Chucky is as foul-mouthed and homicidal as ever in his new Syfy series
Much like the film franchise that spawned it, the new killer-doll series is messy in more ways than one
TV Reviews Chucky
It may not be the strongest horror franchise in cinematic history, but the Child’s Play series deserves credit for never just repeating itself. Those films, about a smiling plastic doll supernaturally possessed by the soul of serial killer Charles Lee Ray (Brad Dourif), progressed from horror to action to comedy to high camp, before transitioning into haunted-house scares and oddball mystery in its two most recent outings.
But for all the variety in style and tone, there have been two constants: creator Don Mancini, who wrote every installment (and directed three of them), and Chucky himself (voiced by Dourif), who remained a foul-mouthed killer no matter the circumstances. In the jump to cable TV, Mancini and Dourif haven’t softened up the little bastard in the slightest.
Chucky, the new series premiering on Syfy, retains all of the character’s penchant for grotesque kills and juvenile, acidic humor. Before the end of the first episode, the doll is murdering clueless adults, vomiting up liquor, and seizing a microphone to call a roomful of kids and their parents a “bunch of fucking assholes.” By the third episode, the brief opening recaps are preceded by Dourif sneering, “Previously, on fuckin’ Chucky…” Elegant, this show is not.
But again, that’s very much in keeping with the franchise’s big-screen history. Other than the first film, Mancini’s scripts have very much taken place in a slightly heightened reality, where people’s behavior is a little more affected than would be expected, and narrative plausibility takes a backseat to propulsiveness.
In other words, how characters get together in a room with Chucky is less important to the story than watching what happens once they’re there. It can feel a little sloppy at points, but things move along at a nice clip, meaning you’re soon engrossed in the next violently boffo set piece, and considerations about the “but why?” of it all only arise upon subsequent reflection.
The setup is simple, with no prior knowledge of the character required (though familiarity pays off via Easter eggs and winking jokes and references). Jake Wheeler (Zackary Arthur), a lonely 14-year-old misanthrope with outsider-art tendencies, finds an old Good Guy doll at a yard sale (“I’m into vintage,” he explains). Resented by his recently widowed father (Devon Sawa) and bullied by seemingly everyone at school, Jake takes solace in his doll-based creations and in listening to the podcast of the kid he has a crush on, true-crime fanatic Devon Lopez (Björgvin Arnarson).
After his dad drunkenly dismantles his artwork (set to the not-exactly-subtle music cue of Madalen Duke’s “How Villains Are Made”), Jake’s newest doll starts making its presence felt—first in subtle ways, such as dissecting Jake’s biology-class frog in less than scientific fashion, but soon graduating to more homicidal pursuits. And Jake, once he discovers his doll is sentient, finds himself warily drawn to the amoral promise of pain for his enemies. “I’m the one friend you got, Jake,” Chucky says, and he’s not wrong. The first few episodes, then, become a sort of battle for Jake’s soul, albeit with one side benefitting from the ability to gleefully murder anyone of the opposing viewpoint.
Given that it’s a show whose primary draw is watching a sadistic children’s toy stalk and kill people, the series assembles a roster of paper-thin characters ripe for the offing. Jake’s antagonist in the early episodes is Lexy (Alyvia Alyn Lind), the kind of cartoonish teenage tormentor so easy to hate. It’s to the series’ credit that it actually makes the case for why even terrible people don’t deserve to die, while also allowing for the thorny morality of endorsing the right to wish they would.
Lexy spends most of her time making others miserable, especially Jake, so it’s no surprise when Chucky sets his sights on her. But there’s no shortage of potential victims, including brutish bully Oliver (Avery Esteves), Jake’s cousin Junior (Teo Briones), and any number of adults who either treat Jake poorly or simply get in the way of Chucky’s deadly pastime.
Strip away all the enjoyably gory bloodshed, though, and Chucky occasionally struggles to fill the time between its title character’s favorite activity. There are ongoing flashbacks to Charles Lee Ray’s youth, meant to establish his backstory and show how he became a maniac eager to mentor a budding young potential killer like Jake, and while they can be entertaining, they rarely feel necessary.
Similarly, the major beats of the story tend to be telegraphed far in advance, so even when Chucky fails to execute an intended victim, it’s not really a surprise. And throughout, the show’s tone wavers, walking an unsteady line between the surreal camp of the mid-period films like Bride Of Chucky—there’s a school talent show that doesn’t begin to approach the realm of believable—and the clever, grounded smarts of the more recent entries.
When the oddball mix of sensibilities works, Chucky can be daffily entertaining. Lexy sings her little sister to sleep with a lullaby rendition of “Don’t Fear The Reaper” (Chucky describes her as a “vicious little Karen-in-training-wheels”). The local hospital is decorated like something out of a Nicolas Winding Refn film, with neon hot-pink crosses and barely lit corridors. At one point Chucky starts a fire in a teenager’s room that explodes outwards into the house with a giant fireball, only for none of the kids present for a house party to even look up from their headphones and notice.
Does it make much sense? No. But it’s fun to see it play out with a mischievous sense of anything-goes silliness. Mancini and Dourif have been doing this for so long, they seem to have nailed down an understanding of what makes Chucky fun. And when Chucky follows suit, it is too.
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Well, Chucky’s hair stylist gets “two snaps up”!
And a Hallelujah?
Resented by his recently widowed father (Devon Sawa)Excuse me while I go crumble into dust.
