10 Slots for the Best Horror I've Seen in the Past Year
[8 of 10]
The TV Horror Slot

And it's a tie!!!

CHANNEL ZERO: NO-END HOUSE

(September 2017)

"God! I keep... waiting for one of you to understand how magnificent this place is!

"All the gifts that it can give you! Because memory is a disease!

“And then this house is the cure! How can you not see that?!”

One of the most amazing things about Channel Zero’s sophomore season is that, though it still fundamentally feels like a Channel Zero story (in so much as the Channel Zero logo doesn’t look out of place in the opening credits), it does so despite the fact that it has a different kind of horror at its core, compared to the horror of Candle Cove.

With its central themes of memory and loss and instinct and co-dependency, No-End House is also surprisingly moving, balancing out the horror with genuine emotion, thanks in no small part to a commendable cast, which includes the excellent John Carroll Lynch.

CHANNEL ZERO:
BUTCHER'S BLOCK

(February 2018)

“... this is the city I come home to.

“When I walk here, I’m in two worlds at the same time. The one you see, and the one I remember.”

With both No-End House and Butcher’s Block making the cut this year, it has become pointedly apparent that Channel Zero is where the best of current television horror can be found.

“You were so scared of losing your mind and then you just gave it away…”

With the insidious spectre of mental illness and the desolation of sacrifice zones some of its preoccupations, Butcher’s Block is “… particularly inspired by Argento films, by Candyman, by Nicolas Roeg films” (in the words of Channel Zero’s creator and showrunner, Nick Antosca).

Directed by Arkasha Stevenson (who brought Lynch to the, ahem, table), Butcher’s Block makes it three for three for Channel Zero, and, once again, the ante is upped for its next season, The Dream Door, directed by E.L. Katz, no stranger to these parts due to Cheap Thrills.*

With reversals, a motley crew of protagonists, and a steady, occasionally hallucinatory build to a Grand Guignol climax, Antosca, Stevenson, and company have brought us a “… particularly bizarre flavor” of horror in Butcher’s Block.

Oh, and did I forget to mention?

Rutger flippin’ Hauer is in this one!

“You know, if you don’t eat enough protein, the body just starts to eat itself. Yeah, I read that in a Reader’s Digest.

“You just get so hungry, your heart will just up and eat itself! And then it moves on to your brain, and then it goes down to your spine, and suddenly, you’re just dead!

“Happens to vegetarians all the time.”

(Channel Zero: No-End House OS courtesy of impawards.com; Channel Zero: Butcher’s Block OS courtesy of dreadcentral.com.)

*Katz also directed “A is for Amateur” for ¡Qué horror! 2015 title, ABCs of Death 2, and was an associate producer on Adam Wingard’s A Horrible Way To Die, one of the Serial Killer Thriller runners-up on the 2012 rundown.

He was also co-producer on the non-¡Qué horror! title, The Aggression Scale, so, yeah… Katz has been ‘round these parts a lot, even when he wasn’t fronting a film.

Here’s hoping he comes back for The Dream Door…

¡QUÉ HORROR! 2018

Candidate #11

CHANNEL ZERO:
BUTCHER'S BLOCK

(February 2018)

“... this is the city I come home to.

“When I walk here, I’m in two worlds at the same time. The one you see, and the one I remember.”

No, you haven’t experienced a time slip.

There are indeed two seasons of a TV show that have staked out Candidate slots in the same year, a ¡Qué horror! first!

With Butcher’s Block, it has become pointedly apparent that Channel Zero is where the best of current television horror can be found.

“You were so scared of losing your mind and then you just gave it away…”

With the insidious spectre of mental illness and the desolation of sacrifice zones some of its preoccupations, Butcher’s Block is “… particularly inspired by Argento films, by Candyman, by Nicolas Roeg films” (in the words of Channel Zero’s creator and showrunner, Nick Antosca).

Directed by Arkasha Stevenson (who brought Lynch to the, ahem, table), Butcher’s Block makes it three for three for Channel Zero, and, once again, the ante is upped for its next season, The Dream Door, directed by E.L. Katz, no stranger to these parts due to Cheap Thrills.*

With reversals, a motley crew of protagonists, and a steady, occasionally hallucinatory build to a Grand Guignol climax, Antosca, Stevenson, and company have brought us a “… particularly bizarre flavor” of horror in Butcher’s Block.

