Hello again my readers and welcome back for more 80s Horror Throwback. What could be more 80s than what we already experienced? Well, how about an obscure 1984 maniac slasher film that didn't get a massive collective of sequels? Yeah I know that many of you are confused but not every low budget slasher film was deemed necessary or worthy of sequels. Now look at some of those Fridays and Halloweens and tell me if they did a decent job all the way through. No instead of griping about lack of continuity or grasp of temporal mechanics, let's give view to actor turned director Larry Stewart in his incursion into horror. This is The Initiation.

A gaggle of sorority sisters jiggling and giggling while a deranged nutter butter stalks them? Let me guess, he escaped a secured maximum wacko basket, visited the local hardware store and is on the loose?

Our film's location is Dallas/ Ft. Worth so you got a lot of ground to cover.  Our story focuses around Kelly Fairchild (Daphne Zuniga of The Sure Thing, Modern Girls, Spaceballs, Last Rites,Melrose Place, Monkey in the Middle adn Beyond Paradise), our plucky protagonist who has a recurring dream of a strange man burning to death, screaming and flailing himself inside her childhood house. Seriously 80s, did any of the teen protagonists have a pseudo-quasi, normal childhood? If that wasn't stress enough, Kelly is taking part in initiation for her sorority house. A group of pledges have to break into her dad's department store after hours with several of her friends. Simultaneously, miles away from all this gallivanting; a sanitarium has a riot, nutters get free and a nurse has been forked to death. (I WROTE FORKED, PERVS!).

Mother and Father Fairchild cracked me up as it is Frances (Vera Miles of The Searchers, Psycho, Follow Me, Boys!, The Spirit is Willing, Hotel, Murder, She Wrote and Separate Lives) and Dwight (Clu Gulager of The Killers, The Last Picture Show, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge, Uninvited, The Return of the Living Dead, Gunfighter, Feast, Piranha 3DD, and Blue Jay). I guess more Clu Gulager equals boobs and gore for your horror film. That morning, Frances and Dwight have been notified of the escape as if a dark secret is about to rear its ugly head. Those aren't Dwight's real boobs!!! GASP!! Uh I mean Angela's a boy!!! Um Ricky has a psychic link to an annoying blind girl?

Jinkies, Kelly being a good girl is a bit concerned for the evening's event as she goes to hang out with Peter (James Read of North and South, North and South, Book II, Legally Blonde, American Dreams and Charmed)to work on her thesis for psychology and hopes to understand her nightmares. It just means you into Rick James, baby. That's all.

Back at the department store, the night porter has the life expectancy of a Starfleet red shirt. Now the killer has free reign of the multi-level store. Now to steal all the parachute pants and linen suit jackets! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Kelly, Marcia (Marilyn Kagan of Foxes, Mork & Mindy, Hart to Hart, The Ladies Club and Ellen) and Alison all agreed to split up to look for these uniforms for the initiation. Y'know, instead of the girls sticking together and Kelly leading them all to where the uniforms would be. Cause that would make sense!

While the bodies are stacking up like cord wood, Peter does a work-through with the microfilm and news clippings of convenience describing Kelly's childhood fire as a floor manager at Dwight's store.

Is the killer this Mr. Crispy? Can nothing be done to stop the maniac? What of the secret of the Yeti?

The Bold and the Beautiful fans should get a kick out of seeing Hunter Tylo a.k.a. Dr. Taylor Hayes as Alison in this flick. This is assuming The Bold and the Beautiful fans read my blog.

So with a few plot twists, a red herring here and there, this isn't a bad slasher. Daphne's performance stands out the most because she is really trying to emote and it shows. It had some genuine kill counts, some impressive gore effects, the acting was solid and honestly it was creepy. It would have been creepier, if I didn't see the writing on the wall of 80s tropes coming to fruition. That's okay. I have seen a fair amount of Horror than most.

Welcome back to Rotten Reelz Reviews. Now as last week I was busy just picking random movie and TV to put together a few convoluted and opinionated reviews as per usual. Since epinions was abandoned for paying reviews, I noticed I sat through the sequels but never bothered to give a write-up for the original.   From the creation writer/director Robert Hiltzik (Sleepaway Camp, Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers, Sleepaway Camp III: Teenage Wasteland and Return to Sleepaway Camp) comes the slasher film with the twist ending. This is Sleepaway Camp.

Yes before the campy and goofy patter of Pamela Springteen of Sleepaway Camp II and III, came Angela Baker (Felissa Rose of Taken Alive, Bloodhounds II, Dinner and Driving, Daybreak, Nikos the Impaler, Zombiegeddon, The Drone Virus and Satan's Playground) is off to summer camp with her cousin Ricky (ABC Afterschool Specials, Return to Sleepaway Camp, The Perfect House, Redemption, Blood Reservoir, Then and Again, Terror Tales, Sugar! And William Froste) at Camp Arawak and all its host of deviants. From the bullying of physically mature Judy (Karen Fields of Sleepaway Camp and Judy) and the "Camp Counselor" Meg (Katherine Kamhi of All My Children, CBS Afternoon Playhouse, Kate & Allie, Silent Madness, The Marshall Chronicles, Dragnet, The Young and the Restless and Bones) to the attempted molestation brought to you by the cook Artie (Owen Hughes of Sleepaway Camp) you can imagine the lack of happy campers. Again, a background check would solve a lot of things.

