Board 8 > Snake Ranks Anything Horror Related - LIVE! (sort of)

(+) Yeah! (+)

It's October, the time of the year where I usually come of my grave to do some fun horror ranking stuff but this year I can't really do it the traditional way. So, I'm saying fuck it, and doing it as we go along. I'll discuss any horror-related thing you want to throw at me, and give my take on them, but, since this format will be a little different, I probably won't throw myself as deep as I normally would. Though, who knows! I just really want this topic to just be a crazy, horror-fueled mess by the end of it.

So, you can post one horror-related thing per post until I rank it. Feel free to post anything even if I talked about it in one of these before. It's a clean slate. I may jump around if I want to focus on a topic, or post updates to what horror stuff I'm experiencing in the month personally too just for fun.

So, let's get started! Don't know if this experiment will pan out but I'm excited to try it!

https://youtu.be/H4dGpz6cnHo

Mirrors (2008)

The Yellow Lantern Corps (DC)

American Psycho 2

Well, this is exciting!

Oversimplified SCP

Troll 2 (1990)

The Path - Forest Theme
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IW8VIhJdJ0o

Perfect Blue (soundtrack)
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLG4ENma2RvT4_nBU6aTFqW_iLYfOe2ges

M83 - Car Chase Terror

https://youtu.be/ALBJsKpt7Kg

Plague of Madness (Primal episode)

Jesse_Custer posted...

https://youtu.be/H4dGpz6cnHo

(21 points)

Importance: 5
Fear: 7
Personal: 9

From now on these scores will be represented simply by (5/7/9 = 21).

Starting off with a DOOZY.

I've known about the Backrooms since at least 2019. Though ostensibly built around early day Creepypasta bones, there was something all-around appealing, fascinating, creepy, and even oddly comforting about it. In short: it was just plain odd. Where it deviated quite a bit from the thematic confines of that early day creepypasta, was the shared collective memories those who viewed it experienced, seemingly all at once. The realistic nature of the accompanying photo unlocked visions of days spent waiting in doctors' offices, or the distinctive unexplainable smells of shopping mall dressing rooms, or even ones childhood home, as a snapshot forever locked in place in your mind - empty and disturbingly unmoving.

There was a singularly hypnotic energy here which had gripped people, myself included, as the Backrooms slowly became a bonafide phenomenon, grabbing even the attention of those outside its typical purview of 4chan paranormal hounds and YouTube creepypasta enthusiasts. When the pandemic hit, The Backrooms hit even harder - encapsulating the essence of a place no longer bustling with the people who once passed through it. The concept of "Liminal Spaces", essentially locations in a transitory state, such as an empty school hallway or abandoned subway station, inhabited the mindscape in ways even beyond The Backrooms could accomplish on its own, and managed to tap into distinctly primal, genetic memories. It was profoundly disquieting, and I found it very difficult to shake from my mind.

Which is a long-winded way of bringing us to the actual subject of this write-up. In January 2022, a young filmmaker by the name of Kane Pixels graced us with the Backrooms' ultimate masterpiece. A "found footage" terror which places the viewer directly into the heart of the Backrooms in ways it never had before. The atmosphere is unnerving and visceral, as Kane takes us through a quiet, slow-burning tour of this unassumingly hostile place. We don't belong here. The Backrooms don't want us there.

Kane touches on all aspects of the Backrooms experience - the piss-yellow wallpaper, the puke green floors, the winding & endless fixed-camera esque hallways and walls, feeling much like a maze of ones own disparate memories and psyche. He takes us up menacing ladders and explores staircases, peeks inside Silent Hill 2 like holes to nowhere, and languishes in vaguely ominous references to famous liminal spaces, noticing slowly and slowly of the inevitably of his own entrapment and eventual death. All the while, blood-curdling yarls and horrific shrieks from warped, mutated apparitions just out of view eventually bring Kane to that inevitable conclusion.

It's a journey that tests our thoughts and feelings; it references the original intent of the Backrooms perfectly - that recapturing of nostalgic memory, of a lost time, with the knowledge that this isn't how things were meant to be remembered - The Backrooms ultimate goal to me is displaying the utter horrifying consequences of living for your nostalgia, forever stuck in the past. I firmly believe The Backrooms, by Kane Pixels, is a one-of-a-kind piece of truly terrifying cinema. The general creep-factor alone is definitely there, but as with most excellent horror, I find myself unable to separate those nagging thoughts I have with the work, which are the very things that make it so highly impressive and distressing. It's something absolutely worth your time, and if you haven't seen it, I say drop what you're doing and check it out RIGHT NOW!

