Reaction & Review | The Munsters

Welcome, one and all, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna be covering a movie from 2022. That movie is "The Munsters".

Yes, guys, I'm gonna be tackling Rob Zombie's take on this classic family that came out last year. And before I talk about what I know about this movie going in, I should mention that this was a movie that I was originally gonna hold off on reviewing until early next year. However, I noticed there was an extra opening in October for my schedule that I didn't notice until about close to a week ago. And seeing as how the next episode was gonna be on Halloween itself, I figured that this movie would be a perfect choice to put on there for the upcoming holiday. So, this movie will count as an unofficial Halloween special, seeing as how I normally don't do Halloween specials to begin with. I mostly reserve specials when it comes to Christmas movies. But that's neither here or there.

So anyway, as for this movie, as I've made mention before in the past, I LOVE "The Munsters". I watched it growing up as a child, and I even enjoyed that Christmas television movie that I reviewed several years ago. And when I heard that there was gonna be a new Munsters movie coming out, which was also gonna be produced by Rob Zombie, I was genuinely excited in checking it out. Because when I think about it, there really hasn't been anything new, content wise, when it comes to "The Munsters" that's been released for a long time. I've seen a couple of attempts in bringing back "The Addams Family" through animated features, including that "Wednesday" series on Netflix that a lot of people gushed over for a time. Now I don't know if Rob Zombie is the right choice in reviving this classic family back in modern times, but I am gonna find out soon enough when I eventually start watching the movie.

Which then leads into one other thing I have to sorta make mention of. You see, when this movie was in theaters, it was almost completely blasted by critics and and even some fans, saying that this movie is a complete insult to "The Munsters" franchise. And normally, when I hear this kind of criticism, I would usually going to into it with some sort of caution. And while I am sorta going into it with a bit of caution, I also have to remember that I've went into a lot of movies beforehand that have gotten horrible reputations of being absolutely terrible, and I wind up enjoying them quite a bit. Hell, I even went into that Garbage Pail Kids movie a couple of months ago, despite the fact that almost everyone who saw that film claimed that it was one of the worst movies ever made. And after watching it...no, it ended up nowhere near as bad as everyone made it out to be. So you'll forgive me if I go into this thing with some higher tolerance, because I've learned that, sometimes, film critics have no idea what they're even talking about when it comes to the "worst" movie ever made.

But I'm getting a little bit off track here. I'm really hoping for this thing to be better than what it was made out to be. Now yes, there IS that possibility that this movie could actually be really bad, and that I'll probably end up hating this just like almost everyone else did when this thing was in theaters. But I'm still gonna go into this one with some high hopes, because I love "The Munsters" TV series, and I'm hoping this movie will actually be at least halfway decent. So the only way I'll really know if this movie is gonna be any good at all, is if I shut up, and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "The Munsters".

19 minutes later

All right, guys, I'm gonna say this much, so far. The film is starting off a little bit slow, but I will say that I am liking what I'm seeing so far. The only thing that's sorta questionable is the acting, specifically coming Lily Munster. Her acting sounds a little bit off-putting to me. I don't know what it is exactly, but I'm hoping that I'll be able to get use to it as the movie rolls on. Everyone else, so far, has been doing great. Hoping Lily's actress will do the same soon.

11 minutes later

So, Herman's first words are him basically just telling jokes on a talk show. And some of the jokes here are actually kinda funny, and...OK, that was a little bit of a weird reaction from Lily there. But anyway, the jokes from Herman are also a little bit clever, too. I wasn't really expecting that, honestly.

3 minutes later

Oh, and now Herman's an actual rock star...interesting. Granted, his singing isn't really that good, but I can at least say that the music is OK. I mean, at least it's not something like shitty death metal or anything like that. So, I guess that counts for something.

18 minutes later

I'm gonna reiterate this again, guys, Herman Munster's singing is pretty terrible. Now that may be the intention, because "The Munsters" series had this thing where the Munsters family from the show always perceived things as terrible to be good to them. I know that it doesn't sound like it makes any sense, but it kinda does, if you ever watched the show. At least, to me, it makes sense in that context.

13 minutes later

OK, I have a question and it's something I was just thinking about. How exactly are Lily and Lester suppose to be siblings? I ask this, because Lester is being presented as werewolf while Lily is clearly not. I'm only asking, because if they're suppose to be brother and sister, then that means that the Count must've gotten hitched with a female werewolf at some point. Admittedly, I don't know how the genes are suppose to work between a vampire and a werewolf, but it's just something that I was thinking about, considering we've never heard anything about Lily's mother and all. Granted, I understand this is all trivial and fucking stupid, but it is something that I am a little bit curious about.

7 minutes later

Guys, unless my eyes have gotten worse, I think I just witnessed the origin story for how their pet, Spot, was adopted. For those of you who don't know, in the TV show, Spot was their pet dragon that you never physically saw, with maybe one or two rare exceptions, and it always lived under the stairs. I don't think that was ever established before until this movie. And now that I have gotten to learn the possible origin story for Spot, I will say that it was...pretty cool.

