Something’s Out There and It’s Killing People! And If It’s Monsters, Nobody’s Going to Do a Thing About it Except Us!: The Monster Squad (1987)

Something’s out there and it’s killing people! And if it’s monsters, nobody’s going to do a thing about it except us!

I first saw this film on a Nostalgia Critic review and thought it sounded absolutely hilarious. When I saw that it was on Amazon, I had to watch it. Then I made my mom watch it with me, then my sister, and then my friends.

If you are a fan of the classic monster films: Dracula, Frankenstein, The Wolf Man, The Mummy, and The Creature from the Black Lagoon, then you will love this! This film brings them all together in a wonderful way,

The film starts off in Europe with Van Helsing trying to seal the monsters into limbo for life, but failing. Instead the spell just makes the monsters pause their hauntings and sleep with all the villagers and Van Helsing being trapped in limbo instead.

Time goes by and we are in a small town in the USA. There we have two boys who are always getting into trouble as instead of paying attention in class they draw monsters. The two kids, (they have names but are never really used so I am going to call them Leader and Sidekick), are in charge of the monster club. The monster club also has their friend who is really young, Baby, and another friend who they call Fat Kid who’s name is actually Horace.

Then there is a new guy who wants to join the club, the Cool guy. He has a leather jacket, smokes cigarettes, has long dark hair. My friend pointed out that he actually looks a lot like Nick from Jimmy Neutron. He doesn’t seem like the type of guy who would be interested in a monster club, but he passes every test. The Leader does not want him to join, but the rest of the team do and he’s on the squad. Cool kid turns out to also be interested in spying on Sidekick’s sister, who lives next door to the clubhouse, and always changes in front of her open, blinds up window. They always do this in movies and it makes zero sense!

Meanwhile, the monsters have arrived. Dracula was having himself and Frankenstein’s monster flown over, but a pilot was too curious and when he realized what they were, he dumped the coffins. Dracula searches for his friend and while doing so wakes up the Mummy, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, and the Wolf Man.

The Leader’s father is a police officer and he is having issues with his wife. She wants him to be home more, but he has to work. He starts investigating the “stolen” mummy and gets called away with someone claiming they are a werwolf. The Wolf man freaks out and is killed at the police station…or is he? Only silver can kill a werewolf, so he resurrects and transforms, taking off to join his monster club.

The leader’s mom bought a Van Helsing book in German a yard sale for his son. She leaves it for him; along with a note that a Dr. Acula wants to buy the book. The Leader has to write it out a few times like he thinks it is an anagram and I’m like it is SO OBVIOUS! What kind of Monster Squad leader are you?

There is a man who lives down the way that speaks German and all the kids like to say he is a spy or monster. The squad go over to have him read the book and find out what it says and he tells them it is a spell to seal monsters away forever. All you need is a virgin to read out the words. Aw, so that must have been where they went wrong in the beginning.

They try to figure out what to do next and where to find a virgin, because even though the spell didn’t say it they assume it has to be a girl, when they are all virgins (maybe not Rudy he is a little older), when the Leader’s sister comes over and wants to join the club again. The boys are all no girls allowed, but then she shows that she has Frankenstein’s monster. They all sit in the treehouse trying to decide what to do next when Frankenstein’s monster acts just as pervy as the boys, looking at sidekick’s sister and takes a picture of her.

The squad finds out that the monsters are hiding out in an old abandoned house, down the street. It turns out that Dracula is there because he is looking for the amulet he needs to have the monsters walk the Earth forever. The squad tries to go in and manage to swipe the amulet, but now the real fight will begin as they have only so much time to complete the spell and seal the monsters away forever.

So the monster experts: the Leader and Sidekick do nothing to try and find a way to stop the monsters. Their only plan of attack is to just talk a lot. The real star of this was the cool guy who makes wooden stakes, melts silver for bullets, steals an archery set from the school to shoot down the vampire brides, etc. He’s really awesome as in the grand battle he takes monsters down left and right.

Horace is also really cool as he has been bullied and hurt, but when push comes to shove he takes out the Creature. It is such a great scene as his previous bullies tell him great job fat kid, and he tells them not to call him that.