The revival Creepshow television series has been one of the Shudder’s biggest successes and now, to tide fans over until the new series, they are releasing a Halloween special. Directed by Greg Nicotero, Creepshow Animated Special transports the viewer inside the panels of an issue of the Creepshow comic to tell two macabre tales.
First up is ‘Survivor Type’, adapted from the Stephen King short story of the same name. It’s a fairly grim story revolving around a shipwrecked surgeon (Kiefer Sutherland) who starts hacking off parts of himself in order to survive. It’s told through diary entries that start coherent and focussed enough, filling the viewer in on how he found himself in this predicament. As the days progress, the narrative becomes less coherent and we have a front row seat to his journey into madness. It’s a short that is hard to forget and Nicotero captures that essence within the grisly animations. Whilst the story is narrated rather than featuring speaking characters, it’s so grotesque that it keeps you captivated.
The second story is adapted from Joe Hill’s (son of Stephen King) ‘Twittering from the Circus of the Dead’. Here we join teenager Blake (Joey King) on a road trip with her parents and brother. Bored in the back of the car, she joins Twitter and begins to tweet their journey. Things start mundane enough, but after a detour, the family find themselves strong-armed into attending a creepy circus show. As the show unfolds, things take a deadly turn. Just like the previous segment, Twittering from the circus of the Dead is also told via narration. This time there’s a little more action interspersed to make it more exciting, but after already having sat through one narrated story already, the attention lags at times.
Related: Creepshow Blu-ray review
Sutherland and King both give fantastic vocal performances, Sutherland is especially good at expressing his character’s unravelling, and King demonstrates a surprising range given the limited constraints of her character. However, having both stories play out via narration one after the other, very makes the piece feel like an audiobook. The visuals are suitably impressive, and at times ghastly, but it would have been more effective to have a little more character interaction to break up the two streams of consciousness. A third, shorter, piece in the middle might have also worked to break things up a little. In either case, Creepshow Animated Special is the perfect way to pass forty-five minutes whilst you start the pumpkin carvings and prepare for your Halloween festivities.
Creepshow Animated Special is available to watch on Shudder from Thursday 29th October.
Creepshow Animated Special
Summary
Two chilling tales of survival recounted from the dark minds of Stephen King and Joe Hill ensures that there’s more than enough nightmare fuel to make you wary of going to bed.
