This symbiotic relationship between genres is also present in film, with some of the best scary movies of all time also taking advantage of futuristic tech and speculative biology. While everyone’s heard of masterpieces like Alien and The Thing, today I’d like to shine a light on five lesser-known sci-fi horror movies that also deserve love from genre fans.

As usual, this list is purely based on personal opinion, but keep in mind that I’ll be defining sci-fi horror as genre films that blend common tropes from scary movies with the speculative technology and scientific theories of classic sci-fi; think aliens, robots, and space travel. That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own underrated favorites if you think we missed a particularly memorable one.

With that out of the way, onto the list.

5. Beyond the Black Rainbow (2010)

These days, legendary genre director Panos Cosmatos is best known for surreal hits like Mandy, but I’d argue that the Italian-Canadian filmmaker’s debut feature is also worth revisiting. An ’80s-set period piece where a sinister doctor keeps a telepathic woman captive inside a mysterious research facility, Beyond the Black Rainbow had the rotten luck of releasing during a time when audiences weren’t yet ready for more contemplative genre experiences.

However, if you can get past the deliberate pacing and cryptic narrative, you’ll find that Cosmatos really knocked it out of the park with his attempt at creating an imaginary lost film that he might have rented out of Video Attic during the ’80s – and that’s not even mentioning the mesmerizing performance by genre veteran Michael Rogers.

4. Split Second (1992)

Likely the most divisive film on this list, Split Second has a reputation as a derivative sci-fi flick that borrows from countless superior movies in its attempts at cashing in on the hottest genre trends of the ’90s. However, actually watching this unfairly maligned film will reveal a surprisingly original take on admittedly familiar tropes.

Starring Rutger Hauer as a detective seeking revenge for the death of his partner, this futuristic serial killer thriller eventually evolves into an all-out monster movie that must be seen to be believed. Just don’t expect Blade Runner levels of philosophical implications here, and you’ll likely have a good time with this one.

3. Sputnik (2020)

Alien knockoffs are a dime a dozen, but just because a movie happens to be riffing on Ridley Scott’s cosmic horror opus, it doesn’t mean that the film isn’t worth watching. In fact, Egor Abramenko’s Sputnik is proof that there are still plenty of original stories to tell about extraterrestrial parasites that infect unwitting cosmonauts.

Boasting a kick-ass creature design and surprisingly convincing sci-fi effects and visuals, I’d argue that the only reason Sputnik isn’t more popular is the fact that its release was sabotaged by the unfortunate rise of the Covid-19 pandemic.

2. Aniara (2018)

Harry Martinson’s epic poem Aniara has been adapted into everything from an opera to experimental concerts and even planetarium shows, but Pella Kågerman and Hugo Lilja’s 2018 film adaptation of the book is probably the most accessible version of this deeply disturbing space-faring tragedy.

Following a migratory spaceship that veers off course after a collision, this futuristic fable chronicles the horrific breakdown of society when human beings are deprived of hope. This is obviously far from a cheerful experience, so I wouldn’t recommend this one for your next family movie night, but it’s still one hell of a thought-provoking sci-fi horror movie that’s definitely worth tracking down.

If you’re interested in more bleak sci-fi stories, I’d also recommend checking out my list of Grimdark movies to watch ahead of the Warhammer 40,000 show.

1. Hardware (1990)

One of the most effective examples of punk-rock filmmaking that I’ve ever seen, Richard Stanley’s Hardware is much more than a mere Terminator knock-off like some of its detractors claimed upon the film’s original release. In fact, I’d argue that this unofficial adaptation of the 2000 AD universe is one of the few movies to truly explore what it means to survive a dystopian hellscape.

Featuring cameos by musical legends like Lemmy and Iggy Pop while also introducing the world to one of the most memorable killer robots of all time, Hardware may not appeal to everyone due to its bizarre pacing and over-the-top violence, but it’s still my favorite movie on this list.

I mean, the killer soundtrack alone is already worth the price of admission.

The post 5 Underrated Sci-Fi Horror Movies Worth Discovering appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Del Valle loved all kinds of movies, but he frequently championed older and more niche horror in his writing and speaking. Those interests saw him crossing paths with nearly everyone in the business, and one result of that was a steady supply of anecdotes and stories that he often shared in his commentaries.

House of the Long Shadows is a long-time favorite of mine from my childhood despite it being a soft and silly little picture. I love the horror icons starring within, and Del Valle honors them with both humor and heart in his remembrances.

Now keep reading to see what I heard on the commentary for…

House of the Long Shadows (1983)

Commentator: David Del Valle (film historian, fount of film knowledge, all around great guy), Elijah Drenner (moderator)

1. Del Valle became friends with writer Michael Armstrong, and from there he entered the world of Cannon Films as a script reader. He immersed himself in the studio, and his knowledge is on display in the fantastic documentary Electric Boogaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films.

2. Armstrong and director Pete Walker approached Cannon with a script for a film called Deliver Us from Evil, but the studio said they had another project in need of filmmakers. Basically, they had deals in place for a film starring Vincent Price, Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, and John Carradine, but they needed a story, script, and director. For its various faults, both real and imagined, Cannon accomplished something here that Hammer, Amicus, and others couldn’t in bringing these horror icons together in a film that allows them to actually interact with each other.

3. Del Valle points out the distinction between “haunted house” films and “old dark house” films. The former involves supernatural shenanigans, but the latter ends more in the fashion of Scooby-Doo, with it all being a hoax. Other examples of the “old dark house” variety include The Cat and the Canary, The Bat, and Horror Island.

4. Armstrong and Walker settled on an adaptation of an “ancient” play from 1913 called “Seven Keys to Baldpate,” which was written by George M. Cohan and based on a novel by Earl Derr Biggers,who’s actually best known as the creator of the famed Chinese/American detective character, Charlie Chan. House of the Long Shadows is the eighth screen adaptation of the play.

5. The film and its non-horror lead, Desi Arnaz Jr., were both heavily criticized upon release, but Del Valle suggests that “Vincent Price would defend [him] from the grave.” The horror icon actually introduced Del Valle to Arnaz at an unrelated Los Angeles screening once.

6. Cushing was diagnosed with prostate cancer shortly before filming on the picture began, and he was given just a year to live. (He lived, of course, until 1994, and made five more films after this one.) “He was just working, waiting for death,” says Del Valle, but less because of the prognosis and more because he was still in heavy grief over the death of his wife, Helen, nearly twelve years prior.

7. Del Valle quotes fellow film historian Jonathan Rigby, who once said, “Horror is a little like pornography, and it attracts people who tend to give it a bad name.” It’s part of a conversation about marketing horror and the struggles Cannon faced here (and arguably elsewhere in their catalog) with an 80s horror movie devoid of gore and sex.

8. “He’s kind of a horror star by default,” says Del Valle, about Carradine. He thinks the legendary character actor was stuck under the influence of acclaimed actor John Barrymore, and that his acting suffered as it often felt like little more than imitations of Barrymore’s performances and mannerisms. The exception, he says, is when Carradine worked with the master John Ford, who directed him to greatness in Stagecoach, The Shootist, and more.

9. Cushing and Lee “used to break each other up” with imitations of cartoon characters like Yosemite Sam and Sylvester the Cat. Forget killing baby Hitler, if I had a time machine, I’d go back just to enjoy seeing these two horror legends making each other giggle.

10. This commentary was recorded four days after Lee’s death in 2015.

11. Del Valle knew many of these actors and shares memories of lunches with Carradine and Lee in Los Angeles. Lee lived at the Wilshire Holmby, condos that he vastly preferred over owning a house because he didn’t need to water a garden or mow the lawn. Del Valle recalls having an issue gaining entrance once, and Lee responded by saying, “Well, Muhammad Ali had no trouble getting up here.” Del Valle adds that while Lee was charming and loose in private, “he would become a trifle pompous” in a group, possibly out of nervousness. Richard Roundtree once told Del Valle about working with Lee: “that dude was heavy, too heavy.”

12. Price arrives onscreen at 38:00 “wearing Antonio Fargas’ hat.” (Drenner’s joke is geared towards those of us who grew up watching Starsky & Hutch.) He’s also wearing a red scarf that now belongs to Del Valle, who wore it for his interview segments on the Cannon documentary.

13. “I think the greatest moment in Christopher’s life was being the host of Saturday Night Live,” says Del Valle. Lorne Michaels pressed for a Dracula sketch, but Lee was adamant that he wouldn’t do that, so they settled on Lee playing Death.

14. Lee was “great friends” with Robert Bloch – one of my favorite writers – after meeting in Los Angeles. Lee was doing an episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour and the studio had him in a small motel, but when Bloch heard this, he invited the actor to stay at his home instead. “It became his home away from home.”

15. They mention that this commentary is less of a scene-specific, behind-the-scenes track because Kino Lorber’s Blu-ray also includes a new commentary from the director, who would surely do a better job on that front than they ever could.

16. Victoria (Sheila Keith) shares some music with everyone and starts crying about “Ashley” around 54:05, and while it’s never explained in the film, it’s actually a jokey nod from Armstrong referencing Leslie Howard’s character in Gone With the Wind.

17. Lee worked alongside Orson Welles long ago, and one day when Del Valle was meeting Lee for lunch at Ma Maison in LA, he noticed Welles sitting alone (with his little poodle) at a small table towards the back. Welles was a regular – he would eat up to six boiled chickens per visit – and Del Valle worked up the courage to say hello. They chatted briefly, and Del Valle mentioned that he was waiting for Lee, to which Welles commented that the young writer should be sure to treat Lee like anyone else. When Lee arrived, “he went over, and Orson was kind of standoffish with him, and he looked at me and went, ‘David! It’s so good to see you!’ and the look on Christopher’s face was just priceless.”

18. Price’s third wife, Coral Browne, taught him to swear. He apparently showcased the skill most often when it was time for them to leave parties, and he would tell the hosts, “We’re about to fuck off now.”

19. Arnaz plays a writer, and the opening scene shows him as a passenger in his publisher’s Bentley. “I have to say,” adds Del Valle, “I think if I were a writer, and my publisher was driving a very expensive Bentley, I would wonder where my royalties are really going.” The car actually belonged to Walker.

20. Price ad-libbed the single word at 1:33:58, where he called Lee a “bitch.”

21. The script was originally titled Midnight Mansion (or possibly Midnight Manor, they say both), but Walker insisted it be called House of the Long Shadows.

22. Del Valle reads a long quote by Lee who was writing about his time on this film, and it moves from anecdotes about Price coming down the stairs without any pants on to a general reflection on their careers. “We were proud of our profession, and we did the best we possibly could, trying to transcend the material with which we were bedevilled, cursed, you might almost say. We’re dedicated and very, very determined, and in spite of all the setbacks, problems, and difficulties over the years, and there were many of them, we’re not going to let it get to us. We just keep carrying on.” It’s a touching commentary by Lee on his career, but it could easily be applied to Del Valle, too. He loved the genre, and he brought a classy, humorous, insightful eye to “classic” horror and what many people disregard as lowbrow efforts. His affection was infectious, and he will be missed.

Quotes Without Context

“Is this a comedy? Is this a horror film? Is this a horror/comedy?”

“There’s not a whole lot that happens in this film that would satiate the appetite of a horror audience.”

“He was truly the rock-n-roll horror star at one point.”

“You learn pretty quickly that you’re having lunch with Christopher Lee, and you’re gonna have to pick up the tab.”

“Christopher was always very proud of his teeth.”

Keep up with more horror commentary breakdowns here.

The post 22 Things We Learned from the ‘House of the Long Shadows’ Commentary appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

However, with the MCU’s upcoming crossover event film Avengers: Doomsday finally introducing cinephiles to a lore-accurate take on what might very well be the company’s definitive supervillain, this is the perfect moment to discuss Doctor Doom’s surprisingly horror-tinged past in case readers aren’t familiar with the character’s six decades and counting of evil history.

In fact, while the MCU took nearly twenty years to finally incorporate the iconic supervillain into their big screen plans, Victor von Doom was going up against Marvel’s Founding Family as far back as 1962. Originally created by the iconic duo of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko as a “sensational new villain” capable of taking on four superheroes at once, the character’s conception began with the name itself, with Lee describing the title of Doctor Doom as “eloquent in its simplicity — magnificent in its implied menace”.

Ditko would go on to further develop the idea of Doom as a metaphor for the classic conception of Death, even going so far as to compare his design to the historical Man in the Iron Mask.

The early ’60s were marked by comic book artists finally pulling away from the overused tropes of repetitive mad scientists and their monster-movie-inspired creations, so it made sense for Lee and Ditko to envision Doom as a recurring villain with many of the same qualities that you’d usually only see in a main character. With Lee being the showman that he was, he saw the not-so-good Doctor as a chance to flex his operatic muscles and write an over-the-top Shakespearean villain who communicated his plans through overly dramatic monologues.

That’s why it makes sense that the character harbors all the ingredients for a proper medieval drama in the vein of Richard III. In-universe, Victor is described as a proud Romani born in the fictional kingdom of Latveria, said to be located somewhere in the Alps, with his inevitable descent into villainy occurring after a failed science experiment left him “irreversibly” scarred.

This led von Doom to seek guidance from Tibetan sorcerers, with his ensuing mastery of both science and the mystical arts leading him to retake control of his home country and establish himself as both a terrorist and dictator – not to mention the archnemesis of Reed Richards and the rest of the Fantastic Four.

At this point, you may be asking yourself, “How does horror factor into all of this?” Well, as it turns out, Doom’s fictional history owes a huge debt to classic horror fiction, though it would be a couple of years before Marvel gave the character room to grow as a tragic monster in his own right.

From 1964’s Fantastic Four Annual #2 onward, we’d start to see the character in a more nuanced light, with his masked figure and overly theatrical demeanor clearly borrowing a page from The Phantom of the Opera’s Erik. That being said, neither Ditko nor Lee ever came to an agreement about whether or not Victor’s insecurities about his supposedly disfigured face were justified or merely the result of his absurd levels of vanity after obtaining a tiny scar.

Regardless, future books would also add context to Doom’s quest for world domination by revealing that his original accident was the result of Victor attempting to rescue his mother from literal hell, with the mad Doctor irrationally blaming Reed Richards for the experiment’s malfunction. This is when it was revealed that Doom was the son of both a witch and a scientifically minded Latverian Doctor, with Cynthia von Doom’s dealings with the demonic Mephisto (Marvel’s take on Satan) leading to her becoming trapped in his realm after death.

As is usually the case with long-term serialized storytelling, the details of Doom’s Faustian history have varied over the years, with the character actually teaming up with Doctor Strange to invade hell and rescue his mother in the underrated Triumph and Torment crossover, where Cynthia’s spirit is disgusted by her son’s penchant for evil. But at this point it’s more or less established that the character is a morally complicated sci-fi warlock with a bone to pick with Satan himself.

In fact, recent comics have finally allowed Doom to usurp control of hell away from Mephisto, with the villain undoing all of the demon king’s previously established contracts – including the infamous deal where Spider-Man sacrificed his marriage with Mary-Jane Watson in order to save a dying Aunt May.

This convoluted relationship with hell is even referenced in the Doomsday trailer, with Victor triumphantly claiming that “Hell answers to me” before engaging in the mystic arts. While the film is likely changing much of the character’s backstory and motivations, it’s refreshing to see Marvel actually take one of their beloved villain characters seriously for a change, even though I get the impression that the flick is leading up to some kind of multiversal plot twist about the true identity of this Doom variant.

Beyond these supernatural elements, Doom has also been characterized as a bona fide monster in other ways. From wearing the flayed skin of his genuine first love in order to wield magical powers to committing multiversal genocide just because an alternate version of Victor called his supervillain getup “ridiculous”, the character’s sociopathic tendencies go far beyond your usual comic book fare.

Hell, even Doom’s annoying habit of cheating death by employing near-identical Doombots as proxies is disturbing when you really think about it, as these sentient androids sometimes believe that they really are the original Doom until the bitter end.

I’d argue that Doom’s misplaced code of honor is what really makes these villainous moments that much more painful in hindsight, with the Latverian dictator’s genuine love for his people contrasting with his astounding pettiness and irrational hatred of the Fantastic Four in much the same way that real-life monsters often demonstrate contradictory personality traits, such as Hitler’s well-documented love of animals and Vlad the Impaler’s crusade against poverty in his home country.

I could go on listing all the terrible things that Doom has done in the Marvel Comics continuity. I mean, the man murdered the very Tibetan monks who helped to train him in magic just because he was embarrassed by their knowledge of his disfigurement, but my main point here is that, much like Count Dracula, Hannibal Lecter, and countless other highly intelligent foes with delusions of grandeur, Doctor Doom has historically been used to represent the concept of manipulative evil in positions of power.

If superheroes represent the ultimate fantasy of what it means to be “good” in modern society, it makes sense that Marvel’s supreme supervillain would borrow from the horror genre in order to become evil incarnate, even if the character thinks of himself as a misunderstood hero. However, that last detail may very well be the scariest and most believable aspect of Victor von Doom, and that’s why I’m excited to see if Avengers: Doomsday can finally do the character justice in live-action.

The post “Hell answers to me!”: Doctor Doom’s Horror Origins Explained Before ‘Avengers: Doomsday’ appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Ghidorah’s popularity has led to a number of appearances over the years, some of which are a far cry from the monster’s simple, extraterrestrial origins. Having been around for six decades, though, creative license is necessary to keep Godzilla’s greatest foe both fresh and formidable.

From mere space invader to Japan’s guardian, these are Ghidorah’s most substantial on-screen roles in film and television, ranked from worst to best.

14. Godzilla Island

It was after Godzilla vs. Destoroyah that Toho introduced the most toyetic Godzilla property yet. In fact, Godzilla Island (1997–1998) was made with Bandai’s then-current line of toys, albeit modified versions. A variety of monsters appeared in each micro-sode of this series, including Ghidorah, Mecha-King Ghidorah, and the exclusive Hyper Mecha-King Ghidorah. The latter is unique for having all mechanical heads. As expected, all forms of Ghidorah here are villainous, but they’re also just toys being maneuvered on screen. The entire series, by the way, is now officially available on YouTube.

13. Zone Fighter

Toho’s answer to Tsuburaya’s popular Ultraman franchise was Zone Fighter (1973). This tokusatsu series obviously didn’t last as long as its inspiration, but unlike the Ultra properties, a few Toho monsters could appear without the need for disguises. In two episodes of Zone Fighter, the golden menace was briefly employed by the show’s villains. In the end, the story’s hero gave the dragon a thorough beating, but ultimately Ghidorah survived and escaped.

12. Godzilla vs. Gigan

After headlining two movies in the ’60s, and then popping up as the penultimate ace in Destroy All Monsters, Ghidorah returned as yet another enforcer for some random alien race. As second fiddle to newcomer Gigan, the focus on Ghidorah was noticeably smaller. Much of the monster’s havoc seen here was really stock footage spliced in from previous movies; that whole tumble with Anguirus is entirely lifted from the aforementioned D.A.M. Nonetheless, the bright red eyes and shimmery scales are interesting additions to the Ghidorah design.

11. Godzilla vs. Monster Zero

It was in Godzilla vs. Monster Zero (or Invasion of Astro-Monster) that Ghidorah was first turned into a minion. It’s this growing lack of autonomy that holds Ghidorah’s second-ever on-screen appearance back, although it’s arguable that his second vehicle is better than its predecessor. The final confrontation between the movie’s three monsters is comparably shorter, too. Once Monsters Zero through Two are all freed from the Xiliens’ control, Godzilla and Rodan make quick work of Ghidorah. Of course, it’s only Ghidorah that emerges from that climactic plunge into the sea. Fans know you can’t keep this dastardly dragon down for long.

10. Godzilla: The Planet Eater

Challenging Godzilla’s supremacy on Earth was Ghidorah (a.k.a. Void Ghidorah). The largest reimagining of the space dragon hails from Godzilla: The Planet Eater, the last chapter in Toho’s animated trilogy. As divisive as these films are among fans, there’s no argument that this take on Ghidorah is overwhelming in both size and power. Turning the creature into a cosmic horror is quite fitting, as well.

