Afraid by kaitlyn_forsyth

Table of Contents Friday the 13th Halloween A Nightmare on Elm Street Vs. Vs. Vs. Freddy Vs. Jason Vs. Michael who had the Scaries Film? Jason Voorhees Michael Myers Freddy Kreuger

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Friday the 13th

By Roger Ebert

“Friday the 13th” is about the best “Friday the 13th” movie you could hope for. Its technical credits are excellent.

“It has a lot of scary and gruesome killings.” Not a whole lot of acting is required. If that’s what you want to find out, you can stop reading. OK, now it’s just us in the room. You’re not planning to see “Friday the 13th,” and you wonder why anyone else is. Since the original movie came out in 1980, there were 10 more films -- sequels, retreads, fresh starts, variations, whatever. Now we get

the 2009 “Friday the 13th,” which is billed as a “remake” of the original. That it is clearly not. Let me test you with a trick question: How many kids did Jason kill in the first movie? The answer is none, since Mrs. Voorhees, his mother, did all of the killings, in revenge on the camp counselors who let her beloved son drown in Crystal Lake. Mrs. Voorhees is decapitated at the end of No. 1, and again in the new version, so the new movie is technically a remake up until that point -- but the decapitation, although preceded by several murders, comes before this movie’s title card, so everything after that point is new. It will come as little surprise

that Jason still lives in the woods around Crystal Lake and is still sore about the decapitation of his mom. Jason must be sore in general. So far in the series, he has been drowned, sliced by a machete in the shoulder, hit with an ax in the head, supposedly cremated, aped by a copycat killer, buried, resurrected with a lightning bolt, chained to a boulder and thrown in the lake again, resurrected by telekinesis, drowned again, resurrected by an underwater electrical surge, melted by toxic waste, killed by the FBI, resurrected through the possession of another

body, returned to his own body, thrown into hell, used for research, frozen cryogenically, thawed, blown into space, freed to continue his murder spree on Earth 2, returned to the present, faced off against Freddy Krueger of “Nightmare on Elm Street,” drowned again with him, and made to emerge from Crystal Lake with Freddy’s head, which winks.

I know what you’re thinking. No, I haven’t seen them all. Wikipedia saw them so I didn’t have to. The question arises: Why does Jason continue his miserable existence, when his memoirs would command a seven-figure advance, easy? There is another question. In the 1980 movie, 20 years had already passed since Jason first went to sleep with the fishes. Assuming he was a camper aged 12, he would have been 32 in 1980, and in 2009, he is 61. That helps explain why one of my fellow critics at the screening was wearing an AARP T-shirt.

Spoiler warning! At the end of this film, Jason is whacked with an ax and a board, throttled with a chain and dragged into a wood chipper, although we fade to black just before the chips start to fly, and we are reminded of Marge Gunderson’s immortal words. The next day brings a dawn, as one so often does, and two survivors sit on the old pier with Jason’s body wrapped and tied in canvas. Then they throw him into Crystal Lake. Anyone who thinks they can drown Jason Voorhees for the fifth time is a cockeyed optimist.

Halloween

By Roger Ebert

As much I hate to say this, I’m not sure that David Gordon Green, Danny McBride and the people behind a new sequel to John Carpenter’s “Halloween” really understand what made the first film a masterpiece. Their highly anticipated take on the legend of Michael Myers is admirable in its thematic relation to Carpenter’s vision, but the no-nonsense, tightly-directed aspect of the influential classic just isn’t a part of this one. Carpenter’s movie is so tautly refined that the sometimes incompetent slackness of this one is all the more frustrating.

As is the complete lack of atmosphere, another strength of the original. In that first movie, you can hear the crunch of the leaves and smell Fall in the air. This one always feels like a movie, never transporting you or offering the tactile terror of the story of The Shape. Green and McBride are playing with some interesting themes and there’s a female empowerment story of trauma here that’s interesting (but underdeveloped), but do you know the biggest sin of the new “Halloween”? It’s just not scary. And that’s one thing you could never say about the original.

What I like most about the new “Halloween” is that its message could be boiled down to something as simple as

“Don’t Fuck Around with Evil.” Don’t try and study it, or understand it, or do a podcast about it, or whatever—just kill it. Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) learned this lesson the hard way the night she survived an attack by Michael Myers, who has been incarcerated for the 40 years since (this movie

pretends all of the sequels never happened, even number two, and even has a character make fun of the stories about Michael being Laurie’s brother and things like “revenge” and “curses” in a way comes off as snarky more than clever). Laurie has lived as her own kind of prisoner since that night, completely terrified of the day Michael would come home, basically becoming a doomsday prepper, turning her home into a heavily armed bunker. She also obsessively taught her daughter (Judy Greer) how to fend off the ultimate attacker, so much so that she’s nearly estranged from her.

“Halloween” opens with a pair of podcasters going to meet Michael and Laurie for a piece they’re doing, allowing for a lot of the last paragraph’s “what have they been up to” exposition. Michael has been completely silent for four decades, never saying a word, but the podcasters think it a good idea to bring him his mask on the day of the interview, meaning they (and it) will be nearby when Mike later escapes and beats them to death. As he makes his way back to Haddonfeld on Halloween, a dozen or so victims stand in his way, including Laurie’s granddaughter and some of her teenage friends, some hapless cops, and a few other locals. There’s an excellently staged sequence as Michael’s killing spree

starts and Green’s camera stays mostly outside of homes, watching the icon go about his work through windows. And yet even this moment feels almost too precious. Green makes a number of explicit references to Carpenter’s film with dialogue and even shots, but there’s a difference between referencing something and actually incorporating it into a new vision. The former is just an echo, and that’s often what I felt watching “Halloween”—the echo of the original is loud, but that’s ultimately hollow compared to sequels that truly build on what came before instead of just expressing how much they love it.

