FEATURE: QUANTITY VS QUALITY – THE ‘VERSUS’ FILM

Another week, another feature - something with a little more meat on its bones, as I take a look at the ‘versus movie’.

To me there seems to be no surer sign that a film franchise is running out of ideas (well, shy of sending it to space – here’s looking at you Leprechaun, Jason X and Hellraiser: Bloodline) than deciding to mix it with another established franchise and watch the two icons bounce off one another.

In the not too distant past, we’ve had a couple of massive examples of this in Alien vs Predator (and its sequel, AvP: Requiem) and, of course, the bonkers Freddy vs Jason. Hell, even superhero films are getting in on the act with Batman vs Superman on the way.

These are perfect examples of what the versus film brings to the table, but these are not the first time such a mash up has found its way onto screens. In fact, this particular sub-genre has been with us for decades.

A BIT OF HISTORY

Perhaps the first true golden era for Hollywood horror came at the end of the 1920s/beginning of the 1930s with Universal’s Monsters.

Genuine cinematic legends were born as Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff bought some of literatures greatest monsters to life on the silver screen.

As the likes of Dracula, Frankenstein and The Wolf Man brought the crowds to the box office, in time, the studio needed to up the stakes. And what better way to do it, than by placing these monsters on screen together?

Starting with 1943’s Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, a sequel to both the original Wolf Man and the studio’s own Ghost of Frankenstein (no ‘versus’ in the title yet, but it was still early days!) the iconic characters started to appear in a number of crossovers that soon drew in the infamous Transylvanian count (as well as hunchback and random mad scientist!) in The House of Frankenstein (1944), and then again in its 1945 sequel, The House of Dracula.

Perhaps the death knell came when Universal added comedy duo Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein in 1948 (despite the film’s massive box office success). However, loving homages to these films have appeared throughout the years with the criminally underrated Monster Squad (1987) and the more recent Van Helsing (2004).

These monster mash films are good fun, if a little campy (even for the time), but the biggest problem does seem to stem from the wasted opportunity that came with them. The characters have such little interaction (and in some cases Frankenstein’s monster and Dracula are so marginalised) that it doesn’t seem like putting them in a film together achieves much.

Aside from the sterling cinematic smackdown between the looming Monster and feral Talbot in Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man (in fact this fight would go on to have a large legacy among the films to follow it), there’s very little versus on display here too.

The same cannot be said of the first MEGA monster clash to hit the screen, 1962’s King Kong vs Godzilla.

Part of Toho Studio’s 30^th anniversary celebration, this film TOTALLY embraces the ‘who’s toughest?’ kids-on-a-playground premise of a proper ‘versus film’. In fact the ridiculous plot is almost entirely incidental – it’s basically there to contrive a reason for the great ape and Gojira to fight. And by jove they do!

The fight is epic and full of zany shenanigans like electric storms giving Kong a Street Fighter II-esque, ‘Electro Grasp’ special move and even some judo! As if that wasn’t cool enough, the music played during the epic final confrontation was not an original piece… it was first played during the clash between Frankenstein’s monster and the Wolf Man!

King Kong vs Godzilla was a MASSIVE success (it’s reportedly the most commercially successful Godzilla film ever) and lead to a whole influx of Godzilla vs… films, as Toho paired their iconic monster with a whole host of it’s other gigantic, city wrecking beasties. They’re good fun, but the studio’s own Mothra, King Ghidora, Mechagodzilla et al just don’t offer the same sense of occasion as the big G meeting up with a legit big screen legend in Kong.

Of course, the reason this seemed like such a big deal was due to the fact that these films came from separate studios and it was a genuine big deal to see them interact. A studio mining its own creations just lacks that same spark... unless the studio in question has worked hard to acquire the rights to a franchise for that purpose.

When New Line Cinema snapped up the rights to Friday the 13^th, it only took the release of Jason Goes To Hell to see the plan they had in mind -  a certain razor gloved dream demon was poised to clash with the psychopathic Jason Voorhees.

And so began the long journey to 2003’s Freddy vs Jason, the biggest, baddest and most anticipated horror versus film of all time. If you haven’t seen this film yet, do it. It perfectly gives you all the things you can expect from a versus film, warts and all.

Of course, if you can’t afford the rights to a rival franchise, you can still hope to make money by crossing your own, a clear strategy of Charles Band’s Full Moon Productions in recent years.