Aw, you’re just sad you didn’t get invited to Macaulay Culkin’s 41st birthday party this summer.
Honestly just set to record this series for him alone. Also recently rewatched “Idle Hands” and recommended it to my niece.
You should watch “Hunter Hunter” from last year.
Or a cinematic masterpiece like The Fanatic
Not only that, Sawa LOOKS old too!
sounds kinda like a lesser ash vs. evil dead.
To be fair, almost everything is lesser compared to Ash vs. Evil Dead.
Glad it looks to be okay. Because I’m probably watching this no matter what.
“Teo Briones” sound like the name of a drag performer who’s impersonating Tea Leoni.
or Maria Conchita Alonso eating a Chiquita Banana?
Wait, the main (non-doll) character is a gay kid? I gotta say, it’s pretty open-minded of a serial killer ghost who canonically died in the late 1980s to be so willing to befriend and defend the LGBTQ community. Chucky says gay rights!
Chucky tells the kid – and informs the audience at the same time, if they haven’t seen SEED OF CHUCKY – that he himself has a genderfluid child.
keep yer gender fluids to yerself!
Don Mancini, the creator of Chucky, is gay! Chucky got pretty gay, especially with the intro of camp icon Jennifer Tilly! So I think it’s a nice homage to have the star be queer himself 🙂
Your move, Clive Barker!
The series has been pretty queer leaning ever since Seed of Chucky.
The Neckbeards on Youtube in 3…2…1… This is another example of WOKE culture! They’re pushing it on us! WAAAAH!!!
Did I miss the part where you can actually hear the F word and see knife slicing/stabbing people on SyFy? I thought hard-R was premium-only?Is this only on streaming? Or is the F-bomb and actual violence merely implied, to align with broadcast standards?Serious question; I want to watch it, as long as it’s not a PG-hobbled mess.
I can’t speak for this particular show, but SyFy and a lot of other basic cable networks have been letting it go unbleeped lately. Something on FXX had three or four in an episode a few weeks ago and it caught me off-guard at first.
I was watching something on basic cable recently and fully expecting the dub treatment, but got the straight f-bomb several times. Maybe they dub out a certain number, because it seemed altered at some other points in the movie.
Didn’t Happy have a lot of gore and language? Granted, I watched it on Netflix, so I don’t know if it went unbleeped when it originally aired.
A lot of basic cable shows today have indulged in f-bombs and the like. Cable has always had this freedom — theyre not under FCC guidelines — but worried about losing possible ad sponsors or garnering the wrath of their channel bosses. But once FX started seeping them in and the world kept spinning, a lot of them have loosened up in regards to original shows in particular. USA and SyFy have an informal “witching hour” after 9pm where they will air movies and shows uncensored. So don’t worry about a neutered “Chucky”.
I have a soft spot for the Child’s Play movies, so I’m super looking forward to this!
me too, this sounds pretty decent. Love that horror is finally embracing queerdom, instead of using it as subtext or queer fear like so much of the 80s horror!
I re-watched the first two Child’s Play movies a few Halloweens back and they are still solid. Then last Halloween I watched Curse of Chucky and Cult of Chucky for the first time and really enjoyed them, especially Fiona Dourif (daughter of Chucky himself Brad Dourif). So I’m excited to have a new Chucky series for this Halloween! I’m pretty sure Fiona and Jennifer Tilly are supposed to show up at some point. Curse of Chucky played the long game and for a good chunk of the movie it could have just been a full reboot or ignoring some previous entries, but then eventually Mancini clearly ties it to the series and between the ending and Cult of Chucky it starts bringing back characters from way back and adding new wrinkles to the whole franchise. Hopefully this continues down that path.
Curse RULES.
Fiona Dourif seems like a performer I’d be interested in watching but chooses some lousy projects. I have seen her in Tenet, but it was a very minor role.
She was Fantastic in Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency.
I will not recuse myself from this assessment, thank you.
Maybe so, but it’s still a Max Landis show.
I saw that before her Chucky movies (and before I knew she was Brad’s daughter) and was just floored by her character and performance. That filthy murder hobo was absolutely delightful. Now I’m remembering her trying to eat shampoo because it smells like fruit and I’m smiling.
Fiona Dourif: I don’t remember seeing her in True Blood and a few other things, but when she showed up in Tenet and The Stand I was immediately like “who the hell is that?” She definitely has a unique energy. Unsurprising, because her father is awesome.
Is this another Alyn Lind? If we don’t stop them now they’ve some reach Olsen state.
“It may not be the strongest horror franchise in cinematic history…”No, it probably is. 7 movies, all of them good, great, or the good kind of bad. I guess there’s the remake, but I’m choosing to ignore that.
“It may not be the strongest horror franchise in cinematic history…”“No, it probably is.”I agree. I’ve been rewatching the movies, and I am really surprised by the consistency and continuity. Even the weakest (part 3) is a lot more watchable than the likes of Halloween 5/6/Resurrection or Friday the 13th 5/8, or Nightmare on Elm Street 5/6. The high point might not be as strong as the original Halloween or NOES, but the franchise as a whole holds up better than any of the other extended horror franchises. I’m sure having a consistent writer helped sustain it.
The idea of trying to corrupt the main kid into a killer is actually quite interesting! Like a lot of shows these days, it would probably benefit from a shorter runtime; the dead spots in the first 40 minutes really felt it and it would be a little snappier as a half hour show, but it was better than I expected it to be
it deserves higher than a B-