When we left off in the first half of Chucky Season 3 (on October 25, 2023), the killer doll possessed by the spirit of serial murderer Charles Lee Ray (voiced by Brad Dourif) is horrified – and it takes a lot to horrify this guy – to discover that his plastic body is rapidly aging. His pal, little girl Caroline (Carina Battrick), takes Chucky to curse specialist Dr. Rosen (Richard Waugh). It turns out that the doll has angered his dark god protector Damballa by becoming “infected with Christianity” during a botched exorcism in Season 2.
Thinking he can return to Damballa’s favor by committing murders in a suitably evil place, Chucky infiltrates the White House. He is taken in by U.S. President James Collins’ (Devon Sawa) younger son Henry (Callum Vinson). Henry is convinced that the spirit of his deceased little brother, Joseph, resides in the doll.
When Chucky taunts them, Chucky’s three teen adversaries Jake (Zackary Arthur), Devon (Björgvin Arnarson), and Lexy (Alyvia Alyn Lind), get themselves invited into the White House via Lexy’s flirtation with the President’s oldest son Grant (Jackson Kelly).
Let’s not forget Tiffany Valentine, Chucky’s mistress/nemesis who first inhabited a Belle doll, then took over the body of actress Jennifer Tilly (played by Tilly). Although Tiffany is currently on Death Row in Texas, she is in the process of voodoo-compelling her primary guard to aid her escape.
Chucky’s homicides around the White House are attributed to a human assassin by First Lady Charlotte Collins (Lara Jean Chorostecki) and Chief of Staff Warren Pryce (Gil Bellows), who are keeping the killings secret from not only the public, but also from President Collins. A massive masked White House Halloween party designed to trap the culprit allows Chucky to wreak havoc – but doesn’t stop his aging.
And that brings us to the start of Season 3, Episode 5, “Death Becomes Her” [Warning: Tons of spoilers follow]. President Collins is seeing and hearing Joseph’s ghost. Pryce shows Charlotte footage of Joseph’s ghost vanishing from the Halloween party, but Charlotte refuses to believe it.
The Chucky title (always an episode highlight) forms out of decaying-to-skulls Chucky heads.
Collins asks Henry if he’s seen Joseph’s ghost—not the one in the doll, as Henry insists, but the real boy. Charlotte interrupts because she thinks her husband and Henry are both losing their minds.
Still not knowing that her little sis Caroline has become Chucky’s assistant, Lexy is determined to make Chucky reveal where he took the child. To that end, she plans to get back with Grant.
Chucky, looking like he’s about a hundred years old, is still able to switch out the cleaning lady’s booze with bleach, killing her when she drinks it. Alas, Chucky mourns, the thrill of orchestrating this kind of thing is gone—and he has to clean up the mess so Henry doesn’t see it.
Brainstorming what to do next, Devon comes up with the idea of using Chucky’s voodoo magic against him. Devon and Jake find Dr. Rosen’s website, which mentions Damballa. Bingo! They go on a road trip to see the doc.
Chucky attempts to stab Charlotte in Henry’s room, but he’s way too slow and Charlotte doesn’t notice him (or the cleaning lady’s corpse in the closet) before she exits.
Charlotte tries to support Grant in his breakup with Lexy but only succeeds in making him want to renew the romance. The next day, Grant meets with Lexy at his school. Lexy sincerely tells Grant all the reasons she likes him, and they agree to start over. Lexy tries to warn Grant about Henry’s doll, but Grant’s bodyguard makes him go to class.
Dr. Rosen explains to Jake and Devon that Chucky is dying. Since Chucky has died a lot already and his spirit keeps popping up, the boys want to know how to destroy that, but the only way they can pursue him to the spirit realm is by dying themselves. Dr. Rosen recommends they give up.
Chucky tries to find something to watch on cable. He scoffs at the killer doll movies he finds, including Dead Silence and M3GAN. His pronunciation of the latter title is worth the price of admission (“M-Three-Gan). Then Chucky is further demoralized by a news report of Jennifer Tilly/Tiffany being on Death Row.
Driving back from Dr. Rosen, Devon gloomily reflects that the doctor seemed sure the boys would get themselves killed. There are so many things Devon would like to do—and, to the strains of Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “Relax,” Devon and Jake go to a motel and do some of them for the first time. Afterwards, they both feel “different” in a good way, closer, and in love.
Indeed, the night is so good that the next morning, Devon questions whether they should really go back to fighting Chucky. Jake talks Devon back into being one of the heroes.
When Charlotte confronts Bryce about why he hasn’t managed to track down the killer yet, Bryce says even he is beginning to believe in ghosts. It’s hard to come up with another explanation as to how someone undetectable got into the White House and killed a dozen people.
Charlotte and Bryce break off arguing, stunned, as they witness the room’s American flag contort, re-enacting the suffocation of one of Chucky’s White House victims.
Back in her prison cell, Tiffany-in-Tilly, wearing a tiara and a fur cape, accepts a call from Chucky. When he explains his predicament, Tiffany gives him a pep talk: “Despite all the times we’ve tried to disembowel each other, you’re still the brilliant psychopath I fell in love with.” Chucky confesses he loves Tiffany, too.
When he says he’s throwing in the towel, Tiffany is outraged. Doesn’t Chucky want to go down as the greatest serial killer of all time? He should go out in a blaze of glory, and take as many people as he can down with him. Chucky is inspired: Tiffany is right!
The President follows the sound of Joseph’s voice into Joseph’s old room. The aged Chucky doll is on the bed. Joseph’s ghost warns, “Daddy, look out!”, but Chucky succeeds in breaking a piggy bank over the back of the President’s head, knocking him to the floor.
Chucky then leaps on Collins’ chest, biting out a piece of his cheek, tearing his face, and gouging out his eyes. And then Chucky reaches into the dead man’s jacket pocket and takes out the card with the nuclear codes.
Raise your hand if you thought this final development might be coming as soon as Chucky headed to the White House last year. That’s upping the stakes as high as they go.
With only two murders, “Death Becomes Her” has a lower body count than most Chucky episodes, but the President’s death certainly maintains the gore quotient. Kudos to Chucky for being continually fearless in its gay teen love story.
We’re curious to see how the White House ghosts are going to figure into what comes next. But the real mystery of this episode is the title. Who’s the “her” in “Death Becomes Her”? The cleaning lady? If you say so…
For more, check out our interview with Chucky creator Don Mancini and the cast, promising record amounts of blood for the back half of season 3.
Chucky Season 3: Part 2 premieres April 10 at 10pm EST on USA & SYFY, with weekly new episodes on Wednesday nights, streaming next day on Peacock.
