When I was growing up there was nothing I loved more than monsters. I would spend hours watching monster movies, drawing monsters, and reading about monsters. My dad built me a clubhouse that was hidden in the wall of his workshop, and Strange Things Detective Agency was born. My friends and I would think up mysteries to solve around the neighborhood and always blamed the forces of evil or the supernatural for the missing socks or stolen bike. That time in my life was perfect, there was nothing to worry about other than whatever I was interested in and what I was interested in were monsters. Fred Dekker’s kid horror/adventure film “The Monster Squad” took me back to those days of wonder and excitement. It perfectly captures the time in every horror fan’s life when the most important thing in the world was the monster gracing the silver screen or pages of whatever books were available at the time. The film has all the elements that made movies like “The Goonies”, and “Stand By Me” so awesome plus, it has monsters in it.

We have to cool kid, the fat kid (actually called fat kid in the flick), the nerd, the hot girl, and the little sister that gets in the way. Add to the mix variations on all of the Universal Monsters and “The Monster Squad” rises into cult status. The kids have a monster club and meet up in their tree house to discuss the finer points of monster etiquette. That is until Dracula comes to town and brings the worlds most kick ass monsters with him, forcing the monster club to become “The Monster Squad”.

The special effects are great and testament to why traditional effects work better than 3D. Duncan Regehr is phenomenal as Dracula, the evil leader of the monsters who will stop at nothing to bring a reign of eternal darkness upon our world, even if it means he has to kill a few kids to achieve his goal. Another high point of this flick for me is the fact that Dekker didn’t paint a picture perfect family environment for HMAK (head monster ass kicker), Sean Crenshaw (Andre Gower). His mom and dad are constantly fighting and there is a tension in the house that looked genuine.

The DVD is packed with extras like a featurette complete with interviews, audio commentary, trailers and more. So pick up this DVD as soon as you can because “The Monster Squad” is a killer film!