Perhaps most famous for its Puppet Master series (a franchise with a jaw-dropping number of ever increasing entries), the studio has seen crossovers between it’s Dollman series and the Demonic Toys series too. Often cheap, rarely making any sense, always absolutely barking, these films really show what can happen with a ‘versus’ film run amok.

Interestingly, the first of these Puppet Master vs Demonic Toys, was released in 2004, the same year as the ultimate ‘versus’ film – Alien vs Predator.

Much like Jason Goes To Hell’s Freddy glove, scifi/action fans had been waiting to see the faceoff between these two deadly extraterrestrials since an alien skull popped up in the background in Predator 2.

Having already spawned a series of comics and computer games, the journey to the screen was arduous. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the film went ahead. It made a lot of money (enough to spawn a sequel) but the general consensus is that the film is a bit disappointing. The basic story is a load of old bollocks, ignoring a vast amount of the already established mythology of both franchises to introduce a pyramid in Antarctica and, well, any old excuse to show you how impressive these monsters can be rendered using modern special effects.

Now let me clarify, they DO look incredible. The fights are visceral and the monsters really provide some great screen moments (the first Predator/Xenomorph clash is guaranteed to cause goosebumps). Plus, for those paying attention, a scene from (guess what? Yep, that again!) Frankenstein meets The Wolf Man can be seen playing on a tv screen during the film, so that adds some instant cool.

The only problem is just that the film itself is a bit naff.

Poor characters, poor story, it’s all bang, no buck, which is a crying shame for the series.

So that’s a brief (and certainly not complete rundown) of the versus film. What has this little wander down memory lane shown us?

THE STRENGTHS

The obvious pro for these films is that, well, you’re combining franchises. If one film series has 10million fans and the other has 8million fans, surely you’re looking at 18million people interested in your film? To a studio exec, it’s a no-brainer.

Cynical as that may sound, it’s clearly the biggest motivation in these films. Cinema is a business and businesses are all about making money. A versus film is pretty much a safe bet, just look at the box office returns for the films listed above.

From a less cynical, more creative standpoint, by combining franchises you are able to pick and choose from a deep, rich mythology and backstory with which to tell your own tales. As pointed out above and in my previous feature, lots of films, especially in the horror genre, take place in a shared, interconnected universe – these films are a natural expansion of that, reinforcing and rebuilding those links.

Finally, as mentioned above, there is a genuine thrill to come from seeing two previously unrelated intellectual properties appear together. How do they react to one another? Can they coexist? And if not… which truly is the toughest?

THE WEAKNESSES

Unfortunately, the ‘versus’ film is a bit of a short term fix and can actually deliver the killing blow to a franchise.

Look at it this way — if two seemingly indestructible, unstoppable killing machines come to blows, one has to be revealed to be weaker. By showing one of these boogeymen to be defeated by an onscreen rival, that particular monster loses some of its aura of terror — it is no longer unstoppable, it is weaker than one of its horror film peers. By admitting that, a horror franchise (which are often built around their terrifying lead antagonists) is hobbling itself from that point forward.

Needless to say, that can also provide a huge obstacle in getting two studios to work together for the greater good. Neither wants their pet project to be harmed.

This is equally true of the fans. If you were a fan of one particular villain and then witnessed him take a bloody good hiding from a character you have less affection for, your reaction to the film is likely to be pretty negative.

Look at it this way — how many football supporters leave a match saying it was ‘a great match’ if their team was on the losing end?

Any film seen to portray their screen faves in an unfavourable light will only alienate those fans, essentially driving them away from the film.

Now the typical way to avoid this problem is to provide a cheap, non-finish to the climactic battle.

And I do mean typical.

From Frankenstein’s monster and the Wolf Man being swept away in a flood, to King Kong and Godzilla’s fight reaching its undisclosed conclusion beneath the waves, from Freddy’s severed head winking and the hybrid chestburster tearing free of that final Predator’s chest — these films have a real habit of refusing to provide a satisfactory conclusion to the fight that is the sole purpose of the film.

This in itself is a massive weakness — the films are so often unable to offer a true answer to the question that draws crowds to the film in the first place: ‘Which of these is better?’

Yet, this is not the only weakness inherent in these films. One of the biggest problems, from a story standpoint, is that these antagonists don’t exactly make for sympathetic leads. Undead/demonic/alien killing machines don’t really sell any human element to the plot.

