First Movie REVIEW: MONSTER SQUAD (1987)

In case you missed our post on Wednesday, make sure to check it out here. It'll give you some context for this review.

Now, let’s dive into our review of the 1987 The Monster Squad! If you haven’t seen this one, think of it as The Goonies meets The Universal Monsters. It’s a fun film that balances humor with the seriousness of those iconic monsters we all know and love.

While it doesn’t quite reach the heights of Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein—which had the perfect mix of humor and horror—The Monster Squad still holds its own. It’s a solid movie with plenty of charm and nostalgia.

Rankings:

• Monsters/Villains: 🤖🤖🤖🤖🤖 (5.7)
  Dracula and The Mummy are well done, but The Wolfman and Gillman are about four sizes too big. Who knew that the Wolfman’s chest could grow four sizes too large and his shirt would still fit around his arms?

• Actors/Characters: 🤖🤖🤖🤖 (4.5)
  The kid actors aren’t bad, but the adults were an issue for me. Besides Dracula, the only solid performance came from “The Scary German Dude.” The writers could’ve thrown him a bone and given him an actual name—even something like Hans Gruber would have been better than “The Scary German Dude.” The Dad’s partner was obnoxious and it was a bit of a relief when it took him a solid 3 minutes to get out of his cop car.

• Story: 🤖🤖🤖🤖🤖 (5.2)
  The story is solid, with some 12-year-old boy jokes thrown in. They do a nice job of including old-school monster references. The plot is a bit predictable, but it’s a fun movie to kick off the Halloween season.

• Joe Score: 🤖🤖🤖🤖🤖 (5.5)
  I have a fondness for this movie. I remember watching it as a kid and really enjoying it, but rewatching it shows why we don’t have 12-year-old movie critics. When I was 12, I would have said this was one of the greatest movies ever made! Don’t listen to 12-year-old Joe!

• Overall: 🤖🤖🤖🤖🤖 (5.22)
  This is the highest-ranking movie on the list so far. I’ll have to watch a lot more this weekend!

Stay tuned for more rankings as we continue our journey through the best Halloween movies!