Rey (Dorky big sibling)

This blog is SFW, but isn't appropriate for everyone.

- Some of my interests include Horror, Call of Duty, and and other scary/violent content.

Feel free to reach out! I'd love to make friends with other middles or be a big sibby for others!

- I cuss when im feeling on the bigger side

Sometimes goosebumps kinda drops its horror angle and just becomes fantasy adventure. This is one of those. The title, Creep from the Deep, made me think it might have something to do with either one of my favorite 2 originals, Deep Trouble and Calling all Creeps. Sadly it didnt really have anything to do with either.

I honestly cant say I loved this one. It wasnt bad, but a few things didnt fully work with me. I really liked his crazy imagination in concept, and often its put to good use. It allows the narration to embellish and then backtrack in a way that feels more natural. The book isnt lying to us, Billy is just an unreliable narrator for the moment. My issue comes with his superhero fantasy. Every so often there will be a third person sentence of Billy gloating about how cool his superhero identity is, but it never changes anything. He doesnt act brave or reckless because of this fantasy or anything, he doesnt act like he believes these stories even a little bit. Hes a pretty normal kid despite the narration implying hes more of an oddball.

The villains were also a little off. Most Goosebumps books have a quirky or weird villain. Even when it does traditional monsters it usually puts a twist on them. But the villains of this are just evil skeletons. Ghost pirates who want treasure. The entire book is the protags doing a fetch quest for the pirate captain to get their uncle back. When they do what he wants he says "Actually I love lying so much that I wont give him back", and then they throw a peice of wood at him and he instantly dies. The villains just arent a threat to anyone and arent super funny or memorable either.

I asked myself "what is even happening" multiple times while reading because things just kinda occur for the sake of adding excitment or somwthing kinda scary to the story. I didnt dislike it, but definately not my favorite.

Enter Horrorland

Im only 3 books in right now, but I think this has been my favorite. Its classic Goosebumps stuff. Annoying younger kid, oblivious parents, and a good twist. A really strong start.

Britanny is probably the most relatable protagonist so far. Some of the other protagonist have been given gimmicks, but Britanny is just a normal person who likes painting. She genuinely tries to be nice to her demon of a cousin. Her best friend Molly is allowed to be mean to him, which is pretty cathartic.

I really liked the twist that Slappy wasn't alive until near the end. Ethan consistently acts scared around the dummy, but still brings him everywhere. And you can genuinely suspend your disbelief to think that hes a kid whos so scared he does whatever slappy says. It feels logical when the girls read the words thst can bring him to life thinking it'll put him back to sleep. A lot of the time in these books the characters make some pretty boneheaded decisions, which doesnt always take me out of the story, but its appreciated when It doesnt happen. Also that they dont defeat him by saying the words again! They bring in the mind stealer doll, who was basically fake out from earlier in the book, to beat him.

As a kid I never read all of these books. I had a lot of the original series, and only read a handful of the horrorland ones, but its kinda cool reading them now. The characters have phones and have acess to the internet, and actually use them when applicable! Goosebumps being aggressively 90s was never a problem, but I can appreciate it being super 2000s as well.

Enter Horrorland:

Okay, last the Horrorland segment. And I gotta be honest, I think these are going to be consistently my least favorite parts of these books. I love horrorland and theme parks in general, but by the third book these parts seem to always follow the same pattern. Every scary thing that happens is usually a complete fake-out. And even when they dont immediately tell you its fake, I'm all too aware that we have another 10 books to go, so nothing important is going to happen until the other 70% of the characters will be introduced. Im still reading them, because I like these characters, but they drag a little.

I just wanna talk about these things for a bit. My memories. Ill go in order I suppose.

If you like weird surreal media go watch puff the magic dragon, in the land of lies. Its a sweet cartoon meant to teach kids morals but it does so in such a strange way. I saw it when I was a little kid. I loved the song so my mom must have borrowed it from the library. The court scene really scared me. Im not scared of it anymore but man its still weird.

https://youtu.be/6BV5Ar9qIzk?si=uvG-sojhChBdbD2y

I lied about going in order. I never realized how afraid of plant horror i always was. I think its really cool now, vine monsters. But as a kid it was terrifying to me. The monster from jumanji looks comically fake now, but its slimy rubbery texture combined with how it shot those needle like thorns really got to me. Stay out of the basement was another huge fear. The show scared me first, but the cover of the book is still creepy. And honestly, a lot of things in the page Master were uncanny. The goo in the library, Mr. Hyde, even the ending where the books go back to being inanimate. But that bean stalk stuck with me. The idea of a plant strangling me from the inside was horrifying. Still is, and seeing it so well animated didnt help.

That damned cover for a nightmare in my closet. Ive always been kinds scared of abstract monsters like that. Humanoid but with our traits missing or exaggerated. I was always scared of where the wild things are. This gave me that feeling for the first time.

The next two were meant to be scary, but the occupy space in my brain. As a kid I had a midway machine in my basement that had sinistar on it and man did that voice freak me out. My neighbor would threaten to play it if he wanted to make me upset for some reason or another. Wheelers are scary to this day, i dont know how they let that get into the movie.

Swarm in Spider-man and his amazing friends. Hes so funny looking back, but something about the way he made people sprout wings and antenna got to me. Especially when it happened to aunt may.

Last one is from a Garfield book i had. Honestly the image of the cat monster wasn't what was that scary. It was how he warned Garfield in such a calm way. He just said before night time something like "yeah on some nights I change. Im not myself anymore" and just left it at that. Don't know why it was thst easy to build up suspense in me but it was.