The Zodiac Killer

For future reference I will be putting all rankings on this spreadsheet:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qiQ0QIvkBH5Gis6xbWMHBo3kPPB3MHJto_H_ksLWzY8/edit?usp=sharing

Netflix Resident Evil

marble hornets

Disneys the legend of sleepy hollow (1949)

plasmabeam posted...

Mirrors (2008)

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/4/6/0/AAR-tQAADvIE.jpg
(2/5/5 = 12)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qiQ0QIvkBH5Gis6xbWMHBo3kPPB3MHJto_H_ksLWzY8/edit?usp=sharing

Horror is no stranger to the concept of mirrors. Bloody Mary, Candyman, Evil Dead II, Oculus, Black Mirror, American Werewolf, the countless mirror scares across the board I mean pick a horror property and it probably has some type of scare to do with a mirror. In a way, all horror functions as a mirror to society, and mirrors function as an easy way to get some thematic points across easily to your audience.

Mirrors, a VERY loose remake of the South Korean film Into the Mirror, had so much promise. Of course, American horror remakes proved to be all the rage in the 2000s, spurned on by notable successes such as The Grudge or The Ring. Though like many of its ilk, Mirrors fails to truly capture the macabre, reflective qualities of the original.

Its a film about a suspended detective that gets a new job as the night watchman in a burnt out luxury department store, who then discovers weird happenings with the mirrors that dot all over the building. That's cool. That's interesting, and at first, it's easy to get sucked into the film's alluring atmosphere. I really like the look of the store and some creative shots let us bask in the structure's strange architecture and off-putting mannequins.

Kiefer Sutherland plays the lead, and he mostly does a good job, but I feel like he overacts his "paranoia" scenes in a way that is too exaggerated. The rest of the cast isn't even close to being engaging, especially Paula Patton as Kiefer's wife, who feels especially checked out and rather uninterested in anything that's happening. Unfortunately, this leaves nothing to really be entertained by between the film's sparse but unnerving deaths (the death of Kiefer's sister is the best part of the movie easily), as the plot chugs along at a glacial pace, and the technical details get repetitive and too dull for its own good. At a certain point, we get the intent - mirrors bad. It's boring to just keep demonstrating that if you're not going to have any substance to it. The police procedural elements here are especially clich and Kiefer's stereotypical "disgraced cop" routine with the estranged family just adds to the general sameness of the film.

Mirrors picks up a bit again in a decently exciting climax with an eye-popping demonic possession set-piece, but we're never really treated to any answers to how the supernatural works and not in the "leave you wanting more" way, just the "please give me something to latch on to here" way. The film also never truly commits to the thematic promise of having mirrors as a central conceit to the film. What should have been a smart exploration of our main character's inner insecurities is diluted by sticking too close to an established formula on how this type of film is supposed to turn out.

In short, it's a mundane piece of horror in a director's filmography with highs (High Tension, Crawl) & lows (Mirrors, Piranha 3D).

Dog Soldiers (2002 film)

Hocus Pocus 2

Code Orange - Underneath (album)

Feel free to skip over if it's too much investment

BetrayedTangy posted...

The Yellow Lantern Corps (DC)

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/0/0/3/AAR-tQAADvQj.jpg
(4/6/8 = 18)

The Yellow Lantern Corps, or alternatively the Sinestro Corps, is a organization similar to the Green Lantern Corps, whose members derive their powers from fear rather than willpower. Created by writer Geoff Johns and artist Ethan Van Sciver, the Corps are typically led by Sinestro, a former member of the Green Lantern Corps (he was actually considered the corps' greatest member). Johns' notoriously excellent work in the pages of Green Lantern and beyond, especially the Sinestro Corps War, established the Corps as one of the most fearsome teams to be reckoned with in the DC Universe - Sinestro, Parallax, Arkillo, & of course the Anti-Monitor, key members which established the Corps' penchant for fear tactics, extreme measures, and incredible destruction.

Johns definitely made the most of the Corps' alignment with the frightening and dreadful. The Anti-Monitor alone, with his omnipresent and omnipotent status making it clear that the Corps were a sufficient threat. Memorable moments such as Kyle's possession by Parallax, or the whole host of rings searching for new wearers gave the new Corps a palpable sense of terror, and the gloriously appropriate colorful costumes and designs of the Sinestro Corps were both jaw-dropping to take in while expanding the Green Lantern mythos in such an intriguing way. To me, Johns & his creative team managed to turn the Green Lantern saga into a bonafide horror story, and it worked. Like the best works of horror literature, restraint and what I describe as the comic book equivalent of jump scares were the key elements behind the success of these Sinestro Corps comics. Fun elements would creep in, like an attempt to recruit Batman or the temporary deputation of Scarecrow, but the focus was always the dread-based nature of the Corps and their brutal and uncompromising methods that made them a spine-tingling joy to experience on the pages of DC Comics.

