Twenty-two people died one fateful Halloween in Wickburg, Massachusetts. And as far as the town is concerned, the killer is still on the loose. Robert Cormier’s In the Middle of the Night sounds like it has the makings of a slasher story based on that vague description, but this 1995 novel’s high body count is […]
The post Robert Cormier’s ‘In the Middle of the Night’ Answers the Call of Fear [Buried in a Book] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
The average anthology series draws from multiple wells of inspiration. Apart from original ideas, these shows look to preexisting fiction writing for their source material, seeking the best of the best. Not only does this method encourage variety and bring recognition to less prevailing works, it also puts the spotlight on underappreciated authors. Be that […]
The post Shared Scares: 5 Horror Stories With Multiple TV Anthology Adaptations [Series of Frights] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
After coming up against Mothra, Ghidorah and King Kong, Godzilla was primed and ready to take on the most challenging enemy in his career so far — pollution. The last stretch of Godzilla’s Shōwa period kicked off with an environmentally conscious entry in the spirit of the 1954 film. And, as to be expected from […]
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Casual fans of Goosebumps can usually expect to find some kind of supernatural creature or other bizarre baddie in these books, but R. L. Stine briefly changed gears toward the end of the classic series. The previous 58 entries covered a wide span of far-out villains and unique scenarios, with each one being weirder than […]
The post R. L. Stine’s ‘Goosebumps’ Goes to a Dark Place in “The Haunted School” [Buried in a Book] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
Despite its reputation for deadly animals, Australia has few films about fatal fauna. The most obviously dangerous creatures in the Land Down Under — salties, razorbacks, great whites — have all been villainized on screen; some of them multiple times. However, Everett De Roche looked at Australia’s more unsuspecting creatures as he wrote an “environmental […]
The post ‘Long Weekend’: The Unearthly Nature of an Ozploitation Classic [Horrors Elsewhere] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
With so many people passing through them over the years, it would only make sense for hotels to be haunted. T.S. Rue is one of many storytellers who agrees with the possibility, and starting in 1993, the young-adult author explored the goings-on at a ghostly getaway called Arcadia. Rue, who also goes by Morton Rhue […]
The post T.S. Rue’s ‘Nightmare Inn’ Series Opened With Murder and Time Travel [Buried in a Book] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
Halloween: Resurrection opened to bad reviews upon its unseasonable release in July of 2002. The critics who bothered to assess the sequel, despite there being no advance screenings, made sure to flay the film. “Spectators will indeed sit open-mouthed before the screen, not screaming but yawning,” said The New York Times, and Entertainment Weekly called […]
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Years before feral swine were making the news or going viral on social media, South Korea’s war with boars was foretold in Shin Jung-won’s Chaw (Chawz in the U.S.). This 2009 film, which is as relevant today as it was back then, demonstrates the consequences of man tampering with nature and how nature decidedly bites […]
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Before Jennifer Love Hewitt and her castmates ever felt the sharp end of an ice hook, I Know What You Did Last Summer was a novel by Lois Duncan. The famed young-adult author proposed a dilemma like few others when she pursued an idea of dual identities and a curiosity about hit-and-runs. This seminal 1973 […]
The post How Lois Duncan’s ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ Cuts Deeper Than the 1997 Movie appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
The wrath of rats on film essentially began with 1959’s The Killer Shrews, but more unambiguous depictions first cropped up in the ‘70s. This included Bert I. Gordon’s 1976 adaptation of H. G. Wells’ 1904 book, The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth. Food of the Gods was financially successful by […]
The post ‘Gnaw: Food of the Gods II’ Is B-Movie Perfection and Creature Feature Fun [Horrors Elsewhere] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
About a year after The Blair Witch Project took the box office by storm in 1999, Random House started publishing a series of tie-in novels in conjunction with Artisan Entertainment. The first film’s production designer and the director of two related features, Ben Rock, was also consulted about geography and lore. And to help reinforce the […]
The post ‘The Blair Witch Files’: Investigating the Growing Black Hills Mythology in Those First Three Novels appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
The world is loud, and it is only getting louder. Escaping the noise outside can seem impossible, especially when living in an urban environment. But as anyone who frequents them knows, libraries are a haven from all the bustle. While they have evolved to be more like community centers, libraries still encourage guests to keep […]
The post Read to Death: 5 Tales of Library Horror from TV Anthologies [Series of Frights] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
Venom was an unprecedented move for video-game adaptations when Dimension Films acquired rights to an unproduced game in 2003. Developers Flint Dille and John Zuur Platten said their concept for Backwater was “ready-made to become a horror film as well as a game,” and players were positioned to be “the prey of a modern-day boogieman” […]
The post ‘Venom’ (2005): ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ Director’s Forgotten Slasher [Young Blood] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
Desire is the mainspring of the French erotic thriller Stranger by the Lake (L’inconnu du lac). As men from different walks of life converge on the story’s one and only locale, they enter a world removed from reality and time. The sun toasts their bare skin, and the atmosphere frees their inhibitions. The pebbly lakeshore […]
The post ‘Stranger by the Lake’: Cruisers Caught in a Bad Romance in French Erotic Thriller [Horrors Elsewhere] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.
The 1980s was a pivotal time for horror fiction, especially for young adults. As Grady Hendrix wrote in Paperbacks From Hell, this was the decade where “horror hit its stride with a hungry teenage audience.” Dell Publishing’s own part in the prevailing trend included Twilight: Where Darkness Begins, a collection of self-contained books that helped […]
The post Joseph Trainor’s ‘Watery Grave’ Brings Aquatic Horror to the Surface [Buried in a Book] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.