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Worst of all, Green bungles the ending. I would never spoil it, but you might imagine that an evening massacre that its central characters have been anticipating for four decades has to really stick the landing. At its best, “Halloween” is about a woman dealing with trauma for more than half her life, and only able to exorcise her demon when she faces him again. That sets up a great deal of pressure on the closing scenes, and—other than one nice twist—“Halloween” just doesn’t deliver when it needs to most of all. I walked into “Halloween” wanting to feel the magic of the original again in some form. Carpenter’s film is

one of my favorite films of all time. And David Gordon Green and Danny McBride are clearly smart guys, bringing a higher pedigree than nearly any other horror sequel, allowing for optimism. And there are, of course, elements that display Green’s craftsmanship more than, say, Dwight H. Little (director of “Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers”). I’ve heard a number of people say that it’s the best “Halloween” sequel, to which one almost has to laugh at the low height of that bar. And shouldn’t we expect more from a project this high profile than “better than H20?” Especially when the answer to that question is “just barely.”

A Nightmare on Elm Street

By Nick Schager

As perhaps the most influential horror film of the ’80s (as well as one of the formative films of my youth), and yet consequently also the slasher flick most responsible for the genre’s decade-long degradation into self-conscious camp, A Nightmare on Elm Street is a movie defined by its dual legacies. Wes Craven’s gory tale of undead kiddie-killer Freddy Krueger and the teens he terrorizes via dreams was a slickly produced variation on Halloween’s return-ofthe-repressed conceit that boasted empathetic lambs for the slaughter, an iconic villain, and an overabundance of twisted, horri-

fyingly surreal sights that effectively tapped into the link between carnality and death. “This…is God,” says Freddy (Robert Englund) while holding up his phallic finger razors during his first meeting with slutty Tina (Amanda Wyss), only to then perform faux-castration on his finger in order to let his internal yellow goo spurt— an instance of frighteningly sexualized imagery in tune with the slithering, cockshaped sheet that strangles Lane (Jsu Garcia), the condom-like body bag that encases Tina during virgin Nancy’s (Heather Langenkamp) classroom dream, and the geyser of blood that erupts from the dark, hungry

hole in Glen’s (Johnny Depp) bed. Nightmare’s skill wasn’t that it invented such associations—which had already been thoroughly mined by its ’70s predecessors—but that it refined them in uniquely disturbing ways, drenching itself in an atmosphere of unreality positioned somewhere between waking and slumbering states. It’s an ambiance aided by Craven’s deft editing, Charles Bernstein’s hauntingly jarring score and musical cues, and the film’s unforgettable children’s rhyme (“One, two, Freddy’s coming for you…”), and most convincingly realized during Nancy’s unconscious

trip through her high school hallways (replete with a chilling hall monitor Freddy) and into the type of fiery basement where, it’s later revealed, Freddy the man was eradicated and Freddy the supernatural specter was born. Toss in the ultimate revelation that Freddy is really the byproduct of parental vigilantism—and thus akin to a demon scorned, determined to exact revenge against those who offed him—and the sense that Freddy’s intrusions into his victim’s nightmares are acts of subconsciously perpetrated rape, and Craven’s classic has enough anti-sex, anti-parent, mass-psychosis undercurrents to keep

it relevant for decades, even as time and scores of subsequent, inferior Freddy outings slowly chip away at its once shocking scares. While Craven is only partially to blame for allowing the Nightmare franchise to fall into junky sequel disrepute—after disliking the studio-mandated request for a twist ending, he reportedly cut ties with its follow-up—Freddy’s eventual transformation from malevolent monster to quip-spouting joke nonetheless irrevocably sullied the original’s impact, its central fiend sapped of his terrifying deviance (epitomized by his perverted wagging tongue) by awareness of his forthcoming penchant for corny one-liners. In and of itself, this series devolution into goofiness was dispiriting. Worse, however, is that the

success of Freddy’s maiden voyage (which more or less single-handedly put neophyte New Line Cinema on the map) led to an unfortunate era of tongue-in-cheek mainstream horror films in which bad puns and winkwink kills became the norm. And thus despite Nightmare’s enduring portrait of believable teendom (from Langenkamp’s feisty heroine to the debuting Depp’s bland cuteness), its bizarre vision of adulthood (with John Saxon’s standard-issue daddy cop overshadowed by Ronee Blakley’s creepily spaced-out mom), and its resonant argument in favor of parent-child truthfulness, it also, regrettably, must be held responsible for amusing but distinctly un-horrifying trash like Child’s Play and Dr. Giggles.

VS.

VS. VS. By Melissa B.

One of the most common debates amongst horror movie junkies is which of the three major slasher franchises trumps the rest. All three of the original films Halloween (1978), Friday the 13th (1980) and A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) were all relatively released around the same time. The seventies and eighties were an era where horror was invading the big screen as

special effects and technology were rapidly advancing. First and foremost, I want to put it out there that I like all three filmsâ&#x20AC;&#x201C; I find them all to be scary, entertaining and brilliant in their own ways. However, I do hold one film higher than the other two. As a side-note, I am also not going to count nor really mention any of the three filmâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s sequels or remakes.

A Nightmare on Elm Street Let’s start with dissecting A Nightmare on Elm Street, which plays on the idea of your nightmares coming to life. The movie is actually even loosely based on a true story– where in the 1970’s several Asian men died suddenly in their sleep. The film’s nemesis is Freddy Krueger who helms knives for hands and has a scar-filled face only a mother could love. A Nightmare on Elm Street follows Nancy, a

somewhat sweet and innocent teenager as her and her friends all try to escape the terrifying living nightmare that Freddy has inflicted on them. The film is filled with several creepy and downright scary moments that make you ‘never want to sleep again.’ I find the freakiest scene of the film to be when Nancy dreams of her dead friend Tina walking down the hallways of her school in a bloody body

bag. That scene did a real number on me, along with the creepy and crazy ending. The thing that gripes me about this one though, is that it is very far-fetched, based on a true story or not, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s just plain unrealistic. Yes, I know thousands upon thousands of horror films are unrealistic, but this is just part of the reason.