This often means the inclusion of some human protagonists, not least so we can keep the bodycount up and show off our big bad monsters’ handiwork to whet the appetite for the main course smackdown to come. Unfortunately, these characters rarely have any grounding in the established backstory for either franchise, making it really rather difficult for fans of either franchise to give much of a toss about them.

The closest we get is Mr Weyland (played by LANCE FUCKING HENRIKSEN*, no less) in AVP. Okay, that’s kind of a cool Aliens reference, but are you honestly telling me people wouldn’t have preferred to see Sigourney Weaver’s Ellen Ripley or big Arnie taking on the bad guys?

These disposable human characters often just clutter already crowded films, existing purely to provide exposition or, well, die to show how tough the big bads are.

Now, another problem with featuring bastard, psycho-killer monsters (a great album title there) is that nobody really roots for either side. In fact, by the end of most of their solo outings you’re willing the last survivor of their rampage to get revenge and kill them.

This is where one of my biggest gripes with these films comes from: to rectify this problem, film-makers often decide to make one of the starring monsters sympathetic.

On very rare occasions, this can work. Larry Talbot is a man under a terrible curse, so he can make for a compelling lead when he isn’t under the influence of the full moon. But when the fur is on display, well, Larry is no more Mr Nice Guy.

Most of the time, however, the stretch to paint a big bad as a ‘big good’ is too far.

In AVP a lone surviving Predator forms an alliance with our human heroine to defeat the xenomorph menace. This is because, as has already been shown in canon, the Predators have an honour-based society that recognises aptitude as hunter/warrior.

BOLLOCKS.

All proving yourself to be a good hunter does to a Predator is make you a more prestigious trophy. Did the big scaly dude decide to offer Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Dutch a respectful handshake for proving to be tough? NO, he tried to rip his head off.

The only time a Predator proved to be ok towards a potential viable victim, was at the climax of Predator 2 when Danny Glover’s Harrigan is given a prize for defeating his Predator nemesis. Fair enough, but AVP’s heroine Alexa hadn’t done that. More to the point, the predator bosses certainly didn’t decide to become best mates with Harrigan and hanging around with him.

In Freddy vs Jason, an attempt is made to make Voorhees sympathetic. Of course, Freddy Krueger is about as bad as they come, a murderous child abuser in life, who has manipulated Big Jase into killing on his behalf. Fair enough…

…EXCEPT for the fact that Jason Voorhees has an onscreen body count of over 150 victims, the vast majority of whom were teenage camp counsellors.

And he’s our good guy?????

It is ridiculous to expect a serious horror villain to draw cheers and support — the very nature of horror makes these monsters and their actions repugnant.

In fact, this common evil often leads to a recurring plot point in these films. The villainous antagonists will form an uneasy alliance to cause maximum carnage, before their own volatile natures or sinister agendas bring them into conflict. In fairness, this is the best way a plot point can work with characters who are, at heart, evil, manipulative and unreliable, yet it is fast on its way to becoming a cliché of the genre.

Think Freddy and Jason’s alliance to slaughter teens or Dracula’s dominion over the lesser creatures of the night in the Universal hayday.

Perhaps it is a necessary evil as otherwise the creatures must be kept apart for the vast majority of the film (not necessarily a problem for me) or the film becomes an hour plus of fighting (like They Live, well, nearly).

Perhaps plot clichés should be expected though. Horror has long since established its own rules and tropes, a film combining those is sure to be weighed down by them.

And clichés are not the only bane to a versus film’s plotting, perhaps the biggest is the sheer amount of contrivance needed to justify the film. From the aforementioned Antarctic pyramid in AVP, to Freddy’s convoluted plot to rebuild fear through using Jason, all the way to the barking nonsense of the plot of King Kong vs Godzilla, these films often have to stretch credulity to warrant their ultimate payoff — the titular confrontation.

SO WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

Despite the tremendous financial success of the likes of AVP and Freddy vs Jason (FvJ reported a box office of $114,843,030 on a budget of $30million!) the ‘versus’ film trend seems to have tailed off a little. After FVJ plenty of ideas were floated, including a sequel Freddy vs Jason vs Ash (adding the Evil Dead’s iconic hero played by BRUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCE CAMPBELL). The original treatment for this film can be found online, such as through the fantastic site Bloody Disgusting. The film never materialised but a bloody good comic series was produced to adapt the story.

