‘Child’s Play 3’ – Let’s Give Some Love to the Franchise’s Most Unloved Movie

The newest member in the killer doll pantheon, M3GAN is currently slaying at the box office, with a sequel already in early development at this time. Of course, killer dolls and toys are a subgenre in and of themselves in horror, and no face shines brighter than that of Chucky.

With M3GAN now providing Chucky with some excellent company on the Killer Doll Mount Rushmore, I think the time has come to give the oft dismissed third entry in the still ongoing Child’s Play franchise a reassessment – the Jack Bender-directed Child’s Play 3.

Long considered the black sheep of the franchise, it’s not particularly easy to find many champions of Chucky’s third outing. Creator, writer, and ongoing franchise shepherd Don Mancini has even voiced his disappointment in his own writing on the film. On top of that, the box office take was underwhelming, and fans are never too enthusiastic about it either. The other maligned sequel, 2005’s Seed of Chucky, appears to be growing in esteem recently due its commitment to being a zany, unapologetically queer sequel. Yet Child’s Play 3 still seems left in the dust.

What gives? I’ll be honest, Child’s Play 3 was the first film in the franchise I had any exposure to as a kid, and I have a soft spot in my heart for it. My appreciation for the film isn’t all nostalgia, however. I think there is more to the film than many fans give it credit for.

Child’s Play 3 has some of the franchise’s most memorable sequences, for starters, one of them being the opening credits where we see the birth of a new Chucky body from the blood of the old. Liquid rubber and blood swirl and coalesce as the credits play; the standout score by Cory Lerios and John D’Andrea accompanies the visuals, setting an intense mood. The credits end as the camera zooms into Chucky’s freshly baked, screaming mouth. Come on, this rules.

Mancini always meant for the franchise to act as a satirical dig at the hyper-capitalization of the toy industry that preys upon children and their harried parents. The third film is the last entry in the series to have the most fun with this concept. The opening scene shows us a board of suits in a smoke-filled room weighing the pros and cons of bringing back the Good Guy doll after so much controversy and death surrounded the brand.

Of course the final decision to make money wins out, and the new line of Good Guys is a go thanks to the boss, Sullivan (Peter Haskill). It’s a scene that only seems more and more astute today as a cynical dig at corporate greed more so than a comedic exaggeration.

Sullivan faces the music shortly after because the first doll off the line is, of course, Chucky. Sullivan’s monetary callousness is literally personified by Chucky. The greed-fueled drive to make money above all else literally brought a supernatural killer back to life.

The Sullivan kill is built up masterfully by Bender, who takes cues from John Lafia’s direction from Child’s Play 2 and keeps the camera low and the lighting heavy with shadow. The look of Child’s Play 3 is an underappreciated strong suit as well. It’s shot by John R. Leonetti, a veteran of the lens that captured many gorgeous looking films including but not limited to Insidious, The Conjuring, The Mask, Detroit Rock City, and the original Mortal Kombat.

Child’s Play 3’s military academy setting is filled with dark wood paneled rooms and chilly gray skies. It’s a moody little slasher sequel, with a finale setting almost as good as the Good Guy factory in the previous film. The nightmarish, neon soaked haunted house ride the final battle takes place in is like a playset from hell, adding to the themes of Chucky being a dark mirror to childhood innocence.

But what of the characters and story? It’s here where some wear and tear is seen. We’re back to the “Chucky’s gotta put his soul into another body” plot device, but there are enough narrative wrinkles to keep the film from feeling stale. Mancini ages the franchise’s first protagonist, Andy Barclay, up to a teenager who is just trying to make it through the system.

Taking over from Alex Vincent, Justin Whalin is affable in the role. Andy is one of the very few male slasher heroes in the genre, and Mancini is wise enough to keep him free of any obvious tropes. He’s just an unassuming kid trying to move past his trauma. Only this time he’s the parental/sibling figure taking on the protector role.

When Chucky meets the young and lonely Tyler (Jeremy Sylvers) at the military academy, he sees an opportunity to stop fucking around with Andy and get the job done once and for all. The middle portion of the film is largely a comedy of errors as Chucky stalks the academy trying to “hide the soul” with Tyler only to be thwarted at every turn. This leads to some fun, but less memorable kills overall – which is a bit of a downside. This is easily the driest Child’s Play film.

The supporting characters are all mostly archetypes and don’t quite have the dimension to them that the previous two films were able to create with their cast of characters, but the script is just smart enough, and the casting solid enough, where nobody truly veers into stereotype territory.

The human villain, Shelton (Travis Fine) is a wannabe Sgt. Hartman from Full Metal Jacket. He’s petty, cruel, and violent. It’s through Shelton and his admiration for the totalitarian regime of the academy that the subtext of the film begins to emerge.

Every relationship in the film is hinged upon projections of rigid masculinity. Shelton and Commandant Col. Cochran (Dakin Matthews) enforce a narrow, toxic ideology on what being a man is. Andy and his bunkmate Whitehurst are targeted and bullied for not conforming to the faux-hardass mentality the school masquerades as discipline and respect. Throughout the first two films Andy is a kid fighting to be believed and taken seriously, and that struggle evolves and clings to him as he grows up.

Tyler is chided and judged for still taking joy in playing with dolls because it’s not what a “man does” despite Tyler being a literal child. Like Andy before him, Tyler just wants to be listened to and taken seriously, but the adult world won’t allow that to happen.

One of the core themes of these first three Child’s Play films is just how dismissive and hostile the world is to children when they don’t fall in line with how we want them to be. Child’s Play 3 is no grand thesis on these films, but it ties a decent bow on them as the narrative prepares to shift gears for Bride of Chucky.

The film’s most outlandish and fun side character, Sgt. Botnick (Andrew Robinson) has a perverse obsession with trimming the hair of all the male students of the academy. Botnick asserts his masculinity by tormenting the students about their hair and making it an intimidation tactic. Of course, it doesn’t go so well for him once he tries to trim Chucky’s hair.

The love interest for Andy, De Silva (Perrey Reeves) suffers the most. She’s not a bad character so much as a fairly stock one. She mostly works as a second foil to Shelton’s bullshit. Still, it’s one of the aspects of the script where you can see why Mancini doesn’t speak highly of it.

As always, Brad Dourif is amazing as Chucky. If you ask me, he gets some of his best zingers and one liners in this film, including…

  • “Nothing like a good strangulation to get the circulation goin’!”
  • “Don’t fuck with the Chuck!”
  • Mocking Andy’s porn stash in his footlocker: “Andy, how you’ve grown.”

Chucky is also highly sadistic here, concocting some of his most mean-spirited kills. Switching all of the dummy ammo to real ammo right before the war games is some dark, dark shit.

Child’s Play 3 isn’t the sharpest entry in the franchise, but it’s still well worth a revisit if you haven’t seen it in a while. I’m of the opinion that Child’s Play is the rare horror franchise without a single dud in the bunch, and Child’s Play 3 acts as a good bridge from the first leg of the story to the second.

So after chilling with M3GAN in theaters, why not pop in to say hello to this often unfairly ignored film in the saga of Chucky. If you ask me, it’s still got some juice in its batteries.

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