Puppet Master vs Demonic Toys

OK, so it may not be the best horror film ever made...actually it is one of the worst purely for the concept of it, but hey its only a film! Basically its Christmas Eve...ish, and the demonic toy company are released yeah you guessed it demonic toys set to destroy everything on Christmas day, BUT! Andre Touloun's great nephew Robert Touloun is there to save the day! Accompianed with our old Puppet Master favourites, him, his daughter and a copper attempt to stop the demonic toys and there seemingly demented master. Yes it is completely predictable and the fight scenes are seriously funny, but Corey Feldmnan makes this film watchable as the bumbling hero with some risqué jokes with the copper and just being a generally lovable character :) don't watch if expecting a plot twisting, mind numbing horror film its just a bit of enjoyable carnage

Before we get into what PUPPET MASTER VS. DEMONIC TOYS represents, lets get into the back history of this film. Back when Charles Band and his Full Moon empire were still financed by Paramount Pictures, he was constantly turning out high quality, low budget features that looked like they were more expensive than they actually were (note that I didn't say that they were, you know, good). Anyway, times changed, people changed, and Band was discharged from Camp Paramount. Everything was in his hands now, and therefore, budgets dropped considerably; franchises that fans were use to seeing excellent SFX (we still miss you, David Allen) and great camera work were now only privy to even LOWER budgeted installments (a great example that ties into this film: Anyone remember the fan backlash at CURSE OF THE PUPPET MASTER?). Band even enlisted J.R. Bookwalter's Tempe Entertainment to make some films for him, and ironically, those films were better than anything Band produced or directed since the Paramount breakup.

Enter 2004. The Full Moon/Shadow Entertainment empire that Charles Band once had has pretty much crumbled beneath its own weight. In whatever circumstance occurred, the Sci-Fi Channel ended up with PUPPET MASTER VS. DEMONIC TOYS (oh yeah, note to someone who mentioned if Sci-Fi owned the old Full Moon movies or something that they would have had an all day marathon: Anything Full Moon that is pre-1996 for the most part is owned by Paramount, and almost all of the films from 1996 to 2003 are either owned by other companies that helped financially or were purchased were Kushner-Locke got bought by Artisan, so in essence, Sci-Fi couldn't have a marathon without buying TV rights for those films), and produced what no one thought imaginable: Charles Band's key franchise of the 1990s that put Full Moon on the map in the hand's of another company without their involvement whatsoever, and a sequel actually being released.

Directed and written by former Full Moon alumni Ted Nicolau and C. Courtney Joyner respectively, PMvDT takes a different approach with the PUPPET MASTER concept, that hasn't been seen in a while: Takes home in the low budgetness of the series, know that it is cheesy.

And when it comes to cheese, no one is better known than Corey Feldman, who plays as Robert Toulon with an "accented" deep voice, who I believe helps the film do what it is suppose to do, and that is just take the ball and run with it. Granted, his acting is nothing impressive (its a PUPPET MASTER movie, no Full Moon or not, its not going to actually be high quality entertainment), but his presence is what makes it so over the top.

The puppet and toy work is as good as it can be, given budget restrictions, and a surprising twist to the puppets (well, not surprising, if anyone remembers the old Full Moon Toys line). Although they are essentially completely new puppets (they are remodeled off of the original David Allen designs of the 90s) from the get-go, it was still fun to see some familiar faces running around.

And also, it works as something different for Christmas flare: The low-brow PG-13 (oh I'm sorry, TV-14) humor and violence actually help it, as it doesn't make it go too over the top, but actually fits right at home, and works well despite some entries in previous series being extremely hard R's.

Give it a shot, if your not into low budget, wrecks of films (and in all seriousness, I mean that in a good way), you're not going to have a good time, but if your a fan, look at this as a new beginning, like when New Line took Jason and made JASON GOES TO HELL and JASON X (well, don't think of those specific films, think of the comparison). But do not go into it expecting PUPPET MASTER 1 through 5 quality, because believe me, that will NEVER happen again.

This should have been a lot better than it was. You have two of the best franchises and Corey Feldman, but the story is lackluster and at times silly. I am probably taking it far too seriously as it's only to be intended as silly gory fun, but the original Puppet Master movie was excellent and so were the first two Demonic Toys, plus Ted Nicolaou directing, since he was the one who directed Subspecies, I thought he could have done a better job. Although he claimed to have not been accustomed to working with puppets and apparently he wasn't happy with the film. Silvia Suvadova as Sergeant Jessica Russell was fun and could actually act. Vanessa Angel as Erica Sharpe is clearly having fun as the villain, and Corey Feldman as Robert Toulon should have been great, but I found his husky voice (I think done to make him appear older,) downright annoying. It's clear that Charles Band didn't have a direct hand in this movie. It's true his company Full Moon produced a lot of crap, but this movie was from two of his best franchises and a very talented director, it's just a shame because it could have been so much better.

There was some real potential there.

I consider myself a huge Puppet Master fan and completest. I own the OOP DVD box set most all of the action figures and even have the original movie poster to Puppet Master III. I'm a Puppet Master nut. I even find the good in the worst sequels. But I'm not sure even I would want this in my Puppet Master collection.

Some would scoff, but this is a slap in the face of the Puppet Master series. I was never a big big fan of the Demonic Toys movies, but I always saw the potential for a good movie being made about a battle between the puppets and toys.

If you went to the official Full Moon website years ago, you would have seen a terrific glorious image of the puppets and toys going head to head. That image was better than the whole of this 'movie'. It just doesn't even feel like one of the Puppet Master movies... As I said before, I never really loved Demonic Toys, but it was a masterpiece compared to this.

It's all just too silly. All the attempted humor misses. And the biggest let down is that there is hardly any kind of fight between the puppets and the toys! I don't think it lasted much more than a minute or so and that was at the very end of the film! Obviously whoever directed this didn't see a Puppet Master movie in his life and didn't care to.

I think I can say the Puppet Master series is unfortunately officially dead.

At least I have my old precious Full Moon DVD's to cherish. Cherish what it all USED to be.

When I first heard about this cross-over, I was eager to watch it, because I've always liked the Puppet Master movies. The only problem was, I had never seen any of the Demonic Toys movies.

But, that wasn't a problem because PM vs. DT didn't have much to do with the DT story-line, or so I've been told. And as for the Puppets . . .

Well, I like how Blade, Pinhead, and Six-Shooter were in it, but, Jester? Why not Drill Sergeant, or Lady Leech? Hell, even Cyclops or Dr. Death would've been better than Jester!

But I digress. The story was enjoyable, and Corey Feldman's acting seemed to be straight out of a '50's B-movie (This Island Earth ring a bell?).

I would've preferred it if the Demonic Toys were in it more, but the Puppets were VERY enjoyable. This is one Puppet Master movie that I will watch again-and-again.

My rating: 7 out of 10.