"If Man is 5, then the Devil is 6."—Pixies

Welcome, scarehounds! Behold my foolhardy attempt to live through Cinemonster’s sixth annual Hoop-tober challenge by the end of All Hallows’ Eve. 

I attempted  Hoop-tober last year too, but I fell way behind due to the demands of work and continuing education, ending up with a frankly pathetic final tally of 19/31 films watched. This time I am determined to see it through like a final survivor crawling to safety at last before dying after all in a horrifying last-second twist. As I watch the movies, I will bold their titles below. 

The required categories of blood, madness, and ruin:

6 countries:

UK: The Descent
France: Revenge
Japan: Hausu
Italy: Tenebre
Hong Kong: A Chinese Ghost Story
Sweden: The Phantom Carriage

I ended up with a few bonus nations—Belgium, New Zealand, Mexico—but the six above are the ones I officially chose to fulfill the criteria.

6 decades (heh):

By creative use of other challenge categories, I grant myself the power to choose EVERY decade from the 1920s to the 2010s. (I wanted to go even earlier, but there was a dearth of feature-length horror flicks from before the ‘20s.) To wit:

The Phantom Carriage (1921)
The Invisible Man (1933)
The Wolf Man (1941)
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)
The Innocents (1961)
The Phantom of the Paradise (1974)
Tenebre (1982)
The Sixth Sense (1999)
The Descent (2005)
Tigers Are Not Afraid (2017)

6 films from before 1966:

That would be the five oldest movies from the decade category, plus The Mummy (1932).

Six films from years with a terminal 6:

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)
Carrie (1976)
Night of the Creeps (1986)
Slither (2006)
Black Sheep (2006)
Raw (2016)

6 films featuring some combination of the talents of John Carl Buechler, Jack Pierce, Rob Bottin, Screaming Mad George, and Lon Chaney:

Cellar Dweller (Buechler)
The Mummy and The Wolf Man (Pierce)
The Howling (Bottin)
Society (Screaming)
The Phantom of the Opera (Chaney)

6th of a franchise:
Cult of Chucky

Violent reptiles:
Alligator

2 directed by women:
Revenge
The Slumber Party Massacre

Lowest-rated '80s horror I can access:
... my honor demands that I admit Hobgoblins is readily available to me. Our beloved Hoop-tober host truly is a monster.

Clergy having a bad day:
Prince of Darkness

Larry Cohen or Dick Miller:
The Stuff (Cohen). But The Howling, appearing in multiple other categories, features Miller.

1 classic Universal:
I love those monsters so much that I used the rules to assign myself three of them:
The Mummy
The Invisible Man
The Wolf Man

Dee Wallace:
The Howling

Black director or predominantly black cast:
Tales From the Crypt Presents Demon Knight, directed by Mr. Ernest Roscoe Dickerson.

Horror from Mexico:
Tigers Are Not Afraid

As always, at least one Tobe Hooper film:
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2

And maybe, if I feel like going for extra credit:
Horror Noire
Innocent Blood

Welp. Turns out this is my 66th list created on Letterboxd. I swear I did not plan it that way, but I don’t think Satan will believe me. Okay then! Bring on the cave mutants!

EDIT, 10/31: I watched them all! The 31 movies of the main challenge, that is—no time for extra credit this year. I have been properly Hooped. And now, some random but well-deserved awards:

Nastiest jump scares: The Descent, with a special mention for the window dream.

Best killer's monologue: Billy Zane's rant after his demon character encounters a setback in Demon Knight. "Humans! You're not worth the flesh you're printed on!"

Most likely to make me want to skip my next meal (in a good way): Slither/Raw (tie)

Biggest disappointment: The Howling

Most pleasant surprise: Night of the Creeps

Number of first-time watches: 26

I really do see heads of people (number of movies showing, in whole or in part, a decapitated head): 7

Woo hoo! This was a blast! Can't wait to do it again next year.