Editorials
Hell for the Holidays: The Underseen Madness of ‘Silent Night, Deadly Night 4: Initiation’
Christmas horror often evokes iconic imagery. In particular the film Silent Night, Deadly Night conjures up images of a crazed man in a Santa suit wielding an axe and leaving a bloodbath in his path. The first sequel that followed carved out its own path into horror canon and has become a beloved cult classic today, but there’s one other sequel in particular that doesn’t get as much love. One particular entry that seems to have been forgotten after all these years.
Here’s where things get weird with this wacky franchise…
After the release of solid but quickly forgotten entry Silent Night, Deadly Night III: Better Watch Out, it was decided the series needed a shake up. Something to keep audiences interested in the franchise. The solution was to revisit a rejected pitch for the third entry with an absolutely bonkers story and execution. Where the first three Silent Night, Deadly Night films follow a killer of some sort, Silent Night, Deadly Night 4: Initiation follows occult worshippers, bugs, Clint Howard eating burgers out of the trash, bugs, secular cults and… did I mention bugs?
Hailing from the mind of Brian Yuzna, hot off his success with Society and Bride of Re-Animator, Silent Night, Deadly Night 4: Initiation provides a wholly different experience from the rest of the entire series. This wasn’t your average Christmas Horror film. This time around things would get more abstract. And more sinister than your usual brand of Christmas Horror.
The film follows Kim Levitt (Neith Hunter) in her first but not final appearance in the franchise (more on that later). A Los Angeles-based reporter, she begins to investigate a mysterious death that happens in the beginning of the film, involving spontaneous combustion no less. Using this as a springboard she begins to navigate her investigation which leads her to a bookstore owned by Fima (Maud Adams), where she is given a book having to do with the occult. It’s here where she is also harassed by Ricky (Clint Howard), a character named so as a nod to the first two installments of the franchise. What follows is gross, sinister, and flat out one of the most unforgettable horror movies that I’ve seen.
Without diving into spoiler territory, it should be obvious by now that this is a Silent Night, Deadly Night sequel in name only. Yuzna instead crafts an occult-based horror story around what is most traditionally viewed as a Christian holiday; but also at the same time, whether it was intentional or not, to some level a feminist horror film. Kim throughout the film proves numerous times to be entirely capable and a strong protagonist, from jumping headstrong into a murder investigation to surviving a wiccan cult ritual. It’s honestly quite the paradigm shift from how most women were treated in this franchise. She’s a protagonist that can stand up with some of horror’s best and deserves to have a second look at. What’s great is that this wasn’t her only appearance, as she later reappears in Silent Night, Deadly Night 5: The Toy Maker (another underrated sequel)!
Yuzna brings the gross factor in full force here. Rather than focus solely on gore (don’t worry, there’s still plenty of that), this entry focuses on bugs and gross out creature designs. With the creature effects done by none other than Screaming Mad George! Perhaps best known for his work in Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors and the aforementioned Society, he brings his unique vision to life featuring some of the best practical effects of the 90s that have held up to this day. Squeamish viewers need not apply. It’s the signature Yuzna/Screaming George combo that reinvigorates this beloved series after a lackluster previous installment.
While Silent Night, Deadly Night 4: Initiation saw a release Holiday 1990 during the boom of the late 1980s/early 1990s direct-to-video horror scene, it never quite took off. This could be for any number of reasons: burnout from fans who were disappointed with the series’ third installment, this one being the first to be released directly to video, or the departure from a “Santa Claus” killer that the series was most famous for. Perhaps its biggest reason though is that at the time of this writing, the film hasn’t seen a home media release since December 2009 when Lionsgate released it in a collection including Silent Night, Deadly Night 3-5. With over 10 years since the last proper release, the time is primed for a reprisal of this little known Christmas Horror gem. Who knows, maybe if more people can learn to appreciate Initiation, à la Halloween 3: Season of the Witch, we can finally see an HD home media release of this bonkers little gem.
I highly implore you to seek SNDN 4 out. As far as I’m concerned, it’s right up there with Society, another Brian Yuzna gem that seemingly has 10x the fan following of this one.
Some movies are just so beloved that you can experience them through cultural osmosis without ever sitting down to actually watch them. From loving parodies to meticulous recreations of iconic scenes, memorable filmmaking lives on even after the curtains close on the silver screen. And when it comes to horror, few films can compete with the massive impact that Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining had on popular culture as a whole.
