I might have seen the first ‘Pumpkinhead’ movie, but I can’t rightfully remember. I mean it was released some twenty years ago, but chance are I didn’t see it because tend to remember just about everything. It probably goes without saying that I also didn’t see ‘Pumpkinhead 2’ or ‘Pumpkinhead 3’ either, but the good thing about this fourth movie, ‘Pumkinhead: Blood Feud’, is that they pretty much fill in all the blanks making it unnecessary to backtrack and watch those other three movies, unless it’s something you absolutely feel the need to do. I’m a little shocked at myself but I would be lying to you if said I didn’t like this latest sequel as it was quite the bloody messy ride through hell.

Our film opens with a couple of dudes on dirt bikes driving like crazy trying to get away from that horrific Pumpkinhead who is on the murderous warpath. Pumpkinhead in this iteration is a mix of CGI and a dude in a rubber suit it seems, though the CGI versions are pretty bad. One dude crashes, and that’s pretty much all she wrote for that cat, but my man Dallas Pope (Rob Freeman) keeps riding and busts into some dudes cabin begging him to call it off. Dude responds with ‘I don’t think so’ and Pumpkinhead busts in, slashes Dallas in the chest who pulls out his gun and shoots the monster, killing it, thus getting rid of Pumpkinhead. Dallas is relieved but the specter of Ed Harley (Lance Henrikssen) appears to let Dallas know that his reprieve is only temporary and that when someone calls up the demon again, his fate will be sealed. Now if you haven’t seen a ‘Pumpkinhead’ movie you may be a bit confused on what just happened, but it’s all explained rather clearly down the road.

Five years later allow us to introduce you to the Hatfield’s and the McCoy’s who, as we can tell by the names, are hicks who have been feuding since the beginning of time.

Ricky McCoy (Bradley Taylor) and Jodie Hatfield (Amy Manson) don’t care about that though as they are young and in love. I had JUST seen Amy Manson earlier in the day in the movie ‘Bloodmonkey’ which kind of confirms something I thought about this movie, but later on that. While stealing some kisses with Ricky’s young sister on lookout, a couple of Hatfield boys stumble upon the little girl and chase her causing her lose her footing and smash her head against a tree killing her instantly, though the boys didn’t know this. They then find their sister with that damn Hatfield boy, lynch him for a little while then go on home. Unfortunately Ricky stumbles upon his dead sister and in an inconsolable rage finds the wrinkly witch Haggis (Lynne Verrall), and against the vigorous pleas by Ed Harley not to do it, Haggis informs the ghost she can’t control what that boy does, so after giving Ricky the detailed 411 about the incredible downside of summoning Pumkinhead, he goes ahead and does it anyway.

Now it is time for some McCoys not named Jodie to die, and die they will in some truly horrific ways. Somebody else who isn’t none too happy about this is Sheriff Dallas Pope who knows he’s also on the Pumpkinhead short list, but at least he has an idea of how to stop it. Ed Harley though informs Jodie she’s the only one who can stop it, by doing the hardest thing ever. Whatever that is. Will Jodie be able to figure out what ‘The Hardest Thing Ever’ is in time to save her kinfolk. It really ain’t looking that positive from where I’m sitting. Body count is getting pretty damn high.

So I liked this horror movie, as it was really more of a Monster Movie than a horror movie and I tend to really like monster movies. The body count was through the roof, the gore factor was off the charts, Director Michael Hurst kept this moving along at a nice pace and gave his film a real nice look. Unlike the ‘Bloodmonkey’ mess I saw earlier this very same day, the filmmakers didn’t waste any time with too much bothersome character development, gave us Pumpkinhead early and often and we didn’t have to wait until the end of the movie to finally get a look at the star of this picture. Plus we had the added bonus of Pumpkinhead 101 laying out who the monster is, who Ed Harley is and why he’s always hanging around and the best way to kill Pumpkinhead. Outstanding!

It’s a good thing you don’t have to know how to really act to be in these types of movies because truth be told it was pretty bad. I’m listening to these ‘hicks’ talk and I’m swearing it sounds like they’re vacillating between the awful southern drawls and British accents and wondering what the hell is going on? Have I gone crazy? Probably, but in ‘Bloodmonkey’ Amy Manson had a British accent, probably because she’s British. Like almost the entire cast of ‘Blood Feud’. Like because this is where this movie was largely shot. I’m sure trying to conceal your British accent is tough enough, let alone trying to sound like what you think somebody from Mississippi sounds like. It was horrible.

Fortunately saying AAAIEEEEE!!!! Or glgug gurgle gulug… or AAARRRGGGHHH! Doesn’t require much of any kind of accent and there was plenty screaming and dying so we could get easily past that. I like a decent Monster Movie and ‘Pumpkinhead: Ashes to Ashes’ was a pretty damn decent monster movie.