle on just what the hell is happening. His name is Ross Duffy, played by Cameron Daddo, who seems to have trouble with accents since at first he has no discernable accent but before long he definitely sounds ready to throw another shrimp on the barbie. Ross is a hunky meteorologist who got shunned by the government and the scientific community years earlier when he wrote a thesis pretty much predicting everything that's happening in this miniseries. More importantly, he and Judith used to engage in Greco Roman mattress wrestling back in their college days. I say more importantly because this fact that really doesn't have any real bearing on the plot is constantly brought up, including by the media that will corner the two of them together and ask questions that no sane reporter would ever ask, such as when reporters ambush Judith and Ross on the street and ask such questions as, "Now would it be unfair to say that you brought Dr. Duffy onboard because of your recent divorce and because of the fact that your were college lovers?" Unexplainable weather catastrophes are occurring across the planet, North America is in shambles, and we're supposed to believe the mainstream press would be working the angle that the new female head of FEMA has decided to bring in a guy just because she's a horny divorcee looking to rekindle and old flame? I don't think so. As a matter of fact, the old flame is never rekindled since Ross is happily married, although Mrs. Crackpot Discredited Meteorology Hunk isn't too pleased to learn about her husband's college sex kitten and actually expresses more dismay that her husband is working with an ex-lover than she ever does the whole pesky end of the world scenario.

Oh, did I neglect to mention that Judith also has a teenage son. This is hard to believe because Gina Gershon doesn't look old enough to be this kid's mom, but then that might be because this kid looks to be about 26 trying to play 16. And wouldn't you know it; Judith's teenage son just happens to be dating Ross' pretty teen daughter but neither of them know about their parents former coupling until they see that question asked on live television. The inclusion of these foppish tweeners - in particular a rivalry involving the son, the daughter, and another diplomat's son unhappy about the crackpot's daughter spurning his advances in favor of FEMA girl's dorky son - is completely unnecessary and wreaks of either being a sign that the screenwriter was desperate to pad out the scenario or the producers were desperate to try and appeal to that particular demographic. Sorry CBS; this is airing in primetime on a pair of Sunday nights. That demographic is either watching Desperate Housewives, Adult Swim, or playing Xbox.

I did hope and pray that it would be revealed that Ross was actually the father of Judith's son just so the kid could come to the horrifying realization that the pretty blonde he's been potentially boinking is his own sister. Not only would that be morbidly funny; given the ridiculous subplot involving the Book of Revelations, little brother-sister incest might fit right in.

Ross declares that he's going to need more data on the super storms and demands to be allow his Junior Action Weather Rangers to assist him. Mostly, we're talking computer dorks that sit in front of computers interpreting data while tossing out the occasional snarky comment that only cements their dork status.

Ross also states that he's going to need someone to actually fly into one of these sudden super storms as it's happening in order to gather the data he so desperately needs to interpret conclusively what is causing these violent meteorological catastrophes. Enter Tom Skerrit as the world's greatest hurricane hunter pilot. He's gung ho for the mission but notes that an ordinary hurricane hunter plane won't be fast enough or strong enough to survive flying in the heart of one of these storms. Good news; the United States Air Force just happened to have recently outfitted a supersonic military fighter jet with hurricane hunting equipment, and Tom Skerrit, despite having no experience flying such a jet, will pilot it. Of all the ludicrous concepts this movie tosses out there, the idea of a state-of-the-art fighter jet similar to the one from FIREFOX being turned into a hurricane hunter is one of the absolute ludicrous.

Shannen Doherty of all people turns up as Faith Clavell, one of Ross' former students who found herself blacklisted by the meteorological community after she stood by her mentor and his then seemingly crazy theories and now finds herself forced to pay the bills by working at Coyote Ugly. Ross tracks her down and recruits her to help him save mankind from potential doom. She's initially uninterested, having accepted her fate as a barmaid, but eventually reneges knowing that next phone call from Aaron Spelling is probably never going to come. Doherty's scientific know-how never really comes into play other than her being a whiz at model rocketry. That's really the bulk of her contributions to this film; shooting off model rockets with scientific gizmos attached into storm clouds.

