Horror Highlights: THAT VERY WITCH, HORROR IN HADDONFIELD, SURVIVING LA LLORONA

That Very Witch: Fear, Feminism, and the American Witch Movie: "Researched over the course of seven years, That Very Witch: Fear, Feminism, and the American Witch Movie explores the cyclical rise and fall of the cinematic witch in American culture and her relationship to feminist movements over time.

Through historical analysis and dozens of case studies, Payton McCarty-Simas analyzes how the witch came to be understood as the ultimate cultural bogeywoman on the one hand and a classic feminist symbol of empowerment on the other.

It traces the representation of “demonic women” in the past decade back to older horror cycles and through the “New Age” section of your local bookstore, investigating the (counter)cultural shifts along the way.

The book is a deep dive that demonstrates how changes in cinematic portrayals of the witch over time reflect major shifts in how feminism is perceived politically and interpreted culturally in America. From the birth of the Second Wave to the Moral Majority, from the Satanic Panic to “post-feminism”, from #MeToo to the 2024 election, the witch can be found at the heart of the zeitgeist. What can we learn from her presence?"

Read an excerpt below and to pre-order now, visit: https://www.lunapresspublishing.com/product-page/that-very-witch-that-very-witch-fear-feminism-and-the-american-witch-movie

To say that witches are a feminist symbol may not come as a surprise at this point in history. As horror scholar Barbara Creed points out in her 1993 book The Monstrous-Feminine, witches are the only predominantly female classic horror monster, and unlike vampires or werewolves, this particular monster is burned into our cultural psyche by very real ghost stories and tales of femicide that have marred our history since before our nationʼs founding. Witches have always been deeply political symbols of womenʼs oppression, as well as womenʼs power to resist it. But since the mid-2010s, witches have been in vogue, alongside other feminist antiheroes, “feral” women, and “unlikable female characters” in our pop culture. Over the past decade, this icon of dark femininity has become omnipresent: you might have noticed a New Age section at the local Barnes and Nobles stocked with the Modern Witch Tarot Deck and explicitly feminist Wicca-for-beginners guides with titles like Witch Please. This mainstream wave of witchery and New Age belief— from your friendʼs dedication to the Co-Star astrology app to the remake of Wicked (2024) with Ariana Grande—is part of a longer history of this much loved (and deeply feared) archetype of the monstrous feminine. All of which led me to wonder: how did we get here? Why are we seeing this now? What about the witch has become so appealing to the feminists of the past decade, as opposed to, say, the feminists of the 2000s? Or the 1980s? What can we learn from the pop cultural feminist (or the merely feminist-coded) witch? Are these witches feminist? 

The chapters that follow take on these questions, spanning seven decades, thirteen presidential administrations, and hundreds of films. Most of this book was written while staring down the barrel of the 2024 presidential election, in a moment when conservative judges already felt empowered to suggest that women incur the wrath of God when they seek reproductive healthcare, when the rise of AI has blended real life and our media simulacra of it goes far beyond what even Jean Baudrillard or Marshall McLuhan would have believed possible. I view this project in part as a look at how we got here as a nation. What kinds of stories we tell to give each other the creeps provide a window into what—and whom—we fear. Following those scary stories through history, finding them over and over again across time and genre, seeing them told everywhere—from the grindhouse and the arthouse to the multiplex and the video store, and eventually on streaming platforms—we can begin to learn why we fear what they represent. And what it means when those stories lose their power to scare and become something else.

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Horror in Haddonfield: Halloween's Untold Stories: "Happy Halloween, Michael. Horror in Haddonfield: Halloween’s Untold Stories, by Horror Obsessive founder and crackerjack fright geek Andrew Grevas, unmasks the secrets behind all thirteen of the films in horror’s oldest and longest running slasher franchise. Combining essays and interviews with the casts and creative teams, Grevas uncomplicates complicated timelines, dishes on the films that were planned but never made it to the screen, and reveals never-heard-before stories about the making of the movies. Evil never dies, and nor does horror fans’ fascination with Laurie Strode, Dr. Samuel Loomis, and of course legendary psychopath Michael Myers, whom Vox has dubbed “horror’s most implacable killer.” Includes interviews with actors Ellie Cornell, Danielle Harris, Scout Taylor-Compton, Stacey Nelkin, Dee Wallace, and Tom Atkins; writers Paul Brad Logan, Dan Farrands, Robert Zappia, Shem Bitterman; director Dwight Little; cinematographer Dean Cundey and many more."

To purchase a copy for yourself, visit: https://www.amazon.com/Horror-Haddonfield-Halloweens-Untold-Stories/dp/1959748300

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Q&A: Director Anubys Lopez Discusses His New Horror Series SURVIVING LA LLORONA: "In Mexican and Latin American folklore, you can’t get any scarier than La Llorona. Known as a ghostly spirit, she is often seen roaming near bodies of water mourning her children, whom she drowned in a jealous rage after discovering her husband was unfaithful to her. For almost 100 years now, the malevolent spirit of La Llorona has been depicted on film, first in 1933’s La Llorona and most recently in James Wan’s The Curse of La Llorona for Waner Bros. Director Anubys Lopez is now taking a stab at the story, with his three-part series Surviving La Llorona. The official description reads: “A series that delves into the haunting experiences of individuals who have come face to-face with La Llorona, the weeping woman of folklore. Through their narratives, the series uncovers the enduring power of this terrifying legend.” Anubys likes to say, “La Llorona is more than just a ghost story—she's generational trauma in a veil.”