Artie cracks wise about fresh meat while getting scalded by the pot prepped for cracking corn causing his little black heart to cease to beat. So best way to deal with this is to leave him uncovered and wheeled out right in front of the kids. Camp owner Mel (Mike Kellin of Banning, The Incident, The Boston Strangler, Riot, The People Next Door, Freebie and the Bean, Midnight Express, The Jazz Singer, Fitz and Bones and Sleepaway Camp) rules Artie's demise as an accident. Also one of the longer screaming death scenes. Imagine Meatballs with gore.

Meg and Judy decide to toss Angela in the water because...well they're dicks would be my guess. Small kids hurl handfuls of sand at her and Angela proceeds to stare them down with creeper eyes. With the beach mishap aside, Meg offers a bit of tail to camp owner Mel but she needs a shower first. Aw, sprucing herself up for her sugar daddy. Hot time in the shower leads to a murder in the shower. Mel discovers her, swears vengeance and chases out to the campgrounds and stumbles upon the mutilated corpses of the very small kids that made fun of Angela. Mel remembers in a fit of rage that Ricky was there screaming he would get back at all of them and proceeds to jump the kid, slapping him around and throwing him a beating only to get an arrow through the throat. If not Ricky, then who?

How many more die tonight? Will this make Camp Arawak be less than safe for kids?

Our gore and SFX is brought to us by the FX guru Ed French (Nightmare, Sleepaway Camp, C.H.U.D., The Stuff, Necropolis, Creepshow 2, Mutant Hunt, Prime Evil, Chopper Chicks in Zombietown, Terminator 2: Judgment Days and Return to Sleepaway Camp) and brought one of the most impressive and clever twists in slasher history. More than a handful of young kids swearing profusely made me just laugh remembering how at that age was odd to say the least. While cashing in on the popularity of Friday the 13^th, these films are completely separate and it offers a warped outlook of morality, kids being kids and a disturbing backstory. FYI, Felissa Rose's cool stare will chill you to the bone, if not the soul.

Welcome back gang for Day 3 Sequels Rebound and we moved out of later 80s and early 90s to 2003 for a delightful romp of Summer Camp goodness to arrange campers to repair and maintain the camp but what could ever happen? With the isolation, next to no human contact what is the likelihood that Tracy (Katy Woodruff of Bloody Murder 2: Closing Camp,The Gallows Tree) having nightmares of her lost brother warning her of the camp. This is Bloody Murder 2: Closing Camp.

Placid Pines camp is open for business in spite of the horrors of the previous film...er I mean incidents surrounding the years as the kids are 3 days away from closing up when strange yet familiar happenings occur. The kids tell the tell of Trevor Moorhouse...insert Jason Vorhees tragedy with let's make Jason a tattle tale and disfigured and all that jazz and now Trevor roams the woods seeking revenge for how he was wronged.  Rick, the caretaker (Arthur Benjamin of Bloody Murder 2: Closing Camp) is almost done getting the place ship shape and closed for the season. He has his problem children and horn dogs but overall no issues but his new hire has left suddenly...almost like he was brutally murdered with a machete and rock.

Sheriff Bumbles (John Colton of Van Wilder: Party Liasion, The Day After Tomorrow, The Invasion and Soldiers) informs the kids that it is probably a prank but he will leave one of his deputies to co-ordinate and look around in case of trouble. Two of the camp have left due to the urban legend of Moorhouse and stereotypical superstitious Juanita (Virginia Medoza of Bloody Murder 2:Closing Camp) has done the sacred time honored tradition of Crazy Ralph warning to no avail.

With the cliches and tropes mounting up with have sensitive guy that can't get laid by the good girl who has issues of loss of sibling so he prowls around to girl with loose morals. The Sheriff is handling a few of the murders that already happened and not really busting his ass to solve this plight. With lock down of the camp with the Sheriff and his whole two deputies I don't see anything wrong in the foreseeable future. With exception of poor Elvis (Raymond Novarro Smith of Bloody Murder 2: Closing Camp, How Did You Feel?) getting stabbed and splattered across the walls.

All evidence points to Tracy's boyfriend Mike (Kelly Gunning of Undressed, Unsolved Mysteries, Leela and Bloody Murder 2: Closing Camp) on that tight camera feed Elvis set up and it looks bad for Mike. Is the curse of Trevor Moorhouse a myth??? Where they mythstaken?? Is it Myth or Mister?

A few side-notes on the film now.

The flashback sequences are all hand held, and steady hands I might add. Using one camera for blocking with a decent orchestral soundtrack with some practical effects in different gore gags. Of our cast, the only person I recognize is Tiffany Shepis (Nightmare Man,Thristy, Blood Oath, Chainsaw Cheerleaders, Bonnie & Clyde vs. Dracula and The Maladjusted) playing tough girl with feelings yet again but still a fun addition. So this film is vastly superior to the original but loaded with slasher cliché goodness that we all hold dear.