We NEED To Talk About the Crypt-Kepper's Appalling Introduction to the Poorly Received, Direct-to-Video Tales From the Crypt Movie Ritual
As readers of this website are all too aware, I am a super-fan of the HBO television program Tales From the Crypt. I fell hopelessly in love with it as a nudity-crazed thirteen year old when it debuted in 1989. I’ve never lost my passion for it in its various permutations. In a backwards development, I recently started reading the E.C Comics that the show is based on.
They’re great! They’re like the television show Tales From the Crypt but in comic book form!
I recently wrote up the two British Tales From the Crypt movies, 1972’s Tales From the Crypt and 1973’s The Vault of Horror for this here website. Since I’ve now seen all of the other Tales From the Crypt movies—1994’s Demon Knight and 1996’s The Bordello of Blood—I figured that it was time to finally get around to watching the most poorly received Tales from the Crypt movie ever: Ritual, which was finished in 2002 but only dumped straight to video in 2006.
Usually when a film is poorly received I can’t wait to see it but in this instance at least I let the film’s bad buzz keep me away until recently.
I bought Ritual primarily for the Crypt-Keeper’s introduction. So I was extremely irritated to discover that it wasn’t included in my rental from Amazon Prime.
I had to visit Youtube to experience the only damn reason anyone would waste their time with this nonsense and was mortified by what I discovered.
The reason the Crypt-Keeper is the greatest character in history is because he is so wonderfully familiar and soothingly knowable. Boils and ghouls all over the world know and love Crypt-Keeper’s shtick and signature wordplay.
In that respect the Crypt-Keeper featured in the intro is hopelessly off brand. For starters he’s on the beach instead of in, I dunno, in HIS FUCKING TOMB, THE MALEVOLENT LAIR THAT GIVES HIM HIS NAME.
Ah, but aren’t the beach and a gloomy old crypt pretty much the same? No. Not in the least.
In keeping with his wildly inappropriate new digs the Crypt-Keeper has dreadlocks and speaks in the world’s thickest, fakest, least convincing Jamaican accent. According to the internet, which knows about these kinds of things, apparently the production used the Crypt-Keeper puppet from the kiddie game show Secrets of the Crypt-Keeper’s Haunted House rather than the one from the original show because it was cheaper.
It looks cheaper as well. The dreadlocks seem at least partially inspired by a desire to distract audiences so they wouldn’t notice that a truly impressive puppet has been replaced by a shoddy imitation.
The introduction similarly switches obsessively between the Crypt-Keeper’s hammy patter and the breasts and butts of bikini-clad beach babes.
Because if the Crypt-Keeper and Tales From the Crypt are known for anything, it’s fun in the sun and bikinis.
This off-brand Crypt-Keeper wisecracks lamely, “What up my people? This is Jamaica, mon!
This is your old bosom bloody, the Crypt-Keeper!”
The iconic undead ghoul then stares at a pair of large beasts in a skimpy bikini top and jokes, “Whoa! One of the tings I love about Jamaica is the eye-popping honeys! Of course I would prefer them with a little less meat on their bones. Or better yet, JUST BONES!”
After cackling maniacally (he does that a lot) the Crypt-Keeper sees a shrunken head on a platter and says, “Tanks, but that’s not what I meant when I said I wanted a little head!”
After ample wordplay and ample cleavage he finally ends his introduction with, “Anyway, I just wrapped my new movie here in Jamaica, where they dance, smoke grass, and all the nice girls be in a voodoo trance. What a place to work! You've got mangos, papayas, tourists: and they’re all so delicious (cackles maniacally)
So enough of the jabbering! Our movie awaits! So sit back and relax, kiddies. And don’t worry! Be be happy. The BEAST is yet to come.”
It’s one thing to take great delight in the ghoulish suffering and violent deaths of others. It’s quite another to engage in shameless minstrelsy, cultural appropriation and the sexual objectification of young women.
Not cool, Crypt-Keeper. Not cool.
If I might give the Crypt-Keeper’s Ritual introduction the harshest possible criticism it’s the horror comedy equivalent of Adrien Brody introducing Sean Paul in character on Saturday Night Live.
Also, when did the Crypt-Keeper get so horny? He’s a horror icon, not the host of Ghouls Gone Wild.
You’d think that an introduction from the Crypt-Keeper, one of the most beloved figures in all of horror, would be a huge coup for a low-budget direct-to-video movie.
