Slither - 4K Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Slither: Steelbook Edition



Movie:
4K Video:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:


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Movie
To the average moviegoer, James Gunn is the guy behind Guardians of the Galaxy, and the writer of Dawn of the Dead remake. However, before he was a big Hollywood director, Gunn had his start in low-budget horror. However, it was not just low-budget horror, but the most schlocky and cheese-ridden subgenre of horror. It was Troma Films itself! Gunn has never been ashamed of his low-rent roots, but has instead stated that it is a fond memory and a blast of goofy fun in his life, even though he’s reached for the mainstream stars with his introduction to Marvel. Back before he directed the space epic, he tried his hand at directing a feature film with 2006’s Slither. A horror comedy that hearkens back to the age of David Cronenberg's body horror and a good dose of Night of the Creeps as well.

The town of Wheelsy is your average podunk town in America. Church on Sunday, deer hunting whenever you can, and the ability to gossip about anything and everything. But the sleepy little redneck town has just been invaded by evil. A monster falling from the skies has latched onto the town's rich guy, Grant Grant (Michael Rooker, and yes, his first and last name is the same; that’s not a misspelling). Blending with Grant, this alien being seeks to do the thing that all malevolent alien species want to do, and that is to take over the world with its disgusting slug-like spawns. Little by little the sleepy little town of Wheelsy is infected and taken over by the hive mind of this malevolent being, and now it’s up to Chief of Police, Bill Pardy (Nathan Fillion), Grant’s wife Starla (Elizabeth Banks) and a young girl named Kylie (Tania Saulnier) to save the town by wiping Grant/Alien and his disgusting rampage of terrorizing spawn off the face of the earth.

The plot for Slither is exceedingly simple. It’s your classic body horror film with a dash of good old Troma cheese thrown in for good measure. Grant and his spawn are looking at taking over the world, and our heroes are going to have to blow up, stab, crush, and mangle their way to the head alien and stop it at its source. Sound familiar? Yup, it’s because that’s your typical body-horror-type plot. Gunn revels in the disgusting and the macabre, showing all sorts of ooey gooey guts and slimy tentacles galore. There’s a distinctly low-brow sense of humor to the film as well, winking and nodding at the camera while aliens ingest human bodies, and Nathan Fillion lending his typical boyish charm to the role (a pre Castle Fillion who was only a few years off of Firefly). Much of the humor actually keeps the film from being a little bit TOO grisly and disturbing, as without it Slither would really kind of gross even ME out (and this coming from a near immune to gore horror hound).

The inclusion of humor acts as a sort of bridge for the characters, allowing you to care about them and their plight, including a budding romance between Bill and Starla, as well as keeping the ball rolling so that it doesn’t fall into your typical schlocky horror category. The gore and slimy nastiness are kept at level 10 the whole movie, but it’s never so obscene and disgusting that you feel it detracts from the adventure at hand. Gunn keeps the wit and the effects moving at a snappy pace, so that the simplistic plot never feels like a drag, and the inclusion of a top-notch cast really rounds out the trifecta.

Talking about the cast, Gunn has gotten a great group of actors who really know what it’s like to have fun in a B movie. Nathan Fillion is always a treat to watch, and his charm pretty much carries a good majority of the movie. Elizabeth Banks is very obviously the “easy on the eyes” damsel in distress, and this was just before she broke out and became a decently famous star as well. Rounding out the cast is Jenna Fischer (best known as Pam on The Office) as well as Gunn's favorite, Michael Rooker, and Gregg Henry hamming it up as the jerk everyone loves to hate. It’s simple, it’s nasty, and it’s pure fun, and the cast is having a ball with B-movie cheese.




Rating:

Rated R for strong horror violence and gore, and language




4K Video: Video:

The 2017 Blu-ray was a solid-looking disc, but it still suffered from using that 2006 master that the DVD, HD-DVD, and Canadian Blu-ray utilized. This time Shout! Has gone back to the OCN and pulled a new 4K remaster for both the 2160p 4K UHD disc, as well as the included Blu-ray for good measure. Slither has never been eye candy by any stretch of the imagination, but it does outclass the old Blu-ray by a moderate amount. Fine details are a tad better, with the CGI and practical nature of the monsters showing themselves all the more obviously. Colors are also a bit punchier with the Dolby Vision application, and while it definitely has a warm and parchment/sepia tinged look to everything, certain primary colors pop off the screen quite a bit. The nasty yellow/green of the acid spit, the bright red of the CGI of the worms, or the luscious greens of the countryside all just sparkle. Black levels are quite impressive, getting rid of the banding and crush present on the 2017 disc. However, this is still a grainy affair, with that low-budget grunginess and brown look that early 2000s films had. Overall, a nice little upgrade and a welcome addition to the 4K world.






