Cybermutt (2003)

The world isn’t in the greatest place right now. I could list the reasons that we’re not doing so well… But who needs that? You aren’t here to hear about the doom and gloom of Earth. You’re here for the movie commentary, sparked by whatever bad movies I’ve been checking out recently. I’m here to provide you with that little bit of movie commentary that might take your mind off the world for a few minutes.

When I schedule movies for Sunday “Bad” Movies, there are a few things I think about. I consider what movies are supposed to be released around a certain time, and tie in movies that share something with them. Maybe I’ll go with an Asylum knock-off that’s similar to a big budget sequel. Stuff like that. I’ll toss in some sequels to things I’ve covered for previous weeks. Things like Evil Bong 666 fall into that category. I’ll make sure to fit some suggestions into the mix. Some of those will be coming up soon. Then there are the movies I’ve been meaning to check out, the suggestions, and the movies I find to fill in the final few spots.

Cybermutt fit into that “movies I’ve been meaning to check out” part of scheduling. I don’t remember how I found out about the movie, but it was something that I wanted to be a part of Sunday “Bad” Movies since the moment I found out it existed. It was called Cybermutt, after all. If that title doesn’t seem like the kind of movie that would fit right into this blog, then I don’t know what you think this blog is. It’s a perfect title. It should also be noted that the original scheduling was that I would have seen it last week, which would have been perfect timing, too. Cybermutt would have been covered the week that Dog came out. Evil Bong 666 would have been covered the week Studio 666 came out. At least, here in Canada. Alas, I had to flip them, so here we are.

If you don’t know what Cybermutt is, let me tell you a little bit about it. Nino (Ryan Cooley) and his mom, Juliet (Michelle Nolden), were playing with their dog Rex at the park. They stumbled upon a scientist, Alex (Judd Nelson), who was testing out some new hardware. Rex saved Alex from being hit by a car, suffering life-threatening injuries in the process. Alex did the one thing he knew to save the dog. He placed bionic equipment and a special microchip in Rex to bring him back to life. The problem now was the evil team trying to steal the chip and take out Rex in the process.

Cybermutt was an Animal Planet original movie, released on the channel in either 2002 or 2003. That’s right. The Animal Planet channel made original movies. There were three films they released around that time, considered part of the “Animal Tales” movies. I’m not sure what the other two movies were. All I know is that Cybermutt was one of them. And, boy, was it everything I didn’t expect from an Animal Planet movie.

Starting with the most obvious, Cybermutt was about a cybernetically enhanced golden retriever. That was not something that I thought Animal Planet would do in a movie. I know most of their channel as an “animals being animals” sort of thing. Reality television about animals. Documentaries about animals. Specifically, animals just being themselves in their environments. Those environments could be their homes, the wild, or a football field for the annual Puppy Bowl. Cybermutt wasn’t an animal being itself in its environment. It was a cybernetically enhanced golden retriever being chased by some evil Germans and their trigger-happy henchman.

Oh yeah, that henchman. Cybermutt was a movie for children. It had to be kid-friendly. Yet there was a trigger-happy henchman all over the place. When he first showed up, yeah, he was running around with a tranquilizer, trying to take Rex down in a humane way. Things wouldn’t remain that humane for long. After tricking Nico and his mom into handing Rex over for further testing of the cybernetics, Rex escaped. The henchman pursued him with a real gun. It was no longer loaded with tranquilizers. He started shooting bullets at Rex. He was shooting to kill. It’s this kind of violence that people who criticize ratings boards point out. Why allow someone to try and shoot a dog in a kid’s movie, but not allow swearing? Your guess is as good as mine.

Since I brought up the henchman and quickly mentioned his German superiors, it seems to be about time I brought up the Air Bud story structure that Cybermutt followed. Each Air Bud movie had a similar plot. Buddy would be good at a sport. He would start playing that sport. Someone would see how good he was at that sport and try to take him from the family he lived with. The big game would come up. Buddy would escape from wherever he was being held. He would get to the big game and help the team win. The person or people who took buddy would then be taken into police custody. Each movie in the Air Bud franchise followed this structure, as do many other children’s movies with dogs.

Cybermutt followed that same structure. Rex was a special dog. Instead of that specialty being athletic skill, it was cybernetic inserts. One of those inserts was a special microchip. There were two German people and their henchman who wanted to get that microchip, so they chased Rex around through the entire movie. The bad guys lost in the end, and everyone went on with their lives, as happy as they ever were. It was essentially the same story as an Air Bud movie, without the sports. It even had the “kid who lost his father and wasn’t over it” storyline, which was a big part of the first two Air Bud movies.

For a year or two, I’d been meaning to watch Cybermutt. I don’t remember how I discovered it, but every time I went to the video store (there’s still one around here), I would look for a copy. I never found it. Eventually, I just looked it up on Amazon and bought it. I know, I’m a bad person for using a big corporation like Amazon. Sometimes that’s the only way to get something. Now I have the copy. Now I’ve seen the movie. And… It was okay. It’s nothing special. It’s kind of a weird movie to be made by Animal Planet. But it’s fine.

Sometimes that’s all you need, though. Things are wild in the world right now. Taking some time to zone out while watching an okay movie can be all you need to get your mind out of the anxiety waiting around every corner. Perhaps my post about Cybermutt had the same effect. Maybe it took your mind off things for just a moment. It gave you a little bit of relief. I’m glad to help.

Now for some notes to finish this thing off:

• Evil Bong 666 (week 482) was mentioned in this post.
• Cybermutt marked the fourth Sunday “Bad” Movies appearance of Judd Nelson. He was also in Santa, Jr. (week 107), Steel (week 127), and Never on Tuesday (week 387).
• Have you seen Cybermutt? What did you think? Did you think Animal Planet made movies like this? How are you feeling? Get a hold of me in the comments or on Twitter if you want to share your thoughts.
• Twitter and the comments are two ways you can suggest movies for me to watch for future weeks of Sunday “Bad” Movies. Let me know what movies I should be checking out.
• Sunday “Bad” Movies is on Instagram, sharing more bad movie fun all week long.
• Normally, there would be a “now” here, looking forward to next week. This post is going up late. Surf Nazis Must Die (week 484) was scheduled for the week after, so be sure to check that post out. See you soon for another post.