Late one night, a woman is out walking her dog on an empty street in New York City, when both of them are grabbed and pulled down a manhole by a monstrous creature. The next day, George Cooper, a fashion photographer turned photojournalist, who has just supplied the pictures for an article about the city's homeless population, is now working on getting some for a followup. Unfortunately for him, his live-in girlfriend, model Lauren Daniels, has roped him into a photo shoot for a perfume ad, which he's not looking forward to at all. Elsewhere, Captain Bosch of the NYPD has taken an interest in a rash of disappearances in the vicinity of Lafayette Street and is told of a missing persons report that was put through by A.J. Shepherd. He meets Shepherd, who runs a homeless shelter in the neighborhood and is known by everybody as "the Reverend," and he tells him that his regular spate of "undergrounders," people who live in the sewer system, haven't been seen for two weeks now. Bosch also learns that anybody who lives down there is now looking to get their hands on weapons. Meanwhile, Cooper is called away from the photo shoot to bail out Mrs. Monroe, a homeless woman he knows from his previous assignment and who was arrested for trying to steal a cop's gun. After she's let go, she has Cooper follow her down into the tunnels beneath the city, where other homeless people live, including her brother, Victor. She had intended to bring him the gun, and when Cooper asks him why he wanted it, Victor, who has a massive bite taken out of his right leg, says he wants to use it for protection against some "ugly fuckers." At the soup kitchen, Bosch learns from Shepherd that the yearly EPA probe, which usually lasts for a week, has now been going on for a month. He also shows him some items he's recovered, including an EPA inspector's boot and a radiation-monitoring device, and in one of the tunnels connected to the soup kitchen's basement, they find a Geiger counter, which suddenly spikes when they turn it on, only to fall back down; they also hear a bizarre, inhuman roar echo through the tunnels. Soon, the men become aware of a cover-up orchestrated by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, one to hide the fact that a large amount of toxic waste has been hidden in the bowels of the city. It's also transformed some of the undergrounders into C.H.U.D.s: Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers. These creatures are now starting to come to the streets for prey and soon, the Commission's dirty little secret may put all of New York in danger.
At the meeting, Bosch and Shepherd present their findings, as well as tell them of what's been happening, but the men don't take it seriously until they see Cooper's photos. That's when they come clean about the NRC not being able to transport radioactive materials through New York; materials which Wilson, the NRC representative, claims are already in the city. After Shepherd storms out of the meeting when Wilson refuses to tell him anything, Bosch gets a hint that he's hiding something when he sees the acronym C.H.U.D. in a file that Wilson insists is classified. Following that, the body of a creature Wilson dubs a "Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller" is found and Bosch gets a good look at it. He's refused to send a team armed with flamethrowers down into the sewers with Wilson's survey team but does it anyway, having such a team down there waiting for them. Even after the team is attacked and killed by more of the creatures, Bosch is still not allowed to go public with it, as Wilson is determined to handle the situation in his own way, specifically by flooding the sewers with gas, despite how potentially dangerous it is to the city. After he warns Shepherd about the possible danger, Bosch is called out to the river, where someone finds some remains that turn out to be those of his missing wife. Completely broken about this, Bosch spends some time at the bar, drowning his sorrows and ruminating over it, and later, following the C.H.U.D.s' attacking a diner and slaughtering more people, he's so angry about what's happened that O'Brien has to restrain him from attacking Wilson. He's sent back to his car to cool off and spends most of the third act there, until Shepherd and Cooper, who are trapped down below, manage to get a message through to him. Not only does he intend to help them escape but he's also told that C.H.U.D. actually stands for "Contamination Hazard Urban Disposal," and that drums of industrial waste have been deliberately hidden down in the subway and sewer tunnels, leading to the creation of the mutant creatures. Bosch confronts Wilson, who he realizes is just covering up for the NRC, and threatens to expose him. Wilson pulls a gun on him but Bosch manages to knock him unconscious and proceeds to try to open a manhole so Cooper and Shepherd can escape. He's shot by Wilson while doing this but manages to survive, with Shepherd avenging him in the meantime.
Mrs. Monroe (Ruth Maleczech), the bag lady who was featured in the article Cooper first worked on and is someone he's trying to find for the follow-up article, has an interesting introduction in that she's been arrested for trying to take a cop's gun, refusing to say why she took it. When given her one phone call, she calls Cooper and leaves this colorful message on his answering machine: "Cooper, you son of a bitch! I'm in jail. I only get one phone call. You think I wanna waste it talking to some goddamn fucking machine?" Upon calling and checking his messages while at Lauren's photo shoot, Cooper hears it and promptly goes to bail her out, escorting her out of the station (as she leaves, she grumbles, "Pigs. Suck a duck,"). She asks Cooper if he has a gun she can borrow, saying that it's for her brother, Victor (Bill Raymond). While he doesn't have a gun, Cooper does get some bandages that she asks for and follows her down into the tunnels, where Victor lives. She doesn't answer his questions about why Victor needs a gun, only reiterating that he just says he needs one, and when they see Victor, who's hurt and delirious, his only explanation is that he needs the gun to protect himself from some "ugly fuckers." He refuses to go a hospital, but Cooper is allowed to help change the bandage on his wound, a massive bite mark in his leg, and to take pictures of both it and him. Victor also lives down there with a buddy of his, Hugo (Rocco Siclari), who never speaks but is always willing to defend his friend, threatening Cooper with a club a couple of times, only for Mrs. Monroe to back him down. Late in the movie, when Cooper is trapped down in the tunnels, he finds that Victor is starting to turn into a C.H.U.D. himself, having killed Hugo. Cooper manages to shoot him dead but is attacked by a now completely mad Mrs. Monroe, only for Shepherd to save him from her.
