Leprechaun 2 did well enough to warrant a sequel. However, Leprechaun 3 went straight to video. Did the quality drop enough to warrant a direct to video release, or did this film deserve a theatrical run? Warwick Davis, the man behind the latex, has hinted in a recent interview that Leprechaun 3 is possibly his favorite film in the franchise. That's a huge thing to say. His opinion definitely has a huge weight over this series, but unfortunately we get a lackluster piece.
As always we start with the trailer. The trailer is once again a boring sell. It's hard to convince people to watch a movie about a killer leprechaun. There's a specific audience that would desire to see that and that's a very small, very limited audience. The tagline is fine: Welcome to Vegas...the odds are you won't leave alive! It's a fine sell, but again there's nothing special or memorable about it. This series isn't really known for great trailers or taglines, which is a good thing overall for the series. It's known for the films themselves.
Warwick Davis is right about one thing in the interview, Leprechaun 3 did increase the humor. This is a key element that had the series go on for 3 more entries after this. The leprechaun flips the bird to cars that won't pick him up, he impersonates Elvis, and he is making more limericks than ever before. When you spell it like that, this would seem to be the most enjoyable entry thus far, but actually it's the weakest.
The death scenes are really, really poor this time around. It's obvious they had a huge decrease in budget, which they did $800,000 worth. Caroline Williams of Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 fame appears in this one and has a plastic surgery makeover from hell eventually exploding. But the biggest problem is that the leprechaun enters the film so early and does nothing. In fact the first death scene, the one with the pawn shop owner is dragged on and on and on. It's intercut with our main story, but it's a really awkward shift in tone and it just doesn't flow. It's not good editing at all.
Yet again, this is a brand new leprechaun that just happens to look the same and is played by the same actor. With a new leprechaun comes new rules. A medallion can turn a leprechaun into stone, which is one way you can stop him. Stealing a leprechaun's gold coin will grant you one wish. Some people criticize the film claiming that the people could just wish away the leprechaun, but the leprechaun's gold cannot be used as a wish to harm him. This is explained clearly in dialogue. Also it brings about an interesting insight into human nature. We're greedy. We think of ourselves and forget to help others when we're so close to our wildest dreams. Especially if it's only a wish away. We love being lazy. The easy achievable dream. Ultimately, we're a broken world. We are all very broken, which is evidenced by all of the characters. The way that you can kill the leprechaun this time is by destroying his gold. Which our main character does and this leprechaun like the second film's leprechaun dies by the end. This is one of the fun things about this series now. While it lacks all sense of continuity even though they're claiming to be direct sequels, the rules change every time and once you realize that it makes it for a fun and exciting experience as an audience member.
Two things that also stood out about this movie are the death of the magician. He is literally sawed in half. It's so painful to watch but it's mesmerizing. You can't keep your eyes off of it. It's by far the best death scene in the film and kicks off the film's finale. Another thing is that in this film when the leprechaun bites our lead character's arm, it turns him into a leprechaun. His blood changes, his body starts to change. He starts to speak in limericks occasionally. It also hints that leprechauns are very territorial and can't stand other leprechauns. This was a really interesting addition to this film and really gave a new elevation to the character arc of our leads in these films.
Overall, the film suffers from a decreased budget and poor pacing at the beginning. The film does pick up tremendous speed by the end and introduces some really unique and interesting concepts. It's uneven, but overall a fun addition to the series and is still far better than the original.
Leprechaun 3 was released straight to video on June 27, 1995. The film was again panned by critics, but oddly enough this film holds the highest user rating on IMDb. The budget was $1.2 million. There is no known gross for the film. The film obviously did well enough on video to warrant another straight to video sequel...but where would the leprechaun go after he had gone to Vegas...how would they bring the leprechaun back again after having killed him off in the previous two...would there be another set of rules...well, we'll discuss that next time.
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