Strangely Naked

Paranormal entities have strange tendencies. Evil spirits in particular seem to have no sense of timing. Either they’re strangely dedicated to a slow-build or they immediately tip their hand.

You’ve probably heard about the Amityville Horror, if not, here’s a synopsis: crazy dude murders his family in the house, new family moves into house then claim to be terrorized by evil spirits. But if you’ve read the book or seen the multiple movies about this haunting, the ghosts do a slow build to the truly horrifying. The same thing with the movie Poltergeist, the house is built on an Indian burial ground and the evil spirits (that’s probably a racist characterization) want the family out. In both cases, why do the spirits start subtly and build up to the crazy bleeding walls and flies everywhere and sucking a child into a television? Why not start with that if you don’t want the people in the house?

If the spirits really don’t want the family in the house, why not start when the realtor is giving them the walk-through!?! “It’s a three bedroom but one of the bedrooms smells like burning tires and has sentient dolls who will murder your pet dog. But that won’t affect your decision, right?”  And with haunted houses, the ghosts are never playful. It’s never that the ghost enjoyed the house and also wants you to enjoy the house so you wake up and the ghost has made you coffee or you’re bored and the ghost makes potatoes dance like Benny and Joon.

These are all malevolent ghosts who just so happen to have a sense and tendency toward dramatic escalation like it’s a video game and they have to unlock achievements? Step one: make rocking chair rock. Step 2: glowing red eyes in mirrors and in windows. Step 3: appear in pictures. Step 4: leave painful red welts on people. Step 5: oozing walls. Step 6: the most menacing thing ever, playing Jimmy Buffet’s “Cheeseburger in Paradise” on an endless loop at deafening volume.

“Okay, guys, we got a new family, let’s throw plates at them and make their baby crawl on the ceiling!”

“Dammit, Billy, we are malevolent spirits who are trapped here for eternity, we can’t blow our load before they’ve even unpacked their boxes! Patience.”

On the other side of the malevolent spirit coin is demonic possession where the evil spirit loses all sense of subtlety and immediately starts with head spinning and vomit. If you’re a demon trying to escape Hell by taking possession of a little girl, wouldn’t you just lay low and do some of your evil shenanigans on the sly? You can still masturbate with a crucifix (not an endorsement) but you don’t have to do it in front of a priest, that’s a bit like buying a muscle car in your 40’s, your inadequacy is showing.

Just relax, demon. We all know you’re excited to be out of Hell, but you’re like a teen boy on prom night, maybe settle down a bit. You’re tipping your hand too quick. Savor the experience. If you really need to indulge the demonic tendencies maybe give the kid a crippling addiction or get her into stock trading, the slow evil.

Wait a second, I just realized all I’m doing is giving tips to evil entities.