Trivia / Puppet Master

• California Doubling: Despite taking place in Germany, the entirety of Puppet Master III was filmed in southern California.
• Completely Different Title:
  • Brazil: Dolls of Death
  • Bulgaria: The Puppeteer
  • Finland and Portugal: Killer Dolls
  • Hungary: Killer Puppets
  • Mexico: Devil's Toymaker
  • Spain: Revenge of the Dolls
• Creator Backlash: Producer David DeCoteau hated the second film, especially since so many production issues happened on the set that were out of his hands.
  • Ted Nicolaou when asked about in a interview about directing Puppet Master vs Demonic Toys stated that he felt the movie was "kind of a big mistake, I think, in a lot of ways".
• Executive Meddling: The only reason Leech Woman dies in the second film was because executives at Paramount hated her so much that they'd only fund it if she was killed off.
• Hostility on the Set: Director David DeCoteau and Richard Lynch were at each other's throats during the making of the third film, though they reconciled after filming finished.
• Troubled Production: There was a mild issue on the set of Puppet Master 4 with Guy Rolfe. While he arrived on location, he held up at his hotel and insisted he would not leave his hotel till Charles Band paid him the entire amount of his paycheck in cash for his role by sliding it under the door^note  Considering Charles Band's reputation of ripping people off pay wise, Rolfe was more than likely Properly Paranoid. Director Jeff Burr humorously said he would get constant updates over every little transaction that occurred such as the producers going into the hotel or updates over how much money they would slide under Rolfe's hotel door. Eventually though Rolfe after getting all the money he was owed for the role, showed up on set.
  • Per David DeCoteau on Puppet Master 2, He felt that while David Allen was a talented special effect artist, as a director he was out of his depth. Allen ran into such issues like taking multiple hours to film scenes and getting very little actually done. DeCoteau also claimed that Allen commended no respect on set; Charlie Spradling, who played Wanda in that film, felt that Allen seemed to treat the puppets better than the actors. DeCoteau further elaborated that he wanted to fire Allen but Charles Band wouldn't let him since Allen designed and created the puppets and if they fired him, it could affect their working relationship with Allen who they needed for the series. The film was finished but it went five days over schedule and had multiple incomplete scenes. Allen himself never directed another movie again.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The concept for the first film was different where instead of psychics, the characters were supposed to be witches and sorcerers who were more akin to Asshole Victim due to being abusive ruthless people.
  • Ralph Bates was the original choice for Major Kraus in Puppet Master 3 but they soon discovered when they offered him the role, that he was dying of cancer and indeed Bates would pass away not too long after they had asked him. They also considered Herbert Lom but when offered, Lom amusingly pointed out the entire budget for Puppet Master 3 was the same amount of money he was paid for in a previous movie.
  • Decapitron was a movie about a murderous robot that Charles Band was developing in the late '80s. While the project fell apart later on, Band liked the character so much that he got it integrated as a puppet in the later Puppetmaster films.
  • Puppet Wars I: Curse of the Puppet Master was going to be the first movie in the unproduced Puppet Wars trilogy. Footage from the project was reused in Retro Puppet Master.
    • Scripts for the whole trilogy can be found here.
  • There's also the unproduced original take for Puppet Master vs Demonic Toys.
  • Puppet Master in general began from the ideas of an unmade Dolls sequel.
  • According to Greg Sestero, James Franco auditioned for his part.
  • The Littlest Reich remake was supposed to have several follow ups to it (the movie practically ends on a "To Be Continued" card) including a prequel that was announced called "Ayrans Ahoy" However there has been no follow up to this as of 2023, leaving the future of the new remake series in doubt. Some of this can be contribute to the fact Cinestate the company that distribute the film, was closed after multiple scandals including toxic work environment sets and one of the company producers getting arrested for sexual assault of a underage minor.
  • Six-Shooter was originally designed to be a ninja but was changed to a cowboy during the writing of Puppet Master III. A ninja puppet would eventually get introduced in Axis of Evil.
  • Puppet Master vs Demonic Toys original concept was going to be about toy factory security guard ordering the puppets on E-Bay which would lead to the puppets encountering and having a battle with the demonic toys.
    • Fred Willard was the original choice to play Robert Toulon but that fell through.

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