Marion Crane, in Psycho (1960)

Hitchcock’s masterpiece has been thoroughly analyzed, reviewed, and critiqued for half a century now, but it’s still as subversive as ever. This is due in part to Hitchcock having the film’s leading lady and most recognizable star murdered halfway into the story, and after he’s made sure that we feel the appropriate amount of concern and sympathy for her plight. She’s a woman on the run, and she’s done some morally questionable things, but we want her to make it to California, put the past behind her, and start a new life. Of course, all of that becomes irrelevant after she meets Norman Bates, and her death signals a major shift, as the story now belongs to this creepy mama’s boy.

Corporal Cynthia Dietrich, in Aliens (1986)

Dietrich doesn’t command a lot of attention amongst her more demonstrative marines. Hudson is the team’s loud-mouth clown, Vasquez is their sharp-tongued badass, and Dietrich is the quiet but confident medic. After she examines Newt and declares her perfectly healthy, she ironically becomes the first victim of the aliens. The fact that the team’s medic is the very first to go is a clear sign of things to come. Soon after, they lose their commander and their pilot and are left to fend for themselves with no expectations of help or reprieve.

Jack Goodman, in An American Werewolf in London (1981)

One of the many things I love about An American Werewolf in London is the fact that it works on so many different levels. It’s a romance, a comedy, a monster movie, and a buddy film, even if one of the buddies happens to be dead and decaying at an alarming rate. Jack dies early in the story, but he is nevertheless the film’s moral conscience and its chief source of humor. His ghostly and increasingly grotesque presence reminds David not only of the tragic loss of his best friend, but of David’s own dwindling humanity.

Tina, in A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

The original Nightmare is, at its core, about vengeance . It’s about concerned parents taking the law into their own hands, the victim of vigilante justice having his revenge, and all sorts of past and present sins coming to light. Freddy is a pedophilic, murderous ghost, but he’s also, in some ways, a puritanical scourge who calls attention to Elm Street’s dirty little secrets and dark underbelly. It’s therefore not surprising that the sexually promiscuous Tina and her trouble-making, thug of a boyfriend are his first victims.

Judith Myers, in Halloween (1978)

The fact that Carpenter’s famous opening scene to this film is one continuous shot, that it’s from the point-of-view of the killer, and that the camera seems to probe and zoom with disembodied ease and penetration all speak to its lurid brilliance. And then there’s the way young Michael so inexplicably murders his sister. It’s a clear sign that the ordinary rules that govern character and plot have just been abandoned for something far more sinister and horrifying.

Unnamed Worker in Jurassic Park (1993)

It’s a sad, but well known fact that in the horror genre, the black guy rarely makes it to the end of the film. Visionary director Stephen Spielberg bucked this tradition in Jurassic Park by not letting the black guy make it out of the first four minutes of the film, as he’s almost immediately sucked into a metal crate by a velociraptor. Still, it’s an effective moment in the film because it’s a clear indication that those dinosaurs just aren’t going to make practical pets for rich, bourgeois tourists.

#5 – WES CRAVEN’S NEW NIGHTMARE

this actually isn’t that bad of an entry in the NIGHTMARE series, but boy is it odd. more meta than meta, this film turns the camera around, blurring the line between fiction and reality by taking place in world where a guy named wes craven wrote and directed the original A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET. the film follows the original cast/crew of the first film, as the world’s knowledge and fear of freddy krueger is actually bringing his fictional character into our world, and he’s targeting his creators. for the most part, the idea of a demon stalking people in their dreams remains intact, so this film elicited a rather meager “wtf?” from me at its conclusion, but those who went in without much knowledge of ELM STREET‘s imdb page and were expecting a more traditional freddy krueger film were probably far more perplexed.

#4 – THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 2

the original TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE has its moments of dark comedy, but most audiences missed them due to being in shock from the overwhelming terror they had experienced from the film’s other 82.5 minutes. it also featured a surprising restraint in the gore department, showing very little on-screen violence and almost no blood — which didn’t lessen the impact of the film in the slightest (and may have actually heightened it). its sequel, released 12 years later, confused audiences by pretty much reversing everything i just said about the original. while the basic idea of a family killing and eating people remains intact, very little of the horror does. TEXAS CHAINSAW 2 is, in many ways, more of an action/adventure film than horror, with copious amounts of dark humor and political allegory thrown in for good measure. it also features some of the most over-the-top gore ever recorded on film, thanks to the work of tom savini. like most, i now love TEXAS CHAINSAW 2 as much as the original, but it took many years for that appreciation to grow because of the huge divide in tone and intent of the two films.

