Some movies make you nostalgic for childhood. Demonic Toys makes you wonder if your Teddy Ruxpin was secretly plotting to suffocate you in your sleep. Produced by Charles Band’s Full Moon Entertainment and directed by Peter Manoogian, this straight-to-video horror comedy feels like someone put Child’s Play, Toy Story, and a flea market Satanist pamphlet in a blender, then poured the result directly onto a VHS tape. And yet, despite its absurd premise, the film manages to waste every opportunity for fun, settling for cheap gore, bargain-bin puppets, and dialogue that sounds like it was written on a cocktail napkin after four shots of Jägermeister.
The Plot: Or, How Not to Arrest Gun Dealers
We open with Judith Gray (Tracy Scoggins), a police officer who looks less like she’s on the force and more like she just stepped out of a late-night soap. She and her boyfriend/cop partner Matt are waiting in a toy warehouse to arrest two illegal gun dealers, Lincoln and Hesse. Seems like a normal sting operation—until Judith casually drops that she’s pregnant and has been dreaming about two boys playing war, one good and one bad. In horror movie terms, that’s called foreshadowing. In real-life terms, it’s called “bad timing during an armed stakeout.”
The sting goes about as well as you’d expect. Matt shoots Hesse, Lincoln shoots Matt, and Judith gets stuck in a building full of dolls possessed by a demon who wants to impregnate her unborn child. Yes, you read that right: not content with world domination or general mischief, this demon’s plan is to crawl into a fetus like it’s a one-bedroom AirBnB.
The Villains: Toys That Should’ve Stayed on the Shelf
The stars here aren’t the humans—they’re the pint-sized nightmares:
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Baby Oopsy Daisy: Imagine Chucky after a three-day meth binge, except this doll has catchphrases like “Wanna fuck?” before stabbing someone in the groin. Someone thought this was comedy. It’s not—it’s a cry for help.
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Jack Attack: A jack-in-the-box that strangles people. Not terrifying, unless you’ve ever actually been startled by a real jack-in-the-box, in which case this might trigger some deeply repressed trauma.
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Grizzly Teddy: Starts out as a small bear, mutates into a man-sized monster. Think Care Bear on steroids with a roid-rage problem.
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Mr. Static: A robot toy who mostly annoys people by zapping them with bad stop-motion effects.
The problem? None of them are scary. They’re not even funny in a campy way. They’re just there, like Dollar Store Halloween decorations that somehow learned to walk. Watching them kill is like watching your nephew smash action figures together and call it a plot.
The “Humans”
Tracy Scoggins, bless her, tries to give Judith some emotional weight, but she’s trapped in a script that treats her pregnancy like a plot coupon for Satan. Bentley Mitchum (yes, grandson of that Robert Mitchum) plays Mark, a fried-chicken delivery guy who somehow becomes the film’s action hero. Because nothing screams “capable savior” like a man whose main qualification is knowing his way around a bucket of drumsticks.
Then there’s Charneski, the security guard, whose main contribution is ordering fried chicken before getting massacred by toys. He is also the only character you’ll genuinely miss. RIP, Charneski—you deserved better.
The Demon’s Plan: Satan Needs a Babysitter
Here’s where things go from stupid to intergalactic stupid. The demon manifests as a kid in a dollhouse lair (because sure, why not) and explains that in order to be reborn, he has to impregnate a woman, possess the unborn child, and eat its soul. That’s right—he needs prenatal real estate to stage his comeback. He’s like a time-share salesman from Hell, looking for the right womb to host his eternal vacation package.
And of course, Judith is the chosen one. Because if you’re a centuries-old demon, you’re not looking for a virgin priestess or a bloodline sacrifice—you’re apparently into pregnant cops with unresolved daddy issues.
The “Action”
The climax is what happens when you run out of budget halfway through filming and just decide to wing it. Judith gets tied to a pentagram, Mark fights a man-sized teddy bear, and a toy soldier suddenly comes to life as a real boy, claiming to be the spirit of Judith’s unborn son. Yes, the fetus is now moonlighting as Rambo in toy form.
The toy soldier shoots the demon, transforms back into a child, and swordfights him while Judith cheers. It’s like watching two kids in a sandbox re-enact The Exorcist with action figures. Eventually, Judith stabs the demon and sends him back to Hell, which is probably where this script should’ve stayed.
The Effects: Bargain Basement Hell
Let’s be fair: this is Full Moon Entertainment. Nobody expects ILM-level special effects. But good lord, even by straight-to-video standards, Demonic Toys looks like it was shot in the back aisle of a Toys “R” Us with puppets purchased on clearance. The gore is rubbery, the stop-motion jerky, and the sets look like someone borrowed them from a high school haunted house fundraiser.
Baby Oopsy Daisy, the supposed “star,” moves like he’s operated by a puppeteer who lost interest halfway through the shot. When he cracks jokes, the lip-sync is so off you start wondering if he’s speaking another language.
Dark Humor Highlights
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Judith’s baby is apparently the battlefield for Heaven and Hell. Which means the sequel could’ve been called Sonogram of Satan.
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The demon’s plan requires him to have sex with Judith while in the body of a little boy. It’s presented so casually you almost don’t notice how wildly inappropriate that is. Almost.
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The “hero” is a fried-chicken delivery guy. Imagine if The Exorcist had been saved by someone from KFC.
Final Verdict: Toys to Stay Away From
In theory, Demonic Toys could’ve been fun trash: killer dolls, gore, campy humor. In practice, it’s a sluggish, tone-deaf mess that’s neither scary nor funny. The toys are dull, the demon is embarrassing, and the plot makes less sense than a toddler’s playtime narrative. If you want killer dolls, watch Puppet Master. If you want demonic pregnancy, watch Rosemary’s Baby. If you want fried chicken, go literally anywhere else.
Charles Band clearly wanted to launch a new franchise. And technically he did—this spawned sequels, crossovers (Puppet Master vs. Demonic Toys), and more straight-to-video atrocities. But Demonic Toys is proof that just because you can make a movie doesn’t mean you should.
