#robert radler

After taking over the franchise, Robert Radler made the bold decision to inject good politics into these movies, making villains out of toxic masculinity on the third movie and white supremacy in this one. That’s right, folks, the Substitute has gone woke. 

The Substitute always likes to talk about Vietnam to his students, no matter how little it might relate to the course he’s teaching. This time he teaches a military history class where it might actually be relevant, and doesn’t mention Vietnam once. This series is full of surprises. He also beats up a student again, although I guess it’s easier to excuse in a military academy than in a regular school, unless the lesson is explicitly about what to do when some homeboy disses your flygirl. 

Anyway, this has better villains than the last one, and I appreciated the movie’s attempt to paint how white supremacy can take hold when people don’t call it out. Not gonna pretend it does this with much nuance, but it’s more than I expected with this series. 

In the last movie, Treat Williams gave a lesson about the Cold War and Vietnam while playing with a yo-yo. In this one he gives a lesson about Vietnam and another about steroids. He’s supposed to be teaching English. Not sure this guy actually has a degree in comparative literature. Also, while he hardly seemed credible as a special forces dude in the last one, he does a whole bunch of special forces stuff at the beginning of this one. So you better believe he was in the special forces, even if you doubt his academic credentials. 

I liked when this started out with Treat taking on toxic masculinity, but found it less interesting when the villains turned out to be the mob. But any progressive points are thrown out once Claudia Christian goes undercover with fake boobs and takes part in a wet t-shirt contest. Also, the scene where she chokes out a guy might do a looooooot for some of you. 

Hey, you don't eat that raw fish shit do you?