Another year in horror has about wrapped up and so it is time for the obligatory “Top 10″ lists to start appearing. Though lists are pretty much meaningless, they are fun nonetheless and as I’m making my final preparations for the Splatcademy Award nominees, I figured I’d make a brief return to the site and mention the properties I thought were unforgivably bad. As I explained with last year’s list, it’s easy to pick 10 direct to video shlock films, but this list is more representative of films that really had no business being as bad as they were.

In making this list, I realized that, surprisingly, I was having a tough time finding ten movies I really, really disliked this year. It’s been such a strange year for horror. Not a whole lot that stands out as being either really bad, or really great for that matter. A lot of the films sort of exist in this weird “could go either way, I guess” category. In some respects, maybe that’s a strength? I guess the genre must have done something right if I couldn’t immediately name 10 things I just despised. That, or maybe I just lucked out by missing the garbage. Whatever the reason, here are the ten properties I think stunk up the joint this year…..

I actually enjoyed the theatrical experience of Creature. The film captured a 90′s zeitgeist that most horror films have only begun to broach. I suspect that you’ll start seeing that a lot more as 90′s teens grow into tomorrow’s horror filmmakers. That being said, the film is noteworthy to me for reasons other than the quality itself. No doubt, there will be those who enjoy it’s quirky charms, practical fx, blatant nudity, and gross out humor (the brother/sister handjob, for example). If you’re in a certain frame of mind, I can see one enjoying this movie immensely. But honestly, the thing is poorly made junk with one of the worst endings in horror history. The whole thing is amateur hour but it has that unique aspect of getting a mainstream release and so it has a certain aura about it. The vast majority of people didn’t see it in theaters, though. So unless you were one of those “lucky” few, Creature is probably gonna leave you giggling more at the terrible filmmaking than at the gross out humor.

I remember seeing trailers for this one back in 2010, I think. It looked pretty rad. Nic Cage and Ron Pearlman fighting witches in a period piece? Sign me up. The first scene of this film is also really good, so I was like “Wow, maybe this is gonna be a gem that was overlooked due to the irrational hatred of Nic Cage that people have.” Turns out, those people were kind of right. Now I like Nic Cage. I’ll watch any movie just for Nic Cage (Drive Angry was super fun), but when Nic Cage is bad, he’s really bad. I think he picks roles based on how much fun he thinks he’ll have making them rather than the quality of the project itself. Here, he gets to argue with witches and fight demons. Sounds great in theory, but the execution is so bland and uninteresting. It’s nice to look at, though, and has some stunning cinematography, but the the last act just falls apart and turns into a really terrible CG bitch fight. Ron Pearlman does himself no favors, either. This is a movie that had potential but squandered it on a stale script with wooden performances.

Guillermo del Toro has sort of become unimpeachable to horror fans. In actuality, he’s only directed a handful of films and it’s debatable how “great” his canon is, but his name is everywhere mainly because he produces a lot of stuff. Splice, The Orphanage, Julia’s Eyes, etc. This movie was another one that had del Toro’s name plastered all over it. One thing that cannot be criticized is that del Toro stamps a distinct “look” on his films. I liken him to Tim Burton in that way. He’s always got great visuals and Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark is no different. On a technical level, this film is aces. On a “Does any of this make a lick of sense?” level, it fails utterly. The acting is bad, the CG monsters look ridiculous, character actions make no logical sense….it’s a beautiful, but muddled, film made all the more disappointing because it has these effective moments wrapped around scenes of stupidity. This will probably go down as the biggest disappointment in horror this year. It’s another film with a neat premise that squanders it at every opportunity. We rightly criticize films that talk down to the intelligence of their viewers and Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark does that constantly (Hey mom, you don’t believe me? How about looking at this arm I smashed in the bookcase? k?). This movie was insulting on that level.

If ever there were a film that the anti-PG13 crowd could get behind, it’s The Roommate. Essentially a remake of Single White Female, this one stars a couple hot chicks named Minka and Leighton who start fighting with each other and, ultimately, try to kill each other. The problem you have to overcome when watching this is “Why am I not just watching Single White Female?”, a film that is better, has hot leads who don’t have no nudity clauses, and is willing to actually show the disturbing violence rather than cut away so the Bieber lovers can see the movie without their moms present. Leighton Meester does do a good job of being bat shit insane and she has that “crazy hot” look that you can totally buy, but the film just has no ovaries and gives you nothing to care about at all. You know every beat in this movie before you even start watching it and because the violence is so tame there really isn’t anything to be truly threatened by. A total snoozer.

Fired Superman as a private detective hunting down supernatural monsters? I was sold. Then I watched the film. Brandon Routh is a terrible actor. I said it. This is a movie that looks great because it’s Hollywood. In fact, if you want to see the exact same look, watch the television show Grimm. But the jokes fall flat, the banter between Routh and his dead partner lacks any sort of chemistry, and Routh himself  solidifies the main complaint against him as Superman: zero charisma. I’m watching these guys go through the motions and not giving a shit about any of it. And I like stuff like this. One of my favorite films is Cast A Deadly Spell, something I was hoping this would be in the vein of. Instead, there was no charm. Dylan Dog is the definition of cold, dead cinema. Full disclosure, I have not read the comic source material, so I have no idea how accurate it is to the spirit of those books, but as a movie, I recommend putting it on if you have insomnia. It’s a good cure.

