If you’re looking for that special St. Patrick’s day video rental, I can’t recommend the Leprechaun franchise enough. Okay, so the movies kind of stink, but there’s something astonishing in their cheapness. How did so much bad writing get past the early script development phase, let alone into a final cut? This mystery runs throughout the series.
The first Leprechaun features a young Jennifer Aniston. The series started to sag when, in the fourth entry, they took the Leprechaun arch-villain anti-hero (Warwick Davis), into space. But the best entry is the most recent, Leprechaun in the Hood, in which Davis heads into battle against a group of black wannabe rap stars (Ice T stars and Coolio cameos). In one scene, two of the aspiring rappers must remove a magical piece of jewellery from Leprechaun, who’s holed up in a basement hideout having sex with as many hos as he can. So, these two fellas dress up as tarty women, hoping to fool the Leprechaun into smoking a joint. No ordinary doobie, this one is rolled with four-leaf clovers which, when smoked by the Leprechaun, will rob him of all his magical powers. Now this is innovative writing!
Alas, Leprechaun fans appear to be short on lucky charms, as there are no plans for a Lep 6. Still, Leprechaun freaks tell me you can e-mail the folks at Lion’s Gate films to lobby them: feedback@lgecorp.com. :

—Matthew Hays