10 Brilliant Horror Movie Concepts Not Taken Far Enough
1. Slender Man (2018)
With such a legendary creepypasta to base a film on, this film completely misses the mark.
Joey King leads a group of young girls that have been sucked in by the Slender Man mythos and decide that a sleepover is the perfect time to call upon the faceless spectre. Soon each girl finds herself haunted by the long-armed being and one by one they go missing.
Not only did Slender Man release FAR too late to capitalize on the success of the creepypasta and the resultant video game. but it somehow managed to capture none of the intrigue and downright creepiness of ether. A cast of bland and uninteresting characters explains a Slender Man mythology that is much too convoluted and not at all the child-snatching long-armed ghoul we know. Instead the films opts to depict Slender Man as an entity that must be summoned and will then then seek those who have called upon him. Turning a villain with a unique appearance, backstory and a built-in fan base into a generic "boo" movie ghost is just a crying shame and left audiences confused. The consensus is that the filmmakers didn't quite understand what they had with Slender Man and that they had squandered their opportunity.
The most baffling decision of all is the choice to rarely show the now-iconic boogeyman that audiences came to see. Perhaps in more capable hands, this would've been a worthy chill-fest and may have given as many sleepless nights as its source material.