Creature Feature Sunday was on again this weekend. I settled down with a beer and a big bowl of popcorn for this interpretation of the classic man vs jungle vs giant genetically-modified wasp story. We’ve all been there.

It’s actually the sort of thing I was looking for when I watched Monsters (2010). On the surface, Monsters seemed to have a similarly promising ‘jungle/monsters/run for your lives’ kind of vibe, but it ended up being quite an understated, smart movie. (Monsters, if you were wondering, does have legit monsters, but they take a side seat to the main characters’ metaphorical internal monsters. At the time this struck me as disappointing, but on reflection, it was kind of cleverly done even if it didn’t deliver the exploding head quota I was looking for).

Dragon Wasps, happily, is neither understated nor smart. Hot entomologist and friend team up with the US Army to find her missing father in the jungle. Hijinks obviously ensue, including gunfire-riddled encounters with voodoo drug dealer Jaguar and his guerrilla buddies and – of course – a swarm of fire spitting, armoured, terrible CGI dragon wasps.

Corin Nemec (of Parker Lewis Can’t Lose and Stargate SG1 fame) heads the up Army unit and, bless his cotton socks, he’s really on board and doing his best with his latest run of creature features (Sand Sharks, Jurassic Attack, Robocroc and more), thus solidifying his potential as my future husband substantially.

But back to the dragon wasps. I’m no entomologist, so thank goodness the scientists were there to inform me, after an extensive examination, that dragon wasps are “basically giant wasps” (direct quote; not even joking). Their obvious smarts don’t save them from mistaking bricks of cocaine for bricks of C4 plastic explosive though. Gosh darn, you guys. How was she supposed to know? It’s fine though, because cocaine is dragon wasp repellent so… The moral of the story seems to be a) screwing with nature is bad b) cocaine saves the day. No, wait. That can’t be right, surely? And yet.

Basically giant wasps, you say? What tipped you off?

With a good amount of blood spatter, fire, and more than one exploding head, Dragon Wasps rates 2.5 out of 5 worker bees.

‘Til next time,