A Film That Hates Everyone Equally
Let’s get this out of the way first: Mon Mon Mon Monsters isn’t just a horror-comedy—it’s a full-blown nervous breakdown projected onto a screen. Written and directed by Giddens Ko, this 2017 Taiwanese nightmare is what happens when you give a misanthrope a camera, a budget, and a grudge against the human race. Ko said he made the movie because “millions of Taiwanese people hated” him. I believe it, because he clearly returned the favor.
This isn’t a horror film so much as a hate crime against empathy. It’s Lord of the Flies meets Mean Girls, but without any charm, redemption, or sense that humanity deserves saving. It’s the cinematic equivalent of watching your classmates dissect a frog—except the frog screams, and you realize you’re the frog.
The Plot (or, How I Learned to Stop Caring and Love the Carnage)
The story follows Lin Shuwei, a shy, decent student framed by a group of sociopathic classmates for stealing money. Instead of justice, his teacher decides that character-building means forcing him to do community service with his tormentors. Because nothing teaches moral growth like hanging out with the guys who nearly stabbed you with a dart for fun.
These bullies—led by Renhao, a sadist with the charisma of an expired yogurt—spend their days tormenting the elderly, humiliating women, and being walking TikTok comments. Eventually, they stumble upon two flesh-eating ghouls who live in an elevator shaft (because this is Taiwan, and even monsters can’t afford rent). They capture one, and what follows is less Monster Squad and more Saw: High School Edition.
From there, it’s 90 minutes of increasingly vile torture, interspersed with half-hearted social commentary about morality and mob mentality. The bullies chain up the ghoul, extract her teeth, drill her face shut, and play “scientist” with her blood. Meanwhile, the audience plays “how long before I turn this off.”
A Director’s Therapy Session Gone Wrong
Ko famously made this film to express his rage after a scandal, and it shows. This isn’t horror as catharsis—it’s horror as emotional projectile vomiting. Every frame radiates pure spite. There’s no pacing, no subtlety, no relief. The movie hates its characters, its audience, and possibly itself. It’s like watching someone scream into a blender for two hours and then calling it art.
The bullies aren’t just bad—they’re cartoonishly evil. They’re the kind of people who’d kick a puppy just to see if it squeaks. Their dialogue is a mix of locker-room cruelty and self-help slogans. One of them literally says “I can kill you in a million ways,” which is a bold line coming from a kid who looks like he still gets winded walking up stairs.
And poor Lin Shuwei, the protagonist, isn’t much better. The movie keeps telling us he’s “good,” but he spends half the runtime participating in torture like he’s auditioning for a Clockwork Orange remake. He’s a moral coward in the most depressing way—too weak to stop the bullies, too dumb to leave, and too melodramatic to make his inevitable breakdown interesting.
Monster? Victim? Same Thing, Apparently
The film’s only sympathetic character is the ghoul, and even she gets treated like a lab experiment designed by Satan’s middle schoolers. She’s tortured, mutilated, and eventually weaponized. The movie wants to ask, “Who are the real monsters?” but the answer is obvious: everyone with a pulse.
The creatures themselves are genuinely interesting—a tragic pair of sisters transformed into flesh-eating abominations. They could’ve been a great metaphor for dehumanization or vengeance. Instead, they’re props in Ko’s revenge fantasy, trapped in a plot that confuses “disturbing” with “profound.”
When the older ghoul finally goes on a killing spree, it should feel cathartic. Instead, it’s like watching the teacher’s lounge burn down—part of you cheers, part of you wonders if you should just leave the country.
The Aesthetic of Misery
Technically, the film is well-made, which somehow makes it worse. The cinematography is slick and stylized, drenched in neon grime and urban rot. The lighting is gorgeous, the gore practical, and the camera movements fluid. It’s beautifully shot nihilism—like The Breakfast Club if it were filmed by Satan’s personal DP.
The problem is tone. Mon Mon Mon Monsters calls itself a horror-comedy, but the “comedy” part is buried under mountains of despair. The only laughter it inspires is nervous or unintentional. Watching bullies make the elderly fight each other isn’t funny; it’s sociopathic. The film keeps smirking at its own cruelty like a teenager who thinks being edgy is a personality.
Even the soundtrack can’t decide what it wants to be. One minute it’s techno horror, the next it’s sentimental piano, as if Ko suddenly remembered he was supposed to care about something. It’s tonal whiplash at its finest—you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll wonder why the projector hasn’t spontaneously combusted.
Violence as a Vibe
If Mon Mon Mon Monsters has a message, it’s that cruelty is contagious, and society turns good people bad. A noble idea, sure—but the film delivers it by gleefully wallowing in the same sadism it condemns. It’s like an anti-smoking PSA that chain-smokes through the commercial.
Every act of violence feels performative. Every torture scene goes on just a few seconds too long, like Ko’s trying to see how much you can take before you walk out. It’s not shocking—it’s exhausting. By the time the film hits its climax, you’re numb. Characters burn alive, monsters cry, Lin poisons his classmates, and you’re sitting there thinking, “Okay, but is it over?”
It’s a film that mistakes despair for depth. It wants to make a statement about bullying, justice, and morality, but what it actually says is: “Everything sucks, and if you’re watching this, so do you.”
A Cast of Screaming Meat Bags
Deng Yu Kai as Lin does what he can with a character who’s basically a human doormat. Kent Tsai as Renhao chews the scenery like it owes him money, turning every line into an audition for “Most Punchable Face in Cinema.” The rest of the cast oscillates between overacting and underreacting, as though they’re all trapped in different movies.
Eugenie Liu, as the older monster, deserves better. She’s haunting and feral, managing to convey tragedy under layers of makeup and goo. If this movie had focused on her story instead of the adolescent torture porn, it might have been something special. Instead, she’s relegated to “vengeful ghoul #2.”
Mon Mon Mon Misery
The ending tries to be poetic—Lin poisons his classmates, sets himself on fire, and burns with everyone else. It’s supposed to be symbolic, but it plays like a director yelling, “See? I told you people are trash!” for the tenth time. Subtlety is not on the syllabus here.
You leave the film feeling dirty, not scared. It doesn’t haunt you; it clings to you like moral residue. You can tell Ko wanted to create a brutal allegory about youth and cruelty, but what he made is an emotional dumpster fire that mistakes cynicism for intelligence.
Final Verdict: A Hate Letter to Humanity (Stamped in Gore)
Mon Mon Mon Monsters is well-crafted, well-acted, and deeply unpleasant—like watching a TED Talk about nihilism directed by a serial killer. It’s one of those films that makes you want to shower, then apologize to your reflection.
It’s not without value—it’s certainly unique, and its commentary on mob cruelty hits hard—but it’s so drenched in self-loathing that it forgets to be, well, a movie. By the time the credits roll, you’re not sure if you’ve watched a horror film or a two-hour therapy session disguised as a snuff video.
Rating: 3 out of 10 mon-mon-monsters.
One point for the cinematography, one for the performances, and one for reminding us that humanity truly is the scariest monster of all—especially when it directs movies.