What can be said about this that hasn’t already been expressed by the genre community? John Carpenter’s big return to feature length horror after nearly a decade away playing videogames arrived with one of the most generic, lame ass “ghost” stories ever. This movie makes The Roommate look like a new Charlie Kaufman flick.  Maybe time will be kinder to The Ward. I suppose it’s possible that horror fans collectively were just too amped up for the return of JC, but I doubt it. This movie came on the heels of Pro-Life and didn’t do much to make us believe Carpenter still had “it”. It didn’t help that Martin Scorsese made a similar film called Shutter Island that was a million times better (and still as predictable). The jury is still out on whether Carpenter can get back to making above average genre fare, but what we definitely do know is that The Ward certainly isn’t it. Shallow, boring, lazily filmed (Take a shot every time you see that corridor dolly shot), and predictable. Carpenter should have known better.

This is probably the one selection on my list that will have people going “You’re crazy.” I fully understand that there is an amazing amount of slurpage for this show (Though I have noticed more and more criticism of it as late), but I have been a critic of The Walking Dead television show from Day 1. And I will continue to be one until it proves me wrong. As I go through the list of things that sucked this year, the main theme seems to be a total and utter lack of creativity. Most of the films on my list are just mind numbingly dull, with story lines so generic and telegraphed that it feels like they were spit out by an internet plot generator. The Walking Dead is probably the apex of that. Do a drinking game to this show. Every time you predict the next “twist”, take a shot. Anybody who has spent anytime with the zombie genre will be dead before one episode is done. Now, to be fair, I’ve heard that the television show deviates considerably from the comics. I haven’t read the comics, I’m just critiquing the show itself. To me, it’s a boring soap opera whose story is hampered by the writers having to force every overly dramatic character into the stupidest scenarios possible in order for them to be in any sort of danger. The tension never feels organic in this show. It’s always “Um, better put in a couple zombies now that we’ve discussed the Shane/Rick/Lori baby drama some more”. It’s cookie-cutter nonsense. You are more than welcome to ride my bandwagon. There’s plenty of room. Just don’t get Tebowed.

I did a full review of this film awhile back that you can read here. It’s amazing to me that people thought that the premise of the original could be expanded in any meaningful way. I guess Tom Six did the best he could with the limited concept, by trying to make it a meta commentary on horror film viewing. Then simultaneously undercutting that entire message by deciding to go full Rob Zombie and giving detailed explanations of his characters screwed up childhood. Mr. Six, you never go Full Rob Zombie. There’s no coming back from that. This is another movie that is all talk and no substance. Hell, you won’t even get the extreme violence you probably think you will based on the bluster of Six and crew. Bullshit masquerading as art-house transgressiveness. Yawn.

Wrong Turn 4 is this years 2001 Maniacs: Field of Screams.  It’s a film that feels completely rushed, with little or no thought towards making anything even half-way respectable. This one is prequel that shows the cannibal family inhabiting an insane asylum that a group of college kids end up staying at while getting lost in some snowy mountains. They then get killed by the cannibals. That’s it. This film just looks ugly on a technical level. Horrid audio issues, bad framing, nasty lighting, and winner for worst cast of the year by far. It also relies on CG blood and gore for nearly all of its kills. Did anyone want a prequel to the Wrong Turn movies? I think the franchise is fun, but it took a giant step backwards with this entry. It barely qualifies as a movie. Normally, something as bad as Tim Sullivan’s Field of Screams would be number one on this list. I mean, it would have to take a pretty shitty director to be able to top something like this….

That director would be Tim Sullivan. There is that old classic choice as to whether you’d press a button for a million dollars at the risk of killing someone, possibly close to you. I’d press the button over and over just to get rid of Tim Sullivan, family be damned. I’m convinced that this guy is single-handedly trying to destroy the horror genre. The anthology Chillerama is one of the funnest genre experiences of the year. Tim Sullivan does his absolute best to drag his talented buddies into the gutter with his entry. Werebear looks like it was made for three bucks. The humor is awful, the music is ghastly, the direction is non-existant. There is nothing of any value in it. Now, please don’t mistake this as negatively impugning Chillerama as an entire package. It’s good, and worth your time. But Tim Sullivan’s gay werewolf musical is atrocious. Like, it will make you want to break your disc in half and then castrate yourself to feel better. I can’t imagine what Adam Green, Joe Lynch, and Adam Rifkin thought to themselves when Tim Sullivan turned in his anthology entry. They were probably insanely excited about what they were putting together…and then they saw this. Oh to be a fly in the minds of those three. You know in their heart of hearts they curse Tim Sullivan’s name. This is so bad that I think it would be completely justified if they just flat out ended their friendship with him. Right there in the editing room. “Tim, fuck you, dude.” I’ve actually met Tim Sullivan. He was the definition of a pretentious cock and Teenage Werebear just oozes Tim Sullivan’s ego in every frame. It’s without a doubt the worst thing I’ve seen all year and I’m hoping that an old man with half a face delivers a box to me sometime soon. Apologies for any collateral damage

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