| "New Year's Day" | |
|---|---|
| Fear Itself episode | |
 Helen kissing a wounded Eddie | |
| Episode no. | Season 1 Episode 6 |
| Directed by | Darren Lynn Bousman |
| Written by | Steve Niles Ben Sokolowski |
| Featured music | Charlie Clouser |
| Original air date | July 17, 2008 |
| Guest appearances | |
| Briana Evigan; Zulay Henao; Niall Matter; Cory Monteith; J. LaRose; Campbell Lane | |
"New Year's Day" is the sixth episode of the NBC horror anthology Fear Itself . This episode is based on the short story The Dead Time by Paul Kane.
Briana Evigan plays Helen, a young woman who wakes up with a hangover on New Year's Day. Alarms are going off all over the city. It is revealed that a cataclysmic event at a local chemical plant has turned a large part of the population into zombies. Gradually as she wanders the city, Helen's memory of the previous night returns. Hoping to distract her from the recent death of her brother, roommate Eddie Jones (Niall Matter) took her out to a New Year's Eve party which James (Cory Monteith), a man to whom Helen is attracted, will be attending. At the party, Helen finds Chrissie (Zulay Henao), whom she has lost contact with since the death of her brother. Helen tells her that she's her best friend and the only person at the party who truly cares for the way she is.
Later, she remembers talking to James and telling him that she really loves him, based on mistaken information that she received from Eddie. It turns out that Eddie, not James, is in love with Helen, and she searches out James, whom she finds making out with Chrissie. Helen has survived the night and finally made it to James' apartment. She breaks down the door to find Chrissie screaming. James then shoots Helen in the back.
It is revealed that, in despair, Helen committed suicide after the New Year's Eve party. She has been a zombie the entire night and all of her attempts to communicate with people have been thwarted because she isn't actually speaking English anymore, just zombie-like grunts and groans. In love, Eddie, also a zombie, has been following her the entire night. After he kills James, they hold hands and turn toward Chrissie and eat her.
Critical reception for "New Year's Day" was mixed. Den of Geek and IGN panned the episode, with IGN criticizing the episode for trying to portray Evigan as unattractive. [1] [2] The A.V. Club and Dread Central were more favorable. Both felt that the episode was fine but not exceptional. [3] [4] Bloody Disgusting rated the episode favorably, giving it 7/10 and writing that "with the exception of the uneven pacing and an impossible to justify appearance by one of the zombies in the final moments of the film, NEW YEAR’S DAY offers a respectable ending with a nice twist, a solid performance from its lead actress, and an interesting new idea to consider adding to the lexicon of zombie lore." [5]
Danielle Andrea Harris is an American actress and film director. She is known as a "scream queen" for her roles in multiple horror films, including four entries in the Halloween franchise as Jamie Lloyd, and the Halloween remake and its sequel as Annie Brackett (2007–09). Other such roles include Tosh in Urban Legend (1998), Belle in Stake Land (2010), and Marybeth Dunston in the Hatchet series (2010–17). In 2012, she was inducted into the Fangoria Hall of Fame.
Dawn of the Dead is a 2004 American action horror film directed by Zack Snyder in his directorial debut, with a screenplay by James Gunn. A remake of George A. Romero's 1978 horror film of the same name, it stars an ensemble cast that includes Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames, Jake Weber, and Mekhi Phifer. Scott Reiniger, Tom Savini, and Ken Foree from the original film also make cameo appearances. Set in Milwaukee, the film follows a group of survivors who take refuge in an upscale suburban shopping mall during a zombie apocalypse.
Robert Barton Englund is an American actor and director. He is best known for playing the supernatural serial killer Freddy Krueger in the Nightmare on Elm Street film series. Classically trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Englund began his career as a stage actor in regional theatre, and made his film debut in Buster and Billie in 1974. After supporting roles in films in the 1970s such as Stay Hungry, A Star Is Born, and Big Wednesday, Englund had his breakthrough as the resistance fighter Willie in the miniseries V in 1983. Following his performance in the original A Nightmare on Elm Street in 1984, he became closely associated with the horror film genre, and is widely-regarded as one of its iconic actors.
Tony Todd is an American actor who made his debut as Sgt. Warren in the film Platoon (1986), and portrayed Kurn in the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation (1990–1991) and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1996). He achieved stardom for his roles as Ben in the 1990 remake of Night of the Living Dead, as the titular character in the four films of the Candyman film series (1992–2021) and William Bludworth in the Final Destination franchise (2000–2011). He also starred as Dan in The Man from Earth (2007) and voiced The Fallen in Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009), Darkseid in the DC Animated Movie Universe, Zoom in The Flash and Venom in the upcoming Spider-Man 2 (2023) game.