9. Destroy All Monsters

Destroy All Monsters is an overstuffed parade of monsters that doesn’t live up to its potential, but the wicked aliens’ last-minute deployment of Ghidorah leads to a memorable brawl between beasts. To be fair, it’s more of a beatdown. The Kilaaks were bold to think a single monster could tame Godzilla, Anguirus, Rodan, Mothra, Gorosaurus, and others. Even if it is Ghidorah, who didn’t have much say in the matter, there’s only so much he can do against an army of monsters. Nonetheless, watching the golden dragon desperately hold his ground is entertaining.

8. Godzilla: Final Wars

However one feels about the spectacle that is Godzilla: Final Wars, there is something to be said about the movie’s depiction of Ghidorah. Or, to be more accurate, Keizer Ghidorah, the second form of Monster X. So while this isn’t the King Ghidorah we all grew up with, and superficially it’s more akin to Desghidorah from the Mothra trilogy, that vampiric monster is still very intimidating. The death match between it and Godzilla is also an exciting way to top off such a lawless movie.

7. Ghidorah: The Three-Headed Monster

Regarding Ghidorah’s design, Toho knocked it out of the park on that first try. Sure, it took some attempts to perfect the monster’s look we all now know and love, but the work paid off. Unlike in subsequent movies, Ghidorah is a free agent. That dragon from space isn’t under anyone’s control, and he’s simply an unstoppable terror. Even the combined forces of Godzilla, Mothra and Rodan can’t overcome Ghidorah here.

6. Rebirth of Mothra

Consider yourself deprived if you’ve never seen the Rebirth of Mothra trilogy. These rather weird and unruly movies veer toward high fantasy, and they focus more on pyrotechnics than plot. The Queen of Monsters and her kin do battle with the likes of Desghidorah (or Death Ghidorah to some), an ancient, Draculean redo of the original Ghidorah. This one-and-done creature’s threat was short-lasting, but the damage he caused was unforgettable.

5. Rebirth of Mothra III

After sitting out the second installment in the solo Mothra movies, Ghidorah returned in the third and final entry. This time, though, Ghidorah was looking more like his old self. He also possessed a surprising appetite for Earth’s children. This new and improved Ghidorah was, for the time being, the best the monster ever looked. As a bonus, the movie delivered a prehistoric prototype to go with the ancient Mothra.

4. Godzilla: King of the Monsters

King Ghidorah’s Monsterverse form is a sight to behold. You’re in awe of that massive wingspan, the regenerating heads, and the sheer presence of this behemoth. There’s a real weight about Ghidorah here that we have yet to see again in the Monsterverse movies. The “King” in his name feels well deserved, regardless of how things turned out.

3. Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah

Your enjoyment of genres crossing streams will ensure a better experience while viewing this Heisei Godzilla movie. Maybe the strangest of them all, the truly out-there Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah, packs the usual monster mayhem, but on top of that we also see time travel, political thriller, and even a bit of war drama. The standard element of sci-fi is dialed up, too, as the sleeker, meaner Ghidorah later returns as cyborg Mecha-King Ghidorah. The following movies from the ’90s cycle would never be this wild again.

2. Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack

As something of a modern fairy tale, Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack flips the script by having Ghidorah be the hero. G.M.K.‘s subversion of the traditionally villainous character, who awakens from a deep slumber to protect Japan alongside Mothra and Baragon, actually works in this context. Ghidorah as an analog for the mythical Yamata no Orochi makes sense. Yet because of Ghidorah’s new status, he starts out smaller and weaker than Godzilla. The finished product, once Mothra lends him her life force, is more impressive.

1. Godzilla Minus Zero

Godzilla Minus Zero skipped the likes of Rodan and Mothra as antagonists, and instead this sequel went straight for Ghidorah. This version doesn’t start out like any previous Ghidorah; it’s not the Dorats situation from the ’91 movie, either. No, we start with a generic, one-headed dragon that then grows in size and sprouts two additional necks. Classic Ghidorah’s unmistakable roar and golden coating soon follow, completing this monster’s upgrade. Now referred to as “King Ghidorah”, this horrific form wields a devastating anti-gravity ability to go with its signature lightning beams. You might even say this is the most brutal Ghidorah seen so far, seeing as how he tore Godzilla’s spines from his back.

As with other Ghidorahs, though, this one couldn’t defeat the King of Monsters. But at least Takashi Yamazaki‘s reimagining didn’t make Godzilla’s latest victory an easy one.

The post King Ghidorah: Ranking Godzilla’s Archnemesis In Every On-Screen Appearance, From Worst To Best appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

During the 2000s, genre fans experienced an especially turbulent moment where studios were desperate to reboot aging slasher franchises with more modern sensibilities. While genre purists often insist on discarding this era of Blockbuster remakes entirely, I’d argue that this cinematic movement had interesting results which are still worth talking about today.

That’s why I’ve decided to come up with a list ranking all ten of the major slasher remakes released between 2000 and 2010!

As usual, this ranking is obviously based on personal opinion, but keep in mind that I’ll be defining “slasher” as a horror movie where characters are systematically stalked and murdered by a masked/deformed killer in a style reminiscent of John Carpenter’s Halloween. Naturally, this definition leaves out a couple of classic horror remakes like The Hills Have Eyes and The Hitcher. I also won’t be including sequels on the list in order to keep things simple.

That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own opinion on millennial remakes if you have a different take on the ranking.

With that out of the way, onto the list.

10. A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)

I don’t think anyone will be surprised to see this infamous remake in last place, but I actually don’t think it’s quite as irredeemable as some folks make it out to be. In a vacuum, the micro-naps are a neat idea, and I actually enjoy both Rooney Mara as the new Nancy and Jackie Earle Haley as a more gruesome Freddy Krueger. It’s also always fun to see Kyle Gallner show up in a scary movie.

The real problem here is that the flick’s new ideas are few and far between, with everything else having been done better in the original series. This is especially unfortunate since 2010’s A Nightmare on Elm Street is a particularly humorless experience that can’t even coast on the inherent entertainment value of Robert Englund’s over-the-top dream demon.

9. Prom Night (2008)

The original Prom Night might not be quite as popular as some of its contemporaries, but it actually happens to be one of the most influential Slashers of all time. The remake, on the other hand, is a serviceable scary movie that you’ll likely forget about the day after you watch it.

I’d be more lenient towards the flick if it at least offered up some interesting kills, but the PG-13 rating makes it all the more frustrating when you realize that the movie is wasting serious talent like Idris Elba and Ming-Na Wen.

8. Sorority Row (2009)

Stewart Hendler’s cheeky reimagining of The House on Sorority Row might not work for every horror enthusiast out there (you really have to be a fan of “mean girl” dialogue and extreme camp to dig this one), but I’m part of the small subset of moviegoers that think this charming little romp is better than the original.

Sorority Row is certainly no masterpiece, but I’m still waiting on that sequel we were teased about nearly two decades ago.

7. Black Christmas (2009)

Unlike the previous entry, 2009’s Black Christmas is by no means an improvement over the original. However, this batshit crazy flick is also so different from Bob Clark’s eerie movie that it’s hard to even compare the two.

When evaluated as a standalone slasher only tangentially related to 1974’s Black Christmas, I’d argue that Glen Morgan’s follow-up is a really fun, not to mention absurd, romp with gnarly kills and a memorable, if at times ridiculous-looking, villain.

6. The Toolbox Murders (2004)

Another remake that only borrows the basic premise of the original and reinvents everything else, Tobe Hooper’s take on The Toolbox Murders is a delightfully bizarre thriller. Feeling like a cross between classic Giallo, Rosemary’s Baby and Konami’s Silent Hill 4, there’s nothing else quite like this weird little horror experiment.

In fact, the only reason I don’t rank this one any higher is the fact that Hooper technically never had the chance to finish shooting the film, with the theatrical cut having been cobbled together from incomplete footage.

5. House of Wax (2005)

The 1953 version of House of Wax was more of a gothic thriller than anything resembling a slasher, and its 1933 predecessor even more so, but Jaume Collet-Serra fully embraced mid-2000s excess when the time came for him to direct his iconic remake.

While the result was more than a little influenced by 1979’s Tourist Trap, it also happened to become an instant cult classic. In fact, 2005’s House of Wax is still remembered fondly as one of the most entertaining B-movies of the 2000s,  and not just because of Paris Hilton’s highly advertised death scene.

4. Friday the 13th (2009)

I never understood the hate for Marcus Nispel’s Friday the 13th. Not only does this flick feature Jason Voorhees at his scariest, except maybe for the sackheaded variant we saw in Part II, but with the exception of the prologue/opening credits that recap the first couple of movies, this could easily have been just another sequel paying homage to all of the franchise’s greatest hits.

In fact, a lot of the criticism directed towards this movie is word-for-word the same kind of complaining that fans used to hear about older films in the series, which is why I think 2009’s Friday the 13th remains a must watch addition to the franchise.

3. Halloween (2007)

I have mixed feelings about Rob Zombie’s Halloween, but I can’t bring myself to call it a bad movie. While I agree that the film shouldn’t have tried to humanize the boogeyman and the parts that simply repeat Carpenter’s work are done so with less elegance, Tyler Mane’s incarnation of Michael Myers is the only version of the character to have ever truly scared me. I also appreciate the breakneck pacing of the second half of the picture.

I actually think that this is a great standalone slasher, with an even better sequel. It’s just not a very faithful recreation of the elements that made Halloween such a fascinating movie in the first place. However, I can’t fault Zombie for at least trying to do something a little different, and that’s why I still rewatch this one almost as often as the 1978 original!

2. My Bloody Valentine 3D (2009)

1981’s My Bloody Valentine is one of the most underrated slashers of all time, but its three-dimensional remake is no slouch either! Directed by Patrick Lussier, this over-the-top whodunnit is one of the best in its class despite merely following the classic slasher formula to a T.

I mean, the characters are memorable, Jensen Ackles makes for a great lead, and the kills are awesome even if you watch the movie in 2D, so what else do you need? Hell, my only gripe with the movie is that they don’t reuse the charming Ballad of Harry Warden from the original, though Michael Wandmacher’s new soundtrack is pretty cool, too.

1. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003)

Tobe Hooper’s original Texas Chain Saw Massacre captured lightning in a bottle, and the filmmaker himself was aware of this when he came back for a sequel. That’s why a remake attempting to recreate the exact same look and feel of the first movie was never going to work, especially in a post-9/11 society where exaggerated violence had become something that you could watch for free on the nightly news.

With that in mind, Marcus Nispel’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is the best retelling of this story that we could have hoped for, with all the blood and guts dialed up to eleven in a neo-grindhouse experience that still holds up as the best slasher remake of the 2000s – and the third-best entry in the Texas Chain Saw Massacre franchise as a whole if you ask me.

The post Ranking Every Major Slasher Remake Of The Early 2000s appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Cole and Lorraine are a married couple trying to save up to buy a house. In addition to their regular jobs, they do paid playtesting gigs for board game designers to make some extra cash on the side. When Cole is approached to check out an obscure and complicated new game called The Ship of Death, their life is turned upside down by the strange effect it has on both of them. After a scary night bartending at his job, Cole meets a mysterious man named Javier, who insists on joining their game, sending everything spiraling out of control.

The majority of the narrative is presented in the form of post-game reports that Cole is ostensibly sending to the game’s creator, telling them how their experience is going with the game, night by night. Per the creator’s instruction, Cole includes all the details of his day surrounding their gaming sessions, which stretches the credibility of the format, but still works for the most part. It feels a little like an excuse for Winkler to write in the style of a traditional novel for these sections, as they feel more like freeform journaling than a formal playtesting document. The prose in these parts can be a little awkward at times, but feels in-character enough to give you a solid look at Cole’s psychology as he’s recounting the unbelievable events the couple is experiencing.

Lorraine’s inner life is brought to the forefront by notes from her sessions with her therapist, where she digs into unresolved family trauma that colors a lot of her actions, and journal entries that she writes for her therapist. Despite the majority of the narrative coming from Cole’s reports, Lorraine’s journey ends up being one of the most impactful and unsettling parts of the novel, as the game challenges her to push her relationship with her neighbor Annabeth into disturbing directions.

Running parallel to, and blurring with, the real world story is the narrative of the titular game. The action in The Ship of Death takes place aboard a land-faring magical ship that is sailing on the quest to find a specific city to perform a ritual. As the game reports continue, the intriguing lore of the game is slowly revealed, feeding you tantalizing details without ever giving you the whole picture. While it plays with a lot of traditional cosmic horror ideas of beings beyond the realm of our comprehension, the way it plays out has so many great details that make it feel unique and lived-in, setting it apart and drawing you in deeper.

The game itself is an interesting mix of board game and RPG, asking the players not only to draw cards and make rolls as they progress across the ever-expanding map, but also to roleplay directly as their characters. This embodiment of their characters makes it easy for the game’s world to bleed into their real lives in a way that would feel understandable at the beginning, before things get more fantastical as time goes on. As much as I was invested in Cole and Lorraine, I was also invested in Lowcoin and Rot Apple, their characters, as they explored the strange world of Mishilect, dealing with shifting allegiances as a mutiny aboard the ship causes everyone to have to choose sides.

There are so many wild ideas in the game that really make it feel so unique, giving you the right amount of explanation that you can follow what’s happening without fully telling you all the details. At one point early on, a dream Cole has prompts him to ask a question to the designers, who mysteriously declare that dreams are valid parts of the game, and anything that happens there should be considered while playing. The game also introduces the concept of the Intensities, which are described as raw emotion and power without a consciousness attached to them, making for some excellent scenes within the world of the game that are just as tense as the real life drama. I also particularly loved all of the imagery around Ygg, one of the cosmic beings in the world of the game, around which much of the narrative revolves.

There are a few jumps in logic that the story makes that feel like they are a bit of a stretch, particularly with how quickly they accept Javier and his increasingly erratic behavior, but the novel’s breakneck pace keeps things moving quickly enough that it didn’t bother me too much. Despite really enjoying the way the game’s full purpose was revealed throughout the novel, I wish the conclusion was a bit more satisfying. In the climax, I thought they were telegraphing one thing that seemed like a great way to wrap it up, but instead it ended on a bit of a whimper. It’s a frustrating feeling when you come up with a conclusion that feels more fitting, and a stronger ending would have made this book an all-timer.

With the popularity of books like Dungeon Crawler Carl that bring elements of RPGs into their storytelling, it’s only natural that the concept would excel in the world of horror. The Ship of Death uses the idea to smartly make connections between the act of playing a game and the act of performing a ritual. The added layers of intriguing cosmic horror give the narrative an air of mystique, even if some storytelling stumbles keep it from classic status. I’ve seen the book pitched as House of Leaves meets Jumanji, and while it’s not exactly that, if that combination appeals to you, I would recommend this in a heartbeat.

The Ship of Death is available now.

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Fans of Stephen King’s 1986 novel, It, know that the tiny town of Derry, Maine, has been troubled for a very long time. The story follows a group of outcast friends who call themselves the Losers’ Club as they battle a shapeshifting monster known as Pennywise the Dancing Clown, first as tweens before returning as adults to finish the job.

Though King’s novel unfolds in these parallel timelines, the story is punctuated by a series of Interludes as librarian and Loser Mike Hanlon collects information about the monster’s past seasons of destruction. Created by Jason Fuchs and Andy & Barbara Muschietti, the HBO series It: Welcome to Derry brings these Interludes to life, perpetually cycling back towards the origin of the Entity. 

Nearly one year after concluding the show’s blockbuster first season, Fuchs and the Muschiettis dropped a surprise for fans. Premiering on Halloween, the thirty-minute “A Story of Derry” serves as its own interlude while expanding on the show’s most mysterious lore. In addition to a new band of brave Losers, season one sees Dick Hallorann (Chris Chalk) use his “shining” abilities to peer into the mind of an indigenous man named Taniel (Joshua Odjick) who has grown up hearing about the Galloo, the Wabanaki name for the nebulous creature. Episode four concludes with an extended flashback in which we see It crash land as a falling star. 

Next, we’re introduced to a brave warrior named Sesqui (Morningstar Angeline) of the Wabanaki tribe whose wisest members have discovered a way to fight the Kollu. Using shards of the star in which It fell to Earth, they can repel the creature in all Its forms. One masked man brandishes a makeshift blade made of the onyx-like substance that glows with red symbols in the monster’s presence. We also learn that after Sesqui’s noble death, her daughter Necani (Kiawentiio) collected thirteen pieces of this cosmic container and buried them deep within the earth. These “pillars” became a perimeter trapping It to the western woods, a dense forest which the Losers will one day call the Barrens. 

“A Story of Derry” shows us an expanded version of this tale, presented from the perspective of those who lived it rather than a legend passed down through generations. Some of the details and names are slightly different, and an opening title card informs viewers that this is the secret truth the Wabanaki do not teach. The story begins as Necani and her friends Kino (Isabel Deroy-Olson) and Maneese (Michael Podemski-Bedard) venture into the dreaded woods, determined to hunt and kill the monster to protect the land they call home.

Like the eventual Losers’ Club, they encounter It in the guise of their worst fear: a horde of diseased settlers. Just before It can devour them, an unlikely hero springs into action. We remember this “wise” warrior from Taniel’s story and finally get to see his face. However, “A Story of Derry” will reveal a disturbing truth. 

After sending the monster away with his powerful blade, the warrior removes his mask and introduces himself. Mitig (Zahn McClarnon) is the lone survivor of a hunting party who originally tried to kill the Kollu. As he takes them to his camp, the friendly man recounts how It appeared as a giant bull moose and used its razor-sharp antlers to kill his friends. However, when Maneese excuses himself from the campfire, he finds bodies littered around the camp, throwing Mitig’s story into question. What’s more, Maneese fears that the meat they have been served is actually human flesh, cut from the bodies of the warrior’s victims. 

While director Tazbah Chavez leaves the salacious facts to our imaginations, this fleeting bit of cannibalism reminds us of a dangerous hike through the Maine woods in another of King’s most frightening tales. The 1983 novel Pet Sematary follows the destruction of Louis Creed and his young family as they’re influenced by a powerful force in the extensive woods behind their house. While trekking through the dangerous terrain and carrying the corpse of his daughter’s cat, Louis hears a monstrous creature pass nearby and a hideous face hovering just inches in front of his own. 

As doom hangs over his head, Louis learns that the indigenous Miꞌkmaq people stopped using the ritual burial ground that lies behind the quaint Pet Sematary because they believed it to be cursed by the Wendigo. Now anyone interred in the unhallowed ground will rise again, possessed by a malevolent spirit with a taste for human flesh. Algonquian legend describes the Wendigo as a sinister spirit capable of turning its victims into cannibals. Often pictured as an emaciated beast with jagged antlers, this could be the inspiration for the form It takes when attacking Mitig and his hunting party, thus explaining Mitig’s monstrous dietary turn. Or perhaps this dangerous man is merely the first in a long line of untrustworthy adults who inhabit the land that will become Derry, Maine. 

In addition to this sinister cannibal, McClarnon has another connection to the Stephen King world. Fans of Mike Flanagan’s 2019 adaptation of King’s Doctor Sleep will recognize the indigenous actor as Crow Daddy, lover of Rose the Hat (Rebecca Ferguson) and second in command to her group of ageless energy vampires. Outwardly charming, Crow Daddy proves instrumental in luring children into danger as Rose and her followers feed on the pain of “shining” kids. Here McClarnon plays another friendly face whose kindness hides a horrific secret. But before Mitig’s cannibalistic turn, this beguiling character will introduce one of King’s most powerful figures. 

Moments after saving their lives, Mitig tells Neekani and her friends that the turtle has “smiled on” them. He will go on to explain that in a cosmic battle for dominance, the titanic protector known as Marutin banished to Earth the entity who would come to be known as Pennywise. We watch as a massive ball of fire crashes into the western woods. King describes only this falling star, witnessed in a smoke-induced hallucination, while leaving the cause open for speculation. 