Initially, Chief O'Brien (Eddie Jones) and the Commissioner (John Ramsey) are anything but supportive of Bosch. The former initially tells him that he needs to keep quiet about all the missing people, adding that it's not his directive and there's nothing he can do about it, only to be taken aback when Bosch later tells him to arrange a meeting with the Commissioner and someone from the NRC, flat-out accusing them of working together in some kind of conspiracy. During said meeting, the Commissioner, like Wilson, decries everything that Bosch and A.J. Shepherd tell and show them, most definitely taking his cues from him. When Shepherd starts grilling Wilson about the tie between the nuclear material they have in the city and the disappearances, the Commissioner tries to answer for him but Shepherd tells him to shut up, following that up with a full-on, "Eat it!", when he's told there's no reason to be insolent. By the time the meeting has gone up in smoke, O'Brien tells Bosch that he's really done it now, but he doesn't feel that way for long when the C.H.U.D.s are proven to be real and attack and kill Wilson's team. Upon seeing the footage the team captured, both O'Brien and the Commissioner now firmly agree with Bosch but still have no choice but to defer to Wilson and his plan to kill the creatures with gas, despite trying to warn him how dangerous such a plan could be to the city.
John Heard and Daniel Stern are far from the only familiar faces who appear in C.H.U.D. Peter Michael Goetz, who went on to appear in movies like The World According to Garp, Jumpin' Jack Flash, Father of the Bride, and My Girl, among many others, as well as numerous spots on television, appears briefly here as a man who gets dragged into the sewers by a C.H.U.D. in front of his traumatized granddaughter. Sam McMurray, who's had numerous appearances in television, often as a jerk (he's best known to me as Supervisor O'Boyle on The King of Queens), has a small role as Officer Crespi, the cop whose gun Mrs. Monroe tried to steal for Victor. However, the most notable person in the entire movie, despite appearing in just one scene, is a young John Goodman as one of two cops who go to a diner for a bite and acts very flirtatious with the waitress. He manages to get in some great lines before the C.H.U.D.s break into the diner and kill him and everybody else, such as, when the waitress says she heard his comment about her nice legs, he says, "Yeah? I bet you heard it before, too." Also, when she tells him he's asking for it, he says, "I've been asking for it all my life. Just never get it." The only thing is that he puts on a bit of an exaggerated New York accent but it's not as distracting as it could be. And finally, Mrs. Flora Bosch, who's taken into the sewers at the very beginning of the movie, is actually played by Daniel Stern's wife, Laure Mattos.
Besides the cast, C.H.U.D. also gets major points for the very uncomfortable atmosphere its setting creates. New York is depicted as a filthy, sleazy, and crime-riddled city, with grimy, wet streets and back-alleys that are often lined with garbage, graffiti on many of the walls and sides of buildings, an abundance of crime going on, and you can also tell just from looking at it that it's very hot and sticky (it was shot during a heatwave, which made it especially tough for the guys who had to play the C.H.U.D.s), with people who aren't even homeless often looking sweaty, dirty, and disheveled. Speaking of which, you really have to feel bad for the numerous homeless people in and below the city, who have to either live amidst the garbage and pollution on the streets or in the dark, dank, foul-smelling tunnels below them. You know that cerainly can't be a healthy way of life and they often look as diseased as they are dirty. Even the soup kitchen that A.J. Shepherd runs and is the only source of food for much of the homeless doesn't look very sanitary, with Shepherd himself always looking like he just got through wallowing around in a trash dump, and the interior of the police precinct Bosch works at, while not horrendous, has clearly seen better days as well. In fact, the studio apartment that George Cooper and Lauren Daniels share, the glossy studio where their photo shoot takes place, and the park the two of them visit at one point are the only places where there's any kind of beauty to be seen, and even that's kind of muted by the movie's actual look. As you can see, the film looks a bit grainy and de-saturated, adding to its sleaziness in the same way that the 16mm visages of The Last House on the Left and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre gave those movies the rawness they're known for. Although, I guess a more appropriate comparison would be with the first Basket Case, which also takes place in New York and has a similarly sleazy feel. In fact, this movie itself might have been shot on 16mm but I'm not sure. (By the way, here's a laugh: when he was interviewed by Fangoria, producer Andrew Bonime called C.H.U.D., "An expensive looking film and an expensive concept... It's a high quality kind of picture." Yeah.)
As bad as the city itself is, the underground is what really hits home just how hellish an existence it is to live there, especially if you're destitute. Having been to a big city myself, I can assure you that subway tunnels look just as awful in reality as they do in this film, and that's to say nothing of the sewer system further down in the bowels of the city, made up of dark, humid, filthy tunnels, some of which you have to crawl through, and big chambers full of garbage and junk that the undergrounders have gathered together to live on. I just can't imagine the hell these poor people must go through, being trapped in such an unenviable existence, and that's without the C.H.U.D.s. Once the C.H.U.D.s do come into being, the tunnels become a maze-like deathtrap, being virtually impossible to navigate and with potential danger lurking around every corner. The C.H.U.D.s themselves are also pitiable in a way, as they were once homeless people themselves but have now become hideous, flesh-eating monsters after being exposed to the toxic waste that has been purposefully dumped into the only place they had left to live. But what's most impressive about the underground setting is that I'm pretty sure they did actually film down there. I'm sure a number of those scenes were done in a studio, for both budgetary and safety reasons, but still, it does look like they did actually get to shoot beneath the city and for that, they have to be commended, as that could not have been easy or particularly pleasant to do.