Randy Quaid returns (from the dead!) as Tommy Tornado, the daredevil tornado chaser we saw get killed towards the end of CATEGORY 6. As Tommy tells us, upon being sucked into the tornado he figured that since he was going to die he might as well make an experience of it so he opened the door and flew out inside of the tornado that then dropped him down into one of the Great Lakes. He somehow survived and is currently hospitalized in a full body cast complete with one of those halo things worn by people that have had serious neck injuries. But one phone call from old pal Ross and the man who should be physically incapacitated for months and probably requiring physical therapy years requests a hacksaw to cut himself out of his medical bandaging so he can climb back into an SUV and go chasing cataclysmic super storms. Next time we see him he's halo-free, cast-free, and turning and twisting his neck around, picking up heavy objects, running, ducking, jumping, climbing, and never showing any signs of a man that should be in crippling agony.

Tommy and Faith find themselves partnered together, driving around in a supped-up SUV, conveniently showing up wherever a potential super storm will emerge. Tommy has a sixth sense when it comes to tornadoes; he can literally just say, "I sense a tornado" and one will appear mere moments later. As best I can tell, the point of their partnership is for him to sense super storms and drive them into the heart of danger just before the real danger kicks in so that Faith can hop out and work her model rocketry magic while they take turns communicating with Ross via cellular phone. And personally, Randy Quaid looks like Bozo the Clown sans make-up and clown costume but in a pair of Raybans.

It wouldn't be the end of the world without a little Book of Revelations tossed in so here come Donny & Penny Hall, husband and wife televangelists inspired by either the Van Impe's or the Crouch's. I'd guess a little from column A and a whole lot from column B. Although, as scary as it is for me to say this, Brolin's portrayal, even if it an over-the-top caricature, is pretty spot on to quite a few Southern preachers I've seen in real life. Donny is actually sincere in his beliefs, wanting to provide real spiritual guidance to the masses, but Penny is basically the Lady MacBeth of televangelism, a money-grubbing schemer shamelessly willing to play off people's fears by screeching Bible passages related to the End Times while all but demanding people send them every last penny they have. Her on-air pleas for "donations" are so ridiculously transparent that even the most gullible blue-haired old bitty should be able to see through her.

Apparently not, and that leads us to the introduction to intrepid reporter Bridget, a red-haired cutie played by CRY WOLF's Lindy Booth. She really hates people that use religion for their own personal financial gain and sets her sights on exposing the Hall's. Ironically, Lindy Booth looks like she could very well be the offspring of Penny and Donny Hill since she physically resembles a young Swoosie Kurtz and has James Brolin's toothy grin. It's never really apparent how she's going to go about exposing them since most of her scenes involve her either watching the Hall's on TV and reacting in disgust or getting it on with her studly federal agent boyfriend, at least I think he was a federal agent. I honestly don't know recall his name or his occupation but he just happens to be Judith's kid brother and in part two he'll spend an awful lot of time running around with a gun acting all law enforcement type. He might have been with Homeland Security. Again, I forget. More importantly, I don't care. Both of these characters are very extraneous and how they factor into the second half of the miniseries is nothing short of appalling.

Speaking of extraneous and appalling, for all you X-Files fans out there, ever wondered what really became of Agent Krychek? Well, let me tell you. He became a born again Christian, changed his name to Monty, and got a job working as Penny Hill's right hand man. Neither of the Hall's ever really find themselves concerned about Monty despite the fact that he spends every waking scene behaving like a potentially deranged religious fanatic to the point that any rational person in real life regardless of their religious beliefs would be ready to speed dial the cops to take him to the loony bin just based on the constant aura of mentally unstable creepiness he perpetually exudes.

