Return of the Virus from Hell (2021)

Retrofit Drive In Vaccination Special

Jul 24, 2021

“Farewells can be shattering, but returns are surely worse. Solid flesh can never live up to the bright shadow cast by its absence. Time and distance blur the edges; then suddenly the beloved has arrived and it’s noon with its merciless light, and every spot and pore and wrinkle and bristle stands clear.” --The Blind Assassin (2000), Margaret Atwood

Returns, usually referred to as sequels, can be great fun. In movies, sequels of the 40s and 50s had titles like The Invisible Man Returns (1940) and Return of the Fly (1959). You knew right off the bat this story was going to start where the last one left off. Just when you thought it was over, it comes back.

In the 1970s, the movie title business changed a bit when the second Godfather movie was called Godfather II (1974). Fans knew immediately that Don Corleone was deceased, but we were about to see how the family business gets handled by his charming son Michael. Then there is the warning from Jaws 2 (1978) ...”just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water…”

Share RETROFIT

For this edition of the Retrofit Drive In, we present a double feature of subjects we never wanted to come back. No one who ever drove a stake through Dracula’s heart wanted to see the Count step into the ring for another round, but sure enough here he is in The Return of Dracula (1958). And what about that damn kid in the hockey mask, Michael Myers!?!? Nobody in Haddonfield was ready for that slashing little bastard again, but he is back for the fourth go-round in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988).

The reason for two loathsome returns in this edition, beyond free entertainment and spooky thrills, is that we are ALSO experiencing a sequel in real life that nobody wanted to see. Professor Mikey is a “Live and Let Live” kind of guy. But right now, modern times are giving us a preview of Live and Let Die (1976).

The most ominous return of all. Graphic: Nancy Flanagan

None of us expected the coronavirus pandemic. We heard bits and fragments early last year, and we assumed it would be like Ebola. It would be scary, but we had the wits and knowhow to soften the impact. We were right, of the 11 total cases in the U.S., we had 2 deaths and 9 recoveries.

Now we are in the midst of something that hasn’t been seen in a hundred years. None of us has experienced anything like it. When I just looked, we as a nation were sitting on 35,283,050 confirmed cases of COVID-19. We are adding a 67,000-seat football stadium to that number every day. So far, 626,658 have died, roughly the population of Vermont or Luxembourg. When you read this, it will be higher.

The Flu Pandemic, 1918. Graphic courtesy The History Channel

When Charlie Chaplin was the hottest little tramp going in Hollywood, the flu pandemic had no sense of humor. It killed more people than World War I. For the U.S. tallies, it is usually reported to have claimed between 20 and 50 million lives between 1918-1920. Revised conservative estimates now believe the true death toll for The Lost Generation was between 17 million and 100 million from the flu alone. Earth’s number of inhabitants lost was 500 million, a total of one-third of the people in the world.

The world of 1920, airplanes and their routes.

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

What we are living through is so monumental yet unexpected, largely because medicine has had a century of incredible advancement. With what we know and what we are capable of, it really caught us with our global pants down. With instant communication and knowledge unimaginable twenty years ago, the urgency of ending the pandemic is muddied in a sea of digital madness and misinformation. The pandemic and the diminished world it enforces robs us of friends and loved ones and keeps us held hostage by fear.

As of now every new death is preventable, and still we watch everything burn. You thought wars were tough. The Covid-19 pandemic is going to be so hard to explain to future generations.

A year ago we were watching irate customers refusing to wear masks while shopping, and coughing in the direction of managers on duty. Last week a mask denier was still getting airtime on a national news service, maintaining masks were never needed in the first place.

But now we see almost 40% of the country refusing to get vaccinated for personal reasons that are none of anybody’s business. Personal reasons are one thing and are to be expected. Regardless of those reasons, the Virus from Beyond Hell is everybody’s business.

Delta blues, a different variant. Son House (1902-1988) delivers the “Death Letter Blues.”

If you or someone you know has beliefs that are religious, secular, spiritual, or whatever, and those guidelines dictate they take no medicine, participate in no way implied or directly in the killing of animals for food or clothing, specifically directs that all the food they eat they must grow and never spray from an aerosol can, then all should stay with those beliefs. They obviously have worked so far.

But if you smoke, drink, eat processed foods, take drugs or medicines of any kind, and still don’t want to take a vaccination that might pollute your immaculate system, come off that. If you see a political post saying there hasn’t been enough research on the vaccine, here is the place for skepticism.

Sterling Hayden as Brig. Gen. Jack D. Ripper in *Dr. Strangelove Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love The Bomb*

If you, or someone you know, believes you might have a bad reaction, you might. You’ll most definitely get a sore arm, probably after both shots. It’s not a deal breaker. You might even, especially after the second one, feel a little loopy like you are coming down with a cold. It will go away. And when it goes away, you will get your life back.

You won’t be recorded, like the patients filling the hospitals in Los Angeles, begging for a vaccine that will no longer work on them. You won’t be remembered on your deathbed, urging others to not be like you, to get the vaccine. Who wants to be a public sad example?

At this point, it really is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. 97% of the hospitalizations are unvaccinated, as are 99% of the deaths. Nobody wants to lose you or anybody else. I need readers. You need to make your dreams come true. Or to help someone you know who needs to use you as one of their lifelines. Right now, this is for all the money.

OK, so much for the curtain speech. Let’s go to the Retrofit Drive In!

In addition to Dracula resorting to identity theft to keep his blood flowing, we get the fourth round of bloody tricks and no treats from Mike Myers. Not to be confused with Austin Powers.

Those are followed by a series of great videos highlighting return tunes from Elvis, The Misfits, and Rob Zombie. Those guys should have toured together. Captain Marvel is back for the seventh installment of the first super-hero motion picture. The curtain comes down as The Incredible Hulk turns green during “The Return of the Beast.”

Enjoy the flicks this week! Get your shot and kick back. The hell with Dracula, Halloween with Roman numerals and pandemics. Be Buffy the Virus Slayer.

When we finally return, let’s come all the way back.