Child's Play (2019)

I have to say, “Child’s Play” (2019) was nowhere near as flat and disappointing as I was expecting. First off, I was pleasantly surprised with the voice work from Mark Hamill as Chucky. Brad Dourif is such a fantastic actor that even though he’s synonymous with Chucky from all of the Child’s Play films (I still haven’t seen “Cult of Chucky” yet, which was released in 2017, so the reimagining of Child’s Play wasn’t long after yet another sequel featuring the killer doll that just won’t go away) he’s not suffering from the albatross of this one character. Hamill has sort of suffered as being synonymous with Luke Skywalker but he, too, has carved out a niche for himself as a voice actor, with a wonderful take on Joker. His cheery, child-like delivery, even when on the attack or at Andy's bedside, applied to the doll just felt right. And Chucky always popping up unexpected and startling folks, singing to Andy and dedicated to his mission of protecting the friendship.

What I was especially fond of in the reimagining is the casting. I have a crush on Aubrey Plaza, and while I wished the film done a little more with her, that brand of eye roll and snarkiness that seems to follow her no matter what role she takes on doesn’t weigh down her single mom trying to raise her son, Andy (Gabriel Bateman of “Lights Out” (2016)), while working at a tech store with the popular brand of Kaslan (think something akin to Apple) products. Kaslan (Tim Matheson) is a tech giant with even smart cars, cameras, televisions, air conditioning, lights in the house that can be operated through the use of the Buddi doll if the owners wish for the synch programming. I think the decision to go this route—AI run amok—was for the best, as Chucky, from the original, through possession and some Charles Lee Ray Satanism, on a rampage cracking-wise has been done in every way imaginable.

You could have not convinced me that after “Child’s Play 3” (1991) there would be any more of these films. Then “Bride of Chucky” (1998) came along and seemed to resuscitate the franchise. Here we are at 2017 with yet another sequel, so trying something completely different but retaining enough of what made the 1988 film popular was the right decision. I probably could have gone to this film during the summer; I remember actually contemplating visiting a local drive-in that was playing it for that weekend. I recall the posters where Chucky was taking out Woody and Buzz from “Toy Story”; a coworker didn’t like those posters at all! I knew that a lot of Child’s Play fans just weren’t going to give this a chance. I admit that I’ve never been that big a fanboy of the franchise, or even all that crazy for the first film, but those first three films were rental store (and premium channel) popular. I recall wanting to rent them at the time and the shelves often had boxes (or absent altogether from the shelves depending on how the store rented them out) with no black VHS box copies available. And with so many sequels attached to Chucky, perhaps a reimagining was a little too soon. After watching the 2019 film, I didn’t feel aggravated or annoyed by it. I can’t say that with a lot of others that try to profit from old titles. The doll, despite how others felt about it, didn’t even bother me. It looks like one of those creepy prosthetic dolls perhaps gifted too much technology. That much control available to a doll was a frightening concept that the film does have fun with.

The loveable Carlease Burke as Mrs. Doreen, a neighbor of Plaza’s Karen and Andy, can’t wait to take a smart car while her detective son, Mike (a well cast Brian Tyree Henry), is tasked with murders Chucky commits. That smart car is a Kaslan and Chucky causing it to crash before attacking her with a butcher knife is the film’s gut-punch. A married Shane (David Lewis), pretending not to be (that is an ugh moment revealed much later in the film), is Karen’s love interest, later taking down lights from his house (Christmas time) before Chucky causes his fall from a ladder (snapping a leg bone), later turning on a ground mulcher (he had a watermelon patch) that takes off his head.

The showtopping kill most will remember is this creepy janitor in Karen’s apartment complex who “rescues” Chucky from the trash, replenishing his “core” that was removed by Andy and his friends (he bonds with Beatrice Kitsos and Ty Consiglio when they find him ordering Chucky to act a certain way, even seeing the doll curse, a reaction supposedly not allowed in its programming) in order to disable and “turn off” the doll. The janitor has cameras set up to spy on residents, including Karen (he is about to masturbate to her while she’s in the bathroom, about to shower). He recovers Chucky and provides a repaired core in order to hack free Kaslan technology. Instead, the creep allows Chucky to once again pursue those that stand in the doll’s way of being Andy’s “one true friend”. The faulty/corrupted programming traces back to the beginning of the film when a tormented Vietnam factory worker fired by a harassing assembly manager eventually leaps to his death, not before deactivating protective/security codes that keep the doll from being a threat to its owners (and others.) So when the janitor brings Chucky back from the dead, nothing stops the doll from tapping into any Kaslan product. So the janitor can’t prepare for Chucky’s knife attack, later controlling the heat so that he can’t maintain a grip on a pipe, dropping right into a running table saw the splits him right in the crotch! Ouch! A severed hip-to-foot dropping to the floor definitely is a jaw-dropper.

How Chucky adopts his eventual personality relates back to Hal from “2001: A Space Odyssey”, processing the information and devoted to his “friendship” to Andy, believing that this should be protected, cultivated, and rewarded when it would appear that forces are working against the boy. If Shane angrily confronts Andy or orders him around, and the boy talks about how much he hates the asshole, Chucky will work to make his friend happy. A Texas Chainsaw film provides “inspiration” to Chucky in collecting a “trophy” for Andy in Shane’s face skinning! Chucky sees the cat scratch Andy with the boy commenting negatively about the feline, so the killer doll acts to “protect” and “please” his friend. If Karen presents a threat to Chucky and Andy’s “friendship” or Mrs. Doreen mentions that she is Andy’s new best friend, or Andy’s other friends are “picking on him”, Chucky processes them as threats that must be “removed”. The conclusion at the tech store (the parents busting open the door to get the second line of Buddi dolls) as Chucky locks down the doors and sends in the drones to attack shows how synching Kaslan tech might be a very bad idea. And the bear tech doll line produces some “uh oh” attacks in the store furthering the idea that Kaslan might need to reconsider their entire marketing and toy-selling approach. That Karen will be hanging from a noose while Andy tries to put an end to Chucky at the end with Mike reemerging from certain death due to propeller blades from a drone is the typical ending, so that might be a bit too generic.

How Chucky replays what Andy says and replays “memories” recorded from what it has processed do bring the boy a lot of grief. At a point towards the end, Karen believes her son needs to be at work with her because he can’t be trusted while Mike even considered him a suspect in the murder of Shane. I think the film is at its best when technology is used against folks who never intended for words they say and types of behavior to be taken out of context. Television screens displaying Chucky’s visual memories and the doll replaying Andy’s statements were damaging when the boy never meant for the doll to ever commit crimes. Chucky misunderstood and because of its programming being corrupted reacted from the information processed…the violence bred from no protective measures in place. So I think the doll going on a rampage because of factors working against it was quite a clever storytelling decision…can you really blame Chucky for what happens when an emotionally crippled employee made sure he would turn out exactly as expected. 2.5/5