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"Lycan" or not

You have to appreciate a few things about "Underworld: Rise of the Lycans", the third movie in the moderately lucrative vampire-vs-werewolf franchise:

1) The original director and original star (husband and wife combo Len Wiseman and Kate Beckinsale) decided to bail on the series.

2) Michael Sheen (the indisputably good actor from "The Queen" and "Frost/Nixon") did not.

3) The filmmakers made this third installment a prequel.

Yes, "U3" takes place some number of years before the first "Underworld" movie in what looks like a faraway corner of the medieval world. But that's not important. What is important (and I use the term loosely) is that this third film may final put a nail in the (ahem) coffin of this stubbornly ongoing series.

With the recent glut of vampire movies, I have to admit it would have been refreshing to see a movie centered around their hairier horror cousins. Of course, "Underworld 3" is about werewolves the way "Batman" is about bats. Most of the movie (and budget) is spent with CGI battles, warmed-over plot complications and (sigh) humans growling at each other (haven't we learned that that's simply not scary).

Through some overwrought, underwritten opening voice-over, we learn that vampires, led by Victor (Bill Nighy, camping it up through ice-blue contact lenses), have enslaved werewolves (called Lycans here 'cause, y'know, that's cooler-sounding). It seems that, over time, the Lycans have lost their ability to return to human form. All except Lucian, the brooding, shaggy-haired character you might remember from the previous "Underworld" movies. What you might not remember is that Lucian was played by Michael Sheen in those films and, yes, he reprises the role here (though I may never know why).

Lucian works as a kind of Lycan liaison for Victor (he's shackled with a particularly nasty-looking dog collar that impedes his ability to wolf-out). When Victor's daughter Sonja (played blankly by Rhona Mitra, who actually made me miss Kate Beckinsale) is chased by werewolves, Lucian steps in to blithely pick them off with a crossbow. Though he's happily blowing away his own kin, he rationalizes it by regarding them as dumb animals (even though they clearly show some level of intelligence).

Anyway, to the surprise of no one, Lucian and Sonja hook up (in a sex scene of laughable posturing), much to Victor's chagrin. There's also something about a Lycan uprising too, but it's all very dull. So undercooked is the film's plot, that the entire universe appears to consist of one castle surrounded by a wolf-infested forest. Occasionally, visitors attempt to make it through the woods, but more often than not they end up as dog food.

The film is directed with a drab blue tint by special effects artist-turned-director Patrick Tatopoulos, who has a third-grader's love (and ability) for handheld camera (the fight sequences are flat-out boring and incomprehensible). The script, by Danny McBride, Dirk Blackman & Howard McCain, suffers from many of the same problems as "Alien vs Predator". With monsters on either side of the equation, there's no one to root for. Lucian is supposed to be the redeemable one because of his love for Sonja, but their relationship has zero chemistry and, in the end, he's just a howling beast.

I should mention that there's one other thing to appreciate in "Underworld 3", and that's the fact that the movie is so bad that it actually gets funny towards the end. If it's not Bill Nighy's eye-popping, scenery-chewing theatrics, then it's the fact that his character locks his two greatest enemies in a prison cell right next to each other.

Since this is an "Underworld" prequel, I really shouldn't be calling it "Underworld 3". It's more like "Underworld 0.5". Which is appropriate because that's exactly how many stars it deserves.