Pluthar (William Paulson) works at a garbage disposal company on the planet Pluton. While disposing of a mutated beast, the disposal unit malfunctions and sends the creature to Earth where it is electronically picked up by the satellite disk belonging to the Putterman family. The Putterman family consists of Stan (Gerrit Graham), his wife, Raquel (Mary Woronov), their two children, Sherman and Suzy (Chad Allen and Diane Franklin) and their grandfather (Bert Remsen).
Stan and Raquel head out to a swinger's bar while Suzy and her boyfriend O.D. (Jon Gries) go out partying. With the alien gumming up the satellite signal Stan puts in a call to the satellite repairman, Norton (Sonny Carl Davis) before heading out with Raquel. Now the only ones left in the house are Sherman and Grampa.
The guys fall asleep in front of the television while watching a late-night horror host called Medusa (Jennifer Richards). While they are asleep the alien monster comes through the set and manifests in the Putterman living room. Sherman and Grampa wake up and see the alien. They run for the underground bunker that survivalist Grampa constructed in the family home. Arming themselves, Grampa and Sherman go hunting for the monster. Norton shows up to fix the satellite dish and gets eaten by the creature. Grampa is the next to get eaten.
By this time Stan and Raquel return home hoping to do some swinging with another couple they picked up, Spiro (Alejandro Rey) and Cherry (Randi Brooks). Sherman tries to tell his mother about the monster, but she is more interested in getting it on with Spiro, so she locks him in the bunker.
Meanwhile the monster roams around the house by popping in and out of television sets. Still hungry, it begins eating Cherry, Spiro, Stan and Raquel. Sherman resorts to breaking out of the bunker using some of Grampa’s plastic explosives.
Suzy and O.D. return to the house and come face to face with the monster. The creature is about to eat O.D. when he is attracted to the leather studded arm band the heavy metal rocker is wearing. The studded leather reminds the creature of its former owner. The creature becomes docile. Now that the creature is calm, O.D., Suzy and Sherman decide to make a pet out of it, put it on television and become rich exploiting it. That idea doesn’t last very long.
“TerrorVision” was released in 1986 and was written and directed by Ted Nicolaou. It is a horror science fiction comedy. The movie didn’t do very well at the box office, but like so many of those types of films it later developed a cult following.
It is one of many tongue-in-cheek horroresque films done in the 80’s, many of them done by Empire Entertainment and Full Moon Features. Both of which were created by Charles Band. If you’ve seen any of the “Evil Bong” or “Gingerbread Man” films, you know what to expect. If not, then you are in for a crazy ride where nothing is sacred, and anything can happen.
The voice of the monster was done by Frank Welker.