April Fool’s Week

Holy guacamoley, we really outdid ourselves this year with the April fool’s day prank, which consisted of two co-ordinated efforts for a winning result. Our complete and total rule is best exemplified in the comments on Blood Test, where longtime reader Tuzo wrote “I used to [love] the April Fool’s day jokes on this site, but you guys are slipping a bit in your obviousness. Good try, though.” Dave’s spectacular fake Blood Test was the classic red herring which successfully bait-and-switched you all away from calling out Thomas’ fabricated Honeymoon Killer piece, the more nuanced affair. Once again Retro Slashers wins the pig, the keg, and the paper crown! See you next year. Now for some history and what you can expect this coming week.

Our first April fool’s prank was in 2007 when I took some painted Friday the 13th computer game magazine coverart, elements of the Australian video cover for Cellar Dwellar, threw them in a blender and presented a VHS copy of one of the fabled lost slashers (but never really existed) Summerhouse Slaughter. We had to skip 2008 because, I believe, Retro Slashers was going through a critical transitional phase and was actually offline on April 1st  – that unfortunately wasn’t a joke! The next few years’ pranks would be masterminded by Thomas, whose hijinx would score us coverage outside of the slasher spectrum. An intoxicated Thomas recalls:

The first one I did was Secret Retro Slasher Projects Revealed back in 2009. The gag that got picked up by other sites and made it on to Fangoria Radio is Heavy Metal Maniacs in a Haunted House. 2010 was Retro Slashers is now Retro Mini Moni. The highlights of that one for me was Jake Adelstein, a writer mentioned in the gag, posted a comment and got in touch with you seeing the banner on the site changed to Retro Mini Moni for a few days… Several j-pop fansites and forums picked this on up and were amazed at the accuracy of the article. A bunch of blood thirsty anime lovers took over the comments section calling for the slasher deaths of Sailor Moon and all her Sailor Scouts. My only disappointment with this prank is none of the Mini Moni girls left a comment. Silly me, I forgot they can’t speak or read English.

So now that we’ve fooled you good and proper, this coming week we make it up to you by educating you on a pair of April fool’s day-based retro slashers from 1986: Paramount’s April Fool’s Day & Vestron’s Slaughter High (announced as April Fool’s Day, and still released in some quarters under that title). Like our last theme week for My Bloody Valentine, you’re going to be getting a broad base of subjects covered, including something I’ve been promising for years.