2 minutes later

OK, so now I'm actually getting a chance to see what Spot actually looks like up close. And I will say...he does look sorta cute, for a dragon, anyway. Wow, you REALLY do learn something new everyday, don't ya?

19 minutes later

You know, guys, I am gonna say that the music in this movie has been mostly really good so far...and then there's this bullshit techno music that's currently playing. You guys can't hear it for obvious reasons, but this techno music REALLY fucking sucks. Granted, that kinda applies to most techno music in general, but this music is only proving why it sucks in the first place.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "The Munsters". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. So...what to even begin with? Well, I will say that, going into this movie, part of me was thinking that it was going to be just as horrible as a lot of people made it out to be when it was in theaters. And now that I've finally gotten a chance to see this thing for myself, I am gonna say that I actually wound up almost kinda loving it. Now mind you, the movie isn't great, but as someone who grew up watching "The Munsters", this film felt like a treat to me, and I really appreciate the effort Rob Zombie went through in order to make this movie happen.

So with that said, let's talk about the movie itself, shall we? And I'm gonna start with something that I brought up earlier. Specifically, on how critics perceived this movie as being terrible to them. Now I am not here to judge anyone's opinion on this movie if they didn't like it for whatever reasoning. But to a certain extent, I can *kind of* see why some people would have an issue with this movie. For starters, one of the biggest problems this movie has is that the writing almost borders on being plotless. Now that's not to say that there isn't any story here at all, but most of it really goes nowhere, and it doesn't really get resolved. For instance, we have these two grave robbers who try to steal the brain of some dead brilliant scientist from a morgue, and they use it for their own science experiment, AKA the Frankenstein method. However, one of them ends up stealing the wrong brain, and ends up creating what we know as Herman Munster. I should mention that this movie is a prequel to the TV series, and most of it is basically an origin story for how Herman got created, how he and Lily got together, and they, along with Lily's father the Count, end up moving from Transylvania to Mockingbird Lane in California. And that's pretty much it for this movie's plot. Like I said, there's barely any conflict here, and most of it gets dropped by the time the Munsters move to Mockingbird Lane. And I could see this being an issue for some people. But in real honestly, the Munsters TV series, overall, never really had a serious story. But then again, it WAS a sitcom, so I guess that was to be expected. Some sitcoms might try to pull a serious story, but the Munsters doesn't really fit that bill. So I can honestly overlook the story here being almost plotless, considering the nature of that show never had any continuing storylines.

Now since I just mentioned that this movie was based off a sitcom from the 60's, I want to touch upon the movie's humor. One thing I was sort of concerned about was the fact that since this movie was made in 2022, I was concerned that this movie was going to rely on stuff like pop culture references or trying to "modernize" it in some stupid way. And the reason why I put the quotations there is because some studios have some sort of bad habit of slipping in trends that are current at the time, and try to shoehorn it into their movies to feel like they're up to date with how they think modern audiences watches movies. Like, for example, how exactly would Herman Munster interact with bullshit like Tik-Tok? Or what if Lily Munster was too busy taking selfies on Instagram or Snapchat? Stuff like that. Or perhaps they would fit in some sort of political message into the film that is completely unnecessary to the overall story. Thankfully, however, this movie does nothing like. With maybe one or two jokes aside, this movie mostly relies on corny jokes or puns, most of that coming from Herman Munster. And I know some people don't like corny jokes and REALLY hate puns. I myself, personally, don't mind any of it, as long it's decently written. And for the most part, the jokes here are kind of funny. Granted, not all of them are gonna make you laugh out loud or anything, but some of the jokes here, at least for me, wound up with either a chuckle or a grin, or even both. And that's more than what I could ask for when you're making a movie about the Munsters. It's campy, but not to the point where you feel like you want to cringe if it was trying too hard to be funny.

One other thing I want to mention about this movie's writing are the references. And this is another thing that I feel is gonna tie into why this movie wasn't loved by critics. You see, this movie feels like it was made for fans of the TV show. And for those people who've seen it are gonna instantly recognize the references that came from the TV show. For example, any time Herman Munster looks at himself through a mirror, it always cracks. Or how anytime he or Lily Munster appears with him in front of somebody, or even a crowd, the footage would always speed itself up to see the people running away in fright faster than usual. One thing that I was really surprised by was the fact that they actually gave Spot, their pet dragon, an origin story on how he was first discovered and was eventually adopted into the Munsters family. It wasn't something that I was expecting, because, like I mentioned earlier, I don't think they ever explored that aspect before in the show. But regardless, I was happy to see that kind of detail being shown in this movie. However, as I mentioned earlier, this movie feels like it was made for fans of the show. And I have a feeling that a lot of critics who saw this movie never actually watched the show. So I could see them not getting the references, because they would feel that the movie was just throwing in some extra jokes for the sake of comedy. So for those who have have seen the show, they would most likely get the references almost instantly. However, for those who have never seen it, you're probably not gonna understand any of the references that this movie was trying to make. And if that's the case, then I would most likely recommend you go watch the show first before watching this movie in order for you to get the references.

