Categories: JoBlo Originals

HORROR TEN SPOT: Top 10 Promising Horror That Failed

I was psyched to check out THE LAST AIRBENDER recently, hoping it would be a return to form for Shyamalan. Sadly it’s not only the worst film he’s made, it also tarnishes an amazing show through the magnitude of its suckiness.
Which got me to thinking about other films that I’ve been excited for, and left sorely disappointed. Sometimes it’s a sequel that falls flat, or a cool concept that couldn’t sustain a feature run time. Hell, occasionally you just have a flick that falls apart for no clear reason.
So this week is all about those films that brought us in with the promise of a great lay, but ended up treating us like vagina dentata munching on a jimmy. Spit bullets on the films that took advantage of your faith in good horror, and let’s all work together to expose those bastards to the cruel light of day.

1. EXORCIST II: THE HERETIC

Want to know how to derail a sequel? Well this piece of shite is like a paint by numbers explanation of how to do it. Stupidly tweak the mythology of the first film, make no sense, direct everyone to forget how to act, write groan inducing line after groan inducing line, and finally switch genres. Yep, I think that’ll about do it. Blair’s braless boobies look nice, though.

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2. DIARY OF THE DEAD

I was psyched for this new approach to zombie telling from the master because LAND OF THE DEAD was such a strong return to form. Sadly, this heavy handed, preachy misstep suffered from just about every affliction of the low budget filmmaking it was trying to ape. Bad acting, ridiculous effects, poor quality in general, and the constant annoyance that these people were too damn stupid to put the camera down. Sure there would have been no film, but in this case, that would have been a good thing.

3. VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED

It was around this time that I realized John Carpenter sort of follows a good film/bad film pattern. And dear God this is a bad film. In fact it’s only outpaced in suck by his ESCAPE FROM L.A. which would have been on this list except that the only horror about it is that it exists. Which is OK, because VOTD feels like a skit on SNL more than a legitimate attempt at horror. The cast doesn’t help any either, with a still walking Chris Reeve and the pre-fat Kirstie Alley hitting all the wrong notes. The whole thing pretty much has paycheck stamped all over it.

4. THE VILLAGE

Anybody remember when M. Night Shyamalan was a good director and storyteller? Each new film he released was worthy of note because he’d served up three excellent, at times imperfect, but excellent films in a row. And here was an Oscar cast filled monster story that looked amazing and promised to be his best since THE SIXTH SENSE. So what happened? Bad writing, bad story, silly shenanigans all over the place. It’s like Night made a deal with the devil that only covered three films. And sadly, with the possible exception of LADY IN THE WATER, he’s done nothing but get worse and worse since.

5. MIRRORS

After HIGH TENSION and a very decent remake of THE HILLS HAVE EYES it was hard not to get excited about a new movie from horror auteur Alexandre Aja. Especially since he brought along none other than Jack Bauer as his leading man. Alas, all that positive mojo didn’t manage to sear our collective brain pans like most of us hoped. It honestly did just about everything that I hoped, but ultimately the story fell flat. It was OK, but given that I went in expecting great, that was a shallow pay day.

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6. WHAT LIES BENEATH

It’s rare that horror gets a decent cast, much less A-listers like Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer for the leads. Throw in a director like Robert Zemekis before he decided that animated films should be the creepiest of all, and you’ve got a surprising, but very promising project. Sure the trailers seemed to give everything away, but surely they were holding something back. Unfortunately not. There is a “twist” at the end, but basically you go in knowing what’s going to happen, and nothing in the film is strong enough to overcome that weakness.

7. THE RING TWO

While I’m not as big a fan of the original as many, there’s no denying that THE RING is widely considered one of the most successful horror remakes yet. So there was no reason to feel, with a strong returning cast and Samara creepiness all around that the second wouldn’t be an able companion to the first. Instead we got a nearly unwatchable clusterf*ck.

8. Rob Zombie’s HALLOWEEN II

A common theme on this list will be sequels that promise to expand on the original, but do so in a way that just makes us shake our heads in despair. Zombie’s take on HALLOWEEN was largely unnecessary, but had its moments, gave us ample teen boobage to gawk at, and delivered an origin story that was almost too interesting since the rest of the movie paled in comparison. So when Zombie said that H2 was truly the HALLOWEEN movie he wanted to make, how do you not get excited? Alas the HALLOWEEN movie he wanted to make blew ropey goat chunks.

9. ALIEN VS.PREDATOR – REQUIEM

AvP was alright. Entertaining enough, and while it lacked substance and gore, it did a mediocre job of scratching an itch that had been present for a while. So it was with quite a bit of anticipation that I caught the sequel, thrilled both with the cast, the fact that it was gonna be a civilization bound battle, and let’s not forget the PredAlien. Should be incredible right? Instead we get served a castrated WB inspired entry into the slowly disintegrating franchise. They f*cked this one up bad, and we all paid the price.

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10. BOOGEYMAN

I distinctly remember this film because with Raimi behind Ghost House pictures I was willing to believe PG-13 horror might work. And on top of that, the marketing campaign was brilliant. Made the whole thing look pretty awesome, including some mind-blowing concept art that got me a little wet despite my lack of a va-jay-jay. Alas, it was not to be, although the disgusting parade of useless teen horror pop that came after took copious notes from this on how to sell themselves. Just like the whores that they are

Tags: Hollywood

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Matt Withers