Sunday, December 04, 2016

Killjoy's Psycho Circus Returns for a Fifth Outing VOD-style!: A Film Review

*a screener of this film was provided by Full Moon Features for Review.

**spoiler alert.

Killjoy's Psycho Circus could easily have been UHF meets "Power Rangers," had the story been given more of a nerdy kid's style pop culture bent. As a continuation of a franchise and saga about a demon clown summoned to Earth, to cause mayhem and destruction in a willy-nilly manner, is the wait for another movie worth it? Instead of a direct to video release, this latest entry is now on Amazon and Full Moon Streaming.

The previous tales had him reigning chaos like an evil djinn upon unsuspecting mortals. After four films and four years since the last round of daemonic silliness where the titular character went to hell and was put on trial, it's hard to say. To see Killjoy turn web TV talk show host for part of the movie feels like a bit a departure of what to expect from him. While he's as fun as the Crypt Keeper ("Tales from the Crypt"), I wanted more. There are moments to enjoy, like seeing Killjoy interviewing himself (Trent Haaga) without the makeup (and the explosive glory is fun) but this film felt like a departure from what I roughly recall from the earlier films.

All the foul mouthed banter and camp remains, but where's the terror? There's a few suitably gory moments and this film is more about the camp than anything else. Killjoy's comrades in arms, Batty Boop (Victoria De Mare), Punchy The Hobo Clown (Al Burke), Freakshow (Tai Chan Ngo) and Handy (Tim Chizmar) are mising home.

The story gets more exciting when Beelzebub (Stephen F. Cardwell) enters the story like a Sentai style villain (hence the Power Rangers). He is bent on catching Killjoy and returning to Hell with this prisoner to get back his horns. Just why he needs a spaceship is never explained. Production-wise, the digital effects are very good! When this half of the film turns into a Flash Gordon inspired pulp action tale — which I actually liked — any notion of this franchise being a horror comedy is gone as it takes on a tone of Spaceballs (with music sounding like and a moment taken from Star Trek II: Wrath of Kahn).

After watching this latest installment, I'm inspired to pull out my Queen soundtrack to Mike Hodges' 1980 film Flash Gordon and have that playing in the background as I give Psycho Circus another whirl. Sorry KISS, but your album of the same name does not cut it anymore.

Overall: 6 out of 10.

Killjoy selections at Full Moon Entertainment: The Killjoy Series at Full Moon Ent.

Writer Ed Sum talks about film and media on his own site, here: Ed Sum at Otakunoculture


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