#3 – JASON GOES TO HELL

regardless of what you call it (JASON GOES TO HELL, FRIDAY THE 13th PART 9, THE FINAL FRIDAY, etc.), this film kinda sucks. it has its moments (e.g., creighton duke describing what he thinks of when he hears the name “jason voorhees” and the tent kill), but largely this is just a big ‘ol turd. the primary reason for this is that when you go to see a FRIDAY THE 13th film, you’re expecting to see jason. particularly when the effing title of the film starts with his name. instead, what we received was a jason-as-the-bread sandwich, with 3 minutes of jason at the beginning, another 3 minutes at the end, filled in the middle with 85 minutes of a body-hopping demon slug. i understand cunningham wanted to take the series in a new direction, but he really needed to choose a different one. because there is nothing down the road in that particular direction other than tears, pain and disappointment.

#2 – FRIDAY THE 13th PART 5: A NEW BEGINNING

perhaps the impact of the ninth FRIDAY THE 13th sequel was lessened because the series had already faced an even bigger “wtf?” moment years earlier with part five. to be fair, the subtitle does tell you right there, straight up, we’re beginning something kinda new here. what it doesn’t mention is that “something kinda new” equates to “something kinda shitty.” just look at the poster. it’s just words, and the biggest word of all on it is “JASON.” a reasonable person might think that implies that jason is featured prominently in the film… well, that reasonable person isn’t really as reasonable as you thought because they would be wrong. instead of the big triumphant return of jason voorhees, the big climax is the reveal that the killer is some guy named roy. roy, an extra who appeared in the film 80 minutes ago, who you probably don’t even remember and whose motivation doesn’t really make much sense. yeah, it was stupid in 1985 and it’s stupid now and, in all likelihood, it will be stupid for an indefinite time into the future. the producers got it right with the next sequel, by informing audiences right away in the title that “jason lives.” because i doubt they would have lined up around the block for FRIDAY THE 13th PART 6: ROY RETURNS.

#1 – HALLOWEEN 3: SEASON OF THE WITCH

now we’re to the big kahuna, the largest “wtf?” slasher film of them all. this one really bucks tradition because while the other four can at least be categorized roughly as “slasher films,” HALLOWEEN 3 cannot. it has something to do with robots and stonehenge and tom atkins screaming a lot (which is always fun to watch), but it has absolutely nothing to do with a guy in a white mask stabbing people. which, as i recall, was a pretty big part of HALLOWEEN and HALLOWEEN 2. this film has a cult following and actually isn’t that bad — but it should have been titled STONEHENGE DEATH BOTS or something, NOT HALLOWEEN 3. likely due to its financial performance, the studio learned its lesson and eventually released HALLOWEEN 4: THE RETURN OF MICHAEL MYERS, which is roughly the same thing as titling it HALLOWEEN 4: SORRY ABOUT THAT LAST CRAP-FEST, HERE’S WHAT YOU WERE LOOKING FOR. if you couldn’t read or were so traumatized by part three that you’d forgotten his name, they also put michael’s head on the poster so there’d be no ambiguity. it filled about 120% of the frame.

Second runner-up:

First runner up:

It should be obvious that I love this quote. Loomis’ hysterical hyperbole always strikes my funny bone in ways I don’t think he intended.

Second runner-up:

First runner up:

The way he uses “it” as a personal pronoun, and the way he says this in nearly perfect lines of iambic tetrameter make it clear that Bill may be crazy, but he’s the Shakespeare of creepy phrasing.

