Puppet Master 4 (1993)

If 2023 is the year of the unsung horror franchise middle-era entry (looking at you, Third Saturday in October Part V), allow me to sing to you of Puppet Master 4 (1993), actual historical tagline When Bad Puppets Turn Good. I’ll assume for the sake of this review you share my inclination to identify with monsters (when we watch Jaws, we root for Bruce, and the best Godzilla entries are Shōwa era savior of humanity style) and so, perhaps, you too are a Bad Puppet, occasionally animated by less savory desires not altogether your own. I’ll assume as well you enjoy the storied canon of movies that feature little guys who turn a corner and go “raaggghhh,” i.e. Gremlins, Critters, Munchies, etc. (And if you can’t hear that noise in your head, please know I agonized over how to transcribe it.) If this describes you but you haven’t gotten around to Puppet Master, I suspect there’s little I can say to convince you, but I’d like to argue in general for the intentional franchise entrance mid-stream, the distinctive feeling of which I imagine Third Saturday aims to capture, although I haven’t seen it (too busy watching B movies from the ’90s, clearly). The sort of home video roulette experience only possible in the age of physical media, pre-streaming, particularly common to childhood sleepovers. Direct-to-video B movies presuppose a tear from context, allowing ample opportunity to re-use footage (by no means exclusive to direct-to-video: see previous reference to Godzilla) but no amount of rushed framing truly enables a mid-stream franchise entry to “make sense,” as much as a B movie wants to make sense, anyway. This provides for delightfully absurd viewing, as you either attempt to fill in the gaps or allow yourself to be swept along.

Tasting notes: Stop-motion animation (transcendently realized by David Allen); hellbeasts hell bent on punishing humanity for stealing the gift (?) of AI (topical!); a love interest inexplicably dressed as Nickelodeon’s Doug; sloppy confirmation the franchise’s protagonist was not a Nazi (a detail infuriatingly ret-conned in the most recent main-series reboot from 2018); laser fights; and, as previously hinted at, evil puppets that are pretty cute, making their tiny little noises, tilting their heads inquisitively as a dog’s, one even sporting actual human tiny hands, huge on his tiny body, supposedly provided by a particularly small-handed Production Assistant. Why do the bad puppets turn good? It’s not supposed to make sense. I crave that feeling beyond understanding, where understanding is not the point. I feel that connection you might know too, of subculture: delight found in a thing in the world most people choose not to experience, whether out of fear, more mainstream taste, or simply lack of knowledge.

Tempted to remove one sac for lack of Leech Woman (google Leech Woman and you’ll agree with me), but Puppet Master 4 is a film I hope you’ll treat yourself to watching my recommended way, with little to no context. (Feel free to pair it with Puppet Master 5, its direct sequel, for a Friday double feature, and enjoy some visions of corporate America that can only be compared to the work of Neil Breen, recently featured in the New York Times.) 5 out of 5 sacs of blood.

—Rachel Milligan