Oh, and did I forget to mention?

Rutger flippin’ Hauer is in this one!

“You know, if you don’t eat enough protein, the body just starts to eat itself. Yeah, I read that in a Reader’s Digest.

“You just get so hungry, your heart will just up and eat itself! And then it moves on to your brain, and then it goes down to your spine, and suddenly, you’re just dead!

“Happens to vegetarians all the time.”

(Channel Zero: Butcher’s Block OS courtesy of dreadcentral.com.)

*Katz also directed “A is for Amateur” for ¡Qué horror! 2015 title, ABCs of Death 2, and was an associate producer on Adam Wingard’s A Horrible Way To Die, one of the Serial Killer Thriller runners-up on the 2012 rundown.

He was also co-producer on the non-¡Qué horror! title, The Aggression Scale, so, yeah… Katz has been ‘round these parts a lot, even when he wasn’t fronting a film.

Here’s hoping he comes back for The Dream Door…

¡Qué horror! 2012

Candidate # 25

MIDNIGHT SON

(July 2011)

Let’s get down to brass tacks: writer/director Scott Leberecht’s debut feature, Midnight Son, is an excellent vampire film, the sort of atypical bloodsucker title that I’ve always been predisposed to.

I waffled a bit on this, since the “horror” isn’t as apparent in it as in other ¡Qué Horror! candidates, and I thought I’d sneak this out of the ¡Qué Horror! madness (as I’ve done this year with titles like Steven C. Miller’s The Aggression Scale). Ultimately though, this is a horror movie (at least, to my way of thinking it is), so here it is, an official ¡Qué Horror! 2012 candidate.

As with Tomas Alfredson’s Låt Den Rätte Komma In, the centerpiece of Midnight Son is a burgeoning relationship between a human and a vampire, though in this case, it’s a decidedly adult relationship. There’s also the added complication of the vampire (Zak Kilberg’s Jacob) not even knowing what it is he’s becoming exactly.

There are muted strains of body horror in this, as Jacob gradually succumbs to the bizarre urges that are consuming him, which then neatly segue into vampirism as metaphor for addiction.

This may be the kind of vampire film that isn’t for everyone, but as I said before, I’m a (heh) sucker for atypical vampire films.

And let’s face it, these days, any vampire that doesn’t do the whole Sparkle Motion thing, that’s instantly a big plus in my book.

In addition, this has got Eduardo Sánchez (whose Altered and Seventh Moon I love and reviewed here at the Iguana, and whose Lovely Molly I’m so looking forward to) as one of its executive producers, and as I’ve also found myself to be predisposed to Sánchez’s post-Blair Witch films, it made putting Midnight Son up here an awesome doubleplusgood.

Parting shot: Speaking of doubleplusgood, I’m also so looking forward to what Leberecht chooses to direct next, as well as Sánchez’s Bigfoot movie, Exists.

(Midnight Son OS courtesy of shocktillyoudrop.com.)

THE AGGRESSION SCALE

(Review)

(ag·gres·sion scale): noun: “A psychological test measuring the frequency of overt aggressive behaviors that may result in physical or psychological injury to others.”

So I waffled a bit on this since a significant portion of this film’s DNA is decidedly “thriller,” and it seemed odd to put this one up there on the ¡Qué Horror! candidate list (even with the horrific, violent bits), so here we are, outside of all of that.

Steven C. Miller’s The Aggression Scale is an interesting spin on the home invasion film, as a search for some missing money puts two young step-siblings in jeopardy.

Think Home Alone-style hijinx--where the baddies are put through the wringer by an underaged hooligan--but played with a deadly straight face; have Twin Peaks alumni Ray Wise and Dana Ashbrook, and Derek Mears (the “new” Jason Voorhees) along for the ride, as their bad guy a$$es are run ragged by The Thompsons’ Ryan Hartwig and John Dies at the End’s Fabianne Therese, and you’ll have a fair idea of what’s in store for you in The Aggression Scale.

If you ever wondered what Home Alone would have looked like if it had been made for an adult audience, well, here you go…

(The Aggression Scale DVD cover art courtesy of twitchfilm.com.)