For me, Halloween is all about the classic movie monsters. (And, to an extent, animated TV holiday specials, but that’s another story.)
Dracula. Frankenstein’s monster. The Mummy. The Wolf Man, I guess … although whenever he shows up it always feels like the party’s over.
The seasonal blitz of movies like Hocus Pocus on Freeform’s 31 Nights of Halloween marathon back that tradition in grand old fashion, but let’s dig up some its ancestors.
As the hunchback said, walk this way …
House of (insert monster here) and (_________) meets (_________).
Universal was the undisputed king of monster movies. Turner Classic Movies has been replaying a lot of them lately. Near the end of the golden age of monster flicks, Universal just started throwing them together in random combinations as a blatant cash-grab, so you see movies like Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, House of Frankenstein, House of Dracula and, inevitably, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein and Abbott and Costello Meet The Mummy (which, I’m sorry, is just horrible). The monster actors switch roles all the time and, in a cruel trick of space-time, the production values actually get progressively worse as the years advance. In the late 1990s, animated direct-to-video movies paired the Wolf Man and Frankenstein with Alvin and the Chipmunks, and at least one of them was better than many of the later black-and-white live action romps.
DuckTales: ‘Ducky Horror Picture Show’
Scrooge McDuck hopes to capitalize on monster movie mania and scare up some business with his new convention center, but gets more than he bargained for when a gathering of what he thinks are actors turns out to be real beasts.
Konami’s Castlevania games
While centered on Count Dracula and the Belmont clan of vampire killers, a trek through the castle grounds is a veritable who’s who of classic monsters. If a problem comes along, you must whip it.
Castle Ravenloft
This classic D&D adventure module, recently updated for a newer edition of the game as well as converted to a board game, also centers on a vampire count, but his eerie abode and the surrounding lands are swarming with werewolves, zombies, ghouls and other creeps.
Being Human
The UK hit about ghost, vampire and werewolf roommates, translated to an also-successful Americanized version on Syfy, is a modern equivalent to the classic monster mashups, but the humor is more subtle and reflective of life in a real world that’s as terrifying as any horror flick.
True Blood
Bon Temps is home to vampires, fairies, maenads, witches, werewolves and other shapeshifters. Love bites.
The Twilight Saga
Vampires that sparkle and werewolves without shirts. It’s just like a drugstore Halloween costume aisle on Oct. 30…
What are YOUR favorite classic monster team-ups?
