Attack of the Demons

It is evident from the get-go how much time and work went into this project, which makes it all the more heartbreaking to say that it doesn’t work. The voice acting is amateurish, and it’s abundantly clear that no one in the cast has any experience since their attempts to convey genuine emotion are just painful. The dialogue sounds like it was recorded with a low-end microphone in an echoey room, and the monsters look as if they were created by a particularly edgy sixth grader. But all of that could have been forgiven if not for a glaring problem—the script.

Attack of the Demons just takes forever to get to the meat of the story. So until the titular event occurs, we slog through excruciating conversations between our main characters about how difficult it is to be young, how no one understands them, and how the world is boring and unfair. I was not too fond of these conversations when I was in my 20s, and I have no nostalgia for them now that I am old.

“…takes forever to get to the meat of the story.”

But let’s talk about nostalgia. Attack of the Demons is dripping with it. The movie is just soaked in callbacks, references, and attempts to capture that warm fuzzy feeling you get when you’re reminded of something from your childhood. But, here’s the thing: a lot of projects are trying to hit the nostalgia button in our hearts, and I don’t know about you, but I am suffering from nostalgia fatigue. Too many artists have realized that you can get an instant connection to an audience by having a character say, “Remember (X)?”, then the audience says, “Yeah, I remember (X).” Then the viewers feel warm and fuzzy and are more disposed to enjoy the movie. Well, my nostalgia center must be burnt out, because this trick just doesn’t work anymore.

Again, I feel terrible giving this a bad review because it is clear in every second how much time, effort, and love went into the production. But, none of that is enough to make Attack of the Demons enjoyable, let alone watchable.