From Suck to Awesome: Halloween III: Season of the Witch

Every now and then, the trend is bucked. The norm, flipped. Something that I loved, swore by as a kid devolving into laughably-awful art. Films like Transylvania 6-500, or the made-for-TV film adaptation of The House of Dies Drear. When I was younger, these were products that I would've attested to being "brilliant," or at the least "cool-as-hell." Experiencing them now, though, reveals the hard-to-stomach truth: they're utter shit, totally inept and heinous creations that only a kid (such as I was) could enjoy with a straight face. Sort of like Soulja Boy's music, today, in more-relatable terms.

One of the greatest joys for me, however, is when the oppostie happens. It's a rare event, but sometimes things that I shrugged off, brushed aside as artistic-queafs in my earlier years age like the finest of fancy liquid intoxicants. Sure, this doesn't necessarily mean that the respective "thing" is really that good, or that I unfairly dismissed. It's just that, in my older years, now having nurtured a stronger sense of appreciation and affinity for/of "schlock," I can sit back, absorb, and have some well-jolly shits and giggles.

Caee in point: 1982's Halloween III: Season of the Witch. The first two Halloweens are quite possibly my favorite one-two horror sequence of all time. The later sequels, though, were all forgettable at best, mere "one death, two death, three death, etc" body-pilers that abandoned any shred of innovation and stone-cold seriousness found in the first two. But then, there was always the third entry, Season of the With, which always left me scratching my head more than anything else. Where the fuck is Michael Myers? I'd wonder. Why didn't they just call it Season of the Witch, rather than piggyback off the Myers' franchise's success?

Now, though, I know the truth: long story short, John Carpenter (the filmmaking genius who birthed the series) envisioned this film as the first of a yearly Halloween-labeled series, where a new director would have a chance to make an original, genre-pushing scareshow that'd utilize the Halloween brand. Like a Tales from the Crypt, or Night Gallery vibe. (Something that M. Night Shyamalan is currently doing, which is wise, because he sucks now; hopefully he'll better as a behind-the-scenes shotcaller) The plan never extended past this one, unfortunately, leaving later audiences confused and pissed.



Sucks. Because, looking at Season of the Witch now (or earlier today, as I did on the tube, the third time in the last few months I've watched it), it's hard not to love the film for the batshit-crazy mess that it is. Totally ludicrous, without an inkling of rationality. There in, though, rests its many charms.

1) Its easily one of the coldest, most mean-spirited films I've ever seen. Think about it; the whole premise centers on an evil Halloween-mask-maker hellbent on killing the world's children (and subsequently their parents) on H-ween night, via an annoying-as-fuck, but can't-shake-from-your-head commercial broadcast-ed jingle. 2) The corporate Lucifer behind the whole shibang is some immortal warlock/neo-Nazi kingpin who's harboring the prehistoric Stonehenge monument in his factory's basement, guarded by robots masked as men in business suits. 3) It stars Tom Atkins, who any self-respecting obsessor of horror puts in the same air-of-coolness as Bruce Campbell. Why else would it be justifiable and unquestionable that his doctor-character would meet the daughter of a murdered patient, run away with her to play detective, and end up having sex with her hours later? Because he's Tom motherfucking Atkins, that's why! He's got it like that, bitches!


The man whose middle name should be Motherfuckin

Seriously....the Stonehenge monument involved in some post-Nazi-reign plot to kill the world's kiddies by turning their skulls into cages full of snakes, insects, and other creepy-crawlies? How amazing is that, really? One of a kind, for sure. Ridiculous and moronic, certainly. But one good time to watch? Fuck sure.

See for yourselves:


Even though the movie is by no means "good," that scene is pretty well-handled, and creepily effective in my book.

An awesomely-bad film that gets better every time you (or I) watch it. I hear that some horror-heavy, small theaters out in Cali show it at midnight like once a year, to a packed crowd of aficionados and people who share my same "one hated it, now love it" belief. That's something I need to do before I die, it seems....

And, just because I'm a dude who more-than appreciates a smoking-hot brunette....now, I'll pay tribute to one Stacey Nelkin, who plays the aforementioned dead-man'-daughter who beds Tom Atkins and looks adorably-smashing from start to finish here.

Did she appear in any other films? I shall investigate.