The Toxic Avenger

At long last, you can watch Peter Dinklage’s mutant eco-vigilante deal out a sludge-barrel of blood and guts in this gleefully gory, formerly buried Troma reboot. Winston Gooze (Peter Dinklage) is a meek janitor at an environmentally devastating chemical factory. His wife has died of cancer, leaving him stepdad to Wade (Jacob Tremblay, Room), and Winston has himself been diagnosed with a fatal brain disease – but his evil boss, Bob Garbinger (Kevin Bacon), won’t even cover his medical treatment on the company’s health insurance. Shortly after meeting whistleblower J.J. Doherty (Taylour Paige, Zola, MIFF 2021), Winston accidentally topples into a vat of toxic waste and emerges profoundly, disgustingly changed. Time for this one-mutant EPA to gruesomely protect his village using superhuman strength and a sludge-dipped, glowing green mop! The original 1984 vigilante B-movie by splatterhouse Troma Entertainment mutated into several sequels, a stage musical, comic books, videogames and a TV cartoon; here, horror multi-hyphenate and Toxie super-fan Macon Blair merges it with his own creative DNA. Repeat Blair collaborators including Dinklage and Elijah Wood (as Bob’s villainous brother, Fritz) relish the more anti-establishment gore splashing around here – so much of it, in fact, that after its triumphant premiere at Fantastic Fest 2023’s opening night, distributors called the film “unreleasable” and shelved it indefinitely. Two years on, as The Toxic Avenger finally staggers back into the world, do you dare to contaminate your eyeballs with a film this outrageously silly? “A ridiculous, over-the-top, madcap satire … Don’t let the big (but not that big) budget fool you: it's Troma, baby, just how you like it.” – The Austin Chronicle