Ho Hum Halloween

There comes a time when you’ve garnered so much success that you feel the need to alienate your audience. I have not found such fortune, yet I plan to do the latter all the same.

Halloween is a time of tradition, a time for indulging in what makes you feel complete. It may be colors, childhood memories, repetitive movies and media, or familiar activities. While new happenings trickle in from time to time, often it’s what we do again and again that forms the basis for what we consider to be the true experience.

So let me dump all over five things that just do little to nothing for me. I’ll admit that this isn’t a list of things I explicitly dislike, but rather those that leave me with a bit of apathy or feel like they’ve been blown out of proportion in the social zeitgeist. Hopefully once you get to the bottom, I’ve explained my thoughts, and you’ll still be angry all the same.

Spirit Halloween

We’ll start with the least controversial item. Based on some offline feedback on the last previous article, which I have no proof was ever said, there’s still love for the smaller Halloween shops. Corporations are usually an easy target too, even if few want to forego the convenience they offer.

Now, this wasn’t always the case. I remember when Spirit first started expanding, and it was novel to have a dedicated outlet for the season. This was a time of drugstore decorations and Walmart costumes, so it was a blessing to have everything in one place. The best part was November 1st, when everything was half off. I’d try unsuccessfully to get there and stock up for the following year, but not as often as I’d like.

With the passage of time, however, it feels like it caters only to the major franchises, overprices the props, and overall feels soulless. I suppose for the meat and potatoes of Halloween prep, it does the job, but without any sense of flair—at least insofar as the way I like to celebrate. Sure, the yearly setups are cool and still worth visiting just for that purpose, but I’d be hard-pressed to buy anything.

I hate to say that the corporate entity that is Target somehow comes up with fresher concepts. Not as much in recent years, since I’ve found that somewhat lackluster lately, but it’s at least reasonably priced. Otherwise, I’m happy finding other local options.

Halloween Songs

I admit, I’m a purist when it comes to Christmas music. None of this pop nonsense or anything written in the past century. But this isn’t about holiday tunes—we’re talking the spooky stuff. But that introduces another problem. What is Halloween music?

Surely there are ones directly associated with the day in question, but I can’t recall too many. As much as people give Insane Clown Posse grief, I believe they actually fulfill that void more so than most. Heck, they have entire albums dedicated to it, but they’ll never make the playlists.

Instead, we get quasi-tangential connections as long as the theme is borderline spooky. Monster Mash? Sure. It’s vintage and fun. Purple People Eater? Eh, maybe, but it’s pushing the boundaries. Zombie by the Cranberries? I think we’re putting a little too much stock into the title.

I guess the main issue I have is that it doesn’t really set the mood or get me into one. A proper Christmas song and a candle are a magic wand when I need a quick fix of holiday cheer. I can’t say Thriller does much for me.

I will give credit to horror themes and the cassette tapes of random spooky sounds, but those aren’t really streaming-radio friendly. And speaking of horror…

Horror Movies

Much like music, how many horror movies deal with Halloween proper? Most of them aren’t even horror movies and tend to delve more into fun-atmospheric territory—not that I have much issue with that. It’s more preferable, actually.

But binging a horror movie just because it’s October doesn’t do much for me. I chalk it up to being hyper busy all season, so dedicating time to movies just doesn’t fit into my schedule. I suppose it is, like most things, that I have a certain aesthetic that I chase that slashers and torture porn don’t come close to touching.

Far from being a downer, I’ll suggest a few that do fit the bill: Satan’s Little Helper, Murder Party, and Trick r’ Treat.

Nightmare Before Christmas

Stop motion has always been fascinating for me. How tactile it is, despite the shortcomings. Spanning almost the history of film (or all of it if you consider the galloping horse an early form), I adored everything from the Claymation Christmas to the early entries in the 60s like Jason and the Argonauts. So, you must be wondering why I didn’t like The Nightmare Before Christmas. Well, that’s because I DID like the movie—in 1991. It was a cute spin on the holiday-themed movies and elevated the archaic methods of stop motion into the computer age. It was flawless in execution, funny, and charming.

Then we promptly forgot about it for ten years.

Hot Topic at the time was still catering to the goth aesthetic during its heyday in a non-ironic fashion. They still had darkwave and industrial samplers for sale. Heck, they still had music for sale. But around this time, it went from subculture to pop culture. Rather than dealing with things that might be seen as strange in the public eye, they adopted certain safe franchises that the public might still disapprove of but would be okay with as long as you feel you’re in on the joke. Take Napoleon Dynamite, for example. I’ve never seen it, but from an outside perspective, it appears to be something that we don’t have to take seriously, thus making it immune to any contrary opinion.

And did they latch onto The Nightmare Before Christmas in the same way… The Tim Burton aesthetic had reached its pinnacle and formed the perfect meld between the macabre and marketability. For the 10th anniversary, the movie was brought back and has never left since. I will give credit for there not being a sequel cash grab, but I don’t believe they’ll ever need to worry about a steady flow of sales despite this.

My main issue is generally the mixing of Halloween and Christmas. I like each equally, but I prefer to give them their due. If anything, I wish there was a bit more time before Christmas, since I begin my Halloween prep in late July, and that doesn’t divvy up the celebrations fairly. Mixing them up or feeling the need to make Christmas scary in order to uphold some street cred never sat well with me. There are several months for the darker side of life, and then once it’s over, you can enjoy something a bit more lighthearted.

I know Nightmare Before Christmas had a point to it, and it very explicitly pointed out the issues of merging the holidays, but marketing doesn’t care. Snow globes of mausoleums, haunted Christmas trees, twisted ornaments. It’s all very much geared towards a cynical approach to the wholesomeness I find more comforting. It’s akin to the people on Facebook announcing that ‘they celebrate Krampus.’ No disrespect to the cultural origins of the tradition, but you can tell it’s just an attempt to be too cool for something that’s actually nice for once.

Salem

Oh, Salem. Much like everything on this list, it holds some good memories. Visiting two decades ago was a treat, especially towards the evening/night. People roaming the street in elaborate costumes, preachers warning against the condemnation of your soul, and random events around every corner that add to the atmosphere. You could tell that it was a capitalization on the 17th-century mythos, but it was generally in fun

I suppose little has changed, but some of the spectacle has dulled. Going back, especially during daylight hours, reveals a relatively modern city with vague witchiness thrown in without any discernment as to what ‘witch’ means. The Wiccans have latched onto it due to the loose terminology link, even if they are worlds apart. Much of the witch trial history is approached with a tut-tut attitude about backwards people from a less enlightened time doing things that go against modern sensibilities. In that regard, I don’t disagree, but in a time where winter mortality was at fifty percent, perhaps I’d react differently when a cow gave me an evil eye and cursed my existence.

In retrospect, the witch fervor was relatively short-lived. There’s a book that came out a few years after the events, where a minister sailed over from England and more or less settled the disputes and dispelled the superstitions. But it’s popular to be edgy.

If you do go, the Black Cat Tour is pretty good. They don’t indulge in the drama as much and even give some other Salem history from more recent times. Some of the others appear to just relish in how much they disliked religion, with the setting providing an undeniable excuse to do so. One group took a break near the ‘creepy statue,’ which just ended up being a rather benign figure of Mary with children.

Combine that with people kicking over gravestones of the accusers, the bleak parking situation, the endless crowds, and the exorbitant prices, and I’m okay not taking time in October to make that a stop. I did an article a while back on an off-season event, which is a much better time, in my opinion.

Hopefully next week I can be in better spirits and do something like fail at baking cookies again.