Howard the Duck Reviews

Many of my childhood favourites have held up wonderfully, films like Disney's Beauty and the Beast and The Wizard of Oz. Howard the Duck is not one of them, in fact along with 1996's Kazaam it is one of those films that I cannot believe now that I loved as a child. It's not even so bad it's good, for me it is just excrement, and a fine example of a film that aimed to "quack me up falls fowl". It does start off alright, but the last forty five minutes especially is so weird, creepy and dull it spoils the whole movie on its own. The production values are not that good, the special effects in particular look as though they were made on the cheap. The whole film is poorly scripted with jokes that made me groan rather than laugh, the story is bizarre in a distasteful way and the acting is poor. Howard is annoying, Lea Thompson plays it straight to the point you want to give her a steroid shot and Tim Robbins mugs embarrassingly. All in all, a real mess. 1/10 Bethany Cox

Once upon a time, Marvel’s entertainment industry was in a downward spiral, releasing bomb after bomb on television and on the big screen. Nowhere has there been a better example of this than Howard the Duck. Released under the mindset of George Lucas, this fish-out-of-water story follows the adventures of Howard, a duck-like alien, who gets transported to Earth and lands on the streets of Cleveland. There, he befriends a beautiful rock musician Beverly (Lea Thompson), who potentially becomes his love interest, and the aspired scientist Phil (Tim Robbins), who hopes to study him. The outcast duck also makes a fair share of enemies, including a group of street alley thugs, Beverly’s sleazy band manager, Japanese diner chefs who want to cook him, and a race of alien overlords, one of them possesses Dr. Jenning (Jeffrey Jones). While I will forgive the subpar ILM special effects, the creepy duck suit and the abundance of duck puns, the main problem with the movie is the inconsistent tone. The movie is too ridiculous and silly for adults and it’s too extreme and mean-spirited for children. There are far too many adult themes including Lucasfilm inside jokes, violent threats, use of profanity, alcoholism, bestiality, sexual themes and even a female duck with exposed humanlike breasts. By reading this, you guys don’t need me to tell you that Howard the Duck is the reason why a bad idea should stay a bad idea. In fact, shut your computers off and watch Guardians of the Galaxy instead.

(1 ½ Duck Titties out of 5) (It was either that or “Quiche Lorraine,” but “Duck Titties” sounded funnier and bore repeating. Duck titties.)

I figured that it was finally time to check this out after several years of hearing how ridiculous and nonsensical it is. It has a few surprising cast members that I didn't know about and some I did. The pop culture references replaced with the ducks was cheesy, but I think for the time was actually kind of fun. The acting is over the top which with a movie about a humanoid duck it should be expected. The fight scenes were definitely of the 80s slapstick type. It had it's cute and funny moments though. I have to say Lea Thompson is the best thing about this. I'm sure if I was born in the 70s she would have definitely been one of my crushes. On an unrelated not she is still pretty attractive. The villain kind of reminded me of the look and feel of the villain from Men in Black. Anyways it isn't the worst thing I've ever seen, but it isn't a particularly good film. It's an oddball for sure. If you are a connoisseur of bad 80s movies this is right up that alley. I think if they remake it with the CGI available and a better storyline that would be much better.

Obviously, I wasn’t expecting much from this flick but I still wanted to check out if it was really so bad. Eventually, it definitely deserved its poor reputation. The main issue is that the whole concept was just seriously misguided. I mean, to make a live-action feature about some anthropomorphic duck was probably one of the worst ideas I have ever heard. Some people might argue that it could be cool nowadays with some modern CGI special-effects but I highly doubt it. Seriously, what was George Lucas thinking with this piece of sh*t ?!? I'm pretty sure he needed some dough and thought he found his new cash cow. No way, this is maybe the worst comic-book adaptation ever... In fact, this movie was the first attemp of a theatrical release of a Marvel character since 1944 with ‘Captain America’. Basically, it pretty much killed this market and it took Marvel several decades to properly launch their characters pretty much ruling the box-office in the process. Anyway, coming back to our main feature, the story was rather moronic, the main character was completely obnoxious and, indeed, the special effects did look cheap, something you wouldn't expect from a movie produced by George Lucas. To conclude, just avoid it.

by Dane Youssef


Wow... what can possibly be said about this movie that hasn't already be said a thousand times? It almost seems redundant and tiresome to keep shooting such an already over-satirized target... though this movie took moments off my life I will never have back. I watched it simply to see what all the fuss was about.

I understand now...

Ughhhhhh....

They actually put this movie on DVD? Wow... well...

Easy target as it may be, I must now express my contempt and hatred. After the severe deforming scar it left on my psyche, it's the very least of my

I actually lost seconds of my life as well, dear children. I actually feel like I'm suffering from motion sickness just THINKING about this movie...

