Turning Public Domain Children’s Media into Horror Films Sucks

Popeye, the Slayer Man

Winnie the Pooh Blood and Honey (I and II) 

Pinocchio: Unstrung 

Bambi: The Reckoning 

Peter Pan’s Neverland Nightmare 

The movies listed above, and they are actual movies that’ve been released or are soon to be released, are from the mind of Rhys Frake-Waterfield and the Twisted Childhood Universe with the exception of the Popeye movie. Given the name, the idea is that you have children’s IP and turn a horror spin on them. Bonus points if it’s media where the copyright has expired and they’re now in the public domain. 

The first slew of these movies was Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey in 2023. I thought the idea was a little cheeky and it tickled me that Winnie the Pooh’s copyright expired and some indie director decided to twist it into a horror direction. I’m all up for reimaginings, so why not? The end product, however, ended up as a gore slog with very little imagination. It’s a movie that just has some burly guys in masks vaguely looking like Winnie and Piglet and go around killing people akin to the Friday the 13th series with a much tighter budget. The script was nothing, the kills weren’t even creative, and the biggest draw to the movie is the mere idea that Winnie the Pooh kills people. So provocative! Bravo. 

Then it’s sequel and plans of a shared universe were revealed this year and I’m already over it. I love the idea of sticking it to a corporate conglomerate, but something like this is not the way to go about it if the creator’s are going to put in minimal creative effort into the projects. And then Popeye the Slayer Man was announced and had a teaser trailer. Then I looked up the creators and it wasn’t made by the same hacks as the TCU. I had this pit in my stomach after realizing that copycat creators were latching onto this “childhood character but is a killer” trope in an attempt to monetize on the honey Winnie was stirring up. Because the one thing that worse than a lousy filmmaker is the filmmaker chasing the money from the lousy filmmaker. 

The idea is just tiring. Seeing a slew of mediocre movies for the upcoming years in the form of a cinematic universe is even more draining. I understand being an indie filmmaker is a tough route to climb up the success ladder, but I don’t see how this is creatively fulfilling and reeks of a ‘get rich quick’ scheme. I say that because the moves are all there. 

1. They’re cheap to make - the first movie was made for $100,000 and it grossed $7.7 million dollars, nearly making back eighty times its budget. The sequel cost $500,000 and made $7.6 million. It only made fourteen times its budget but it’s still a great profit margin. 
2. The audience has no expectations - With a horror movie with the premise that Winnie and friends kill people, guess what? You only need to fulfill the promise that Winnie and friends will kill people and hope the idea titillates people enough to spread news of it via word of mouth. 
3. No story is required - It’s a horror film made for $100,000. Who gives a fuck about story? Focus solely on the gore and lame jump scares crammed in 90 minutes and get the fuck out. Horror schlock have thrived on this idea for nearly a hundred years and are generally where filmmakers make a name for themselves when they’re just starting out. You get no budget, no big name actors. All you have is your creativity and $20 to film it. Go get ‘em, Champ. 
4. The Premise sells itself - It’s all you need. It’s Winnie the Pooh… but he’s a serial killer. What more do you want? 

Now, I’m not opposed to this idea, but we’ve got to try harder; as creatives and as an audience. Fairy tales and children’s stories alike are how they started. You ever read the Grimm’s Fairy Tales? They’re dark and obtusely violent in an attempt to teach a lesson to children in the olden days. It’s not a strange concept to imagine Disney flicks as horror films. Guillermo Del Toro did so recently with his stop-motion adaptation of Pinnochio. That was actually a brilliant film and tied it to themes of death, fascism, and obedience, all while not buckling to the notion that it needed to be a schlockfest in order to make it an ‘adult’ adaptation. But alas, not everyone is Guillermo Del Toro and 9/10 will get a shitty take on an old story. 

I could go on a whole rant on how I’d adapt these stories into darker, scarier versions but that’s a whole other discussion. But I’d put in much more thought than Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey.