Spoiler Warning: Weapons spoilers follow. If you haven’t watched the new horror movie, please exercise extreme caution!
The 2025 movie schedule has given us some great gems, especially when it comes to horror. At the top of the pack, both in terms of quality and sheer brutality, is Weapons, Zach Cregger’s deeply unsettling and instantly iconic horror-thriller (we gave it a five-star review, by the way). However, I did find myself getting distracted by something while waiting to find out what happened to those 17 schoolkids who ran away in the middle of the night.
No, it wasn’t the fantastic Weapons score, nor was it wandering thoughts about who Pedro Pascal was playing before he dropped out. Instead, it had to do with a minor character who appeared in several of the film’s chapters and his connection to one of the best ‘90s Nickelodeon shows. Allow me to explain…
I Spent Way To Long Trying To Remember Why Police Chief Ed Locke Looked So Familiar
When Police Chief Ed Locke first showed up in the second chapter of Weapons, I admittedly thought he looked so familiar but couldn’t put my finger on it. When he came back into the picture in a later scene (after thinking about it for way too long), I realized that this was Toby Huss, one of those actors whose faces you recognize but not their name, who played none other than Artie, “the Strongest Man in the World,” on The Adventures of Pete & Pete many, many years ago.
Honestly, I dedicated too much time trying to figure it out, like an earworm you get stuck in your head but can’t quite figure out the rest of the song. After that, I had a good chuckle and went back to watching the movie’s intense gore and terrifying scenes with my hands covering my face.
Now I'm Over Here Thinking About How Artie Would Have Saved Those Kids
During the Weapons ending, and even afterward, I was sitting there wondering how the movie would have shaken out if Artie were a resident of Maybrook, Pennsylvania. Would he take on the mysterious Gladys (Amy Madigan) and defeat her a lot sooner than Archer Graff (Josh Brolin) and Justine Gandy (Julia Garner)? Would he team up with Alex Lilly (Gary Christopher) like he did with Little Pete Wrigley (Danny Tamberelli) back in the early ‘90s?
But For Real, I Wasn't Prepared For Weapons' Over-The-Top Gore
You know, I’m sort of glad I was distracted by the whole “I need to figure out where I’ve seen this guy before” problem during Weapons because the violence and gore in this was over-the-top, maybe too much. Between forks to faces, a veggie peeler taking off strips of skin, needles being jammed into people’s faces, and someone being crushed and pulled apart, my cup was full with all the blood, guts, and nasty little bits up on the screen.
I’m all down for body horror and massive gross-out scenes that leave me stomping and pacing around a theater on a Monday night, but wow!
Who knows, maybe I’ll get to see more of Toby Huss as Chief Locke if the Weapons follow-up comes to fruition. In the meantime, I guess I just watch, or at least listen to him on Hulu’s King of the Hill revival, where he’s taken over the role of fan-favorite Dale Gribble.