Whether or not you think the flick is a good adaptation of Stephen King’s seminal novel, 1980’s The Shining slowly but surely grew into one of the most influential genre movies ever made, inspiring everything from surprisingly heartfelt sequels to classic episodes of The Simpsons. However, not all The Shining references are created equal, and today I’d like to shine a light on six unexpected homages to Kubrick’s iconic film.
In this list, we’ll be focusing on references and Easter eggs that either came out of the blue or came from creators that you wouldn’t expect to be fans of this classic ghost story. That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own favorite references to the Torrance family and the Overlook Hotel if you think we missed a particularly memorable one.
With that out of the way, onto the list!
5. A Nightmare on FaceTime – South Park (2012)
Regardless of the brand’s iffy reputation among former employees, the death of Blockbuster Video was a serious blow to fans of physical media. Of course, some folks were more affected by this than others, and South Park’s Randy Marsh definitely took things a little too far in the twelfth episode of the show’s sixteenth season.
Titled A Nightmare on FaceTime, the main plot of this 2012 story is a surprisingly faithful recreation of The Shining where Randy purchases an empty Blockbuster store and begins to go mad once he realizes that his investment may not have been a very good idea due to the rise of streaming and the now-defunct RedBox storefronts.
4. The Overlook Hotel Level – Ready Player One (2018)
I was never really a fan of Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One, so I viewed Stephen Spielberg’s divisive adaptation of the novel as an improvement over the source material despite having its own narrative issues. In fact, I actually prefer how Spielberg changed the story by removing several references to his own work and replacing a lengthy Blade Runner detour with an over-the-top homage to The Shining.
A CGI-heavy recreation of the film’s most iconic moments that feels like a big-budget ghost train ride set within the Overlook Hotel, this intense sequence is more of a recreation of the freaky aesthetics of The Shining rather than its mind-bending narrative. However, it’s still fun to see Spielberg make a heartfelt tribute to a filmmaker that was once his close personal friend.
3. IKEA Singapore Halloween Ad (2014)
It makes sense that commercials don’t typically borrow from the horror genre, as it might be a bad idea to scare away potential customers, but some references are just too much fun to pass up.
That’s probably why the publicists behind this Ikea ad from Singapore were allowed to turn their commercial into a genuinely unsettling recreation of Danny’s tricycle scene from The Shining. After all, nobody cares if your store is haunted so long as it offers late-night shopping hours and a large selection of merchandise that you can become lost in forever and ever…
2. The End of ‘Bondage and Beta Male Sexuality’ – Community (2014)
Community is no stranger to recreating iconic movie moments within the show, and the series had previously tackled horror tropes in episodes like the fan-favorite Epidemiology. However, the most laugh-out-loud moment on this particular list comes from a brief gag towards the end of the season five episode ‘Bondage and Beta Male Sexuality’.
The majority of this episode has nothing to do with scary movies, but there’s a brief subplot involving supporting character Chang and a possible encounter with ghosts that leads him to question his own existence. This subplot culminates in the episode’s hilarious ending where the camera zooms in on a black-and-white photograph of Chang in period clothing at some kind of celebration, just like Jack Nicholson at the end of The Shining.
However, the picture’s subtitle eventually reveals that it’s merely a conveniently placed keepsake from the ‘Old Timey Photo Club’.
1. The Overlook Hedge Maze Sequence – Zootopia 2 (2025)
Disney movies are pretty far removed from both the gruesome horror of Stephen King and the heady filmmaking of Stanley Kubrick, so I don’t think anyone was expecting the climax of last year’s Zootopia sequel to take place in an animated version of the snowy hedge maze from The Shining.
In this unexpectedly intense sequence, friend-turned-villain Pawbert Lynxley (an unhinged lynx cat played by Andy Samberg) chases our protagonists through a creepy labyrinth in a loving recreation of Jack Nicholson’s icy demise outside the Overlook Hotel. The actual ending here might be a little more child-friendly than what’s being referenced, but it’s amazing that the filmmakers were able to push the horror elements as far as they did – especially since the scene doesn’t really have anything to do with the rest of the movie.
You must be logged in to post a comment.