Young Andy Barclay has a new friend Chucky to play with, but Chucky has his own ideas on how to have fun with the boy. The movie opens on serial killer Charles Lee Ray (Brad Dourif), the "Lakeshore Strangler," running from Detective Mike Norris (Chris Sarandon). Ray's getaway driver is forced to leave him behind as police give chase, when Norris manages to shoot him. Though Ray manages to break into a toy store to hide, Norris gets a shot off right to his chest, leaving him stumbling around mortally wounded. After declaring that he'll get Norris for this, Ray repeatedly states that he needs to find someone, collapsing at a stack of "Good Guy" dolls. Recognizing an opportunity, Ray grabs a doll and chants a spell as lightning and thunder begin. When he ends the chant, a bolt of lightning knocks Norris into a stack of boxes, and an explosion destroys the store. Norris stumbles out of the wreckage, finding Ray's now-dead body lying next to the Good Guy doll he grabbed before. Elsewhere, 6-year-old Andy Barclay (Alex Vincent) is watching the "Goody Guy" cartoon on his birthday as he prepares breakfast in bed for his mom Karen (Catherine Hicks). He makes an appalling mess in the process, distracted by a commercial Good Guy dolls that say three sentences, move their heads, and blink. Andy becomes excited noticing a large present nearby, and leaves a trail of food and drink taking the breakfast to wake up Karen. She is groggy, but plays with the excited birthday boy and gets up so he can open his presents, changing the TV from a report about Ray's death. Digging into the big box, Andy is unable to hide his disappointment when he finds clothes instead of a Good Guy doll. She suggests he open the other present to find toys, presenting him with a Good Guy tool set. He says he wants a doll to go with it, and she sadly replies that she wasn't able to save up enough money that month. While she's working at a jewelry store, her friend Maggie Peterson (Dinah Manoff) runs over and reveals that a peddler behind the store has a Good Guy doll. Eager to get it for Andy, Karen leaves her station and buys the pricey doll, despite Maggie pointing out that it might not work. Back inside, Karen's boss reprimands her for taking a break and reveals she has to take an extra shift to cover someone who's out sick. Maggie tells the boss to chill out and decides she'll just watch Andy that night while Karen is on the second shift. Before the shift, Karen surprises Andy with the toy, who introduces himself as "Chucky," and she is happy to see Andy so excited. While Andy plays with his tools, Chucky turns his head to watch a news report on Eddie Caputo, the getaway driver from the film's start, who has escaped. Maggie tells Andy to go to bed, despite him saying Chucky wants to watch the 9 o'clock news, so she carries them to Andy's room, carelessly holding Chucky. To Maggie's pleasure, Andy then goes to brush his teeth, but she is startled when the TV come on; Chucky is seated in front of it. She stomps back to Andy's room with Chucky, angry that the boy didn't listen, but Andy is confused, claiming he didn't take Chucky in there. When she leaves, Andy whispers to Chucky that he told him she'd get mad if he watched the news, then goes to sleep. With Karen still at work, Maggie settles in, only to hear Chucky scampering through the house, dragging a chair. Maggie gets up to investigate, finding the chair pushed up to the door, and flour spilled in the kitchen. A call from Karen startles Maggie, and while she admits to being spooked, she assures Karen that everything is fine. While cleaning the flour, Maggie decides to check behind some plants, only to find nothing. She reassures herself, but gets a surprise after turning around when Chucky hits her in the face with Andy's toy hammer, which causes her to stumble back and crash through the window, hurtling down onto a car below. When Karen returns later, police have arrived and taped off the building, so she rushes upstairs in a panic. Upstairs, she finds her apartment swarming with officers, and runs into Andy's room where she finds him safe with Detective Norris. Norris tells her what happened to Maggie, then points out small footprints in the flour on the counter, angering her by suggesting Andy was there. Though none of the shoes in Andy's closet matched the prints, Norris notices that Andy's current pair do before Karen sends the boy to his room. Upset about Maggie and angry at Norris for suspecting Andy, Karen demands some time alone, so he clears the place out. Andy asks Chucky why Norris would care about his shoes, then realizes Chucky's