It's a shame that the C.H.U.D.s aren't in the movie more than they are, as I really like their design, with their monstrous, misshapen faces and heads; mouths full of sharp teeth; pointy, bat-like ears; bright, glowing eyes; and grotesque, reptilian-style arms and clawed hands (the latter, however, often look more than a bit rubbery). Their body shape, stance, and the fact that the ripped remnants of their clothes are most black or, at the very least, darkly-colored, make them come off kind of like the iconic Tarman zombie in The Return of the Living Dead (that film was made the following year, making me wonder if they might have taken some ideas from this). Their ability to stretch their normally thick necks into a thinner, snake-like manner, while a decent effect, is a bit much but, fortunately, you only see it one time. Also, their blood is a green, glowing fluid, akin to that of the Predator, and their roars and snarls have a vaguely human, moaning quality behind them that makes them even more disturbing. While there's nothing to the C.H.U.D.s in terms of their depiction, as they come off as just mindless monsters looking for their next victim, the basic concept behind them makes them both unsettling and sad. It's creepy when you consider how long they've likely been down there in the sewers, without anyone knowing about them, and that they're now starting to come up to the streets in search of prey, pulling people down manholes when they get too close or even climbing out and going after the nearest victims they can find. And it's sad because, like I said up above, you know that these things were once just poor homeless people themselves, being forced to take refuge down in the sewers, and because of that, they fell victim to the toxic waste that had been dumped down there. In addition, you have to think about what a slow and painful change it must have been and, how over time, they must have cannibalized those that hadn't changed, while others likely either fell prey to or, even worse, had to watch their loved ones become these bloodthirsty creatures. Case in point, when he's lost down in the tunnels, George Cooper comes across Victor, who's starting to change and has already killed Hugo, while Mrs. Monroe has apparently lost her mind over this, causing her to attack Cooper when he kills Victor.
For about 90% of the movie, especially during the first two acts, the C.H.U.D.s' screentime is kept to a minimum, their presence being only hinted at in either quick glimpses, like the opening when one pulls Flora Bosch down the manhole and when the grandfather gets killed in front of his granddaughter (which is when you get your first look at one's face), or in scenes where they're completely off-screen, like when one is suggested to be rummaging beneath a bunch of garbage covering a hole in the sidewalk or when Bosch and Shepherd detect one on a Geiger counter before hearing its roar down in the tunnel. Even around the halfway point, the filmmakers still don't really show them to you, as the body of a dead one that Wilson, Bosch, and his superiors see is glimpsed in the face-plate of the bio-hazard suit Bosch has to wear and, when Wilson and Bosch's teams are attacked in the tunnels, you only see a very fleeting glimpse of a silhouette in the grainy video footage. As I've said before, the less is more approach can be a very effective way of making a horror movie or a monster movie and it's done pretty well during the first half here, but the downside is that there's no real payoff to all of this buildup. The only major scene involving a C.H.U.D. is when the one makes its way into Cooper and Lauren's building and up to their apartment, where it stalks Lauren, whereas the attack on the diner is shown in only quick cuts and the creatures are barely seen at all during the long section where Cooper and Shepherd are trying to find their way out of the underground. The focus of the climax is much more about trying to stop Wilson, whose plan is made out to be much more of a danger to the city than the C.H.U.D.s, and also expose him for the immoral piece of garbage he is. I'm guessing the lack of any significant creature action was a budget issue more than anything else but it's still a shame that we don't get more scenes with these cool-looking monsters, which is what I usually look and hope for in these kinds of films (you don't always need them but it usually helps).
In terms of blood and guts, C.H.U.D. isn't a complete gorefest but it does have some grisly images, mostly in terms of the aftermath of the monsters' attacks, as you see severed heads, arms, legs, and torsos (the latter of which has some innards spilling out of its lower side), as well as the nasty, bloody chunk that one bit out of Victor's leg and the body of Flora Bosch's dog that's still hanging by its leash from when the one C.H.U.D. pulled them both down the manhole at the beginning of the movie. The only really bloody moment comes when Lauren is in the shower, the drain becomes clogged, and when she uses a wire to try to unclog it, a geyser of blood blows out of the drain, spraying her right in the face and covering parts of the shower, with a striking shot of the blood covering a bar of soap and the wall behind it. Otherwise, the traces of blood that you see following a C.H.U.D. attack are very, very subdued.
I imagine that, at this point, you're wondering why I said I'm not that big on this movie as, aside from my wish that the C.H.U.D.s themselves were in it more, I've done nothing but compliment it. Moreover, I'm going to go as far as to say that I don't think it warrants the reputation it's gotten over the years as a really bad movie. The premise may be as B-movie as you can get but I don't know if it deserved to be lampooned by its own director and actors in the audio commentary or be the focus of an April Fool's prank by the Criterion Collection (in 2011, they announced they were going to give the film the Criterion treatment, only to put out something else entirely). But, the reason why I'm featuring it this month is because, despite all the good things I can say about it, the movie falls short for me by focusing more on the government cover-up angle than the monsters. I had a feeling that would be part of the story, given the origin of the C.H.U.D.s, but I would have preferred for it not to focus so much on Wilson being more of an antagonist than them, with his plan to kill the monsters that could be an even bigger threat to the city (which also comes off as the bigger threat to Cooper and Shepherd when they get trapped in the underground), the discovery that he's actually been dumping toxic waste down in the sewers, which reveals what C.H.U.D. actually stands for, and that he'll go as far as to kill to make sure he's not exposed. Like I said, I don't mind that there's a long build-up to the C.H.U.D.s but I wish that, once the authorities become aware of their existence, the focus was on trying to keep them from reaching the streets until a sensible method of killing them could be devised, only for them to find some way around it. In addition to the attack on the diner, having them appear in the basements of other buildings or even in the subways would have made for some good scenes too. It would have been nice if they'd had a bigger budget to make those sequences more elaborate but I would have even settled for the quick cutting approach taken by some that are here, as long as it ensured more C.H.U.D. action and a better payoff to the buildup. As it stands, I find the movie's latter half to be kind of dull, as I'm not getting any monster action to the extent that I'd want, save for the scene in the apartment with Lauren, and during the climax, I find myself wishing it was more about the C.H.U.D.s than Wilson and his ulterior motives.
