If A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting proves anything, it’s that not every book trilogy needs a movie adaptation—sometimes it just needs a nap and a firm “no” from Netflix.
On paper, it sounds like a slam dunk:
💀 Secret babysitter society
👹 Monsters based on kids’ nightmares
🎃 Halloween setting
⚡ Tom Felton as a glam-rock Boogeyman in eyeliner
In execution, it feels like someone tried to make Spy Kids, Monster Squad, and a babysitting PSA at the same time, then dropped the script into a blender labeled “Content.”
Monster Girl vs. The Script
Our heroine is Kelly Ferguson, a Rhode Island teen still traumatized—and publicly branded “Monster Girl”—because a monster attacked her when she was five. This is treated like a social death sentence, which is wild considering this is a high school where kids wear full Halloween costumes in public and nobody blinks.
Kelly:
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Wants to go to a senior’s Halloween party
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Gets volunteered by her mom to babysit Jacob, the nervous, monster-obsessed kid of her boss
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Tries to balance teen social life, trauma, and childcare like a stressed-out Disney Channel protagonist
Jacob immediately shows her drawings of the monsters that torment him, which should tell you that this kid needs either a therapist or an exorcist, not a high school freshman with a flashlight.
Kelly does the classic “monsters aren’t real, you’ll grow out of it” speech, which lasts exactly 3 minutes before Toadies—tiny goblin creatures that look like rejected cereal mascots—kidnap Jacob right out from under her nose.
If you’ve ever wanted to watch a movie where the main character is proven wrong by reality every ten minutes, this one’s for you.
The Babysitter Avengers (Wish.com Edition)
Enter Liz LeRue, elite member of a secret global babysitter society who shows up like a deadpan goth Mary Poppins with better weapons and less job security.
Liz:
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Is part of the Order of Babysitters, a worldwide network dedicated to protecting kids from monsters
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Has a baby sidekick she shamelessly uses as live bait, so that’s… a choice
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Radiates the energy of “I’m too cool for this film, but I signed a contract”
She introduces Kelly to the babysitter HQ at Brown University (sure), where teen babysitters from around the world train to fight monsters using:
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Magical dust
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Special potions
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Gadgets supplied by a guy literally named Curtis Critter
It’s like Kingsman if it were sponsored by Babys R Us and written by someone who thinks “SITs” (Sitters In Training) is a clever acronym.
The movie keeps insisting this is an ancient, powerful, covert organization, but it has the vibe of a student club that meets once a week and mostly shares Pinterest boards.
The Boogeyman: Diet Villain, Full-Sugar Hair Gel
The main villain is the Grand Guignol, aka the Boogeyman, played by Tom Felton in full “I lost the Draco Malfoy wig but kept the energy” mode.
He:
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Has big “overzealous high school theatre kid” vibes
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Wants to use Jacob’s imagination to create an army of nightmare monsters
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Hooks Jacob up to a helmet that extracts his nightmares like it’s some sort of evil NES peripheral
The movie could have made him genuinely unsettling—this is, after all, the guy who traumatized Kelly as a child. Instead, he mostly stalks around scenery-chewing, purring exposition, and looking like he fronted a 2009 emo band that never quite broke out of MySpace.
He’s not scary, but he is committed. He’s the one part of this film that seems to know it’s ridiculous and decides to go full camp instead of pretending otherwise.
The Plot: Side Quest Simulator
From there, the movie becomes a sequence of side quests wrapped in neon-colored chaos:
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Memory dust flashback: Kelly remembers the Boogeyman from her childhood and realizes she has the power to bring dreams to life. The movie treats this like a twist; the audience treats it like, “Yeah, we figured that out about 40 minutes ago.”
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Toadie tracking scheme: They feed a Toadie a tracker, then follow it—like AirTagging a gremlin. This somehow leads them to…
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The Halloween party detour: Kelly’s dream party turns out to be a distraction. There’s a shadow monster, some running around, and the realization that the Boogeyman is still ten steps ahead and the script is three drafts behind.
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The cat’s eye amulet: There’s also a magic amulet he needs, which they fail to stop him from getting. It’s supposed to raise the stakes, but it mostly raises questions like, “Why is everything in this movie solved by vaguely shiny objects?”
All of this feels less like a carefully woven narrative and more like the writer refused to cut any idea from the outline.
Shannon-Level Stakes, Dora-Level Tone
The biggest problem is tonal whiplash.
The ingredients are there for real stakes:
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Kidnapped child
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Childhood trauma
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Nightmare creatures
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A villain who literally steals children’s fears
But every time the movie edges toward genuine menace, it pulls back into:
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Quippy dialogue
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Cartoonish monster antics
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Training montages and cute gadgets
It wants to be a dark fantasy, but it keeps tripping over its own need to be kid-friendly and “fun.” Which is how you end up with:
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A Boogeyman who threatens the world while dressed like Hot Topic’s seasonal manager
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A babysitter SWAT team that somehow makes fighting demons look like an extracurricular
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A kidnapped child plugged into a nightmare machine that never actually feels all that horrifying
It’s like the movie is constantly afraid you might feel too much.
Babysitter’s Guide to Wasting Potential
That’s the real tragedy: the concept has so much potential.
A secret babysitter order? Great.
Monsters born from kids’ nightmares? Great.
A heroine reclaiming her “Monster Girl” trauma and turning it into strength? Great.
But the film keeps taking the safest, blandest route:
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The Order feels underdeveloped, more aesthetic than substance
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The monsters are mostly personality-free CGI gremlins
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Kelly’s arc—bullied “Monster Girl” to brave monster-fighter—is rushed and predictable
By the time she saves Jacob with a magically enhanced “monster punch” (yes, that’s really a thing), you’re less cheering and more nodding like, “Yep, that tracks for this script.”
Final Thoughts: Not Bad Enough to Be Good, Not Good Enough to Be Fun
A Babysitter’s Guide to Monster Hunting ends up in the worst possible spot: aggressively mediocre.
It’s not awful in a glorious, so-bad-it’s-fun way. It’s not sharp or inventive enough to stand out as a new Halloween staple. It’s just… fine. Background noise. The cinematic equivalent of fun-size candy: technically on theme, briefly distracting, instantly forgettable.
If you’re:
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Under 12
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Obsessed with Halloween
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And still impressed by any movie where someone somersaults while holding a glowing vial
…this might land for you.
For everyone else, it’s a reminder that not every babysitter adventure deserves a franchise. Some should just end with, “The kid fell asleep, here’s your money, and no one opened a portal to a half-baked CGI hellscape tonight.”