Second runner-up:

First runner up:

The original line was supposed to be “You’re on TV now, girl,” so Englund’s improvisation is a definite improvement. Still, it’s a really goofy thing for anybody to say, especially for a killer who’s supposed to be adept at psychological terror.

halloween

atari 2600 — in 1983 wizard video games released halloween, “the game where HE comes home.” the pronoun is a bit ambiguous as neither the box nor the manual ever calls michael myers by name, but i think it’s safe to assume the white faced guy with the knife is michael. created for the atari 2600, the player controls an unnamed babysitter. points can be scored in one of two ways — either by escorting children to safe rooms within the house or by finding the knife and stabbing michael. five children or two michael stabs equals a level up, with each level featuring a faster incarnation of ‘the shape.’ play continues until the player loses all three lives, happily represented by grinning pumpkins at the top of the screen.

the game was controversial in its time due to its violent content. if the babysitter is touched by michael, she is decapitated, featuring a death animation complete with spurting red pixels. the game sold extremely poorly, likely because most stores kept it behind the counter due to the controversy. wizard eventually went bankrupt and, while liquidating their merchandise, eventually sold the game with only a hand printed label (copies of which are now collector’s items).

not a horrible game by any means, my favorite aspect is that it retains carpenter’s haunting theme whenever michael appears on screen. a video of gameplay can be seen below.

the texas chainsaw massacre

atari 2600 — while halloween put you in the role of victim, the texas chainsaw massacre (also produced by wizard video games) puts you in the role of mass murderer, leatherface. your goal is to “murder trespassers while avoiding obstacles such as fences, wheelchairs, and cow skulls.” each victim slain gives the player 1,000 points and a life is lost when the player’s chainsaw runs out of gasoline.

i love the inclusion of franklin’s wheelchair as one of the obstacles you need to avoid, but this game is far more flawed than halloween. it’s too easy to get stuck on the obstacles (which have invisible pixels you can get caught on), the character/chainsaw models are crude even by atari 2600 standards and the loud beep used to emulate the victim’s scream is a near constant annoyance.

friday the 13th

nes — one virtue that the previous games had is that they generally followed the plot of the films they’re based on — a babysitter did need to protect kids from michael myers and leatherface did chase people around in the woods with a chainsaw. 1988′s friday the 13th game, however, plays a little looser with its source material, but ends up being a rather interesting (if difficult) early chapter in the survival horror genre.

in the nes adaptation of friday the 13th, you control six different camp counselors of various skills as they attempt to survive three days protecting campers at camp crystal lake. while jason is certainly in the game, you spend most of your time fighting various birds, wolves and zombies (the latter are, as the instructions explain, former victims of jason’s who have risen from the grave to do his bidding). now, i consider myself fairly knowledgeable when it comes to the friday the 13th franchise, but i’m fairly certain that jason did not control an army of avian and canine wildlife and undead camp counselors. maybe that was in part 5, which i usually skip over.

jason can show up in the cabins, outside or in the lake (where he swims like an aquatic bat out of hell, chasing down your boat). fights with jason become increasingly harder each day you survive. while the jason we know from the film’s rarely threatened children, in this game he will readily slaughter your group of children if you don’t rescue them fast enough.

optionally, you can also face down the decapitated head of pamela voorhees, which flitters around like an angry rubber bat on an angry stretchy string, striking at you occasionally. defeating the head of jason’s mother gives you special items (like her sweater, which protects one of your counselors from damage).

i recall two things about this game from when i originally played it in the 80s. i remember the awesome opening animation of the hockey mask, which gets stabbed through one of the eye-holes with a knife and changes color. and i remember that this game was damn near impossible. i’m not sure i fully understood what the goal of the game was, as all i can really remember is walking around, lighting fires in fireplaces and getting smacked down by jason whenever he’d stroll by. i think i eventually figured it out, but my chief complaint against the game is that it never really did anything to feel like a friday the 13th film.

a far more in-depth look at the game can be seen at sydlexia.

a nightmare on elm street

nes — ljn, who released the friday the 13th game for the nes also released a nightmare on elm street on the same platform. as in that game, you begin by fighting off various forms of wildlife (snakes, bats, dogs, etc.), but things eventually get more interesting. once you enter a house, the enemies become nightmarish creatures like skulls on legs, giant freddy gloves, etc.

