Shocker (1989)
(On Cable TV, September 2022) It does not favourably reflect on Shocker that I had almost forgotten I had seen it two years ago, until the gonzo finale finally sparked a recollection. Writer-director Wes Craven is a horror legend, of course, but his filmography isn’t solely composed of solid hits, and so much of Shocker is dull that the film could easily have gone the way of such forgettable titles as Deadly Friend or The Serpent and the Rainbow if it wasn’t for that crazy finale. Consider the snooze-inducing nature of the premise, in which a serial killer executed by electric chair deals with the devil to transform himself into electricity to further torment his son and kill other victims. This is both crazy and stupid—the kind of premise that can go either way. Unfortunately, much of it is surprisingly generic: nothing more than a crazy villain, a plucky teenage protagonist, plenty of serial killings and not much more going on. No wonder I forgot all about that bit of the film—which is most of it. But then! Our killer becomes electricity and rides the airwaves, prodded by our protagonist. He ends up inside the TV! He’s inserted, via crude special effects, into other TV shows! Suddenly, belatedly, Shocker finds its purpose: somewhere between comedy and horror, tackling one late-1980s TV cliché after another as our protagonist is pursued by a murderous villain through a variety of shows and genres. If there had been a way to make this most of the film, then I certainly would have remembered it more clearly. As it is, however, the channel-hopping comes as a ridiculous but fun reward for a particularly uninvolving film. The interest sharply falls off the moment the two leads exit TV-land for a far more conventional finale atop a TV antenna. There are quite a few interesting names here—Mitch Peleggi as the killer, but also actor-now-director Peter Berg as the teenage protagonist, as well as guest appearances by Timothy Leary, Heather Lagenkamp and Tosh Tesh. Shocker, clearly, should have been something much crazier throughout its entire duration: it hints at the potential to outdo the Nightmare on Elm Street series but settles for a variable series of highs and lows. I just hope I remember enough of that final sequence not to record and watch it again in two years.