Chucky Movies in Order: How to Watch Chronologically or by Release Date - Collider.com
When it comes to longstanding horror franchises, it's hard to find a character with the longevity and ability to adapt to ongoing sociological fears as Chucky.
From psychological thrillers to campy bloodfests to dark comedies, the little redheaded doll has gone through many iterations, all focusing on the loose premise of a doll that is animated with a malicious spirit. Innocuous and cute, Chucky finds his way into intimate familial settings that other monsters would not, giving him an edge of surprise that he exploits over and over. The following list compiles all eight full-length films belonging to the franchise, as well as two short films placed in the order of release. In addition to these films, Chucky has inspired comic books, video games, and a television show that's been slated to release in the fall of 2021.
Chucky Movies in Order of Release Date
- Child's Play - November 9, 1988
- Child's Play 2 - November 9, 1990
- Child's Play 3 - August 30, 1991
- Bride of Chucky - October 16, 1998
- Seed of Chucky - November 12, 2004
- Chucky's Vacation Slides - June 7, 2005 (Blu-ray and DVD release)
- Chucky Invades - 2013 (Curse of Chucky Promotional Tie-in Videos)
- Curse of Chucky - September 24, 2013
- Cult of Chucky - October 3, 2017
- Child's Play - June 21, 2019 (Remake)
Chucky Movies in Chronological Order
There are no prequels yet, so the best way to watch the films is in the order of release, with one exception: the 2019 film is a remake, not a sequel continuing the previous three decades of the franchise, which means it can be watched as a standalone without worrying about the rest of the chronology.
1. Child's Play (1988)
The original Child's Play (1988) film begins with a man who is both a serial killer and voodoo practitioner (Brad Dourif) transferring his soul into the body of a doll after almost dying from a cop's gunshot wound to his chest. Once inside the doll, he is able to infiltrate the life of a boy named Andy Barclay (Alex Vincent), continuing to commit the murders that he would have done in his original body. Directed by Tom Holland, this film was dramatically successful at the box office. So successful, in fact, that it garnered a cult following that would propel the evil doll forward with enough momentum to create a decades-long franchise.
2. Child's Play 2 (1990)
Not only is the second film next chronologically, the same amount of time that lapsed between releases also lapsed in the Child's Play universe. Picking up two years after the events of the first film, Child's Play 2, Andy is now in foster care because his mother ended up in an institution after the previous struggle with Chucky. A strange electrical malfunction brings Chucky back to life, allowing him to take up his previous pursuit of following and tormenting Andy. As with later iterations of Child's Play franchise, Child's Play 2 addresses anxiety surrounding not only childhood but the ways that adults and those in positions of power are reduced to a childlike understanding of the mechanical functions around them, from the dolls that are shipped from a warehouse to the electrical spark that can return life to a deceased serial killer.
3. Child's Play 3 (1991)
Andy just can't seem to catch a break. This time played by Justin Whalin, the boy is now sixteen and ready to destroy Chucky. After all of the negative publicity the company garnered from the previous two films, the Good Guys factory is attempting to re-mold their toys, but the melted wax contains a drip of Chucky's blood, which is enough to bring him back to life in the new doll. Directed by Jack Bender, this is the last film in the franchise to include Child's Play in its title. From here on out, Chucky becomes the recognizable throughline in the films' titles.
4. Bride of Chucky (1998)
Already pretty drenched in camp, Bride of Chucky is where the franchise really takes a turn for the humorous. For the first time in ten years, the character of Andy Barclay gets a break. Instead, this installment focuses on the relationship between Chucky and a doll animated by his former lover and accomplice, Tiffany Valentine (Jennifer Tilly). After the resounding commercial success of the first three films, Bride of Chucky watches more like a parody of itself. Positioned pretty squarely in the middle of the franchise, this moment of levity injects an increased playfulness into the violence.