Audio:

Every new release gets a better audio mix, as the old HD-DVD back in the day was only lossy Dolby Digital, and then Shout!’s 2017 Blu-ray release got us a 5.1 and 2.0 DTS-HD MA track (both of which are included in this disc). But to take it up a notch further, Shout! Has gone so far as to give us a brand new Atmos mix as well. The mix is still very similar to the 5.1 (which I had to A/B to compare), and isn’t going to make this a whole new experience for the listener. Instead, it is simply a fine-tuning of the 5.1 mix, adding in a few rear bits for the chaos with the worms, and some overhead usage with the score and said worms (such as them crawling on the ceiling in the farmhouse, or coming out of the vents in the police department). LFE is solid, though never overly impressive, and the dialog is spot on perfect. I have this a 4/5 for the 2017 Blu-ray, and this time it’s a 4.5/5. Nothing major, but just enough of a boost to make it just that much better.

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Extras:

Disc 1: 4K UHD

• NEW 4K Scan From The 35mm Interpositive Approved By Writer/Director James Gunn And Director Of Photography Gregory Middleton
• Presented In Dolby Vision And Dolby Atmos
• Audio Commentary With Writer/Director James Gunn And Actors Nathan Fillion And Michael Rooker
• Audio Commentary With Writer/Director James Gunn And Actor Nathan Fillion

Disc 2: Blu-ray

• NEW 4K Scan From The 35mm Interpositive Approved By Writer/Director James Gunn And Director Of Photography Gregory Middleton
• Audio Commentary With Writer/Director James Gunn And Actors Nathan Fillion And Michael Rooker
• Audio Commentary With Writer/Director James Gunn And Actor Nathan Fillion
• NEW “We've Got Worms” - Interview With Director of Photography Gregory Middleton
• NEW "Feed The Fear" - Interview With Editor John Axelrad
• NEW "Just A Bee Sting" - Interview With Special Make-up Effects Designer Todd Masters
• NEW "What's Gotten Into You" - Interview With Composer Tyler Bates
• “The Genesis Of Slither” - Interview With Writer/Director James Gunn
• “The Other MacReady” - Interview With Actor Gregg Henry
• Deleted And Extended Scenes With Optional Commentary With James Gunn
• Visual Effects Progressions
• Slithery Set Tour With Actor Nathan Fillion
• The Sick Minds And Slimy Days Of Slither Featurette
• “Brewing The Blood” Featurette
• Bringing Slither's Creatures To Life Featurette
• Lloyd Kaufman's Video Diary
• Gag Reel
• “Who Is Bill Pardy?” Featurette
• Theatrical Trailer

Final Score: ​

Slither is pure cinematic B-movie cheese, and it’s probably one of the best horror/comedies that you’ve never seen. The special effects are solid, the casting is top-notch, and James Gunn’s trademark humor infuses a cheeky sort of fun that is infectious. Much like The Evil Dead 2, I like to dub it one of my favorite “splatstick films of all time. And every time I watch the film, I pick up a little bit extra (I never realized that there was an end credits scene, and I've watched this flick at least a dozen times). The Blu-ray was good, but the 4K takes it a notch better, having gotten rid of that aging 2006 master and given a new 4K remaster from the 35mm OCN. It's never going to look slick and glossy, but this is a nice upgrade over the 1080p disc that Shout! released back in 2017, too. Plus, we get a bunch of new extras, pushing it into 5/5 territory for that particular aspect. And yeah, if you still love this creature feature as much as I do, then this is another must-buy.




Technical Specifications:

Starring: Nathan Fillion, Elizabeth Banks, Michael Rooker
Directed by: James Gunn
Written by: James Gunn
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 HEVC
Audio: English: Dolby Atmos (Dolby TrueHD 7.1 Core), English DTS-HD MA 5.1, English DTS-HD MA 2.0
Studio: Shout! Studios
Rated: NR
Runtime: 96 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: June 23rd, 2026

Recommendation: Definite Buy