At the same time other potential crossovers included the insane sounding Helloween, in which Hellraiser’s cenobites would come into direct conflict with Halloween’s fellow horror A-lister Michael Myers. A very very daft but certainly intriguing idea, like F v J v A, this never occurred either.

But if Pinhead vs Myers seems an odd choice for smackdown, one other proposed showdown really takes the cake.

Chucky vs Leprechaun.

Seriously.

Warwick Davis’s pintsize magical malevolent dwarf vs Child’s Play’s Good Guy gone bad — on film.

Perhaps I’ve been hit in the head one too many times, but by god, I imagine I’d fall in love with that.

Before you dismiss this as random fanwank, first heed this — in a bizarre twist, the creator of the Child’s Play, Don Mancini has himself spoken about the idea at this year’s Frightfest in the UK and even added his own dream idea of Chucky and Freddy Krueger going head to head in a kill contest on the big screen!

Don has been quoted online as saying:

It all just seems too obvious to me [Leprechaun vs Chucky]. I mean Freddy vs. Jason, I thought that was a fun movie… But for me the problem with that team up is that Jason doesn’t really have any personality and doesn’t talk. If Freddy and Chucky got together that would be a really funny double act. If you did a Child’s Play on Elm Street and did it like a horror movie version of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. So Chucky and Freddy meet and Freddy says, Chucky I’m a big fan of your work. Chucky says, Freddy I admire your technique. And they decide that Elm Street is too small for the two of them so they have to have a contest to see who can kill the most teenagers before sunrise.

Of course, none of this has happened either.

And perhaps the reason for this, is that, well, versus films just don’t measure up to their original franchises. While Freddy vs Jason and Alien vs Predator may have done well, who really prefers those films to the strongest film in either of the franchises they combine?

AVP is at least 4^th place in the Alien series and I’d argue that all three Predator films are superior.

Who would say they prefer F vs J to the original Elm Street or Friday the 13^th? Or even those series’ fan faves, like Dream Warriors or Jason Lives?

Surely there can’t be a lunatic out there who’d say King Kong vs Godzilla get ANYWHERE near the sheer brilliance of King Kong or Godzilla?

While Frankenstein meets the Wolfman is undoubtedly great fun, it pales in significance next to Universal’s initial outings for their iconic monsters. The studio’s own masterpiece, The Bride of Frankenstein makes this monster mash look positively amateurish is comparison.

Unfortunately, the smackdown between two major characters isn’t enough to warrant making a film when a cheaper, easier to produce sequel will keep things ticking along nicely.

The whole ‘who would win in a fight?’ seems to be going strong in the medium of comics, itself a supposedly more action oriented product.

And there have been some excellent horror mash ups written by the medium’s most talented writers. The likes of Hack/Slash and Army of Darkness (itself an adaptation and continuation of the Evil Dead)have taken in all kinds of additional horror icons such as Chucky, Re-Animator’s Herbert West and Hatchet’s Victor Crowley (including a current crossover between those two titles), while the treatment for Freddy vs Jason vs Ash was also translated to comic format.

This alone shows the sheer amounts of awesome you can see with comic ‘versus’ ideas:

WHAT.

With all this in mind, it can come as no real surprise that the next major versus film is between two comicbook heroes. As superhero films are big business now (following the success of Marvel’s Avengers, itself boasting a host of cool versus clashes such as Iron Man vs Thor) it can be no wonder that Batman vs Superman is going ahead.

If it performs as well as I imagine it will, perhaps it could once again herald a whole new wave of horror versus films.

Like what I hear you cry?

Well, look at next week’s blog entry to see the creatively bankrupt suggestions my pretty little head can come up with.

I bet you can’t wait. 

* Like I wasn’t going to mention him!

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Until next time, I hope you enjoyed your stay.

WE'RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER: THE LINKS

‘We’re all in this together.’

That’s the line so often used in a horror film when the shit hits the fan, the bodies start piling up and each of the characters starts to eye everybody else as if they might be the axe wielding maniac/shape-shifting mutant/undead fiend in their midst.

But I wonder if they have any idea just how many other horror characters are in this together?

You see, their are a number of very cool links between horror films that suggest these films take place in the same shared ‘universe’.

