Pledge Night, which has just been released in a Blu-ray/DVD combo pack, is about as bad as any other slasher that moved us away from the eighties and into the nineties back in the day. No atmosphere, no scares, no compelling score, weak attempts at a wise-cracking killer—it’s right up there with the tone of other post-awesome eighties era slashers like Slumber Party Massacre 2, Prom Night 2 and 3, and Sleepaway Camp 2 and 3. Yet…it’s not a crappy sequel. It’s just crap.
This slasher trash starts with 45 minutes of guys being perversely hazed—a delicious reminder of how simultaneously gay and homophobic frats (and horror movies) can be. These boys should have been made honorary members of an actual frat after this movie considering what they’re put through on camera. They get a paddle to the ass.
Unshaved ass gets branded.
The boys pick cherries off a block of ice with their asses while wearing jockstraps then eat them.
There’s even gross stuff like being forced to eat shit from a toilet bowl and being covered in bugs.
There’s also talk of how important it is to have one black guy and one Jew in the frat. The black dude is gorgeous, the Jewish guy is hot and hairy.
Most importantly, there’s a brief story of a kid drenched in acid as part of a hazing years before.
Finally, acid kid returns as some sort of biker hippie corpse to kill all the frat boys and their girls. He looks absolutely ridiculous, and his one-liners are no better.
And as with all these bad late 80s slashers, the plot is convoluted for no good reason. Before the supernatural killer takes full control of the situation, a psychotic pledge snaps and handles the initial dirty work for him. Weird.
The kills are over the top, including a toilet bowl kill and a cherry bomb up the ass—and yet the dude’s biggest concern when his pants are pulled down is that the killer is a homo.
Boobs and blood abound, the music is brought to us by Anthrax, a big sword comes into play to ensure the film is as absurd as a 1990 slasher should be, and what else do you need to hear before you take the plunge and add this shitty classic to your collection like I did?