Loser Bill Denbrough will encounter this mysterious god as he engages in the Ritual of Chüd, a metaphysical battle of wits with Pennywise in his unknowable form. As Bill rushes towards a comforting shape, King writes, “The eyes of the Turtle were kind. Bill thought it must be the oldest thing anyone could imagine, older by far than It, which had claimed to be eternal.” Appearing as a gargantuan turtle, Bill describes Maturin’s shell, “plated with many blazing colors,” and his toenails, “they were an odd bluish-yellow color, and he could see galaxies swimming in each one.” Bill also learns that Maturin accidentally created the universe in the midst of a cosmic bellyache. When asked for help against Pennywise, Maturin insists, “I take no stand in these matters.” However, this benevolent god becomes a reassuring figure throughout the novel and subsequent adaptations. 

During the Ritual of Chüd, Bill intuits the true scope of Maturin’s powers. “The Turtle spoke in Bill’s head, and Bill understood somehow that there was yet Another, and that Final Other dwelt in a void beyond this one. This Final Other was, perhaps, the creator of the Turtle, which only watched, and It, which only ate. This Other was a force beyond the universe, a power beyond all other power, the author of all there was.” King is likely referring to Gan, an almighty figure in King’s Dark Tower saga.

While Maturin may have accidentally vomited up our universe, Gan is the creator of the multiverse that the turtle carries on its back. In King’s 1991 novel The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands, we learn that in addition to this burden, Maturin is one of twelve guardians of the Beams, magical bands that converge to hold up the Dark Tower, a physical manifestation of Gan and the nexus of all known realities.

Considering his cosmic pedigree, it’s fascinating and a bit humorous to hear Mitig casually ask Neekani if she wants “to talk to him?” Blowing smoke rings, the devious warrior explains that through conversations with Maturin, he discovered Its extraterrestrial casing and a method for warding the creature away. He now reveres the shapeshifting monster as an alternate god and offers It human sacrifices, likely feeding on the leftover corpses. While fleeing the camp, Kino pauses to grab a bit of the root Mitig is smoking to later study in her training as a healer.

We see that after Sesqui’s noble death, she ingests this substance herself and hallucinates her own conversation with the galactic creature. As a result of this encounter, she, Neekani, and Maneese discover the location of Its fallen star, allowing them to create the pillars that define Its hunting ground. 

Though Chavez refrains from explicitly connecting these dots, the plant Kino takes from Mitig’s camp will likely become known as Maturin Root, used by Taniel and his beloved Aunt Rose (Kimberly Guerrero) to connect with their ancestral deities. Throughout season one, we’ve seen the kind woman track the beginning of It’s 1962 cycle of death while watching an old friend use military force to set It free.

We understand that though the Losers may fight Pennywise throughout their lives, Rose belongs to a much longer lineage. “A Story of Derry” ends with Neekani naming her own group of brave tweens “the Children of Maturin.” We can now assume she is the origin of Rose’s group of indigenous elders dedicated to protecting the world from Pennywise. 

The post How ‘It: Welcome to Derry’ Bonus Episode Connects Pennywise, Maturin, and Stephen King’s Dark Tower Universe appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

November brings lots of new options from both established and debut voices, including books that run the gamut from sci-fi horror to psychological horror and everything in between. 

Here are 10 horror books we can’t wait to read this month, from living legends, debut authors, and more. 

Chimera Skin by Johnny Compton (November 3)

Johnny Compton has proven his gifts for horror that blends crime fiction with Southern Gothic several times over now, and it’s time for something new. A short book in the vein of things like Richard Matheson’s I Am Legend, this is the story of humanity’s last hope in a world driven mad by a strange prophet, and how far he’ll push his mutated body and his soul to save the people he cares about. It’s Compton doing visceral, ambitious sci-fi horror, and it’s very hard to put down. 

There Used to Be People Here by Kennedy Cole (November 3)

A very buzzy debut billed as The X-Files meets the Southern noir of S.A. Cosby, Kennedy Cole‘s first novel is set in Mississippi in the 1970s, and follows the lone black detective in town as he chases down a bizarre case. It begins with a mysterious death in the bathroom of a gay bar, then expands to include a plane crash that may have actually hidden evidence of visitors from another world. What’s really going on? I don’t know, but the mix of elements I love is too good to pass up here.

Milkteeth by Caitlin Starling (November 10)

A potent reinvention of vampire lore in a year full of great vampire books, the latest novel from Caitlin Starling will keep you reading late into the night, and I know because it’s already happened to me. Set in the dingy, bloodstained basement levels of a high-rise building, Milkteeth follows Beatrice, a “broodmother” for a vampire clan whose job is to nurse newly turned vampires with blood from her own body, readying them for the wider world. But when Beatrice takes on more children than she can handle, she faces madness, mayhem, and something worse than death. I got a very early look at this one, and it’s a must-read.

Coldy Empty Rooms by Andy Marino (November 10)

Andy Marino‘s name has popped up more and more in horror lit circles recently, and Cold Empty Rooms looks to be the book that will cement him as one of the genre’s most important rising voices. As the title implies, this is a haunted house book: the story of a young couple who inherit a strange old manor house and start to hear voices. But not just any voices. These are the voices of a powerful dark being with a plan of its own, and it’s asking things of them. This one carries endorsements from genre icons like Keith Rosson and Clay McLeod Chapman, and frankly, that’s all I need to dig in.

Depth Charge by Tyler Jones (November 10)

Sometimes a hook grabs you so tightly you know it won’t let go until you’ve read the book, and the latest from Tyler Jones hit me like that. Depth Charge is the story of a painter named Julian, a rising star in the art world famous in part for using his own blood on his canvases. But Julian’s blood is more than just an unorthodox art supply. It allows him to see the future, and as he descends deeper into a world of conspiracy and darkness, the future only gets more terrifying. See what I mean? That’s a great hook, and I can’t wait to read the rest of the book. 

Ancestral by Ramsey Campbell (November 17)

Ramsey Campbell is a living horror legend with some of the most influential works in the genre to his name, and it’s never too late to get on board with one of English Horror’s most gifted practitioners. With Ancestral, Campbell follows a couple and their son as the boy begins to exhibit strange impulses to visit places no one from either side of the family can really remember. Yes, these places hold great significance to the boy’s lineage, one of darkness and age-old feuds and strange occurrences. Is he carrying ancestral memories, and if he is, what did everyone else work so hard to forget? This is a classic Campbell premise, the foundation for a nerve-shredding journey through creepy old locales and dark secrets, and it’s a journey I’d like to take.

Welcome Home, Mariam by Sanchita Mitra (November 10)

One of the most thoroughly unsettling premises I’ve come across in a while, Welcome Home, Mariam begins exactly as the title implies, with a young woman named Mariam returning to her childhood home. At least, that’s what everyone tells her. Mariam has total amnesia from an apparent attack she can’t remember, and now she’s home with her parents, in her perfectly preserved childhood bedroom, with neighbors bringing her gifts and looking in on her constantly. It’s all quite welcoming and warm, so why can’t Mariam remember it, and why does it seem that everyone’s ignoring how quickly she’s unraveling? This is exactly the kind of psychological horror that could keep me up at night, and I look forward to seeing just how true that might be.

Pinfeathers by Christina Henry (November 17)

A young mother named Nora settles into her new life at home with her newborn daughter, then discovers the child seems to be growing feathers. What does it mean? Nora’s not sure, but she is sure that she wants to keep it a secret no matter what her husband says. Because despite the terror of a human baby sprouting feathers, the strange visitors asking about her daughter terrify Nora even more. We’re living in an era of really great, terrifying maternal horror at the moment, and this feels like that latest addition to that wave, so I can’t wait to check it out.

Dive by Allison Mick (November 17)

The folks at indie horror bastion Tenebrous Press have a knack for finding really cool high-concept stuff to deliver to their readers, and Dive is the latest in that line. Set at The Liz, an Oakland punk bar with a rich and strange history, the book is a series of interconnected short stories all sharing the same locale, covering everything from strange experiments to vampires and beyond. I love a story collection with a structural hook, so I’ll be picking this one up to meet everyone at The Liz, living and dead.

Black Horror: Canonical Voices from Then to Now (November 24)

Edited by Maurice Broaddus and Dr. Chesya Burke, this new anthology seeks to chart the past, present, and future of Black American horror voices with a host of talented writers. In these pages you’ll find work from titans like Tananarive Due, P. Djeli Clark, Victor LaValle and more, along with new works selected from open submissions by Black writers of every experience level. The last few years have been a gold mine for readers hoping to expand their horizons through anthologies spotlighting historically marginalized groups in the genre, and this is no exception. Pick this book up, find new writers to follow, and chase down everything else they’ve ever written to open up whole new corners of the horror world for yourself.

The post Mutants, Vampires, and Punk Bars: 10 Horror Books We Can’t Wait to Read November 2026 appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

King would present this version of the character in five connected short stories published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction before collecting them all in The Gunslinger, which was released in 1982. Since then King has built a massive universe around Roland’s quest to reach the mysterious Dark Tower. Fifty-six years later, his newest novel, Other Worlds Than These, serves as the third installment in the Talisman trilogy while doubling as the official conclusion to the Dark Tower saga. 

WARNING: The following contains major spoilers for The Talisman Trilogy and The Dark Tower series. 

We first meet Roland with King’s now-iconic line, “The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.” Inspired by Clint Eastwood’s Man with No Name from Sergio Leone’s Dollars Trilogy, Roland is the last in a line of noble knights dedicated to keeping the world from “moving on” or decaying around humanity. Rather than a sword and shield, Roland carries a pair of sandalwood guns made with steel melted down from Excalibur. In the first novel, he meets a twelve-year-old boy named Jake Chambers, who finds himself trapped in Roland’s Mid-World, as a sort of liminal afterlife.

Though Roland grows to love Jake, he ultimately sacrifices the boy for a chance to converse with his nemesis. Jake falls to his death calling, “Go, then. There are other worlds than these,” thus sparking guilt that will follow Roland to the end of his quest. 

Two years later, King would introduce us to another brave adventurer. Co-written with Peter Straub, The Talisman follows Jack Sawyer on a journey to save his dying mother. To retrieve the powerful Talisman, Jack must traverse another fantasy world called the Territories, which runs parallel to our own. Each person who exists “America-side” has a nearly identical Territories counterpart known as a twinner.

However, Jack learns that he is uniquely single-natured, his own twinner having died in infancy. What’s more, he is able to flip between worlds and naturally acclimate to each realm. Determined to save his mother Lily Cavanaugh — and her twinner Queen Laura DeLoessian — Jack begins a dangerous journey across America and the Territories to a sinister black hotel known as the Agincourt. 

Why The Talisman Was Always Connected to The Dark Tower

Though King will not explicitly connect these worlds for another seventeen years, his description of the Dark Tower and the Talisman bear striking resemblance. In The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger, the Man in Black explains, “The greatest mystery the universe offers is not life but size. Size encompasses life, and the Tower encompasses size. … Perhaps you saw what place our universe plays in the scheme of things—as no more than an atom in a blade of grass. Could it be that everything we can perceive, from the microscopic virus to the distant Horsehead Nebula, is contained in one blade of grass that may have existed for only a single season in an alien time-flow?” 

Jack experiences this mind-bending concept when he holds the Talisman in his hands. King writes, “Jack Sawyer was everywhere; Jack Sawyer was everything. A blade of grass on a world fifty thousand worlds down the chain from earth died of thirst on an inconsequential plain somewhere in the center of a continent which roughly corresponded in position to Africa; Jack died with that blade of grass. … Far out in the ether universes away, three specks of dust floated near one another in interstellar space. Jack was the dust, and Jack was the space between.” Though young Jack may appear to be a twinner for Jake, we see that the Talisman is a microcosmic twinner for the Tower itself.

Returning to Roland’s strange journey, King would begin to build out Mid-World while introducing one of his signature tropes. In The Dark Tower II: The Drawing of the Three and The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands, Roland constructs a ka-tet of nontraditional gunslingers. Defined as “one from many,” this is a group of people drawn together by fate. King’s first ka-tet is his band of vampire hunters in the 1975 novel Salem’s Lot, but he’s continued to feature heroic groups throughout his career.

In addition to Roland’s disparate clan, other ka-tets can be found in The Stand, Under the Dome, Dreamcatcher, Cell, The Institute, and The Hodges Trilogy, not to mention the beloved Losers’ Club of his 1986 novel It.

How Stephen King Created His Own Fantasy Multiverse

Though they officially unite in Mid-World, Roland’s ka-tet comes from a handful of different timelines. While stranded on a deserted beach, Roland pulls Eddie Dean and a woman who will eventually call herself Susannah from two metaphysical doors that bring the gunslinger into each character’s mind. Drawn from the New York Cities of 1964 and 1987, the three travelers will reunite with Jake then complete the ka-tet with a lovable Billy Bumbler (Mid-World’s approximation of a dog or raccoon) named Oy who possesses limited powers of speech.

Joining Roland on his quest to the Dark Tower, they encounter a maniacal AI train known as Blaine the Mono, who has gone insane from centuries of ageless decay. King leaves us on a shocking cliffhanger as Roland’s ka-tet must win a battle of wits to prevent Blaine from destroying the world. 

After leaving the ka-tet on the brink of disaster, King would also leave Mid-World for six long years. However, as this fantasy universe grew, Dark Tower nods began creeping into other sections of his catalogue. Though ostensibly about an elderly man named Ralph Roberts whose poor sleep habits grant him disturbing sight, Insomnia winds up introducing one the Dark Tower saga’s most mysterious characters.

As a kamikaze pilot threatens to destroy an overflowing arena — coincidentally located in Derry, Maine — Ralph rushes to save a little boy named Patrick Danville who can control reality through his art. While death literally hangs over his head, Patrick idly doodles a red man on a high balcony. This menacing figure is the Crimson King, an evil overlord determined to tear down the Dark Tower and spread discordia (chaos) throughout the multiverse. 

Other novellas and short stories would expand on the Crimson King’s shadowy organization and the depths of Roland’s magical world. Originally published in 1998, “The Little Sisters of Eluria” is a short story following Roland in the early days of his quest as he encounters a group of deceptive vampire nuns. The marquee story of King’s 2002 collection Everything’s Eventual, which also contains “The Little Sisters of Eluria”, introduces us to Dinky Earnshaw, a lonely teen with a dangerous power. Alongside Ted Brautigan, whose story is told in the 1999 novella Low Men in Yellow Coats, King presents the Breakers, psychically gifted prisoners pulled from our reality.

Driven by the Crimson King, they’re forced to relentlessly combine their powers to tear down the last remaining Beams, metaphysical channels that span the universe and converge to hold up the Dark Tower itself. The turtle we meet in King’s It is one of twelve magical guardians of these massive Beams.

How Roland’s Quest Became Stephen King’s Defining Epic

But King would save his most jarring revelation for the next official Dark Tower installment. Though the bulk of The Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass is an extended flashback to Roland’s youth, King’s conclusion delivers a shocking reveal. After Roland has finished telling his story, we learn that the Man in Black is none other than Randall Flagg. Also known as the Dark Man, this trickster was first introduced in King’s apocalyptic 1978 masterpiece The Stand while also appearing as a cloaked sorcerer in the 1984 YA fantasy The Eyes of the Dragon. He would go on to haunt King’s collected works and remains one of the author’s most intriguing villains.

Perhaps inspired by this ever expanding world, King incorporated his other fantasy tale. Seventeen years after publishing The Talisman, he would again join forces with Peter Straub to follow Jack Sawyer as an adult. Black House reunites us with the intrepid boy, now a retired detective living in rural Wisconsin. Haunted by his time in the Territories, Jack finds himself entangled in a grisly string of child murders strangely connected to the Tower itself. As Jack remembers his youthful adventure, we learn that a cannibal known as the Fisherman has been abducting and eating local children. Protected by the Crimson King, this monster turns over any kids who happen to possess psychic gifts. With the titular house serving as a portal between worlds, these “shining” children will be locked away to serve as tortured Beam Breakers. 

Though many of the aforementioned novels and stories were published in the 21st century, they were all written before June 19, 1999. On this fateful day, King was taking a walk when he was struck and nearly killed by a passing van. The world-famous author chronicles his painful journey back to health in the 2000 memoir On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, but this incident seems to have kick-started a determination to finish the languishing saga. In the wake of his recovery, King would release a concluding trilogy in a stunning burst of publication. The Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla, The Dark Tower VI: Song of Susannah, and The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower were all published within a single year and see Roland finally complete his quest. 

With the creative gloves off, King stretches the borders of reality. Not only do we see a returning character from Salem’s Lot, but King actually writes himself into the story. Separated from the larger group, Roland and Eddie travel back to the year 1977 and meet a young and distracted Stephen King, a writer magically influenced to tell Roland’s story. With powers similar to Patrick Danville, King’s novels control the gunslinger’s fate and his ability to save the universe.

But the fictional author ultimately leaves the story unfinished when he is killed by a van in 1999. Determined to save their own mission to the Tower, Roland and his ka-tet return to this pivotal moment and manage to save King’s life by pushing him out of the way just in time. It’s a stunning example of literary self-reflection as King considers his own near-death experience and the nature of his own obsession.

Ka, Destiny, and the Endless Cycle of the Dark Tower

Despite this magnificent slight of hand, King’s conclusion to the Dark Tower proved divisive among his long-time fans. With his ka-tet picked off one by one, Roland finally enters the legendary Tower and feels the hands of Gan (God) pulling him forward. As he ascends each level, Roland recognizes moments from his life. When a final door bears his own name, the gunslinger is horrified to realize that he has reached this point many times before and will be cursed to live it all over again. With only a whisper of memory, Roland walks through the door and finds himself on familiar terrain, The final Dark Tower novel concludes with “the man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.” 

Considering this extended literary journey, some Constant Readers were ultimately frustrated with the lack of a definitive ending. But King addresses this concern within the story itself. The penultimate chapter serves as a coda in which Susannah reunites with Eddie, Jake, and presumably Oy on a snowy day in New York City. As the final chapter begins, King warns readers, “Should you go on, you will surely be disappointed, perhaps even heartbroken.”

It’s a shocking conclusion to a mesmerizing story that reflects the very nature of life. King notes, “There is no such thing as a happy ending. I never met a single one to equal “Once upon a time.’” We see that, as in our own lives, the only true destination is death and our journey is the experience of living each day. Until we walk through our own final doors, we will be granted an endless number of chances to become better versions of ourselves.  

After this sprint to the finish line, we see that King was reluctant to leave his beloved characters behind. Eight years later in 2012, he would publish The Dark Tower: The Wind Through the Keyhole, an interstitial story set between books four and five. Randall Flagg would also reappear in King’s 2017 collaboration with Richard Chizmar, Gwendy’s Button Box and the following trilogy.

And it seems King had not forgotten about his other lonely hero, Jack Sawyer.

How Other Worlds Than These Completes Stephen King’s Greatest Mythology

In casual conversations and correspondence, Straub shared an idea for a third Talisman novel in which the world-weary detective would battle a pair of lovesick teens loosely based on the crimes of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate. Shortly after Straub passed away in 2022, King began floating the possibility of a final installment. 

Also credited to Straub, Other Worlds Than These blends The Dark Tower with The Talisman. In promotional material, King confessed, “I wanted to go back to Mid-World, which was always the Territories by another name.” Not only does this admission casually confirm what many die-hard Constant Readers had long suspected, but prepares the reader for a lynchpin in King’s massive catalogue. While serving as the third Talisman novel, Other Worlds Than These takes place in Roland’s Mid-World and features constant references to his epic quest. We also see the remnants of Project Arrowhead, confirming that the monsters in King’s 1980 novella The Mist originate from Todash Space, a void between King’s realities.

The story begins with an aging Jack who now lives in the seaside town of Mejis. Widowed, he lives a lonely life and converses with a handful of prisoners kidnapped from America-side and forced to serve an immature king. When a pair of young and reckless killers ignite a corrosive force that threatens to destroy both worlds, Jack finds himself tasked with another quest. Uniting with his own ka-tet — which includes a noble Billy Bumbler — he sets out on a suicide mission to seal a widening breach of nothingness. 

