Larry Blamire's sequel picks up two years (and change) after Cadavra ended, when government agent Reet Pappin (Frank Dietz) is tasked to find Jerranium 90, an ultra-rare new mineral that exists only in the Amazon. He seeks out the assistance of Dr. Paul Armstrong (Blamire), but finds that Betty Armstrong (Fay Masterson) hasn't seen him since he went to the jungle two years ago. Together they set off to find Armstrong, who is hiding out in some fictional South American country feeling bitter. Eventually they talk him into helping them find Jerranium 90 with the assistance of Jungle Brad (Dan Conroy) and Peter Fleming (Brian Howe), both twin brothers of characters killed in The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra. (Jungle Brad is different from Ranger Brad in that they "have different last names")Unbeknownst to our heroes, Fleming is under the control of the Lost Skeleton (voiced by Blamire) who is reduced to an irritable skull. While the Skeleton is capable of flying around and murdering people, most of the time he simply complains about the stupidity of the person carrying him. If the Skeleton can find the Dalp of Annacrab - which happens to be made of Jerranium 90 - his body will return to him and he can rule the world.
Additionally, a rival team is searching for the Jerranium 90, led by Dr. Ellamy Royne (Trish Geiger), followed by crook Handscombe Draile (Robert Deveau), ne'er-do-well Gondreau Slykes (Daniel Roebuck), and aliens Kro-bar (Andrew Parks) and Lattis (Susan McConnell), who want to warn Paul and Betty of the danger they're in. Both groups set forth into the Valley of Monsters to find Jerranium 90 and brave the horrors that lay ahead.
While The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra was a send-up of cheap-o science fiction films of the 1950s, The Lost Skeleton Returns Again is more along the lines of Sam Katzman (The Giant Claw, Zombies of Mora Tau) productions: attempting to look less cheap than they are. The Lost Skeleton Returns Again is presented in SkeletoRama and abruptly shifts from Black and White to a garish Technicolor about halfway through. Even so, when the film cuts to stock footage, that's usually still in Black and White.
Like the first film - and Dark and Stormy Night - The Lost Skeleton Returns Again works best at the beginning and ending, with the mid-section dragging as they trek through the jungle. The first twenty minutes, which re-establish the main characters, works best: many of the biggest laughs come from the writing early on, which hits the stilted seriousness of military protocol and scientific mumbo-jumbo, followed by a whopper of Paul Armstrong's jungle-induced bitterness, summed up best in this Apocalypse Now-influenced monologue:
The jungle is every place for bitterness. It sows and reaps it like so much cane sugar. The jungle gets into your blood and builds tiny little houses of pain and you don't wanna be there when the rent's due because the anaconda, funny thing, they don't know how to read a lease. Seems they've never learned! But the only thing longer than a croc's mouth is the time it takes to swallow you whole. So next time you talk to me about jungles and bitterness, next time you're trying to find your eyes with both hands, just keep that in mind... that is if you still have a mind.
It isn't that the film immediately drags when things go to color, but a lot of the things I enjoyed the least about the film happen after they cross into the Valley of Monsters. Oh sure, there are giant trilobites, the Gralmanopidon, and the return of Animala (Jennifer Blaire), but the humor grinds to a halt for long periods of time, leaving us relying on Chinfa, Queen of the Cantaloupe People (Alison Martin), a character I found grating at nearly every turn. By the time the two parties come together and four or five characters are killed off, it's a relief to see Animala steal the Darp of Annacrab and unleash the Magraclop (another cheap rubber monster). The Skeleton is good for some chuckles, but most of the cast falls by the wayside as Chinfa agrees to share her Jerranium 90 with Dr. Royne in exchange for learning the secret of the "double negative."
This counts as a SPOILER, so just skip this paragraph if you want to be untainted: the separation of Fleming and the Skeleton also hurts the Valley of Monsters part, as Fleming dies not too long afterward (saving Lattis from a giant Venus Fly Trap) and Lattis and Kro-bar decide to sing his name in praise, which elicited no laughs from the Cap'n whatsoever, nor did it during the final scene when the joke reprises.
Just like The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra and Dark and Stormy Night, I would recommend this to anyone who wants a knowing, if gentle, ribbing at cheap genre movies from cinema's middle years. While the mid-section again is a bit sluggish, there's enough to keep you going until the end, and the beginning had Professor Murder uncontrollably laughing, as I suspect you will too. The stream of non sequiturs coming from Betty, Fleming, The Skeleton, and General Scottmanson (H.W. Wynant) will coast you easily into The Lost Skeleton Returns Again.
SUPER SPOILER ALERT: The Lost Skeleton will not return again (again): Alas, it seems this will be the last film featuring the Lost Skeleton of Cadavra, as the Magraclop pretty definitively destroys his skull at the end. What a shame...
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