Once Episode 4 ended with the murder of a genuine WWE Superstar, there was a feeling that the magnificent lunacy of this genuinely madcap 47 minutes of insane televison simply couldn’t be topped.
Fuck, I love being wrong.
While Doll On Doll brings us back to our regularly scheduled programming, it also manages to keep that manic, anything goes energy of the previous installment that manages to juggle nearly a half dozen complicated plotlines involving numerous characters and multiple Chucky’s that somehow satisfyingly digs deep into the franchise’s lore and serve recurring characters both new and old.
However, even more impressive is that it also grabs the questionable legacy of Seed Of Chucky (usually fingered as the least loved film of the entire franchise) and finally rehabilitates it seamlessly into the worlds of Jake, Devon and Lexy.
Rejoining the face off Episode 3 left us with, the absurdly ripped Strong Chucky faces off with the brainwashed Good Chucky in the office of Father Bryce while Jake and Devon nervously listen at the locked door as this tale of two Chuckys violently plays out. Devon hopes that both the dolls will take each other out, believing that the passive nature of Good Chucky can’t last, but the good Good Guy doll manages to best his muscled twin by crucifying the plastic meat head with some handy knives. However, when Father Bryce arrives, he mistakenly believes that Devon is responsible and finally has an excuse to punish him for his gay lifestyle. Elsewhere, while Nadine and Lexy try and clear up the mangled body of Trevor, they bond (nothing like body disposable to make two people become bffs) and Lexy even manages to throw the remainder of her drug stash away in order to get clean, but their warm moment is sullied when they discover that the body they were supposed to disappear has…. disappeared! However, the most disturbing revelation seems to be when Jake, still reeling from the exploding of his younger step brother, takes even more pity on the seemingly remorseful Good Chucky and even goes so far as to baptise him, making Jake and Nadine his god parents – something that disgusts Devon and Lexy, who follow a lead to finally discover who is the mastermind behind this latest onslaught only to discover that the mysterious “Colonal” is the bald Chucky from Episode one who has gone fully native, Apocalypse Now style and has a still alive Andy Barclay captive.
Elsewhere, in an attempt to divulge each other’s secrets after Glenda escaped with Nica, Tiffany and Glen try to get to the bottom of each others recent behavior only to reveal something of a bombshell. The orginal Jennifer Tilly, still trapped in Tiffany’s doll form after swapping minds, has been a prisoner of the psycho-bitch even since the end of Seed Of Chucky (a revelation that doesn’t do Jennifer’s sister, Meg Tilly, many favors) and after filling in Glen about they’re fucked up family tree, actually manage to reconcile and head out to catch up with Glenda and Nica.
Jesus, that’s is a lot to cram into 47 minutes…
After last week’s belter of a detour into the realms of a meta murder mystery that finally let Jennifer Tilly’s scene chewing Tiffany Valentine take centre stage and reintroduced Chucky’s gender fluid siblings Glen and Glenda back into the mix, Doll On Doll had a lot to live up to. After all, this fifth episode has a lot of ground to cover as we round the halfway mark and sprint for home and we now have quite a potentially unwieldy number of cast members to juggle with an incredible amount of backstory to negotiate. Somehow, someway, the episode actually manages it by taking the trick the show used in Season one by taking the various players from over thirty years of Child’s Play continuity and teaming them up into little groups and impressively doing it in a single episode. So in one camp we have the group of Nica, Glenda and Kyle that was formed last episode who have united to take down Tiffany who take a much needed break here, allowing us to spend more time with our other groups as they form and break. For example, our core gang of Jake, Lexy, Devon and Nadine are fracturing due to everyone’s varying opinions on the self proclaimed Good Chucky who proves himself to Jake by defeating the muscled Chucky in slightly awkward combat (it’s a TV budget, so we’ll give it a pass), but his need to forgive the red-headed little fucker is alienating his friends and further widening the schism between him and Devon who believes no Chucky should be left alive. However, it’s to the credit of the script, the small battalion of puppeteers and Chucky actor Brad Dourif that you genuinely feel for this ex-killer doll whose accessories now come with a conscience. The final straw comes when Jake and Nadine baptise the doll, cleansing him of his past sins and while thread of a good Chucky, while having the full potential to be as cringe worthy as a forty five year old’s Tiktok account, has proven to be a massively interesting shift in the franchise’s status quo.
Elsewhere, while I was certainly eager to return to the main story line, it would still be a major loss to have Tiffany Valentine regress back to a supporting role after the deranged energy she brought to the last episode. However, it’s with great relief that not only do we still get a sizable dollop of Tilly, but she also gets some fascinating progression when its revealed that the soul swapped Jennifer Tilly survived the axe blow to the head in Seed Of Chucky and is still in the form of the Tiffany doll, imprisoned in a cage, doomed to a life of signing checks, answering fan mail and unwillingly earning checks for Tiffany on the side (“For years made you money online poker and voicing Bonnie on Family Guy!”). Not only does this mean that we continue to check some typically awesome exposition from Tilly (“Nica’s my girlfriend… and sometimes your father.”), but the references to Seed just keep coming with Glen forging an alliance with they’re mother and face their legacy by being gifted the Glen doll.
And still the hits keep coming with the show finally takes a hefty punt a religion with Strong Chucky recovering from getting crucified with a heart “I am risen!” and Father Bryce finally breaking cover on Devon’s sexuality; the mystery mastermind behind the most recent Chucky plot being revealed as the slapheaded “Colonal” Chucky (complete with Dourif doing Brando’s Kurtz) and the survival of Andy Barclay. Yes it’s crowded, but the episode still finds room for empathy as Lexy ditches her drug habit and bonds with Nadine and Good Chucky laments about his blood drenched legacy and due to a near perfect balance of plot propulsion and fan service, it all flows incredibly smoothly.
Best episode of Chucky yet? Worship it.
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