I’m old. By the time Stine’s Fear Street series came out, I was deep into Stephen King. I was reading big boy horror with big boy scares (and even some sex scenes!). I didn’t have time for teen spookiness! My first real exposure to Stine was through my then girlfriend’s younger brother. He loved the Goosebumps books. I may have casually perused one or two at the time, but I don’t remember actually reading any. I did watch the Goosebumps movie (and reviewed it!) back when I was slowly easing my kid into horror so I could have a horror buddy at home (the wife is not a fan). It was not great as a horror movie but it was fun to watch with a 7-year-old. I also watched Netflix’s Fear Street trilogy and liked it quite a bit. So, when choosing my 31st film for the October 2025 Halloween Havoc Horror HoedownTM, I went with one set on/around Halloween, new-to-me, and based on one of the (if not the) highest selling horror author’s works – R.L. Stine’s Pumpkinhead. Let’s get into it, shall we?
Cassie moves from the big city to a podunk farm town with her teen sons, Sam and Finn. Finn, the elder son, is pretty emotionally mature and taking the move in stride. Sam is a whiny, pouty baby making everyone’s life harder by sharing his misery. The townsfolk are welcoming – especially the sheriff – and invite the family to their annual harvest celebration at Old Man Palmer’s farm. Palmer is gruff, but generously shares the bounty of his fertile fields with everyone. Just don’t go in his locked barn snooping around! Sam does exactly that and finds a strange pumpkin atop a pile of vines. What does the brat do? He steals it of course! When Finn finds out, he takes the quickly rotting thing back to the barn but doesn’t come back. When Sam tells his mother and the sheriff that his brother is missing, they think he’s kidding. You see, they have no recollection of anyone named Finn! Sam enlists the help of the neighbor girl, Becka, and local hermit, Rusty, to find his brother and get to the bottom of this mysterious farm and its guardian scarecrow.
I did a micro-review last year for Slay, which is also from this film’s writer/director, Jem Garrard. It was fun and funny with a nice layer of camp. The same can be said of this film. The camp in this case is found in campy throwback horror (as opposed to vaudeville/draggy camp). Garrard even included Slay as a bit of an easy-to-spot easter egg here. And despite my harsh description of the Sam character, it is developmentally appropriate for a 13-year-old to be sulky when they’ve been uprooted from their city life after the death of their dad. The audience ends up rooting for the kid and his plucky, sarcastic friend. They make for a good pair of adventurous teens taking on a terrifying (to them. the movie isn’t super intense overall) supernatural force. Pairing them up with the town kook, Rusty, is genius. Matty Finochio is seriously fun to watch in the oddball role. His character arc is touching too. This is how to do tween horror right! The stakes are high; the kids are on their own with help from only one adult weirdo; and there is plenty of humor mixed in among the frights. And the frights are mostly done through practical effects! You love to see it!
The Final Cut: R.L. Stine’s Pumpkinhead is a superb supernatural adventure for tweens on up featuring fun characters, a slew of great practical effects, and spooky season shenanigans.
No Real Danger 