Special FX Master George Lucas disowned this film. I know "Willow" wasn't great... and neither was "Radioland Murders" Or "Star Wars: Episode II"...

But here is a movie... that brings us all together... unifying us... in anger, disgust and hate... and annoyance...

Too stupid and lame to be fun and thought-provoking... takes itself too seriously to be campy fun (even by the standards of schlock '50's sci-fi/action movies--now some of THOSE are fun!) But with none of the charm, innocence, sweetness, much grosser, much raunchier... and special FX that even for their time, look cheesy and crummy. They borderline on rolling static.

Too poorly filmed and horribly shot and embarrassingly acted to a fun family movie, too awkward and straight-faced to even be unintentionally funny...

....and the bestiality thing with Thompson and the duck...

well, there's just NO genre for that, now is there?

This was not a good day for film. It's like a full-length version of "ALF...."

No, wait... I LIKED "Alf." I will not smear his legacy by associating it with this interplanetary bird-flu.

The fact that Howard knows a type of martial arts ("Quack Fu," as he calls it) is hurtfully unfunny.

And this came from Lucas, who's special FX company ILM is the finest on the planet? The effects are phony and ugly and hideous and horribly unconvincing... and that's the last thing we'd ever expect from George Lucas. The special effects look like they're from the '50's, like the very same surving production values from "Plan 9 From Outer Space." Including the acting and screenplay. It's like if Jar Jar Binks got his own starring movie... actually, that might have been better.

It's "all too easy" (to quote the great Darth Vader) to point out what a hideously mismade, tacky as can be blunder. One can go on and on about what a monumental waste of film, time, money and other precious human resources. Hell, look at all the time and effort Lucas' other company, Industrial Light & Magic put into this one. Why didn't they just set it all on fire and dump it all into a cesspool? Would've saved time and cut-out the middle-man.

This little piffle was written by Gloria Katz and Willard Huyck, who are no strangers to Lucasfilm projects, having written several Lucas' projects ("American Graffiti," "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" and "Radioland Murders"). They're obviously favorites and friends of Lucas and clearly they wanted to make a special-effects sci-fi extravaganza of their own. And you have to love Lucas for giving them the shot.

But it's a disaster. Willard Hyuck has proved to be necessary and crucial script doctor polishing Lucas' stuff so he seems like a superhuman Greek god of film. But every film he's ever directed is not just bad, it becomes renown for being such a low point in cinema history.

His "catastrophes" include "Best Defense," "Dead People" and this steaming pile. (OK, I'll concede "French Postcards." Hell, I guess even a broken clock is right twice a day).

Kids love taking animal characters, paticularly muppets and the like. Their favorite are the traditional wise-cracking, pratfalling types. Well, I'm sorry to say that Howard lacks humor or charm really of any kind. Honestly, he lacks any kind of interest whatsoever.

Does anyone here remember the scene where Jeffrey Jones as the Dark Overlord in the biker bar... the final showdown where the demons may enter through the portal to our dimension... the scene where Howard brawls with the guy managing the group... all had me shaking my head in disbelief...

I know most of this goddammed review isn't exactly written in a deep, compelling way. But if the filmmakers didn't put any real interest (or much fun) into this one, how can anyone talking about it? Well, maybe at it's expense. That's the best thing you can do with a bad movie.

And for this one, the rolling credits over the musical montage concert at the end... didn't come soon enough.

Former accomplished ballerina-turned actress Lea Thompson has recovered from this abomination thankfully. Though I certainly have not.

It still haunts me...


by Dane Youssef


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I actually read the novel whilst waiting for this movie to go on general release. The story that came from the pages was entertaining, clever and in places I actually laughed out loud at the humour contained within the lines. I was so eager to get to the cinema!

Sadly the movie ‘Howard the duck’ was a travesty. Anyone who also has endured this movie will know just how disappointed I felt, although I also had the indignity of having to pay to see this rubbish!

Howard the duck is a wise-cracking creature from a parallel planet where ducks, not man, stood tallish and industrialised their world. Through a science experiment gone wrong on Earth, Howard is grabbed and pulled through space and lands on earth with a thud. Saving the young damsel in distress he then tries to romance the young singer and fit in to his new home. This could have been the whole story in itself (similar to Short Circuit), but the science experiment also pulls Dark Overlords to Earth and so it’s down to Howard and friends to save our planet. The real problem with this movie is the target audience, there just isn’t one. There are movie references and Howard isn’t shy about showing his appreciation for the human female form, with a lot of work it could have become a cult movie classic among adults. But sadly this movie also has an equal focus on entertaining the children, with comical baddies, an over simplistic plot and slapstick.

There are worse movies out there, but being the least offensive of a pile of excrement isn’t something to be proud of. Certainly one to avoid!