Following an incident at some black tie Washington function at a museum, I think, where South American Poison Arrow Frogs got loose and... I really can't even explain that scene. I don't know what ass they pulled this one out of but the screenwriter was definitely reaching around behind himself to come up with this ludicrous turn of events. Part of me even wonders if the screenwriter read my Foyeurism about NATURE UNLEASHED: TORNADO, swiped my idea for NATURE UNLEASHED: FROGFALL involving the sky raining South American Poison Arrow Frogs, and put his own spin on it. It just seems too coincidental. We're never given much explanation as to what this function is all about or where it's being held other than serving to get the Carr family together, introduce the evil energy corporation douchebag, and then have tiny poisonous frogs get loose and cause several high class patrons that came in contact with them have seizures.

Penny Hill uses this odd occurrence as part of her Book of Revelations pledge drive (I missed the Sunday school class on the Armageddon but one of the signs involves rampant reptiles) and then conspires with Monty who suggests that the masses still need more convincing that this the end is near and they have to get right with God now; she of course only sees dollar signs. The scheme involves Monty going to Capitol Hill and releasing a swarm of flies in the rotunda. As it seems, Congressional security can detect firearms, potential bombs, and letters laced with Anthrax but they completely miss the guy carrying the box with a bazillion flies in it. Penny goes on the air citing apocalyptic scripture relating to insect swarms as a sign of impending doom and Monty simmers believing that there's still more of the Lord's work to be done. Donny, meanwhile, is oblivious to all this as he's more interested in working on the sermon he plans to give in a baseball stadium in Buffalo, another site predicted to get walloped by an impending superstorm. Donny does indeed go on live television amid the calamity and God rewards him by tossing a lightning bolt his way allowing him to experience the miracle that is the Quickening. "There can be only one - true god!"

I know some would probably take offense to how this movie portrays these Christian characters but in a miniseries this monumentally retarded there really is no need in taking offense. Everyone is either a bad stereotype or lacking enough personality to even qualify as a character much less a caricature.

Heck, don't even ask me to try and explain the scientific mumbo jumbo tossed about in this one. My knowledge of meteorology is quite limited but I still know enough to know the theories CATEGORY 7 proposes are beyond ridiculous. If there actually was an electronic device called a "Bullshit Detector" the junk science used in CATEGORY 7 would be enough to cause it to burst into flames. Ross' theory about pieces of the Mesosphere collapsing and becoming extremely volatile when it hits rising plumes of heat generated by big city energy output. Yes, folks, the sky is literally falling. Except the whole heat plumes from energy hoarding cities doesn't jive with a lot of the stuff we're shown earlier involving monster tornadoes striking rural areas and trailer parks. Therefore, I'm not going to dwell any further on the film's science other than to say that science is this movie's bitch.

As Part 1 drew to a close, the miniseries fulfills its destiny of by becoming a low rent version of THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW as a gargantuan flood of water sweeps through the city. Tommy and Faith show up just in time to begin climbing up buildings to safety as the water engulfs everything. When we last see them, the Statue of Liberty's arm has been blown off and is heading right for them. That's actually the final scene of the first half but before that cliffhanger happens; our heroes have to deal with the dilemma of a Category 5 hurricane named Eduardo heading towards Washington D.C. where it's set to collide with the superstorm that struck Buffalo. Again, I don't understand the scientific principles involved one bit, least of all how Hurricane Eduardo fits into things. Oh wait; I do know how the hurricane fits in. It's there so Judith and Ross can talk by phone about the ramifications of one of the sky is falling superstorms combining with a catastrophic hurricane and Ross can utter part one's most memorable line of dialogue, "We're not talking Category 6.... We’re talking Category 7!" Dum... Dum... DUM!!!

I'm not going to lie to you; I enjoyed the hell out of the first half of CATEGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD. As I've already stated, this is as preposterous a disaster flick as you will ever seen. It's in a realm all its own and I found myself giggling throughout. If you can find yourself hating a disaster movie this delightfully daffy then you really should have your bad movie watching license revoked. It's a schlocktackular hoot. To my own amazement, I actually found myself chomping at the bit at the prospect of having to wait a whole damn week to see the second half. Seven friggin' days until I could learn how they were going to wrap this train wreck up.

