For a cycle of three 1960s films more or less based out of the U.K. thanks to a deal with Warner Brothers/Seven Arts ended, producer Harry Alan Towers took the series and star Christopher Lee to director Jess Franco for two more films that ended up being shot mostly in Spain with a bit of location work in Rio and Turkey. The end results were a little confounding for fans of the series and drew very harsh criticism over the years, especially the final film, though Franco fanatics will find them easier to appreciate as early entries in the director's cycle of colorful, glossy projects for Towers which also included Venus in Furs, 99 Women, The Bloody Judge, and Eugenie.

1968's The Blood of Fu Manchu, also released in edited form as Kiss and Kill and Against All Odds, ups the kink factor of the series to its highest levels and brings back the usual characters including Lee and Chin battling Nayland Smith (Tales from the Crypt's Greene this time) for another variation on the idea of a female army scientifically engineered to take out world leaders, a la Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs. Here ten women are being held captive in a forgotten Amazonian jungle city and filled with enough poison to kill a man with a single kiss. Fu Manchu decides to test out his latest sexy weapon on Smith, which leaves him blinded and relying on compatriot Dr. Petrie (Crawford) to help him track down the villainous scourge. That leads them to the jungle where they infiltrate the deadly lair with the aid of soldier of fortune Carl Jansen (George) and the beautiful blonde cowgirl Ursula Wagner (Rohm).

Filled with bright colors, banditos, and bondage galore courtesy of chained women in cages, this film encountered numerous censorship hassles and raised more than a few eyebrows with its publicity stills of topless women being tortured, one of which adorned the film's first VHS release box in America despite the fact that anything remotely naughty had been trimmed out of the film itself. The nudity level is actually pretty discreet by today's standards, but for a series of adventure films geared at preteens, it was definitely strong stuff. The low budget and sometimes pokey pacing can be a challenge if you're expecting something like the earlier Fu Manchu titles, but as a slice of cinematic exotica with a slinky score by regular Franco composer Daniel White, it's an amusing diversion and a key entry in Franco's post-'60s evolution. Extra points for a cameo appearance by the always welcome Shirley Eaton (Goldfinger), in between her Towers gigs on The Million Eyes of Sumuru and Franco's The Girl from Rio and supposedly stuck in here without her knowledge.

The following year's The Castle of Fu Manchu is easily the least loved of the series and displays significant signs of a slashed budget including a reliance on close ups of characters sitting in rooms with a lot of stock footage thrown in to pad out the running time. Not helping matters was the fact that the film was released in murky, poorly timed theatrical prints in most territories, with even worse video editions over the years and a butchered version aired on Mystery Science Theater 3000 making it a real slog to watch. Fortunately the refurbished transfers in more recent years improved things by restoring Franco'soriginal color schemes, which are vital to appreciating its place in the director's canon and give the film a more stylized feeling than before. It's still flawed, of course, but not the endurance test it seemed to be at first glance.

This time Fu Manchu intones that he has developed the means to turn water into ice, which means he can control the solid or liquid state of the oceans. He proves this by sinking an ocean liner (with footage strangely cribbed from Brides of Fu Manchu and A Night to Remember!) and threatens to hold sway over the nautical shipping routes around the world. To accomplish this he needs the enforced services of some of the world's most brilliant minds, namely Dr. Heracles, Dr. Kessler (Stoll), and Dr. Koch (Perschy). The intrigue heats up in Turkey when other parties including Lisa (Italian sex symbol Neri, dressed in drag for an extended period) and even Franco himself as a local inspector get involved in the plot, which also tangentially brings back Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie again (still Greene and Crawford) to unravel the mystery, which also entails some open heart surgery and even more stock footage.

Both of these films bowed on DVD in 2003 from Blue Underground and looked considerably better than any prior editions. They were also the most complete editions to date, reinstating substantial chunks of footage removed for various territories over the years (with the U.S. getting the shortest one, sometimes years later). The same contents were ported over onto one disc for the 2017 Blu-ray release (absent a couple of text rundowns about the films), but in this case that's meant a little too literally; the preexisting standard def masters were just duplicated here, upconverted and given a slathering of waxy noise reduction that kills much of the film grain and detail in the process. There's literally no increase in detail here whatsoever, and in fact some issues like aliasing are aggravated in the process. The audio also shows no difference from the prior editions as well. On the featurette side, "The Rise of Fu Manchu" (15m3s) features Franco, Lee, Eaton, Chin, and Towers, while "The Fall of Fu Manchu" (14m1s) has Franco, Lee, Chin, and Towers, essentially forming a complete piece between them about the rise of "yellow peril" pulp novels (which bore no resemblance to reality), the strangeness of Towers buying rights to the series and writing original scripts under his own pen name instead, the annoyance of the Fu Manchu makeup, and the amusement of having a director whose real first name, "Jesus," provided plenty of on-set puns. Theatrical trailers and galleries of posters and stills are included for both features, with The Blood of Fu Manchu getting both its American and European trailer options.