One other quick thing I want to bring up is the film's runtime. It clocks in at about an hour and 50 minutes, and it does kinda show a little bit. It starts off pretty slow, roughly for about the first 20-30 minutes or so. And normally, I would have an issue with some movies taking too long to get somewhere because of their slow pacing. But honestly, and this is gonna sound a little bit biased seeing as how I am a fan of this series, it does flow better as the movie rolls along. And if you're able to stick with it, the rest of the movie is a breeze to get through. However, I obviously can't guarantee that for everyone else who just wants to see their movies get to the point.

So overall, the writing here is mostly decent, barring the non-existent story. And our characters here are all fleshed out and have tons of personality. And what helps it the most is the acting. Being that this was the first Munsters movie in a long time, I wasn't totally sure if they were going to get the right cast members for this. Now as for who they did get to play these classic characters and how they turned out, most of it feels pretty accurate to the TV show. The only weak part of our 3 main cast members would have to go to Jeff Daniel Phillips as Herman Munster. I'm not totally sure what it is, but I feel like, at times, he hammed up his performance a little bit too much for my liking. Now that's not to say that he sucked or anything, or that he was ever going to match the same kind of charm that Fred Gwynne gave to the character, but still, he could've toned some of it down a little bit. But regardless, Jeff Daniel Phillips still did a really good job with what he could do as Herman. I mentioned earlier that I was sorta put off by Lily Munster's actress, Sheri Moon Zombie, at first, but she quickly got more comfortable with the role as the film went on, and she definitely got a lot better. But the best of the bunch, by far, would have to go to Daniel Roebuck as the Count, AKA Grandpa Munster. My God, does this man ever nail this performance perfectly. He almost matches what Al Lewis did back in the day when playing the Count. And even at times, almost outshines him. He is just THAT good at what he does. If there ever is another Munsters movie being made, I would love to see him come back to play as the Count, because he was having a blast with this role. In fact, everybody in this cast was having so much fun with their given roles. Nobody here phones it in, aside from the occasional hiccup with Herman and Lily Munster. But you would have to notice it like I did, and it's mostly just a minor nitpick in the end. So overall, the acting here is great from everyone in this movie.

The sets here look really awesome. You can tell that Rob Zombie was trying to capture the look and feel of the Munsters, and it shows. The sets surrounding Transylvania look creepy, yet they also look colorful and bright at the same time. It really gives off that horror-esque feel without looking too scary. The costuming is a little bit of a mixed bag. At times, it looks like the costumes were made for cheap. However, I also have to consider the TV show, in which it also looked kinda cheap as well. And it's very well possible that this was done intentionally so that it could match as close as it could to how the show looked. Which is another thing that I think for people who have never seen the show will think that this movie is cheapening it out on these costumes and it's effects for real because the movie didn't have a high enough budget to get quality costumes and better effects. But that's just me theorizing there, so you have to take it for what it's worth. The makeup effects look really awesome. Especially on our three main characters, who look just like the characters from back during the day. The special effects involving CG, what little there actually is here, is decent for what it is. So overall, I can say that the special effects look mostly really good in this movie.

Camerawork here is pretty good. The lighting here is great. Like I mentioned earlier, everything here is bright and colorful, and it definitely makes the movie stand out in a positive light...god, that pun was terrible. But anyway, the lighting here works fine. The sound-mix here is mixed really well. The music here is mostly really good, minus that one techno track that plays towards near the end of the movie shortly after the Munsters move to Mockingbird Lane. As I said earlier, techno music in general is not really that good, and the piece of techno music they used here isn't any better. But everything else in terms of music is really good, including right at the end, where they play a remix of the theme song to "The Munsters" TV show, and it sounds great. So for the most part, the music here sounds really good.

Ultimately, guys, when all is and done, am I able to recommend "The Munsters"? For fans of the show, yes. As I've already stated before, this movie was made for fans of the TV show. And as someone who grew up watching the show, I can most definitely recommend it there. It is a great love letter to the TV show, and it definitely sticks to it's roots without trying to modernize it in some way. Now with that being said, can I recommend it to non-fans of the show? Honestly...probably not. If you've never watched the show, then you're probably not gonna want to watch this. If you really want to get into "The Munsters", then I would probably say go watch the TV show before you even considering watching this thing. Because if you go into this movie having no experience with the show, then you'd most likely not get any of the references or nods to the show that this movie was trying to aim for. Also, I don't know if I could recommend this to anyone who has seen any of Rob Zombie's films, because I've only seen just this one, so I can't really comment on any of his previous work. As for how this movie holds up on it's own standards, I would say it's OK, but it is sorta flawed. But as for someone who has seen the TV show, I ended up almost loving it. Again, the movie isn't great, and it certainly is flawed, but it's something that I can mostly overlook. And who knows? Probably on my second or third viewing of this thing, I'll end up loving it even more. For now, though, I think I'm gonna go back and rewatch some episodes of "The Munsters" TV show. I have the first season on DVD, so I'm just gonna go marathon some episodes of that right now, and this thing will definitely have a spot on my DVD shelf.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and have a Happy Halloween. Peace.