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Monkey (2025) Review
A One-Joke Horror-Comedy That Quickly Beats Itself to Death
Some horror movies thrive on suspense. Others lean into absurdity. Monkey (2025), adapted from a Stephen King short story and directed by Osgood Perkins, tries to do both and lands in a muddled middle ground. The premise is as bare-bones as it gets: an evil-looking wind-up toy monkey bangs its little drum, and someone dies in grotesque fashion. That’s it. Rinse and repeat for an hour and a half.
At first, the setup has some bite. The opening death scenes carry a hint of shock value, the characters seem quirky enough, and there’s a curiosity factor in watching how the next “accident” will play out. For a brief stretch, it almost captures that Final Destination energy—the guilty pleasure of waiting for the next over-the-top demise.
But the film squanders that potential fast. Each death is less about suspense and more about setting up a punchline. Once or twice, that works. By the fifth or sixth time, the joke is stale. By the eighth, you’re left wondering if the writers had anything else in their toolbox besides “drum roll → blood splatter → shrug.”
That’s the heart of the problem: Monkey wants to be a horror-comedy but doesn’t succeed as either. The horror never feels tense or threatening, while the comedy leans on cheap gags that undercut any serious themes the story flirts with—like the strained father-son relationship or the curse of the monkey itself. Instead of deepening the narrative, those elements are played off with a wink and a nudge, leaving everything hollow.
Worse still, the second half drags. What starts as absurd fun devolves into what feels like a string of TikTok skits stitched together with buckets of fake blood. The ending, without spoiling it, feels particularly lazy—like the filmmakers wrote themselves into a corner and picked the silliest exit ramp they could find.
To be fair, the film isn’t outright unwatchable. It’s better crafted than most bargain-bin horror flicks, and the production value shows that real talent was involved. If you set your expectations at “mindless gore comedy,” you might even find it mildly amusing. But with Stephen King’s name attached, and Perkins’ reputation for smarter, moodier work, it’s hard not to feel disappointed.
In the end, Monkey is less a terrifying horror tale than a one-joke gag that wears thin long before the credits roll. A silly idea could have made for a sharp, subversive horror-comedy. Instead, it just bangs the same drum until there’s nothing left but noise.
Verdict: A throwaway horror-comedy that squanders its potential. Watch if you’re in the mood for cheap absurdity, but don’t expect scares—or laughs—that last.