Only now does it occur to me... CHILD'S PLAY 3 (1991)

Only now does it occur to me... that just when I thought I couldn't talk about HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH any more than I already do, it rears its beautiful head once more and they reference it in CHILD'S PLAY 3!

CHILD'S PLAY 3 flashes forward eight years past the second installment, with series hero Andy Barclay now a teenaged cadet at a military academy––but, naturally, Chucky the Good Guy Doll is not too far behind.  Anyway, one of the senior officers at the military academy is named "Colonel Cochrane,"


which is a clear nod to HALLOWEEN 3, where Dan O'Herlihy's evil Irish mask factory owner is called "Conal Cochran."  You can imagine my delight at this relatively obscure reference.  I'm starting to think that HALLOWEEN 3 really is a cultural touchstone.

On the whole, CHILD'S PLAY 3 is definitely one of the weaker entries in the franchise, though I have to applaud the continuity and the attention to detail (creator Don Mancini has written every script in the series). For example, a minor toy company exec from part 2 (Peter Haskell) returns in part 3 to meet a gruesome fate,

Dourif gets a "human" cameo during a slideshow briefing,

and we even see what happened to the Good Guy factory after the showdown at the end of part 2.

Elsewhere, Andy Robinson (of DIRTY HARRY, CHARLEY VARRICK, and HELLRAISER fame) has a nice, fun bit as a sadistic military barber,

and the martial setting lends itself to parodies of FULL METAL JACKET, RAMBO, and the like.

And Brad Dourif, as usual, just kills it:

2015 HALLOWEEN COUNTDOWN OVERFLOW

1.  SCANNERS (1981, David Cronenberg)

2.  MICHAEL IRONSIDE: MENTAL SABOTEUR (2014, Karen Stetler)

3.  NOMADS (1986, John McTiernan)

4.  THE STUFF (1985, Larry Cohen)

5.  THE BEACH (2000, Danny Boyle)

6.  CHILD'S PLAY 2 (1990, John Lafia)

7.  NIGHT OF THE DEMONS (1988, Kevin S. Tenney)
8. VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED (1995, John Carpenter)

9. BLACK ROSES (1988, John Fasano)

10. BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, "HALLOWEEN" (1997, Bruce Seth Green) 

11. ANGEL, "THE RING" (2000, Nick Marck)

12. ...