B-Grade Horror: Better Isn’t Always Best, But Sometimes More Is More

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Army of Darkness, B-Grade Horror, Bruce Campbell, Evil Dead 2, horror films, Ray Harryhausen, The Evil Dead, Vincent Price

You’ve heard the phrase, “It’s so bad, it’s good”? Or “He’s so ugly, he’s cute”? Well, that’s exactly how I like my horror movies: So bad, they’re good.

With the 2016-17 television season pretty much over for the summer, I’ve found myself with more time to watch movies. Wanting something scary and fun, I decided I would revisit some ’80s cult classic horror: Sam Raimi’s “Evil Dead” trilogy.

The first film, “The Evil Dead” premiered in 1981. Its sequel, “Evil Dead 2” came six years later in 1987. The final film, “Army of Darkness” closed out the series in 1992.

Dynamation Creations: My Top 10 Ray Harryhausen Creatures

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#Harryhausen100, Clash of the Titans, cyclops, hydra, Jason and the Argonauts, Kali, Medusa, Ray Harryhausen, Skeleton Army, stop-motion animation, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad

So, I’ve had Ray Harryhausen on the brain lately, though he’s never very far from my mind because I follow the Ray & Diana Harryhausen Foundation‘s account on Twitter.

A few weeks ago, they were tweeting about a number of Harryhausen’s movies that would be airing in the UK over the bank holiday weekend. One of the films was “It Came From Beneath the Sea” — a fabulous sci-fi thriller from 1955 which features an amazing giant octopus created by Ray.

It also happened to be a film I had never seen. So that was my Tuesday night sorted out! Side note: I watched the colourized version, and while I normally don’t like to see the colourization of black and white films (or photography for that matter), this movie definitely benefited from the addition of colour!

The four-year anniversary of the animation legend’s death was earlier this month, and while I was programming some tweets for the day, I reread my previous post, “Creature Feature: Ray Harryhausen’s Mythical Menagerie“. Then a friend sent me a link to a Harryhausen article on one of my new favourite blogs: Wolfbane Blooms. A few days later, Wolfbane Blooms posted yet another Harryhausen article that really piqued my interest: “The 10 Best Ray Harryhausen Monsters“.

A list. You KNOW I love lists! And monsters. And Ray Harryhausen. Sooo… surely you know what’s coming now: My own top 10 list! Now, since Ray didn’t like using the term “monster” for his creations, I’m not going to limit my list to only the “monsters”. After all, not all of his creatures were baddies!

Creature Feature: Ray Harryhausen’s Mythical Menagerie

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Clash of the Titans, Dynamation, Jason and the Argonauts, Ray Harryhausen, Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger, special effects, stop-motion animation, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad

They say there’s an exception to every rule. Normally, I would balk at this a little bit. But when it comes to my extreme dislike (okay, my sheer terror) of stop-motion animation, surprisingly, this is all too true.

My completely rational fear of stop-motion/Claymation all stems from one fateful Christmas time viewing of “The Little Drummer Boy” in grade 2. Seriously, the kid’s father gets knifed (er, sworded?) right in front of him. And ME. So while the rest of the class was all “Aww, he’s playing his drum for Jesus!”, I was sitting in the corner, crying and traumatized for the rest of my life. I’m 28 years old, and if you handed me $100 to watch that now? I’d emphatically decline your offer. You sick sadist.

But in that dark, disturbing world of creepy clay models, moving literally one frame at a time, lies something truly incredible. Something that I can’t help but like. And his name was Ray Harryhausen.

Harryhausen was a true pioneer. A legend in the realm of animation, his scale model creatures breathed life into a pre-CGI film world. Perhaps his most recognizable work (and my personal favourite) is the skeleton army from “Jason and Argonauts”.

Ray Harryhausen’s skeleton army from “Jason and the Argonauts” (1963)

Omigosh, they’re so cool.