Horrible

Back To Tha Hood may not have been horrible, but it certainly did nothing to help the series. Granted Leprechaun can't exactly be taken seriously, but that's why I have loved the past films, they were tongue-in-cheek comically bad horror with a cheesy but entertaining sense of humor. This one just felt like a stereotypically weak ghetto drama spliced with moments of Leprechaun goodness.

I have no problem with a little focus on the plot, even in a series such as this, but it came at the expense of the Leprechaun. He was given hardly any lines, and most of his kill scenes seemed like they were a last minute thought at best. Even at its worst, the Leprechaun franchise has allowed the titular character to have the spotlight, but here he was used as a means to an end, nothing more. There were a lot of things I liked, especially the opening bit with the creative animation, and the whole Leprechaun/bong scenario was harmlessly hilarious while developing his desire to reclaim the gold, but the vast majority of the film collapsed under the melodramatic schlock that tried to make me care for the protagonists. From my perspective it seems that the film was modeled after the original Leprechaun, only set in 'the hood' (again), making for a horror movie that lacked any even residually creepy settings. There was a severe lack of violence or even remotely "scary" scenes (note I mean scary in the loosest sense) and the humor was resigned to only three or four truly funny scenes (though every time I saw Leprechaun leap from a tree or tackle a character I nearly p*ssed myself).

I understand that this film was a way for a young director to get some experience, but many (not all) that make up the small but cult fanbase want to see what made this such a fun series: the Leprechaun (with his limericks, wit, vengeance and murderous rage all bound together), not a bunch of faceless 'good guys' learning a lesson about greed and love under exceedingly macabre circumstances.

After the initial scene with Warwick Davis and the preacher, the next 20 minutes crawled by setting up a threadbare plot, at which time a buddy of mine watching commented "Dammit, where's the Leprechaun? If I wanted to see a gangsta drama I'd watch Boyz N' Tha Hood". Couple that sentiment with the complete lack of consistency (the Leprechaun uses zero magic throughout the film, yet then conjures up what one can only assume was some heinous voodoo in the fortune-teller's apartment since the director saw fit to leave it out; the main characters are told only clovers and his gold can harm the Leprechaun, yet proceed to try to beat him up and burn him, then when they do use the clover against him it seemingly fails SEVERAL times) and a whole-heartedly unoriginal plot set-up (look at these hard luck ghetto inhabitants get rich, watch rival gangsters plot their demise, look at the torn ex-lovers hiding their true feelings from one another, look at the drug dealer selling to the painfully out-of-touch white man!) and it makes for a stand-alone film that tries hard but has its shortcomings and for a franchise film to succeed in only disappointing those that were excited at the thought of a new film.

For all of its mistakes, Leprechaun In The Hood was a better movie that at least knew it was a bad film and had fun with the Leprechaun while giving the audience what it was looking for, where as Back To Tha Hood lacked any creativity with what to do with him at all.