The film's opening features a woman, who would later be identified as Flora Bosch, walking her dog down a dark city street in the middle of the night. She walks towards a manhole that has steam billowing out of its edges and, when she moves to walk to the left of it, she drops her purse. When she bends down to pick it up, a monstrous arm erupts out of the manhole, grabs her leg, and pulls her and her dog, leash and all, down into the sewers, leaving only one of her shoes on the street above. The next day, a street-cleaning vehicle moves down the road towards the manhole, sucking up every bit of trash that it comes across up into it, and eventually reaches and does the same to Flora's shoe. During this bit, you get your first look at how sleazy and filthy a place this is and how bad its homeless problem is as well. After the introduction to George Cooper and Lauren Daniels, there comes a moment where, while Cooper is on the phone, Lauren goes down to their building's basement in order to grab her jewelry case. While down there, searching for it, she hears some rattling and notes that it's coming from under the covering to an opening in the floor. Not thinking anything of it, Lauren finds her box and heads out, but another rattle, along with some growling, shows the audience that there is definitely something under there. Out on the street, there's a moment where a woman walks by a big heap of trash on the sidewalk, only to see something move under it. She moves in for a closer look, only for whatever it is to come close to exploding out at her, causing her to scream. Everything settles down and she moves in for another look, spying a large in the sidewalk that's lined with blood, and with a whiskey bottle next to it, suggesting that a homeless drunk got dragged down through it.
There's a long stretch establishing Captain Bosch and his interest in the recent spate of disappearances in his precinct. Despite being told by Chief O'Brien to keep things quiet, he has Officer Sanderson run down the blotter and find everything that's happened in the area around Lafayette Street. He then goes into the interrogation room, where the homeless Mrs. Monroe is being questioned about why she tried to take Officer Crespi's gun. Though she refuses to say anything, Bosch's interest is piqued when he learns that it happened at Lafayette and Houston. He also tells Crespi to allow her to make her one allowed phone call. Off-camera, she makes her phone call to Cooper's apartment, and he hears the message when, during a break in the photo shoot, he calls home to check messages. He promptly leaves to go bail her out upon hearing it. Meanwhile, Bosch learns of a missing persons report that was put in by A.J. Shepherd over at his soup kitchen on Lafayette. Going there, he talks with Shepherd, who tells him that he hasn't seen any of his regular undergrounders, who usually come up to the kitchen through a hole in the basement wall, in almost two weeks and adds that he's talking about ten to twelve people. He also tells Bosch about Val, who used to be an undergrounder but isn't anymore. Although he doesn't get anywhere with the rather crazed Val, he does learn that all of the undergrounders are looking for weapons. On a hunch, he goes to check in. Back at the station, Cooper has arrived to bail out Mrs. Monroe, and the two of them are leaving, Officer Jackson, who's on the phone with Bosch, is told to tail them.
Walking down the street with Mrs. Monroe, Cooper asks her why she wanted the cop's gun but she says that the gun was for her brother, Victor. She goes as far as to ask him for a gun but he can't help there, although he does agree to give her some bandages that she asks for next. With that, Cooper, now carrying a bag, is led to the nearest subway and down a ladder next to the track. Jackson continues following them, watching them walk down a dark corridor next to the tracks, but he stops due to the nasty smell emitting from the corridor and decides to just tell Bosch that he lost them. Mrs. Monroe leads Cooper to a large chamber deep beneath the city, through a small passage that they have to crawl through, around a corner, and through a similar small passage. On the other side, they find a very large chamber full of heaps of trash and junk, as well as some undergrounders who promptly run when they see them. Bewildered, Cooper asks Mrs. Monroe what they're so afraid of but she doesn't give him an answer, instead just leading him. He then asks Victor wants a gun but she answers, "He says he needs it, he needs it." They then climb a small ladder up onto a ledge, where a man brandishing a club lunges at Cooper. Mrs. Monroe, however, reins the man, Hugo, in, telling that Cooper photographed him for his first article. With that, Hugo backs down and she leads Cooper to a spot where Victor is lying on a mattress in a corner, breathing heavily and looking unwell, his living situation aside. Victor asks his sister if she got the gun and when she tells him that she got some bandages for him, he says he really needs a gun. Cooper asks him why he wants a gun and Victor answers, "Shoot them... Ugly fuckers." When he asks him to elaborate, Victor says, "Any ugly fucker who comes around here." Not getting anywhere with him, Cooper suggests they get Victor to a hospital but Victor protests and Mrs. Monroe, again, has to keep Hugo from attacking Cooper on Victor's behalf. They proceed to change the bandage on his right leg, and when Cooper removes it, he recoils at the sight of a massive bite, which has torn the flesh straight down to the bone.