Felissa Rose Esposito, better known as simply Felissa Rose, is an American actress and producer. Rose has amassed over 100 film credits, and is best known for her work in the horror genre, for which she is recognized as a scream queen.
Judith Amanda Geeson is an English film, stage, and television actress. She began her career primarily working on British television series, with a leading role on The Newcomers from 1965 to 1967, before making her major film debut in To Sir, with Love (1967). She starred in a range of films throughout the 1970s, from crime pictures to thriller and horror films, including The Executioner (1970), Fear in the Night (1972), Brannigan (1975) and The Eagle Has Landed (1976).
Night of the Demons is a 1988 American supernatural horror film directed by Kevin S. Tenney, written and produced by Joe Augustyn, and starring Amelia Kinkade, Cathy Podewell, Linnea Quigley, Hal Havins, and Alvin Alexis. The plot follows a group of high school students who throw a party inside an isolated funeral parlor on Halloween night. While attempting a séance, they accidentally release a demon locked in the crematorium that begins to possess them one by one.
Boy Eats Girl is a 2005 horror-comedy film directed by Stephen Bradley and starring Samantha Mumba, produced and shot in Ireland. The plot tells of a teenage boy who comes back to life as a zombie, similar to the plot of the American film My Boyfriend's Back.
After Dark Horrorfest was an annual horror film festival featuring eight independent horror movies, sometimes with "secret" bonus films, all distributed by After Dark Films in the USA. The first HorrorFest was held in 2006.
Xavier Gens is a French film director.
Briana Barbara-Jane Evigan is an American actress and dancer best known for her roles in the Step Up series and for her scream queen roles in numerous horror films. Born in Los Angeles, Evigan is the daughter of actor Greg Evigan and his wife Pamela, a dancer, model and choreographer. She began dancing and acting at a young age, graduating from Los Angeles Valley College with a degree in speech and communication.
"The Sacrifice" is the first episode of the television series Fear Itself. The episode originally aired on June 5, 2008. It was based on Del Howinson's short story titled "The Lost Herd." The plot revolves around four men who become stranded in an old fort—to find that it is home to an ancient vampire.
"Spooked" is the second episode of the NBC horror anthology Fear Itself.
"Family Man" is the third episode of the NBC horror anthology Fear Itself.
"In Sickness and in Health" is the fourth episode of the NBC horror anthology Fear Itself. The episode guest-starred Psych co-stars Maggie Lawson and James Roday.
"Eater" is the fifth episode of the NBC horror anthology Fear Itself and is based on the Peter Crowther short story of the same name.
"Skin and Bones", also stylized as "Skin & Bones", is the eighth episode in the television series Fear Itself on NBC. The plot revolves around a man who becomes possessed by a Wendigo.
Brittany Allen is a Canadian actress. Her first notable role was as Marissa Chandler on All My Children from 2009 to 2010, for which she received a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Actress in 2011. In later years, she worked consistently on television, and in the films of her partner, Colin Minihan, including the 2014 film Extraterrestrial, the 2016 film It Stains the Sands Red and the 2018 film What Keeps You Alive, the latter of which Allen starred in and scored.
Night of the Demons is a 2009 American horror film and remake of the 1988 film of the same name. It was directed by Adam Gierasch, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Jace Anderson, and stars Edward Furlong, Monica Keena, Bobbi Sue Luther, Shannon Elizabeth, Diora Baird, and Michael Copon.
The Devil's Carnival is a 2012 American musical horror film directed by Darren Lynn Bousman and starring Sean Patrick Flanery, Briana Evigan, Jessica Lowndes, Paul Sorvino, Emilie Autumn and Terrance Zdunich. The film marks the second collaboration of Bousman and writer/actor Terrance Zdunich, their previous work being the unrelated musical film Repo! The Genetic Opera. The film also brings back several of the cast members of Repo!, such as Sorvino, Alexa Vega, Bill Moseley and Nivek Ogre. The Devil's Carnival has Aesop's Fables and other folklore at the core of its story, with the main characters each representing a fable. Flanery's character John represents "Grief and His Due", Evigan's character Merrywood represents "The Dog and Its Reflection", and Lowndes' character Tamara represents "The Scorpion and the Frog", an animal fable that seems to have first emerged in Russia.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link){{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)  | This article about a United States television episode is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |