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Creepshow was great. A bunch of horror people got together to make an anthology that was deeply mired in corny old horror comics and evoked the same kind of tongue-in-cheek style. It was kind of like a collection of Tales from the Crypt episodes that somehow managed not to suck. Plus, there just aren't enough anthologies out there in general. Creepshow 2 was an underrated followup. Some no talent hack bought the naming rights and made something totally unrelated called Creepshow 3. It's one of these things I only know about because Netflix picks up on what you're doing if you rent enough movies it says you're going to hate and you agree. Nobody seems to find it watchable.
We start off with this stupid flash animated intro thing where a "creepy" little kid abducts someone's dog and then we see him running a hot dog stand all sinister like. So... we're aiming young, I guess? And... now we seem to be setting up the magic TV remote deal. OK, this... actually might be way more in keeping with its namesakes than I was expecting. This is still pretty freaking terrible though. Here's a fun tip to tell if something is going to be enjoyable or not. Just look at the actors when they aren't actively involved in something. Does it seem like they're all having a really good time? If so, it's going to be enjoyable. If they all look like they want to escape, run. Also, holy @#$%. The first button pressed on the magic remote was to "adjust the color" which made everyone but the annoying girl who is arbitrarily our protagonist despite not being the one playing with the remote become black. Also, better actors. The next button is subtitles, which turns them spanish, then... "signal" which I don't think is a remote button generally, and... makes our protagonist horribly deformed... which really breaks the pattern but at least it's more appropriate to a horror movie.
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Also, quality control. She just picked up an old rotary phone, and... dialed it like a digital one. Also, casual F-bomb. So... kids' horror kids can't watch? Also weird- She doesn't seem to mind at all that her hand is a fused mess and her foot is a leaky thing being dragged behind her. Aren't you supposed to be the one sane person? Come on, if you're going to run with a hackey premise, do it right. Eventually she just kinda reverts for the next button press for the heck of it. Next being "off" which makes her super goopy. Again, this would all make so much more sense if everything was effectign her. Anyway, the kindly old scientist across the street picks her up and she reverts to her true form as a rabbit. Uh. OK, did we accidentally grab the last page of a different script or something because that doesn't make the slightest bit of sense.
The next segment starts pretty darn abruptly... and has many more swears to further cement this not reaching the audience that would appreciate it. We've got some guy who is a security guard. I kinda wish you could tell how long my pauses between sentences were. One of these days I might have to try doing these as audio files... but then I'd kinda just be a much less entertaining rifftrax. Still, point is, this guy comes home from work, and hen just putters around. For a while. A long while. Then he goes outside to were some old guy who is supposed to be one of those mysterious chinese shop owners, but I guess they didn't want to push their luck after the "colored" joke so he's just some old white guy selling stuff on the street outside the church (including the remote from the last short because callbacks! Those are funny, right? See, we get jokes! Honest) and long story short he buys a radio antena. For his radio. Which he has for entertainment. Because... the script for this movie was written in the 40's or something? Oh hey, he has a TV too apparently.
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Anyway, the radio talks now. And he gets all freaked out and starts waving his gun around. Because a voice coming from the radio!?! That's not right! Eventually he stops and takes a shower, then the radio starts talking to him in a much more specifically to-him fashion, but now he's not freaking out. Basically, it just tells him he should be less of a slob, and suggests he make himself a sandwich. In a nice soothing voice. So uh... I guess the writer hates his girlfriend. Seriously, this is our premise. A guy has a radio which politely gives him sensible advice, and he says OK, and starts carrying it around with him. It encourages him to flirt with his prostitute neighbor so... we're not going to go the jealous route with this. Is it like... going to be secretly giving evil advice? Was using too much mayonnaise secretly the just and noble path he was swayed from? This is such a weirdly tiny radio too. OK, so...it suggested he tell his other abused wife neighbor to shut up about being locked out of her apartment... but now it's pointing out how someone obstructed a fire escape and that that's something that should be looked into. And... yeah, we totally needed to spend a full minute on him crawling through a window at the top. Again, where are we going with this? Now it's advising he kill squirrels on sight. Can you get a read on this? Is this trying to suggest it's evil? Because, really, squirrels are as evil as they come. OK, yeah, we're going evil. It leads him to a box full of money which... I guess the radio hid there after a bank heist it pulled earlier? It also suggests killing witnesses... then like... immediately after, the witness in question tries to break in, and it suggests not shooting him. So he doesn't, he just kinda fisticuffs him, causing him to fall down the stairs and die, which, is reasonable self-defense, and he ties his girlfriend who sees this up. Apparently he's ordered to kill her too, but does so off-camera because seriously, this is a movie in every way age-appropriate for 10 year olds except for the random smattering of swears. 10 year olds we don't have a lot of respect for.
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Here's a cop come by to question him. He's not suspicious at all, then sees that someone was trying to break in from the doorknob when he's leaving... as opposed to entering, and suddenly gets somewhat suspicious. Aha! Wait no, that makes no sense. Now he's going to leave town immediately, because... that's how you avoid suspicion, right? He's also skipping town with prostitute gal. Apparently the money belongs to her pimp. Because yeah, you totally want to establish connections with people you'd otherwise not be held suspicious of robbing. And now we're playing the jealousy card. OK, radio? You're the one who suggested he flirt with her in the first place. He murders the radio for suggesting he kill the prostitute, who immediately comes back from off camera land and shoots him... and then is in turn immediately shot by her pimp, who's suddenly here in the middle of nowhere. Apparently he has his own magic advice radio... which somehow didn't clue him in to this in time to, you know, hide his money better. Also, he drives away past a road sign with arrows pointing to both Canada and Mexico, so I guess he's headed towards a very non-specific border? Anyway, that's the final image of this one.
Now continuing our vague attempt at connecting these internally instead of presenting them as an anthology (methinks the Creepshow name was appropriated VERY late in the development cycle, reflected only in half-hearted still frame 4-color-izations) we have some other murdery prostitute who apparently lives in the same area. And by murdery I mean she just has like a dozen knives in her glove compartment, and she just kinda... randomly stabs people. I mean, clients obviously, but then also this random old lady on the street. Then a handy expository radio broadcast tells us... what we were just shown, calling her a "serial killer" and also calling cops "cowboys" for some reason. So yeah, this guy calls her over, through the ad on her website... and gee these really aren't very competent police are they. "Hmm... we're after a stab-happy prostitute, and all these villains have a prostitute's website open on their browsers when we find them stabbed to death. It could be anyone!" Also, this guy has no money... which she doesn't care about, but... dear gods this is such lazy and inconsistent writing. Oh, he does have money now. Also he apparently killed the people who actually live in this house, but that's not important. What's important is whether he does or does not have money when first calling this prostitute. Logic people! At his request, she handcuffs him to a bed and blindfolds him, using supplies he provided, and gets ready to stab him. By which I mean she just kinda prods him with a knife a while, which he enjoys, but... what does he think she's doing? Then she stabs him in the heart a bit... and I actually like the blood effects here. Calls him pathetic, takes a shower, I'd like to stress the lack of anything approaching nudity here. Puts on a big frumpy bathrobe... did she go home or is she just... yeah, loitering around the crime scene. As was this guy for that matter. And oh hey, he's a vampire, which isn't a big shock, but he's got this Fright Night style big awesome puppet vampire mouth, and that's never not great. So he kills her, then leaves... in broad daylight. Because this is the sort of vampire who doesn't die from being stabbed in the heart and can walk around in broad daylight. Also, shooting scenes at night is hard, I guess. In fairness, the heart thing makes sense, metal knife.
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OK, 4th and final short. We've got another scientist. Maybe even that first one. He's got candy rainbow glasses frames and a bow tie. He's like, the kind of mad scientist that makes flubber, not monsters. But he's probably going to make a monster anyway. Because bad movie. And... here's the prostitute from last time? Wait, this is an incidental scene we had before. And oh hey, there's the bunny that girl apparently was. All our shorts are officially in a single continuity. He's doing science by pecking at a keyboard and prodding a metal thing with a power drill. OK, I like this guy. He's single-handedly bumping this movie up a grade. Maybe even two. Also, that thing I said about people having fun? Yeah, this guy's having fun. I mean, this is still really terrible and poorly written, but it's enjoyably bad. Anyway, this guy's getting married to a Stepford wife or something, and inviting his 2 favorite old students to the ceremony, so... OK? Not much of a plot, but a plot. One is judging him for cradle robbing, the other suggests that oh yeah, he's totally marrying a robot girlfriend he made for himself. First guy then goes "Well good for him!" Also, Stepford Wife can't pull off robotic bimbo... which is pretty impressive since that's usually what you come off as when you can't pull something off as an actress.
Anyway, yeah, at this point they're both convinced she's a robot, which I suppose means she isn't, because that's how this stuff goes. So do they murder her trying to prove it, or is she just like, a succubus or a rabit or something. Oh, here's more flashbacks of the professor totally being a flubber sort of mad scientist. Or an evil prankster maybe. OK, now they're planning to try and locate her off switch, so... maybe we're going to go with... oh, OK. We're doing the murder thing. I thought they were going with some kind of assumed rape scenario, but no. They're so convinced she's an android that they club her over the head with a paint can, hack her apart with power tools, and are amazed at how he's such an amazing roboticist that there's no trace of circuitry in any of the limbs or brain, or other random bits they're kinda getting into slap fights with. OK, this short? This one is awesome. This is actually funny and taking advantage of the cheesy bad writing atmosphere we have going. I fully approve.. So now they're stashing bits in the fridge and stuff and trying to clean up the blood in a wacky montage sequence while the professor returns with a cake and takes his sweet time in the living room calling them. Then he finds her head, in two pieces, in the stove, and the short ends. Um... OK, that's a weird place to end it.
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And... huh. There's a 5th short? I'm looking at the sleeve here and it gives names for the four I just saw and that's it. Four's the magic number too, so what gives? Anyway, some guy buys a hotdog, gives it to a bum, gets another, then the bum dies from... "bad hot dog." He continues along to work, or... mandatory charity service at a free clinic I guess. Pops some pills, uh... did he intentionally murder that bum? I wasn't really paying attention because I was too baffled by there being a fourth short. Oh, this is mentioned on the blurb, just stuck in the middle for some reason. So yeah, guy's officially a jerk is his deal. We've got some attempted humor here. It's not working. A racist joke of sorts... or two. Uh... can we move on already? This montage is way too long. Oh then he sees the ghost of the bum he killed with a "bad hotdog."
Now we're just bringing the professor back in. Apparently he built the magic advice antenna, and probably the remote, that that bum is selling, and he wants to buy a voodoo book off him. And Jerk Doc is friends with vampire guy. We're making a sincere effort to bring it all together. Further cementing that the title was a last minute acquisition. Oh and here's bum ghost again, at this random party the vampire's throwing, trying to give the hotdog back. Don't think it was intentionally murder though. I guess just... revenge for letting him choke to death on it? He'd kinda already turned to walk away though, and I mean... act of pure charity? And here's another unfunny scumbag doctor montage. Really, mostly he just kinda comes off as being bitter about working in a free clinic nd not so much evil or anything. Like, here's he's saying "Oh, you have an inoperable brain tumor. Have fun while you can, you're doomed. And.... well, OK? He said inoperable. What would you rather he do? Well, yeah, eat the hot dog, but I wasn't asking you Ghost Bum, I was asking the reader. No offense. I'm sure eventually he'll eat the hot dog though, don't worry. Just be persistent in offering it... and... huh. Actually, turns out he just wanted to thank him for the free hotdog this whole time.
Wait wait wait, what now? That was 5 shorts, we should be done. Oh. OK, closure. The professor uses the voodoo book to revive his fiancee and get married anyway. That's good, he deserves a happy ending. I suppose she does too. Then we mention that rabbit thing again. Seriously, could someone explain to me what was up with that first short? Not one thing about it made any sense at all. Then at the end we go back to flash animation, and we're done.