Though Jack may once have been seen as a twinner to Jake, he begins to resemble Roland himself. Years after his journey to the Tower, the gunslinger and his ka-tet have become legendary figures. Exploits of their heroism have transformed into quasi-religious folklore, with Jack even dismissing one epic battle chronicled in The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands as embellishment or exaggeration. However, Jack finds himself living out elements of these miraculous stories. Not only does he lose two fingers — mirroring an injury Roland suffers in The Dark Tower II: The Drawing of the Three — he is hailed by hopeful Mid-World residents as a gunslinger when he embarks on a suicide mission to save the world.

But King resists simply recreating his famous anti-hero. Though Jack forms his own ka-tet with refugees pulled from America-side, he reminds us that Jack is a Copiceman, the Mid-World approximation of a detective. And while he may also end up saving the world, his stated goal is to uphold the law and protect his beloved community. Revisiting themes from his magnum opus, King reminds us that anyone can act as a gunslinger regardless of their lineage and that each new hero’s victory is merely one point on an ever turning cycle of life.

The novel ends with Jack reaching the end of his quest then returning to a familiar beach. Twelve years old again, we reunite with young Jack Sawyer just moments before setting out for the Territories. 

As he nears the end of his own career, King seems to be contemplating the meaning of life. Other Worlds Than These sees him revisiting the concept of ka itself, the Mid-World word for destiny. In The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands, King writes, “Ka was like a wheel, its one purpose to turn, and in the end it always came back to the place where it had started.” Though he has officially concluded The Talisman Trilogy and his epic Dark Tower saga, King’s latest novel reminds us that the battle to save the world will continue to cycle long after we’re gone.

While there will always be malevolent threats, new heroes will rise and fall as well. And though King may have reached his own literary Dark Tower, the wheel of ka will continue to turn.

The post The Wheel of Ka: ‘Other World Than These’ Completes Stephen King’s Five-Decade Journey appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

We now feel more comfortable awarding the title an enthusiastic thumbs up after giving a caveated recommendation in our initial review, yet it’s still far from perfect. Where once it was plagued by technical faults and game-breaking bugs, now it’s got a problem with rotten apples in the community.

Whatever you want to call them — be it trolls, griefers, rage-baiters, or tedious fucking dickheads — these poor sports can ruin the experience for everyone. But they are especially irksome when you’re the one taking on killer duties as Michael Myers.

Undermining the intended slasher-movie experience, they’ll form self-styled “bully squads” to mess you around and completely suck the fun out of the whole experience. You may have already been on the receiving end of such harassment, whether it’s been because trolls have sequestered themselves in awkward parts of the map, prevented you from being able to use Mikey’s vital “Shape Jump” power, or ganged up on you in a way that somehow felt underhanded.

It might not be outright cheating, but we all know unsporting conduct when we see it. So, to help level the playing field a bit and troubleshoot some of the worst behaviors, we’ve pulled together a handy list of top tips.

Here’s how to deal with nuisance players in Halloween: The Game.

Don’t Be Drawn into Pointless Encounters 

If you take away nothing else from this guide, then make sure to heed our one golden rule: Do not allow trolls to distract you from the main objective!

Granted, that can be easier said than done, but their tactics only work when you’re entertaining them. Griefers want to get a rise out of you and will try their hardest to goad you into a cat-and-mouse chase because, that way, you’re no longer playing to Michael’s strengths.

Every asymmetrical horror title encourages a subtly different playstyle for its big bads. The hulking Jason in Friday the 13th: The Game, for instance, was an unstoppable tank ill-suited for anything that required an elegant touch. He was built for smashing through locked doors and barreling down on his victims in the face of incoming shotgun blasts, futile axe swings, and ineffectual machete cleaves. Conversely, to thrive as part of the Sawyer clan in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, you would need to strategize with fellow cannibals — laying booby traps and making the most of your home-field advantage — while the colorful E.T.s of Killer Klowns from Outer Space relied on zany powers to carry out successful harvests.

Myers, on the other hand, is supposed to be a methodical, patient hunter. His M.O. is to lurk in the shadows, stalk unsuspecting victims from afar, and stealthily move in for the kill only when the opportunity is ripe. In John Carpenter’s original movie, he spends most of his screen time lingering in the background of the frame, completely undetected by either his quarry or the authorities. If you’re playing smart, then that’s how he should be acting here too.

With his glacial, unhurried stride, he’s not cut out for marathon pursuits, nor is he a blunt instrument like Jason Voorhees, who is capable of brute-forcing his way to targets. So, if those bully squads do try to provoke you into a direct confrontation or a merry chase across the map, don’t give them the satisfaction.

It’s not a contest that you’re likely to win and, while you’re wasting time getting bear-baited, their teammates could be unlocking escape routes and rescuing NPCs. It’s the latter that should really be your priority here. You can secure a very decisive victory without taking out a single human player in Halloween: The Game, as long as you slaughter enough A.I. bots.

Take Your Time and Stalk Everyone 

At the risk of sounding like a naïve parent giving insipid advice to their child about how to deal with bullies, we’d urge you to just ignore the troublemakers. They’re not worth it and thrive on you giving them oxygen.

Rather than playing into their hands, you’d be much better off defining the rules of engagement yourself. The proven method for excelling as Michael — whether you’re up against rage-baiters or legit competition — is to take it slow and steady.

Don’t let the opposing team pressure you into an impulsive rush, as that only sets you up for failure. Instead, start off by focusing on A.I. residents and give them the proper Boogeyman experience. Kill the lights, infiltrate households, and fully stalk your prey before taking them unawares!

Not only does this predatory playstyle feel more authentically Michael, but it actually yields gameplay rewards that will pay dividends if you do happen to bump into bad faith agitators later. You see, leveling up through the stalk tiers and performing “surprise” ambushes fills your bloodthirst meter way, way faster than going on some artless killing spree.

Should you take the time to accrue that bloodthirst, Michael will get progressively more powerful. His ability cooldowns will reduce, he’ll be much tougher to knock down, his senses will become heightened (helping you track down elusive survivors), and his attacks will deal increased damage. Remember to prioritize this and, when the moment comes to face off against those griefers, you’ll be in a much stronger position. If, on the other hand, you rashly attempt to take on a party of trolls without any of the available buffs, you’ll be in for an uphill battle.

Make sure, then, to warm up and get Michael’s homicidal motor running. Seize every opportunity to acquire bloodthirst by jump-scaring residents, perving on police, and generally stalking everything in sight. You might not necessarily be racking up kills on the scoreboard while you do it, but this foreplay is important.

Extra tip: as yet another way of topping up the bloodthirst meter, you can also use “Killer Sense” to gawk at dead bodies and “admire” your handiwork after the fact (squeezing every last bit of value out of kills).

Use Evil Presence to Disrupt Looping

Our first two recommendations for handling bully squads revolve around not engaging with them on their terms. Alas, sometimes there isn’t a viable alternative.

When you have no other choice but to give chase, don’t get frustrated. Get tactical! A go-to strategy these trolls like to rely on (and a likely source of PTSD for any Dead by Daylight vets out there) is to repeatedly “loop” you around cars and other objects in the vicinity. If they are proficient at this, they can lead you in circles for minutes on end without you having a snowball’s chance in hell of catching up.

One effective counterplay that we’ve identified for this cheese is “Evil Presence”. The primary function of said ability is to give Michael extra damage resistance for when he’s being ganged up on. However, it also has the added benefit of staggering nearby survivors.

If timed just right during looping situations, this temporary stun can grant you a helpful window to close the distance for a slash attack or even knock trolls back into your grab range. It’s saved us a lot of aggravation in matches and can make the difference between a chase that resembles a farcical Keystone Cops routine and a genuine horror movie set-piece.

Enter “Killer Sense” Mode To Strengthen Grabs

On that note, once you’ve deployed “Evil Presence” to get your hands on a nuisance player, you’re going to want to make sure that you can maintain that grasp long enough to trigger an execution. Recent patches have made this increasingly difficult, and you may have noticed that opponents now seem capable of escaping Michael’s chokehold near instantaneously.

That’s because the duration of your grab attack has become far more explicitly tied to how much you’ve stalked the target in question. If they haven’t been subjected to any voyeurism whatsoever, then the button-mashing QTE they’ll need to pass to break free will be quite trivial. Conversely, if you’ve kept obsessive tabs on them and reached the third (and highest) level of surveillance, then they’ll find it much more challenging to wiggle out of your clutches.

With that said, if you’re dealing with a nuisance player who just keeps on taunting you, don’t give them the chance to prolong your torment by neglecting to do the necessary prep work. Always enter into the first-person “Killer Sense” mode at first contact and stalk the hell out of them, even if it means temporarily letting them get away with some bullshit.

Whether they’re trying to loop you, bully you with melee weapons, or run you down with a bike, chances are they won’t be expecting you to abruptly stop dead in your tracks and stare them down. Often, we find that they’re a tad perplexed by this behavior (you know, someone playing the game as intended) and misread it as you going into the pause menu to rage quit. They’re just so used to people taking the bait and hounding them no matter what.

But let them think that. Let them drop their guard. Bide your time, do all the peeping you can, and get delayed gratification when that level 3 stalk grab is within reach. The griefers almost never anticipate it.

Put Cyclists In Their Place

Bicycles are destined to remain a point of contention for future updates in Halloween: The Game, as their implementation has, to put it mildly, been completely and utterly fucked. In a downright absurd scenario, Michael was nearly powerless at launch to stop meddling kids on bikes from thwarting his schemes, almost like he’d been reduced to the villain of a Saturday morning cartoon show.

Cyclists could mow him down in the middle of the street, propel themselves through doorways and into homes to interrupt grabs, and then leisurely pedal away without so much as breaking a sweat. It felt less like the conduct of desperate survivors and more like that of juvenile delinquents abusing their elderly neighbors.

While there’s still some work to be done in the balancing department here, there are a few things you can do as a player to counter the bike exploit. For a start, make sure to destroy any unattended wheels you see while exploring the map by hitting them a few times with your melee weapon. That way you can take them off the board before they ever become a problem.

Even when they’re being ridden, you can still take bikes out of commission, although there is a trick to it. Michael’s “Blackout” power will emit an EMP pulse that knocks cyclists off balance, but if you’ve got decent aim, we’d recommend equipping the ranged “Shadow Strike” ability and needling them with that instead. It’s got a bit more versatility and can be used to counter several other forms of trolling you might be confronted with (we’d advise not having both “Blackout” and “Shadow Strike” in your anti-bully loadout, as you’ll definitely need to keep at least one slot free for “Evil Presence”).

Regardless of which method you use to dismount cyclists, don’t go after them immediately. It’s better to prioritize disabling their rides. Because if they manage to evade your grab, they — or, indeed, somebody else — could end up on that pesky saddle again and then you’re right back to square one.

Mute the Nonsense Trash Talk

This last pointer may not seem especially tactical, but it’s one that we’d urge you to follow unless you’re really amused by the sounds of inane shrieking, belabored memes, and confusing racism, with more frequent usage of the N-word than Twelve Years a Slave.

Frankly, you’ll never get any valuable information from the in-game proximity chat when playing as Michael. It can be fun to hear good-natured opponents freak out whenever you exit “Shape Jump” to startle them, but those interactions are outweighed and overshadowed by the rampant toxicity elsewhere.

There’s a pretty direct correlation between those trolls who engage in underhanded bully-squad behavior and those who are determined to make your ears bleed. In fact, we’d go so far as to say that the Venn diagram depicting those two insufferable cohorts is just a regular circle.

We’re slightly embarrassed to admit how often we found ourselves pushed to the precipice of quitting a match, simply because we couldn’t stand to hear any more witless dickheads yelling “Miiiiiiiiiccccaaaaaellll” over and over again. There’s never going to be a time when you engage with them and don’t instantly regret it.

When we finally decided to cut off that entire channel of noxious audio, we were overcome with the most profound sense of tranquillity, like a Buddhist monk who has achieved Nirvana. It is a shame to have to do this, of course, yet we’ve hardly noticed the absence of quality chat, to be honest. It’s not like you’re depriving yourself of any scintillating conversation, after all, and whenever you do need to communicate with fellow players, there are plenty of options for doing so non-verbally.

On a more serious gameplay note, the trolls deliberately use voice chat to antagonize, muffle sounds you need to hear, and generally distract you. If you’re hearing them speak, it’s because it somehow furthers the head game they’re playing and benefits their attempts to enrage. So, silencing them just takes away another weapon in their deeply annoying arsenal and leaves them wasting their breath. Do yourself a favor and turn it off.

Halloween: The Game, is available on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, and PC via Steam and Epic Games Store.

The post Master Michael Myers With These 6 Essential ‘Halloween: The Game’ Tips appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

New to Tubi November Horror Films

Black Christmas (2006)

• Premise: On Christmas Eve, an escaped maniac returns to his childhood home, which is now a sorority house, and begins to murder the sorority sisters one by one.
• Why Watch It? Get an early start on the holidays with a (re)watch of the ridiculously over the top remake of Bob Clark’s quintessential classic. The new film is filled with bitchy, vapid sorority girls played by genre stalwarts such as Katie Cassidy, Michelle Trachtenberg, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Lacey Chabert and Andrea Martin. While the vomit color palette (yellows and greens), as well as the incest-laden backstory and eyeball fetish, is off-putting to some, the bizarre turns and campiness of Glenn Morgan’s story is Christmas catnip to others.
• Streaming: November 1

Dante’s Peak (1997)

• Premise: A volcanologist arrives at a countryside town recently named the second-most desirable place to live in America, and discovers that a nearby long-dormant volcano may awaken at any moment.
• Why Watch It? One half of 1997’s volcano double bill (the other is the Tommy Lee Jones/Anne Heche title), Dante’s Peak is often regarded as the superior entry. Starring James Bond himself, Pierce Brosnan and Linda Hamilton, the film takes the micro approach to disaster movies by keeping the action specific to the titular small Washington town. Come for Bond and Sarah Connor surviving invasive lava, but stay for the terrifying hot springs sequence, in which bathers are boiled alive.
• Streaming: November 1

Dream Scenario (2023)

• Premise: An ordinary family man finds his life turned upside down when strangers suddenly start seeing him in their dreams.
• Why Watch It? Easily the most adventurous title in this month’s guide, the Nic Cage-starrer is firmly arthouse and straddles multiple genres. Basically, Cage’s Paul Matthews is a regular professor whose life is completely upturned when he becomes a Freddy Krueger-esque manifestation in people’s dreams. Initially, writer/director Kristoffer Borgli uses this for comedic effect, playing off Matthews’ bumbling everyman persona. But the narrative quickly takes a dark turn, resulting in a paranoid, occasionally freaky film that blends comedy, family drama, and, yes, horror. It’s not wholly successful, but it’s definitely worth a watch for the uninitiated.
• Streaming: November 1

The Intruder (2019)

• Premise: A young married couple buys a beautiful house on several acres of land, only to find out that the man they bought it from refuses to let go of the property.
• Why Watch It? This one’s a curiosity: it’s relatively contemporary, but sounds utterly unfamiliar. The cast is totally solid: Michael Ealy and Megan Good play the couple, while Dennis Quaid is the psychopath who makes their life a living hell (because racism!) The film has a certain pedigree in director David Loughery, the man behind similar thrillers like Lakeview Terrace, Obsessed, Fatale, and uncredited work on The Good Son back in the day. Even more surprising is the fact that the film was a quiet hit: the worldwide gross is $40.6M on a budget of $8M. And I have *zero* recollection of it, AT ALL. Perhaps now is the time to rectify that!
• Streaming: November 1

Kong: Skull Island (2017)

• Premise: After the Vietnam War, a team of scientists explores an uncharted island in the Pacific, venturing into the domain of the mighty Kong and must fight to escape a primal Eden.
• Why Watch It? Full confession: I always forget that this film is a period piece. It does seem as though folks sometimes overlook this title, which arrives 12 years after Peter Jackson’s (semi-bloated) epic and four years before we started adding x to all of the titles. Director Jordan Vogt-Roberts doesn’t have a ton of credits in his filmography (he’s more of a TV guy than film), but Dan Gilroy is one of three screenwriters credited, and the cast boasts A-listers like Tom Hiddleston, Samuel L. Jackson, Brie Larson, John C. Reilly, John Goodman, and Corey Hawkins. Perhaps it’s time to revisit this less popular entry in the Kong franchise?
• Streaming: November 1

Saw X (2023)

• Premise: A sick and desperate John (Tobin Bell) travels to Mexico for a risky and experimental medical procedure in hopes of a miracle cure for his cancer, only to discover the entire operation is a scam to defraud the most vulnerable.
• Why Watch It? Why yes, I am recommending the tenth entry in the Saw franchise, because it is undeniably THE BEST sequel of the bunch. Quibbles about Shawnee Smith’s haircut aside, by focusing on John and Amanda’s relationship, the prequel breathes new life into the characters without compromising on the series’ iconic torture devices. The creative team of director Kevin Greutert and screenwriters Josh Stolberg and Pete Goldfinger really did something special with this one. The only drawback is knowing that we’re unlikely to get any resolution for the epic battle of wills between Jigsaw and this film’s wonderfully hissable villain Cecilia (Synnøve Macody Lund) <Siiiigh>
• Streaming: November 19

Silent Night (2023)

• Premise: A grieving father (Joel Kinnaman) enacts his long-awaited revenge against a ruthless gang on Christmas Eve.
• Why Watch It? While the film didn’t exactly light the box office on fire with a final gross of $11M, it’s part of a recent trend of action films that experiment with non-verbal protagonists (see also: Alan Ritchardson’s much better received Motor City from last year). While Kinnaman has yet to truly break out in North America, the Swede has been delivering compelling performances on this continent for going on fifteen years. Oh, and to bury the lede, this is a John Woo film, so even if the rest of the film is a bag of meh, you know the violence is going to hit hard. (But also: can we declare a moratorium on holiday films with this title? Between this, the impeccable 2021 horror comedy, and last year’s SNDN remake, stick a fork in the phrase “Silent Night”).
• Streaming: November 15

Tales From The Hood 1-3 (1995-2020)

• Premise: A funeral director tells four strange tales of horror with an African American focus to three drug dealers he traps in his place of business.
• Why Watch It? Folks who dismiss horror in the early to mid-90s would do well to remember that this is the time when Tales from the Hood was quietly delivering Black horror excellence. If you can only watch one of the three films, it’s undoubtedly the first entry: the groundbreaking anthology hails from Rusty Cundieff and Darin Scott, features FX courtesy of Screaming Mad George and dolls by the Chiodo Brothers, and stars the fantastic Clarence Williams III as storyteller, Mr Simms.
• Streaming: November 1

Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation (1994)

• Premise: A group of teenagers gets into a car crash in the Texas woods on prom night, then wander into an old farmhouse that is home to Leatherface (Robert Jacks) and his insane family of cannibalistic psychopaths.
• Why Watch It? The fourth film in the TCM franchise is arguably the one with the worst reputation, but it’s completely unearned. This movie is a camp masterpiece, filled with bizarre moments and characters that sing, including Tonie Perensky’s delightful Darla. Making the viewing experience even better is the fact that this is the queerest entry in the series, with Leatherface fully decked out in female drag for the majority of the movie. It’s a wild, wild ride, but at least it’s memorable/never boring. Oh right: The Next Generation also features early performances by Renée Zellweger and Matthew McConaughey. Phew!
• Streaming: November 1

November Tubi Originals

Don’t Quit (2026)

• Premise: Ten years after an accident ends her boxing career, a fallen fighter returns to the ring to train her younger sister for a shot at glory.
• Streaming: November 11

What’s your favorite from the list above? Will you check out the new Original? Sound off in the comments below.

The post The Best Horror Movies Streaming on Tubi [November 2026] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

While there are plenty of Halloween-set frights to binge this weekend, this list is for those seeking visceral scares that’ll send shivers down your spine. These horror movies are designed to induce goosebumps, leave you on edge, and unleash pure nightmare fuel.

Here are eight terrifying horror movies you can and should stream this weekend.

