Puppet Master X: Axis Rising

Director - Charles Band (Evil Bong 666, Trophy Heads)
Starring - Kip Canyon (1313: Bermuda Triangle, Puppet Master: Axis Termination), Jean Louise O'Sullivan (Tim & Eric Awesome Show, Great Job), and Oto Brezina (Nude Nuns with Big Guns, Goregoyles: The Holy Terror)
Release Date - 2012
Genre - Horror
Tagline - "The battle is over.  The war has just begun"
Format - Bluray (Personal Collection) (Screener)

Rating (out of 5):

     My adventures through Puppet Masterland is coming to an end.  I have now watched ten different Puppet Master films spanning two decades.  How impressive is that?  When Charles Band dismantled Empire Pictures he founded Full Moon with the hopes of creating more original content for himself and the first Puppet Master was born.  Now I'm sitting here watching the 10th film in the series.  This installment, Axis Rising, is part of a new trilogy of Puppet Master films that is still cannon to the original series. 

      The film picks up moments after the first film.  A young man has lost his family except his girlfriend and just stopped an Axis attack on a weapons plant.  The U.S. army catches wind of their brave actions and grab them.  They offer them an award for their service and have a military officer follow them around to keep them safe.  What they don't know is that the Nazis kidnapped on of their puppets and discovered what makes it tick.  Now they are creating their own puppets to combat the Toulon puppets.  Now its the Axis vs. the Allies in puppet form.
     Axis of Evil had some fun moments but was still riddled with plot holes and inconsistencies.  Sadly, Axis Rising was a struggle to finish.  The acting was bad, the story was lacking, and the effects were some of the weakest in the series.  The acting in this one is the low point of the series.  I didn't think the cast could sink lower than the last film but this one did.  The recurring characters has been recast and for good reason but it looks like Band and company went with a lower qualified cast.  The story for this one is more or less more of Axis of Evil and takes that story where the first film should have went with a puppet vs puppet battle.  Sadly, the way the film was shot the impact of these scenes is lost and what could be an epic battle turns out to be a dud.  Finally, the practical effects are one again minimal with the exception of the puppets.  The puppets look fantastic.  Overall, Axis Rising is one of the biggest let downs in cinematic history.  What was they thinking?