Editorials
Why Splatoon is Legitimately a Horror Game
So, I understand how the premise of Splatoon came about. “Let’s try to design a shooter that doesn’t use gratuitous violence as a crutch for fun gameplay.” Cool idea. So, what’s a great alternative for bullet-induced gore? Well, first you’ve got to add a projectile that lands with a softer impact. Something, I dunno, splattable. Then, you’ve got to have lots of color, because the screen isn’t gonna be red from all the blood and stuff.
What’s both splattable and colorful? Ink! Brilliant; but like, humans don’t really shoot ink at each other. Squid do, though. How about a squid/human hybrid? Fantastic. You’ve only gone and done it. Splatoon is born.
The idea of a humanoid squid is pretty terrifying, though. Like, cue The Shadow Over Innsmouth. I’d give Nintendo a free pass, but this isn’t the first time they’ve gone full Lovecraftian. From the eponymous Majora’s Mask’s Cthulhu tentacles to the fact that Pokemon‘s Mewtwo is the result of the kind of cloning that seems to have beaten the antics of Bloodborne’s Healing Church to the punch, Nintendo has always been operating within some pretty weird territory. I’d like to emphasize “weird”, and extend it to “Weird”, because this is absolutely in line with the tenets of weird fiction, and “The Weird.” Overall, pretty weird.
Nintendo is no stranger to Lovecraftian creepiness.
The Shadow Over Innsmouth, for those who have not read it, is based on a small town and its interactions with an alien species who live in the ocean – the Deep Ones. These Deep bois sign a pact with the local townspeople, in which the townspeople agree to cross-breed in exchange for not being annihilated by the Deep Ones. There wasn’t really an alternative. Give us Deep One babies, or we’ll just straight up murder everyone here. The town obliged to commit to the former.
Years down the line, the town of Innsmouth is filled with people with non-functional eyelids, and webbed hands and feet. Not quite squid-people, but definitely some hybrid form of humanity and cephalopods. In Lovecraft’s book, this is supposed to be, and is successfully, utterly horrific. Splatoon doesn’t provide an explanation as to why its squid-people are emphatically squid-people, but I mean, how else would this have come about? It’s the unwritten esoterica that usually contains the stuff that’s a bit weird, so it’s worth speculating. Someone, at some point in time, eyed up a lovely squid and thought, “how you doin’?”
Also, you’ve got the Octarians, who are the bad guys. They’re octopi, as the name would suggest, and they went and stole Inkopolis’ electricity. Dick move, that. Anyway, there’s some fishy stuff going on in Splatoon (Pun intended because you should always own your puns). At the end of the campaign, when you’ve inevitably reclaimed Inkopolis’ supply of electricity, and all of the squid-people are rejoicing, you can hear some pretty messed up sounds. The devs said that they weren’t aware of this, but I’m not so sure. I think that these are the howls of, I dunno, an entire marine race who have just lost their electricity and are now stuck in the Mariana Trench with like, no lights. Done in by the squiddy bois.
In a way, it kind of fulfills the narrative that you’d expect would follow from The Shadow Over Innsmouth. Eventually, you get an army of Deep Ones, who can either ignore or expunge humanity, depending on what side of the seabed they woke up on – yes, I tried Googling “where do squid sleep,” but alas, my research efforts were in vain… Anyway, this army of squiddy bois can pretty easily create a marine empire, what, with their human brains and all that, and that’s kind of what you do in Splatoon. Despite having three hearts, you heartlessly strip an indigenous marine animal of what it needs to survive and go on to celebrate all colonial-like back in your metropolitan haven for Deep Ones. Like, you’re 100% the oppressor.
Nope. Nothing wrong here.
Color and fun aside, just look at Splatoon from the perspective of the Octarians. They’ve got an army of squiddy bois splatting their women and children with ink. Like, they must be absolutely terrified. Just a day in the life when, all of a sudden, you’re under attack. Yeah, they stole the electricity supply, but I think they can plead Robin Hood and say that they needed it more than Inkopolis. After all, the army of Deep One squiddy bois seem to be doing just fine, and their human brains could for sure figure out a way to provide electricity for both parties. That’s not horror for the Octarians, though, is it? Unless they’re getting splatted left, right, and center, this theory doesn’t stand.
Splatoon is great fun, but you’re basically playing as the things that put the horror into of one of the most famous horror stories ever. I know what you’re up to, Nintendo. Don’t even get me started on what it means to catch Mewtwo in Gen I of Pokemon. You’re getting horror, dressing it up in bright colors, and saying, “Hey, look how fun this is.” And it is fun. But, it’s also completely horrifying when you strip the color away and you’re left thinking “Well, shit. That’s a bit mad, actually.”
