March 22, 2019
Sample Jon & Al Kaplan’s score for CRITTERS: A NEW BINGE
– by Randall D. Larson
What became a series of four movies in the late 1980s and early ‘90s began with the release of CRITTERS in 1986, from New Line Cinema. While the film was accused of being a knock-off of Warner Bros;’ GREMLINS (1984), CRITTERS director Stephen Herek has pointed out, in his liner notes for the film’s UK Cinema Club VHS release, that the first CRITTERS script was written by Domonic Muir long before GREMLINS went into production and subsequently underwent rewrites to reduce the apparent similarities between the two films.
CRITTERS begat CRITTERS 2: THE MAIN COURSE (1988), which begat CRITTERS 3 (1991), which begat CRITTERS 4 (1992). All of them subsequently begat a television reboot, CRITTERS: A NEW BINGE, which began shooting in Canada in mid-2018, wrapping in Vancouver.
The series is directed by Jordan Rubin and written by Rubin along with Jon and Al Kaplan. The latter also composed the series theme and its music. Known for their film scoring work with Jim Wynorski (GILA!, PIRANHACONDA, DINOCROC VS. SUPERGATOR), Jon and Al also scored Rubin’s previous two films, ZOMBEAVERS and THE DRONE.
CRITTERS: A NEW BINGE focuses on a group of the malevolent carnivorous aliens who are being pursued by intergalactic bounty hunters, forcing them to return to Earth on a secret mission. The series premiered on AMC’s streaming service, Shudder on March 21, 2019
Watch the series’ trailer below – but first sample an 11-minute suite of Jon and Al Kaplan’s music from the film:
