If you thought the witch trials were the worst thing to happen in Salem, think again.
You hadn't counted on 'Hubie Halloween'.
A typically star studded Netflix comedy vehicle built around Adam Sandler, you get exactly what you fear.
It's a typically laugh free movie that operates under the illusion that it is a joke fest.
Sandler once again resorts to his comic simpleton act as a much derided delicatessen counter employee in Salem.
He is naive, not that bright and, gee, all heart.
Hubie lives at home with his devoted mum played by June Squibb, when he is not riding his bicycle around Salem.
He is terrorised by the local kids from middle school and high school including Karan Brar's Mike Mundi who works with him at the deli and regularly pranks him.
Ray Liotta's Pete Landolfa, an old acquaintance from his school days, also takes pleasure in bullying him - even shoving him into a grave after he buries his father.
Hubie gets barbed comments from Tim Meadows and Maya Rudolph's obnoxious couple, Lester and Mary Hennessy who he also had the misfortune to go to school with.
Michael Chikilis' Father Dave also treats him with contempt.
And then there's Kevin James' Sergeant Steve Downey who humours him but bitches to his colleague, Kenan Thompson's Sergeant Blake about the need to keep Hubie out of the office.
Hubie does, however, come across a nice new neighbour, Steve Buscemi's Walter Lambert who mysteriously advises him to ignore any weird sounds coming from his house.
And he also has an admirer, Julie Bowen's waitress and single mom, Violet Valentine who used to be married to Sergeant Downey.
Hubie is jittery when it comes to Halloween but becomes even more so when he begins to suspect that Mr Lambert is a rampaging werewolf.
When various townsfolk start to disappear in Salem over the course of Halloween night, Hubie takes on the role of a protector - even though he's not the most heroic of individuals.
With a screenplay by Sandler and his regular screenwriting collaborator Tim Herlihy, 'Hubie Halloween' is a typically dispiriting affair which just seems like a terrible waste of talent.
Sandler, who has shown in films like 'Punch Drunk Love,' 'The Meyerowitz Stories' and 'Uncut Gems' that he is capable of so much better, resorts to the usual mugging to camera.
Hubie is the same man child role he has been churning out for decades and an incredibly lazily written character.
But like a lot of Sandler's movies, there is a monumental waste of talent with Buscemi, Liotta, Chikilis and Squibb going through the motions.
Bowen, who has shown in 'Modern Family' what a smart comic actress she is, is chronically underused.
Ben Stiller pops up with a handlebar moustache, reprising his role as Hal L from 'Happy Gilmore' in an irritating preamble set in a facility for the criminally insane.
Thompson, Rudolph, Meadows, James and Brar already do little to elevate already chequered movie CVs.
Noah Schnapp of 'Stranger Things' fame goes through the motions as Violet's good hearted foster son Tommy, as does Paris Berelc as his sweetheart Megan.
Rob Schneider turns up as an associate of Mr Lambert's - which is never a good sign in any comedy.
Basketball legend Shaquille O'Neal is roped in for a cameo as a DJ with a surprising voice and even Sandler's wife Jackie gets on on the act, playing a local TV reporter while their daughters Sadie and Sunny play Violet's foster daughters.
There are puerile jokes about Hubie not really understanding what the word "boner" means and prat falls galore.
When a film insists in its credits on showing you what a wonderful time they had with amusing outtakes, you know deep in its heart it knows how feeble it is.
And Steven Brill, who directed other Sandler comedy vehicles like 'Little Nicky' and 'Mr Deeds', must know how poor this attempt at comedy horror is.
Why bother with 'Hubie Halloween' when 'Shaun of the Dead' is out there?
That's a question Brill and Sandler spectacularly fails to answer.
('Hubie Halloween' was made available for streaming on Netflix on October 7, 2020)
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