Reed Alexander's Horror Review FINALLY Reviews 'Child's Play' (2019)

Can I just interupt this review for one second to say I'm so fucking sick of 'Streaming Service Roulette!' JESUS H FUCKING CHRIST! I only have so much time on my plate to see movies in the theater, and if I miss it, it's a god damn crap chute if it will come out on a stremeing service I'm actualy paying for. And to be clear, I have Netflix (which barely ever delivers), Hulu (which makes me pay for comercials), Shudder (which you get what you get and that's it), and Tubi (which is like 'great vallue' Hulu).

That's a pretty fucking wide net I'm casting, but now with Amazon, CBS on Demand, HBO on Demand, and about a god-damn bagilion other fucking streaming services, I miss a lot of stuff I desperatly want to see. These fuckers better all learn to package, and fucking soon, or the market is going to go tits up from pirating. I'm still fucking pissed about Netflix copyright trolling me off YouTube, because they don't understand 'fair use' laws.

ANY-FUCKING-WHO... Yeah, this was really good. Look, the question on everyone's mind is, "was it better than the original." Well... kinda...

Look, the original will always be my favorite of the two, and while I don't really believe in objectivity when it comes to media, I can say, there are a lot of thing ABOUT this movie that was objectively better. However, I can't say one movie is objectively better than another, that is wholly subjective. And Subjectively, I like the original Child's Play (1988). I'll always choose to watch it over this one.

Now, I was never skeptical about this movie's capacity to be good. In an article I wrote for Madness Heart Press, I talked about how the 'anti-remake' movement was largely blown out of proportion by an extremely vocal minority whom honestly don't have any merit to their complaints.

One of those primary complaints I can firmly say was objectively wrong, and I knew that long before I even got a chance to see this movie. They complained about the new Good Guy Doll (now called Buddi), was "obviously garbage CGI" when it was in fact 90% animatronics, only using CGI when absolutely necessary. It also was an objectively good mixture of both the Practical and CGI FX.

There were many other similar complaints that also had no ground to stand on, and were based on bad information. However, I did have two complaints, one of which was explained in the movie, the other of which is unavoidably a bit of a sore thumb.

First, Andy is a bit too old for dolls, and 'My Budy' style dolls went the way of the dodo in the late 80's. It would be difficult to convince me that a kid would actively want such a thing. They dealt with this by Andy actively NOT wanting the thing. The gift, which was mostly a joke, was something Andy was pretty disappointed to have. In fact, he thought it was pretty fucking lame until he figures out some pretty fucked up stuff to do with it. Namely, train it to harass his mom's shithead boyfriend.

My second complaint is that Buddi is REALLY fucking creepy. He looks more like Anabel from the Conjuring franchise than a Good Guy Doll. They tried to hang a lantern on it by flat out calling Chucky creepy looking, but then, who would design the equivalent of an intelligent Furby to be creepy?! Chucky should look like a god damn Porg or a baby Yoda. These companies know how to market cute.

But it all really falls down to story and acting. The acting was just flat out better. Audry Plaza blew it out of the water as the mom, and even the child actor Gabriel Bateman did a better job with Andy. The story also makes more sense. Remember, the plot of the original was that Charles Lee Ray used voodoo to escape his death by placing his soul in a Good Guy Doll. Much as I love the movie, and Brad Dourif... the plot is hammy as all fuck.

What's great is that even this movie kept a lot of the silly, hammy spirit of the original, while being more tangible with its storyline. An AI run amok, makes WAY more sense in a modern setting than voodoo.

I still love the original 1988 more, but this one is just better. I consider it a 'must watch,' and it will be going on my all-time top list.

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SPOILERS!!!

There really isn't a lot to spoil here, but I do want to point one thing out that seriously bothered the shit out of me... The "no one believes the kid" trope is played WAY the fuck out. Literally all the mom had to do was watch ONE damn video, and she had EVER reason to do it, but adamantly refused with a pretty shaky excuse as to why. Yeah, I get it, Andy stole his friend's phone, but if his mom genuinely believed this was all in Andy's head, she would have GLADLY watched to video to prove it before returning the stolen phone. It's not like having the fucking phone for ten more damn seconds would have made a difference.

Not to mention there was zero plot reason to not just include the mom at that moment. It's not like her suddenly realizing Chucky was on a murderous rampage would have changed a damn thing about the movie other than the "no one believes the kid" trope.

In any case, this movie is actually better than the original. I only like the original more out of personal preference for the franchise as a whole. From 1988 to Seed of Chucky, skipping Curse of Chucky, and moving on to Cult of Chucky. But I'll gladly see part 2 slated for 2021 or 22.

Give this a shot. It was definitely worth it.