At the soup kitchen, after getting Shepherd to identify the people that Cooper photographed for the article on the homeless, Bosch is told that the yearly probe by the Environmental Protection Agency has been going on for a month instead of ending after just a week, and it's still going on. Shepherd leads Bosch down to the soup kitchen's basement, telling him that he called the Agency and they claimed that the probe ended after a week like normal. He then shows him some items he found in the tunnel connecting to the basement, including a boot belonging to one of the surveyors and a radiation detector that's usually worn by those who work in nuclear energy plants, before leading Bosch into the tunnel itself. On the way, he tells him that, after he found those items, he called up the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and, while they wouldn't offer any explanations, they got very nervous about how he found said stuff. The two of them head down through a hatch in the floor and enter into the sewer system, finding a discarded Geiger counter on the floor. Picking it up, Bosch turns it on and, when he points the wand in the direction of the tunnel, it gets a signal, which gets stronger and stronger and stronger, hits the top, and then dies back down. The two of them wonder what that was about, when a freakish, moaning roar echoes through the tunnel.
Late that night, as Cooper and Lauren, upon learning that Lauren is going to have a baby, sleep up in their apartment, down on the street below, an older man crosses the road with his young granddaughter. Realizing that he's lost, he decides to stop at a phone booth and call the girl's uncle to get directions as to where they're going. Neither of them notice that the nearby manhole's lid is beginning to lift up, or that two reptilian, clawed hands are emerging from the hole and gripping the sides of the lid. Inside the booth, the man dials the number and gets ahold of the uncle, when the granddaughter, who's sitting at his feet, sees what's approaching them from outside. She tugs on his pants leg and he looks in time to see the creature, which rips the door open, snarls as it grabs him by the throat, and yanks him out of the booth, leaving the granddaughter slumped in the corner, clearly in shock from what she's just seen.
The next day, the young girl is at the police station when Bosch comes in and learns from Crespi that she's claiming a monster came out of the sewer and killed her grandfather. This prompts Bosch to tell Sanderson to get Chief O'Brien on the phone and order Jackson to post men on every street corner near Lafayette and Spring and to do the same for the subways. He also asks him to put an APB out on his wife. Then, he gets on the phone and tells O'Brien to set up a meeting at the Commissioner's office at 12:00, with someone from the NRC, adding that if he doesn't show up, he'll read about his involvement in an NRC cover-up in the afternoon papers, slamming the phone down before O'Brien can give him an earful over this. On his way, he drives by the soup kitchen, picks up Shepherd, along with his items, and the two of them stop by Cooper's building, explaining that he hopes the photographer has something really solid; if not, he's going to be in deep trouble upon accusing the Commissioner of a cover-up. They walk up to his apartment and Bosch knocks on his door, only to get no response. Needing to get in, Bosch tries to think of a way, while Shepherd takes out a pocketknife and uses it to open the lock, ignoring Bosch's protest about it being a case of breaking and entering. Inside, Bosch and Shepherd look through Cooper's darkroom and finds some new pictures of Victor, as well as a couple of the bite in his leg. At the meeting, Bosch and Shepherd present their evidence to the Commissioner, O'Brien, and Wilson of the NRC, with Bosch then telling them of what happened in the tunnel when they found the Geiger counter. Wilson comes up with glib dismissals of everything and they're especially incredulous when Bosch tells them about the girl who claims her grandfather was killed by a monster. Shepherd starts to pack up his stuff and leave, mentioning, "I'll take my pictures somewhere else." This catches the men's attention and he shows them the pictures of Victor and the bite in his leg. They start to take things more seriously then, especially when Shepherd threatens to go talk to the newspapers about it. With that, the Commissioner tells them that the EPA came across elevated radiation levels in the Lafayette area and Wilson admits that there are radioactive materials in the city that they're unable to move because of a pending court order. Shepherd then tries to get Wilson to explain what this has to do with the missing people but he refuses to talk and acts very condescending towards him, saying he doesn't want his help in the matter. With that, Shepherd storms out, threatening to go to the press and calls the Commissioner a fool and Wilson a liar, saying that he's hiding something. Though Wilson doesn't seem concerned about Shepherd's claims, telling him he has no evidence, Shepherd shoves the photos in his face, indicating that's his evidence. Irritated, Wilson smacks the photos down and Shepherd, in turn, grabs his briefcase and throws it across the room before storming out.
Wilson makes a call, telling someone to follow him, and while O'Brien scolds Bosch for what just happened, the captain, who picks up the briefcase, notices a file with the acronym, "C.H.U.D," on the front cover. Bosch demands to know what it means but Wilson, who promptly takes the file back, is less than willing to say anything. Before they can argue the matter further, Wilson gets a call and, after hanging up, tells the men, "Two gas company guys just found it: a Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller. A C.H.U.D." Out on the street, Shepherd, unaware that he's being followed, walks to the nearest payphone but, when he attempts to make a call, the man tailing him stops him, making a display of putting his quarter in his mouth when it's spat back out. Intimidated, Shepherd walks away, the thug having a satisfied grin on his face. Elsewhere, Wilson takes Bosch, the Commissioner, and O'Brien to the small facility where the C.H.U.D.'s body is being kept. Changing into some bio-hazard suits, the men are then shown the creature's corpse, which is being kept under a tarp, and they're clearly aghast at the sight of it, especially given that the scientist tells them that it was once human. Outside, Wilson is told that the creature was killed by a gas leak and then announces that he's going ahead with the probe and cleanup. He insists that this creature was the result of a freak accident and there couldn't be more. Bosch is intent upon sending a team armed with flamethrowers down with them but Wilson shoots it down, saying that he can't afford the publicity it would stir up. He goes on to say that he'll make it an order if he must and the Commissioner breaks it to Bosch that Wilson is in charge in this matter.