I did not pick this film as the bestâ&#x20AC;Ś You will understand more later on in the article. Another part to mention, is that Freddy talks a lot, which does indeed make him scary. But the fact that in the other two films, you do not hear much of anything from the killer makes them all the more frightening.

Friday the 13th Next on the list is Friday the 13th, where sex-crazed camp counselors try to survive the night as they are randomly sliced and diced one by one. I really enjoyed the setting, a secluded camp out in the middle of nowhere.. and there’s just something about horror movies that take place in the summer that make them all the more creepy. Perhaps it’s because summer usually makes people warm and happy, rather than cold and dead. The film is a very fun and suspenseful watch, but to me lacks some serious scares when compared to Halloween and ANOES. My opinion is they could have skimped out a bit on the sex and nudity and replaced it

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with more creepy scenes. It’s just that when I think of Friday the 13th, I really can’t come up with that many scary parts.. just crafty kills and a feeling of being trapped with no escape. Don’t get me wrong though– I LOVE this film’s ending, it was very well-crafted and the twist with the resulting kill is just plain awesome. Betsy Palmer plays a terrifying villain as well.. there’s just something about her that gets underneath your skin. The boat scene at the very end never fails to make me jump… if they had more scenes like the boat one in the film, I think it would have been much more frightening.

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Halloween And now we’ve made our way to Halloween, which I am sure by now you’ve discovered is my top pick of the trio. The pure simplicity of this film is what makes it so effective. There’s no over-the-top graphics, the characters seem real and relatable and movie packs far more scares and intense moments than the other two. And Michael… the emotionless killing machine that just one look at gives you chills. The total lack of unknown regarding Michael is what makes him all the

more scary. You don’t know his drive or motivation for wanting to kill people. He just plain does it, almost as if he’s fascinated by it. We find out motives and such of the killers in Friday the 13th and ANOES which makes us understand them more, which in a way, offers reassurance. However, not knowing is not reassuring in the least. Also, the fact that the budget was only a mere $300,000, which is the lowest of the three films also is quite amazing.

I love the atmosphere Halloween creates, the way they show the ordinary random suburb that could be any town in America. The way they portray the three best friends makes it so really could be anyone’s best friends when they were in high school. All the ingredients to the plot were just plain perfect, even if it was a very simple one. I also need to mention the beginning, the first person POV of young Michael as he murders his sister is brilliant,

and the film makers spent a great deal of time to make it just right. We also can not forget the amazing score, and the Halloween theme that makes the movie what it is– almost like it’s Halloween’s trademark. All the right music was perfectly crafted and placed at the exact moments it’s needed to be.

One of the scariest and most powerful scene to me is the infamous closet scene. It’s always where people always think of to hide, where people think they can’t be seen. Yet in Halloween, it turns into something much more terrifying. The scene is very tense and makes you want to look away… you can feel Laurie’s fear as it’s so perfectly displayed on Jamie Lee Curtis’ face.

The last few scenes of the film are made of true terror. In my opinion, the other two films lack this very thing. Not saying they don’t all have scary scenes, but Halloween just seems to be swimming in them, when Friday the 13th and ANOES just feature them. I do understand Halloween is what started them all, and filmmakers were most likely inspired by it but to me, no one was ever able to top it.

Freddy vs Jason who had the sca We break the movies down into three (what else?) categories to help you decide what one to watch tonight…

Lead Character A Nightmare on Elm Street: Freddy is literally nightmare fuel. His burned face and disturbing finger knives definitely carry a high fear factor. (And that hat with a green and red jumper? Nerve-shredding.) Even his deranged running style is freaky. Scary from start to finish, Freddy Krueger is a hard one to top. Halloween: But if anyone can, it’s Michael Myers. Apart from a brief glimpse he is a complete enigma which makes him horrifying hidden behind that mask.

With a menacing glide, strong posture and a relentless demeanour, coupled with supernatural skills to appear and disappear at will he is a spooky slasher that created the genre as we know it. Friday the 13th: Well, Jason isn’t really in this one so while it’s impressive he is the star a horror franchise, his first appearance was a disappointingly submerged performance. Winner: Halloween

vs Michael â&#x20AC;&#x201C; riest first film? By Gary Phillips

Actions and Attacks A Nightmare on Elm Street: From creeping on Nancy in the bath to attacking victims using his built-in finger knives, Freddy is a nightmarish threat that seems impossible to stop. The scariest part of his actions is the increasing lack of sleep his prey get, making them more and more susceptible to attack. His dream world is freaky and the fear it creates in the film’s protagonists is tangible. Friday the 13th: Gory. The use of POV to show the killer creep up on the victims is great and terrifying to see them gloriously unaware of their fate. Mrs Vorhees’ commitment to her grudge is strangely admirable and adds to your fear, knowing to what lengths she will go to for revenge. Plus the

Jason scare is big for the first couple of times you watch this. Halloween: Although Michael doesn’t kill many in this (which is very much addressed in the new sequel), the scariest thing about Halloween is how realistic a murderer like him is and how easy it is for him to kill. As mentioned above, his relentlessness, ability to appear where (not) needed, and his brutality make his stalking of Laurie Strode and his other victims truly frightening. Winner: A Nightmare on Elm Street

