Macabre...ish Horror Review: The Shed

The Shed, 2019/ 1 hr 39 min

A man, Joe Bane, is hunting a monster in the woods but he is unsuccessful and is bitten instead. When sun comes out and reduces it to ashes and scorches the man’s skin, he learns quick that he has to get out of the sun. So he takes refuge in a nearby garden shed.

The shed is in the yard of a kid, Stanley (Jay Jay Warren), who lives with his granddad, Ellis (Timothy Bottoms) who is a hard man, Stan lives with him after he lost his parents. And when he goes to school, he’s bullied all day. He and his buddy, Dommer (Cody Kostro). When he realizes there’s a vampire in his shed after finding a pile of teeth on a work bench. Stan accidentally feeds the beast his dog. Then his grandad. When he tries to confront whoever in the hell killed his dog.

Stan grabs a chain and boards and locks up the shed. He doesn’t call the police because he’s on probation. So when his friend comes over after being jumped again after Stan is narrowly attacked by the shed monster, Dommer has an idea. And a bad one.

He wants to use the monster to get rid of their bullies.

Meanwhile, Sheriff Dorney (Siobhan Fallon Hogan) is looking for Joe Bane who went missing days ago and Stanley’s granddad.  It gets bad when the sheriff shows up and find the shed boarded up, then one of the bullies, Marble (Chris Petrovski). Also, after years of being bullied, Dommer is slipping and Stanley can’t stop what’s coming next.

P.S. I don’t want to leave out Roxie (Sophia Happonen), who is an old friend who childhood friend who returns and is our Final Girl in this story.

This movie was much better than expected. It’s both a coming of age story and a monster movie. I was not thrilled with the original vamp and almost judged the entire movie based on that but I’m glad I didn’t! There is a Stand By Me/original IT feel to it, with a little Fright Night thrown in. These aren’t sexy or sparkly vampires either but gnarly, grotesque monsters.

There are plenty of jump scares, it’s somewhat gory and the score really brings it all together. The effects are not amazing but I think it’s purposeful and adds to this flick’s overall nostalgic feel.