The Autopsy of Jane Doe – Paramount+ with Showtime, Roku Channel, Shudder

André Øvredal goes full throttle for the scares in this quiet little chiller that sees a father and son coroner team stumped over the bizarre mysteries contained within the body of an unidentified young woman. Well-executed scares, clever twists, and earnest performances by Brian Cox and Emile Hirsch give this supernatural haunter serious heft. While the narrative bides its time unveiling the truth behind Jane Doe’s battered body, it’s heavily steeped in witchcraft. In other words, The Autopsy of Jane Doe presents a new take on the subgenre. More importantly, it’s seriously spooky.

The Dark and the Wicked – Hoopla, Shudder

Bryan Bertino, a filmmaker with a reputation for bleak horror, creates unrelenting dread and evil in the vacuum of loss here. Siblings Louise (Marin Ireland) and Michael (Michael Abbott Jr.) return to their childhood home to say their final goodbyes to their dying father, much to their mother’s disappointment. She’d warned them not to come, and it doesn’t take long to figure out why; an evil presence has taken root on the family’s rural land, and it wants them all. Ireland and Abbott Jr. get put through the physical and emotional wringer in a foreboding, nihilistic horror movie that feels evil.

The Descent – Fawesome, Shudder, Tubi

One year after a tragic accident, Sarah sets off with her friends on a spelunking adventure. Too bad pal Juno leads the group into an uncharted cave system, which traps them due to a collapse. As if no hope of rescue isn’t bad enough, this cave system happens to be inhabited by man-eating creatures. The fight for survival has never been quite as primal and bloody as it is in Neil Marshall’s fantastic entry in the annals of claustrophobic horror. It’s intense, unnerving, and epic.

Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum – Hoopla, Prime Video, Roku Channel, Tubi

Amateur ghost hunters in over their heads is a plot description that could apply to many found footage movies, let alone horror in general. If you’re going this route, you’d better find an innovative way to set it apart from the rest, or at least ensure the scares are plenty. Gonjiam nails it. In this Korean film, a horror web show crew plans a live stream event in one of the country’s most infamous abandoned hospitals. The host has rigged fake scares to spook his team for the sake of ratings, but they prove unnecessary thanks to the sinister forces haunting the place. While this movie doesn’t reinvent the wheel, it makes up for that with unrelenting terror. Turn the lights down low and prepare to get creeped out.

Hokum – Hulu

A surly, traumatized writer, Adam Scott’s Ohm, must break free from his self-imposed shackles of guilt when confronted by a wicked witch haunting a quaint Irish inn in the latest by writer/director Damian McCarthy (Oddity). The creepy as hell witch doles out some supernatural karma for crimes committed, but never in the way you’d expect.  Channeling Stephen King, this creeper plays like a traditional campfire tale in mood and style, infusing genuine scares with a sense of magic and heart. That means it delivers on spooky atmosphere and scares, and it also happens to take place over Halloween.

Sinister – Disney+, Hulu, Moviesphere+, Peacock, Pluto TV

True crime author Ellison Oswalt has uprooted his family and moved them into a home where a family was previously murdered, unbeknownst to them. He’s researching the murder for his new book, hoping the research will lead him to the whereabouts of the murdered family’s missing 10-year-old girl. When he finds a box of Super 8 home movies in the attic, he discovers the murder might be the work of a serial killer whose work dates back to the 1960s. Scott Derrickson and C. Robert Cargill’s feature consistently ranks high among the scariest horror movies, and it’s not hard to see why. Eerie atmosphere, iconic jump scares, and a memorable boogeyman all make for a noteworthy genre movie.

Smile 2 – Paramount+

Smile 2 picks up days after the first film’s events, tracking the curse’s path to world-famous pop star Skye Riley (Naomi Scott) just as she’s preparing to launch her new global tour. Two things become immediately clear: the entity seems much more savage this round, and Skye is a deeply flawed and fragile character. Writer/Director Parker Finn is much a more confident and assured filmmaker this round, injecting a more pronounced sense of humor and personality when not scaring the pants off his audience. Make no mistake, though, Smile 2 is far more vicious. It makes for a satisfying thrill ride of jaw-dropping horror and unrelenting dread; a perfect Halloween treat for those in need of a good scare — or twenty.

Terrified – Shudder

The cinematic equivalent of enjoying a haunted attraction, Demián Rugna’s feature is an onslaught of terror from beginning to end. Plot-wise, there’s not much to it, nor is there a lot of explanation for those who prefer answers. However, that doesn’t stop a cop on the cusp of retirement and a slew of paranormal experts from trying to get to the bottom of a series of bizarre activities plaguing a Buenos Aires neighborhood. With creative and innovative scares aplenty, Terrified is the type of horror film that lives up to its name; it’s freaking petrifying. Make it a Rugna double feature with visceral possession shocker When Evil Lurks, also streaming on Shudder.

The post 8 Terrifying Horror Movies to Stream This Halloween Weekend appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

So, in honor of Revival breaking the mold by actually paying attention to the narrative elements that made fans fall in love with this hellish world in the first place, and actually consulting with its original creator, today I’d like to highlight five other Clive Barker movies/stories that deserve their own interactive adaptations.

Naturally, this won’t be a comprehensive list of every single Barker yarn that could be developed into a fun video game, so don’t forget to comment below with your own ideas if you think we missed a particularly interesting story.

With that out of the way, onto the list!

5. Lord of Illusions

As a huge fan of investigative games where players are put in charge of solving some kind of overarching mystery (think The Wolf Among Us or even L.A. Noire), I can easily see how 1995’s Lord of Illusions could make for a compelling adventure title if adapted by the right team.

That being said, this one wouldn’t even have to be a straight adaptation of this particular story, as the paranormal detective Harry D’Amour is capable of shooting and drinking his way out of nearly any supernatural mystery the writers can throw his way. Of course, if it were up to me, the developers would bring Scott Bakula back to reprise his role from the underrated film – possibly in an interactive recreation of the Hellraiser crossover The Scarlet Gospels.

4. Mister B. Gone

I might be cheating by including this one since it’s technically the only entry on the list that was never even considered for a big-screen adaptation, but even the story’s harshest critics have to admit that the metafictional delights of Mister B. Gone could make for one hell of a mind-bending interactive experience in the vein of the Alan Wake games.

Think about it: there’s nothing stopping the literary demon Jakabok Botch from making the leap from the page to the digital realm. Once inside a game, it’s only natural that this cruel anti-hero would entice players to help him enact a variety of hellish schemes meant to bring him back to the physical world. Gameplay-wise, I can see this one being a mix of the stealth-action of Cyanide’s Styx titles combined with the darkly humorous puzzles of Shiver Games’ Lucius trilogy.

3. The Midnight Meat Train

I’ve always been a fan of serial killer simulators like Manhunt and Hotline Miami that make you question why you’re having so much fun engaging in virtual murder. Couple that with the recent trend of “job simulator” horror where developers subvert expectations by adding scary elements to seemingly innocent labor (think of The Closing Shift or even The Mortuary Assistant), and I think you’ve got a great pitch for a Midnight Meat Train adaptation.

After all, both Ryuhei Kitamura’s film and Barker’s original story make it clear that the Subway Butcher is working for the greater good, so a grungy urban horror game where you funnel potential victims into the train, execute survivors, and then prepare their meat for your ravenous masters could make for a disturbingly memorable recreation of one of the best Books of Blood yarns.

2. Tortured Souls 

We never got to see the rumored big screen adaptation of Barker and Todd McFarlane’s bizarre line of demonic action figures, but it would be a shame to let all of the established lore and disturbing visuals go to waste! That’s why I think a video game adaptation of this strange world of hellish body modification and disgusting monsters would be a good idea.

In fact, the ideal Tortured Souls video game could be developed by the very same team that gave us Hellraiser: Revival, with Saber Interactive having already proven themselves capable of transforming gnarly body-horror and twisted character designs into addictive action gameplay. Of course, I wouldn’t mind a freakier take on a classic monster battler either!

1. Nightbreed

Clive Barker’s 1990 adaptation of his novel Cabal may not have been a huge hit back when it was first released, but the years have been kind to this bizarre monster movie that feels more like a spooky take on the X-Men than a follow-up to Hellraiser. While there already was a pair of Nightbreed tie-in games released back in 1990, I don’t think either of them lived up to the potential of Barker’s surreal underworld.

Think about it: a whole civilization of super-powered monsters living on the run from human society is such a great premise for a blood-soaked RPG in the vein of Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines. That being said, a Nightbreed adaptation could also be reworked into a gory FPS where you hunt down monsters only to realize later on that you’re actually the villain of this particular story, and possibly even switching sides in order to aid the denizens of Midian.

The post 5 Clive Barker Stories That Should Be Adapted Into Horror Video Games Next appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

His last pure horror film was 2009’s Drag Me to Hell – pure horror with a heavy dose of black humor – and his latest isn’t about to change that. Send Help is a darkly comic thriller and a fun time despite some fairly rough CG. I’m not against its use in general, but it just stands out so much in a film set almost entirely outside in nature.

Now keep reading to see what I heard on the 2026 commentary for…

Send Help (2026)

Commentators: Sam Raimi (director), Zainab Azizi (producer)

1. “I always loved the power and the majesty of the great 20th Century Fox logo,” says Raimi, and while he says the new 20th Century Studios one is “very good,” he really wanted a return to the older style. They created this one and petitioned the studio to let them use it. Azizi adds that it wasn’t easy getting that approval.

2. Linda Liddle’s (Rachel McAdams) shoes were nicknamed “the mules” on set.

3. McAdams had “a tremendous amount of input” in regard to every aspect of her character, from her wardrobe and appearance to the production design of her cubicle. Her grandmother had a pet bird and would share toast with it every night, so McAdams even incorporated that into her character, which required the animal trainer to teach Linda’s little bird to nibble on toast when offered.

4. Linda’s coworker, River, is played by Raimi’s daughter, Emma Raimi. His son, Lorne Raimi, is 2nd Unit Director on the film, too.

5. McAdams wore varying degrees of padding to make her look frumpy and unappealing to idiots. Early scenes had her in “stage one” thickness; later island scenes drop her to stage two, and it’s all gone by the time she hits the waterfall at 41:33.

6. Raimi’s infamous Delta 88 Oldsmobile – the classic car that has cameoed in his movies – appears in the parking garage at 15:03. “Well,” adds Raimi, “it is and it isn’t.” He says the original is “hidden somewhere in the United States” because “Bruce Campbell, my good buddy, has threatened to destroy it.” True or not, this is a stand-in used here.

7. They couldn’t afford to put the plane set on a gimbal – a big frame that allows a set to be moved in 360 degrees – so they resorted to using airbags to rock the plane’s interior side to side. Once it hits the water, the plane’s shell is actually being lowered into a train car filled with water.

8. The beach scenes were filmed in Phuket, Thailand, alongside a coconut grove. They had to remove all the coconuts from the trees beforehand to avoid injury or death from falling coconuts. Raimi makes *a lot* of jokes throughout the commentary, but this is not one of them. “For me it would be a very embarrassing way to go.”

9. The script originally featured a scene with a large coconut crab “the size of a small child” crawling towards Bradley (Dylan O’Brien) on the beach. They cut it for both cost and creative reasons.

10. They used a boar puppet on a wheelbarrow while filming the boar hunt scene as a way to give McAdams something to react to. Audiences, unfortunately, are stuck with the iffy CG effects that replaced it.

11. Raimi personally splashed blood onto McAdams’ face during the boar kill scene.

12. Azizi recalls the best description she saw of O’Brien’s laughter in the film is that he “has laughs in every font.”

13. Live sound recording was obviously difficult while filming on the beach due to everything from the waves to the wind to cicadas in the trees. “With the modern AI tools,” says Raimi, failing to read the room, “we were really able to clean up those tracks.”

14. “No animals were harmed on set,” says Raimi as a Thai water bug appears at 48:39. It’s real as it crawls along the rock, but it’s swapped for an edible treat with kicking CG legs. “I’m told by Dylan that it actually tasted like a meringue pie.”

15. Linda’s sushi spread is actually strips of lychee fruit. Azizi corrects Raimi’s pronunciation, and he reminds her that he’s a member of the California Rare Fruit Grower’s Society.

16. Linda helps nature by roasting some green bananas, and they appear to love the result. Raimi, having just learned about this from the script, tried impressing his girlfriend with the trick, but the end result was disgusting. “Don’t follow this film if you want to impress your girlfriend,” he says. “It doesn’t work.”

17. It was important that they kept track of the moral/human standing of the two leads. Linda is obviously the pure protagonist from the start, with Bradley being a smarmy villain, but there’s a shift that happens around the one-hour mark as the two talk by the fire. Viewers start opening up to him as he talks about his upbringing, and at the same time they’re starting to doubt Linda, knowing that she’s intentionally avoiding rescue. “That was a brilliant thing about the script that we really embraced, which was switching audience identification from Linda and Bradley.” The goal at that point was to somehow switch that loyalty back again by the time the end credits roll. They think they succeed, and your mileage may vary, but I’m of the opinion that she ends the film as a villain, as she killed two innocent people, Zuri (Edyll Ismail) and the boat captain (Thaneth Warakulnukroh).

18. “I hate to speak as another know-it-all,” says Raimi, “but I am also a member of the California Junior Winemakers Club.” He points out that making wine takes a lot longer than the two days mentioned by Linda here. To that end, they did shoot a scene at the house with Linda pouring vodka into her bamboo flask, but it was cut from the flashbacks.

19. A spider web with creepy arachnids is seen in the cave at 1:05:33, and they want it known it’s not a reference to Spider-Man. Instead, the CG shot was added in post-production because test audiences rightfully pointed out that Linda and Bradley should just be using the dry, warm cave as their base camp.

20. This scene still makes me sick,” says Azizi as Linda vomits onto Bradley’s face… four times. Raimi blames his editor, Bob Murawski, saying he has “a fascination with things coming out of people’s mouths.” Mmhmm.

21. They began pitching the film back in 2019, and Azizi recalls one executive saying they were “crazy” to include the scene with Linda poisoning/paralyzing Bradley with the octopus meal and then pretending to castrate him. “They were right,” replies Raimi.

22. The shot starting at 1:27:28 was performed in reverse to give Zuri’s rise and shambling walk an “EC Comics” feel.

23. The film’s writers, Damian Shannon and Mark Swift, described the fight between Linda and Bradley at 1:33:00 as “a feral fight, not one that you would see in a Marvel film.”

24. One of the reasons they filmed in Thailand, aside from the gorgeous location and incredibly kind people, was the tax incentive granted if they helped promote the country in the film. Linda’s line about there being “a frozen Massaman curry” in the freezer at 1:36:30: “and that counted as one of the boxes to check off.” The house the scene occurs within was located in Sydney, Australia.

25. An aside, but I will never understand Hollywood accounting. This is a studio production that filmed in Thailand, Australia, and elsewhere with two major stars, but they say they couldn’t afford things like fancy loafers for Bradley (the costume department had to fabricate some instead) or to tent the outside of the house in order to pretend it’s nighttime (they instead had to film the interiors on a tight nighttime schedule). I mean, they went to the Dominican Republic and South Africa to shoot a few minutes of beach/jungle footage! I don’t get it.

26. Raimi’s old assistant, J.R. Young, is now the Senior Vice President of Production at 20th Century Studios, which technically makes him Raimi’s boss now. “Like in the movie.”

27. Azizi thanks the writers for the script and asks them to hurry up on the sequel.

Quotes Without Context

“Americans use Vegemite all the time; we just have another name for it. Motor oil.”

“How do you make the most beautiful actress in Hollywood into Linda Liddle?”

“I don’t want to brag, but I am a member of the California Rare Fruit Grower’s Society.”

“Now you’re glad you bought this DVD. You learned something, kid.”

“The audience is always smarter than I give them credit for, except in the case of this audience that’s paid money for the DVD.”

Keep up with more horror commentary breakdowns here.

The post 27 Things We Learned from Sam Raimi’s ‘Send Help’ Commentary appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

Today, October 30, Screambox will premiere Your Dearest Darkest Friend, a new talk show hosted and created by Raimi, which follows the actor, producer, director, and writer as he simultaneously plays classic horror host and in-depth interviewer. Each episode features a conversation with a fellow horror icon, covering everything from the trajectory of their careers to the craft they apply to each project, supported by custom-created cocktails and, naturally, a puppet co-host named Mort (voiced by Ed Larson). 

The show’s premiere means that Raimi fans will spend a portion of their Halloween weekend with him and his guests, but how does Ted Raimi like to spend Halloween? What are his must-watch films that he resurrects every single October? 

Speaking to Bloody Disgusting via Zoom, Raimi explained that his Halloween is not complete without a few “tragedies,” movies where good doesn’t always prevail over evil, and the heroes actually often end up in a darker place than when they began. 

“The ones I watch every year are ones where the hero in the story fails miserably at the end,” Raimi said. “I do love gore, and I’ll always watch gore, but the ones I always go back to are character-centric horror, where the hero attempts something so outlandish and fails in a horror way. Those are the ones I love the most.”

So, which movies are included in his list of must-watch character pieces? 

“I would say number one is Cronenberg’s The Fly, the remake. Also The Dead Zone, another one where the character attempts everything he can and fails horribly at the end. Angel Heart, a detective-story failure. The Serpent and the Rainbow is another must-watch for the very same reason. I always go back to that during Halloween. Jacob’s Ladder, total soldier failure, but great. I love tragedies in horror, horror and tragedy.

“Another one I like is an early John Frankenheimer movie called Seconds. It’s from 1966; you gotta be in the right place to dig that. The Vanishing, I just watched that one the other day. The Spoorloos one from 1988. That is a character whose curiosity truly kills him in the end, in a gruesome way. Sorry, spoiler alert, but I’m not going to say how he dies. Finally, another Cronenberg film, The Shrouds, which came out a couple years ago, same thing. My girlfriend and I love that movie, and I’ll watch that a million times or more. Those movies are probably my top, whatever that is, 8 to 10 pictures.”

So, why does Raimi tend to go for tragedy rather than, say, a horror-comedy or something lighter? Because on Halloween, Ted Raimi likes to be truly, deeply scared. 

“Those are the things that frighten me the most,” Raimi explained. “I like a mixture of human tragedy with gore and body horror. You can always divorce yourself from gore when you get out of a movie. It’s like a roller-coaster ride. I love it, but you can divorce yourself from it. The movies that stay with you are the ones that also have personal tragedy in them.

“A good example is The Hitcher with Rutger Hauer and C. Thomas Howell. It’s another good example of that, where C. Thomas Howell is just a kid, and he’s just trying to drive a car across the country. That’s it. That’s all he wants. Everything horrible happens to him, and he loses at the end. Those movies really stick with me because of that.”

According to the man himself, if you go to Ted Raimi’s house on Halloween, you’re going to get a lot of movies that end on very sad notes. Fortunately, as with Your Dearest, Darkest Friend, you’ll also get cocktails to wash those movies down. So, what’s Raimi drinking during all of these cinematic tragedies?

“Everything,” Raimi said with a laugh. “For these movies, it’s usually classics. I don’t like too many fancy drinks with my horror movies. I’ll either do Old Fashioneds or Gin Martinis with olives, never with a twist because I like the tartness of the olives. You need that. If I drink something that’s too elaborate during a horror movie, I just focus on the drink, and I don’t want to do that.”

Ted Raimi’s Halloween Watchlist:

1. The Fly 
2. The Dead Zone
3. Angel Heart
4. The Serpent and the Rainbow
5. Jacob’s Ladder
6. Seconds
7. The Vanishing
8. The Shrouds
9. The Hitcher

Your Dearest, Darkest Friend with Ted Raimi premieres October 30 on Screambox. New episodes will release every Friday. 

The post Ted Raimi Reveals His Essential Halloween Horror Watchlist appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

After years of focusing on real and confirmed creatures, Animal Planet experimented with pseudoscience. In hindsight, Lost Tapes was a sign of things to come, seeing as how cryptozoology went from niche to mainstream in the 2010s. For instance, Finding Bigfoot, one of Animal Planet’s highest-rated programs, was only a few years away at that point. And how can we forget the controversial documentary, Mermaids: The Body Found?

