I'm currently on a mission to see every single one ever made. So far, the plan is moving along nicely. The main one that I've yet been unable to track down, though, is a made-for-TV film from 1975, Trilogy of Terror. Made infamous by two key characteristics: first, the same actress, Karen Black, starred in all three of the entries, and second, one of the stories featured an African Zuni fetish doll that preceded Child's Play's Chucky in the reigning scary doll standings.
How awesome does that little bastard look?
Overall, Trilogy of Terror is supposed to be tons of cheesy yet capably-creepy fun, but it's unavailable on DVD as far as I can tell, and pretty much never airs on the tube-of-cable-options. Aside from its anthology aspects, a huge reason as to why I'm dying to see it is that the largest writing contribution falls to one Richard Matheson, who---for those who read this site regularly should know, meaning all five of you---is a writing giant in these here parts.
For now, however, I'll have to settle with having only seen its two-decades-later sequel, Trilogy of Terror 2. Directed, like the original, by Dan Curtis, its regarded unanimously as inferior, and riddled by too much cheese and not enough meat. Sadly, I'm here to report that such a negative reputation is justified, because it's pretty much a snooze from story one, the irrtatingly predictable and derivative "The Graveyard Rats," right through to story tres, "He Who Kills," which has earned a slightly warm spot in genre heads' hearts for marking the return of the 1975 flick's bloodlusting Zuni doll. None of the three stories are particularly good, not even Matheson's contribution, the second tale, "Bobby." Granted, there are a few moments of shameful viewing glee to be had here, but ultimately its resting at the bottom run of Horror Anthologies that I've seen thus far. Shit, it's even worse than the bulk of NBC's recent shitshow Fear Itself, and boy did every one of those episodes disappoint to excruciating ends.
Trilogy of Terror 2 is so below-mediocre that I don't even feel compelled to dissect it in extensive measure, so I'll just breeze through all three parts. First up, the opener "Graveyard Rats," which tells the awfully-uninventive narrative of a young hottie (played by total-hottie Lysette Anthony, who gets her 1975-Karen-Black on here by starring in all three parts) married to a prick of an elder millionaire. She's having an affair with her "cousin," who is also a prick (she can really pick them, I guess). Short story even shorter, she and her lover devise a scheme to kill the old coot so she can gain his inheritance, only it turns out that some codes needed to unlock his assets have been buried with him. So the widow and her male-jumpoff do some graverobbing, but are thwarted by terribly-fake-looking overgrown rodent puppets that gnaw off Anthony's pretty face. The end. Saw it coming light years away, and it sucked. Although, the truly-bootleg feel of the rodents' attack is quite entertaining in an awesomely-bad way.
Two pricks for the free-price of one. Prick squared.
The second story, "Bobby," is either one of the weakest Richard Matheson stories ever, or a marginal one that's butchered in page-to-screen translation by director Curtis. Whatever the case is, though, "Bobby" is extremely dull, and made head-achingly annoying thanks to the Bobby character himself: a pre-teen kid brought back from the dead, Pet Sematary style, by his grieving mother (Lysette Anthony again, looking even hotter with pitch-black hair). Of course, he comes back far from his old self, this time a demonic slasher playing the most boring game of hide-and-seek with his "frightened" mother. Bobby's taunting dialogue ("Where are you, Mommy?! Aren't you glad you brought me back, Mommy?!") is poorly acted and badly written, busting past the point of nails-on-a-chalkboard, and making you hope that his mother will just kill the little asshole and end this segment immediately. The story's kind-of-a-surprise ending is good in theory, but misses the mark in this incarnation.
Looks a helluva lot like Yellow Rat Bastard from Sin City, actually.
The last entry (thank God....definitely can't handle more than three turds in one serving), "He Who Kills," follows up Trilogy of Terror '75's "Prey," a Matheson work that introduced the world to that cool-ass Zuni doll. Anthony plays a doctor given the responsibility to inspect the Zuni doll, found at the scene of a double homicide. The badass Zuni comes to, naturally, and makes a couple of museum security guards (one of whom is unconvincingly played by the same guy who was David Spade's dumbass, meathead frat brother in PCU, film lovers) bleed their ways to the afterlife. It then engages in a little toy-vs-sexy doctor battle royale, which I've read pales in comparison to the Karen Black/Zuni throwdown from the first film. I'd sure hope so, because the Zuni's stalk-and-attack here isn't anything remotely special, save for the fact that the Zuni is a great-looking antagonist. Anthony's doctor character makes too many "what a dumb bitch" mistakes, ones so blatantly moronic that even the biggest of belief suspension (and trust, I had mine suspended to maximum capacity knowing that I was watching a killer Zuni fetish doll) can't hide the stupidity. Zuni doll appears to be dead inside a locked suitcase, so why not open the suitcase to check, right? Or, our Zuni friend has been incinerated in a vat of acid (but not totally burned to crisps, strangely enough), so how about you open the vat and check again? You fool. By the time the Zuni overtakes her body and she goes all ax-wielder on a detective for the final reel, I was left thinking, "That Zuni did this dumb chick a favor. Seriously."
Rgardless of Trilogy of Terror 2's lack of success, though, somebody should've given the tiny bastard his own film franchise by now; if that fucking Leprechaun can get one, why not this guy:
It's funny: I watch something like Trilogy of Terror 2 and suddenly my always-flimsy confidence soars a bit. If shit like this gets made and remembered over the years, I can definitely come up with some Horror Anthologies of my own, right? It's a life's dream/goal of mine, and something I'm developing in the head on a daily basis. Sure, the only reason this shit was even made was that it rode the 20-year-old coattails of a respected, Richard Matheson-heavy work, which is something I'll never be able to claim.
But why not a Matt Barone-heavy work that's celebrated equally at some point? A dude can aspire, can't he?
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