Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round review
Twisted childhood horror done right.
New movie reviews will not contain spoilers.
Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round
Directed by Aidan Leary
Written by Aiden Leary and C.R. Thompson
Starring Michael Gilio
Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round Review
You probably grew up watching something similar to the show within Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round. From Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood to Pee-Wee’s Playhouse…educational children’s television shows have been popular forever. From Shari Lewis to Captain Kangaroo…Blue’s Clues to Sesame Street…these hosts and programs are a staple of most people’s childhoods. Which makes it a concept ripe for the horror movie treatment. Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round is here to fill that void.
James Jensen (Michael Gilio) plays a Fred Rogers-esque host of a children’s television show. His friends are puppets…led by the inherently creepy monkey with human hands. Things take a strange turn when an episode about forgotten memories begins to affect Jensen…and unlock his own memories.
The first thing you’ll notice about Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round is its commitment to delivering an authentic children’s television show. It looks and feels like a lost episode of an old program you vaguely remember from your own childhood. Without diverting this review too far off course…this is a quality that the deluge of recent horror movies based on actual childhood favorite characters always gets wrong. There hasn’t been one Mickey Mouse, Popeye or Winnie-the-Pooh horror adaptation that actually feels like any of those properties to begin with. Three minutes into Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round…you realize how important that is. The movie does a wonderful job setting the tone…and then pushing things in a surreal direction.
While we know we’re watching a TV show…and Jensen speaks and acts as if he is on one…there is no crew or behind the scenes aspect to the movie. Monkey and the puppets don’t even seem to understand what Jensen is talking about when he mentions it being a show in the first place. This adds to the surreal nature of the movie…and immediately opens itself to the obvious question: What is going on?
It doesn’t take long for things to turn bloody. Jensen does a short skit pretending that his knee is a new character…and then watches in painful horror as his own hands begin to cut that knee with a knife. He manages to turn it into a lesson about healing oneself with bandages…which feels so at home in one of these types of shows it is genuinely unnerving. Michael Gilio sings and dances his way through his increasingly nightmare fueled program with joy. It’s a fantastic performance that sells the concept completely. He doesn’t come across another actual person to act against for a while…when he finally caches up with the post lady he’s been just missing deliver his mail throughout the series. It causes him to break character briefly and identify her as his mother. So yeah…things start getting very weird.
The already eerie nature of the “show” begins to break at the seams as Jensen begins to remember…and probably suffer a psychotic break. The already creepy puppets become darker, creepier and include more human parts. Jensen’s desire to remove himself from the show and his playground pals turns things into a full-on nightmare. He begins to question the nature of his reality and rebel against the “show”. Monkey and his cohorts don’t take kindly to that.
There’s a part of me that wants to compare Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round to the part in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory where Willy Wonka takes the group on that boat ride and things get psychedelic and horrific for a minute. At times, this is somewhat like that. Only with more blood and gore. With impressively done practical effects at that. I’ll just say…watching Monkey with his distractingly human hands play a game of operation is among the best horror scenes of the year.
Eventually we (more or less) learn the truth of Jensen’s situation. It does a good job tying together images and moments that might have seemed random or innocuous at first glance. It provides a fitting ending for Jensen’s struggle to escape his playground trap…and, most importantly, doesn’t get in the way of any of the twisted fun the movie has had getting there. There’s a dark joy to the way it unfolds…some memorable antagonist puppets…and a strong lead performance to combat them. It even manages to impart a lesson in the end. Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round is, finally, twisted childhood horror done right.
Scare Value
Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round gets a whole lot of things right. The visuals are on point. Michael Gilio’s performance is terrific. Jensen’s puppet friends are unnerving. It creates a believable children’s television show and then twists it into a dark, surreal nightmare. With excellent practical gore effects and a reasonably strong finish…Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round is what movies like Five Nights at Freddy’s or any of the public domain horror movies wish they were. While some pacing issues briefly sag the story about an hour in…Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round ends with a flourish…and delivers on the whole.
3.5/5
Monkey’s Magic Merry Go Round Link
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Streaming on SCREAMBOX
