Editorials
Horror Icons in Fighting Games – Why It’s a KO Move!
As more and more horror icons are getting crammed into fighting titles, we explore the relationship between the two
The villains and anti-heroes of our favorite horror franchises have effectively been terrorizing and entertaining audiences (“terrortaining”, to coin a bad phrase) for decades now across numerous franchises. We love these monsters. We need these monsters. But in spite of the constant franchise-ization of horror and the many costumes of these boogeymen that are trotted out every Halloween allowing us to become them, there is still a degree of disconnect going on here. Even though audiences have made it clear that they want to be these monsters, video games have been incredibly slow on the uptake to cater to this wicked whim.
With the recent announcement that the Xenomorph and Leatherface are both soon to join the bloody fray of Mortal Kombat X, some interesting questions have been brought up as a result. With this news causing an avalanche of excitement between Mortal Kombat and horror fans alike, why has this trend been so slow moving? Why haven’t horror icons seen a full invasion into the violent fighting genre of gaming at this point? We’ll examine the progress made in this area through the recent years, as well as how horror could firmly transplant itself in the medium and create a whole new messy playground to invade.
Admittedly, video games haven’t been completely devoid of featuring some of our favorite horror heavyweights through the years. Franchises like Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and even The Texas Chain Saw Massacre have all seen video game adaptations, but these have been few and far between, not to mention resulting in shoddy titles that are largely superfluous. Only recently, with the release of Alien: Isolation have we seen horror franchises beginning to get respect in the medium with this hopefully becoming a trend of what’s to come. There have been wheels in motion recently to get Jason Voorhes back in the gaming world with a new Friday the 13th title, and the timing couldn’t be better.
With it appearing like (at least for now) that action-adventure and even survival horror angles for horror franchise adaptations aren’t the right direction, what seems like the next logical choice is to turn to the realm of fighting games. This genre distills this mindless carnage of horror films into a medium that revolves around excessive gore. Putting people in control of these psychopaths (as opposed to surviving them), is additionally a fresh twist that gamers are eager for. Adversely, having a bunch of free-range horror icons in one title together becomes a fun mash-up of sorts that allows you to create your own Monster Vs. Monster scenarios, truly indulging and flexing your horror muscle.
Horror franchises allow such an easy transition into fighting games, and it’s likely why there’s already been a good deal of cross-pollination in the field. While not taking iconic horror villains per se, the Killer Instinct and Clay Fighters series were still indulging in these sort of archetypes, featuring fighters that would span everything from werewolves, to headless horsemen, to skeletons, to killer snowmen. In a lot of ways the waters were being tested here to see how palatable characters like this could be in a fighting title.
Flash forward into the more recent generations of gaming and the genesis of the popular trend of “guest characters” in fighting games. I suppose it only makes sense that in a growing time of “system exclusives” and pre-order bonuses that differ depending on your retailer, finding a way to incentivize purchases is the natural progression of things. One of the more famous examples of this has been with Namco’s popular Soul Calibur series. The multi-platform fighting title would feature different guest characters depending on which system you were purchasing for. While they might not be horror franchise icons necessarily, XBOX’s version of Soul Calibur II contains Todd McFarlane’s Spawn, and Soul Calibur IV for the PS3 features Darth Vader, opening the doors for such villainous cameos. If these sort of sweeping experiments could work, then clearly pushing things a little further wouldn’t be that difficult.
Such a push finally happened in the ninth Mortal Kombat title (aptly titled simply, Mortal Kombat), which saw the release of several DLC characters (including Kratos from the God of War video game franchise), which most notably saw the inclusion of Freddy Kreuger. With fans accepting this character with open claws and Freddy quickly becoming one of the most popular characters within the game, clearly this crossover could work. Mortal Kombat might have merely grazed this premise, but the latest game in the series, Mortal Kombat X, has made it their mantra. So Freddy might be absent from the party this time, but Mortal Kombat X does have Jason Voorhes, the Predator, with Leatherface and the Xenomorph from the Alien series on the way. That’s kind of unbelievable. People are going to be reenacting their own personal Alien Vs. Predator fight scenes now, and it’s within a title that exists beyond both of them.
