It’s often said that the 1990s weren’t the horror genre’s best years; that may be true, but let’s not ignore the fact that countless gems were released between 1990 and 1999. One of those gems was Robert Kurtzman’s Wishmaster, which introduced the world to a brand new horror icon in 1997. Full of awesome practical effects and featuring an incredible performance from Andrew Divoff that helped make a pretty good case for the evil Djinn being ranked alongside Freddy, Jason and all the greats, the loaded-with-cameos Wishmaster is a whole lot of fun to watch.

As I write this post, Lionsgate is gearing up to release the 4-film Wishmaster Collection on Blu-ray on March 28th. In other words, it’s the perfect time to talk Wishmaster, and Robert Englund did just that at the recent Emerald City Comic Con. He took part in an hour-long panel where he answered various questions from fans, and the conversation at one point turned to the ’97 film.

In addition to telling a fun behind-the-scenes story about his experience on set, Englund also took a moment to heap some much-deserve praise on Wishmaster. He told the con crowd:

I knew that we were on to something original. I think the Wishmaster movies deserved a little more respect. It’s a great hook, and Andrew Divoff is terrific in those films. I thought it was just a great great hook… a great gimmick for a franchise. That unfortunately didn’t go far enough, I think. I think there was probably at least one more to be made. Would’ve been really interesting.

Englund of course played Raymond Beaumont in the first Wishmaster film, which I call the original “Expendables of horror.” Nice to see him giving it some love, after all these years.

Check out the full chat below. The Wishmaster talk begins at 31:32.