Necessary Evil: Columbus Day Slasher Movie!

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

Welcome back, my horror-loving ladies and gents! We are indeed back with a second helping of our new column of Necessary Evil! It was a blast reading all the comments (both positive and hateful) regarding our last (and first ever) Necessary Evil that proposed the possibility of Dr. Sam Loomis getting his own TV show! So, let’s keep this horror-idea-generating train powering forward with a new and timely proposition that has yet to befall our beloved genre! We have finally reached our favorite month of the year: October! The month that contains a holiday that I can’t believe has yet to be used as a basis for a slasher movie. I’m speaking, of course, about Columbus Day!

IDEA: A slasher movie that takes place on and/or around Columbus Day.

OUTLINE: Nearly every national holiday has a horror movie! Holidays are normally times of joy, peace, happiness, or honor, which are a direct 180 to the elements of a horror movie, specifically the slasher sub genre. I think that is why the combination of holiday and horror works so well. From Days that are widely popular (Halloween) to ones a bit obscure (Graduation Day), the concept is rich with fun potential!

Columbus Day has yet to be treated to a horror offering and I say it’s time for that to change! The idea would fit so perfectly into the slasher template of exploitative entertainment and the background of Christopher Columbus can be nicely utilized as well. Maybe the killing starts because someone took someone else’s land (as many claim Columbus did to Native Americans). Hell, maybe a character of Native American descent gets accidentally killed, which triggers our slasher’s vengeful slaughter? You dress our killer up in a Christopher Columbus mask and garb, and then have the psycho stalk his prey with a tomahawk and bow and arrow. Make it as twisted, offensive, and gory as you want! That’s the point!

WHY IT COULD WORK: Remember Eli Roth’s glorious fake trailer for Thanksgiving? It beautifully summed up the “holiday slasher” entity and people loved it. Why an actual movie still hasn’t been made is beyond me. The point is, horror fans tend to inherently enjoy their slasher movies when the carnage centers around a particular Day that is specially called out on the calendar!

CHARACTERS: Okay, it’s a slasher movie, so we all probably have a pretty good idea of what characters it will consist of. Yeah, it should probably take place in Small Town USA, so we’d need a bunch of high school kids to help pad the body count as well as the mystery of who the killer could be.

However, I say we also try to add a little freshness to the typical slasher character MO and add in a bunch of adult central characters. Maybe a farmer or a history teacher or some blue collar worker? Perhaps even set part of it in a retirement home and have some really old people step up to the slasher genre?

Regardless of whoever the characters end up being, the only non-negotiable must-haves would be a Final Girl and an Ahab because some classics just never die.

CONCLUSION: Slasher movies are very popular. The ones that take place on or around holidays seem to possess a little extra panache that makes for an even more enjoyable experience. Halloween, Black Christmas, Bloody New Year, My Bloody Valentine, Mother’s Day, and even Leprechaun are all fine examples. Columbus Day has yet to be claimed for the slasher genre. I say that fertile land is ripe for the taking!

So, how do you feel about this second outing of Necessary Evil? Are you a fan of horror on holidays and hope to see one on a Day that has yet to be made? Are there any other yet untapped holidays that deserve their own slasher outing? Kindly fire them bullets below! And if you have any ideas that you think should be made into horror reality, let me know at [email protected].