by Joe Vampire

The holidays have descended upon us again, and you know what? I got the bug. I’m feeling generous. This is the official season of giving and I’m gonna give! Unfortunately, you’re not getting something awesome. This is more like getting chlamydia. But, at least I’m warning you?

Today I’m going to give you a list that will be perfect inspiration for your Christmas Holiday / New Years list. I’m going to tell you about some strange, terrible, and ridiculous movie monsters.

10.  Giant, fluffy bunnies (from Night of the Lepus)

You know what the internet loves? (Besides horrific p*rnography, of course.) Cute animals! The internet loves cute animals, as evidenced by the ubiquity of the cheezburger hasing lolcats. In this day and age, there’s no way that anybody could be scared by a movie about big, evil rabbits. But, was this the case back in the dark ages of 1972?

Yes. Yes it was. They didn’t even show the rabbits in the trailer of this movie. That’s how little confidence the marketing department at MGM had in the ability of the bunnies to frighten.I don’t blame them, though. When the rabbits are shown onscreen, it’s painfully obvious that they had either been filmed in front of miniatures to look larger or poorly pasted on top of the human actors in an example of blue screen technology going horribly wrong. Faced with an objectively bad movie and a stupid monster, the only way that this movie could have gotten people in the seats would be based on the hope that people didn’t know that Lepus is the name of the rabbit constellation next to Orion’s foot.

“That's no ordinary rabbit.  That's the most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodent you ever set eyes on!”

9.  The Sharktopus (from the SyFy Original Movie, Sharktopus)

First things first, watch this trailer.

Now, thank legendary schlockmesiter-extraordinaire Roger Corman. With nearly 400 movies under his belt and a career stretching back to the early 50s, I can guarantee that you’ve seen at least one thing that he has touched. Much as King Midas had a touch that turned everything to gold, Roger Corman has a touch that turns every movie into low camp. I really don’t need to talk about the movie or the monster because you already know everything about both when I say it’s a SyFy Original produced by Roger Corman called Sharktopus.

Coming soon: Piranhaconda! 
That’s not a joke.

Oh yeah, Sharktopus can go on land and stuff, too, because of course he can

8.  Edward Cullen (from Twilight and other movies that I won’t watch)

My own personal feelings towards every teenage girl’s favorite sanguiphage notwithstanding, [damn books ruined my pseudonym and damn movie made more than my Muppets!] this is one of the dumbest versions of a vampire on record. Since he’s supposed to be a monster, we’ll ignore Edward’s fits of blind rage and general behavior that would net a real guy a restraining order. It’s the other stuff that’s wrong. This is a monster who is a “vampire vegetarian” (i.e. doesn’t go after humans), sparkles in sunlight (making him even more “perfect and beautiful” instead of you know, dying in a giant ball of fire), and has been going to high school for 80 years. 80 years! Do you remember high school? That place was awful! Who would willingly do that more than the four years you have to go? It’s not like the high school curriculum is valid to the vampire career path.

I’m not even going to get into the issues raised with the fact that this guy was over 100 when he met Wet Burlap Sack [note: I don’t remember the girl’s actual name, so I named her after her personality], who was actually of appropriate high school age OR the weirdness of waiting over 100 years to have sex for the first time. (Which works how, exactly?)

I don’t know about you guys, but that sounds like a pretty terrible monster to me.

“Get in line, ladies”

7.  The Pale Man (from El Laberinto del Fauno [Pan’s Labyrinth])

Let’s cleanse the palate for a moment. This creature is the product of Guillermo del Toro, who has a true talent for developing frightening creatures, and this guy is actually a scary monster. Why is he on the list? Well, he’s a little strange. The Pale Man keeps his eyes on the table when they aren’t embedded in his hands, has flesh hanging off his gaunt frame as though he once weighed much more, possesses a varying, unnatural gait, craves the flesh of children (and faeries, which is just plain evil), and has no genitalia. The Pale Man is creepy, strange, weird, and will give you nightmares forever.

The last thing he eats is your soul.

6.  The Goblins (from Troll 2)

No, I didn’t mistype that. Believe it or not, Troll 2 does not have a single troll in the movie. In fact, Troll 2 isn’t even related to the first Troll movie (which did have trolls). But what Troll 2 lacks in trolls it makes up for in goblins with burlap sacks for costumes, masks that feature no moving parts and some of the worst “acting” that has ever been committed to film. Taking place in the town of Nilbog [I see what you did there], the plot of Troll 2 centers on a tow-headed young man who has to learn the hard way not to “piss on hospitality.” There’s also a really, really sexy scene involving an ear of corn. What more is there to say? Just look at them.

