Review of Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich (2018) by Rory S — 16 Aug 2018

This film placates more to the fangoria fanbase demographic than it does to fans of the source material; choosing to remove the enriched plot of the first five films and replacing it with as many practical effect gore scenes it's producers felt could fit in the film.

Easily the film's two biggest strengths are its use of practical effects and it's acting talent. The puppeteering is actually top-notch, and most of the gore is delightful for those who are fans of such things. The film does not pretend to take its own violence seriously which offers at the opportunity to explore some very fun kills. I feel the excellent cast was kind of wasted on an underwhelming script. A solid 80% of the characters introduced in this film are dispatched without any sort of introduction. Their first scene is literally their last. With the very small handful of characters who actually do get enough screen time to exhibit any development, their struggles for survival are very underwhelming and when the occasional character dies, it has little emotional resonance. This leads me to what I would consider this film's Achilles heel.

The script is not very good. The concept is solid enough, but it isn't fleshed out at all. Most of the dialogue feels incredibly stiff and blocky. The changes made to the source material end up stripping the puppets and their creator of any Intrigue or personality. Despite all of the advertising for this film heavily boasting the return of such favorites as blade, Pinhead, torch and tunneler, their involvement in the story is incredibly superficial and their personalities are all but non-existent. Many people will boast the cultural significance of a story about not the puppets and hate crimes because of the politically charged environment we live in today, but honestly I feel it could have been done better.

Ultimately, this film had me very torn. As a fan of lowbrow horror Cinema, I enjoyed a lot of things about this movie. The gore was terrific, the comedy was spot-on and the monster effects were great. As a fan of the original series, I feel this film strips away everything that made the source material stand out and replaces it with standard surface-level horror violence. I would say this film has my recommendation to all horror fans besides the most die-hard puppet master fans.