Crackcoon is a 2024 American horror comedy directed by Brad Twigg, a West Virginia filmmaker whose back catalogue includes Killer Campout, WrestleMassacre and Shriekshow. Produced by Fuzzy Monkey Films and Burning Bulb Productions, it landed on Screambox as a Screambox Original on 1 October 2024, just in time for Halloween. Total Film described it as “Rocket Raccoon meets Cocaine Bear”.
Two drug dealers, Denny and his partner Frankie, get pulled over by the local sheriff and hurl their stash out of the car window. The package contains Acid Mind Drainage, a synthetic street drug that drives its users psychotic. Before anyone can retrieve it, a raccoon finds it, eats it and turns into a killing machine. Its rampage leads through a mountain community: hunters, hikers, a bickering couple, a cult trying to exorcise heavy metal demons from a Dio fan, and five spring breakers who have rented a cabin to party in.
What makes Crackcoon special is how openly it embraces its own limits. The killer is a raccoon puppet that gets thrown at the victims, who wrestle with it while arterial spray soaks everything in reach. The effects are practical throughout, including a disembowelment and a face being gnawed off. In between there is a generous helping of bare skin and crude jokes, and not all of them land. But at 88 minutes the film never overstays its welcome. Night of the Living Dead co-creator John A. Russo turns up in the cast, and the end credits song “Crackcoon Kills” by The Transylvania Hellhounds is a fitting send-off. A proper microbudget creature feature for everyone who always wondered what a raccoon on crack looks like.