the game seems to be loosely based on a nightmare on elm street 4: the dream master since you collect “dream warrior” power tokens that grant your character borrowed abilities (magic attack, throwing star attack, hovering ability, etc.). you fight your way through each building on elm street, working your way to a freddy boss at the end of each level. one of the more interesting aspects of the game is that it employs a transformation from the dream world to the real world from time to time, presenting you with different challenges and enemies in each. this ‘alternate version of the same environment’ gameplay is later used in the soul reaver, silent hill and h.r. giger’s dark seed games.

chiller

arcade/nes — while not actually based on a horror movie franchise, no discussion of old-school horror games would be complete without a mention of chiller.

imagine hostel the video game, and you’ve basically got chiller. while most horror games put you in the role of the hero fighting the monster/s, chiller puts you in the role of a sadistic madman bent on human torture. you score points by knocking flesh and bone off helpless victims who are usually chained to some wall or device. for example, score extra points by shooting the flesh off a man’s legs before shooting the crank on the guillotine to behead him. gameplay is spread across four locales, the torture chamber, the rack room, the hallway and the graveyard. once you’ve scored enough points in a room according to the ‘monster meter’, your total score is calculated on the oddly named ‘ectoplasmic tabulator.’

i never played this on the nes, but i do remember running into it as a kid at a local arcade. my friends and i would laugh at the absurdity of it all, in particular the horrible graphics and the low-quality computer screeches that passed for the victim’s screams. however, there were a lot of “omg, did you just see that!?!” exclamations thrown around… a reaction the game can still provoke today given its blatant disregard for good taste.

bonus entry

terrordrome

pc — while certainly not a classic game since it’s still in development, i thought i’d throw in terrordrome as a bonus.

what would be the coolest game ever made? i’ll tell you — it’d be a fighter with classic horror icons as the combatants — like soul calibur but with freddy, jason and michael myers. the rights issues alone dictate we will probably never really see a licensed version of such a thing, but terrordrome: rise of the boogeymen is a fan-made version of what i’ve just described.

while still under development, characters will include michael myers, freddy krueger, leatherface, ash, chucky, jason, herbert west, candyman, ghostface and more. a playable demo which includes the first four characters can be found at terrordrome-thegame.com. while many pages are still under construction, the site also includes screenshots, videos and character models.

i’m incredibly impressed with the models, locations, sound effects and special attacks. i’ve only played on a keyboard which i found a bit cumbersome, but i plan to try it out again using a controller soon. i am indebted to our friends over at horrorfilmmagazine for drawing my attention to this amazing little project; to read more about terrordrome, check out their in-depth look at the game.

jason goblet
price: $2.99

why would a goblet need protective face gear? and what is that on the base… it kinda looks like it’s sitting in dog feces. with the three dollar price tag, i assume this is made of styrofoam or something as opposed to the metal you’d assume ‘goblet’ implied. which means the first time you put wine in it, all that silver paint will probably flake off and give you some sort of fatal poisoning. i have to get one of these.

pinhead hellraiser teddy bear
price: $14.95

sound in theory, this just doesn’t work in practice. that’s not pinhead as a teddy bear — that’s a teddy bear with weird black sticks hanging out of his face. technically that’d make him ‘black stick head,’ which is not nearly as scary. it’d actually be easier, cheaper and more effective to make your own pinhead bear. all you’d need to do is go here with this. i do like this one’s outfit tho.

chucky cushion
price: $14.99

the price on this item keeps getting marked down as i work on this article… i don’t understand why. who wouldn’t want to rest their head on a deformed and scarred pillow which mildly resembles chucky and has weird ears and an afro?

hanging hellraiser butterball decor
price: $13.99

if there’s one cenobite that you want to be able to hang from your car’s rearview mirror or christmas tree, it’s certainly butterball.

blair witch project kubrick box set
price: $29.50

when blair witch-mania hit, it hit hard. i admit to having a blair witch branded shot glass… and during those couple of months in 1999, i might have also bought the heather, josh and mike lego-esque kubrick figures shown here.