The past decade or so has seen a lot of online discourse about how comic-book movies popularized multiversal crossovers on the big screen. However, the truth is that the horror genre has been bringing fan-favorite characters together since before cinematic universes were even a thing.
From the iconic Universal Monsters to more recent match-ups like Freddy vs Jason, genre fans have always enjoyed seeing their favorite characters duke it out like blood-soaked professional wrestlers. While the movies can only occasionally offer us this kind of entertainment due to the inherent legal complications involved in convincing different studios to relinquish the rights to their precious IPs, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t plenty of entertaining crossovers in other media (as well as some lesser-known movies that manage to skirt legal issues).
With that in mind, I’ve decided to come up with a list celebrating five underrated horror crossovers from different mediums. After all, genre fans might be surprised to learn about what the cenobites have been up to in the literary world, and plenty of our favorite “dead” franchises are still alive and well in the world of comic books.
That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own favorite crossovers if you think we missed a particularly underrated one.
With that out of the way, onto the list!
5. Hack/Slash (2004-2018)
A lot of crossover comics treat these events as semi-canonical spin-offs that usually have little bearing on the overarching plot of the main story, but this definitely wasn’t the case with Tim Seeley’s fan-favorite Hack/Slash. Every time Cassie and Vlad came across a familiar character such as Chucky, Ash Williams, and even Jeffrey Combs’ incarnation of Herbert West, the writers made a point of expanding the comic’s mythology in order to permanently incorporate elements from each different series.
In fact, one Redditor even compiled all of the different horror franchises that coexist under the Hack/Slash umbrella, and the comic actually serves as the quasi-official home to a veritable army of scary movies!
Of course, we can only hope that the rumored live-action adaptation continues this trend of honoring the iconic slashers of yesteryear…
4. Scoobynatural (2018)
Possibly the last truly great episode of Supernatural, this unexpected crossover event put demon hunting brothers Sam and Dean smack-dab in the middle of the classic Scooby-Doo caper A Night of Fright is No Delight! The best part is that this officially licensed adventure manages to blend both live-action and animation in order to tell a meta story that’s sure to thrill fans of either franchise.
Unfortunately, while the crossover was a highly promoted television event back in 2018, it aired towards the end of the internet’s love affair with Supernatural. At that point, many of the series’ long-time fans had already jumped ship and never got the chance to enjoy one of the show’s best episodes.
That’s why I’d urge genre fans to revisit this standalone adventure even if they have no interest in watching the rest of the series!
3. Terrordrome: Reign of the Legends (2018)
The original Terrordrome was one of my all-time favorite fan-games, but the folks at Huracan Studios were painfully aware that they could never turn that nasty roster of licensed characters into a proper fighting franchise. That’s why it makes sense that the spiritual sequel to Rise of the Bogeymen only features public-domain monsters and killers.
While it lacks easily recognizable icons like Jason and Leatherface, a new game engine and years of updates have transformed Reign of the Legends into a superior product. Despite the rudimentary 3D graphics, there are undeniable thrills to be found in beating the snot out of Sasquatch while playing as Bloody Mary, and I’ve spent way more time on the multiplayer mode than I’d care to admit.
2. Monster Brawl (2011)
Another public domain standoff between iconic horror titans that are no longer owned by studios, Jesse Thomas Cook’s wrestling-themed thriller remains one of the most creative takes on a creature-feature that I’ve ever seen. In this ambitious low-budget production, audiences are treated to a supernatural wrestling event featuring fan-favorite monsters like Frankenstein, The Mummy and even a handful of freaks from Greek mythology.
While the flick often feels more like an especially spooky pay-per-view event rather than a proper movie, wrestling fans are sure to have a blast with Cook’s fiendish sense of humor as well as some surprisingly well-choreographed knockouts.
1. Sherlock Holmes and the Servants of Hell (2016)
Paul Kane is already a fan-favorite author among Hellraiser fans, with the English writer having been involved in everything from the incredibly fun Hellbound Hearts anthology to the non-fiction classic The Hellraiser Films and Their Legacy. That being said, my personal favorite example of Kane’s work is the criminally underread crossover Sherlock Holmes and the Servants of Hell.
A loving pastiche that brings Clive Barker and Arthur Conan Doyle together for a blood-splattered good time, this unique novel could only have been made by a writer with intricate knowledge of both the Sherlock stories and Hellraiser’s in-depth mythology. That’s why I’d recommend it to discerning horror fans craving a more investigative take on the cenobites!
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