Why do I watch these things?

5.  Horrible Mutated Snail Woman (from Tokyo Gore Police)

Since “The Worst Monsters Japan Has Put on Screen” is an obvious article for later, I will only select one creature. What horrible abomination will it be?

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

RUN AWAY!  KILL IT!  KILL IT WITH FIRE!

Why do I do this?  *sobbing*

4.  Belial, the evil parasitic conjoined twin (from Basket Case)

If you remember going to video rental stores in the 1980s and 90s, I can all but guarantee that you saw this cover at every place you went and it intrigued you.

You may or may not have let the curiosity get the better of you. If you didn’t, you’re a better person than I. If you did, then you were treated to the story of a man and his evil, formerly-conjoined twin, Belial. It’s not all his fault though, if you’re named Belial you kind of have to be evil. It’s just how it goes. It’s like being named Jeeves. If you’re Jeeves, you’re gonna buttle.

The plot of Basket Case (review) basically has to do with the fact that Belial is incredibly pissed off that he was surgically separated from his brother, Duane (who carries a usually hidden Belial around in a basket), and wants to get revenge on the doctors who performed the surgery. And get ridiculous revenge he does!

Man, Billy Corgan is looking GOOOOD these days!

It’s cheesy, you can see the seams on the monster and sometimes you can see the puppeteer’s hand. "Basket Case" may not be good, but at least it’s sometimes entertaining (read the MoreHorror.com exclusive interview with 'Basket Case' Director Frank Henenlotter) unlike:

3.  Uncle Sam (yeah, that Uncle Sam) (from Uncle Sam)

This film is awful and the monster is somehow even worse. If you were the type of person who gets aroused by puns and violence revolving around jingoistic patriotism you’d love it. But since that description only includes Michelle Bachmann, who I think was actually just made up to scare children, it is therefore impossible to like this movie about a soldier who died in the first Gulf War due to friendly fire. Oh yeah, that soldier happened to be a total psychopathic überpatriot named Sam who rose from the dead on July 4th to kill people… for some reason.

I’d say more but according to the Patriot Act, if I say just one more bad thing about this movie and/or its monster, I will be declared an enemy of the state due to disparaging a great symbol of this county. So to make sure I keep my citizenship: bald eagles, Dallas Cowboys, NASCAR, and Pabst Blue Ribbon! Woooooooooooo! Go America!

He wants you…dead.  I wish I was.

2.  The Baby (from Eraserhead)

The only movie on this list worth watching besides Pan’s Labyrinth, Eraserhead is also the most difficult of all these films to watch. The upsetting visuals, unsettling score, and unnatural dialog combine to make an excruciating experience. It’s not excruciating in, say, an Uwe Böll-movie way, but rather just feels oppressive, yet compelling. Of all the unsettling elements in the movie – and this is a movie that shows sperm-like creatures falling from the “sky” while a woman with a distorted face sings a song inside a radiator – the baby is the worst.

The baby is the culmination of nearly every horrible fear that a person who has ever even thought of having children has had. Looking at it and hearing it makes me want to go through no fewer than eight vasectomies to make sure that I could never produce such a monster. The child is born extremely premature, incredibly deformed and incessantly cries in a truly disturbing manner. It’s no wonder that the main character makes a certain decision at the end. Piece of advice: don’t click on that last link before bed.]

According to Lynch, nobody has yet done an accurate analysis of this movie.  This is probably a good thing because if you are able to do an accurate analysis of Eraserhead, you are crazy.  Certifiably, objectively, belonging-in-a-loony-bin crazy.

I will not be sleeping for a week and now you won’t either.

1.  The Death Bed (from Death Bed: The Bed that Eats)

A lot of this list has been populated by some of the dumbest monsters from some of the worst movies of all time. The Death Bed is no exception. Death Bed: The Bed that Eats has such a stupid origin that I refuse to type it. Instead I am just going to copy and paste from Wikipedia: “A large, black, four-poster bed, possessed by a demon, is passed from owner to owner. The Demon was a tree, who became a breeze and seemingly fell in love with a woman he blew past. The demon then took human form and conjured up a bed. While he was making love with the woman she died and his eyes bled onto the bed, causing it to become possessed.” There’s a reason this didn’t get released until 2003, though made in 1977.

There was a happy ending for one person though, the man whose hands disintegrate in the video below went on to play Ben Savage’s dad on Boy Meets World. So there’s that…

If you can explain the look on that woman’s face at any point during that clip, you’re a smarter person than I.

What a bunch of garbage.

This guest article was written by Joe Vampire, who works at a company that sells scary costumes all year round. He watched these movies so you don’t have to.