Rob Zombie has made a name for himself with his horror-infused heavy metal musician persona as well as his film writing and directing credits.
His first major full-length feature film was "The House of 1,000 Corpses" (2003) even though he had been directing his own music videos as early as 1995.
Most of his productions - just like his music - emphasize his obsession with horror and murder elements.
Zombie's most recent production is a remake of "The Munsters", the classic television series airing on CBS from September 1964 to May 1966 which starred Fred Gwynn and Yvonne De Carlo as Herman and Lily Munster.
This isn't the first time the series was given a reboot; a modern reimagining called "Mockingbird Lane" - a reference to the title family's street address - was produced in 2012 for CBS.
That iteration starred Jerry O'Connell and Portia de Rossi in the Gwynn and De Carlo roles respectively, but only the pilot aired. CBS fridged the project because it got such low ratings.
This newest iteration seemingly appeared out of nowhere like a multiversal doppelganger from hell. The quirky and smartly written family elements are gone and it steers horribly into the macabre, turning this entry into an unnecessary origin story.
Instead of a series, it's a one-off film starring Jeff Daniel Phillips as Herman and Sheri Moon Zombie - Rob's real wife - as Lily. In fact, this project feels like just another in a long line of Zombie uses just to give his wife something to do for work.
The story is boring and the performances are uninspired. In fact, Sheri Moon's performance as Lily feels like she went through trephination because most of what she does is giggle with enough brainlessness to make a Barbie doll cringe.
There's even some weird side plot about a werewolf that owes money for a gambling debt that feels unnecessarily shoehorned in.
Most of the editing is done in such a way that the plot has no coherent timeline; things just happen with more of a vignette vibe than cohesive story.
The jokes are so bland, they're decomposing. Herman gets landed with his surname because it reminds one character of Muenster the cheese, not a play on the word "monster".
The movie also provides its director with an opportunity to use it as a platform to compose the soundtrack, like some kind of goth-horror variant of director Robert Rodriguez ("Desperado", "Spy Kids").
"The Munsters" is just absolutely dreadful ... and not in a good way. It would be a much better movie if it had a more competent writer and director. While Zombie's more serious works have had tons of positive reviews from his fans, it feels like he is out of his creative depth.
This doesn't feel like it was made with fans of the original series in mind and while it is praiseworthy for Netflix to even release the film for newer audiences more prone to streaming than hitting the theaters, the question remains: Why was this movie greenlit and who was it made for?
