Chatty Chucky: "Child's Play" a clever, playfully malevolent update that justifies its existence

Child’s Play (2019)

90 min.
Release Date: June 21, 2019 (Wide)

It might never be necessary to re-imagine a highly regarded horror film, particularly one that has spawned six sequels and still continues to thrive by its original creator with a TV series on the way, but 2019’s “Child’s Play” figures out a way to be fresh. One can keep their fondness for 1988’s Tom Holland-directed, Don Mancini-written “Child’s Play”—and its sequels—and not dismiss this clever update on its own merits. Dropping the voodoo angle of the original mythos, where the soul of serial strangler Charles Lee Ray (Brad Douriff) was transferred into a Good Guy doll, director Lars Klevberg and first-time screenwriter Tyler Burton Smith take a more current, high-tech approach that’s not far off from a “Black Mirror” episode about artificial intelligence run amok. As such, “Child’s Play” is refreshingly playful with a demented glee.

The Kaslan Corporation specializes in making life a whole lot easier with its innovative technology, pushing out a line of toy products, particularly a popular “Buddi” doll that can control and connect to other smart household devices. After a disgruntled sweatshop worker in Vietnam disables all of the safety firewalls on one of the dolls and then kills himself, the defective animatronic toy gets dumped into U.S. department store Zed Mart and falls into the hands of customer service employee and single mom Karen Barclay (Aubrey Plaza). Her 13-year-old son, Andy (Gabriel Bateman), is having a tough time acclimating to their fresh start and making new friends. Even though the “Buddi 2” model is fast approaching, Karen wraps up the doll as an early birthday gift and gives it to Andy. Not too impressed at first, Andy then imprints himself on the doll and makes buddies with his new pal who calls himself Chucky. All is going well, until the computer inside Chucky becomes too self-aware and starts to take out those who hurt Andy, like Karen’s jerk of a boyfriend (David Lewis). As Chucky leaves a trail of bodies, Detective Mike Norris (Brian Tyree Henry) investigates. 

Besides carrying over the title, the names of the main characters, and the overall premise of a murderous doll named Chucky, 2019’s “Child’s Play” goes its own way instead of being a note-for-note retread, thus making a case for its own existence. The film has the decency to be aware of its own silliness and how creepy the doll looks even before it goes violent. When Andy makes friends with a pair of siblings, Falyn (Beatrice Kitsos) and Pugg (Ty Consiglio), who live in his apartment building, they sit around and watch “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2,” laughing at the over-the-top carnage on TV. Chucky, meanwhile, mistakes the violence for being hilarious and grabs a knife, as if his behavior is learned through his environment. Thankfully, “Child’s Play” does not go soft on its targeted new generation by being as gory and gnarly as it wants to be, even if children are involved. Chucky is still up to his stab-a-thon, but he also makes use of a rototiller, a self-driving smart car, and a thermostat paired with a circular saw. The film is never particularly scary, although a quick game of peekaboo in a car is tense and creepy, and a piece of murder evidence attached to a watermelon is one of the film’s most morbidly amusing gags. The climax, set at Zed Mart’s “Buddi 2.0” doll unveiling, does crank the carnage up to eleven, but it’s almost as hurried as it is ultimately satisfying.

Aubrey Plaza playing a cool single mom is certainly out-of-the-box casting, and while she does convince and gets a few chances to enliven the role with snarky wit, it approaches thankless status by giving her far less to do than Catherine Hicks’ Karen Barclay in the original film. Brian Tyree Henry is likable as Detective Mike, whose mom Doreen (Carlease Burke) lives down the hall from the Barclays, but he is fairly underutilized as well. Gabriel Bateman (2016’s “Lights Out”), on the other hand, is terrific as Andy and carries most of the film on his shoulders. And how is Chucky? Brad Douriff is so synonymous with Chucky, having voiced the one-liner-spewing killer doll for all seven films in Don Mancini’s series, and while he cannot be matched, it is a rather inspired choice to cast Mark Hamill (whom one might forget has done lot of voice work over the course of his career) as the sweetly menacing voice of this newly designed Chucky. 

Director Lars Klevberg’s direction is surprisingly stylish, coupled by cinematographer Brendan Uegama bringing a colorful slickness and Bear McCreary’s perfect score of malevolent whimsy, and there are a couple of sly visual nods to “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial,” as well as an overt reference to “Han Solo” (“Luke Skywalker” would have been too obvious). This 2019 redux will divide the most protective Chucky fans, but it does dare to separate itself enough from original “Child’s Play” creator Don Mancini’s still-active series that audiences should be pretty entertained and pleased with an alternative version of their favorite ginger-haired, denim overall-wearing bad guy. It’s okay to like both.

Grade: B -