The Cabin in the Woods/Fridge

Fridge Logic:



 * Some more Fridge Logic: They seem awfully sure of what they're doing. Usually, I'd expect things like this to be ruled by ironclad ancient tradition and a heaping helping of overkill, since there's only one way to find out you screwed up, and it's not a good way.
 * They do give it a heaping helping of overkill: there are dozens of similar facilities all over the world, all simultaneously running similar rituals. It's just bad luck that.


 * Still more Fridge Logic: Why, exactly, does the facility have a very conspicuous, easily accessed button that What possible use could this have?
 * That may not have been its intended purpose.
 * Maybe it was installed by contractors who, for security reasons, didn't know what was going to be in the containers.
 * Death by Irony. The controllers' job was to know and manipulate horror movie tropes. They might have had this very wiki be part of their training manuals. And yet, they ignored every single trope about putting big easily accessible red self-destruct buttons in low-security areas (or anywhere at all).
 * That might be the answer: it was a self-destruct system, designed to let the monsters wipe out anyone in the complex. Not because the controllers were Genre Blind, but because they knew they'd have to cover up what they were doing if anyone other than a party of chosen sacrifices stumbled over the site. Presumably if Curt really had returned with the National Guard, they'd have walked straight into the Carnage while the facility's staff hid out in a safe room: one they didn't have time to reach when Marty pushed the button without sounding the alarms first.
 * The facility has at least one intern, who is presumably there to build his resume. That resume would be a very interesting document. How do you phrase on a resume?




 * Did anyone else wonder if  character had ever been  ?




 * When, the whole operation is interrupted by an earthquake, which Sitterson attributes to the enjoyment of someone "downstairs." However, it never happens when anyone else




 * Why did Patience
 * Also, because in the horror film narrative that the Redneck Zombie Torture Family would be following, if their story was a movie, Patience would have


 * Why ? Because it doesn't have to be specially trained to leave   unharmed/for last!
 * And it's probably a reference to Attack of the Killer Whatever films like Leprechaun, Night of the Lepus or MonSturd.
 * Also recent "evil fairy" movies that play it straight, like Pan's Labyrinth or Don't Be Afraid of the Dark.
 * There are also myths about man-eating unicorns...
 * Because it's FUCKING AWESOME


 * In the opening scene, Hadley complains to Sitterson that his wife is over-preparing for their planned pregnancy, which has yet to occur. He says that the more prepared you are to have a child, the less likely you are to have one. Which means the only way to balance out his Crazy Prepared wife would, of course, be
 * In addition, it foreshadows how being Crazy Prepared will make you vulnerable to the tiniest deviations that slip through all your perfectly-crafted plans. The agency prepared for everything --except for the "ineffectual comic relief" just barely escaping what, a few inches to the side, would have been a fatal wound, which snowballed into worse and worse consequences later on.


 * Kind of ironic, since the reason  is (probably) supposed to
 * That, and the very people they're attacking have been training them to Kill All Humans for the whole of their incarceration. Even if they were natural enemies once, they're too conditioned to kill everyone in sight  to stop and fight one another.




 * The one thing I got out of the movie was, surprisingly, Humans Are Warriors.
 * The tunnel  It's easy to assume they're referring to the unseen directors, considering the controller's references to "upstairs" meaning management and "downstairs" meaning , but what it really was is

Fridge Horror:

 * Probably none of the girls
 * Japanese horror tropes don't require the US horror archetypes described by this film, nor does it always need to "punish" transgressors. All it needs, more often than not, is for someone to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, or to find an Artifact of Doom by complete chance. The victims in The Ring, One Missed Call and The Grudge were guilty of nothing except of finding a Cursed Tape, receiving a call from the future, or walking into a house. It's a staple of J-horror that bad things WILL happen to ordinary people who don't deserve it. More than likely, . The Fridge Brilliance lies in that the Japanese branch had a perfect record up until that point, because J-horror typically victimizes teens and adults, and it always ends badly..
 * Think of it like this: When you're hungry, you need something to eat. What it is may differ with where you are and what the chef cooks. But the Kung Pao Chicken from the Chinese restaurant has different ingredient requirements, is cooked in different ways from the American hamburger or the burrito from the Mexican food place, but they all still satiate your hunger.
 * Hmm, and if they put soy sauce on the burrito, you find it trendy and tacky. You want authentic ethnic food. So we're dealing with the hipsters of the underworld.
 * Perhaps "culture" could also be a play on "pop culture," or just modern culture in general. America likes its reality tv show-style attractive airheads; Japan likes its innocent Lolicon bait.
 * Turn it around. Maybe
 * Marty meets Randy!
 * Here's some Fridge Logic and Fridge Horror in one:  Unless   And that could lead to either a   or just some more Fridge Horror.
 * In order to stop, at least one of  has to succeed. In this case, . Which means , so . That actually turns back into Fridge Brilliance, since.
 * So there just happens to be one Ancient One per major human country, or culture? Sounds awful convenient. What if over time a new culture, with completely different mores about youth morality, springs up? Will there be a new Ancient One that demands sacrifices from *them*? However, the "Turn it Around" idea above might solve this dilemma;
 * Mordecai (gas station guy) is placed there as an effective barrier that people must go through to get to the cabin. This is even lampshaded in the movie; if people go on even after their conversation with him, they clearly wanted to continue on and are traveling forth of their own volition. That is also a necessary condition; they must be unknowing volunteers, so the random [read: unintended, undesired, incidental] deaths in the facility don't qualify for the ritual.
 * Plus, the ritual is a performance, not just a procedure. Would you be satisfied if a movie showed you the same characters going through hell for an hour, then suddenly switched to scenes of some anonymous extras getting killed off, without ever wrapping up the main characters' story? The intended audience doesn't like seeing plot threads left hanging.
 * And the Director explicitly says that the tributes must be young people. All of the facility's staff that we see are too old. The chemist that we see is probably the youngest of the lot, and the actress is well over thirty.
 * Could  end up being male? Or   be a girl?
 * What. Of course that's a possibility.
 * It depends on whether  have modern attitudes about gender. So NO is a distinct possibility.
 * Especially considering the carvings of each role.
 * I would have to say that subverting the tropes likely does not work. The A.O.s want specific tropes, dammit. Inversions and subversions and other trope-play do not please them. They are not fans of irony or originality. You know, like your average horror movie watcher.
 * Like, quite unironically, many people who watched this very film, and then proceeded to hate it for not being the typical horror movie.
 * In order to stop, at least one of  has to succeed. In this case, . Which means , so . That actually turns back into Fridge Brilliance, since.
 * So there just happens to be one Ancient One per major human country, or culture? Sounds awful convenient. What if over time a new culture, with completely different mores about youth morality, springs up? Will there be a new Ancient One that demands sacrifices from *them*? However, the "Turn it Around" idea above might solve this dilemma;
 * Mordecai (gas station guy) is placed there as an effective barrier that people must go through to get to the cabin. This is even lampshaded in the movie; if people go on even after their conversation with him, they clearly wanted to continue on and are traveling forth of their own volition. That is also a necessary condition; they must be unknowing volunteers, so the random [read: unintended, undesired, incidental] deaths in the facility don't qualify for the ritual.
 * Plus, the ritual is a performance, not just a procedure. Would you be satisfied if a movie showed you the same characters going through hell for an hour, then suddenly switched to scenes of some anonymous extras getting killed off, without ever wrapping up the main characters' story? The intended audience doesn't like seeing plot threads left hanging.
 * And the Director explicitly says that the tributes must be young people. All of the facility's staff that we see are too old. The chemist that we see is probably the youngest of the lot, and the actress is well over thirty.
 * Could  end up being male? Or   be a girl?
 * What. Of course that's a possibility.
 * It depends on whether  have modern attitudes about gender. So NO is a distinct possibility.
 * Especially considering the carvings of each role.
 * I would have to say that subverting the tropes likely does not work. The A.O.s want specific tropes, dammit. Inversions and subversions and other trope-play do not please them. They are not fans of irony or originality. You know, like your average horror movie watcher.
 * Like, quite unironically, many people who watched this very film, and then proceeded to hate it for not being the typical horror movie.
 * Especially considering the carvings of each role.
 * I would have to say that subverting the tropes likely does not work. The A.O.s want specific tropes, dammit. Inversions and subversions and other trope-play do not please them. They are not fans of irony or originality. You know, like your average horror movie watcher.
 * Like, quite unironically, many people who watched this very film, and then proceeded to hate it for not being the typical horror movie.