Anubys goes in depth about his work on Surviving La Llorona in the below conversation. You can stream Surviving La Llorona for free here."

Surviving La Llorona is based on real encounters submitted to the filmmakers from those who truly believe they had survived something supernatural. How did you track down the people with these occurrences?

It all started when a close friend told me about their personal story with La Llorona that had happened to them—something they couldn’t explain, something terrifying. That story stuck with me. I kept wondering how many others had similar experiences, but never talked about them. So we put out a casting call online, asking if anyone had encountered something they believed was La Llorona.. The response was wild—it went viral almost immediately. We received so many submissions that we had to create a new email just to handle the volume. It was incredible. People weren’t just sending in stories—they were pouring their hearts out. That’s when we realized this series needed to exist. These weren’t just ghost stories—they were survival stories.

There have been a lot of shows and films around La Llorona. Why do you think people are so intrigued with this figure?

Because La Llorona is more than just a ghost story—she's generational trauma in a veil. Her legend is deeply embedded in Latino culture, passed down like folklore but felt like a memory. Whether you believe or not, she taps into something primal: grief, guilt, and the fear of losing what you love most. That’s why she endures.

La Llorona, played by actress Cassandra Luna, is pretty terrifying in the series. How did you find her and what made you decide to cast her?

We found Cassandra on Instagram, and from the moment I saw her, I knew she had something special. I still remember the silence that fell over the room when she stepped onto set. Everyone felt it. She didn’t just play the role—she embodied centuries of pain, grief, and rage without saying a single word. She brought vulnerability and real menace to the character. Honestly, Cassandra is La Llorona, and I can’t imagine anyone else wearing that veil.

When building the world of La Llorona, how did you ensure a successful horror tale?

By grounding everything in truth. Horror only works when the emotions underneath it are real. From the very beginning, I didn’t want Surviving La Llorona to feel like fiction—I wanted it to feel like something you heard from your cousin, your grandmother, or a neighbor who swears something unexplainable happened to them. So we built the world around those stories. We leaned into the quiet moments, the tension in the air, the things that aren’t said. The cinematography, sound design, and pacing were all crafted to feel restrained but ominous. Instead of overloading the viewer with constant action, we let the dread creep in slowly, just like in a real haunting.. That authenticity is what makes the horror in Surviving La Llorona really land.

For you, as a horror director, at what point do you use the approach “less is more”?

Almost always. I believe that horror is most effective when it respects the audience’s imagination. What you don’t show is just as important—if not more—than what you do. I use the “less is more” philosophy when the emotion I want to evoke is dread instead of just fear. Letting the audience sit in uncertainty, letting their own mind run wild, is powerful. In one scene, for instance, we hear La Llorona’s cry—but we never show her. It’s just a sound echoing through a hallway—and it unsettles people far more than a visual ever could. We’re wired to create monsters in our minds, to fill in the blanks with our deepest fears. That’s the kind of horror that lingers after the screen goes dark. As a director, I try to leave space for that to happen.

Surviving La Llorona is a three-part series. Do one of the episodes stand out more to you than others?

Definitely—the church episode. That one really hit home for me. It’s entirely in Spanish, which gives it a different kind of weight and authenticity. It feels rooted in our culture in a way the others don’t. There’s something deeply unsettling about blending faith and fear. Growing up, so many of us were taught that church was a sanctuary—but what happens when even that sacred space doesn’t protect you? That’s what this episode explores. The setting, the language, the pacing—it all just worked. And on set, there was this quiet energy, like we were filming something we weren’t supposed to witness. To this day, that episode stays with me the most.

Where did you film the series? The cemetery in the “Echoes of the Drowned” episode was particularly menacing. Where was that?

We filmed that in Cat Spring, Texas. It’s a small, rural town about an hour west of Houston, and it had exactly the kind of atmosphere we needed. That cemetery in particular was chilling—it wasn’t just about the visual; it was the feeling. There’s something unnerving about a place that feels like it remembers things. 

Are there going to be more episodes added?

We’re definitely talking about it. There’s a strong chance we’ll be releasing a fourth episode soon. We’ve already received more real stories from people who saw the series and wanted to share their own experiences. That alone tells me there’s more to tell. Beyond that, we’re in the early stages of developing a feature film version of Surviving La Llorona. The idea is to take the world we’ve built and expand it into something even more emotionally driven. The show proved there’s an audience for grounded, cultural horror—and we’re ready to take that further.

Did anything scary happen during the production of the series?

Yes—and it wasn’t just once. But the one that stands out the most happened during an interview we shot inside a reportedly haunted house. We were mid-interview, completely locked in, when out of nowhere a door slammed off its hinges—literally flew open with force. No one was near it, no wind, nothing that made sense. Everyone froze. You can hear the fear in our voices in the behind-the-scenes video we posted on Instagram. After that, the mood on set shifted. Even the crew started treating the house with a kind of reverence, like we weren’t alone. Whether you believe in the supernatural or not, that moment made believers out of a few of us.

Anything else you would like to add about Surviving La Llorona?

I just want to say how grateful I am—for the people who shared their stories, for the cast and crew who gave this project their all, and for the audience that’s embraced it. Surviving La Llorona is more than a horror series—it’s a cultural experience, a reflection of the fears we grow up with and the folklore that shapes who we are. The goal was never just to scare people—it was to validate those who’ve carried these stories for generations. Horror is at its best when it’s personal. And for me, this one’s personal.