1979 alien cookie jar
price: $99.99

a bit out of my price range, but if i had one of these i’d definitely keep dog biscuits in it. i love the look on the alien’s face here, as if he’s trying to say “hi, look what i got. an egg!”

friday the 13th air freshener
price: $3.95

perhaps the most disturbing part of the description for this friday the 13th air freshner is that it doesn’t tell you what it smells like. ponder the possibilities before moving onto…

freddy trick arm
price: $6.99

a freddy arm! the description lists the arm as ‘full-length,’ which is lucky because anything less simply wouldn’t have served my needs. the box is not included… which is a shame. i like the idea of freddy climbing into a steamer trunk, only to have the lid close and crush his armpit… as depicted here.

cthulhu plush fanny pack
price: $18.74

well, if you must wear a fanny pack…

this would have made a great movie prop for finalgirl.blogspot.com’s latest short-film, the devil’s bum bag.

michael myers mask with hair
price: $34.99

i have seen some crappy halloween masks before, but at thirty-five dollars — this isn’t just a horrible reproduction of the original mask, it’s a rip-off too. also… worst. hair. evar.

freddy matchbox car
price: $5.99

so… piecing the story together just from what i can see here… freddy is fifty feet tall and attacking the springwood boiler maintenance van. wouldn’t that be counter-productive? who’s he gonna call when his pipes stop shooting out mood-steam or he loses one of his sheep behind a furnace?

cthulhu christmas wreath
price: $34.99

cthulhu christmas wreath. ’nuff said.

jason snowglobe
price: $43.99

this is probably the item on this list i’d be most likely to actually purchase. ‘snowglobe’ is an odd market for horror to branch out into, but the result isn’t too bad… and i just realized that the girl looks quite a bit like my fiancée. i don’t know whether that’d make her like it or hate it more if it was in our living room.

jason guitar picks
price: $3.99

i almost want to learn guitar just so i can use these. will they work with rock band or guitar hero?

freddy vs. jason battling game
price: $29.99

even if you ignore the fact that the two combatants seem to be facing away from each other, this just looks ridiculous. like a horribly boring version of hungry hungry hippos… with really fat hippos.

freddy yo-yo
price: $6.99

i never fully understood the marketting for a nightmare on elm street. while i imagine there are adults who like yo-yos, this is obviously primarily aimed at children… children who want a yo-yo branded with a burnt, psychotic child molester/murderer’s image? is that a big market? i say this knowing i would have bought it if i’d seen it when i was 13… so i guess the answer is ‘yeah.’

japanese freddy plush doll
price: $49.99

we all know the japanese are weird with their karaoke bars and host clubs and used panty vending machines… but this is going a bit far. a cross-eyed freddy krueger doll that wears a blue sweater and a pirate hat? blasphemy.

michael mask in a bottle
price: $9.00

who wouldn’t want an itty bitty michael myers mask in a jar? that can (as the description informs us) be filled with water. the description also says that this is a “gotta have” for michael myers fans. count me in.

jason spitballs
price: ???

i couldn’t actually find these for sale anywhere. that’s too bad, cuz… well… look at ‘em. friday the 13th spitballs… that possess a “scary 18 foot squirt!” i like that they actually took the care to put the proper cut mark in the hockey mask… but the look on the victim’s face cracks me up.

jason matchbox car
price: $5.99

i can’t really see what the truck says on it, but i assume it’s a camp crystal lake counselor vehicle. unlike the freddy version, the story here obviously makes sense… a fifty foot jason voorhees is attacking counselors. that, or a normal size jason is attacking 5-inch tall counselors. i’d readily watch either one.

horror candle set
price: ???

i don’t really understand how you use this. is every one of these things a separate candle? so five candles… a hockey mask, an arm, a leg, a chainsaw and an axe. jason doesn’t really use a chainsaw, so i don’t completely get that one… but this hardly looks like an officially licensed product anyway.

saw 400% be@rbrick
price: $59.99

ok, i was just getting used the whole ‘kubrick’ thing (the lego-type figures)… but now it turns out there’s a whole other subdivision of them, where the characters are bears… known as be@rbricks. i thought saw was a pretty good movie, but i’m not sure i’m prepared to spend sixty dollars for a blocky saw puppet with bear ears. and yes, even if it glows in the dark.

custom nike jason sneakers
price: ???

as a teen unfamiliar with what females actually found attractive, i absolutely would have worn these high top sneakers, had they existed in 1990. hell, on the right occasion, i might wear them now.

