A ventriloquist’s dummy, which looks exactly like Urkel, comes to life and terrorizes the Winslows and Steve must stop it.
Family Matters–or as I called it, Urkel–was a media staple in my childhood home. We’d watch every Friday during the TGIF programming block, and I was a big fan…right up until season eight, episode seven, Stevil. This was the year that rather than do a Halloween episode about the typical sitcom scenarios of trick-or-treating or a party, Family Matters opted to dip its toes into horror and created an evil Steve. Stevil. It scared me 24 years ago, but it felt time to revisit the character.
Stevil featured in two episodes, the aforementioned Stevil, and season nine’s Stevil II: This Time, He’s Not Alone. Voiced by Rich Correll (Leave it to Beaver) and performed by Josh Ryan Evans (How the Grinch Stole Christmas) it was a surprisingly effective, though still sitcom-y creation. Close up shots were accomplished with traditional puppetry while anything with ambulation was left to Evans.
Brought to life by a well aimed lightning bolt, Stevil sets out almost immediately to destroy the Winslow family. The horror and gore are very much sitcom safe, but the implications and story are surprisingly bleak. After “getting rid of” the Winslows, Stevil tours Steve through the house like it’s a murder museum to show him everything he did. One of the stops being Urkel’s bedroom, where he has mounted the heads of the boys (presumably after running them over and decapitating them).
Sadly, the episode ends with a cliche. It was all a dream. However, this didn’t stop Family Matters from bringing Stevil back for another season and giving him a friend, Carlsbad. This episode deepens the mythology around Stevil, giving him the objective of stealing Steve’s soul. It falls a bit flat, moving at an accelerated pace and with less sitcom horror than before. They even went for the dream ending a second time (though it was Carl’s dream instead). That said, the expanded mythology and possession elements did add something that wasn’t there the first time around.
Sitcoms are always going to struggle to go full horror, but this insane mid-90s attempt was incredibly fun to revisit. It’s a campy time capsule of 90s goodness, and should hit that nostalgic sweet spot for many.
