The Curator of Schlock #204 by Jeff Shuster

Doctor Butcher, M.D.

The M.D. stands for Medical Deviant.

Happy Black Friday, everybody. I hope you’re getting your shop on, mace in hand, so you can get that deal on zip drives down at your local Circuit City. I know most of you were dining on turkey or ham yesterday on our day of Thanksgiving, the food of the common American. You think the wealthy are dining on turkey and ham on Thanksgiving? No way. They have access to more forbidden fruit, and by forbidden fruit, I mean people! I know the 1% is eating people on major holidays. It’s a conspiracy at the highest levels. The Vanassterbelts must be behind it. And it’s not fair. Why should only the rich get to eat human flesh on Thanksgiving?

Unfortunately, as a Curator of Schlock, I only have so much pull. I can’t even get my human jerky business off the ground. There was interest when I launched the Kickstarter, but that was shut down. I’ll keep fighting the good fight, but in the meantime, how about a cannibal movie? I’ve got 1980’s Doctor Butcher, M.D. from director Frank Martin. It’s got cannibals, zombies, and a mad scientist in it. What more could you ask for?

I’d first read about Doctor Butcher, M.D. in issue number three of TurboZone magazine, the go to source on all info for the greatest video game console of all time, the TurboGrafx 16. Also included in that issue was coverage of new hit video game, Lords of Thunder, and the Japanese animated series, Bubblegum Crisis.

Lords of Thunder, Bubblegum Crisis, and Doctor Butcher, M.D. That was the perfect Saturday night back in 1992. Hell, that’s the perfect Saturday night today if you want my opinion.

What’s Doctor Butcher about? Uhhhhh…It starts out in a New York hospital. There’s a nurse who takes it upon himself to cut a hand off of one of the cadavers and sneaks off with it. Finger food for later? In a later scene, this same nurse cuts open another cadaver, rips out a heart, and starts chowing down. He’s the Augustus Gloop of cannibals. His feasting gets cut short when the head physician confronts him with a bunch of security guards. The nurse decides to crash through a glass window, falling several stories before he thuds on the ground. His arm even pops off from the impact. Funny how it was reattached when they examined the man’s body.

Enter Lori Ridgeway (Alexandra Delli Colli), an anthropologist, and Dr. Peter Chandler (Ian McCullough), a doctor. They discover that the nurse was a native of the Molucca Islands, an area of the world where the residents worship a cannibal god and practice human sacrifice. Naturally, the good doctor and anthropologist decide to lead an expedition to the islands to investigate. They run into some native cannibals. They kill members of the party, devouring their organs right in front of them as they bleed out. Lori makes out all right. After stripping her naked and tying her to stone slab, the natives realize she’s their cannibal queen.

Oh, and there’s a mad scientist on the island of Kito named Dr. Butcher (Donald O’Brien) who wants to extend human life by transplanting the brains of the living into the corpses of the dead.

All he ends up doing is creating a new type of zombie. Not too impressive if you ask me. Doctor Butcher, M.D. is currently streaming for free on Amazon Prime.

Jeffrey Shuster (episode 47, episode 102, episode 124, episode 131, and episode 284) is an MFA graduate from the University of Central Florida.