Johnbobb posted...

American Psycho 2

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/0/1/5/AAR-tQAADvQv.jpg

(1/1/1 = 3)

Haha, fuck this movie. I feel bad for everyone who had to be a part of this hackneyed, painfully-scripted, and jarring """""""""sequel""""""""" to my favorite horror movie of all time. Let's get this straight, this film has NOTHING to do with American Psycho besides one shoe-horned Patrick Bateman scene. It's not even a very good movie separated from that fact; the idea of a woman drawn to murder sure has potential, but instead the writers take that potential and squish it into a boring slasher plot. The film is ridiculous, uncomfortable, and leaves me rolling my eyes at every possible opportunity. Bafflingly awful.

Horrorcore (rap genre)

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (character)

Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2

House of Leaves

(since I'm curious how it would have ranked last time)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiD_CP_Pios

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Co6d3h-NpS8

Classic creepypastas (like, pre-2013 but feel free to use your own definition)

the concept of there being a skeleton inside you

Phasmophobia
https://store.steampowered.com/app/739630/Phasmophobia/

https://youtu.be/BI9fKfX5V68

The Creeping Flesh

I just finished watching it a few minutes ago, so lets go with that.

trdl23 posted...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiD_CP_Pios

Keeping up tradition I see!

You know it! Glad to have this topic back in some form

Raka_Putra posted...

Oversimplified SCP

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3jjv0wpZJg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aK_xnoE74_U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12O_Gex8Pqo

(2/1/7 = 10)

A cutesy version of the popular internet monster database, these manga style drawings do exactly what they say on the tin - oversimplify SCPs.

Instead of encyclopedia-length descriptions, these short comics include visual aides such as SCP sketches, text box factoids, and the sequential storytelling of the medium. For those more invested in the lore of SCP, I can see these being a bit TOO bare-bones to be of any real interest outside of neat curio. But for the rest of us, I can see these being a relatively interesting way of plunging into the universe to get a quick idea of what a certain SCP is really like and possibly using them as a diving board into the deeper, heftier lore of these things.

The art is a healthy mixture of Japanese and Internet memes, which helps to greatly contribute the ease and breeziness at which these go by. Given the sheer number of SCPs, I could see this series lasting a long time, and they are a nice place to go for a quick pinch of lore and to learn about these hyper-detailed creatures in a more readily accessible fashion.

Friday the 13th (NES game)

Nemesis himself from the original PS1 RE3.

HOORAY!!

Can you just go through my entries from last year that you didn't get to yet?

BlueCrystalTear posted...

Troll 2 (1990)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyophYBP_w4

(5/1/7 = 13)

One of the funniest bad movies you'll ever see. Most bad movies, especially horror, can just be awful slogs, like Birdemic for instance. Troll 2 is that one rare exception, made up entirely of wooden acting, crude effects, and laughably bad dialogue. It has no connection to the original Troll, does not even have TROLLS but rather goblins, and most scenes feel more like non-sequiturs. This makes it a brutal nonsensical but hilarious ride. Preferably with a friend. The film's creators have tried to say it was always intentional for this movie to be bad. I don't believe them and it ruins the magic of it honestly to say something like that. You don't luck into scenes as good as "Oh my goooooood" or "double decker bologna sandwich" if you're making something like that on purpose. It just doesn't compute. Of course, no film except for The Room can keep up that kind of energy and you occasionally do have to sit through some torturous scenes of seances or boring parts where people just sit around talking. Still, overall it's side-splittingly good and definitely deserves it's spot in the bad horror hall of fame.

jcgamer107 posted...

HOORAY!!

Can you just go through my entries from last year that you didn't get to yet?

Honestly I do want to talk about The Minute Hour and Human Crush a lot so maybe! Still listen to them a year later!

Troll 2 is indeed the ultimate in "So Bad It's Good" entertainment. For all the reasons you stated. That's why I love it.

The shower scene in Psycho

rwlh posted...

