Editorials
Horror Fans Have Never Had it This Good
I hope you’re enjoying yourself, because we horror fans have it pretty good right now. If you’ve ever needed proof that our favorite genre is still very much alive, you needn’t look any further than this month’s offering of video games. Whatever flavor(s) of horror you prefer, we’ve seen a bit of everything — from supernatural to survival horror, prehistoric to post-apocalyptic.
For the most part, the last few weeks’ worth of horror-themed releases have been quality games, and the ones that are still on the way look incredibly promising.
Even if the rest of this month’s new releases are disappointing, that won’t change the fact that we haven’t had it this good in years.
So what, specifically, am I referring to? Well, technically, this horror game extravaganza kicked off with Daylight on April 29th. It wasn’t a great game, but that doesn’t matter, because it was quickly followed up by several other titles that are well worth your time if that one didn’t interest you.
May started strong, with the full release of developer Big Robot’s quirky, British robo-horror stealth survival game Sir, You Are Being Hunted. I’ve spent some time with the game, though not as much as I would have liked, and so far my favorite thing about it is its fantastic sense of humor. It’s also not an easy game, or maybe I’m just not very good at it. Either way, if you’re looking for a challenge, this one offers that and so much more.
A week after the British (robot) invasion, we saw the release of Outlast: Whistleblower (May 6), a prequel expansion to arguably the scariest game of 2013. It’s narrative is stronger than the base game, and it wraps up the story of Mount Massive asylum nicely, while offering a bit of closure for anyone who were unsatisfied with Outlast’s ending.
Not long after Red Barrels had put a neat, blood-spattered bow on their terrifying game of hide-and-seek, Telltale released the third episode in the five episode-long second season of their ridiculously good The Walking Dead: The Game.
In Harm’s Way continues the increasingly perilous story of Clementine and friends as they face new dangers, most of which consist of cruel people doing awful things, which is sometimes broken up by the sudden unwelcome appearance of a few zombies. If you’re wondering where my review of this is, I had to delay it to make way for a trip out of town. It’ll go live early next week, I promise.
And finally, Fatal Frame fans got their spirit photography fix with the long anticipated arrival of DreadOut on May 15. It follows a group of students who discover a ghost town during their class trip to Indonesia. Unfortunately for them, this ghost town lives up to its name, but it’s not all bad, as one of the students soon learns she has the power to vanquish these malicious spirits (because video games).
Alone, that many scary games in a little over two week’s time would be worthy of celebration, but the fun doesn’t end there, no sir. We haven’t even touched on the handful of titles that will be made available to the public in the coming weeks, albeit in unfinished states.
Last week, Dead Island: Epidemic hit Steam Early Access, introducing its colorful new take on the popular zombie franchise. It’s also free-to-play, so there’s no real reason not to at least give it a try. On Monday, F.E.A.R. Online will be joining Epidemic with its horror-themed free-to-play multiplayer offering, and the party ends with The Forest and The Stomping Land which both arrive on Steam Early Access on May 30.
If memory serves, it’s been at least two years since we were last gifted with a release schedule that was this exciting, and the month I’m remembering wasn’t all that impressive. If you’ll take a journey back to March 2012, you’ll likely remember how promising that month was, with its decent selection of promising horror games that included I Am Alive, Silent Hill HD Collection, Silent Hill Downpour, Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City, and Yakuza: Dead Souls. It was exciting, until the games came out, and then it wasn’t.
Thanks to a number of talented indie developers — six of the nine titles I mentioned are coming from small studios that are self-publishing their games — we’ve had a month that will be remembered. The reason I decided to take the time to write about all this is simple, really.
I’ve made it a goal of mine to use Bloody Disgusting’s substantial reach to promote indie developers who I think deserve it, because the games I’m most excited for nowadays are almost entirely coming from the indie space. I also keep hearing people say that horror is either dead, dying, or the bubble that is this golden age of indie horror we currently find ourselves in is about to burst, sending us all free-falling into a sea of brown and grey shooters, sequels, and casual games. I don’t believe it, not for a second.
Genres gain and lose popularity and attention over time — there’s no avoiding that — but in no way is horror on its way out. At least not for a while.
This leads me to my question: with all of these new horror games available or coming soon, which one(s) will have your attention as we head into E3?
The penultimate season of Tales from the Crypt (1989–1996) aired its first three episodes on October 31, so it’s understandable that at least one of those three stories is set on Halloween.
Sandwiched between “Let the Punishment Fit the Crime” (Russell Mulcahy, Ron Finley) and “Whirlpool” (Mick Garris, A. L. Katz & Gilbert Adler) is the most severe episode of the bunch. Maybe the entire series? William Malone and Dick Beebe’s “Only Skin Deep” traded the show’s typical sense of fun for startling amounts of bleakness and kink.
“Only Skin Deep” is, apart from the Crypt Keeper’s intro and outro, noticeably unfunny. There are no considerable attempts at making the viewer laugh. Come to think of it, if those bookends had been replaced, and there was more of a sci-fi element in the story, HBO could have easily squeezed this tale into that successor anthology, Perversions of Science (1997). In Crypt, though, “Only Skin Deep” is much too grim for an audience that had become accustomed to campiness and levity.