monster freddy doll
price: ???

ok, here’s another unlicensed piece-of-crap depiction of a sexual predator marketed to children. it’s obviously freddy krueger, but they changed the color of the sweater. although they got at least one color right, and his eyes are relatively straight, so they’re a step ahead of the japanese doll seen earlier.

camp crystal lake room rolls
price: $21.59

this is the worst officially licensed product on this list. mainly because there’s no reason for it to be licensed. i suppose you put this on your wall to give the illusion of you being at camp crystal lake… but there’s no camp crystal lake sign, no jason hiding behind a tree (unless he’s really well hidden), or even a creepy reflection of a hockey mask in the water… there’s just some trees and some water. that’d hardly make it the crown jewel of your horror memorabilia collection. the description even hints to such as it clearly states “combine with other jason products (sold separately) for the perfect scene.”

friday the 13th and texas chainsaw christmas lights
price: $34.95

i greatly desire to see a christmas tree decorated solely in these lights. perhaps a nice lament configuration or pinhead figurine up on top? after all, he’s a demon to some, angel to others

the exorcist spider walk regan action figure
price: $16.99

those who haven’t seen the exorcist: the version you’ve never seen (and really, with a name like that there’s likely to be a few) will probably wonder why you have a doll of a 12-year old girl in a night-gown doing a back-bend in your room… but screw it. that scene was freakin’ creepy and so is this figurine.

cloverfield movie monster
price: $99.99

a bit pricey at $100, but damn this toy version of clover is cool. it stands 14″ tall, comes with 10 parasites, the head of the statue of liberty and features ‘authentic sounds.’ i only hope those sounds aren’t what makes up most of the dialogue in the film, which would just be a constant loop of “rob, dude. dude. rob, hey. rob. we gotta go. rob. dude.”

alien pile statue
price: $234.99

ok, like many of items listed here — this defies any description other than “awesome!”

and they’re so cute… i imagine if these guys were your pets, they’d sit in front of the door just like this while you were at work… waiting anxiously for you to come home.

alien 400% kubrick figure
price: $67.49

i’m not sure why these lego-type versions of characters are called ‘kubricks’ (i assume it has nothing to do with stanley), but they sure are adorable. most are rather small, but this one stands almost a foot high and is based off the original giger designs for alien. this would make a terrific present for any adult sci-fi/horror fan… or a really crappy one for your five-year old nephew.

alien 18-inch classic figure
price: $49.99

ok, i’m completely getting one of these when they’re released. so few of the alien toys feature the clear dome skull (most go for the crinkly, less interesting heads used in cameron’s film). at 18-inches tall, this guy will be able to do mock-battles with my giant new blood jason voorhees, which is a big plus.

alien warrior life size replica
price: $4500.00

ok, i’m completely not getting one of these… but not for a lack of desire. the price is a bit out of my range, but holy god… when people came over to your place they’d either think you were the coolest guy in all the land… or the creepiest.

movable lament configuration
price: $419.00

one of the disappointments of owning a hellraiser puzzle box is that it’s never going to move around and make all the crazy shapes it does in the movie, nor will it open a doorway to hell. the latter is probably ok, but the former would be frickin’ awesome… well, this box comes the closest in that it will actually make the first two moves of the puzzle. hand-crafted from mahogany and etched in brass, it’s rather amazing looking as well.

puzzle box signed
price: $129.99

i’m quite fond of this box because while it may not move, it does come in the nifty display case… which would really be the only way to display it in your home. get a couple of them like dr. channard did in the film and display them next to a bloody mattress for added creepiness.

hellraiser paperweight
price: $19.99

for the budget-minded or those looking for a more modern take on the classic lament configuration, here’s a clear version. it seems to have the words ‘hellraiser’ printed on it though, which i’d prefer it didn’t.

frank figure
price: $13.99

who wouldn’t want a tiny skinnless frank in a suit, and it appears to come with frank’s trademark cigarette and switchblade as well. now if they’d only make a ‘frank strung up on hooks & chains emanating from the depths of hell’ christmas tree ornament, i’d be set.

