Viking Night: Killer Klowns From Outer Space

By Bruce Hall

July 2, 2013

I recommend that you tip them.

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Sometimes, everything you need to know about a movie is in the title. And Killer Klowns From Outer Space is literally about Killer Klowns From Outer Space. Everything about this glorious title reminds me of the crap I used to draw on my desk in seventh grade math. Of course, this usually earned me a detention, mournfully scraping half chewed gum from every nook and cranny in the classroom. But it was worth it, since pencil lasts forever. I'd like to think that to this day, children still marvel at my painstakingly detailed sketch of Batman fighting Wolverine on top of Mount Everest. But this isn't about my failed academic career; this is about Killer Klowns From Outer Space - an obscure, low budget horror extravaganza from the year that brought us Rick Astley and Dan Quayle.

The Klowns in question are interstellar circus freaks who find the sweet, savory taste of human flesh all but impossible to resist. And their story starts the same way most horror movies do - in a small town, with a bunch of 30-year-old actors pretending to be teenagers. One night everyone is up at Makeout Point when a meteorite lands nearby, drawing the attention of absolutely no one but frisky Joe Tobacco (Grant Cramer) and his girlfriend Debbie (Suzanne Snyder). Like most kids, they pass up the opportunity to get drunk and screw to go see what they expect to be a flaming hole in the ground.




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What they find is a strange circus tent out in the middle of nowhere. Like Dr. Who's crib, the place is much larger inside than out, and the decor is best described as Death Star meets Pee Wee's Playhouse. They stumble upon a colorful chamber filled with cotton candy cocoons, roughly sufficient in size to accommodate say, a human adult. So shockingly, they find inside them the bloody remains of several townspeople, including a good friend of Joe's. Soon they're interrupted by a pair of grotesque looking aliens, dressed like Klowns, armed with popcorn scatter guns and chattering like demented squirrels. The kids escape, but their intrusion prompts the aliens to unleash a wave of delicious candy coated murder on the unsuspecting town.

Joe takes Debbie to the police station, where her dashing ex-boyfriend Dave (John Allen Nelson) is on duty with his partner Mooney (John Vernon, importing his performance from Animal House), an acerbic old timer who hates teenagers almost as much as he loves whiskey. Mooney mocks their story, as is his way, but Dave is more sympathetic. So after dropping Debbie off at home (consensus: girls should not be exposed to danger) the boys hit the woods, only to find...nothing. Enraged, Dave arrests Joe and they head back to town, only to find a small posse of insane Klowns tearing the place apart and harvesting people like summer wheat. With egg on his face and the city in chaos, Dave has no choice but to join forces with Joe and Debbie to repel the Klown invasion single handedly - with or without mean old officer Mooney and his friend Jack Daniels.


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