have flour on them. He rushes out to tell Karen and Norris, but his mother sends him away and forces Norris out the door. Norris leaves with his partner Jack Santos (Tommy Swerdlow), revealing Andy's toy hammer as a possible murder weapon, which gets a chuckle out of Santos. Karen hears Andy talking to Chucky, and the boy reveals that Chucky has told him he is really Charles Lee Ray, and that Andy's dad sent him down from heaven to play. He continues that Chucky told him Maggie was "a real bitch who got what she deserved," horrifying Karen, who has to argue with him that Chucky's not alive. Realizing that she's upset about Maggie, Andy promises to stop making up stories and turns down her offer to sleep in her bed, as he has Chucky. Once she leaves, he admits that Chucky was right: she didn't believe him. Chucky turns and sees that Karen is still at the door, so he says one of his normal phrases. She takes Andy to school the next day, but when she leaves, he comes back outside and walks off with Chucky in his arms. With somehow no one noticing, Andy boards a train to a shady area, talking to Chucky the whole time. After finding a rundown building, Andy leaves Chucky in a chair to go pee, and the doll then scampers over to the building. Inside, Caputo wakens as Freddy opens a stove, blowing out the pilot light and turning on the gas, so the man readies his gun. After hearing a noise, he fires blindly into another room, alerting Andy. Caputo almost accidentally shoots the boy, then hears another noise in the kitchen and moves on. Caputo slams open the door and shoots into the kitchen, causing the gas to ignite and blow up the house. Norris calls Karen down after they find Andy at the scene, and Santos is questioning him about Maggie. She tells Andy that if he doesn't tell the truth, they'll take him away from her, so he pleads with Chucky to say something. When he gets no response, he becomes angry and beats the doll, which merely says one of its phrases, and he tells Karen that Chucky is doing it on purpose and had threatened to kill him if he told anyone the truth. The group is interrupted when a psychiatric hospital's head doctor, Dr. Ardmore (Jack Colvin) says he's seen enough and wants Andy to go to the hospital for a while. Karen returns home alone and upset, venting by demanding that Chucky say something and chuckling when he gives a phrase again. When she inspects the Good Guy box, Chucky disappears. Two batteries fall out of the box, causing Karen to realize that Chucky shouldn't be able to speak or move. Chucky has since returned to where he was before, and whens he inspects his batter area, she finds it empty. His head whips around and he says another phrase, causing her to drop him in shock, and he rolls under the couch. She finds him still under there but he doesn't react when she tells him to speak, so she threatens to throw him in the lit fireplace if he doesn't do what she says. Chucky suddenly comes to life again, screaming obscenities and biting her arm. She hurls him across the room, so he dashes outside and into the elevator. She chases him down the stairs, but by the time she gets outside, he's already out of sight, so she rushes to the precinct to talk to Norris. He of course doesn't believe her story of what just happened, though he shows concern for her bite wound. Frustrated, she decides to check with the peddler who sold her Chucky, despite Norris's warnings that the area is dangerous at night. Karen finally locates the man from before, but he demands something in return for telling her where he got the doll, forcing himself on her when she doesn't have much. Norris arrives and saves her,getting the man to admit he got the doll from the toy store where Ray died. Telling her about Ray's threat to kill him and Caputo, Karen becomes sure that he is Chucky. Norris, though tired of her assertions, tells her Ray's address but says it's empty, and drops her at her place, ignoring her warning that Chucky will come for him. Though he doesn't believe her, Norris gets Ray's file from the precinct, and while driving home, Chucky springs up in the backseat to strangle him with cables. Speeding through the streets, Norris manages to burn Chucky with the cigarette lighter, but the doll counters with a butcher knife through the seat. Chucky keeps the car speeding, causing Norris to grind through a tunnel and finally swerve and flip over. Taunting Norris that he can't be hurt, Chucky runs around the car, evading the detective's bullets and retrieving his knife. When Chucky tries to attack, Norris manages to get a shot off directly in his chest, and the doll