Lost Tapes, on the other hand, didn’t waste your time like Finding Bigfoot and other similar shows. No, you were guaranteed to see a weird beastie or monster of some kind in every episode of this mockumentary, even if it was nothing more than a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it sort of moment. Not to mention, those darting shadows and peripheral figures were quite fearsome.

It was the night before Halloween of 2008 when Animal Planet delivered a sneak preview of Lost Tapes, ahead of its official season premiere the following January. Gateway episodes “Chupacabra” and “Bigfoot” tackled two of the best-known cryptids in North America, as well as established the series’ format. Using a combination of real-life footage, reenactments, and interviews from experts, Lost Tapes quickly set itself apart from other monster hunting-type shows, such as Destination Truth.

It’s hard to be fooled by something like Lost Tapes, especially when every episode opens with the lines “the presence of hidden creatures is the subject of continued debate” and “the following story is inspired by the possibility of their existence”. Right there you’re told this is a work of fiction. The style of each episode, however, submits a notion of reality that’s based on our histories with documentaries. We know better than to think any of this is real, but the presentation messes with our brains.

Found footage didn’t immediately take off after the success of The Blair Witch Project. Indeed, there were attempts to cash in on the style, but Blair Witch parodies tended to receive the most attention back then. It was only after Paranormal Activity that found footage saw a substantial resurgence not only in cinema, but also on television, albeit to a lesser degree for the latter. Lost Tapes preceded both The River and Siberia, two shows that aired on big broadcast networks. However, out of the three, only Lost Tapes lasted more than one season.

Unlike the aforementioned shows, Lost Tapes didn’t have a continuous plot. It was more in the vein of classic anthology television that focused on self-contained storytelling. And in a little under thirty minutes, you could get in and out of any given episode with no fuss. You went in knowing these were essentially miniature found-footage horror movies, and that’s exactly what you got.

A basic installment of Lost Tapes followed the routine of most cinematic found footage; a third party compiled video shot by whoever crossed paths with the unexplained. They then padded that with the contributions of cryptozoologists, scientists and folklorists, plus any real-life footage and scientific tidbits that supported the subject matter. These traumatic encounters, by the way, didn’t always end in death for the humans involved. Some escaped their ordeals, whereas plenty others disappeared.

On the same channel, you could find Cats 101 and Too Cute was now a show prefaced with a “viewer discretion is advised” warning. Seasoned horror hounds would struggle to be frightened of anything here, but fans of cheap thrills would be absolutely delighted. Those reenactments of people’s run-ins with cryptids and whatnot were the small-screen equivalent of jump-scares found inside a haunted attraction, although less coherent. Money shots of the monsters were not ever certain, either.

In the show’s humbler beginnings, you could expect to see a whole lot of nothing. A creature’s being was hinted at, or if you were lucky, briefly shown under a veil of darkness. Gruesome makeup on the actors, courtesy of artists like Scott Conner, helped drive home the ferocity of these monstrosities. However, it wasn’t until Season Two that an episode’s subject was occasionally seen in plain view. Their time on screen was, once again, limited to a matter of mere seconds, or they were conveniently obstructed. It’s understandable that the show was minimizing your seeing an obvious costume, but somehow it’s actually more effective to have cryptids, and their ilk, exist in flashes and fragments.

It was in the third and final season that Lost Tapes introduced a recurring character of sorts. That impulse to raise the ante on otherworldly matters had already happened with the Season Two episode “Alien”, but now zombies, ghosts, and the deity Quetzalcoatl had been thrown into the mix. And a few of these more out-there additions to this show’s cabinet of creepy curiosities were confronted by a group called the Enigma Corporation. This private security firm popped up every now and then, in lieu of civilians, and their presence suggested an underlying plot that, unfortunately, never got the chance to grow.

Nowadays, Lost Tapes comes across as silly and lightweight. Having said that, this show gave us a fresh and fun way of investigating cryptozoology and the paranormal on television. The artifice is easy to see through, and the episodes are formulaic, but in an age where Bigfoot and the like have been sterilized by pop culture, it’s nice to remember a time when they were depicted as mysterious and scary.

The post Animal Planet’s ‘Lost Tapes’ Was the Perfect Blend of Found Footage and Cryptid Horror appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

The game I chose to run was the 2015 RPG Ten Candles by Stephen Dewey, which is billed as a “game of tragic horror.” Not only is it a game with simple rules that are easy to learn, but it also encourages a stellar atmosphere at the table.

If you’re thinking of running Ten Candles, the first thing you should do is emphasize to your players that it’s bleak. By the very structure of the game, no one will survive.

Instead of a traditional journey of heroes overcoming odds to save the world, characters will be desperately trying to make a small difference as they fight through their last moments before the end. This desperation is not only because of the dour setting, which is purposefully loose but with just enough definition, but also because of the pacing mechanics that shift the balance of narrative power as the game progresses.

Ten days ago, the world went dark. The cause is unknown, but the effect is total. With the darkness came vicious creatures that people simply took to calling “Them,” and supplies are beginning to run out for survivors. This is the general setup, which allows you to get a great idea of the tone while still giving your group room to fill in the specifics through play. Even the modules included in the book are starting points rather than fully prepped scenarios, which emphasizes the collaborative nature of the game.

Why the Candles Are More Than a Clever Gimmick

If you’ve heard of Ten Candles before, it’s likely because of its gimmick, which goes far beyond just an attention-grabbing trick. You play in the dark, with your only light being provided by ten tea candles that you have placed in a circle around your playspace. These act as your timer for the characters’ eventual demise. As your dice rolls fail, you’ll put them out one by one, slowly making the physical space you’re playing in darker as the story’s tone gets more grim.

In addition, inadvertently putting out candles just by moving at the table will also have consequences, which adds a layer of physical tension that’s hard to get. It’s rare that I’ve seen a game that has so perfectly melded its story and mechanics to create a unique environment around the physical table, and it makes the game top in class.

The dice themselves are linked directly to the candles, shifting the balance of narrative power as the light dwindles. Anytime the story gets to a place of uncertainty, the GM can call for a Conflict Roll. When this happens, the player rolls a number of six-sided dice equal to the number of lit candles while the GM rolls dice equal to the number of unlit candles. Whichever person ends up with more sixes has narrative control over what happens next. On a success, if any ones are rolled, those are removed from the dice pool for the remainder of the scene.

How the Dice System Builds Tension Naturally

As you can see, the game begins pretty easy. When trying to search for supplies or sneak down a dark alley, it will be fairly trivial to succeed given the sheer amount of dice you will be rolling. But sixes aren’t guaranteed, and eventually the odds will catch up to you, causing you to lose a candle, slowly making each scene more and more dangerous. Late game rolls truly feel desperate, as you are praying for even just one six while hoping beyond hope that your GM has a bad roll.

Once things start to go bad, everything goes downhill quickly until all your players have met their tragic end. It’s such an elegant system that mechanically reinforces a very natural horror arc in a way that makes everyone at the table feel like they are contributing to the terrifying tale being told.

To further add to the mood, there is a ritual-like process you go through every time you fail a roll or end a scene. The GM starts off this phase by saying, “These things are true: the world is dark.” After that, the players and the GM will go around the table and establish truths about the situation equal to the number of remaining candles, with the final truth, said collectively by the group, being “and we are alive.”

Not only does this create an interesting rhythm to the game, making it feel unique and atmospheric, but it’s a powerful resource for the players to take control and move the story where they want to. Truths can be things like, “and we arrived safely to the police station” or “we find a survivor on the road,” so it’s an exercise in collectively figuring out where the next scene will pick up. Since everyone is bought in on telling this tragic tale, this shouldn’t be something that’s abused to ‘win,’ but rather to continue to craft a compelling narrative that everyone can enjoy.

Even if your truth is something like “and I find a gun,” the GM can always make “with only one bullet” a truth on their turn, so it becomes a push-and-pull improv game of getting what you want with the knowledge that it will come crashing down later.

Collaborative Storytelling at Its Most Powerful

In line with the collaborative spirit of the game, character creation is also done collectively. Characters are made up of traits (a virtue and a vice), moments, and brinks, which are all written down on individual index cards. Rather than writing your own traits, these will be chosen by the players to your left and right and handed to you. Once you have your virtue and vice, you’ll come up with a general character concept and a moment, which will be a scene of your character finding hope that you will weave into the story at some point.

Once you have that, you’ll get a brink from another player next to you, and that will be a situation where you have been pushed to the edge by desperation. Importantly, one person will actually write a brink for the GM that will define an aspect of Them, allowing at least one player to have some narrative control over the horrors that they face on their journey.

These index cards are placed in a stack in front of you, and you can use the top one in order to gain specific benefits during the game, generally in the form of rerolls. This gives you a resource to fight back against failure, as long as you are able to narratively tie in whatever you are spending into the action being performed. To keep everything focused on the titular candles, the way you expend these characteristics is by physically burning the index card you’re using.

It’s truly something to watch a piece of your character actually burn in front of you, making for a compelling touch that just adds to the mystique of the game.

The Recording That Delivers One Final Emotional Gut Punch

The final piece of the puzzle before you start in earnest is the recording, one of the most emotional twists to the game. After character creation is done, the GM passes around a digital recording device, and each player takes a moment to record a parting message before they set off on their final quest. This could be something like a note for a family member or a report to a superior officer, whatever makes sense for the character you’ve created.

The GM then holds onto this recording and plays it at the very end of the game after all characters are dead and the players are left sitting in the darkness. It’s a surprisingly emotional touch, hearing the characters’ previous moments of hope or optimism play after the moment when all is lost. It’s a perfect way to end such a unique and flavorful game, wrapping it up in a way that feels almost cinematic in its delivery.

As much as the mechanics shine, everything in this brief 81-page rulebook is laser-focused on helping you create atmosphere at the table. Not only is the book clear in its depiction of the rules, but the writing itself is wonderfully evocative. In the intro of the book, it describes the stories you tell through Ten Candles as “the sort of story that has sharp edges. The kind that lingers long after it’s gone, nesting in nightmares and drifting on every shadow.”

It’s such a beautifully written book that puts you in the right headspace for playing it with every turn of phrase.

Why Ten Candles Still Stands Above Other Horror RPGs

I’ve run many, many games since that first game of Ten Candles, but few are as memorable or impactful. I’ll always remember the raving artist that stalked my players through the woods, or the horror of seeing his creations come to life when they reached his “gallery” that was set up in the military base they thought would be their sanctuary. The moments of victory after succeeding at an impossible roll or the defeat of failing after sacrificing one of their traits.

Even though everyone ‘loses’ in the end, it feels like you’ve truly collaborated on a horrifying tale on par with many genre classics, all while basking in an atmosphere unlike any other I’ve experienced at the table.

Roleplaying games already have a lot in common with rituals, and Ten Candles leans into that idea as hard as possible, creating an unforgettable experience.

Ten Candles is available for purchase from Calvary Games.

The post ‘Ten Candles’ Horror RPG Turns Every Game Into a Tragic Masterpiece appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

On top of all the popular and well-known titles it features, Tubi boasts a number of hidden gems. These are movies that have gone unnoticed by the masses, or they’ve been forgotten. In either case, they’re entertaining and deserve more eyes on them.

The following are ten horror hidden gems that can now be found at Tubi.

Death Weekend (1976)

You may know Brenda Vaccaro from her stage work, from movies like Midnight Cowboy, or that Golden Girls episode where she played Sophia’s daughter-in-law. Regardless of how you recognize Vaccaro, don’t overlook one of her most visceral and vulnerable performances. After being hard to find for a number of years, this Canadian slice of exploitation is now tucked away on Tubi. It’s presented in the 4:3 aspect ratio, but that only elevates its drive-in quality. In William Fruet‘s Death Weekend (a.k.a. The House by the Lake), a couple’s romantic getaway is disrupted by a group of cruel home invaders.

The Enchanted (1984)

Folk horror varies from movie to movie, but for the most part, they’re about someone’s unusual beliefs. This applies to the spellbinding The Enchanted, a regional folktale shot in rural Florida. Here, a sailor (Will Sennett) returns from sea, and while fixing up an old ranch, he meets a local family. A neighbor played by Julius Harris advises him to steer clear of Miss Twyla (Casey Blanton) and her weird kin, but of course that warning goes unheeded.

The Caller (1987)

You’re advised not to read a thing about Arthur Allan Seidelman‘s The Caller beforehand. It’s best to go in not knowing any details about this movie other than the setup. In this two hander, the only characters, who are simply credited as The Girl (Madolyn Smith) and the Caller (Malcolm McDowell), are trapped with each other’s company. The Girl allows this random stranger into her remote house in the woods, unaware of his intentions. Keep in mind, his host has secrets of her own. Once again, do watch The Caller without spoiling yourself. That way the ending will come as more of a shock.

Demonwarp (1988)

From the director who brought us New Year’s Evil is this wild-as-hell Bigfoot movie. Emmett Alston‘s Demonwarp looks to be a basic cryptid slasher, but soon it turns into something else entirely. The schlock factor, however, never fades. Here, George Kennedy and his young co-stars are in for a nightmare as they deal with not only a rampaging Bigfoot, but also the strange forces lurking in these woods.

The Wrong Door (1990)

Fans of regional horror may be interested in Bill Weiss and Shawn Korby‘s The Wrong Door. Shot on Super 8 and for very little money, this largely all-in-one-night suspense tale is worth seeking out. The trouble begins after mystery-loving college student Ted (Matt Felmlee) gets mixed up in a mystery of his own. During his part-time job as a singing telegram deliverer, he briefly goes to the wrong address. The woman who answered is mouthing things like “help me” to him, but Ted doesn’t understand. That is until the same woman later turns up dead, and the killer then comes after Ted.

Campfire Tales (1997)

Conceived in 1995, and almost put into theaters, the anthology Campfire Tales has garnered a following, in spite of its relative unavailability for some years. Then all of a sudden, it found its way to streaming. In this omnibus, which was co-directed by Martin Kunert, David Semel and Matt Cooper, four young people (including The Craft‘s Christine Taylor) are stranded in the woods after a car accident. They then bide their time by telling tales based on urban legends and ghost stories. Other before-they-were-famous stars in the movie are James Marsden, Ron Livingston and Amy Smart.

The Paranormal (1998)

To all the shot-on-video enthusiasts reading this, your assignment is to watch The Paranormal ASAP. Todd Norris‘ Kansas-shot movie is more charming than scary, but that’s no reason to let it collect more dust. This lo-fi production centers around a paranormal academic (Norris) who’s given a new field assignment; a theater in his hometown is reportedly haunted. Any assumptions you ever had about SOV will be challenged after one viewing of this sharp and well-made movie. Oh, and be on the lookout for Darren Lynn Bousman; he played a zombie here before directing movies like Saw II and Repo! The Genetic Opera.

Infection (2004)

Infection (a.k.a. Kansen) hails from a series of movies called “J-Horror Theater”. Other installments in this line include Takashi Shimizu‘s Reincarnation and Kiyoshi Kurosawa‘s Retribution. In Masayuki Ochiai‘s entry, a hospital is overcome by what seems like the supernatural after a doctor (Kōichi Satō) and his team make a grave medical error.  This goopy, creepy movie is based on Ochiai’s segment in the 1991 anthology Tales of the Unusual: Spring Edition; the story was inspired by the hospital setting of The Exorcist III.

Butterfly Kisses (2018)

Tubi is a fountain of found footage, but as many would agree, it can be tough to sift through everything there. Even so, you can always count on Butterfly Kisses, a movie from the last ten years that has rightfully gained a sizable fanbase. Erik Kristopher Myers concocted a frightfully fun urban legend, then spun it into a story that’s both terrifying and affecting. One of this movie’s additional strengths is the attention paid to its complex main character.

Initiation (2020)

While it’s not a remake of 1984’s The Initiation, John Berardo‘s Initiation is also a slasher. And unlike the former movie, this is a rather grounded take on the formula we all know and love. However, the story is timely with its themes and content; a case of sexual assault on a college campus leads to a spree of brutal murders committed by a mysterious, masked killer. Initiation is definitely heavier than some of its contemporaries, but it also never forgets to be a slasher. You can expect suspenseful chases, vicious kills, and a surprising unmasking.

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After the honeymoon period has elapsed, these obsessives are the ones likeliest to stick around, and they end up defining the norms and codes of conduct for the experience going forward. So, if you want to stand even the faintest chance of scraping by, you’ll have to keep up with them by studiously researching the ever-evolving META of the game in question and calibrating your loadouts to become nigh-on-invulnerable.  

This alienating of novices is as inevitable a part of the asym life cycle as a buggy launch or the eventual cessation of developer support. Still, we hoped that it would take a bit longer for Halloween: The Game to become so unwelcoming and gentrified. The hyper-competitive weirdos and self-anointed “bully squads” could have at least waited until after the titular holiday had passed before spoiling the fun for the rest of us!   

Alas, IllFonic’s title has already been infected with the teabagging bullshit that always plagues these things, and anyone naively hoping to dip their toes in now — to celebrate October 31st — is in for a world of pain. Short of a high school gym class or perhaps the abyssal depths of the ocean, you’d be hard-pressed to find an environment that is less hospitable and that subjects its weakest inhabitants to quite as much antagonism.

2 Months After Launch, Michael Myers Has Become the One Being Hunted

It’s not really fair to criticise a game for grievances that are beyond the developers’ control, and you’ll find bad apples in any online community. Yet there’s no getting around the fact that, just two months after launch, Halloween has a rather nasty troll problem. One that makes it difficult to recommend to newbies who just want to enjoy themselves this spooky season.  

Anyone but the most competent of Michaels will struggle to hold their own against toxic rivals here, as tiresome griefers have learned (in record time) how to completely dismantle the intended experience. As a result of their nonsense, the once-terrifying boogeyman is no longer an unperturbable force of evil, but rather a pitiable wretch trying to cope with a spate of nuisance behaviour from Haddonfield’s unruly youth.  

In what feels tantamount to elder abuse, civilians will gang up to tauntingly loop the glacial killer around vehicles, prevent him from phasing into his incorporeal shape-jump form (by surveilling him from all angles), bombard him with confusing racial slurs and, in what’s become a bit of a meme, repeatedly mow him down with bicycles. Michael isn’t even necessarily guaranteed to prevail in knife fights against a party of trolls anymore, as they can easily stun-lock him if they’re not focused on playing the objective, which is just kind of sad.

After all, wreaking havoc with a blade is meant to be this legendary slasher’s whole M.O., and yet now he’s being shown up by addlepated stoners and 80-pound prom queens.  

It’s an undignified state of affairs, to say the least, and robs the killer of any menace he once possessed. Indeed, little of the initial power-fantasy thrill remains in Michael gameplay at this point. Half the time, the iconic villain is fleeing from baseball-bat-wielding teens (not the other way around), and hunting down player-controlled characters has become an exercise in sheer frustration.  

Granted, PvP isn’t meant to be your sole focus when taking on the murderer role — given that there are plenty of NPC residents in Haddonfield for you to slice, dice, and asphyxiate— but sometimes it’s an unavoidable part of the scenario. And it’s one that’s becoming increasingly grating with each passing day. 

If you think this is a skill issue on our part, we seem to consistently achieve “Overwhelming Victories” when playing as civilians ourselves. So, there’s obviously something amiss. Eluding, or even downing, Michael has become trivial, and it’s not uncommon to see matches conclude without a single fatality occurring, often because your opponent has justifiably rage-quit.  

It’s not fun if you’re the killer and — unless you’re one of the offending rage-baiters — it’s not even very fun to be a civilian in these circumstances either. Instead, it’s just kind of deflating, because you’re being denied that authentic Halloween experience that the game is sold on. Honestly, we’ve found ourselves actively rooting for Michael to take retribution on our own teammates on more than one occasion, as they were being such poor sports. 

Patches Have Dramatically Improved Stability Since Launch

In these asymmetrical horror releases, taking your turn as the slasher should be cause for excitement. Yet in Halloween, it feels like a civic duty at best (that someone has to take on to facilitate the match) and a humiliation ritual at worst.  