That's right, the teenagers in this universe REALLY have a lot to worry about.

So where to start? A good jumping on point would be Friday the 13th IX: Jason Goes To Hell.

While the film is pretty ropy, it’s got a couple of lovely references. One of the best is that when Steven goes poking around in the old Voorhees house, we catch sight of a certain book that should be all too familiar to horror fans: the Evil Dead’s Naturan Demonata AKA Necronomicon Ex-Mortis AKA The Book of the Dead! (This is already a direct reference to the literary works of H.P. Lovecraft, one of the greatest horror authors in history)

Quite what it's doing there isn’t exactly explained.

Fans of completely unfounded conjecture (and who ISN’T?) have suggested that maybe the cabin in the woods that housed Professor Knowby’s research into Kandarian demons isn’t too far from Camp Crystal Lake. Another rather cute theory suggests that Pamela Voorhees herself may have used the resurrection incantations within the book to bring back her son after he was drowned as a child.

These are both beautiful theories, but unfortunately neither has a shred of evidence to support them!

In fact, the Voorhees house seems to be kind of a dumping ground for horror artifacts. The rather decrepit basement is shown to house a large packing crate. On the side you can read the words ‘ARCTIC EXPEDITION JULIA CARPENTER HORLICKS UNIVERSITY’.

‘So what?’ you may ask. Well, it just so happens that this is the same box from the story ‘The Crate’ in Creepshow. A nice touch here is that in Creepshow, Professor Northrup disposed of the crate by throwing it in a nearby lake. Could that lake have been Crystal Lake?

The stories in Creepshow all take place in the same cinematic world (that within the pages of the Creepshow comic book). In this case, it’s worth noting that in the segment ‘The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill’ a road sign can be seen to Castle Rock, one of Stephen King’s trademark fictional towns (alongside Derry). Any fan of King knows that all of his work seems to be interlinked via a complex threadwork of connections, shared appearances and characters (not least of which his frankly SUPERB Dark Tower series). So how’s that for a cool link, people? This horror universe is also home to the master of modern horror's nightmarish creations!

Of course, King’s work has already provided links to other creations. In smash TV show Lost a parachute is seen emblazoned with the logo of Nozz-A-La, a fictional brand of soda from The Dark Tower series. JJ Abrams, Lost’s creator, is known for tying in links between his works. The fictional brand Slusho appears in a number of Abram’s works: Alias, Cloverfield, Fringe, Super 8, his Star Trek reboot and even in the TV show Heroes! The Lost character Charlie’s band, Driveshaft, can be heard playing their hit song ‘You All Everybody’ at a birthday party in Alias; the logo for Lost’s mysterious Dharma Initiative is viewed on the screen in Cloverfield. Furthermore, Oceanic Airlines, the airline of Lost’s crashed plane makes an appearance in a number of programmes, including Abram’s own Fringe (the specific flight 815 is name-checked in Chuck while the airline is also referenced in the film Executive Decision, Joss Whedon’s comic book season 8 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and even the computer game Dead Island. However, I am not going to open this list up to games, as it will become never ending! I’ll just give honorable mentions to the two Saw games which actually help to fill in some plot gaps and perfectly complement the films and the fact that a certain Freddy Krueger has appeared as a downloadable player in the Mortal Kombat series). A superb horror/sci fi hybrid, Fringe boasts links to two of its greatest predecessors.

One of the very coolest occurs in the episode ‘Firefly’ Walter is seen wearing a pair of very distinctive sunglasses. When asked about them, he replies: ‘They were sent to me by a Dr. Jacoby from Washington State.'

The classic series Twin Peaks took place in the town of Twin Peaks, Washington. The town’s resident psychiatrist Dr Lawrence Jacoby wore these very same glasses. It appears the two were once in correspondence!

And in the season 2 episode ‘New Day In An Old Town’ Senator Schell tells head of Fringe Division Chief Broyles that ‘The old X designation, and your Fringe investigations, have been indulgences in the Federal budget for over half a century’. A Federal investigation team dealing with paranormal and unusual cases? With the X designation? Who ever could they mean?

Of course, this is a none-to subtle reference to The X Files. The X Files itself was linked to multiple other shows, most notably spinoff The Lone Gunmen and LANCE FUCKING HENRIKSEN’s Millennium. The character of Jose Chung appears in both series while LFH’s Frank Black took a decent guest appearance in the X Files episode Millennium.

