More Troma candidates, that is all.
What’s The Work?
We’ll never be done with Troma movies. Anyway Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D. is a 1990 superhero comedy directed by Lloyd Kaufman and Michael Herz. Basically the plot is that this guy called Sato has spent 25 years training this guy to become Kabukiman, because Kabukiman is the only one who can stop The Evil One, who will gain complete control over the universe if the dragon dances through the hoop of jupiter while the monkey rides a jaguar and a tiger feasts on the nubile. Everything goes wrong however when the Kabukiman to be is killed and so is Sato and his entire group of kabuki performers, Sato is forced to give the powers of Kabukiman to police officer Harry Griswold instead. Now Griswold has to stop The Evil One’s plan while being trained how to use his new powers by Sato’s granddaughter Lotus.
Who Are They? What Have They Done?
Reginald Stewart
| “ | Our revels now are ended. The time is almost upon us. Soon, there will be no stopping us. But in the meantime, we must be very, very careful. The first thing we must do is to move everything out of the church. Now I know this cop, Griswold, has been suspended. But I’ve dealt with his type many, many times before. He will never, never leave us alone. Griswold must be eliminated. Everyone associated with Griswold must be eliminated. Then and only then will everything be in order. Only then will we emerge triumphant. | „ |
Reginald Stewart is the main antagonist of the movie. Introduced talking about how he funded a kabuki performance, it’s revealed he only did this to kill off the actor’s on stage due to their association with kabukiman, with him also having Rembrandt kill the man who was supposed to be Kabukiman’s entire family, young children included. This also leads to the deranged Rembrandt shooting up the entire theatre. Later on his nephew Skipper would barge into his office while he’s in the middle of discussing a deal related to drugs being peddled out of youth centres and churches by Reverend Snipes to complain him taking the blame for the theatre massacre lead to him being put in prison for a few hours and getting raped. Stewart responds by shooting him in the head.
Stewart is able to spin the whole situation with the theatre massacre and claim his men were just there to protect everyone and that the real shooter was someone that wasn’t even in the building. He then sends a bunch of people to kill Officer LaRosa for looking into Reverend Snipes’s drug operation, with them also attempting to rape her, however, this goes wrong and they all get beaten up by Griswold while he’s acting as Kabukiman. Annoyed by their failure, Stewart sends Rembrandt to the hospital where she’s being kept to finish her off, with him editing her prescription to give her a lethal dose of morphine, which kills her.
After Griswold confronts Reverend Snipes in his church, Reginald tells all his employees that he and everyone associated with him must be eliminated, leading Rembrandt to make several attempts on his life. Then a bit later, it’s shown Stewart is setting things up so that the dragon will dance through the hoop of jupiter while the monkey rides a jaguar and a tiger will feast on the nubile, to make sure The Evil One rains supreme across the universe for eternity. After Rembrandt kidnaps Lotus and brings her to him, he attempts to have her fed to a tiger, all while creepily sexually harassing her.
Kabukiman shows up and saves her however, and so do the police who try to arrest Stewart and his men. But before they can, Stewart quickly replaces Lotus with one of his female workers and has her fed to the tiger. Stewart then reveals himself to be The Evil One and sprays acid on one of his men for no reason, killing him. He then begins fighting Kabukiman and while this is going on, Lotus’s monkey attempts to ride a jaguar (car) but before he can he’s pulled out, resulting in the ritual failing and The Evil One exploding. Though it's made clear he'll be back in another 1,000 years to try again, just like he did before.
Rembrandt
| “ | Kabukiman: What have you done with Lotus?! Rembrandt: By now, your nubile little friend is being seasoned for the tiger’s feast! |
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Rembrandt is the secondary antagonist of the movie. He’s an unhinged psychopath working for Stewart that’s introduced sadistically killing the man who was supposed to be Kabukiman’s entire family, including throwing his wife out the window leading to her falling on and killing an additional man. Tasked by Stewart to kill off several kabuki actors associated with Kabukiman while disguising the whole thing as a kabuki performance, he ends up going way too far and begins massacring the theatre’s audience, leading to Stewart scolding him for putting the whole plan at risk. Then, when Stewart kills his nephew for complaining, Rembrandt takes a sno ball he was eating and dips it into the bloody bullet wound on his head.
Later on in the movie, he’s tasked by Reginald Stewart to finish off Officer LaRosa so she can’t expose Reverend Snipes’s drug operation and thus also expose Stewart. So he breaks into the hospital where she’s being kept posing as a doctor, prescribes her a lethal dose of morphine and then she dies. He’s then seen backstage at one of Reverend Snipes’s sermons, and when Griswold accidentally turns himself into a clown instead of Kabukiman, he and the other men begin chasing him down, with him stealing a car with an old woman still inside. At one point Griswold is mistaken for a birthday clown, leading Rembrandt to try and gun him down while he’s surrounded by kids. Griswold then gets stuck on his car for a while only getting off after Rembrandt crashes because he sprayed silly string on his windshield. After he crashes he attacks one of the other men and starts blaming him for his crash.
Following Stewart’s orders to kill Kabukiman and anyone associated with him, Rembrandt attempts to run him over while driving a van full of Stewart’s stuff; he survives however in the most cartoony way possible. Kabukiman and Lotus then follow him and they get into a battle where Kabukiman and Lotus only escape alive due to Kabukiman’s ability to fly. Later on, Rembrandt appears in Kabukiman’s home and reveals he’s kidnapped Lotus to be eaten by the tiger as part of the ritual to ensure The Evil One reigns supreme, he then attempts to bite Kabukiman’s nose off. Rembrandt keeps taunting him about the fate of his girlfriend, causing him to turn back into Griswold, Griswold then pretends he’s going to arrest him, only to shoot him in the head instead, killing him.
Mitigating Factors
Of course not. Stewart getting mad at Rembrandt for killing a theatre of people is purely because he’s mad he now has to cover it up, and Rembrandt literally has nothing.
Heinous Standard
Yeah they both pass. If everything else Stewart does wasn’t already enough, attempting to take over the universe and fill it with evil for eternity is definitely enough. Rembrandt on the other hand isn’t as impressive but he still definitely does enough. He goes beyond just following Stewart’s orders and kickstarts a massacre in a theatre and endangers a dozen children solely on his own. Plus, it’s clear Stewart wouldn’t have gotten as far along in his plan as he did if it wasn’t for Rembrandt, as he’s the one he always has to send out to do his work for him, including massacring an entire family, killing Officer LaRosa and kidnapping Lotus in order to fulfil the final part of the prophecy. Combine this with just how sadistic and cruel he is and he definitely does enough.
Are They Silly Enough?
Yeah definitely. Stewart and Rembrandt are both very much intentionally over the top villains, with Stewart being a parody of charismatic billionaires that are not so secretly evil and Rembrandt being a parody of insanely sadistic psycho for hires. Both get a lot of comedic moments like the whole ritual in general just being really over the top and complex with Stewart at one point pausing to show where the star shapes are with red arrows, the entire birthday party sequence and Rembrandt dipping a sno ball he was eating in blood, to name just a few examples. I know I say this basically every time, but it’s a Troma movie, what do you expect?
Verdict
Easy yes to both.