When it comes to slasher franchises they usually go through four phases: the first phase being the 'good' phase, when the films are of good quality and are generally popular among fans and critics. The second phase sees the films gradually decline in quality before they get so bad that they enter the third phase, the hiatus phase. This usually sees the franchise take a break before they are scrapped altogether or they enter the fourth and final phase: the remake phase. We've seen this happen with many popular slasher franchises, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, Halloween, all franchises that got off to a great start before declining in quality and eventually getting the remake treatment. However, one big slasher franchise has managed to avoid this tragic fate, a franchise that has managed to keep itself going for over 25 years without being remade, rebooted or any of that business. Yes of course, I'm talking about the Child's Play franchise.
Beginning back in 1988 with the original Child's Play film, the series follows serial killer Charles Lee Ray (Brad Dourif) who uses voodoo to transfer his soul into an innocent 'Good Guy Doll' named Chucky to escape death. What follows is a bizarre yet incredibly entertaining saga of films that sees Chucky go to military school, Hollywood, and even starting a family. But how does a franchise about a killer doll manage to maintain itself for over 20 years without being remade, rebooted or scrapped altogether? Well here's a couple of reasons why.
A Good Villain
No horror franchise is complete without its menacing villain, and despite his short stature, Chucky is very menacing indeed. The idea of a maniacal killer being inside something as innocent as a children's toy is unsettling enough, and Chucky's ruthlessness manages to back this up every time he takes a life. He will kill whoever it takes in order to find himself a new body to possess, he is even willing to kill children to achieve this. One of my personal favourite kill scenes in the franchise involves Chucky beating a teacher to death with a yardstick after she kept his target victim Andy (Alex Vincent) in detention and locked Chucky in a cupboard. While Chucky is ruthless in nature, he also has a sense of humour much like fellow movie killer Freddy Kruger. Right from the first film Chucky exhibits this darkly comical side to himself, spouting obscenities and wise cracks at almost all of his victims before ultimately killing them. It's an advantage that Chucky has this humourous side to him as you can't really have a killer doll of all things take himself too seriously. Above all else, he is a well developed character and is allowed enough time to develop in each of his films so that we actually care about what he does next and why he does it. In later films that tend to focus more on Chucky as an anti-hero especially do we see this sense of character development as he goes from murderous doll to family man.It's some of the most interesting character development in a horror film bad guy and is what sets him apart from the likes of Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers. He is crude, he is insane and he is pure evil, yet somehow we can't help but love the little maniac, he's a villain with personality which may not always be an advantage, but in this case it is.
Don Mancini
One of the reasons why slasher films decline in quality is because they fail to maintain consistent writers, new writers and directors are brought in for almost each installment which can lead to changes in the narrative, plot holes and sometimes even changing the story altogether in cases like Halloween: H20. However, the Child's Play franchise has managed to maintain one consistent writer since its very inception, the man behind Chucky, Don Mancini. Not only did Mancini create the character of Chucky in the first place, he has also written every Child's Play film from the original to 2013's Curse of Chucky and the apparent seventh installment currently in the making. Having the one consistent writer right from the beginning is a huge advantage for any franchise, they know their material inside and out, they know what their characters are like and how they would act, and ultimately they know what is best for their franchise. While Mancini has changed the tone of the franchise a few times over the years, he never changes his characters too much which means nothing they ever do is really out of character. Sure, Chucky is more comical in the later films, but he's always had that sense of humour so it never seems inconsistent. His films all take place within the same linear canon which allows for a coherent story and no mix ups with the narrative which is a big advantage for any franchise.
It Keeps Itself Fresh
Many slasher franchises become repetitive after a while as many of the films bare too much resemblance to each other that it's hard to tell them apart, case in point Friday the 13th. However Child's Play has seen a number of changes in tone and style over the years in order to keep it fresh which I feel is it's main advantage. Child's Play, Child's Play 2 and Child's Play 3 all feel like a self-contained trilogy that follows the ongoing rivalry between Chucky and Andy Barclay, the boy who he wishes to possess. In the first film he pursues young Andy, then follows him and his foster family in the second film and even follows him to military school in the third. While the third film isn't terrible, things do start to feel repetitive here and writer Don Mancini took this into account, changing the direction of the franchise in the fourth installment, Bride of Chucky. This takes a more comical, self-referential route that was popular in the 90's with films like Scream, and while the film wasn't popular among everybody, it's hard to deny that this was the right way to go in order to keep the franchise fresh. It even brought in Tiffany (Jennifer Tilly), Chucky's love interest and the titular bride.
The fifth installment Seed of Chucky continues with the comedic tone, becomes even more self-referential and introduces Chucky's son Glen (Billy Boyd), it was an entertaining film but didn't do so well with critics, forcing the franchise to go into hiatus for 9 years. There were talks of remakes, reboots etc. but thankfully Mancini wrote, produced and directed the franchises sixth and most recent installment, Curse of Chucky. It veered away from its rather comedic predecessors and was a much more darker film, a Hitchcockian isolated thriller that follows a wheelchair bound woman (Fiona Dourif) who must survive against the evil doll. This frequent tonal change is important for the franchise to keep with the times and not be too repetitive and it certainly works here. None of the films feel too alike in the Child's Play franchise and they each feel like they bring something new.
Child's Play may not be the longest slasher franchise, or the most critically and financially successful, but it is one that manages to change and adapt itself in order to keep in line with the ever evolving horror genre. It came at the tail and of the great slasher boom of the 1980's, perhaps Mancini learned from the mistakes of past franchises and applied this knowledge to Child's Play in order to avoid the mistakes of other franchises. Regardless of how he did it, Mancini has crafted an entertaining horror franchise with a coherent story that spans over 2 decades, and while it has changed its tone many times over the years, Child's Play manages to maintain its universe from its story, to its characters to Chucky himself. To me, it is one of the greatest horror franchises of modern times.
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