Music A Nightmare on Elm Street: A subtle and suitably dreamlike score accompanies the nightmares caused by Mr Krueger. It hits all the right notes in building tension and scares, but it doesn’t quite cut deep enough to the bone when it come to the fight scenes. Friday the 13th: This has a pacey score that really adds to the fast attacks and gruesome action that plays out on screen. The breathy vocalness of the music increases the level of mystery surrounding the attacker and their intentions shrouding them as an intimidating, faceless killer. Not as much about building tension but

creating an unrelenting and overwhelming atmosphere, this score crushes any hope of getting out alive. Halloween: John Carpenter’s score is a classic and the theme is instantly recognizabel but it’s also an integral part of the fear factor of Halloween. The chilling musical cues and flourishes turn the pace at a moment’s notice and augment Myers’ apparent ability to appear anywhere. Much like Michael the music is unrelenting and it leaves you constantly on the edge of your seat. Winner: Halloween

Result: While theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re all scary in their own ways, it is still impossible to beat the original Halloween from the godfather of horror John Carpenter. Michael is a brutal and scarily real killer that stalks the town of Haddonfield, Illinois to a spine-chilling soundtrack. On the 31st of October, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s got to be Halloween.

Jason Voorhees Origin Jason Voorhees was a physically deformed child. His handicaps alienated him from other children, who tormented him both psychologically and physically. This alienation lead to him forming a special bond with his mother Pamela Voorhees, as when Jason was a child his father left in fear of his mother. After his father left his mother was his only true friend and caretaker. Pamela wanted young Jason to have all of the fun and experiences the other children had, and wanted nothing more than for him to be happy. So one year she allowed little Jason

By oogway123

to join a summer camp, at Camp Crystal Lake, Where she worked as the cook. However one fateful day, the two counselors on duty who were meant to be supervising the young campers, left their duties to have sex. While the counselors were having indulging their carnal desires, little Jason was chased down to the Lake by the other kids who threw him into the water. However, Jason didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t know how to swim, and without any adult supervision he drowned. This was something which his mother could not forgive. Hearing the voice of her dead son, drove her to

murderous madness. She went on to kill many camp counselors, in the name of her son who rested at the bottom of the Crystal Lake. One fateful night however, a Camp Counselor by the name of Alice fought back, decapitating Pamela with her own machete. That night Jason witnessed his mother die, bringing life back into his cold rotting corpse, he would avenge his motherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s death. Thus, Jason not only has suffered the abuse, ridicule and humiliation that others caused him throughout his whole childhood, also he suffered the murder of

the only person who loved him: his mother. Because of this, Jason developed an animadversion so hellish that he killed, without any distinction (except children), all those who invaded his territory.

Resurrection

Friday The 13th Part 2

After returning from the watery grave of Crystal Lake, Jason became the prominent killer in the second film, a trend that would last the rest of the series. with the exception being Part V: A New Beginning.

Before he wore the iconic hockey mask, Jason wore a burlap sack with a single eye-hole. With this crude covering on, he tracked his motherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s killer Alice. He followed to her quiet suburban home where he drove a screw-driver through her skull. After dispatching Alice, Jason returned to Crystal Lake only to find a new group of campers had set-up shop, in his home. He murdered them in various ways. The main protagonist, Ginny bore a striking resemblance to Voorheesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; mother. She

Friday The 13th Part 3 used this to her advantage and convinced Jason to kneel down in front of her. As Jason became aware of the ruse, another survivor, Paul, arrived in time to distract Jason as Ginny slashed through his shoulder. However, it didn’t kill Jason, and he returned with one last jump scare where the survivors were hiding; crashing through the window, grabbing Paul. Ginny would wake up in an ambulance sometime later, having no recollection of what transpired after these events, leaving Paul’s fate unclear and Jason still wandering the woods.

Jason finally donned his iconic mask when he killed the lovable goofball Shelley. This time the protagonist was Chris, a woman who had been attacked and almost killed by a mysterious figure previously at Camp Crystal Lake years ago. This time she ran across Jason who murdered all of her friends in unique ways; pitchforks to the throat, spears to the eye, and eye-popping head crushing. Confronting Jason at the top level of a barn, Chris was successfully able to place a noose around Jason’s neck, pushing him off and hanging him. When she thought it

was all over, Jason sprang back to life, revealing his face, that of Chrisâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; attacker years ago. Ultimately Chris defeated Jason by burying an axe straight into his head. The end of this film seems to pay homage to Cunninghamâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s original ending. Chris awakes in a small boat in the morning and is terrified to see that Jason has apparently survived. Panicking as Jason comes toward her, she tries to escape. Right then, a figure that appears to be Jasonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s mother Pamela, somehow not decapitated, pops out of the water, grabbing Chris from behind. Awakening from an appar-

ent nightmare, Chris is seen being escorted away by the police, having seemingly gone mad from the previous events.

Friday The 13th Part 4: The Final Chapter Jason faced his most notorious foe Tommy Jarvis. Tommy was just a young child, but he was the only character (aside from Jason) to appear in more than two Friday the 13th films. The day after Jason was defeated by the hands of previous survivor Chris, he woke up in the local hospital where he proceeded to kill a nurse with a scalpel, and Doctor Axel with a bonesaw. Jason then made his way back to the camp only find that strangers have yet again invaded his home. Once more, this spurs another murder spree.

However in a strange twist of fate amongst the carnage Tommy realized that Jason wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t very clever. So Tommy proceeded to shave his head in order to make himself resemble the child form of Mr. Voorhees. Jason was caught by surprise, and Tommy used the situation to his advantage, by hacking Jason into several pieces. Jason was hit in the head, and fell face first onto the ground with his quivering head sliding viscerally down the macheteâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s blade.

Friday The 13th Part 5: A New Beginning Jason only appeared in flashbacks to previous films. And hallucinations of Tommy Jarvis who had become heavily traumatized from his previous experience with Jason. Roy Burns, a paramedic whose son had been killed at Camp Crystal Lake, dons the Jason attire. He then continues Jasonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s legacy of mutilation and murder. Tommy Jarvis re-appeared as a troubled teenager.

Friday The 13th Part 6: Jason Lives Tommy Jarvis returned. With a buddy, Tommy decided to make sure that Jason could never come back. So they found Jason’s grave, and opened his casket with the intention to burn his corpse. However, at the sight of seeing Jason, Tommy lost control and began driving a metal fence post into Jason’s corpse. Sudden lightning struck the metal post, and the electricity re-animated Jason. Jason immediately killed Tommy’s friend, and Tommy ran off in fear. Jason retrieved his mask from the

open grave and returned to Camp Crystal Lake (which had been re-named Camp Forest Green in an attempt to cleanse the Camp of the negative press it had received over the years). While Jason was slaying the Camp counselors, Tommy was locked up in the county jail for acting like a lunatic. After some help from the Sheriff’s daughter, Tommy was freed. In his last battle with Jason, he anchored a large stone to Voorhees’ neck, drowning him for the second time.

Friday The 13th Part 7: The New Blood Jason was pitted against his most formidable foe so far, Tina. A young woman with psychic powers, Tina accidentally drowned her own father in Crystal Lake when she was a child. Tinaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s therapist thought it would be beneficial for her to return to Crystal Lake (where she had first discovered her powers) to help put things to rest. However, it was a deceitful lie by her t herapist who wanted to strengthen and study Tinaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s unique abilities. One night when she was particularly frustrated, Tina went out to the docks to vent. Accidentally, her venting caused the resurrection

of Jason. Yet again, Jason proceeded to kill counselors, Tinaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s mother, her therapist, and anyone he could find. Eventually only Tina and her boyfriend remained. There was a final epic battle between Jason and Tina, in which she electrocuted him, strangled him, filled his face with nails, sets him on fire, and eventually resurrects her own father who drowned Jason for the third time. Friday The 13th Part 8: Jason Takes Manhattan Jason had resurrected once again from his watery tomb, when a boat anchor sliced open a power cable running across the bottom of the lake. The surge of electricity

revived him once more. Jason found his way on board a cruise ship, on which he murdered several college students in unique ways; guitar chopping, hot sauna rocks punched though the torso, and neck snapping. The remaining students and teachers realized what was happening, and abandoned the ship. They took a small raft and landed in New Yorkâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s harbor. However Jason followed them to the City, and killed most of them until he was ultimately submerged and drowned in toxic waste.

Jason Goes To Hell Jason mysteriously returned to Crystal Lake, and was promptly set up by the military who blew him into pieces. However, his heart was intact and when it was examined during his autopsy, the heart began to beat, emitting a kind of evil spell which drove the coroner to devour it. This allowed Jason’s soul to inhabit the Doctor’s body, and it was revealed that he could be reborn if he found someone

bearing Voorhees blood. Eventually he found Diana Kimble and her adult daughter Jessica, who both bear the bloodline. Jason’s hunt continued as his soul traveled from body to body, in search of Diana and Jessica. He eventually inhabited Diana’s body and was reborn through her, but Creighton Duke, an unfortunate bounty hunter, told of the only way to put an end to Jason: he can

only be killed by a magic dagger (from the Evil Dead series) wielded by the hand of a Voorhees. After Duke was killed by Jason, the protagonists beat him with the fatal blow of the dagger. This sent Jason to Hell, while Freddy Krueger dragged his hockey mask into Hell. This movie reveals some clues about the secrets of the resurrection and the supernatural origins of the Jason’s demonic powers,

as when is evidenced in the Voorhees’s house, the ancient book of evil magic ritual to contact powerful demonic entities: The Necronomicon Ex-Mortis, which suggests that Pamela Voorhees (Jason’s mother) has used it at some time to resuscitate Jason.

Jason X Chronologically this is the end of the Jason series, but it is not the last film. Jason took his bloody adventures into space. After having been captured by the government, he ultimately broke free of his confines. Slaughtering almost everyone in the facility, a lone survivor managed to freeze Jason and herself in cryo-freeze. Having been discovered in the future on an uninhabitable Earth, they were brought on board a ship by students on a field trip from the new human colony, Earth-2. There, having been resurrected, he began his killing spree once again, leaving only a few

survivors and the unfortunate woman frozen along side him previously to try and stop his reign of terror. After having been blown apart by an android, he was resurrected by the shipâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nanobot repair technology, becoming what was known as Uber-Jason, even more powerful than he once was. Eventually Jason was shot out of an airlock, falling through the atmosphere of Earth-2. As a couple on an Earth-2 lakeside go to investigate what they see as an apparent meteor, we get a final glimpse of Jasonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s new mask, floating by itself in the depths of the lake.

Freddy Vs Jason Jason was pitted against fellow horror icon Freddy Krueger. Having been resurrected from Hell by Freddy, Jason was tricked into going to Elm St, where he killed high school students to renew their fear of Freddy, which would allow Freddy to also return from Hell. Having been pulled out of the dream world by one of the survivors, Freddy battled Jason at Camp Crystal Lake. Freddy, slowly dying, was ultimately impaled by his own severed glove-bearing arm, used against him by the also dying Jason and decapitated by the heroine of the story. In an ambiguous ending, Jason rises from

the depths of Camp Crystal Lake the next morning, holding Kruegerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s decapitated head, which winks at the camera, cutting to black. Friday The 13th (2009) The Story of Jasonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s first four films was revamped for a newer generation.

Michael Myers By Simon Abrams

Unmasked The first man to play masked killer Michael Myers—the real star of the Halloween franchise—was Nick Castle, who went to college and played in a band with Halloween director and co-writer John Carpenter. Castle had no formal training as an actor, but neither did many of his successors—a little less than a dozen actors over the past 40 years. Their backgrounds range from stunt coordinator (Dick Warlock, of Halloween II) to professional wrestler (6-foot8-inch Tyler Mane, Adult Michael in the 2007 and 2009 Halloween remakes) to Stella Adler Studio-trained

actor (James Jude Courtney, of this year’s Halloween sequel). But all managed to successfully disappear into the part, a role that has transformed over the decades (and 11 films) from the embodiment of “pure evil” (as Donald Pleasence’s paranoid Dr. Loomis put it in the original film) to a recognizably human stain on real, flesh-and-blood survivors like Loomis and Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), Michael’s sister—the P.T.S.D.-stricken star of David Gordon Green’s 2018 Halloween, which comes to theaters October 19.

Michael Myers is, admittedly, a bit of a cipher; in an interview, 2007 Halloween-remake director Rob Zombie aptly described the part as “a lead character whose face you never see, and who never says anything.” But each man who’s played him has brought something unique to the role. Here, seven actors who have played Michael open up about scaring children, walking like wood through water, and setting themselves on fire—all in the name of Halloween.

The role of Michael Myers can be subtly challenging; because the character wears a mask and doesn’t speak, he must be understood through body language. Since the beginning of the Halloween franchise, that has led casting directors, producers, and stunt coordinators to emphasize stunt-readiness over other traditional on-camera experience—and the ability to move with a menacing, catlike grace.

ROB ZOMBIE, DIRECTOR, HALLOWEEN (2007): The funny thing about that mask: it’s so blank that everybody projects on to it what they want to see, and how he should behave. Sometimes, I’d get pushback along the lines of, “Michael Myers can’t do that?” According to who? The Michael Myers Handbook? I never got a copy of that. NICK CASTLE, MICHAEL MYERS, HALLOWEEN (1978): I was paid $25 per day for Halloween. That was a lot at the time! You have to remember: my interest in doing the film was being on set, so I could demystify the experience of filmmaking and directing. I expected to

hang around the set for no money. But hey, $25 per day, and all I had to do was wear a rubber mask. It’s a mystery what John [Carpenter, who directed the first Halloween] saw in me and the way I moved. I asked John, “What is this character going to do?” And he said, “Just walk across the street.” I knew Michael’s movements weren’t going to be robotic. He was a real guy. He’s not rushing. DICK WARLOCK, MICHAEL MYERS, HALLOWEEN II (1981): [Halloween II director Rick Rosenthal] never gave me any instruction on how to play [Michael]— nothing at all about the walk.

Debra Hill was there every day, and Debra never said, “Can you make the walk a little faster, Dick?” or “Can you make your movements a little swifter?” Years later, in an interview, she said, “Dick Warlock never got the walk down.” Well, give me a break. I’m a stunt guy; I’m not an actor. If I wasn’t doing it right, you should have told me. DON SHANKS, MICHAEL MYERS, HALLOWEEN 5 (1989): I went in to meet with [director Dominique Othenin-Girard]. His one direction was, “I want you to get up and walk like wood through water.” I did, and he said, “Perfect, you got it.” I interpreted that direction as: you’re rigid,

but you’re still adapting to the water. You’re moving smoothly through the water; you’re not getting pushed through it. CHRIS DURAND, MICHAEL MYERS, HALLOWEEN H20: 20 YEARS LATER (1998): Think about how a tiger will lock eyes on its prey with a singular focus.  As I was stalking my victims, I tilted my head down slightly, locked onto them, and did a deep, guttural growl. To his credit, the sound guy picked up on my growling and subtly layered it into the final edit. I don’t believe that any of my castmates ever picked up on that, but it lent a certain primal energy to each take.

JAMES JUDE COURTNEY, MICHAEL MYERS, HALLOWEEN (2018): Years ago, I met a real hit man through a mutual acquaintance—he wanted his life story written, so he was living with me. He had just left a safe house and served in a penitentiary up in the Northwest. I absorbed his life just by hanging out with him every day. I took him to see a film I was in called The Hit List. We walked out of the screening, and he said to me, “Jimmy, it’s a really nice movie, but that’s not how you kill people.” “Really?” “I’m gonna show you how.” There’s a stealth efficiency to the way an actual trained killer works. Movies tend to dilute that quality with dramatic pauses and dialogue, which a true predator would never waste time doing. That efficiency is what I took to the part of Michael Myers.

Michael has been terrifying children for decades, both on-screen and off—and appearing with the character can be especially frightening for a young actor. Still, many of Michael’s teenage and pre-teen targets have taken to working with him like old pros. SHANKS: [then-11-year-old co-star Danielle Harris] did all her own stunts. I was literally stabbing in the dark, because I can’t see her. They blind Michael at the end of Halloween II, so they put nylon netting over the eyes, which makes it a little difficult doing the stuntwork. But Danielle trusted me. There’s a scene where I’m chasing her in a car, and I get pretty close to her. But she knows I’m not going to hit her. That gives you a little more freedom to do what you want—to be creative,

but not to have that fear of “Is this guy going to hit me?” DURAND: We shot the exterior of the rest-stop sequence on the first day of shooting. The setup: a mom and her young daughter pull into a rest stop, desperately needing to use the bathroom. They rush up to the ladies’ room, but the door is locked. So they go into the men’s room instead. I was supposed to crack the men’s-room door open and peek over the doorframe. But they neglected to tell the little girl that I was in there, and that she wasn’t supposed to pull the door open. [Seven-year-old actress Emmalee Thompson] marched right up to the door, swung it open, and came face-toface with Michael. I watched the blood drain from her face.  Boom, that fast—we

were down for an hour as I ripped the mask off and helped to get her calmed down again. After about an hour, she decided that I wasn’t such a bad guy after all. ZOMBIE: There’s a scene, in the first remake, where Michael bursts through the door. Everybody knew what was going to happen, because the scene was in the script. But Tyler’s big, and I don’t know if she [actress Jenny Gregg Stewart] had seen his mask yet. When he came smashing through the door, her scream was completely genuine. She told me it was; she was freaked out.

TYLER MANE, ADULT MICHAEL, HALLOWEEN (2007) AND HALLOWEEN II (2009): You mean Jenny Gregg Stewart from the first movie? I don’t remember that! We always rehearse the scenes several times before shooting, and I only put the mask on at the very last minute. So that surprises me, but maybe. In the moment, it’s good that she was scared, I guess!

Stuntwork is key to Michael’s enduring appeal; in most Halloween films, the masked villain appears to be just about indestructible. Stunt coordinators like Warlock and Donna Keegan (from Halloween H20) work to ensure their Michaels have what they need to safely hit their marks—but human actors aren’t always as durable as the character they’re playin.

DAEG FAERCH, YOUNG MICHAEL, HALLOWEEN (2007): There’s that one shot right before I kill [William Forsythe], and the camera is outside the house looking in. The killing scenes weren’t scary for me, but they left me alone in that house for that take, and I was afraid of the dark. I was young, and I was by myself.

CASTLE: The most difficult scene is easy for me to remember. It was a scene shot in the middle of the night, where Michael jumps on top of a car as he’s escaping the mental hospital. It wasn’t freezing, but it was in the mid-40s. I was in a hospital gown and underpants. I don’t think John let me know what he had in store for me.

He turns to the crew and says something like, “O.K., start the water cannons.” The hospital’s sprinkler system was more like a fire hose. The water arced into the air, and when it came down on me, it felt like icicles hitting me on the back. He yells “action.” It was the most painful thing I’d ever experienced outside of a broken arm. That was the one scene that I really remember thinking, “Maybe I should have got more than $25.”

SHANKS: The most physically demanding scene was when Michael gets blown out of the mine shaft, and I fall into the river, at the beginning of the film. That river was full of melted snow, so it was maybe 30 degrees. The mask was stuck to my face, and I couldn’t get the water out. I also had to grab a safety net on the other side of the river and pull myself out. If I missed the net and went around the river’s bend, I’d hit a water processing plant. Then I’d get killed.

WARLOCK: For the scene where I was set on fire: they quickly flashed on a wall of propane flames, and when I walked through the fire, the flames ignited my suit. Then I walked as slowly as I could. I had six stunt guys standing by with fire extinguishers, just waiting for me. If you watch closely, you’ll see there’s a little jiggle in my arms, and then I fall down. That’s because I burned my arm. I trusted the guys I got that stunt’s

suit from, so I didn’t see that it had zippers on the arm. The flames went right through the suit. They were superficial burns, really; the doc applied a salve to them. We did the stunt two times; for whatever reason, the first take didn’t work out. It got hot quicker than I thought it would. If it wasn’t for that zipper, I could have gone another 10, 15 seconds. It was intense.

Michael Myers has passed into popular legend—but the men who played him, of course, also have very personal associations with the character. For these actors, Michael brings to mind thousands of enthusiastic horror-conventions fans, as well as co-stars like Pleasence and Curtis—all of whom helped to make Michael an iconic horror monster. Mane: [Michael] hits a very primitive nerve. He’s human, but he’s not. There’s something very off there when you can’t see the face or read what he’s thinking. He’s like a shark in that you can’t reason with him, you can’t out-run him, and he’s completely unstoppable. Plus, add that white mask with eyes that are skull-like holes, and everything about him screams “death.”

Castle: There was a period of time where I’d think, “Oh my god, this is going to go on my tombstone. It won’t say anything about me directing The Last Starfighter. It won’t say anything about anything else. All it’ll say is that I was known as the guy who wore a mask in Halloween.” But then I loosened up. It’s not every day that you can look across your desk and see a plastic figurine of yourself. It’s a lot of fun. Faerch: I’ve been rapping for seven years now, but my fans kept telling me that they knew me from Halloween, so I figured I should connect the two things together. Doing the music video for “Halloween on Friday the 13th” was really fun. I got to relive—or re-kill—some of my favorite moments.

Normally, fans all understand that it’s just a movie. There are times though when I have to impress upon them that that’s not me. I’m Daeg. I rap and hang out with my friends. I’m not Michael Myers. Courtney: Fraternities are cool, whether it’s combat veterans or football players or journalists. That’s something that only these guys and I get to know. No one else will get to experience that. Part of the honor of this experience is being able to join a club with these distinguished gentlemen who happen to kill people for a living.

Shanks: One time, I had just wrapped for the night. And [co-star and series regular Donald Pleasence] raps on my trailer door and says, ”Might I ask a favor? I have this scene where I know that you’re out there, and it would help me if I knew that you really were physically out there—even though I don’t see you.” I thought that was the least I could do.

Freddy Kreuger By Comic Vine

Origin Amanda Krueger was a nurse at the local state hospital. When counting the inmates before the lock down for the Christmas holiday, Amanda was accidentally locked in a room of 100 inmates. When everyone found her, she was beaten and raped and with child. She gave birth to Fred Krueger. As a child, Freddy was tormented by other children driving him further insane. The other school kids often referred to him as the “Son of a Hundred Maniacs”. Freddy was an easy target

for bullies and was often alone on the playground. He took pleasure in torturing small animals like mice and hamsters. Life at home wasn’t the easiest, especially with his often drunk and abusive father. Freddy eventually snapped and stopped feeling pain. He was 18 when he murdered his father. He eventually got married to Loretta, and had a child of their own, during which he killed many teenagers under the alias of the Springwood Slasher. When his wife finds out about his

secret, he kills her in front of their young daughter, Kathryn. Freddy tells the young girl “that mommy needed to take her medicine” and makes his daughter promise to keep his statement secret, but she doesn’t listen. During the trial, Fred’s lawyer’s found an error in the search warrants. The judge was forced to release Krueger on the spot. When the judge lets him walk, the friends and family of the murdered teenagers take matters into their own hands. They burned him alive in his boiler/lair. While his whole place was burning

down around him 3 dream demons offered him the chance of another life in the fear and dream of teenagers for eternity, then the real fun began! And every time Freddy is about to appear, three girls and a boy show up jumping rope (probably his first few victims) and singing “One, two, Freddy’s coming for you. Three, four, better lock your door. Five, six, grab your crucifix. Seven, eight, gonna stay up late. Nine, ten, ever sleep again.”

