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The Total Bastard Database

The greatest killers, madmen, monsters and maniacs in horror movie history.

SPOILER WARNING!!
All entries in the TBDB are likely to carry spoliers so if you ain't seen the movie they relate to don't read 'em!

 
 

CHROMESKULL

AKA

Nick Principe

Was a bastard in…

Laid to Rest (2009)

So who the hell is he?

Sporting a rather dapper black suit and driving a luxuriously expensive car, Chrome Skull cuts quite the elegant figure.

Well, he might do if it wasn't for the big shiny skull mask he insists on wearing at all times and the camcorder (which is laser guided for some reason) he has constantly fastened to his shoulder as if he were some kid who watched Predator one too many times.

mrs ganush

Oh and his habit of brutally murdering everybody he meets doesn't do masses for his overall appeal either I suppose. In fact ChromeSkull, as he is known (almost certainly due to his choice of face wear but hey, you can never be too sure), is an outright maniac to rival Michael, Freddy, Jason and all the other top dogs in the field.

Unlike those characters however, very little is known about this guy. He appears to be quite wealthy, if his flash car and quality weapons are anything to go by, with a clear skill for surgery. Maybe he is a doctor in his normal life? Maybe a surgeon? It doesn't really matter to be honest What matters is that he is a ruthless, sadistic bloodthirsty loon with a penchant for filming himself murdering and mutilating the corpses of a fairly lengthy succession of young women. Somehow (and I have no idea how) he seems to have struck a deal with the owner of a local funeral home whose barn he uses to stash all his lifeless playmates in. The trouble is, his barn is starting to smell...

That’s not a knife…

Being a fan of all things shiny, Chrome Skull's weapons of choice are his two barbarically serrated hunting knives with knuckle grips and of course that pleasing shine he seems so fond of. They must be pretty sharp seeing as he is able to cut into at least two people's actual skulls with them. It's strange therefore that he has to saw away for several minutes to get through the altogether softer neck... Maybe all that head stabbing blunted them or something huh?

As with so many of his serial killer chums however ChromeSkull is quite happy to improvise when the situation calls for it, though I'm not entirely sure what sort of situation calls for sitcking the nozzle of a can of expanding tyre filler into somebody's ear and filling up their head until it pops like an over inflated ballon.

A balloon which is full of meat and eyeballs.

And being inflated with expanding tyre filler.

 

Why, for the love of God why?!!?!

Who knows? It's hard to say but then again, lots of things are hard to say if you're anything like the heroine of "Laid To Rest" who seems to be suffering from some sort of condition which not only has robbed her of her memory but also the ability to speak and think properly. This is why she says she is so scared of Chrome Skull coming to "make her dead" when she will be put into a "Death Box". Apparently, extreme stupidity of this magnitude is a side-effect of being cracked in the head by a baseball bat but I'm guessing she probably wasn't the brightest spark to begin with to be perfectly honest...

As for ChromeSkull, we are never really told why he does what he does. He just seems to really like it.

So what’s the damage?

He manages to rack up a pretty impressive number of kills in the short time we are with ChromeSkull but when we catch a glimpse of his hideout we see the true extent of his carnage. The place is full of coffins, most of which are occupied by corpses in varying degress of...erm completeness. Nice.

It's his kill sequences which make him truly memorable as a prime bastard however. Unhesitating and brutally efficient, he is an expert with his horribly painful looking knives which he delights in ramming through skulls, cutting off heads with and slitting other poor sap's stomachs open with. The trick is to do it so quick that they don't even notice...

It’s a million to one chance but it might just work…

Though he isn't of a supernatural nature ChromeSkull can certainly take some punishment. Over the course of the film he gets variously beaten, stabbed, eye-gouged and shot, all of which he shakes off with barely any ill effects (it's amazing how protective these chrome masks are you know, they really should be issued to the military with their amzing ability to stop bullets and also the idea of an entire army wearing chrome skull masks just plain kinda rocks).

Of course, if you really want to put him down the best thing to do is to somehow trick him into melting his own face off with superglue so powerful that it's stronger than most acids.

Yes, I know what you're thinking but that's what happens - what can I do? Take it up with Robert Hall - he wrote it!

Words of wisdom

As is to be expected with these masked killer types ol' Chromey isn't really given to a onversational attitude. He does, however seem a little more keen on text messaging which he does to make our intrepid heroine go and buy more mini-dv tapes for his camera. Which for some reason she actually does, but then I did tell you she was stupid.

 

By Matt Compton

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