It goes without saying that Tobe Hooper has gifted audiences with some of the most iconic horror movies and television projects of all-time. After all, he did direct the 1974 classic The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Now a different horror classic from Tobe Hooper is streaming on Max.
After his work on The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Tobe Hooper’s career took some very interesting turns. He collaborated with his Chain Saw co-writer on a new horror movie titled Eaten Alive. Hooper then proceeded to work with Warner Bros. Television for the CBS miniseries adaptation of Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s Lot.
Outside of Eaten Alive, Tobe Hooper‘s success then took him straight to Universal where he began work on The Funhouse. Though it wasn’t as popular as Chain Saw, it did lead him to Steven Spielberg, where the two collaborated on creating Poltergeist.
Lifeforce became his next endeavor, with the sci-fi vampire film being one of the biggest productions yet by Cannon Films. Unfortunately, the film flopped, and so did its successor, Cannon’s Invaders from Mars, a remake of the sci-fi picture from 1953. Hooper had one last deal with Cannon: a sequel to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.
The 1986 film, aptly-titled The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, goes in wildly different directions compared to the original classic. A sequel had been in varying stages of development ever since the original film broke box office records. Ultimately, Hooper decided to take a more comedic route, and L. M. Kit Carson wrote the screenplay to make it happen.
It’s this horror classic that fans can now find streaming on Max. Of course, its perception was not always positive. As with Hooper’s other projects for Cannon Films, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 essentially flopped at the box office. Audiences were not prepared for such a strange, humorous, and more or less parody of the original film.
As the years have passed, however, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 has grown in popularity. It’s been recognized as a time capsule for the period, one which illustrates just how gonzo the 1980s had become in a post-Gremlins world.
Additionally, stars Caroline Williams and Bill Moseley have become true icons of the genre themselves, with Moseley reaching a new level of fame for his performance as Otis B. Driftwood in Rob Zombie’s House of 1000 Corpses, The Devil’s Rejects, and more recently 3 From Hell. In fact, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, as with the original film, are clear influences on Rob Zombie and his own filmmaking career.
Now both Tobe Hooper fans and newcomers can revisit the reevaluated horror classic, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, on Max. It goes to show that Hooper really was ahead of his time.