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Excellent but underrated film

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Ernest Borgnine is the star attraction in this fantasy/horror straight-to-video effort. In it, he only appears in the framing story where he narrates the main story to his young grandson, a young lad with little to no acting ability. The story itself is a cheerfully moronic one about the wizard Merlin who, along with his wife (?) Zurelia sets up a magic shop in downtown L.A. in the mid 90's. It's really never in the least bit obvious why the great wizard has taken this career path but to this end he offers an Aladdin's Cave of mystical wonders for the benefit of the Californian general public. The narrative is essentially made up of four parts – Borgnine's grandfather and grandson thing, Merlin and his shop-based dramas and two sub-stories about dangerous artefacts from the shop being released into the wider world causing a certain amount of perturbation and despair. It is essentially an example of a horror anthology and I think it's this very reason which made me find it really quite watchable, as while the events on display were hardly very good, the anthology format meant that nothing went on for too long, resulting in the pacing being pretty good.In the first main sub-story an arrogant reporter who is sceptical of Merlin and is mystical-based claims is given a book by the irritated wizard. The journalist takes it home and discovers to his chagrin that it gives him the unwanted ability of fire-breathing and then proceeds to age him greatly and then turns him into a baby. It's hardly the most focused story in the world and feels more like a bunch of random ideas thrown together. In the second story a thief steals a toy monkey with dangerous malign powers and offers it to a shop. I could swear that the magical monkey then winds up at a completely different shop where it is then purchased by a man from the 80's. This guy lives in a suburban estate next door to a weird bearded bloke kitted out in sandals, socks and tight shorts – the 'best friend in the world' according to the man from the 80's, I'm guessing his social circle was quite limited. Anyway the monkey immediately starts clashing its symbols together and stuff happens that could be described as 'slightly bad'. The most pulse-pounding part involves an attempt to knock the monkey into a bag by pretending to accidentally bump a vacuum cleaner against a table – in suspense terms it's not up there with the likes of the shower scene from Psycho (1960) but it is certainly different at the very least that much I can say confidently. Meanwhile, Merlin walks the streets of L.A. looking desperately for a man from the 80's who bought his monkey. Both story threads eventually dovetail in a jarring manner and all the monkeying about comes to an end.The film is notable for splicing in a sizable segment from an earlier movie, The Devil's Gift (1984). This was also directed by Kenneth J Berton; in fact these are the only two films he ever worked on. Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders certainly does not have a stellar reputation but I sort of enjoyed it well enough anyway. It's stupid and ineffective as a horror movie but sort of quite likable nonsense in a strange way. There are a few chuckles to be had at some of the ropier moments, while the combination of straight-to video 90's cheap-jack material with the 80's stuff from The Devil's Gift is at best uneven but the resultant film had a sort of clunky charm which made for entertaining enough viewing, for me at least.

Wow! I question as to why this was made into a movie instead of a terrible anthology TV pilot. Along with being bad, this is just truly bizarre. It starts off with a burning building, which turns out to be a little kid watching TV. I guess the television program he's watching may foreshadow later events, but it's still pointless. The kid's Grandpa (Ernest Borgnine) tells him to turn that trash off, only to tell him a couple of strange horror stories to put him to sleep.Before the first story really starts, we are introduced to Merlin and his wife who now own a shop to bring magic to the world. Merlin ends up giving a book of spells to a jerk who's wife can't have a baby, but wants one. This guy ends up dabbling in the spells and doing some crazy stuff, including spitting out fire at the cat. Then there's a really dumb twist ending that I'm not going to give away. This segment was really strange, mainly because the first 15 minutes of it was Merlin, then it switches to a short 15 minute story. Also, by the rationale of this segment, Merlin gets his power from Satan. The second segment is better than this one...and the second one was terrible.A dad ends up giving his boy a stolen wind up monkey with symbols toy for his birthday. This doll claps the symbols together and bad things happen. To stop the bad things, all you have to do is put your finger in between the symbols, so it really isn't a very effective killer. The dad finds out the toy is evil somehow when his dog dies in a fire, which leads him to ask a psychic for help. Meanwhile Merlin walks the streets searching for info on where the evil toy he has for some reason, may be. The plot all leads to the dad trying to dispose of the doll before it hurts anyone, but when plans fail, will his family be fine? Who cares. This story is a big rip-off of two Twilight Zone episodes, "Living Doll" and "It's a Good Life", and even though they were made 30 something years earlier, they were much scarier and more believable.Along with these two stories sidetracked by Merlin and his wife's wacky antics, we have this dumb wraparound. The wraparound is stupid and pointless, but even more pointless is the title character, Merlin. There was no need to have Merlin in this. It would've been slightly better if they put in 3 stories and cut out the stupid old wizard and his cantankerous wife. Plus the music in the film I'm pretty sure is stolen from various films, including "the Pagemaster". In the end, this is a very bad and bizarre film. Adults will feel it's too violent and profane for little kids, older kids won't like it, and little kids will be too scared. For my final thought, I know this review sounds like a big complaint, and it really is. Let's hope the movie studios learned from their mistakes.My rating: BOMB/****. 85 mins. Contains some violence, language and some mildly sexual innuendos.

I give this rating to the Mystery Science Theater 3000, forthwith known as the MST3K version. MST3K can make almost any horrible movie a laughing riot, and "Merlin's Hop" is no exception. If you do not know of MST3K, now you do, and I highly recommend you go check it out, especially if your the kind of person who likes to sit around with your friends and make fun of horrible movies. Basically, a guy and his two friends watch horrible movies like Merlin's Shop and critique it in every comedic way a horrible B-movie deserves to be critiqued. By itself, this movie is not worth watching, unless you wanna sit around with your friends and make fun of it yourself. But in the MST3K format, the "making-fun" is already done for you, and all you have to do is sit back and enjoy. Enjoy!

omg i so totally agree with un0gosse7fou this is one of the most amazing movies ever! mark hurtado was greatly cast as grandson. i also must agree with un0gosse7fou by saying that i do not know mark, do not attend his church and have never dated him. It is most amazing every time i see it. incredibly also is such great work by such a young actor(now almost seventeen). i particularly liked when it is shown with the robots on the bottom of the screen, making fun of the movie in the process. It was just genius. now the rest of the movie had its downs but we have to agree on the brilliance of young hurtado's work in this said film