Elsewhere in gaming the boundaries have become increasingly fluid, with multi-property titles like Lego Dimensions bringing stuff on the fringe of horror like Doctor Who, Jurassic World, and even 2001 into play. Valve’s Poker Night surprisingly has Ash Williams from Raimi’s Evil Dead as a character, which is a step in the right direction, even if his inclusion here is mostly useless. Even an iOS game like Car Town Streets has the Ecto-1 from Ghostbusters in it! Our perception of what is acceptable and how sacred these worlds are is broadening every year.
There have been several fighting games at this point that have featured a mélange of all the monsters and kaiju out of the Godzilla franchise, with that seeming to have a somewhat smaller fan base (at least in America) than all of the most popular horror series. If these Godzilla fighters can stand, then why not a horror royal rumble? Sure, licensing could be a pain (the only real obstacle I see), but if Mortal Kombat can already assemble this sort of “talent” while seemingly not even trying, then it must be doable. Mortal Kombat saw itself branching out and crossing over with the DC Universe in their Mortal Kombat Vs. DC Universe game, and with so much of a horror slant already being present in their following titles, why not just go all-in and make your next crossover title be Mortal Kombat Vs. All-Star Slashers? When Shrek can appear in Tony Hawk’s Underground 2 (and Iron Man in its predecessor), pretty much anything is possible.
A fully realized horror franchise fighting game seems like where we should be heading, so naturally it makes sense to touch upon when this very thing did end up happening…kind of. Terrordrome is a fan-made, free-to-download PC/MAC/Linux title that’s a nightmare come true for horror fans. It’s essentially everything we’ve been talking about here, as it provides a fighting game featuring fourteen of horror’s most famous antagonists. Terrordrome is far from perfect, but there’s a ton of attention to detail and love for horror that’s clearly present in the project (plus online play). It’s a far cry from a commercial release in this vein, but any fraction of enjoyment that you experience here is a glimpse of how incredible a major release like this would be.
A very nice blueprint has been set up so far by the likes of Mortal Kombat but just picture the madness that could be had by really scraping the bottom of the murderers’ row of horror villains. Legends like Ash, Hellraiser, Michael Myers, Damien Thorne (in both child and adult-form, like Human and Robot Smoke), or any Murder Santa would be too much. There could even be DLC focusing on certain sizes of characters, with a Tiny Horror Pack containing the likes of Chucky, Leprechaun, and Critters, and a Beasts of Burden Pack featuring more unruly types like The Thing or Pumpkinhead. The sort of variety of fighters present in a title like this, rather than everyone being lumbering men with sharp knives, adds even more value to the concept.
With the release and fallout of Leatherface and the Predator in Mortal Kombat X still having yet to take place, it’s impossible to predict just how much of an influence they’ll end up having. It seems safe to say though that we’ll surely be seeing more of this, and I would honestly be surprised if Mortal Kombat didn’t end up eventually fully giving into this rather than just dishing out more and more guest DLC characters. Whether it’s through Mortal Kombat or some new franchise all onto its own, it likely won’t be long until we’re creating our own horror franchise deleted scenes and acting like a murder pig in murder slop. And don’t we deserve that?
Now, quickly, tell me what Chucky’s fatality would be! Go!
The great Ernest Dickerson turns seventy-five years old this month, so we’re looking back at his most memorable contribution to the horror genre – 1995’s Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight!
The film hit screens while the Tales from the Crypt series was winding down its run on television, and it stands apart with a story that feels a step or two removed from the franchise norm. That was the smart play, though, as the show’s stories – and those from the original EC comics – work best in short bites. The result is a film that holds up beautifully as a gory good time.
Now keep reading to see what I heard on the commentary for…
Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight (1995)
Commentator: Ernest Dickerson (director), Michael Felsher (moderator)
1. Dickerson was in post-production on Surviving the Game when he got a call from his agent saying that producer Gil Adler wanted to meet about a Tales from the Crypt feature film. It went well, so Dickerson met with Joel Silver next and secured the job.
2. The original screenplay for the film came to the producers as a spec script wholly detached from the Tales from the Crypt brand. They added the Crypt Keeper (voiced by John Kassir) bookends to make it fit.
