Evil Needs an Occam's Razor

Saw the new Stephen King/John Cusack horror flick this weekend, which was quite fun. But it suffered from the same problem a lot of these movies do: Why is evil so circuitous? Early in the film, we learn that the Evil Hotel Room has killed not just the 20-some folks whose grisly deaths were carried in the newspapers, but another couple dozen who died "naturally": Strokes, heart attacks, drowned in their soup. And yet, the Evil Hotel Room spends the next hour and change trying to convince Cusack to kill himself. It's bizarre. Just give the guy a stroke!

The movie does get props for trying to resolve the tension, as when Cusack asks the room why it doesn't just kill him, and the room archly deadpans that "All guests at the Dolphin hotel have complementary free will." And sure, heart attacks and strokes can be caused by the stress of facing down a haunted hotel room. But still: this should be simpler.

The better example of this oddity comes from Final Destination, wherein Death itself is trying to kill the main characters, and goes about it in absurdly complicated ways. As I remember, one accidentally pours a glass of vodka, which Death puts a small hole in, creating a trail of dripping alcohol from the kitchen to the computer. The character then sits at the computer, which sparks, setting the house on fire, driving the character back into the kitchen, where she falls down, tries to grab a towel which "happens" to be laid across a knife rack, and instead flips all the cutlery into her chest. Grisly, to be sure, but why didn't Death just pop her organs? It's silly.

Speaking of movies, for those who haven't seen it, the opener to Aqua Teen Hunger Force is more awesome than language can convey. Watch the whole thing.