Major Story Arcs The First Nightmare Years after Freddy’s physical death, and after his daughter is taken away and all records of her true identity are done away with, a new family moves into Freddy’s old house... 1428 Elm Street. It was always in this house where Freddy committed most of his murders. Through the use of Nancy Thompson Freddy kills teens through their dreams and most of all their fears. He used their souls to strengthen his powers and their fear of him to live on through their dreams. For ten years he continued his slaughter

of teens, each time seemingly defeated by teens with unusual dream powers. He survived until he found his daughter. Katheryn managed to pull Freddy out of her dream. With the help of a few friends she managed to “finally kill Freddy”. Freddy vs. Jason Eventually, the parents of Spring Wood, Ohio found a way to “erase” Freddy from existence. All the kids that had been in contact with him were sent to Western Hills, and given a dream suppressant, Hypnocil. They blacked out all obituaries

concerning the Spring Wood Slasher. During this time, Freddy brought back Jason Voorhees, Crystal Lake Killer, to help make the children of Elm Street remember him. His plan works too well, and Freddy can’t stop Jason from killing “his children”.

Powers and Abilities While his “avatar” was dreaming, Freddy could control their dreams to his whim, manipulating them to his liking. Any physical harm done on a person in their dream would become a reality and carry on into their real lives. For example, if he cut a person’s stomach, when that person woke up he/she would have cuts on their stomach. With this ability, it’s easy for him to commit numerous murders, hence why he has harmed and killed multiple people. Freddy constantly plays with his victims appearance and his surroundings, most often

resembling their real world home. His powers increased at the rate of kids believing he existed. At his prime, he could cause critical damage in the real world. Among this variety of options included possession of humans (as shown in the second Nightmare film and Freddy vs. Jason) or his corpse (as shown in the third). If Freddy is in close contact with someone he’s affecting, (i.e, choking someone in their sleep etc.), Freddy comes into the real world along with his victim where he has superhuman strength and durability. This was used for a long fight in

scenes of “Freddy’s Dead” and “Freddy vs. Jason”. In his victim’s dreams, Freddy could use their fears and personalities against them, which became a trademark in his movies. A few of his victims somehow managed to use their imagination to manipulate their dreams to battle him (imagine you going to sleep and becoming aware that you’re dreaming. This is what they did) but this did little to Freddy, who was already in control of their dreams to start with. These people were known as Dream Warriors. Another

of Freddy’s powers included absorbing the souls of his victim which increased his already high power. A mark of this is their faces on his chest.

Video Games Mortal Kombat 2011 Freddy is the second guest character to appear in MK 2011 behind Kratos. He is based on his look in the remake of “ The Nightmare on Elm Street”. To combat the ninjas, gods, demons, and other fighters Freddy has been equipped with two sets of his famous gloves and fights with a variety of swipes, stabs, and his dream realm powers. Game Bio: “A malevolent spirit of the Dream Realm, Freddy Krueger preys on the souls of the living as they sleep. When Shao Kahn began to steal Earthrealm’s souls - souls Freddy considered his own - Freddy battled the emperor in the Dream Realm. But Shao Kahn’s will was too strong. He pulled Freddy into the real world, where he was

mortal, and defeated him. A badly injured yet determined Freddy fitted both his hands with demonically enhanced razor gloves. Once he has killed Shao Kahn he will find a way back to the Dream Realm, where he will torment Earthrealm’s souls for eternity.”

Signature Moves Hell Spike:

Power Glove Toss:

Freddy Krueger stabs his claws into the ground which causes massive spikes to rise from underneath his opponent.

The upgrade to glove toss where Freddy Krueger tosses both of his clawed gloves for double the damage.

Sweet Dreams:

Freddy Fingers:

Freddy Krueger causes a green orb to fall on his opponent causing them to fall asleep allowing for a free shot.

Freddy Kruger lets one of his gloves walk across the ground toi damage his opponents feet.

Glove Toss: Freddy Krueger launches one of his clawed gloves at

his opponent.

Dream Shift: Freddy Krueger uses his dream powers to teleport around the field. This can be done to get in close or

damaging their skull. escape his opponent. X-Ray Move - What a Rush: Freddy Krueger uppercuts his opponent then impales his opponents chest, breaking their ribs and puncturing their lungs. He then slashes the opponent in the face,

Fatalities Tellâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;em Freddy Sent Ya: Freddy Krueger disappears then reappears behind them and impales then on his gloves, he then drags them through a portal and causes a bunch of blood to gush from the hole. This is based on how he kills Glen Lantz in the orignal Nightmare on Elm Street. Welcome to my Nightmare: Freddy Krueger summons his boiler from the ground. He then impales his opponent in the neck and stomach and throws them in. After waving goodbye he slams the door closed, which cuts off the opponents arm since they are trying to get out. This is based on how he kills Kristen Parker in A Nightmare on Elm Street 4.

Designed by Kaitlyn Forsyth Fall 2018 Bodoni & Avenir 8/9.6 All content found in these pages is the original property of its creators and owners. Articles, interviews, photographs, and other text were collected and organized for the compilation of this book, which was created as a student design project. Some text have been condensed, reformatted, and edited to increase readability. Photographs have been edited to optimize their printed appearance.