dr. channard statue
price: $239.99

i don’t know that dr. channard was one of my favorite characters, but those tentacles coming out of his hands making flowers and razors and stuff were pretty cool. as far as mobility, he’s sorta limited by this tentacle thing attached to his head leading him around which sorta makes him hell’s yo-yo, i guess — but he’s still pretty cool.

brundle-fly statue
price: $194.99

of all the tiny statues of jeff goldblum that are out there… this is the one to have.

american werewolf 2-pack
price: $22.49

i have wanted this toy for over 20 years now… i absolutely love the design of the werewolf in an american werewolf in london, but he’s never been in toy form before. i was so disappointed when i heard years ago they’d released a figure from the film and it just ended up being one of those nazi guys from the dream sequence — what were they thinking? anyway, they finally did it right and created a werewolf/meatloaf jack two-pack, which i promptly accidentally let my fiancée know was something i couldn’t live without. inspired by pure love, i’m fairly certain that she rushed out and pre-ordered it for my birthday… over a year ago. the release date has been pushed back more times than i can remember, but i am certain that it will arrive in time for one of my birthdays in the coming years.

american werewolf life-size prop
price: $5500.00

if i won a million dollars, this would be the first thing i’d buy. not a car, house or speedboat… this. i’d sit it next to the couch and use it as an arm rest and sit my soda in its mouth… and see how many years it’d be before my dogs (and possibly my fiancée) came out from hiding under the bed.

dog soldiers figure
price: $6.93

while not as cool as the above werewolves, i quite liked the dog soldiers design as well. and at 5,493 dollars and 7 cents cheaper than the previous item… it’s quite the bargain.

trilogy of terror zuni figure
price: $88.00

while most toys are a pale imitation of what they’re based on, it’s not all that hard to make a doll version of a doll… so this is an almost perfect version of the tiny, angry dude from the 70s made-for-tv-movie. if this was sitting on my bookcase i’d have to install motion sensors in the living room to be able to sleep. just in case.

the new blood scream scene statue
price: $179.99

jason in friday the 13th part 7 has always been my favorite incarnation of the crystal lake killer. i have two figures based on him already, but i’d be happy to have another showing how he begins the film… still trapped at the bottom of crystal lake, bobbing around like a fish aquarium treasure chest.

bag head jason figure
price: $14.99

scary bag-head jason is scary. i really need to pick one of these up sometime so that i have a itty bitty version of the creepiest version of jason voorhees.

jason plush
price: $27.99

plush jason is just way too cool for school. i actually couldn’t resist and ordered one of these while working on this article…. he’s just so cute!

jason animated maquette
price: $80.99

friday the 13th: the animated series is just too fabulous of an idea to ever actually exist in our reality. this statue is likely as close as we’ll come to seeing it.

silver shampain final chapter mask
price: $110.00

these masks seem to be the best compromise between quality and price that i’ve found. this site offers versions of jason’s mask from every film… i’m seriously considering getting a final chapter or new blood one from this site or the next one.

ruste dowg new blood mask
price: $170.00-$200.00

this site also offers masks from every film and more variations as well. these seem to be higher quality than those on the previous site, and the price reflects that. another option is ordering a mask from frightstuff.com and painting it yourself… or hiring one of the artists in their forums to paint it for you, which is where i found ruste dowg’s site.

ultra cthulhu statue
price: $224.99

who wouldn’t want a statue of one of ‘the great old ones’ on their mantle? standing 14″ tall, this is probably significantly smaller than the actual cthulhu, but looks fantastic regardless.

freddy krueger glove replica
price: $134.99

i’ve never loved freddy quite as much as jason or michael, but i have to admit that the glove is rather stylin’. far more realistic and menacing than the golf glove/plastic knife/duct tape combo i created in middle-school, this thing would look great in the living room or stuffed in your basement furnace.

texas chainsaw massacre: the beginning set
price: $24.74

you would not want this out when the in-laws stopped by. few of these toys are truly grotesque, but this one breaks that trend by being just as disturbing as the scene it was based on. i’m not sure i’d actually want to own this, but i have to admit it makes an impression and is making me want to go back and revisit the film.

day of the dead dr. tongue figure
price: $16.18

apart from the american werewolf, this is the toy i always dreamed of… but never thought would actually get made. dr. tongue is my favorite zombie of all time, but he’s only on-screen in day of the dead for five or six seconds. based on some of savini’s most imaginative work, this is the next action figure i’ll end up ordering… just as soon as it’s released later this year (or, if it follows the release schedule of the american werewolf figure, sometime around 2014).