runs away. Norris goes to Ray's house, where Karen is inspecting wall paintings that point toward Ray's occult background. He reveals that, looking through Ray's file, he discovered his nickname was Chucky, and he spent time with John Bishop (Raymond Oliver), who resembles the painting. Chucky is with Bishop now, surprising the man with his form, and asking why his gunshot wound is bleeding when he thought he was invincible. Bishop reveals that he is slowly becoming human again, and when Chucky demands his help, the man claims he won't do it because Chucky is an abomination who perverted what he was taught. Bishop tries to call the cops, but Chucky tortures him using a voodoo doll until he reveals that he has to transfer his soul to the first person he revealed himself to. This gives Chucky a laugh, since he realizes he'll get to take Andy's body, and he stabs the doll in the chest before leaving. Norris and Karen drive up and find Bishop bleeding out, and he dies after warning them to stop Chucky by going for his heart before he finishes the transfer chant. At the psychiatric hospital, Andy becomes frantic after seeing Chucky. Ardmore doesn't believe his claim that Chucky is there, so he sinks to the floor sobbing. Chucky swipes the keys and enters Andy's room, only for the boy to sneak past him outside with the keys. Ardmore sees the boy running and the hospital goes on alert. After blinding Andy with an operation light, Chucky attacks and the boy is left clutching a scalpel when Ardmore finds him and wrestles it away. As Ardmore tries to sedate Andy, Chucky stabs him with the scalpel and puts an electroshock headband on the doctor, frying him. Norris and Karen soon come to the hospital, where Santos tells the detective what happened and that he thinks Karen would know where Andy went. Karen learns that some other patients saw Chucky before, and tells Norris that Andy would go home if he were in trouble. With Andy at home and Chucky on his tail, it's a mad race back to the apartment as Norris and Karen try to stop the doll. Honestly, I've personally never found Chucky to be as intimidated of a horror icon as some like Freddy or Jason.
Obviously there is a great threat in these movies, as like with Freddy already being dead, there's no way people are going to believe a doll is committing these murders. This gives Chucky the edge, especially because he can easily blend in by acting like a normal Good Guy doll, occasionally blinking and saying a catchphrase. Along with this, his small size allows him to sneak around, and as his go-to method for kills is sneak attacks, he can easily hide. On the other hand, even with his voodoo apparently giving him normal human strength, he is still a doll. In some series, like Halloween and Friday the 13th, even after you know who the killer is, they're still a threat, because the villains have advantages like size and strength. Once you know about and are facing Chucky, he's just a doll, and though he is strong, it's the strength of a normal man. As a doll, he's gonna have limited range and mobility due to his size, and I personally would find it pretty funny to see him punted across a room. In a way, Chucky's situation causes him to behave similarly to Freddy in that, as he knows no one will believe those who talk about him, he enjoys taunting his victims. Because of this, also like with Freddy, he sometimes gets rather silly, and the movies became sillier over time. He does do a great job with this comical aspect, with one of my favorite creepy yet funny moments being when he tells Bishop "I've got a date with a 6-year-old boy" as he leaves to swap his soul to Andy's body. Considering all of that, although I don't exactly find Chucky himself as scary, the movie is still entertaining and creepy, and there's reasons some people have a fear of dolls, Chucky being a likely one. Brad Dourif has always been the one to play Chucky, aside from a section of the most recent film, and his portrayal is enjoyed for good reason. Dourif always gives it his all as Freddy, really selling that he is this psychotic soul and enjoys the sick life he lives. The other actors also give great performances, with one of the most impressive moments to me being when Andy collapses in his hospital room. Vincent does a convincing job of slowly breaking into sobs, really making you feel for the young man whom Chucky is after. I might not have the same reaction as some to Chucky, but this is partially because I didn't see him as soon in life as some, and this classic is definitely still worth watching.
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