Through trial and error, we’ve figured out how to disrupt the worst underhanded tactics. For instance, activating the “Evil Presence” buff in the vicinity of a survivor who’s trying to loop you (or prevent you from shape jumping) can cause them to stumble, helping you to close the gap and maybe opening up the window for a perfect grab attack. Meanwhile, entering the “Killer Sense” view to fully stalk griefers will make it harder for them to mess you around when you do finally catch up to them.  

Still, it’s a pity to have to focus on anticipating the bad behaviour of others in this way, when you should just be having a blast roleplaying as the motherfucking Boogeyman! It’s especially vexing since the foundations of Halloween: The Game are extremely solid, and it’s also come a long way since our wobbly first impressions.  

When we reviewed the title back in September, we fretted over how we couldn’t “in good conscience overlook serious issues that [were] dampening our enthusiasm for it”. This was in reference to a smorgasbord of mechanical bugs, game-breaking glitches, hardlocks, softlocks, and assorted crashes that tarnished the early-access period.  

Survivors would regularly find themselves unable to move after equipping certain items; they’d get caught up in either looping animations or on the scenery itself and, if they were really unlucky, were liable to fall through the map into some kind of purgatorial liminal space. Michael didn’t emerge from this jankfest unscathed either, often spawning without a functioning cooldown for his traversal abilities, forcing him to prowl the map at the pace of continental drift.  

Not to mention there was a litany of other faults related to matchmaking, unresponsive bots, and perk cards failing to activate. In short, it was virtually impossible to get through a play session without encountering some kind of critical malfunction.  

We’re pleased to report, then, that the game is in a much healthier state two months down the line. The vast majority of its teething issues have been resolved, and it’s an all-round smoother experience. What few bugs do remain at this stage are predominantly visual in nature, and can even be sort of endearing if you are willing to forgive the occasional lapse. Watching residents vampirically glide around households as they perform domestic chores is always good for a laugh.  

Not only has Halloween dramatically improved in terms of stability, but the steady rollout of patches has also helped to address some balancing niggles. Item spawn rates have been judiciously tweaked, meaning that Haddonfield is no longer littered with a preposterous amount of bolt cutters; Michael’s damage output scales more appropriately with his bloodthirst level. incentivising you to patiently stalk targets and not just run around mindlessly swinging an axe; the A.I. has finally acquired the beginnings of self-preservation instincts; and victims can now be more easily detected in the nail-biting climax of a match so they can no longer just wait out the clock cowering in dumpsters.  

Were it not for those infuriating bully squads exploiting the odd lingering oversight, we’d say that the civilian/killer dynamic has been pretty much nailed. Indeed, when everyone is playing in good faith, Halloween: The Game is a dream come true for horror fans. Matches unfold with the classic slasher structure, and the various systems come together to produce all kinds of dynamic scenes that feel as though they’ve been ripped straight from your favourite scary movie.  

We’ve had agonising narrow escapes as civilians and orchestrated sublime jump scares as their adversary. We’ve drowned victims in toilets, singed their flesh against kitchen stoves, and mounted them on coat racks. We’ve organically assumed the role of a final girl: leaping through windows, hiding in closets, fending off our tormenter with a fire poker and breaking free from his grasp before evacuating the town by the skin of our teeth; in one electrifying instance, with a single percentage point of HP left. 

That is what Halloween: The Game should, and occasionally does, feel like. When everything is allowed to unfold properly — and it isn’t just a bunch of dickheads running around a car for 20 minutes — it can be truly cinematic and intense.  

The Tower Farm Terror DLC Adds Welcome Variety

Given that IllFonic has quite rightly been concentrating on fixing their product over the past two months, they haven’t had a chance to implement much in the way of new content yet. A recent patch did add another contextual execution— whereby Michael skewers his target against a junction box — and they’ve controversially removed the sex minigame in order to prevent Dr. Loomis from committing statutory rape. Otherwise, the core offering is more or less unchanged from where it was at the start.  

That’s all set to change now, however, with the game’s first-ever DLC drop. Dubbed “Tower Farm Terror”, this expansion is essentially comprised of two separate halves. There’s the titular map situated on the rural outskirts of Haddonfield, and then there are the extra cosmetics that can be unlocked for a premium.  

The former is an excellent and, crucially, free supplement to the map rotation that provides a refreshing change of scenery. Up until now, the “night he came home” has taken place against an exclusively suburban backdrop, the single-player’s brief stop at Smith’s Grove Sanitarium notwithstanding, but the Tower Farm has a much more rustic flavour. 

It’s probably the most unique environment the game’s offered so far, with far more open space and distinctive features that fundamentally alter the flow of chases. The sprawling cornfields, for example, provide both hunter and prey alike with ample opportunity to hide during protracted cat-and-mouse face-offs.  

We also love how, out of all the maps currently available, it’s the one that best embraces the All Hallows’ Eve atmosphere. Set during the middle of harvest celebrations, it’s got a real cosy autumnal vibe — at least until the bloodletting starts — and there’s nowhere else in the game where you’re liable to see quite so many pumpkins. There’s even a Sleepy Hollow scarecrow with a jack-o’-lantern for a head!  

It would have been nice if they could have shaken up the stale civilian objectives a little more, but, on the plus side, the map does provide new contextual kills and a scythe weapon for Michael. When wielded, the latter enables you to perform broad sweep attacks that can hit multiple targets at once, as well as a pair of especially brutal finishers. You can find it lying around the farm, or you can equip it as a starter weapon if you purchase the new 1989 skin for Michael.  

On that note, the “Tower Farm Terror” update also introduces a few premium cosmetics that can be purchased individually. There are two Mikey costumes up for grabs at f$9.99 each (the aforementioned one taken from Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers and a 2018 one based on David Gordon Green’s reboot). We’d argue that these aren’t quite as momentous as when new Dead by Daylight killers debut, however, or even when you’d unlock a new Jason in Friday the 13th: The Game. Neither of the looks are too dissimilar from the standard version of the boogeyman and are essentially still just a man in mechanic’s coveralls and a spray-painted William Shatner mask (turns out the Shape isn’t as much of a fashionista as some of his slasher contemporaries). 

What does add a bit more colour and vibrancy to the proceedings is the “Civilian Costumes Pack”. Also priced at $9.99, this gives existing survivor characters the opportunity to don fancy dress attire, including firefighter, pirate, sexy cat and witch outfits. Obviously, this release has been timed to coincide with the trick-‘r-treating season, but we’d be eager to see more wacky cosmetics like these added in the future. Another thing we’d like to commend the developers for here is applying the Halloween getups to NPC residents as well, so even if you don’t shell out for the costume pack, you still get to see them in action.  

In addition to this, two new survivors have also been added to the roster (again, for a cost). There are some Twitch drops taking place over the coming days, and you’ll have a chance to unlock adorable “Ghoul Googles” if you manage to complete a limited-time challenge before the end of the month. We can’t fault any of these new inclusions, and it’s pleasing to see that Halloween is properly getting into the spirit of its namesake holiday.  

In terms of content and stability, then, the game has unquestionably come a long way. What we’d like to see IllFonic target next is some of the outstanding balancing issues and those infuriating bully squads, because it would be a real shame if bad actors drove people away from a product that, in every other respect, is on the right trajectory.

Oh, and for the love of all that is holy, please let us customise our loadouts while waiting for everyone to ready up in the lobbies!  

Halloween: The Game, along with its first post-launch DLC, is available on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, and PC via Steam and Epic Games Store.

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However, now that the dust has settled and our readers have likely had the chance to watch all eight episodes of the prequel show, let’s explore the most controversial element of showrunner Brad Caleb Kane’s latest entry in the long-running franchise: Jason Voorhees’ sci-fi-inspired origin story as the only successful subject of Bellflower Chemical’s “Project Argonaut”.

Before we dive in, it’s worth mentioning that Jason’s backstory has never made much sense to begin with. Whether it’s the inconsistencies surrounding his tragic drowning in the first movie and inexplicable reappearance as a grown man in Friday the 13th: Part II or even the reasoning behind the bolt of lightning that revives him in Part VI: Jason Lives, filmmakers have always played fast and loose with the franchise’s established mythology in order to produce entertaining standalone movies.

Historically, this approach tends to work because slasher films are uniquely well-suited for formulaic campfire stories with details that shift according to the needs of the storyteller. However, a made-for-TV prequel with nearly eight hours of runtime (and possible future seasons to contend with) doesn’t have the luxury of dancing around information that our characters would surely have by now. That’s why it’s understandable that Brad would decide to pick a lane and come up with a definitive answer to the problem of Jason Voorhees.

What Crystal Lake ultimately reveals is that the Voorhees name itself is a sham, with Pamela Wittering (Linda Cardellini) and her son (Callum Vinson) actually being fugitives on the run from the insidious Bellflower Chemical, a secretive corporation that was conducting human experiments during the Cold War. According to the seventh episode, Jason is actually the only successful subject of the cleverly-named Project Argonaut, a research program meant to develop enhanced humans capable of withstanding the inevitable nuclear holocaust of World War III.

In the first live-action appearance of a character that the franchise has been teasing for decades, Jason’s father and Director of Operations at Bellflower, Elias Wittering (Hamish Linklater), claims that the project is attempting to emulate the cockroach’s uncanny resistance to radiation. In practice, what the company’s cruel research ultimately achieved was the creation of a preternaturally strong child that only grows stronger and develops faster after being exposed to trauma, a conclusion that the company reached after poking and prodding at Jason and even subjecting him to insane amounts of radiation.

In theory, these powers would explain Jason’s apparent immunity to all forms of serious bodily harm, with Bellflower’s fascination with the child even harkening back to David Cronenberg’s character from Jason X. While some dissatisfied fans are now referring to this incarnation of the iconic character as “Cockroach Jason”, it’s never actually implied that Bellflower is literally injecting arthropod DNA into fetuses – especially since the whole spiel about cockroaches being nuclear-resistant is a scientifically discredited myth.

That being said, the final episode of the show, cheekily titled “The Final Chapter”, adds an interesting caveat to Jason’s abilities, as his watery resurrection in Crystal Lake appears to have come with unfortunate side effects. The eleven-year-old may have come back bigger with enhanced strength and durability, but he also lost much of his humanity in the process. By the end of the episode, he very nearly murders Pamela before recognizing her as his doting mother and fleeing into the woods to continue life as a serial-killing woodsman.

This added detail explains why Pamela would still be grief-stricken about what happened at the lake despite Jason having technically survived, and it even factors in how each subsequent Friday the 13th sequel depicts the iconic Slasher as more of a monster after each “death”. The sci-fi shenanigans also open the door for more Bellflower experiments to show up further down the line, something that could even be used to explain the telekinetic Tina Shepard from New Blood – or maybe Kane could give Jason another unkillable slasher to fight!

While I personally would have preferred not to know exactly how Jason keeps coming back for more punishment, as I’ve always interpreted the curse surrounding Crystal Lake and the Voorhees family to be an actual supernatural force instead of anything explainable by science, Peacock’s show technically takes place in an alternate continuity where Jason drowned in 1971 instead of 1957, and the initial camp counselor murders weren’t even committed by Pamela. That’s why I don’t think this new take on the character harms the existing mythology, even if it’s not exactly the story I would have chosen to tell.

Besides, no matter what backstory Kane had gone with, the fan backlash would likely have been the same because he’s still dealing with millions of genre enthusiasts who each have their own theories about the Voorhees mythos and what makes the character tick. Since I’m of the opinion that Stranger Things doesn’t have a monopoly on the concept of super-powered youngsters who were abused by MK Ultra-adjacent programs —the Duffer brothers actually borrowed that idea from Stephen King’s Firestarter, which was in turn based on real-life experiments and conspiracy theories— I actually have no qualms with “Cockroach Jason.”

As the Joker once said: “If I’m going to have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice.” If you ask me, I think there are worse possible origins for Jason than the ones we got from Crystal Lake.

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Yet for those who have a busy schedule, or maybe they’re just looking for some variety in their viewings, there’s always the option of television.

The twenty following recommendations, all of which come from horror series, are another great way to observe Halloween.

Night Gallery – “Fright Night”

After The Twilight Zone, Rod Serling gave us another anthology show called Night Gallery (1970–1973). In the Halloween-adjacent episode “Fright Night”, a couple (Stuart Whitman, Barbara Anderson) inherits a house with one stipulation: they can’t open the locked trunk in the attic. Following that one rule proves difficult when the trunk then starts to move.

Tales from the Darkside – “Halloween Candy”

There are three solid episodes about Halloween in the anthology series Tales from the Darkside (1984–1988), and I advise you to watch them all. The pilot (“Trick or Treat”) is about trick-or-treaters entering the haunted house of a miser, and “The Cutty Black Sow” sees a boy trying to save his great-grandmother’s soul from a demon that comes after anyone who dies on Halloween. As for “Halloween Candy”, which was directed by Tom Savini, a curmudgeon (Roy Poole) is visited by a wicked goblin.

The Ray Bradbury Theater – “The Emissary”

Halloween is in the background of this notable episode of The Ray Bradbury Theater (1985–1992), that anthology based on the namesake’s body of work. In “The Emissary”, a sick, housebound boy has a dog that will fetch him anything. This includes a friendly teacher played by Helen Shaver. In due time, the episode takes a creepy turn that’s hard to forget.

The Real Ghostbusters – “The Halloween Door”

With so much bustin’ of ghosts, ghouls, and demons in The Real Ghostbusters (1986–1991), Halloween episodes seemed unnecessary. That said, some of the more memorable episodes of this live-action-movie-turned-cartoon are about Halloween. The primetime-aired “The Halloween Door” boasts snazzier animation, as the Ghostbusters deal with the supernatural consequences caused by anti-Halloweeners trying to cancel the holiday.

Werewolf – “All Hallow’s Eve”

One of Fox’s first scripted dramas was Werewolf (1987–1988), wherein a college student named Eric (John J. York) hopes to cure himself of his affliction by killing the originator of his whole bloodline. During the full moon on Halloween Night, Eric holes up in what he thought was an empty house. Turns out he was wrong.

Friday the 13th: The Series – “Hellowe’en”

By now, every Friday the 13th fan knows Friday the 13th: The Series (1987–1990) wasn’t connected to the movies, in spite of both being co-produced by Frank Mancuso Jr. Here, the characters go around reclaiming cursed objects that were sold at their inherited antiques store. In the Halloween episode “Hellowe’en”, a festive party is crashed by the store’s previous owner; the dead Uncle Frank now wants to rejoin the living.

Tales from the Crypt – “Only Skin Deep”

Like most horror shows, Tales from the Crypt (1989–1996) didn’t require Halloween settings, on account of every episode feeling like Halloween. Nonetheless, “Only Skin Deep” is one story that takes place on the holiday. Here, a woman’s abusive ex (Peter Onorati) leaves a Halloween costume party with another guest (Sherrie Rose). This other woman, though, never removes her mask. What does she have planned for their evening?

Are You Afraid of the Dark? – “The Tale of the Midnight Ride”

Before it became a full-on series, the classic children’s anthology Are You Afraid of the Dark? (1992–1996, 1999–2000) began with the Halloween-set special called “The Tale of the Twisted Claw”. Subsequent episodes “The Tale of the Dream Machine” and “The Tale of the Midnight Ride” also feature the holiday, although it’s the latter that contains some of the series’ most iconic imagery. Here, the new kid in town learns that the Headless Horseman is neither mythical nor friendly.

Eerie, Indiana – “America’s Scariest Home Video”

Shortly before he appeared in Hocus Pocus, Omri Katz was the lead in a children’s horror series called Eerie, Indiana (1991–1993). The main character, Marshall, ends up in bizarre situations after moving to the titular town. While he and Simon are stuck babysitting on Halloween, their charge, Simon’s little brother, somehow switches places with the mummy from a movie.

Goosebumps – “The Haunted Mask”

If you only ever watch one episode from Goosebumps‘ first television adaptation, make it “The Haunted Mask”. The premiere episode, wherein a girl named Carly Beth (Kathryn Long) becomes what she wears for Halloween, is on a completely different level when compared to other entries in this beloved anthology for kids. Additional Halloween episodes include “Haunted Mask II” and “Attack of the Jack-O’-Lanterns”.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer – “Fear, Itself”

Cult television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997–2003) established the in-universe lore that supernatural activity was minimal on Halloween. As fans learned, that rule didn’t always hold up. Episodes like “Halloween”, “Fear, Itself” and “All the Way” showed how October 31 was no different than any other creepy day in Sunnydale. The strange goings-on in the fun “Fear, Itself” had the Scoobies getting trapped inside of a haunted frat house.

Millennium – “…Thirteen Years Later”

While Millennium (1996–1999) fans would say “The Curse of Frank Black” is the show’s best Halloween-set episode, and you should definitely watch it, “…Thirteen Years Later” is amusing. Millennium didn’t get a lot of chances to be silly, like Chris Carter‘s other show, The X-Files. So for some lighter shades of darkness in Frank Black’s (Lance Henriksen) bleak universe, this episode delivers. Not only is Frank visiting the set of a movie based on one of his cases, but the band KISS performs.

Supernatural – “Mint Condition”

There are more than enough creepy, stand-alone episodes of Supernatural (2005–2020) that you could watch for Halloween, but for episodes that actually have to do with the holiday, your choices are “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester” and “Mint Condition”. The latter is from Season 14, and it has much less to do with the overarching story. There, Dean (Jensen Ackles) and Sam (Jared Padalecki) investigate what look to be toys being turned into life-sized killers. This includes Dean’s favorite horror movie character, a Michael Myers-type named David Yaeger, a.k.a. Hatchet Man.

Fear Itself – “The Spirit Box”

Anthology series Fear Itself (2008), a spiritual successor to Masters of Horror, had two Halloween episodes: “The Spirit Box” and “The Circle”. The former has Anna Kendrick and Jessica Parker Kennedy using a homemade spirit board to speak to their dead classmate on Halloween. As you would expect, the cheap thrill has dire consequences.

Grimm – “La Llorona”

In Grimm (2011–2017), that show about a homicide detective (David Giuntoli) whose second job is to keep the balance between humans and supernatural creatures, Halloween tackles the legendary La Llorona, a.k.a. the Weeping Woman. Could she be to blame for a series of missing children in the area?

Inside No. 9 – “Dead Line”

Multi-genre British anthology Inside No. 9 (2014–2024) was a big fan of horror, and episodes like “Dead Line” show that affection. This Halloween special confused some audiences back then, as they thought the technical difficulties during what was said to be a live airing were genuine. On the contrary, creators and stars Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith channeled the TV ruse that was Ghostwatch. “Dead Line” wanted us to believe an old television studio was haunted.

Scream: The TV Series – “Halloween Special”

The Scream show (2015–2016, 2019), which is unrelated to the movies, eventually found the surviving characters of Seasons One and Two going to an island for Halloween and getting tangled up in a new mystery. For those new to the series, this whodunit is mostly self-contained.

Wynonna Earp – “Hell Raisin’ Good Time”

The town of Purgatory is no stranger to weirdness. On Halloween, Wynonna Earp (2016–2021) whipped up a villain perfect for the holiday. In this episode from the supernatural western, a pumpkin-headed demon called Rotten Jack comes and causes havoc.

Evil – “October 31”

It’s a busy Halloween Night in this episode of Evil (2019–2024). While Kristen (Katja Herbers) and David (Mike Colter) spend their Halloween debating the legitimacy of an exorcism case, Ben (Aasif Mandvi) debunks the supernatural on his favorite show. The kids also have some Halloween fun during a scary sleepover.

Chucky – “Give Me Something Good to Eat”

Halloween gets plenty of love in Chucky (2021–2024); every season features the holiday at one point. In the first season, Halloween feels different for Jake (Zackary Arthur) after he loses someone close to him. Nonetheless, he goes to a Halloween party where mean girl Lexy (Alyvia Alyn Lind) wears the most insensitive costume possible. It’s then up to Jake to stop Chucky (voiced by Brad Dourif) from murdering Lexy.

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This streaming guide brings gateway scares, and most of them are set on or around Halloween, ensuring proper spooky season viewing. Grown-ups seeking non-gateway horror Halloween watches can find a selection here.

