It may seem unbelievable, but stories and scripts influenced by Halloween were first introduced on radio, not in movies. H.G. Wells, the well-known novelist of “War of the Worlds,” the movie version of which starred Tom Cruise, is the first perpetrator of one of the earliest, most daunting, and hair-raising Halloween stories.
H.G. Wells was the creator of the War of the Worlds. So how could people be scared by something as plain as a literary piece? A radio production made by Orson Welles is the genius behind the effective appropriation of War of the Worlds for Halloween.
“And in the news today Aliens!”
You guessed it right. Somewhere in the recent thriller/horror/comedy films of modern Hollywood, Welles’ production was remembered. Parts of War of the Worlds were used as news bulletins that were read in between the pieces of music.
Imagine hearing something as macabre as War of the Worlds as real news on an ordinary day, just before Halloween! The premise was perfect. Again, you guessed it right. People were actually scared! There was news that people actually panicked (North American listeners).
Actually, in New Jersey people were subjected to mass panic! Imagine the effectiveness of the move. It was pure genius, and a wonderful appropriation of a classic literary piece. In addition, this was just in 1930s. What would follow was a careful yet guided effort to use Halloween as a central theme in available media.
Literature
The theme of Halloween also managed to make it into printed media. Barely 15 years after the very scary radio production, the writer Anthony Boucher wrote a noir story that focused on reality and the grisly. Boucher’s story was set in California, adding to its realism.
Five years later, a North American comic series, Shock, rendered the prospect of Halloween scarier than it originally was. A hardened master of an asylum for orphans eventually got his just reward as a Halloween pumpkin. Moreover, Halloween pumpkins are hollowed out pretty well, and get some of their front coverings removed. It was a bold move, the existence and acceptance of such materials soon made Halloween an event where only a few universal themes were followed.
EC Comics also created their own spooky comics, but censoring some parts of the stories was on the rise. Before the 1960s, the American Comic Code controlled the circulation of these stories, as some of the story elements were no longer “suitable.” This caused the horror comic books to subside.
Now, comic series like “Watchmen” from Alan Moore and “Sandman” by Neil Gaiman are showing to be lucrative enterprises in the comic industry. But these stories are not endorsed by American Comics Code. ACC only supports more wholesome comic books like “Archie.”
Free TV and the movies
For some reason or another, free TV was slow to respond to the Halloween theme. Perhaps it was censorship (the religious Right) that made television productions that much more difficult.
Movies, on the other hand, fared slightly better. These were some of the more popular Halloween shows and movies made:
- Whispering Ghosts (Milton Berle)
- Footlight Serenade (Betty Grable & Victor Mature)
- Frankenstein (Boris Karloff)
- The House on the Haunted Hill (Vincent Price)
- Rosemary’s Baby (Audrey Hepburn)
- Night of the Living Dead (George Romero)
- King Kong
- Godzilla
- Psycho (Hitchcock)
- Night of the Demons
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