A cop, a watchman, a chicken delivery driver and a homeless lady fight off tiny demonic terrors who kill at the whim for a demon that wants to be reborn in a new body. 

They want to play with you.

Directed by Peter Manoogian

Starring:Tracy Scoggins, Bentley Mitchem and Daniel Cerny

A dynamic duo of undercover police detectives screw up an arms deal so badly that one of them gets killed.  The other detective, Judity Gray (Scoggins), decides to go after the guys who killed her partner AND lover and chases them into an old toy warehouse.  It just so happens the warehouse is home to a demon that’s waiting to be reborn and guess who’s pregnant? What’s this have to do with killer toys? Well the demon, lying in wait for 66 years, uses his remaining power to animate some of the toys to kill everyone else in the warehouse and bring him Judith. One thing I’ve come to learn is to never expect Shakespeare from Charles Band and Full Moon Pictures. (Hard to believe David “Batman Begins” Goyer wrote this, but everyone’s gotta start somewhere.) The toys the demon brings to life: a Jack-in-the-box with razor sharp teeth, a robot that can shoot lasers, a teddy bear with claws, and my favorite, a foul-mouthed baby doll.

Judith winds up getting some unexpected help against the tiny terrors with the always angry night watchmen, the chicken delivery guy the fat ass watchmen called earlier, and a runaway girl who apparently lives in the heat ducts? I’d probably put my money on the toys beating this group of misfits. If you’re getting your life threatened by a killer baby doll, chances are your life sucked in the first place. Meanwhile, while all this is happening, there’s another fight going on. The child version of the demon is battling the cop’s unborn child in another dimension as she watches on. How do they do battle? By playing the card game, War. Subtle. These scenes are spread throughout the movie to show the psychological warfare going on rather than just the gory battle going on outside this dream world, but chances are there’s only one story you’ll be interested in and it doesn’t involve kids playing cards.

Alright, so the story’s there just enough to string you along til you get to the good stuff. The movie’s quite gory, thank God. Teddy bites some fingers off, Jack chews off a dude’s face, Baby Oopsy stabs someone in the face and eye and then my favorite scene. Oopsy goes after the guard with some smack talk. “I can walk, I can talk, I can even shit my pants. Can you shit your pants?” He proceeds to shoot the guard in the leg and stab him in the balls. Yeeeeaah. The weirdest scene is probably when Teddy morphs into a fucking Sasquatch to go after the good guys. Speaking of that…

The blood effects are good, but the puppet effects are very simple. Not that it needed to be overly complicated with these creatures but you can really tell that most of the toys are just hand puppets. Except when Teddy turns into Sasquatch, that’s a full body suit. You’ll rarely see the toys moving on their own on screen, it’s mostly close ups so you don’t see the arms coming out of their asses.  When it comes to these types of films, simpler is sometimes better. Charlie Band basically rips off his own killer toy franchise, Puppet Master, just switching out the puppets for new tiny killers. It’s silly, sometimes downright stupid, but it’s still a gory, entertaining waste of time.

TL;DR

Story: 5 – A motley crew of victims get mostly taken out by toys in a warehouse.  Eh, whatever works.

Blood: 6 – The walls aren’t dripping bloody entrails or anything but the film is messier than you’d expect.

Nudity: 5 – There’s a quick scene with a topless centerfold model that no one will deny is too quick.

Overall: 6 – If you didn’t like Dolls, Child’s Play, Puppet Master and so on…this may not be for you, but if you’re looking for a bloody quick diversion you could do much worse.  One of the better films to come from the Band factory of Full Moon.

Trivia

-The toys would eventually go on to star alongside the puppets in Puppet Master vs. Demonic Toys but it’s the worst ever.

-David Goyer, the writer of the film, was going to direct but the film was given to Peter Manoogian instead since he had worked for Charles Band at Empire Pictures.  Goyer did go on to direct Blade Trinity…yay?