4. Child's Play 3
The jump in quality from the fifth ranked Chucky film to the fourth ranked Chucky film is pretty big to me. Many fans don't consider Child's Play 3 to be that great, but I don't think anyone would deny that it's worlds better then Seed. Child's Play 3 follows young Andy Barclay, the little boy stalked by Chucky in the first two films, as he becomes a teenager and is sent to military school. Unfortunately for him, his old pal Chucky isn't far behind. This is, by far, the darkest of the films. Andy's life has been nothing but misery ever since Chucky entered it and here we see how low he's gotten because of his little friend's murdering ways. This Andy is much older and much more world weary, although new actor Justin Whalin does retain some of Alex Vincent's innocence (the fact that the two actors do resemble each other a bit helps with the time jump as well). Above all, I feel that making Andy significantly older gave this film a great new dynamic to play with. Andy isn't a child anymore. He knows Chucky's game better than anyone. Unfortunately, his militant surroundings and more mature stature make his crazy ramblings far more harmful to him personally then in the two previous films. He's no longer a child with a wild imagination in fear of a time out. He's a young adult making seemingly insane allegations surrounded by hard-case Army lunatics. The setting itself makes the film darker. There's no mom here. There's no spunky, older foster sister. This is Andy against the world and it's a world that doesn't care one bit about his feelings or his tragic background. Once again, the series tries to do something different. Instead of trotting out yet another "Chucky chases little Andy" plot, Mancini attempts to explore, fairly realistically, what life would be like for a child in this situation. How would the world react to a young boy who's constantly surrounded by dead bodies with no other explanation than "my doll did it"? Where would he ultimately end up? It's one thing to kill Chucky. That solves the immediate problem. However, there are still many long-term problems that would logically arise from such a scenario and it was really interesting to see Mancini attempt to look at the situation from a realistic psychological standpoint. Okay, enough with Andy. What about the Chuckster? I think it's safe to say that Child's Play 3 is the film that really, truly fleshes out the character. The first film only barely introduces him. The second gives us more. The third really lets him loose. This is Chucky at his most wise-cracking, most mean-spirited point yet in the series. Not only do we see the indirect results of Chucky on Andy's life, we see the direct results of Chucky's plan to possess the body of a new child, Tyler. Andy is punished and repeatedly bullied as a result of Chucky's actions. The one adult in the whole movie that is anything close to nice to Andy dies of a heart attack at the sight of the little red demon. Even a seemingly innocent game of war games-style paintball is ruined horribly as, in one of the most horrible acts we've ever seen Chucky commit, he loads the guns with real ammunition and watches the kids unwittingly shoot at each other all while throwing live grenades and cracking wise. Probably wasn't a great idea to have a pint-sized psychopath running around a compound with that many projectile weapons and explosives. Nope. Not at all. Ultimately, part of what keeps this entry so low on the list is that the darkness and mean-spirited nature of its story makes it kind of hard to have fun with. While I applaud Mancini for attempting to give the story some depth, there's only so much torment an audience can take in a movie about a killer doll. If Seed of Chucky went too far in the comedic direction, it could be said that Child's Play 3 goes too far in the serious direction. Yes, Chucky does have his one-liners, but it's hard to laugh at anything while you're watching kids shoot at each other. Another detriment to the proceedings is the little actor who plays Tyler. This kid is beyond annoying. He's every plucky, too-naive-for-his-own-good caricature of a kid combined. He makes little Alex Vincent look like Natalie Portman. Now, I may be laying too much on the actor. His role wasn't written that well. But, surely they could have found a kid who could dial it down just a little more. As a result, you find yourself cringing every time he's on screen and not caring terribly whether Chucky possesses him or not. Maybe being possessed by Chucky would have made him less annoying. We'll never know. Finally, the effects here are not good. They're not the worst, but you can't call them good. Child's Play 3 was released less than a year after Child's Play 2, and the main casualty of that rush is the effects. There's no attempt made to make the "still" doll look like the "action" doll. Chucky's angry brow is always larger when he's moving around and nonexistent when he's not. There's no shot of him coming to life. The camera always cuts away. What was a great hallmark of the previous entry is a shabby mess in this one. What's worse is that the inferior effects really take you out of the story as they really are that noticeable when compared to the previous two films. Combine all those elements with a pretty lame level of suspense and you get a film that, while admirable for its attempt, takes all the fun out of what makes Chucky work in the first place.