My jovial mood would be short lived. Part two of CATEGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD is polar opposite in terms of entertainment value ranking amongst the biggest waste of two hours I've ever seen. It even becomes apparent that the budget was starting to run out as evidenced by the increasing use of actual tornado stock footage. How could it go so wrong?

Oh, I know how they screwed up. The bulk of part two deals not with how D.C. reacts and responds to the Category 7 storm but with the asinine shenanigans involving a group of terrorists that kidnapped the tweeners. Let me back up. Near the end of the first half, D.C. officials are told they will have to stay behind during the Category 7 storm but their families will be evacuated by bus. Judith's son and Ross' wife and daughter are on one of the buses that gets stopped and boarded by a gang of masked terrorists that proceed to abduct the beaurocrats' teenage offspring. They're then transported to an undisclosed location in D.C. where they are held hostage. The possibility of Muslim terrorists using America's current climatological crisis as an opening to perpetrate some sort of horrific act of terror is brought up subtlety several times during part one. But as it turns out, the terrorists that pulled off this improbable yet perfectly timed kidnapping are not Islamic terrorist; they're not even terrorists. Nope, they're just a group of gun-toting, ski-masked hooligans hired by that wacko Monty. All the teens taken are the first born children of Washington officials and the Book of Revelations speaks of the sacrificing of first borns. I'd dare say that nearly half of the second half's running time deals with this subplot, primarily Judith's son, Ross' daughter, and that snobby bully working together to thwart their numbskull abductors, who actually sit around wondering aloud when Monty is going to show up with the money he promised to pay them even as the entire city around them is being obliterated by a series of monolithic tornadoes, not that unlike the giant tornadoes from the Los Angeles scene in THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW.

Part two kicks off with Tommy and Faith in their SUV racing towards Washington D.C. No explanation is ever given as to how they escaped certain death at the hand of the Statue of Liberty's detached airborne hand other than a backhanded comment from Shannen Doherty about their "close call." Also not explained, how did their SUV survive the flood when it was clearly in the path of the flood waters? The two of them will end in D.C. during the height of the storm leading to the culmination of their storyline; Tommy convinced that he truly is immortal and that being at Ground Zero during this apocalyptic storm is his destiny forcing a teary-eyed Faith to have to talk some sense into him before he gets them both killed.

Among other storyline resolutions:

Tom Skerrit commits suicide to get data by flying into the heart of the Category 7 hellstorm (A sequence that bares a striking resemblance to the X-MEN 2 scene of Storm flying the X-Men's jet with the tornadoes in the sky) in order to get Ross the final bits of data he so desperately requires to prove his theory, but not before finding the time to drop off his co-pilot and going home to in effect say goodbye to his daughter and grandson.

Bridget is granted an interview with the widow Penny Hill and just happens to choose the very day that Washington D.C. is going to get eradicated and Monty, who Penny finally comes to realize has gone batshit insane after he confesses to having organized the kidnapping, goes completely insane, murders Penny because he deems her a temptation, and chases Bridget around the abandoned rectory with a gun. Bridget manages to call her boyfriend, who races their amid the destruction of D.C. Lindy Booth and Nicholas Lea are then forced to embarrass themselves with one of the worst dialogue exchanges about the Bible you will ever endure. It's not offensively bad in its treatment of scripture; it's just bad in the sense of bad writing leading to bad acting at its absolute worst. The boyfriend shows up just in the nick of time, Monty dies but not before revealing the secret location where the first born are being held captive, and Bridget is sent to a storm shelter for safety while Judith's brother races back out into the cataclysmic storm to save his nephew and the others.