For those looking for new family frights to sink their fangs into this Halloween season, don’t miss these family-friendly frights.

The Curse of Bridge Hollow – Netflix

Director Jeff Wadlow (“Are You Afraid of the Dark?,” Cry Wolf) makes the most of the Halloween concept that sees Halloween décor spring to life to terrorize a town. The Howards have just moved to the quaint town of Bridge Hollow, just in time for Halloween. That’s excellent news for teen Sydney (Priah Ferguson, “Stranger Things”); her keen interest in the supernatural means she’s excited to see the entire block decked out with perfectly themed Halloween lawn displays. But when Sydney accidentally frees Stingy Jack’s ghost, which creates an army from holiday décor, she’s forced to team up with dad, Howard (Marlon Wayans), to save the town. It’s difficult not to fall under this movie’s spell, thanks to its commitment to capturing the essence and importance of Halloween.

Don’t Look Under the Bed – Disney+

The first PG-rated Disney Channel Original Movie to premiere on television in 1999 received many complaints from parents for being too scary for kids. New high schooler Frances begins noticing strange occurrences in town, pranks that seem to frame her as the one responsible. She teams up with Houdini, an older kid who reveals himself to be an imaginary friend. He tells her that it’s the Boogeyman that’s framing her. There’s an interesting mythology behind the Boogeyman here, and this movie also explores some rather adult themes of death. But more importantly, the boogeymen (yes, plural) in this film are pretty freaking creepy. Especially for a Disney film. Seriously. They look like they’re beginning their transformation into full-blown demons from Lamberto Bava’s Demons.

The Hole – Pluto TV, Prime Video, Roku Channel

This 2009 fantasy horror film has flown under the radar, but it makes a great primer for horror master Joe Dante’s body of work. While this kid horror movie also happens to feature a mysterious hole that torments the lead characters, this hole happens to really hone in on the deepest, personal fears of its victims. For 10-year-old Lucas, that means a fear of clowns. For older brother Dane and his love interest, Julie, that means a more profound fear stemming from their guilt-ridden past. This movie wins for taking on some deeper themes while delivering on jump scares and one very creepy clown doll. Also, look for Trick ‘r Treat’s Quinn Lord as a female ghost.

The Monster Squad – Paramount+, Pluto TV, Prime Video

A Goonies-esque horror movie featuring a group of pre-teens taking on the classic Universal movie monsters is a must for any budding horror fan. With memorable quotes, the best set production, memorable makeup effects, and nods to the genre that the grown-ups will appreciate, The Monster Squad is one for the ages. Phoebe’s friendship with Frankenstein’s monster will leave both kids and adults in tears, and lines like “Wolfman’s got nards!” will forever stick in your memory. Though parents be warned: this one is rated PG-13 for language, so save it for the slightly older monster kid.

Nightbooks – Netflix

Alex (Come Play’s Winslow Fegley) adores scary things so much that his birthday party looks more like a Halloween party, complete with costumes, décor, and candy. But when no one shows up, prompting a concerned but hushed conversation between his parents, Alex runs away. He quickly gets stuck inside the magical apartment and is forced to tell an evil witch (Krysten Ritter) a scary story every night if he hopes to live. Alex must team up with another prisoner, Yasmin (The Exorcist: Believer’s Lidya Jewett), to find a way to escape. It’s a whimsical horror fantasy movie produced by Sam Raimi, aimed at the horror-loving monster kid. It may not technically be set on Halloween, but it embraces the spirit all the same.

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark – Peaock

On Halloween 1968, Stella (Zoe Margaret Colletti) and her two friends meet drifter Ramon (Michael Garza) while fleeing from bullies (Resident Evil‘s Austin Abrams). They invite Ramon to explore a local haunted house, where Stella discovers a mysterious book containing horror stories that seem to write themselves in real time. Director André Øvredal brings the nightmarish illustrations by Stephen Gammell and stories by Alvin Schwartz to life. Harold the scarecrow, the Pale Lady, the Big Toe corpse (Javier Botet), and the Jangly Man (Troy James) terrorize Mill Valley’s teens in this recent Halloween treat. It’s the perfect October movie full of chills for the older kid or kid at heart. Though maybe save this one for the older kids; it’s rated PG-13.

Something Wicked This Way Comes – Disney+

Disney+ has finally brought this quintessential gateway Halloween horror gem to streaming for the first time. Director Jack Clayton’s horror/dark fantasy film Something Wicked This Way Comes, adapted for the screen by author Ray Bradbury, didn’t shy away from getting pretty dark. Set in late October, two young boys visit a traveling carnival, led by the mysterious and ominous Mr. Dark. Faustian offers of wishes granted curdle the boys’ fantasies into waking nightmares. A haunting carousel, a blind witch, autumnal vibes, and more ensure there’s enough Halloween tricks and treats here for all. Just beware that some imagery may be far too intense for very young viewers, including a tarantula scene that’ll induce arachnophobia.

Under Wraps – Disney+

Released in 1997, this Disney Channel Original Movie has finally made it to streaming. It also happens to take place around Halloween! It centers on a horror-loving preteen and his two friends as they accidentally awaken an ancient mummy. It sets in motion a race against the clock to reunite the clumsy mummy with his long-lost love. It’s all holiday laughs over scares in this gateway Disney classic, though one that was all but impossible to find until recently. Under Wraps also has a remake and sequel available to stream on Disney+.

The post 8 Family-Friendly Horror Movies to Stream This Halloween appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

It’s not uncommon for some fans to treat the movies and television they love as sacred text that should remain untouched until the end of time. Even Stevie Wonder can see why we are often emotionally attached to characters, and our first iteration of said characters. Just like a horror movie that shakes one to the core, rarely does anything top “the first time.” So it’s understandable that one word causes so much friction, especially in a media landscape where “intellectual property” is every executive’s favorite phrase as they scour libraries for anything that might make them a quick buck or two hundred million. 

That fear and cynicism ignore the role remakes, reboots, and adaptations play. They harken back to the oldest form of word-of-mouth storytelling, where humans passed down stories through oral traditions. Telling tales from one generation to the next reframes them for modern relevance. The details may change, and new elements may appear, but when done well, they ensure the spirit of the story–no pun intended–outlives us all. 

Any effective remake connects with a modern audience. No matter the changes, it must find thematic resonance with the audience. Christian Nyby’s The Thing from Another World and John Carpenter’s The Thing both adapt John W. Campbell Jr.‘s novella. Both movies honor Campbell’s work by sticking to the author’s general ideas, but they approach the specifics very differently, with Nyby and Carpenter speaking to different eras. The America of 1951 and the America of 1982 are not in the same ballpark. They’re more like comparing golf and bowling in that they’re not even the same sport.

Nyby’s flick reflected a country leery of scientists, while Carpenter’s lived in a world where regular citizens grew weary of trusting each other. The ‘82 film, smartly, isn’t a carbon copy of the original adaptation. Carpenter infused modern sensibilities and other thematic elements germane to his time. He answered the question every storyteller should ask themselves when they embark upon the thorny road of retelling: Why this story and why now?

“Why now” is the most interesting half of that equation. Newer audiences might find some barriers to entry for older movies. Not saying it’s definite, but it can happen, especially if said movie has what they consider dated effects, anachronistic character types, or passé cultural moods. Marcus Nispel’s The Texas Chainsaw Massacre turned Tobe Hooper’s Vietnam-era original into something befitting a generation still in the throes of the 9/11 attacks, which included the start of a war. With all of that in mind, Nispel made Hooper’s implied violence extremely overt. He matched the violence of war seen on television, along with the fearful mood pulsating through teens around the United States as war became a very real thing and not just something depicted in entertainment. 

The context became the “why.” In the same vein came Nia DaCosta’s Candyman. The remake/sequel is centered on a gentrified Chicago where the Cabrini Green projects are no more, and a bellowing outcry against police brutality echoed from Black neighborhoods to every part of the country. The 2021 Candyman engages with the idea from the ‘92 original that this Black man would haunt and antagonize people who look like him through the movie’s victims and, more importantly, why they became victims. Fittingly, DaCosta’s movie touts the importance of retelling stories to keep legends alive, but does so in a way that speaks to now and honors the past without becoming a slave to it. 

On the flip side, remakes like When a Stranger Calls, Martyrs, A Nightmare on Elm Street, or Salem’s Lot do the exact opposite. They’re not only slavish to moments in hopes of becoming no more than a collection of Leonardo DiCaprio pointing memes, but they never establish a personality or reason for being. They’re genre exercises that amount to running in place, in part because they have nothing new to add to an existing legacy. They become so infatuated with recreating moments fans expect that they ignore the emotional context in which those moments exist.

Freddy Kreuger’s hand popping up like a perverted Jack-in-the-Box during Nancy’s bath wasn’t just a money shot for Wes Craven’s original, but that’s exactly what it was in Samuel Bayer’s 2010 remake. It’s a Pavlov’s Dog experiment designed to make devotees salivate rather than provide anything new to digest. Craven’s scene deepened Nancy’s fears and paranoia, while Bayer seemingly put it there out of obligation. Moments like that illustrate how easy it is to fall into traps when retelling any story in any medium. 

A modern version of any story can’t be so afraid of its own shadow that it doesn’t reinvent or interrogate. Mike Flanagan’s output crystallizes this. The man practically bathes in adapting older stories for modern eyes. The Haunting of Hill House uses Shirley Jackson’s story and Robert Wise’s The Haunting for the germ of an idea that spreads into a meditation on family, loss, trauma, grief, and how it feels when one is haunted by their past. He transformed Edgar Allen Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher from a story about two people into an epic focused on an entire lineage haunted by choices made before they were even born, much less thought of. Both of these adaptations find emotional hooks to expand on their initial ideas rather than repeat narrative beats to check a box. 

Flanagan’s Carrie, the latest entry on a list longer than a CVS receipt, places Carrie White’s story firmly in the present. Bullying isn’t a new thing, and Stephen King’s belief that “high school is hell” still rings true. How bullying looks and which circle in hell high school resides in differs from the ‘70s, the late ‘90s, the early 2000s, and the early 2010s. Social media, COVID trauma, school shootings, and a seemingly less empathetic society overall are just a few things affecting today’s teenagers. How does someone like Carrie survive in this world? How do all of those outside forces affect her notoriously conservative and overprotective mother? King’s novel is an evergreen for retellings and reshapings because of its subject matter.

So long as high school remains a thing and teenagers exist, someone will always identify with Carrie. The rub, as they say, goes back to how one grounds the story in a world that feels familiar to its target audience. Adhering to the spirit of the text is more important than being slavish to the letter of the text. 

Remakes, reboots, requels, adaptations, or whatever lingo studios use to call them fulfill a basic function of storytelling that existed long before any of us. They perpetuate our myths and, when done right, put fresh breath into our cautionary tales. Regaling a crowd with scary stories is one of the world’s oldest traditions. It’s not enough to rely on the past to make those tales effective; one must find ways to enthrall each new generation. That’s how the genre creates new lifelong fans who then spread the gospel as far as they can for as long as they can. And maybe, just maybe, their “first time” will become a sacred memory that inspires an updated version of a timeless story.

The post Why Horror Remakes Aren’t the Enemy: The Art of Reimagining The Classics appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

And now that enough time has passed that we don’t mind discussing a few spoilers about the recently released show, we’ve decided to shine a light on the young thespians that brought our favorite machete-wielding killer to life in the latest installment of the Friday the 13^th saga.

For starters, we have Callum Vinson as the eleven-year-old Jason that has the most amount of screentime throughout the series’ eight episodes. Horror fans may remember Callum as Henry Collins from the third and final season of SyFy’s Chucky, though the young actor somehow manages to be even more adorable in his latest horror outing.

Even under all those meticulously crafted prosthetics (which reportedly took over three-to-four hours to apply during initial tests), Callum remains remarkably vulnerable and likable, making it surprisingly easy to side with Pamela’s crash out when her sweet, sweet boy inevitably drowns.

Of course, the icy waters of Crystal Lake have never been able to keep Jason down for good, so it’s only natural that a slightly older and more mysterious version of the character shows up months after his tragic demise and begins to stalk the nearby wilderness (and his mother’s nightmares).

Played by actor and stunt performer Zachary Branch (who previously worked on Stranger Things, Goosebumps and Monarch: Legacy of Monsters), this heavily obscured version of Jason -which was nicknamed The Prowler during production- is treated almost like a supernatural cryptid lurking in the woods surrounding the camp – though Crazy Ralph immediately suspects that this “demon” might actually be real.

You can check out more of this eerie design in Branch’s behind-the-scenes photos below.

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A post shared by Zachary Branch (@zacharybranch)

This is where we start getting into heavy spoiler territory, as the show’s later episodes dive further into Jason and Pamela’s backstories, requiring an even younger version of the character to show up onscreen as we see the toll that Project Argonaut is taking on the young boy’s body.

According to Jason Parker (owner of the Friday the 13^th fan site), the four-year-old Jason seen during the heart-wrenching flashback episode is portrayed by a duo of young actors named Kaiden Cullen and Theo Lonsdale in their first credited roles.

The duo is also joined by several mutated siblings/prototypes that Pamela encounters at Bellflower’s mysterious clinic, with these monstrous attempts at creating a nuclear-resistant superhuman being brought to life by the Oscar-nominated practical effects maestro David Preston and his talented team of makeup artists.

That leads us to Crystal Lake’s final (and arguably most interesting) take on Jason, the “adult” form of the character that appears in the final episode of the season. Looking almost exactly like the Jason we see Friday the 13^th: Part 2, this incarnation of the deformed killer is larger and more dangerous due to his bioengineered body’s unique response to physical trauma. That’s why this twelve-year-old has adult proportions and can easily slice through Bellflower goons as if they were made of butter.

Alternately played by stuntman David Armstrong and actor Jonathan Tison (who only discovered that he was playing the iconic killer once he showed up for makeup tests after learning that he’d been cast as “Joey” in a show that the producers had codenamed “Mama’s Boy”), this Jason appears to be a first draft of the sack-headed murderer from 1981. In fact, Tison revealed that he immediately did his homework upon learning the true nature of his character on the show, with his performance during the climactic confrontation between him, Pamela and Elias being based on Warrington Gillette/Steve Daskewisz’s encounter with Ginny towards the end of Part 2.

And if Peacock greenlights a second season of Crystal Lake (which seems likely as this point, given the show’s international popularity), this is likely the Jason that we’ll continue to see going forward – which is pretty cool for ultra-fans of Part 2 who think that the character was scarier before he donned the iconic hockey mask.

That being said, I think it’s a shame that Callum Vinson didn’t get more time to shine as the more lovable version of the deformed killer, especially given his excellent chemistry with Linda Cardellini’s take on Pamela Voorhees, though it’s always possible that he could return through further flashbacks and hallucinations!

In any case, let us know in the comments below which of these “Jasons” was your favorite, and which ones you’d like to see return in a possible Season 2.

The complete first season of Crystal Lake is now streaming exclusively on Peacock!

The post Meet the SIX Actors Who Played Jason Voorhees in Peacock’s ‘Crystal Lake’ appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.

It’s safe to say a certain generation of horror fans had trouble sleeping after watching 1975’s Trilogy of Terror. You just don’t forget a childhood trauma like the Zuni Doll. A little over two decades later, Dan Curtis did the unexpected and sequelized that classic TV movie. Surely no one asked for this to be made, but speaking only for myself, I’m happy it exists.

The star of 1996’s Trilogy of Terror II, Lysette Anthony, may not seem familiar until you remember her from Krull. However, that possible lack of instant recognition helped Anthony fade into each of her three roles here. To be clear, the sequel is using the same concept as its predecessor; as Karen Black did in her movie, Anthony portrays multiple protagonists in hers. For the most part, she’s rather convincing as a murderer, a mother, and a scientist. You might even say it’s the most challenging work she ever received in her career as an actor.

As with the original movie, there is no framing device in Trilogy of Terror II. You’re thrown into the stories with neither introduction nor interlude. Don’t expect a narrator to steer you, either. This way, though, there is more of an immersive effect. The focus is on the individual tales, their characters and their settings, as opposed to any sort of looming outcome that’s often attached to having a physical storyteller present.

There have been many times that an anthology put a short story on the map. This was the case for “The Graveyard Rats”, an impressive yet overlooked Henry Kuttner short that dates back to the 1930s. It wasn’t until sixty-something years later that Curtis and his co-writer, William F. Nolan, first brought Kuttner’s rodent-infested tale of comeuppance to life.

Before a more faithful version of “The Graveyard Rats” surfaced in Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities, Curtis and Nolan reworked the source material so that it could now include Anthony’s character, an avaricious trophy wife whose adultery has been exposed. Yet rather than staying faithful to her cruel and curmudgeonly husband (Matt Clark), she and her paramour (Geraint Wyn Davies) choose murder. This mild, soap opera-esque setup is eventually eclipsed by the dog-sized rats coming to feast, as Anthony’s character goes from golddigger to gravedigger. Those obvious-looking hand puppets are as unnerving as they are cheesy.

For the second segment, Curtis slightly cheated by redoing “Bobby” from his other ‘70s anthology for TV, Dead of Night. Richard Matheson penned the original teleplay, hence his credit here. Dead of Night was, and still is, not quite as renowned as Trilogy of Terror. Once again, though, Curtis saved the best for last, as “Bobby” is a masterful tale of maternal horror—one so good that it was worth repeating.

The chances of finding Dead of Night at your local Blockbuster back then were low. So more than likely, Trilogy of Terror II was a lot of people’s first time seeing “Bobby” in any form. This do-over is essentially verbatim, albeit with more nightmarish Dutch angles and longer, fuller stretches of eerie darkness in the back half. Meanwhile, the previous version, wherein Joan Hackett played that grieving mother who resurrected her dead son, benefits from that fuzzy, dreamlike quality that was innate to ‘70s horror. Both tellings of “Bobby”, however, pack a wallop of a twist at the end.

The crown jewel of the first Trilogy is its last chapter. Matheson, whose short stories inspired the whole movie, personally penned the adaptation for “Prey”. In what was then called “Amelia”, Black’s character is menaced by a diminutive fetish doll that had been possessed by a demon. Her grueling victory over evil, though, was short-lived.

Matheson was credited on “He Who Kills”, a direct sequel to “Amelia”. Otherwise, Curtis and Nolan took the wheel in this follow-up that did more to update the special effects than the story. Like before, a woman is on the receiving end of that demonic doll’s rampage; Anthony squares off with her tiny assailant inside a science lab. The death count is raised a bit, too, now that the Zuni Doll is not confined to just one room.

“He Who Kills” is enjoyable as something of a fast-paced, supernatural slasher, although it’s far more direct and less mysterious than its progenitor. The depth found in Matheson’s “Amelia” also isn’t replicated in the sequel. Black’s character felt the many cuts of an overbearing mother, prior to her stabby standoff with the Zuni Doll, whereas Anthony’s character has no meat on her bones, so to speak.

Sequels for TV movies weren’t then common, especially ones two decades old—now five, as of this writing. That said, Trilogy of Terror II was a welcome surprise. A curio, if you will. Plus, the first movie wasn’t readily available; Anchor Bay’s DVD wouldn’t be available until three years later. So in the meantime, this follow-up was the next best thing. It doesn’t replace what many consider to be the best horror TV movie of all time, but if I may be so bold, the sequel offers more consistent, if not tawdry, entertainment.

The next time the USA Network pre-celebrated Halloween with an anthology was 2000’s Terror Tract. Technically, though, this is not an in-house production; it was acquired like Cherry Falls, which just so happens to be this movie’s companion on an out-of-print DVD. Finding Terror Tract these days isn’t always easy, but your efforts will be rewarded.

Unlike the last anthology, this one includes both a framing story and a host. The wraparound (called “Make Me an Offer”) is immediately funny, as the camera goes from the top level of an idyllic residential neighborhood to the gruesome underbelly. After that darkly comical take on the food chain, we’re off to meet our host for this bizarre tour; John Ritter turned in a delightfully twisted role as Bob, the realtor who’s desperate to make a sale. Although not desperate enough to keep his mouth shut.