EntertainmentMoviesHorror Moviessleepy hollowMonsters, masters, and raven-haired heroes: Sleepy Hollow was basically the ’90s version of Wednesday (and it rules)When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
EntertainmentMoviesHorror Moviessleepy hollowMonsters, masters, and raven-haired heroes: Sleepy Hollow was basically the ’90s version of Wednesday (and it rules)When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
(Image credit: Mandalay/Getty Images)
A socially awkward, raven-haired “hero” gets ferried to a new place and finds themselves at the center of a murder-riddled mystery. To stop the carnage, said person – who happens to have a penchant for tailored, black outfits and jazzy white collars – sets out to find the elusive monster brutally offing the locals…
Starring the likes of Michael Gambon, Christina Ricci, and Johnny Depp, Sleepy Hollow follows squeamish, skeptical New York police constable Ichabod Crane, as he’s sent to the titular settlement upstate to investigate a trio of peculiar deaths. “The three were slain in open ground, their heads were found severed from their bodies,” he mumbles to Sleepy Hollow’s de-facto leader Baltus, when quizzed on what his superiors told him. “Their heads were not found severed, their heads were not found at all,” Jeffrey Jones' pastor snaps back, expertly setting the film’s eerie, tongue-in-cheek tone in just a few short words.
(Image credit: Netflix)
While both entities do seem to enjoy killing, their most interesting likeness, perhaps, is that both mythical meanies are revealed in their respective titles to have masters hiding in plain sight: botany teacher Marilyn Thornhill (Christina Ricci, tying them together even more strongly) and Miranda Richardson’s Lady Van Tassel. Turns out, Wednesday’s Thornhill is actually Laurel Gates, the missing sister of the late Garrett Gates, who wants to kill off Jericho’s outcasts and carry out her dead family’s wishes, while Lady Van Tassel is actually Mary Archer, who plots to take over Sleepy Hollow and avengeherfamily after they were fatally shunned when she was a child. The two women use supernatural means to control Tyler and the Hessian mercenary to do their bidding.
The outings are close in aesthetics and setting, too, with Wednesday’s Hyde and Sleepy Hollow’s Horseman both wreaking havoc in shadowy, gnarled tree-filled woods. The instantly recognizable Danny Elfman scores don’t help set them apart either. At their cores, though, Wednesday and Sleepy Hollow are about buried wounds; the insidious, corrupting power of bitterness and entitlement, and how the real monsters aren’t always who you think they are.
Mysterious and spooky
(Image credit: Mandalay/Getty Images)
One season in, and Wednesday definitely skews more family friendly than Sleepy Hollow, but I’m hoping it might get a little darker in the upcoming installment. “I think the feel that we’re going for is a little bit more horror-inspired,” lead actor Jenna Ortega told Vanity Fair, citing thatEdgar Allan Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death was a big inspiration for season 2.
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For more, check out our breakdown of the most excitingupcoming horror moviesor keep an eye on the latest Addams Family news with our guide toWednesday season 2.
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