The Path - Forest Theme
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IW8VIhJdJ0o

(1/7/10 = 18)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qiQ0QIvkBH5Gis6xbWMHBo3kPPB3MHJto_H_ksLWzY8/edit#gid=0

A fantastic track front to back. On the one hand, I adore the piano and vocals in this track, and on the other hand, theres some creative arrangement going on here, especially as the track opens up and evolves. The track is structured as an adventure, where the piano stands in as contemplation for an encounter with the big bad wolf and the alluring voice takes the form of a siren's call a fantastic piece of composition. Around 2:00 minutes however, you can feel the track start to break itself down. But that is perfectly placed it's where the track really kicks into gear with added layers of heartbeats, more discordant piano, and what sounds like a squeaky, long-abandoned swing. The adventure has suddenly become more riddled with anxiety. You feel more uneasy; a false sense of control being taken from you by the track. When you find yourself just a mere minute later with an ever so subtly slowed down tempo, this becomes a deafening symphony of intensity with layers on layers of sounds just continuing to build up dread. A track like this is a nightmare, but one you will most definitely not want to wake up from. Again, just moments later, the track halts itself, with only the sounds of gravelly footsteps and the squeaking. The weight and pressure of the grand moment is over - the wolf makes its frightening appearance, "AND I WILL EAT YOU!" growled over and over. Oh fuck. And that's it. There are no final crescendos. One of the most frightening transitions and ending to a track in any game I feel. A phenomenal piece of work here from Kris Force. It shows off her ability as a great scorewriter, and I feel, she transforms the typical horror game score into something primal & terrifying, and it reminds me of the latter work of Lingua Ignota (although Lingua Ignota is definitely towards the harsher side all together). This track is fantastic and I would be hard pressed to point out any faults.

Legion(The Castlevania boss)

Third (Portishead album)

I know you've already talked about it before, but I'm interested in hearing what you'll have to say from a horror-specific perspective. Also, thank you for keeping the spirit of Halloween active however you can!

Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

I'm so glad you liked Forest Theme so much. I've shared it with others because and been met with laughter, particularly at the wolf voice at the end. But to me it's one of the only pieces of music capable of inspiring raw fear in me. Glad you appreciate it.

Let's do the other song I think of when I think of "raw fear." I can't remember if I nominated this for you or not.

Umineko: When They Cry - Answer Arcs - ridicule
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qi3eAjB_LcA

It's definitely an acquired taste. I always say there's a fine line between horror and comedy since they come from the same place of surprise. The way the track steadily builds though and just the sheer sound quality and recording of it is perfect to me though.

Place posted...

Perfect Blue (soundtrack)
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLG4ENma2RvT4_nBU6aTFqW_iLYfOe2ges

(5/7/10 = 22)

Perfect Blue's eclectic mix of J-pop and dark ambient industrial music is one of the most unconventional to ever emerge from a mainstream motion picture, but is a true testament to Masahiro Ikumi's creative spirit. It is as the film - blurring celebrity fantasy with its equally seedy underbelly, yet totally unique within its own different art form. Obviously, since the soundtrack is meant to accompany the film, they would have not too dissimilar themes, yet there's something about it being portrayed totally in sonic form that stands on its own as an alarming piece of horror.

Of course, an experiment like this only works if the music is good first and foremost. Luckily, Ikumi has created one of the most brilliantly minimalistic scores in Japanese film, stripping it back to the bare bones with gentle, contemplative, and thoughtful electronic instrumentation, such as on Mina's Theme which reflects her insecurities and anxieties, immediately AFTER two absolute bops in Angel of Love and Alone But at Ease - from the group she used to be a part of. The juxtaposition is obvious, but it's the care Ikumi puts into both parts of the score that make it work so well. I mean, you would never know those two songs are from an animated horror film.

Despite this being one hook of the soundtrack, I'd actually say the album focuses way more on the industrial side. The latter half becomes very Nine Inch Nails inspired, and are certainly the most challenging pieces. "Nightmare" and "Virtual Mima" both go hand in hand as some of the most audibly disturbing tracks on the whole album. Ikumi pulls off a very unsettling work with both his sharp looping of menacing electronic flourishes and that haunting vocal chorus in "Virtual Mima", with spine-chilling percussion. They have a very dark feel, and "Uchida's Theme", reflecting his twisted world view corrupted by mass media and his own obsessions, completes the haunting trilogy before dovetailing back into the soft jazzy piece "Cherish These Moments".

Basically, if you can push through Ikumi's reticent world of ethereal sound, you'll get a vivid picture of the film to go with it. I personally think it's a challenging soundtrack to listen to, but one of power and atmospheric importance. He somehow finds a way to give a music soundtrack a sense of the real, without actually describing it concretely. For a straight hour you are transported into the minds of strange, brooding and isolated people; a troubling but intriguing study of fame and apprehension whose contradictions leave you questioning everything you thought you knew about Japanese pop music and maybe even your own self.