3. Dickerson was more familiar with the original EC comic books having read them as a kid, but he had watched a few episodes of the HBO series, so he knew what the current vibe was for the project.
4. Adler directed the film’s wraparound segments, meaning Dickerson never actually got to work with the creepy puppet. “Gil and the Crypt Keeper had a great relationship,” he adds, “they worked together for years.”
5. While he was new to the Tales from the Crypt family, Dickerson had previously worked as a director of photography on the Tales from the Darkside anthology series. That show is underappreciated in my humble opinion, and I will go to bat for both it and the equally underloved Monsters.
6. A big appeal of the horror genre for Dickerson is the idea of dark mysteries that challenge our imagination. For this film, that came down to the mythology being created between the characters.
7. Five executive producers are listed in the opening credits, but Dickerson says the only two he had dealings with were Silver and Richard Donner. The other three were Walter Hill, Robert Zemeckis, and David Giler.
8. Dickerson had only ever seen Billy Zane in movies with a full head of hair, so he was surprised when Zane showed up on the first day with a bald head. “He had this case, and he opened up the case that he had all these hair pieces in, and he says, ‘So which one of these do you think I should use?’” Dickerson looked at him and suggested he just go bald for the character.
9. While the bulk of the opening exteriors were filmed in a desert just outside Los Angeles, the shot of the old church at 11:26 was created on a warehouse hangar soundstage where the film’s interiors were shot.
10. When he had read the script, Dickerson pictured the character of Jeryline (Jada Pinkett Smith) “as a little, tough lady.” He had recently seen Smith in Menace II Society, and while the producers had someone else in mind for the role, he fought to get her instead.
11. Just as Zane surprised Dickerson with his hair (or lack thereof), Smith arrived on the first day with her hair dyed platinum white. He “liked the idea” but asked her to please get it tweaked so it looked more yellowish blond. “It’s definitely a statement.”
12. He had seen Brenda Bakke in the 1989 sci-fi/action film from Japan, Gunhed, and thought she’d be great here as Cordelia. The rest of us might recognize her from Death Spa or Trucks.
13. Felsher comments that the film’s setup does a good job not telegraphing who’s going to live or die, and he uses the “nice guy” (Charles Fleischer) and “the kid” (Ryan O’Donohue) as examples. “You don’t play by those rules here,” he says, and Dickerson replies that he wanted to subvert those rules. That extends to Smith as well because she’s Black, “and usually in movies like this they’re the first folks to die.”
14. Dickerson says they had forty days of filming, “which, the way I’m used to working, was a very generous schedule.” It was budgeted at around $10 million.
15. This probably won’t surprise you, but Zane improvised the bit at 26:25 after he jumps out the window and says, “Fuck this cowboy shit! You fuckin’, hodunk Podunk, well, then, motherfuckers!”
16. In the original script, the demons that The Collector (Zane) raises from the dirt actually looked more like the people they used to be. “They were more human,” but the very smart decision was made in pre-production to make them look far more unique instead.
17. The demons are killed by shooting their eyes, but Dickerson felt there should be one more element to it. “Shoot out their eyes, you gotta duck because the souls come shooting out, and if it hits ya, boom, it can kill ya.” This is a fun touch.
18. He’s been asked more than once if these demons are where Peter Jackson got the idea for how the orcs would look in his Lord of the Rings movies. “They do look like orcs.”
19. He recalls having seen Ronny Yu’s The Bride with White Hair shortly before going to work on Demon Knight, and he hoped to bring some of that staged style into his own film. An example of that in practice is Brayker’s (William Sadler) brief flashbacks to Christ on the cross.
20. Character deaths were mostly based on the idea that “each person’s downfall was going to be predicated by their weakness.” The Collector discovers someone’s weakness and then uses it against them. Cordelia wants to be loved, Jeryline wants to travel, Uncle Willy (Dick Miller) is a horndog for both liquor and ladies, Danny loves horror comics, etc.
21. Dickerson says that plenty of genre classics were in the back of his head while making the film, including Assault on Precinct 13, Alien, Aliens, and more.
