"Kick him in the nards! Kick him in the nards!"
"Wolfman don't have nards!"
"Do it! DO IT!"
Fat Kid delivers a solid kick to the Wolfman's junk. The monster doubles over, howling in agony. Fat Kid is amazed.
"WOLFMAN'S GOT NARDS."
I was nine years old in 1987, when THE MONSTER SQUAD was released. The above exchange between Horace aka "Fat Kid," one of his buddies and an angry (and awesomely scary looking) Werewolf featured heavily in the ad campaign for the film and all the kids at school were talking about it. To nine year olds, kicking the Wolf Man in the balls (and his subsequent reaction) was the absolute height of comedy...
Now that I'm 34... Well, it's still pretty freakin' funny, actually.
THE MONSTER SQUAD was a love letter to the classic Universal Studios monsters from director/writer Fred Dekker, his co-writer Shane Black and makeup F/X guru Stan Winston. Some people love it, some people find it a bit too "kiddy" for their (obviously soulless!) tastes, but one thing pretty much everyone agrees on is that Stan Winston and his team crafted some absolutely jaw-droppingly awesome versions of these classic monsters. From the in-your-face badassery of the Gill Man suit (still one of the best full body monster sculpts ever), to the subtle touch of making all of Dracula's teeth turn pointy when he gets mad (and not just the canines), all five creatures of the night are just a joy to behold.
Remakes don't tend to bother me unless they happen in the middle of an ongoing series (because I always prefer the story to continue rather than suddenly start over), but when I first heard that one of the original producers of THE MONSTER SQUAD, Rob Cohen, wanted to direct a remake... I can't exactly say why, but this one stung a bit. Part of it was certainly that powerful and altogether pleasant nostalgia feeling you get from something you loved when you were the age I was in 1987, and years later still think is pretty awesome (even if it's for different reasons)... but the main reason is that I honestly have a really hard time imagining a better way to tell this particular story.
With that in mind, maybe the remakes inability to get off the ground is for the best.
Speaking to comingsoon.net, Rob Cohen had this to say about THE MONSTER SQUAD:
"(The original) is one of the best things I've ever produced and I wanted to direct (the remake). It's sitting at Paramount. It's a great script. I've been kicking them. Michael Bay has been kicking them. They don't roll over… I don't understand it. I'm hoping that one day we just get a call that they've finally seen the light of day.
It happens all the time. They get onto something and they go, 'The biggest audience we can get is young males between 12 and 16. What do you have that's for young males between 12 and 16?' Somebody says, ''Monster Squad'! Let's do it! Let's do 'Monster Squad'!' It's that crazy."