In the next scene, Wilson's team enters the sewer system, armed with only flashlights and a video camera. When they get down there, they're surprised to find a trio of men dressed in black and armed with flamethrowers waiting for them. In his command center, Wilson tells Bosch to leave everything to him... only to then see the video feed on the monitors showing him the team. He glares at Bosch, knowing it's his doing, while Bosch communicates with the leader of his team, Parker, with a walkie-talkie. Wilson tells him to get them out of the sewer but when Bosch ignores that order, Wilson tries to get one of his men, Benson, to do it. To that, Bosch says, "Are you kidding? Your man has a camera. Mine has a flamethrower." Parker then points the flamethrower at the cameraman to get the point across and Wilson reluctantly relents, as Bosch tells them to move out. They arrive at an intersection and, at first, Wilson refuses to tell them which way to go. However, Bosch tells him that he can wait as long as he's able to and Wilson, again, relents, telling them it's the north tunnel. Bosch tells his team to check it out and when it seems like it's clear, they move on in with the others. However, one of their Geiger counters begins picking up something and Parker says that he thinks he sees something ahead in the tunnel. Bosch tells them to get their flamethrowers up and running and, as the Geiger signal continues to climb, they blast fire into the tunnel. As they watch, Wilson thinks it's a waste of time but Bosch spots something amidst the flames. Wilson is at first incredulous but then, it become clear that the man are attacked, as the camera drops and they lose the video signal. Bosch yells for Parker to respond but he gets nothing. Later, the Commissioner and O'Brien are shown the footage and say they now side with Bosch, but Wilson is still intent on doing things his way, announcing his plan to kill the creatures with gas, despite the danger to the city itself.
Shepherd returns to the soup kitchen, looking dehydrated and disoriented, and nearly has a heart attack when he runs into Bosch, who's there waiting for him. He insists that nothing's wrong and washes up using a faucet in the middle of the floor. Meanwhile, Cooper meets up with Murphy, whom he and Lauren met at the park earlier, to demand he give him back his pictures, which are missing. Murphy tells him that the police have his pictures and that there's a cover-up going on, which Cooper doesn't believe is anything more than nonsense that he's trying to drum up for a story. He admits he doesn't know what's being covered up but tells him that the answer is in the tunnels and Cooper, reluctantly, leads him down there. Back at the soup kitchen, Bosch tells Shepherd about the C.H.U.D.s and Wilson's plan to kill them with gas. He warns him that the kitchen isn't a safe place, since the plan could drive the creatures up to the surface, and Bosch asks him if there's somewhere he can take him. Shepherd declines the offer, saying he has to cook dinner and turns on his stove's pilot. Bosch warns him to keep an eye on the flame and leaves. Elsewhere, Wilson has decided to begin the gas plan. O'Brien tells him that he'll blow up the city but Wilson says he's going to only flood a section of the underground with the gas. Down in the tunnels, when they come upon a corner, Murphy says that he heard something and creeps towards the corner, taking out a gun. He swings around the corner and points but sees nothing. When asked why he has a gun, Murphy says that if Victor wanted one, so does he. At the soup kitchen, the light for the stove goes out and Shepherd can't re-light it. Realizing what this means, he heads down to the basement and warns the crazed Val to get out, telling him that the sky's going to shut. Hearing this, he runs for the ladder that leads up to the surface, only to get knocked down before he climb out and die from hitting his head on the bricks and rocks below. Rushing to him, Shepherd hears something snap while looking him over and realizes he's been locked in. It's the handiwork of the man who tailed him, who put a padlock on the hatch. He tries to smash through the hatch using the ladder but it proves to be futile.
Elsewhere in the underground, Cooper and Murphy come upon one of the tighter tunnels they have to go through, when Murphy, again, insists upon checking it out first, armed with his gun. Cooper decides he's had enough and is about to leave, when a C.H.U.D. lunges out of the tunnel at Murphy, grabbing him by the throat and pulling him in, causing him to drop the gun. Cooper reaches in and grabs Murphy's feet, attempting to pull him out, but the creature is too strong and he loses his grip. Scared out of his mind, he runs back the way he came. Back with Shepherd, he takes the route that he walked with Bosch before, using the Geiger counter to see if there are any C.H.U.D.s down below the hatch. Getting a fairly mild signal, he figures it's okay and crawls down there and through the opening to the spot where they found the counter. He has some trouble with his flashlight, as it threatens to go out, but he manages to get it working again and continues on down the passage, through a large chamber, and along a narrow ledge leading down into the sewer system. His flashlight starts acting up again and he takes the front apart to try to fix it, only to drop it down in the water below. Realizing that put an end to that matter, he tosses the whole thing down and takes the passage behind him. Coming out into another tunnel where he has to stay along a narrow ledge above some water, he's about to go on when he looks to his left and sees something that makes him run back into the other passage. Peeking back around, he sees four C.H.U.D.s rummaging around a spot where there's a lot of toxic chemicals. Instead of trying to slip away, he actually tries to get closer, only to nearly slip and cause a noise that gets their attention, sending him running back the way he came.
At the apartment building, as Lauren looks through a photo album down in the basement, unaware of the danger Cooper is in, Shepherd runs for his life, only to come to a dead end. He has no choice but to try to climb up onto a ledge but, as he does, the Geiger counter in his back pocket falls out. It activates and the signal starts to climb rapidly, indicating that the C.H.U.D.s are coming. He manages to make it to the ledge, as one is seen roaming around in the dark in the passage he just came through. Back at the apartment, Lauren removes the covering to an opening in the floor, only to drop her album down there. She climbs down a short ladder there to get it, but when she does, she makes the grisly discovery of a dead dog hanging by its leash, namely Flora Bosch's dog. At that moment, Bosch himself is called down to the river to investigate a report of a body being found, but after he and the two officers with him meet the guy who found it, they walk down to the shore and Bosch nearly loses his balance when he sees that it's his wife's severed head. Bosch has to literally be dragged out of there by the cops. At the building, Lauren runs through the door leading to the basement and locks it, before heading on up to the apartment, while at a bar, the shattered Bosch is drowning his sorrows with the cops. She calls the police to come check it out, before heading into the shower. She has no idea that, as she removes her clothes, a C.H.U.D. is coming up through the opening in the basement floor. During her shower, she realizes that the drain has become clogged and, turning the shower off, attempts to unclog it using a straightened wire hanger. But, when she pulls the hanger back out, she gets hit in the face with a big spray of blood that also covers the walls and the bar of soap sitting in a small alcove.
