A-Z Blogging Challenge Day 10

April 12th

J is for Jack-O-Lantern

Wow, where do we even begin with this one?  Jack-O-Lantern's have long been a tool of the trade for many o' horror characters.  Rather than give any lengthy description of each film I'll just post the covers for each film.

Do I even need to desribe this one?  The funny thing is the story kind of changes in different iterations of "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", so it's hard to describe exactly how the JOL is used.  In some of the versions it is actually declared as Brom whom throws the jack-o-lantern as a prank to scare poor Ichabod, and in others it is the horseman who throws the jack-o-lantern at the end of the tale.  (Though it has long been debated that in the version of the tale where the horseman throws the JOL it could have been Brom who was dressed up as the horseman to begin with)  Here are even more variations of the classic "Legend of Sleepy Hollow" tale, all of which use a "Jack-O-Lantern" as a tool of the trade.

And the list goes on and on...... There have also been several other t.v. shows and cartoon specials that have used "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" as inspiration, all of which include some form of a jack-o-lantern used as a weapon or prank.
Another movie that featured a Jack-O-Lantern was the campy horror classic Jack-O.  I haven't seen this movie in about 10 years so forgive me for not being able to provide ample information about the film.  I'm also sorry about not being able to give an actual screenshot of the demon because I don't own the film, so the cover will have to do for now.

 This is the cover for the 10th Anniversary DVD Edition

This was the cover for the VHS version of the film

So again, the jack-o-lantern wasn't actually used as a weapon but was used as the head of the demon so, does it technically fit the theme?  I doubt it, but I guess you could debate it.

The Halloween Tree, an absolute essential for the Halloween season.  How you ask, are Jack-O-Lanterns used as "tools of the horror trade" in this classic.  Well as you can see above the Jack-O-Lanterns are hung from The Halloween Tree on Mr. Carapace Clavicle Moundshroud's property and used as vessels for the souls of the dead.  When the pumpkin's glowing light goes out, so does the soul of the mortal attached to it extinguish as well.
Of course this is not an all exhaustive list, and to claim so would just be plain fraud.  Soooooo, I'll leave you with these last three movie covers in which a Jack-O-Lantern was used by the villain or villains as a tool of the horror trade.