Coincidentally, online rumours persist that photos of Laura Palmer, the murder victim who sparked the events of Twin Peaks, have appeared in The X Files (most notably on Mulder’s noteboard in the Pilot). I’ve never been able to spot them, but if any of you do, let me know!

Anyway, enough of this distraction let’s head back to Jason Goes To Hell, where a key plot point sees Duke present Jessica with a mystical dagger to finally kill Jason. This dagger was the same Kandarian dagger that put in an appearance in The Evil Dead II.

AWESOME.

As a neat aside, I’d like to point out that outside the Voorhees house we see a rickety old climbing frame. This is the same frame from the Alfred Hitchcock classic, The Birds.

At this point I need to take a little break to tell you guys I LOVE THIS SHIT.

Ahem, anyway, moving on, while this world of brilliance may already seem crazily busy, we have a couple more cool connections. One you probably already know, the other, well, it’s a little subtler.

You see, after Jessica kicks Steve out of the car Sheriff Landis asks where about on Lake Road she did it. Her reply? ‘I don’t know, out past the Myers’ place.’

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeell, I’m sure you all know that the psychotic Michael Myers was the villain in the Halloween films. While Camp Crystal Lake clearly isn't in Haddonfield, Illinois (the setting of Myers’ Halloween rampages) perhaps Mikey has family in Mr Voorhees old stamping ground?

The final (and most obvious) connection to another horror film takes place in the final moments of the film. While Jason’s mask lies discarded on the ground, a hand bursts through the dirt and snatches it before dragging it down to hell. This hand is wearing an all too familiar glove with knife blade claws.

In much the same way that an Alien xenomorph’s skull hanging on display onboard a Predator spacecraft in Predator II leads to Alien vs Predator, from this scene the surprisingly great Freddy vs Jason was born.

Now the Alien and Predator series are huge kings of the crossover. First off the numerous comic book match ups — including 2000A.D’s Judge Dredd and DC heroes such as Batman and Superman — open up a huge world of cross overs including Image Comics’ Spawn, rivals Marvel and tonnes more! 

Perhaps the most exciting of these though, is the link to the works of Joss Whedon. The Buffy the Vampire Slayer spin-off, Angel featured a demonic law firm by the name of Wolfram and Hart. During a corporate video shown on the episode Harm’s Way it is revealed that Wolfram and Hart have a number of large corporate clients. Listed among these are Yoyodyne Propulsion Systems, first mentioned in the Thomas Pynchon’s novel V, then referenced again in The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai. Another company listed with ties to Wolfram and Hart is Weyland-Yutani. That’s right, the self same company that sent the Nostromo into space in Alien and went looking for the crashed ship on LV-426 in Aliens. The company founded by Peter Weyland as seen in the upcoming Prometheus.

HOLY CRAP, right?

But it doesn’t stop there. Whedon’s work continues to embrace this connection. In the pilot of the criminally short-lived sci fi show Firefly, Captain Malcolm ‘Mal’ Reynolds uses a UA 57-D Ground Sentry (an anti-aircraft cannon emplacement) at the Battle of Serenity Valley. When the gun’s HUD is displayed onscreen we are clearly shown the corporate logo of Weyland-Yutani. The Company created the cannon. BOOM!

Yet Joss Whedon toys with us and horror continuity even more. This is some thing we shall return to later.

Anyway, back to F vs J, and if ever there was evidence that these films are taking place in the same world, a film in which two of the most popular antagonists in horror go head to head is the greatest example.

Seeing Voorhees and Krueger face off was a dream come true for many horror fans... and things nearly got so much better.

After the film proved to be a tremendous financial success, writers went to work on ideas for a sequel. This sequel? Freddy vs Jason vs Ash.

Ash.

BRUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCE CAMPBELL's character from the Evil Dead series.

OMFG.

Things even got so far that a treatment was drawn up, describing exactly what would happen in this horror mega mash up. A quick look online will probably turn it up in just a few seconds. I'll wait here while you do.

Back? Good.

Unfortunately the film was never made, but this treatment was adapted into a comic series and even spawned a sequel. It was pretty good fun too!

Of course, this isn’t the first horror property to head to the pages of funny books. Voorhees, Krueger, Ash and Myers have all had their own individual efforts, but some familiar faces join them. One more big name bad guy to feature in comics would be the Goodguy doll formerly known as Charles Lee Ray. That’s right, Child's Play's Chucky.

