Patchwork is a 2015 American horror-comedy.
A woman wakes up on an operating table. Or rather, three women wake up on an operating table. Or … three women in one body wake up on an operating table. They have been cut apart and sewn together, and now share one body and one mind. Now, they’re out for bloody revenge against the man who did this to them. But one of them holds a dark secret that threatens their plot for vengeance.
Patchwork contains examples of:
- Affably Evil: Tom Blake is a charming, charismatic man with a hilariously chipper attitude. He also has a habit of dismembering bodies and trying to reanimate them, and is not above murder.
- Ax-Crazy: All three women count, given how violently they dispatch the scientists responsible for their condition, but Madeleine especially is, considering that she was already a serial killer before the operation.
- Body Horror: Given the premise is about a Frankenstein's Monster crudely pieced together and barely able to coordinate itself, this is inevitable. The creature actually loses an arm while having sex with Garrett. Ew.
- Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Played with. Madeleine tries to persuade Jennifer and Ellie to spare Tom, because she still needs him to finish the operation. The other two women have conflicting plans, so they lobotomize her. Instead of killing him, they have him bring Garrett back to life as another Creature.
- Captain Ersatz: Tom Blake is essentially a frat boy parody of Herbert West. He reanimates corpses with a glowing green fluid.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Subverted for laughs. Early on, the women notice one of Tom's experiments. It's a cat that has had an owl's wings and beak sewn to it. When Tom realizes that he's cornered, he releases it from its cage in the hopes it'll save him. It doesn't.
- Cloud Cuckoolander: Ellie is a rather odd duck, and apparently was one even before the operation. Madeleine is an evil version of this.
- Collapsed Mid-Speech: Blake asks Madeline on the operating table if she's sure she wants to go through with it then knocks her out with a gas mask as she's replying.
- Death of Personality: Jen and Ellie lobotomize Madeleine when they learn she's responsible for their shared condition.
- Dumb Blonde: Ellie is blonde and probably the dumbest of the three women. Flashbacks suggest that she was never very bright in life, either.
- Enemy Mine: Once they're bound to the operating table to be killed by the rest of Tom's experiments, the women are forced to cooperate with each other briefly, even after The Reveal of Madeline's true nature.
- Everyone Has Standards: The three women are discussing what they'll do to the men responsible for their collective condition. When Ellie suggests eating their flesh, Jen and Madeleine appear grossed out.
- Faux Affably Evil: Madeleine puts on an awkward persona when talking up a man at the bar. In truth, she’s actually a murderous, vain psychopath whose first concern is her looks, and flirted with that man with the goal of cutting him up for parts.
- Feel No Pain: The creature feels no pain, which proves useful when hit by a taser.
- Fighting from the Inside: After learning the truth about Madeline, Jennifer and Ellie start fighting her, which from the outside looks like their combined body is just hitting itself.
- Frankenstein's Monster: A rather crude variant. The three women had all been cut to pieces and were pieced back together awkwardly.
- Godzilla Threshold: Hilariously subverted when Tom releases the "owl cat" when it looks like he's screwed. All it does is fly away.
- Lobotomy: When it's discovered that Madeleine is responsible for the three becoming the creature, Jen and Ellie take a power drill to her head to "kill" her personality. In reality, the creature drills into their brain from their mouth.
- Mistaken for Junkie: Early on, the creature hails a taxi. The driver throws her out when he realizes she doesn't have any money, and calls her a "fucking junkie".
- Mix-and-Match Man: The creature is the "stitched-together construct" sort, having been assembled from the parts of three different women.
- Only Sane Man: Jennifer. Between Ellie, the Dumb Blonde Cloud Cuckoolander, and Madeleine, who shared this spot with Jen before The Reveal that she's actually a narcissistic serial killer, she’s the most level-headed person in the movie.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: The creature goes on a killing spree once her shared personalities decide they need to punish whoever did this to them.
- Serial Killer: Madeleine is revealed to have been responsible for an unknown number of murders, and kept her victims’ limbs in her fridge.
- Shout-Out:
- To Re-Animator, most prominently.
- Also, Garrett is shown playing Castlevania in one scene. He's fighting Frankenstein.
- Token Evil Teammate: Madeline helps to provoke Jennifer and Ellie into killing other people.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: The boyish-looking Jennifer to the very feminine Ellie.
- Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: In this otherwise lighthearted horror-comedy, Madeleine manages to be a fairly disturbing character, being a serial killer with a history of mental illness that is decidedly not Played for Laughs.