In 2020, Indicator premiered the films on Blu-ray as part of its The Fu Manchu Cycle, 1965-69 set which also marked their first appearance in bona fide HD. The 4K-sourced scans yield sumptuous results here with the fine film grain restored and far more detail and image info on the sides visible than before. Blood can be viewed in two options (with identical running times) featuring the original title or a Kiss Me to Death title card, and it also comes with a commentary featuring critics and authors David Flint and Adrian J. Smith diving into the strange waters of Franco, Towers, and Lee, as well as the ways these two entries approach the delirious Rohmer source material and deal with the iffy racial issues it entails. A Vic Pratt intro (7m13s) includes thoughts on the increasing "Euro strangeness" infiltrating here via Franco including nudity, psychedelic touches, and even more anachronisms than before. Of course, you can't have a satisfying Franco release without Stephen Thrower on board, and he certainly comes through in "The Men Who Killed Fu Manchu?" (41m5s) exploring the vital collaborative period between the two men, the approach to Rohmer (not just confined to this pair of films), and the change in shooting locations that reflected Franco's visual sensibilities. Another perspective on Towers appears from clapper loader Ray Andrew in "Any Way to Save Money" (10m58s), including thoughts on multiple films in the series as he drifted from one job to another including other Towers projects scattered along the way. One particularly fascinating extra here is "The Fiery Hand" (36m18s), an installment from the 1923 silent serial The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu; presented here in shockingly great condition, it's a fun little cliffhanger adventure (involving a trap-laden house that was the site of two murders, plus the usual disguises and assassination attempts) and can be played with an optional new score by the band Peninsula. Also included are three alternate title sequences (Spanish, Kiss Me to Death, and the U.S. VHS release as Against All Odds), a 45s reel of color test footage of Lee and Chin, the U.K. and U.S. trailers, and an 89-image gallery.

Castle was the only one without a commentary in the Indicator set, but you do get two viewing options (with the original title or as Assignment Istanbul). Here the Vic Pratt intro (6m53s) goes into the elaborate international financing, the belated theatrical release it received long after its completion, and the presence of recycled footage here from Brides they hoped nobody would notice. In "From Alicante to Istanbul" (13m10s): Neri remembers Franco, Rohm and the making of 99 Women (including the big ocean catfight scene and intimidating presence of Mercedes McCambridge) and this film, particularly the story behind her highly unusual fashion choices. Also, the extensive "An Interview with Harry Alan Towers" (44m43s) from 2008 spans the entirety of his career from his pre-TV gigs through his ascension to film production around the globe and several television projects along the way. You also get the alternate Assignment Istanbul and Spanish video title sequences on their own, the theatrical trailer, a 40-image gallery, and in a welcome gesture, another silent serial episode: "The Coughing Horror" (30m34s) from 1924's The Further Mysteries of Dr. Fu-Manchu, again with an optional Peninsula score and fun thrills as the titular villain hatches another plan against Nayland Smith.

In 2025, Blue Underground revisited the films as individual UHD/Blu-ray sets with the films looking even punchier here with very vibrant, crisp presentations; the UHDs in particular are quite a sight to behold with the HDR10-compatible Dolby Vision bringing out gradations in those crazy reds and greens that almost give them a 3-D effect. The DTS-HD MA 1.0 mono tracks sound fine as always, with optional English SDH, French, and Spanish subtitles provided. This time both come with new commentaries featuring this writer and Troy Howarth that obviously can't be evaluated here but hopefully will prove to be worth hearing. The earlier featurette ("The Rise of Fu Manchu") is ported over for Blood, while Thrower appears for the new "Sanguine-Stained Celluloid" (27m34s) in which he provides a thorough recap of Towers' and Franco's paths to collaborating together, the careers at the time of the major actors, the endearing touches here that only Franco could have provided, and the pulp sensibility of the source material that clicked with the filmmaker. The usual international and U.S. trailers are also here, plus a poster and expanded gallery. Castle also has the archival "The Fall of Fu Manchu" featurette, with Thrower delivering the new "Castle of Carnage" (21m25s) surveying the end of the series, the budgetary constraints and declining distributor interest, the colorful aesthetic Franco pushed to the limit here, Franco's own tendency to do cameo appearances, the use of recycled material here, and Lee's approach to the character. Also included are the international trailer and an expanded international poster and photo gallery. In an amusing touch, both features also come with their respective RiffTrax editions (76m37s and 75m5s) in SD with Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy goofing on Franco's entries in the eccentric series.

THE BLOOD OF FU MANCHU (Blue Underground) (2025 Blu-ray)

THE BLOOD OF FU MANCHU (Indicator) (Blu-ray)

THE BLOOD OF FU MANCHU (Blue Underground) (2017 Blu-ray)

THE BLOOD OF FU MANCHU (Blue Underground) (DVD)

THE CASTLE OF FU MANCHU (Blue Underground) (2025 Blu-ray)

THE CASTLE OF FU MANCHU (Indicator)

THE CASTLE OF FU MANCHU (Blue Underground) (2017 Blu-ray)

THE CASTLE OF FU MANCHU (Blue Underground) (DVD)

Reviewed on July 19, 2025