The Most Extreme Sci-Fi Movie Ever Made Is An Unrated, Gore-Filled Instant Classic

By Jonathan Klotz
| Published 1 minute ago

Before Stranger Things brought back the 80s as Steven Spielberg envisioned them, 2015’s Turbo Kid brought back the 80s as Troma envisioned them. The low-budget independent film left audiences stunned back in 2015 with its abundance of gore combined with a love for the old 80s coming of age adventures that somehow managed to combine into an amazing movie. Thankfully, the bloody, gory adventure is now streaming for free on Tubi, Pluto TV, and Amazon Freevee. 

Turbo Kid Is The Superhero You’ve Always Wanted

Turbo Kid takes place in a post-apocalyptic wasteland with scarce resources under the control of vicious warlords. The Kid (Munro Chambers) is a teenager trying to get by as a scavenger while collecting all the comics he can of his hero, Turbo Man. After his new friend, whether he likes it or not, Apple (Laurence Leboeuf, in the best Harley Quinn performance that’s not Harley Quinn) is taken by the warlord Zeus (SeaQuest DSV’s Michael Ironside), The Kid finds the real Turbo Man. Or at least his remains. Taking the armor and weapon of the superhero, The Kid sets out to save Apple and restore hope to his world. 

Turns out, saving the world means killing a whole lot of evil henchmen. In true 80s movie style, Zeus’s second in command is an imposing figure named Skeletron with a signature weapon every kid thinks is cool, but Hollywood never films due to things like “realism” and “practicality.” Skeletron shoots sawblades from a wrist-mounted gun. Not small sawblades, the type that can rip a person in half and sever limbs without even trying. Turbo Kid follows the rule of cool. 

No Budget, No Problem

Over a decade later, and there’s still nothing quite like Turbo Kid. The budget obviously went to the special effects, which still look low-budget and crude, but that’s a large part of the charm of the film and why it works so well. It’s more Toxic Avenger and less Avengers.

Everyone involved understood the assignment, which is why Michael Ironside chews the scenery up like a Sunday brunch. Even the synth-filled soundtrack is a throwback to the 80s. Deep bass beats and a deep voice telling us “This is the future” is how every adventure film should start out. In a world where we don’t even have trailer voice-overs anymore and original soundtracks are replaced by “epic” covers, it’s healing to go back to a decade when originality still existed. 

If you’ve never heard of Turbo Kid before, it’s because in 2015, we were living through an amazing run of Marvel superhero movies, looking forward to Batman vs. Superman, and the independent Canadian/New Zealand production, debuting at the Sundance Film Festival, flew under the radar. After earning under $100,000 in theaters, the cult classic found an audience among hardcore cinephiles and superhero fans who craved something different from generic blockbusters from the Big Two. 

Turbo Kid may not be for everyone with its over-the-top amounts of gore and blood. The post-apocalyptic superhero leans more towards comedy than horror, but it’s still not for the squeamish. Thankfully, if you want to give it a shot, the immediate underground cult classic is available on Pluto TV, Tubi, and Amazon Freevee.