As for the superstorms, it turns out there is no actual way to stop them but there is a way to make them less severe. The answer: cut off all the power in Washington D.C. so that there won't be any heat plume to rise and makes the storm more destructive. Logically speaking, wouldn't such a powerful storm knock out the power anyway? Logic, much like science, is also this movie's bitch.

Nonetheless, the evil energy corporation douchebag scoffs at this notion and refuses to comply. Don't worry; he will soon die for his sins. When the head of Homeland Security head with him and announces his intention to have the power cut off, the evil energy corporation douchebag presents him with a letter from the President forcing his resignation. Yeah, this guy is so powerful he actually walks around all the time with a letter in his pocket allowing him to fire any government official he deems a threat to the all powerful energy cabal. They might as well have tossed in a scene where kidnaps Gina Gershon and ties her to the railroad tracks while they were at it.

The final hour of CATEGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD doesn't even focus on the "End of the World" part. The giant tornadoes that have completely destroyed the White House and most of the nation's capital are in the background to the tweenagers' peril as they run around the water treatment plant they're being held at while being chased by the young hired goons that are now panicking because Monty hasn’t shown up and they saw one abductor's face. Judith's brother races to the water treatment plant to rescue the tweener. After Judith and Ross learn of the kidnapping, they too hop into an SUV and head for the water treatment plant. What sense does it make to show an overturned car being blown down the street by the sheer force of the wind when another vehicle is then shown driving right past it into the direction the wind is coming from with no difficulty whatsoever? Earlier Ross predicted that D.C. would end up looking like a nuclear bomb went off. One of his young assistants chimed in believing that Ross was understating the level of destruction. Seeing Judith and Ross driving through the streets of D.C. it looks less like a nuclear blast and more like they're in the midst of a Category 7 ticker tape parade.

These scenes are intercut with stuff involving Ross' wife showing up at D.C.'s main power substation trying to get them to shut off the power. Romance blooms between two of Ross' techno geeks amid a frenzied attempt to reconnect their DSL line. Seriously. And Senator Carr remains in his office to relay the crucial data about how reducing energy consumption can prevent future climatological holocausts to every world leader he has on speed dial. And Randy Quaid shares a passionate kiss with Shannen Doherty; a kiss with all the passion of two actors realizing that even they would never buy into the two of them ever falling in love.

Let me reiterate, the second half of the miniseries is absolutely brutal to sit through; as bad as bad gets. It is kind of ironic though. The second half of CATEGORY 6: DAY OF DESTRUCTION dealt with a character at a power substation trying to restore power to the city, major characters driving through the windblown paper-littered streets in order to rescue other characters trapped in a building, and reduced the titular storm to the background while all the pathetic attempts at melodrama played out.

In the end, the power is shut off, the superstorm subsides, families and loved ones are reunited, the Head of Homeland Security doesn't have to worry about being fired because he already exploded, and everyone emerges from the rubble of our nation's capitol awaiting Judith Carr who goes on TV to declare, "FEMA trailers for everyone!" Okay, I made that last part up. The miniseries doesn't really have a wrap-up, it just concludes. CATEGORY 7: THE END OF THE WORLD... The world did not end but the entertainment value sure did after the first half. What a pity.

But the important thing to remember is that like its predecessor, this miniseries proved to be a ratings bonanza. You know what that means? That's right; CATEGORY 8! I think we deserve another sequel. We deserve a CATEGORY 8. My plot suggestion: the remnants of the Category 7 storm begin to reform just in time for a massive solar flare to hit our atmosphere igniting it leading to cities being devastated by giant tornadic infernos. I've even got a series of title suggestions for any of the good people at CBS that might be reading this.

CATEGORY 8: IF YOU THOUGHT WE WERE SCREWED BEFORE
CATEGORY 8: THIS TIME IT'S EVEN WORSE
CATEGORY 8: KISS YOUR ASS GOODBYE
CATEGORY 8: THE ARMAGEDDONING
CATEGORY 8: HELL ON EARTH
CATEGORY 8: GOD HATES US
CATEGORY 8: AWWW, SHIT!