22. Cordelia is possessed into a demonic form, and Dickerson’s idea for how she’d look was originally a bit different. “Since Cordelia was a prostitute, I thought that her mouth should actually be a vertical slit that was in her stomach… which would open up with teeth and a tongue.” It was nixed, he says, when “the wife of one of the producers read that and said ‘no way you’re putting that in the movie.’”
23. The key makes an appearance in the followup, Tales from the Crypt: Bordello of Blood, but it wasn’t originally meant to. Apparently, early test audiences expected it to be a more connected sequel to Demon Knight, so the filmmakers added it in to appease them. This is where I go on record saying that Bordello of Blood is a fun time. Can’t touch Demon Knight, obviously, but it’s more entertaining than its reputation suggests.
24. They had to film Uncle Willy’s bar scene “dream” twice, once with the women topless and once with them in bikinis, to have versions for both theaters and television broadcast. “Dick’s a pro.” (To be fair, Dickerson says this in regard to Miller having to endure the makeup application, but the sentiment fits both situations, so…)
25. Dickerson says he’s “always amazed at the love that people show this film,” and adds that fans bring it up to him incredibly often. This is great to hear, as we should always be telling artists how much their work means to us while they’re still alive and able to hear it.
26. Zane also suggested the gag at 1:08:21 with the sponge coming out of his mouth. The beat reminds Dickerson to praise the actor even more, adding that he was an “ally” to the director when “bad ideas” came down from the studio suits.
27. He didn’t get any pushback on killing little Danny. He did insist on one added element, though, as he wanted to immediately follow the boy exploding in the air with a shot of his bloody and torn sneaker hitting the ground below. “And the sneaker had to be a hightop.”
28. Dickerson says there’s “something kinky sexy about” Smith being covered in blood, and then the two commentators go quiet for almost two minutes out of respect for the scene. It’s a good opportunity to reflect on how Dickerson had previously mentioned Alien and Aliens as films being in the back of his head during filming, and how two scenes here reflect that – Jeryline stripping down to her underwear for the final confrontation feels like a nod to Ridley Scott’s film, while an earlier scene with Irene (CCH Pounder) and Dep. Bob (Gary Farmer) realizing they’re surrounded and choosing to blow themselves up alongside some of the demons is something of a callback to the air vent sacrifice in James Cameron’s film.
29. Asked about the film’s critical reception at the time of release, Dickerson says it received good reviews from horror-loving critics and then talks about the importance of horror in general. “Horror has always been a great way of putting out ideas, of talking about some of the things that affect us as people. Some of the best horror, like the best science fiction, talks about what it’s like to be human. Some of the best horror gets very political.”
30. The original ending would have featured The Collector showing “his true self, which is a demon made of fire.” They spent a lot of time trying to make it work, but it was “extremely difficult… back in the day of analog effects.” It was rewritten into the faceoff between him and Jeryline featuring the dancing, the crotch fire, Zane’s attempts at saying “love,” and his eventual demise from her bloody spit.
31. They both agree that a direct sequel to Demon Knight could be a lot of fun, but Dickerson says he’s unaware of any talk on the possibility.
32. Dickerson was super excited about this new Scream Factory Blu-ray in 2015, and he mentions that before its release, he had imported a Blu-ray from Germany presumably to enjoy the film in HD. He’s just like us! (Or am I the only one here who’s imported a German Blu-ray of the much maligned werewolf flick Big Bad Wolf…)
Quotes Without Context
“I was so happy to get Dick Miller for this movie.”
“There was a time when guys used to put ketchup on everything.”
“I’m a big student of Hitchcock, and the best way to make a moment of horror work is to lull the audience into a false sense of security.”
“A villain should always be the most interesting person in a movie.”
“They were a really great bunch of performers who were performing on these little leg-extension stilts wearing a diaper that had a radio-controlled tail that was being manipulated by a special effects tech right out of the frame.”
“It’s hard to direct air; it doesn’t do what you want.”
“The only censorship problem came from the producer’s wife, who didn’t want the vagina dentalis [sic] in the movie.”
“One of the executives wanted to know why the devil didn’t try to have sex with Jada.”
“It always starts with the script.”
Keep up with more horror commentary breakdowns here.
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