(mysterious music)
- Hi everyone, I'm Andrew,
and all the world loves a clown,
and by loves, I mean lives in utter terror of.
Coulrophobia, the fear of clowns, is a very real syndrome,
and I honestly don't.
(balloon popping)
(crowd laughing)
And I honestly don't see
what's so funny about people
with odd makeup choices blowing up balloons
and squeezing into tiny cars.
- Y'all can be florists, or dishwashers.
Some of us have to be artists.
- To be fair, most clowns are upstanding citizens
who just want to bring joy to the children of the world,
they're still terrifying, but they mean well.
When it comes to horror, however,
jeering jesters and hateful harlequins
have become an integral part of the genre,
and we're here to help you survive the circus.
So, grab your greasepaint,
blow up some balloons,
and get ready to laugh 'til you scream,
because this is How to Kill Killer Clowns
(upbeat music)
Evil clowns have been a trope
since the days of Edgar Allan Poe,
and famous operas like 'Pagliacci'
have featured brutal buffoons dating back to 1892,
not to mention a certain clown prince of prime
that's been wreaking havoc on Gotham since 1939.
The most famous real life example surfaced in the 1970's,
when the world was shocked to learn
that serial killer John Wayne Gacy
used to entertain his community as Pogo the Clown.
- I can't believe that's you.
- You better.
I got a clown license to prove it.
- Stephen King codified the concept
with 'It' a few years later in 1986,
but we've already covered Pennywise,
and Mistah J. deserves an episode all his own,
so we're going to shine a spotlight
on some more obscure murderous merrymakers,
like the one in Eli Roth's 2014 film simply called 'Clown,'
where a terrifying transformation
was terminated through Demonic Decapitation.
(monster screaming)
'Clown' takes a different approach
than most movies about perilous punchinellos.
- What kind of makeup do you usually use?
- I'm not a clown.
- Instead of being a disgruntled carnie
or an omnipotent alien,
our hero slash villain
Kent actually finds himself
in more of a were-clown situation.
- Just take the (beep) thing off.
(man screaming)
- Oh Jesus Steve.
- After the hired entertainment
bails on his son's birthday party,
Kent dons a spooky suit he finds in a basement,
only to realize that the wig, nose,
and clothes have become permanently bonded to his skin.
At first, it's all a big joke,
but when his skin is ripped away
while hacking off the fake honker,
Kent realizes that something very bad is happening.
And soon, he begins to feel a gurgling,
insatiable hunger for flesh.
As per modern horror tradition,
he seeks some advice, slash, exposition
from a creepy expert named Karlson,
who informs him that the suit
is actually the skin of an ancient demon
known as the Clöyne.
- [Narrator] Over the centuries
the legend of a Clöyne was forgotten,
he became the clown.
- Which won't rest until it devours five children,
or it's head is separated from its body.
(men screaming)
- What the (beep).
- At first, Kent tries to fight this hunger,
he shoots himself in the mouth to no avail,
and when he tries to saw his own head off,
he inadvertently claims his first victim.
- Mister clown.
- He eventually gives into his blood lust,
and heads for a Chuck E. Cheese,
where a kid can be a kid, can be meal.
(children screaming)
When Kent comes for the final child, his own,
his wife knocks the demon's head off with a hammer.
(demon screaming)
And yanks off that last pesky piece of flesh,
putting a stop to her husband's possession.
Now, Roth's 'Clown' is far from
the only funnyman with infernal origins.
Demons, cults, and clowns are a match made in hell,
and believe me, things can get even weirder.
Like in the 2012 Irish slash Swedish slash British
film called "Stitches"
where its titular terror ends up Scrambled.
(watery explosion)
Stitches is an embarrassment to the art form,
a stumbling, sleazy, unfunny clown,
who shows up late to his bookings,
and fails to even remotely entertain his clients.
Granted, the brats at Tommy's birthday party
are a particular pain in the ass.
- You're an asshole, you big dumb clown.
(child laughing)
- But things go too far when a little bastard named Vinny
ties his clown shoes together,
and Stitches falls face first
onto a butcher knife twice.
The clown dies eventually,
and when Tommy goes to pay his respects,
he finds an obscene ritual occurring at his grave.
Turns out, Stitches was part of a cult
led by a clown called the Mottley,
and part of his soul in trapped inside an egg
with his face painted on it.
Six years later, Stitches returns from the grave,
and seeks revenge on the kids that killed him,
who are all conveniently gathered together
for Tommy's 17th birthday party.
- Hey, thanks for coming.
- (beep) you.
- That's Jeff.
- Stitches busts out his entire bag of tricks
on the unsuspecting adolescents,
tearing a live rabbit from one of their throats,
scooping out the brains of another one,
and making the most messed-up balloon animals in history.
