Fantastic!

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

I should say from the start that I'm a massive fan of the first C.H.U.D. movie, in fact it's one of my favourites of the decade. A shame, then, that BUD THE CHUD is a sequel in name only, and absolutely nothing to do with the first movie. The antagonist is a zombie who escapes some military experiments to wreak the usual havoc in a small town. Gerrit Graham is a good choice for the role, but his character feels like a copy of the similarly-named Bub from Romero's DAY OF THE DEAD, while the film itself is much like RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD PART 2, but even cheesier. The hero is a mulleted Steve Guttenberg impersonator while Robert Vaughn shows up as an army type and has the grace to look mildly embarrassed by the whole thing. With lame jokes and a dearth of interesting plot development, this is very much a below-par film.

The best things about monster movie C.H.U.D. were the creepy critters - all rubbery claws, snaggle fangs and glowing eyes - and the juicy gore (at least in the Director's Cut). C.H.U.D. II: Bud the Chud does away with the creatures, the C.H.U.D now resembling bargain basement zombies with painted faces and joke-store teeth; it also replaces the blood and guts with terrible '80s comedy, making this a serious contender for worst sequel in horror history (yes, even worse than Return of the Living Dead Part II).Brian Robbins stars as obnoxious student Steve Williams, who accidentally loses the cadaver intended for his biology class. So what does he do? He convinces his pal Kevin (Bill Calvert) to help him steal a replacement body from the Winterhaven Disease Control Centre. What the lads don't realise is that their new stiff is actually a frozen C.H.U.D. called Bud (played by Gerrit Graham), the result of a military project to create reanimated super-soldiers who just happen to have cannibalistic tendencies.A really dumb script full of lame humour and dreadful performances all round (Robert Vaughn giving a career worst as military top brass Colonel Masters) go to ensure that this film is utterly cringeworthy from start to finish. Freddy Krueger himself, Robert Englund, has a blink-and-you'll-miss-it cameo as Man in Trenchcoat Walking with Trick-or-Treaters; and he's the best thing about the whole sorry mess.1.5 out of 10, rounded down to 1 for the dancing zombies and the killer poodle.

Unbelievably stupid, tiresome camp comedy sequel to a straight faced original - although it should be noted that "C.H.U.D. II" is a sequel in name only. Its creatures are more like traditional zombies - hungry for brains, once they chomp into somebody or something, that individual becomes a C.H.U.D. too.The outbreak of C.H.U.D.'s in the story is due to the actions of an obnoxious doofus named Steve (Brian Robbins) and his nerdy friend Kevin (Bill Calvert), who swipe a corpse from a "disease control centre" in order to replace a cadaver they lost. Unfortunately for them, their corpse is Bud "The Chud" Oliver (Gerrit Graham), a remnant of a misguided government program to create an ideal soldier. Once unleashed, Bud starts an army that ends up raising Hell at a high school dance.Now, the humour may simply either work for the viewer or not. This viewer found the jokes too forced, and falling flat far too often. Perhaps in an attempt to make up for this, the filmmakers pack their movie with cameos by familiar faces: Larry Linville, Jack Riley, June Lockhart, Norman Fell, Rich Hall, Bianca Jagger, and director David Irving even gets his own mother, Priscilla Pointer, and stepfather, Robert Symonds, to show up. (Pay close attention in order to see a walk-on by an uncredited Robert Englund.) The cast members who fare the best are Graham, who is genuinely funny as Bud, facial expressions, reactions, and everything, and veteran Robert Vaughn, who seems to be having a high old time as the demented colonel in charge of the C.H.U.D. project. Sexy and appealing Tricia Leigh Fisher is a welcome presence as Katie, the female cohort to Steve and Kevin, and together with Graham and Vaughn, she at least makes the movie tolerable. That's not to say that there aren't some good moments along the way, such as one zombie getting decapitated and then constantly kicking his head out of reach. The movie also gets a point for including a zombie poodle before the movie "The Boneyard" (which, coincidentally, also featured Norman Fell).The movie does yield some moderate entertainment, and the level of cheese is hard to resist: the title theme is an only- in-the-80's style hard rock number that is kind of catchy (lyrics by director Mick Garris' wife Cynthia!). Proceed with some caution, unless you really like horror comedies with no brains in sight.Five out of 10.

Well... many years ago, in all my naivety, I rented this one expecting a serious, scary and foul sequel to the original "C.H.U.D.", one of my 80's favorites (not even a guilty pleasure, mind you). After approximately 20 minutes I turned this turkey off, insulted and rather angry. It had absolutely NOTHING to do with the original (other than a very vague reference to the cannibalistic tendencies of the alleged Chuddies portrayed in this movie).Now - the year of writing is 2007 - more than a decade later, with the right mindset and under the influence of a certain person, I decided to give this film another shot. This time determined to watched it all the way through. And, yes, it's totally retarded, but... still some fun and worth a few laughs. It's a pretty dumb horror-comedy that tries to be something like "Night Of The Creeps" or "Return Of The Living Dead, part 2". But it fails completely in being as good. If you like mind-numbingly stoopie horror-spoofs, you still might have some fun with it. Even I did, I'll admit that much. And the climax in the swimming pool was even quite amusing. But I still hold a grudge against it for nearly traumatizing me more than a decade ago. And in the end, it's not much better than, let's say, the zombieësque equivalent of an 80's slasher-spoof like "Killer Party". Hence my rating.