1. in the opening credits, when freddy is building his iconic (although rather impractical) fashion accessory, it clearly shows a pair of thick-rimmed glasses. did freddy wear glasses or are these from one of his victims? given all his victims were children, they seem a bit large to be the latter. if the former, i’d think he’d have better taste…

2. throughout the entire movie, heather langenkamp has a distracting pimple on her forehead. it changes size from scene to scene throughout the film, but my favorite bit was where they covered it up at the sleep disorder clinic with an electrode. facial blemishes are par for the course in your teen years so i don’t mean to make fun, but once you notice it’s there… you’ll find yourself keeping track of it in each scene, whether you intend to or not.

3. in this scene, nancy falls asleep at school and her classmate’s reading of hamlet takes on a creepy feel as he begins whispering the words. this was very effective years ago, but now all i can see is how horribly “1980s” that hair and shirt is. if you wore that today i think you might actually cause a rip in the space/time continuum, turning back time 20 years in, at least, the immediate vicinity.

4. at one point nancy goes to sleep, leaving her boyfriend to watch over her. while in the “dream world” she yells “hey, boyfriend guy — are you still watching?”… and he steps out from behind a tree and says “yeah, so?” this is all fine and good… but in ‘reality,’ what actually happened here? nancy is laying in her bed and johnny depp is sitting in a chair next to her. did sleeping nancy suddenly start yelling in her sleep, and johnny depp answered her unsurprised?

5. in this scene, nancy’s mom asks the sleep disorder specialist what dreams really are. his reply? “mysteries. incredible body hocus pocus.” i would slap any doctor that answered a medical question with the phrase ‘hocus pocus,’ but that’s not what i found interesting about this scene. this time through i noticed that the doctor has chosen a rather interesting photo to put next to the monitoring station. why would anyone want a photo of gigantic cats riding on a trolley? i don’t think furries existed in the 1980s (in san francisco or anywhere else). if only that was true now.

6. anybody have any idea who that is and why the thompsons would have a framed painting of him? looks kinda like nostradamus, but my bet is it’s some early philosopher who wrote about dreams. or a really bad painting of nancy as a baby.

7. a vulture with a tie? some sort of half naked hawaiian demon doll? a decapitated muppet? the official mr. evil moon face throw pillow? i’d have crazy dreams if this stuff was in my room too.

8. johnny depp’s dad doesn’t really seem to have a lot of fashion sense in general, but what’s with that necklace? that looks like some sort of ‘inner sanctum of xenu’ scientology symbol or a gold-plated version of a travel game you’d buy for your kids while on the way to beach.

9. this one is pretty noticable, but i’m going to point it out again. nancy calls her dad at 12:10am and says “come wake me up in 20 minutes. that will be exactly 12:30.” she sets her watch timer for 10 minutes, starting at 12:20. the issue i have is what happens between 12:10 and 12:20. according to the film, it appears that nancy rigs the entire house with booby traps comprised of very complicated parts (drilling holes in light bulbs, removing gun powder from shotgun shells)… none of which are familiar to her since she’s following directions from a book. after setting the house up as death trap, she still has time to sit by her mom’s bed and have a heart-to-heart. that’s one busy 10 minutes.

10. did you know that for years freddy krueger’s glove was hidden in a furnace next to a tapestry of dogs playing pool? well, now you do.

11. (bonus observation) i’m sure you remember the final shots of the film — we see three girls jumping rope singing the care-free freddy rhyme, we cut to a shot of the mom getting pulled through a tiny window, we cut back to the girls jumping rope. now, i’ve always thought it was funny how incredibly fake the mother’s body looked here… but this time through i noticed that while the girls jumping rope are in the exact same positions, the rope-holders actually switch places in the two seconds it takes the mom to oh-so-realistically re-enter the house. ah… an irrelevant continuity mistake. truly a pointless observation, so fully deserving of the top spot on this list.