As well as featuring in his own limited series, Chucky also guested in probably THE greatest horror comic out there, Tim Seeley’s Hack/Slash.

For those of you who haven’t heard of it, it features Cassie Hack, a girl who was forced to kill her own psycho mother, the ghoulish Lunch Lady, and her hulking partner Vlad. These two tough as hell heroes travel from town to town taking on and vanquishing Slashers, the undead and seemingly invincible villains that all too often stalk the screens in horror films. The series is excellent and features it’s own links to other horror icons. As well as Chucky, Cassie and Vlad have thrown down with another horror comic star, Edgar Dill from the short-lived Fangoria Comic's BUMP. In terms of silver screen villains, the dynamic duo have also crossed swords with the Hatchet films’ Victor Crowley and, perhaps even more exciting, Dr Herbert West from the Re-Animator series (as an aside, West also battled the Evil Dead’s Ash in Army of Darkness vs Re-Animator while Ash has found himself battling undead superheroes in the Marvel Zombies series).

Of course, if comics aren’t your thing, Chucky also has onscreen links to more of his contemporaries. These all occur during his fourth outing, Bride of Chucky.

This mainly comes down to one key scene at the beginning of the film. In the police evidence storeroom that holds Chucky’s remains, we are also treated to a number of key distinctive props: Jason Voorhees’ hockey mask can be seen alongside Freddy Krueger’s trademark glove. Elsewhere you can spot a huge chainsaw, the killing weapon of choice of Leatherface from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and a customised white William Shatner mask... as worn by Halloween’s Michael Myers.

As if this treasure trove of links wasn’t enough, after brutally slaying one victim with a nailgun, Chucky looks at the corpse and asks out loud: ‘Why does that look so familiar?’ With his head pierced by multiple nails, John Ritter’s victim bears a striking resemblance to the lead Cenobite from the Hellraiser films, Pinhead.

The implication here is clearly that Chucky has seen Pinhead before. Perhaps Charles Lee Ray's soul received some personal attention from the Cenobites in the underworld? (Coincidentally, an earlier draft of the script for Freddy vs Jason saw the two horror villains dragged down to Hell where they still attempted to continue their battle... right up until a number of hooks and chains drag them apart and Pinhead steps between them to ask: ‘Gentlemen, what seems to be the problem?’)

But Bride of Chucky isn’t the only film to write itself into the big boys’ league. Perhaps the most awesome and comprehensive young pretender to do this would be Behind The Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon. If you haven’t seen it, WATCH THIS FILM!

A kickass deconstruction of the slasher genre, the film follows a documentary crew as they film the title character Leslie Vernon as he plans his rampage to join the ranks of his idols: Myers, Voorhees et al.

The film takes place in a world where these horror film monsters are real and gives us plenty of links to prove it. These include (but aren’t limited to): Leslie standing outside the Rabbit in Red Lounge — in the original Halloween when Dr Loomis travels to Smith’s Grove Sanitarium with Marion Chambers, she lights her cigarettes with matches from the Rabbit in Red Lounge (In Rob Zombie’s remake the bar is revealed to be a strip joint where Michael’s mother Deborah worked. Quite what this says about Nurse Chambers is entirely up to you to decide…); in her documentary, Taylor name checks Haddonfield, Illinois; 1428 Elm Street (Nancy’s address), Springwood and Crystal Lake; the Lament Configuration (Lemarchand’s puzzle box from Hellraiser) can be seen in Leslie’s mentor, Eugene’s house; in fact Eugene’s car is a 1973 Oldsmobile Delta 88 — the same car used in the Evil Dead and all the rest of Sam Raimi’s films; when Leslie is stalking his prey outside the school the three Elm Street skipping girls can be seen in the background; a bottle of ‘Stay Awake’, the medicine from A Nightmare on Elm Street can be seen in Leslie’s home; Leslie’s pet turtles Church and Zowie are an allusion to two of the pets in the Pet Sematary films; and in a deleted scene from the film Leslie mentions that he has ‘spent some time in Texas, helping a friend kind of reinvent his thing’ — this is a reference to the remake of Texas Chain Saw Massacre (the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, see what they did there?) and suggests that Leslie and Leatherface are friends.

