Horror Movie Review: Gingerdead Man 2: Passion of the Crust (2008)

It’s been four years since we watched and reviewed The Gingerdead Man, a Full Moon horror that was very silly but entertaining. Worth watching for Gary Busey’s performance as the title character. You can read our full review here.

The original movie was released in 2005 and this sequel came three years later. From the title you can easily tell that the same tongue in cheek silliness that dominated the first is present here. Even if Full Moon are pushing it under a new title (Gingerdead Man 2: Bakery of Blood).

However, whereas the original offset the silliness by being violent and gory, this one drops most of that. In its place we have even more idiocy. Less Gingerdead Man, no Gary Busey and not very subtle jabs at critics. That last one is a major plot point of the movie. While it’s initially a little amusing, the more it goes on, the more it makes Full Moon and those involved look embarrassingly salty.

K-von Moezzi stars as Kelvin, a film producer trying to keep his father’s studio from bankruptcy. Under his father’s watch, the studio created a large amount of classic cult horrors but Kelvin isn’t living up to the legacy set. Long running franchises such as Tiny Terrors, a puppet related series of movies. Sound familiar? This is as subtle as the movie gets.

Current shooting is falling apart as the cast and crew begin to rebel against the many problems assailing the studio. To make matters worse the critics are turning audiences and services against them with one particular blogger named ‘Demon Warrior 13’ urging boycotts of future films.

Things look bleak, especially when a mass brawl breaks out on set. Hoping to calm things down Polly (Michelle Bauer) brings along a box of baked goods. Which so happens to include the Gingerdead Man, now voiced by John Vulich.

He scrambles away and by an amazing coincidence finds a real spell book in the prop room. In this book he discovers a spell that can transfer his soul out of the baked form into a human body. All he needs is five victim’s blood and then one final sacrifice of a virgin.

Take a guess who is the virgin based on the synopsis written above?

The blogger of course! Seriously…I’ve never seen a company be this bitter towards critics, it’s kind of hilarious!

What isn’t so funny though is how lacking Gingerdead Man 2 is. An unfunny plot, below average acting and a disappointing level of blood and gore, this is not a worthy sequel to the silliness of the original.

For reasons I don’t understand, the Gingerdead Man takes a backseat to the story of the failing studio and an eventual showdown with its biggest critic. The finale is almost completely built around this with the mouthy title character taking a backseat until its done. How on earth can you make Gingerdead Man 2: Passion of the Crust a boring film? That seems like it would take more effort than it was worth.

…but hey, they had to get their critic jabs in, didn’t they?

Passion of the Crust is just a let-down. While the original wasn’t a classic, it has cult status for a reason. The best that can be said about this, is it’s competently filmed, is paced fairly well and the acting isn’t terrible. While Gary Busey is missed, John Vulich does a decent job even if his laugh does sound a bit too ‘Chucky’ for my liking.