Muscle Mom is Scary on Halloween

Jay’s Month of Scares, Day 23- Regular Show, Terror Tales IV

It’s time to start another Terror Tales of the Park with a joke: you know who everyone talks about on Regular Show but never meets? Muscle Man’s mom! We’ve seen him make his “My Mom”, but Muscle Man’s mom was one of the show’s biggest mysteries. Imagine everyone’s surprise, both in-Show and in real life, when Muscle Man agrees to introduce his mom to everyone. However, since this is a Terror Tales episode, the Park Gang has to tell scary stories. Everyone knows my routine by this point: I tell the basic plot, then give my thoughts.

The Hole

In the first story, told by Pops, the Park Gang takes part in a dark Halloween Ritual. Every year, the park members draw from a raffle and choose an unlucky soul to sacrifice to a hole in the park. They think its the only way to survive a mysterious fog that keeps them from leaving the park. Pops is next up to be sacrificed, but he makes a plea to remember life before the raffle; they throw him in anyway.

Pops’ story was the weakest segment of the special, by far. Firstly, its a clear reimagining of the Lottery, a short story with a similar premise. I loathe that story because I think sacrificing someone’s life like that is stupid. Muscle Man even calls Pops out on the re-imagining part. Fortunately, the story ends with Pops choking the hole monster to death and the Park Gang realizing there was no fog.

Unfinished Business

Bensons’ story starts off with a bang: Mordecai and Rigby are dead, yet they never left the house. Since their ghosts are haunting the house, Benson’s has to fulfill his destiny and fire the two. Since the two are essentially poltergeists now, it’s easier said than done.

I admit, Mordecai and Rigby as poltergeists are scary. There’s only so far a kids show can go with scares, however. However, the real treat comes in the form of the ending: Benson was the one dead the whole time! He fell down some stairs and had been wandering around the house for months, freaking out at the sight of everyone. Mordecai points out that that twist’s been done plenty of times, but I still thought it was amusing.

Scary Movie Night

This last story’s brought to the gang by Rigby. One night when Mordecai, Rigby, Eileen, and CJ are picking a scary movie to watch. So, Rigby decides to show them Triple Threat, a VHS mash-up of three horror movies. However, the movie ends up sucking them inside the film. In order to survive, they have to make it to the end of the movie. It’s easier than it sounds, since the main thing is to not be stupid.

I thought that this was the best segment out of the three, mostly because it calls out the stupidity of everyone in horror films. Most of the problems in horror films could be solved by either carrying a weapon or common sense. Thankfully, the quartet’s smart enough not to fall for the obvious danger and gets out. Except ball lightning fuses their butts together!

Meet Muscle Mom

Aside from “the hole”, I thought the stories from this special were pretty solid. “Unfinished Business” felt like a PG version of Poltergeist, while “Scary Movie Night” was hilarious for pointing out horror characters dumb decisions. The real treat, though, comes at the end when viewers finally meet Muscle Mom. She freaks everyone out and makes them run for the hills!

I love shock twist endings like this, and it gets even funnier when its revealed that Muscle Mom’s wearing a costume. It turns out that pranking people and making bad jokes runs in the family. Happy Halloween!

Click here to see the FANDOM Article I did for Halloween last year.

Click here to see my other animation stuff. Or here to see all holiday related posts.