Phew, let’s take a breath while you take all of that in.

Back? Good, because it doesn’t end there! In Hatchet 2, one of Reverend Zombie’s hunting party reveals that his hometown had it’s own psycho killer, much like their intended target, Victor Crowley. This killer’s name?

Leslie Vernon.

NICE.

But that’s not the only connection in Hatchet 2. For those of you who haven’t seen Green’s Frozen, the film about a group of friends who become stranded on a ski lift, look away now…

SPOILERS: Parker, the sole survivor of Frozen is shown recounting her ordeal on a news programme on the TV in the background.

Of course Green isn’t the only director to deliberately link his films. With interconnectivity and crossovers in everything from Charles Band’s numerous Full Moon titles, including Puppet Master, Doll Man and Demonic Toys, to ‘Bloody’ Bill Pon’s Dollboy and Circus of the Dead sharing characters, this is a very common practice. A quick link can be spotted between the Saw series and writer and director Leigh Whannell and James Wan’s Dead Silence. In the theatre that the terrifying, tongue-stealing witch Mary Shaw made her home, Billy, Jigsaw’s creepy ventriloquist’s dummy is quite clearly shown nestled among Shaw’s collection of puppets.

Furthermore Billy the puppet’s face can be seen in graffiti on a wall in Wan’s Death Sentence, while in the creepy Insidious Billy can be seen drawn on a blackboard in Josh’s classroom. Insidious also depicts a certain mask used to travel into the dream world… this mask is the very same worn by the title character in Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comic series. Now, if we’re allowing the comic connections, Sandman has links to Hellblazer’s John Constantine and Swamp Thing. Of course Swamp Thing has his ties to the Justice League, who, featuring Batman and Superman can now link us back to the Alien/Predator world and their link to Joss Whedon’s work.

A-ha, THAT man again. And don’t worry, I hadn’t forgot. Soooo… this is where I’m going to discuss some spoilers to his recent Cabin In The Woods.

If you haven’t seen this film look away! You do NOT want it spoiled.

SERIOUSLY.

Still here?

Sure you’ve seen it and are ready for the discussion to come?

On your head be it…

SPOILERS: the main plot of The Cabin In The Woods follows a worldwide conspiracy in which all major and common horror stories are part of an elaborate conspiracy to pacify Lovecraftian (him again!) Ancient Gods and prevent them from destroying our world.

The climax of the film features all manner of hideous horror filmesque bad guys running amok. Among these you can see a Reaver, the insane space wildmen from Whedon’s own Firefly… bringing this film into that world too.

Now this is all well and good and under this framework you could argue that ALL the other horror films tie into it.

But that’s not enough for you? ‘None of the actual horror villains are mentioned!’ I hear you cry!

WRONG. The employees of the mysterious conspiracy take bets on what form the sacrifice will take each year. As part of this pool all the creatures’ names are jotted down on a whiteboard.

Among the Vampires, Merman and Dolls there are a couple of other interesting names… Angry Molesting Tree and (even more specific) Deadites.

The very same name given to the possessed villains of the Evil Dead.

The same Evil Dead that boast BRUUUUUUCE CAMPBELL’s Ash character, plus the Necronomicon I mentioned that made a guest appearance all the way back at the beginning of this piece in Jason Goes To Hell.

So that’s just about EVERYTHING drawn together. Thank you, thank you very much.

Before I wrap up, I’d just like to point out one more connection. Not a link, so much as a crazy paradox. In the first Scream, Randy’s character is clearly seen to be watching Halloween on TV. In the world of Scream, Halloween is fiction… yet in the Halloween sequel H2O, the characters are shown watching Scream 2. So Scream is fiction in the world of Halloween? But events in Halloween are commented on in the previous film? Or maybe both worlds are viewing each other through the TV screen!

MINDFUCK!!!!!!!

Anyway, of course with the links I’ve listed it’s entirely possible to dismiss some or even find a few that I have undoubtedly missed. The ongoing continuity of such epic, ongoing stories is BOUND to cause problems trying to balance each timeline.

But that’s the fun of these films. Of course they don’t exist in an actual, physical universe. Their home is the imagination of the people that create them and the people that love the genre: us, the fans.

So what do you think? Have I missed anything obvious? Reached a little too far with some? Drop a comment or two and I’ll update this regularly.

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Until next time, I hope you enjoyed your stay.