5. Seed of Chucky (2004)
The sequel to Bride of Chucky, Seed of Chucky is (grotesquely) what it sounds like, featuring perhaps most memorably the dolls using a turkey baster to inseminate a human woman with Chucky's sperm. The film continues with Bride's emphasis on humor and parody, though less successfully from a commercial standpoint. Seed of Chucky begins with Tiffany and Chucky's son, Glen, setting out to learn about the parents he never knew. Don Mancini, who wrote every installment of the franchise apart from the final, 2019 reboot, used this slasher-comedy as his directorial debut. Notably, it was the last of the Chucky films to be released in theaters.
6. Chucky's Vacation Slides (2005)
The DVD and blu-ray version of Seed of Chucky was released a year after it was out in theaters, and those who brought it home got a little something extra: the short film titled Chucky's Vacation Slides. In it, Chucky, Tiffany, and Glen are looking at photographs of their family vacation when Tiffany notices there are corpses behind them. With the conclusion of the last film, she was under the impression that Chucky had quit killing people, so with this revelation, she leaves him, taking Glen with her. Chucky stays behind, watching the photographs until his next victim—a pizza delivery man—arrives.
7. Chucky Invades (2013)
Before Curse of Chucky came out on DVD, four short clips were released as teasers. Together referred to as Chucky Invades, the clips show Chucky infiltrating four different horror films: Psycho, The Purge, Mama, and Drag Me to Hell. These little clips further demonstrate the franchise's commitment to the silliness of the genre. Displayed directly onto the much more serious footage of the films he invades, Chucky can be seen for the subversive, generically undefinable character that has come to be loved and hated in maybe equal proportion.
8. Curse of Chucky (2013)
With Curse of Chucky, director and writer Don Mancini returns to horror after a foray into the realm of comedy-slasher. This plot is much more straightforward and much more in line with the '88 incarnation that started everything. An unwitting family receives Chucky in the mail mysteriously, and once he is in their home, he begins his slasher routine of killing each one of them in succession. There are interesting parallels between Chucky's delivery to the doorstep of a family and this being the first film in the Child's Play franchise to be released straight to video, skipping the publicity of the theater. In this more subtle way, the film can't really avoid its self-referential tendencies.
9. Cult of Chucky (2017)
At the end of the previous movie, the doll was mailed—bizarrely—to the original owner, Andy Barclay, who immediately shot him in the head. Now, four years later, Andy still has the head. But it wasn't enough for Andy to just kill Chucky, so since then he's been continuing to torture the decipitated head, leaving it increasingly deformed. Of course, it doesn't seem like anything will actually put an end to Chucky, and he arrives at the mental hospital where Nica—a survivor from the previous family—is being convinced that she actually committed the murders and Chucky was just a manifestation of her subconscious. The following showdown is nostalgic if chaotic, featuring performances from much of the original cast.
10. Child's Play (2019)
What's convenient can also be monstrous. In this reboot, Chucky responds to a growing fear of machine control. After three decades of the same canon, the Chucky franchise was faced with a studio reboot that set aside the existing timeline (and the paranormal elements of the original franchise). That means this one is a standalone that doesn't tie into the previous films' watch order. The movie starts out with a factory in China, where a worker creating Buddi dolls (AI toys that are able to use the internet to control all of the various smart technologies in a consumer's home) faces horrific working conditions. Before committing suicide, he programs the doll to have none of the ordinary safety features, leading to Chucky's characteristic violent immorality. Child's Play (2019) reiterates the fact that the Chucky, having now haunted three decades of movie-goers, is elastic in his ability to encapsulate historically specific fears including not only autonomous inanimate objects, but those objects that we have breathed life into through rapid technological innovation.
What's Next?
Chucky (2021)
Maybe after all of these installations, you're still feeling like you could use a new iteration of the Chucky franchise. In that case, you're in luck. A TV series, titled Chucky, will premiere on October 12, 2021 at 10 p.m. ET on Syfy and the USA Network. This new show is set to bring back much of the familiar cast, including Dourif and Jennifer Tilly, and will give audiences another chance to get inside the very strange mind of writer and creator Dan Mancini. It will also give audiences a chance to dive back into the original canon after the film reboot, returning to the terrifying timeline established in the previous movies.
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