Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991.  The entire show is streaming on Youtube.

This week, on Monsters, a creepy robot gets a bit too possessive of its operator.  How monstrous is this robot?  Read on and find out!

Episode 1.2 “Holly’s House”

(Dir by Theodore Gershuny, originally aired on October 29th, 1988)

This week’s monster is Holly.

Holly is a robot.  (Sitting inside the Holly costume was actor Michael J. Anderson, who is best known for playing the backwards-talking Man From Another World on Twin Peaks and The Man Who Secretly Controlled Hollywood in Mulholland Drive.)  Holly is the star of an incredibly corny and kind of annoying children’s show called Holly’s House.  Every day, Holly deals with her friends, Early Bird and Mike the Mailman.

Mike the Mailman is actually an actor named Lenny (Perry Lang).  Lenny is the sometime boyfriend of Katherine (Marilyn Jones), the actress who not only provides the voice of Holly but also controls the robots movements during filming.  Katherine has been the star of Holly’s House for four years but she has just discovered that she is pregnant.  Katherine wants to quit the show, marry Lenny, and raise her child.  Holly, however, has other ideas….

This episode was basically a variation on the old idea of the ventriloquist being taken over by their dummy.  Is Holly the one who is being rude to Lenny and deliberately ruining the show or is it Katherine acting through Holly?  And when Holly snaps and starts attacking people, is Holly the one doing it or is it Katherine acting out through Holly?  Unfortunately, regardless of whether Holly is acting on her own or not, Katherine is still the one destined to take the blame for all of her anti-social behavior.

Holly was indeed creepy but this episode was still a bit of a let down.  I think the main problem was that there was no way that Holly’s House would have been a success.  I understand that the show’s portrayal of Holly’s House was probably meant to be a commentary on how vapid most children’s shows were but, even at their most vapid, most children’s shows are still somewhat cute.  Holly’s House only has three cast members — an ugly bird, a creepy robot, and an overly cheerful mailman.  There’s not a kid around that would watch that.  Holly obviously wasn’t happy about Lenny encouraging Katherine to quit the show but seriously, the show was probably on its last legs as it was.

One final note: This episode was directed by Theodore Gershuny, who was the ex-husband of cult film star Mary Woronov and who also directed Silent Night Bloody Night and wrote the excellent book, Soon To Be A Major Motion Picture.  While his direction of this episode didn’t really work for me, I do recommend his Christmas film and the book.