What makes “Only Skin Deep” feel dark, among other things, is its protagonist. Showing up to a Halloween party where he’s not welcome, and where his former girlfriend (Diane DiLasco) is attending, Carl Schlag (Peter Onorati) first comes across as your standard bitter ex. You soon realize it’s much worse than that, once Carl threatens Linda (“You know, silly me, thinking I gave you what you deserved. If I’d have done that, I’d have killed you”). Now, I haven’t forgotten that Tales from the Crypt was teeming with vile men who did women harm. Yet Carl’s brand of misogynistic menace hits differently—it borders on being too realistic for this kind of series.
Mike Vosburg’s EC-style comic cover for “Only Skin Deep”, as seen in the Tales from the Crypt episode.
Despite donning a party mask for much of the episode, Carl can’t ever mask his true nature. The invitation did say “come as you are”, after all. That inability to change and be better, however, is why Carl ends up in such a karmic predicament. His outburst of anger at the party attracts the attention of one loner partygoer named Molly (Sherrie Rose, who was also in Season Four’s “On a Deadman’s Chest”). Her bone-white, featureless “mask” and body-bag costume don’t initially register as too strange, especially on a night like this. But at a party chock-full of colorful, cartoonish, and lighthearted ensembles, it does look out of place.
Darkness attracts darkness as Carl ditches the party and accompanies the mysterious Molly to her place. Which, by the way, should have been an immediate red flag. But perhaps she’s so hot, he doesn’t seem to mind the serial killer aesthetic. Resembling a warehouse that has been converted into living spaces, but never then decorated to remove the cold, industrial look, Molly’s home (or lair) is as gloomy as this whole episode feels. It’s like the set of a grungy music video, albeit a tad cleaner. The environments in a typical Crypt episode tend to be small, overfilled, and broken-in. Warm, regardless of any weird goings-on. All that empty space in Molly’s hovel, on the other hand, elicits a creepy feeling that Carl was unwise to ignore.
Tales from the Crypt featured more sex than it didn’t, but hands down, “Only Skin Deep” boasts the steamiest scene in the show’s history. Pushing it over the line, in addition to Onorati showing bare buns and the camera never turning down one of his pelvic thrusts, is the twisted dirty talk. Carl stays in the moment, whereas Molly unleashes charged lines like “the hurt, the anger, give it to me” and “take it out on my flesh like you want to”. It’s all quite kinky, as well as tied into the story’s theme of pain.
How else “Only Skin Deep” differs from other episodes is its twists. Or rather, its lack thereof. Nothing comes as a great surprise here, particularly because the deuteragonist’s ulterior motives are so obvious. By no means is Molly a wolf in sheep’s clothing; her face is a fright mask, she practically reeks of death, and she lives in what can best be described as a serial killer’s hideout. That last-act revelation of Molly’s mask really being her face is also nothing shocking. Cleverness is certainly not this episode’s strength.
A page from “…Only Skin Deep!”, as seen in EC Comics’ Tales from the Crypt.
While “Only Skin Deep” isn’t the most universally loved episode of Tales from the Crypt, it’s an interesting preview of William Malone’s future as a director. Most notably, he went on to helm House on Haunted Hill (1999) and FeardotCom (2002), the former of which was co-written by Dick Beebe, this episode’s writer. Dark Castle Entertainment, that genre house founded by Crypt producers Joel Silver, Robert Zemeckis, and Gilbert Adler, was instrumental in bringing out Malone’s gruesome, over-the-top vision in House on Haunted Hill. However, FeardotCom and Malone’s Masters of Horror episode, “Fair-Haired Child”, are the most stylistically compatible with “Only Skin Deep”.
As one might guess, this episode is nothing like its source material. The “…Only Skin Deep!” found in the pages of EC Comics is set during Mardi Gras in New Orleans, and save for its last couple of pages, is pretty sweet in nature. There, a man named Herbert is enamored with a woman he met five years prior to the present-day story. Every year, he has come down to Mardi Gras to see Suzanne, who’s always dressed as a hag-faced witch. Well, this time, Herbert plans on popping the question and marrying someone who is, for the most part, a total stranger. Suzanne accepts his proposal, but with one condition: they stay in costume until they’re officially hitched. You can probably see where this is going…
Once they are married, Suzanne remains incognito, even when she and Herbert have consummated their vows. A semi-predictive nightmare then rattles Herbert; he dreamt that Suzanne’s real face was as wizened as her mask. Finally, in his haste to find out the truth, Herbert winds up killing his new wife. Faceless and well on her way to bleeding out, the dying Suzanne manages to say she never wore a mask.
For more traditional EC-style ghastliness, your best bet is reading the comic. It’s wickedly sad. For something less conventional, as far as Tales from the Crypt goes, the role-reversing adaptation is worth watching. It’s not the best this show had to offer, although Malone’s visual style, plus the sexual abandon, does set the episode apart. If nothing else, “Only Skin Deep” leaves an impression that, even years later, shows no signs of fading.
Season Six of Tales from the Crypt can be streamed on Shudder, starting on June 5.
Tales from Tales from the Crypt celebrates the show’s Shudder premiere by singling out one episode from each season. So don’t even think about changing that dial, boys and ghouls. More spot-“frights” are to come.
Carl discovers Molly’s collection of human ‘masks’ in the Tales from the Crypt episode, “Only Skin Deep”.
You must be logged in to post a comment.