As night falls on the city, a couple of cops make their way into a small diner and, after ordering their food, one of them not so subtly flirts with the waitress. Outside, one of a pair of bums sitting against the diner wall sees a C.H.U.D.'s hands emerge from under a manhole cover. He tries to warn his friend but gets no response and decides to run for it. Inside, the one cop is continuing to flirt, when the waitress asks them if they should be on duty somewhere. Just when he says, "Nah," they both turn around and sees numerous C.H.U.D.s standing outside the diner. They proceed to start smashing their way inside, snarling and howling, and this racket wakes up the other bum who was out there and he runs for it too, as the sound of a massacre can be heard inside. At the apartment building, Lauren, who's out of the shower and getting dressed, is unaware that she's about to have similar problems, as a C.H.U.D. is banging on the other side of the door that leads down into the basement. Justin, a little boy who just moved in with his mother, hears the commotion and is about to open the door, but his mom calls him back to their apartment for dinner. There's a moment where he walks back to collect a toy underneath the heater by the window (the first time he went was to retrieve his bouncing ball) and then walks away again, right before the C.H.U.D. manages to smash the door off its hinges. By this point, a mass of police, bystanders, and newscasters have descended upon the diner, with one of the latter admitting that he has no idea what he's going to say when he goes on the air. Some men in bio-hazard suits test the radiation around the manhole the C.H.U.D.s emerged from and find a bit of signal. Also there is Wilson, who's beginning to coordinate an operation to seal off every manhole within a ten block radius.
Cooper finds himself back in the area where the undergrounders lived, making his way around the heaps of junk and back to the spot where Victor was. But, when he gets there, he comes upon Hugo's severed torso lying up against the wall, and then sees Victor apparently cowering in the corner on his mattress. He walks over to him, only for him to face him and reveal that he's becoming a C.H.U.D. himself. He grabs Cooper and forces him down to the ground, but Cooper shoots him, making him recoil off and fall to the ground. Getting up, he moves in to inspect Victor's body, when he rears up and snarls at him. Cooper promptly puts his foot on his chest and shoots him in the head, killing him for good. But, he's then attacked from behind by Mrs. Monroe, angry at him for killing her brother. She picks up the gun, which he dropped, and is about to shoot him, when Shepherd appears and shoves her, incapacitating her (she must've been weak and dying herself, as he barely touched her and she just fell). He helps Cooper to his feet and the two of them team up to try to escape together. Up on the streets, Bosch arrives at the site of the gathered crowd and pushes his way through the onlookers, where he finds O'Brien and Wilson. He immediately confronts Wilson over what's happened but Wilson ignores him, saying they need to start pumping the gas and suggests stopping the subway to kill the power-lines beneath the city. Bosch then accuses Wilson of being responsible for the death of all the people, then attacks him over what happened to his wife, O'Brien having to restrain him. He proclaims that he's going to be the one to stop him but O'Brien sends him back to his squad car to cool off. Up in her apartment, Lauren is watching news coverage of the situation, even though the anchor has no idea of what's even happened, while at the same time, Wilson orders two manholes that lead up onto the street to be sealed with vehicles parked above them. The Commissioner gives a statement about killing the power to the subway and that they're also going to divert some of the gas lines into the sewer system. Hearing this on the news, Lauren realizes that Cooper is in danger from this plan and rushes out of the apartment to try to do something, only to run into a C.H.U.D. coming up the stairway. She immediately rushes back in, closes and locks the door, and tries to call the police again, only to accidentally rip the line out of the wall in her haste. The monster starts banging against the door from the other side and she desperately uses everything she can find, from tables and chairs to a freezer, to barricade it.
As they run through the tunnels, Cooper and Shepherd come upon the one exit Cooper knows of but it's now blocked. Knowing what this means and explaining it to him, Shepherd then leads him to the exit that he knows of, but they find that it's been blocked as well. Meanwhile, the police whom Lauren called for earlier arrive at the apartment building, but no sooner do they walk in than the C.H.U.D. grabs both of them from the side of the door. Not hearing this, but seeing their car outside, Lauren puts her ear to her door to see if she can hear anything. While Cooper and Shepherd stumble into a spot where radioactive materials are kept in the tunnels, the C.H.U.D. in the building starts pounding on the apartment door again. Cooper and Shepherd then find another mass of canisters and boxes, only to see that it's different from what they saw before. Shepherd reads, "Contamination Hazard Urban Disposal" on one of the containers and they realize that it's a dumping site for toxic waste. Due to how much there is, they figure that the dumping must have been going on for years. Up above, Wilson gives the order to start pumping the gas. Beyond the dumping site, Cooper and Shepherd stumble across the slaughtered remains of the team from earlier and Cooper is so freaked out by this that he just about has a nervous breakdown. Shepherd has to restrain him and force him to the floor until he relaxes. When he does, Shepherd spies the camera that was being used before and figures they may be able to use it to get help. Cooper starts filming him with it and Shepherd starts sending a message, telling anybody who's listening that they're trapped. While his image does appear on the monitors in the command center, there's no sound and the one man there has his back to the screens. Inspecting the camera, Cooper sees that there's a headset jack on it and tells Shepherd they need to find the headset. Looking across from them, they see it... still on the head of the person who was using it last. Gingerly removing the headset, they plug it in and Shepherd repeats his message, telling whoever is seeing it to get Bosch. The man at the command center sees this and asks Shepherd who he is. In his squad car, Bosch, who's sitting there, stewing, gets a call from Sanderson, who delivers this message from the man in the command center: "Tell Bosch he's got the reverend on the video in the NRC control room."
