There are movies you watch because they’re great, and then there are movies you watch because they somehow feel like childhood. The Monster Squad is very much the second kind. Not that it isn’t great, more that it is a movie that feels like it was assembled in a laboratory specifically designed to appeal to every weird, horror-loving kid who grew up in the 1980s.
At its heart, The Monster Squad is an old-fashioned kids’ adventure movie. A group of friends, a treehouse, bikes, secret meetings, monsters, ancient curses, and the fate of the world resting on the shoulders of a bunch of kids who probably should be worrying about homework instead. It has the same basic appeal as those great ’80s adventures (think Goonies or the like) where childhood wasn’t treated as a limitation. Kids weren’t merely waiting around for adults to solve the problem. They were the ones who had to save the day.
And then there are the monsters.
Dracula. Frankenstein’s Monster. The Wolfman. The Mummy. The Gill-man. It’s essentially a Universal Monsters greatest-hits package dropped into an E.T.-era kids’ adventure and told to go have fun. There’s genuine affection for these classic creatures underneath all the chaos, but the movie never forgets that monsters are supposed to be fun.
Which brings us, inevitably, to the line. “Wolfman’s got nards!”
It is one of those wonderfully stupid movie moments that somehow became immortal. It was a meme before memes were a thing. The line is funny because it’s delivered with absolute seriousness, and because it perfectly captures the movie’s particular brand of kid logic. These aren’t sophisticated monster hunters. They’re kids. And sometimes defeating the Wolfman apparently involves discovering that the Wolfman has, well, nards.
That’s The Monster Squad in a nutshell: creepy, funny, sincere, ridiculous, and gloriously ’80s. It’s a rare combination that was often aimed for but rarely ever achieved. It is the same combination that made Stranger Things a billion-dollar machine.
If you’re looking for something to continue your Halloween movie season with a big dose of nostalgia, grab some popcorn, gather your friends, and remember when saving the world was a kid’s job.
And whatever you do, never forget:
Wolfman’s got nards.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BX6KrC-PHcQ