- Ruff, ruff.
- Tommy eventually realizes the source of Stitches power,
and makes a desperate attempt to find the eggs.
Unfortunately, Stitches himself is holding onto his soul,
but after Vinny trips him up yet again, he drops the egg,
and when it smashes, he explodes in a shower of yolk.
- I never thought I'd end up with egg on my face.
- You can always count on that (beep) Vinny.
Now, let's move past the paranormal,
and explore the outer reaches of the universe,
because plenty of extraterrestrials
have taken the form of funny-faced freaks.
Pennywise is probably the most famous example,
but he's Mork from Ork compared to
the "Killer Klowns from Outer Space,"
and when it comes to eliminating these aliens,
The Nose Knows.
(shots firing)
Now, monsters in this cheesy '80s classic
aren't even technically clowns,
they're just an alien species
that happens to look like them.
I guess in an infinite universe,
there's got to be at least one planet out there
where the dominant species evolved into monstrous clowns
who drink people through crazy straws.
So I'll allow it.
Just this once.
I'll allow it.
- What are you gonna do?
Knock my block off?
(woman screaming)
- Damn.
- The Killer Klowns arrive on earth via a meteor,
that transforms into a cavernous circus tent
deep within the woods,
and when the locals arrive to inspect the UFO,
they find an army of brightly colored psychos
who systematically slaughter them
using all kinds of silly shit.
- What are you gonna do with those pies boys?
(rock music)
- They'll cocoon you into cotton candy,
melt your face off with a killer cream pie,
sic the balloon hounds on you,
and even eat you via a shadow puppet somehow.
(circus music)
(crowd screaming)
- Holy shit.
- I don't believe it.
- While they're definitely some of the creepiest creatures
in the history of latex foam rubber,
the Klowns have an all-too obvious weakness,
Their bright, red, bulbous noses.
If you can pierce their proboscis,
it'll send the Klown spinning,
before exploding in a shower of green sparks.
Even the towering Jojo the Klownzilla
can be laid low with a teeny prick from a police badge,
blowing up the humongous harlequin, and his spaceship,
once and for all.
(dramatic music)
Now, not all evil clowns are imps and aliens,
sometimes, they're just your run-of-the-mill psychos
with a taste for theatricality.
- Oh little puppy boy.
- [Male Cartoon] Go away you scare me.
- Me? I made with freight? I scare?
- And most of the time,
they share the same weakness as any mere mortal.
So let's finish up with a quick
Lightning Round.
(clown laughing)
After all, if you're a slasher in need of a gimmick,
why go through the trouble of stitching together
a new mask or finding a signature weapon,
when you can just riff on a deep-seated fear
shared by millions around the globe?
- What's the matter kid? Don't you like clowns?
You aint got a reason why you hate clowns.
I'm gonna kill your whole (beep) family.
- It's clearly one of Rob Zombie's favorite tropes,
as evidenced by Captain Spaulding,
who seemingly perishes in a hail of police bullets
at the end of "The Devil's Rejects,"
though it looks like he's coming back for the sequel,
"3 From Hell."
- I'm just a clown dancing for the sins of mankind.
- Now if you're looking for a less ambiguous
depiction of clowns getting killed,
Zombie's "31" is chock full of them.
Six to be precise,
a gang of "heads" that hunt a group of helpless carnies
in a twisted game,
but most of the fools fall to chainsaws, blades,
and blunt force trauma.
As for Twisty the Clown in "American Horror Story,"
he's clearly made of pretty hearty stuff.
He survives being dropped on his head as an infant.
- It wasn't her fault.
Too may cocktails.
(people laughing)
- And blowing his own jaw off with a shotgun,
but when Edward Mandrake comes to collect Twisty's soul,
the killer clown succumbs to a fatal stab wound.
Then he comes back as a ghost, but this is How to Kill,
not How to Kill Things Twice.
Get that shit outta there.
- [Man] Don't mind him folks, he's just a little bit cooky.
- Thousands of twisted individuals
have utilized funny hats and floppy shoes
as instruments of fear,
From "Killjoy" to "Camp Blood,"
"The Clown at Midnight" to ICP,
There are a dozen more examples we could have covered here,
and we know exactly how to take them down.
So please, send in the clowns.
We're ready.
- ♪ When you want to scream, put away that frown, ♪
and never be scared of a clown.♪
- Thanks so much for watching everyone,
I wanna know how you would take out a killer clown.
Would you step on his big shoes?
Would you cut the breaks in its tiny little car?
Or would you just send it back home to the circus?
Leave a comment to let me know,
and please subscribe to Now This Nerd for more Slash Course.