Lauren screams for help out her window but there is no one around to hear her, since everybody's at the diner. The C.H.U.D. bangs on the door from outside again and Lauren scrambles to the fuse-box to the right of the door and kills the lights. Another slam and the door's bolt gives way, allowing the C.H.U.D. to enter the apartment. Once it's in the middle of the room, Lauren tries to slip towards the door but it turns around and spots her. It slams the door shut and turns over the table next to it, as Lauren runs for cover in the darkroom. The C.H.U.D. follows her through the door and wanders into the room, trying to find her. Hiding up on a shelf, Lauren takes the cover off a bucket of developer liquid and, when the C.H.U.D. turns around, throws the stuff in its face. It recoils and puts its hands over its burning eyes, giving her to opportunity to jump down and run out of the room, closing the door behind her. She tries to run out of the apartment but finds herself unable to get the door open or move the table that's leaning up against it. Hearing the C.H.U.D. roar, she grabs a nearby sword (don't ask me why they would have that) and stands at an angle at the door, waiting for it to smash it down. But instead, it plows its way through the wall, coming out behind her. She swings around as, instead of attacking, it stands there and looks around the room, having apparently been blinded by the liquid. It starts stretching its neck until it's long and thin, giving Lauren the opportunity to hack its head off. She watches as green, glowing blood shoots out of the stump of the neck, when the head, which is still conscious, has a go at her leg. She kicks it across the room and watches as the glowing eyes fade, signifying that it now is dead. Meanwhile, Shepherd and Cooper are waiting down in the sewers for a response to their message when they hear the welcome sound of Bosch's voice over the headset. He asks them where they are and when Shepherd tells him, he says for them to run down the side-tunnel to where a manhole is, saying that he'll open it for them. Before they head out, Shepherd tells Bosch what he and Cooper found out about Wilson's involvement in the situation.
While Lauren takes the squad car that belonged to those two unlucky cops from before and drives it to the spot where everyone is gathered, and Cooper and Shepherd, coughing and gasping from the gas, run to the manhole, Bosch rushes back to the site and gets a bullhorn out of his car. He asks for who has the key to the truck that's parked at the spot where the one manhole is, telling them about the men who are trapped. The man with the key shows up and is about to give it to him, but Wilson gets there first and takes the key. He tells Bosch that the C.H.U.D.s will be looking for a way out and that moving the truck would be took risky. That's when Bosch lets on that he knows the truth and Wilson, in order to avoid anyone hearing it, has Bosch follow him over to a secluded corner. There, Bosch tells him that he knows what C.H.U.D. really stands for and about the dumping of the toxic waste beneath the city. Now, Wilson is definitely not going to let him save Cooper and Shepherd and pulls a gun on Bosch, who promptly slugs him and takes the key. Cooper and Shepherd reach the manhole, which still hasn't been cleared, as Bosch rushes to get there as fast as he can. At the same time, Wilson regains consciousness and chases after him, when Lauren arrives and, finding the nearest officer, asks to see the person in charge, saying they need to stop the gas. The officer, seeing Wilson run by, points him out and Lauren runs after him. By this point, the C.H.U.D.s are closing in on Cooper and Shepherd, but Bosch reaches the truck and moves it. He grabs a crowbar, runs to the manhole, and starts to remove the lid, when Wilson shoots him and he collapses. Wilson drags his body away and then gets into the truck, when Cooper and Shepherd manage to push the lid away themselves and climb out. He starts the truck, drives forward down the street, passing by Lauren, turns around, and guns it at the two men. Lauren yells at them and they dive out of the way, landing beside Bosch. Lauren runs to Cooper, as Wilson comes around for another pass at them. Seeing what's happened to Bosch, Shepherd grabs his gun and fires a couple of shots at the oncoming truck. While they miss, one more shot goes through the windshield and strikes Wilson, causing him to crash on the edge of the street. The truck rolls a little bit down the street until the left front tire falls into the manhole, causing the rigged vehicle to explode into a big fireball. As Cooper and Lauren embrace, Shepherd turns when he hears Bosch say, "Nice shot," and rushes to the injured but still alive captain. The movie ends on a shot of the burning truck that pans up to the night sky.
The music for C.H.U.D. was by Martin Cooper and David A. Hughes, two English musical partners who are credited as "Cooper Hughes." Their score for the film is another aspect of it that's quite memorable, as it's an unusual, symphonic score with a lot of interesting cues. Its most notable themes are the main one, a very downbeat but steadily rhythmic piece which you hear when the title comes up and during the ending credits, and the theme for the horror scenes, which is this low, menacing bit that's often accompanied by the eerie sounds of voices vocalizing by going, "ah, ah, ah." There's also a warm, soft theme for Lauren Daniels, which sounds like it's being played on an instrument akin to a keyboard; a notable, rhythmically tapping electronic piece that opens the movie and which you also hear again later on into it; a very freakish, squealing theme that you hear when Lauren gets sprayed with blood in the shower; and the climax is set to this simple theme that's subtle but also fast-paced and works well enough with the sequence. It's not a bad score all in all and I can say that it does fit the movie it goes with, which is often all I ask for.
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