Classic horror movie franchises are being rebooted or given new sequels at an almost frenetic pace. Everyone is getting in on the action. Freddy Kreuger. Michael Myers. Jason Voorhees. Leatherface. Heck, even everyone's favorite "Good Guy" Chucky is getting in on the reboot action.

But Pinhead and his best friends had a recent sequel that was largely ignored. At the very least, Hellraiser didn't seem to get the attention other franchises have gotten in recent years, probably because so many of the sequels were straight to video. Still, it is an underrated franchise that deserves another look from horror fans, and there are several good reasons why.

UPDATE: 2022/09/27 20:47 EST BY SHAWN S. LEALOS

After three decades of movies in the franchise, Hellraiser is returning with a reboot in 2022 on Hulu. This movie will take a fresh look on the franchise and offer something fresh for a new generation of horror movie fans. This movie will set up the same basic premise, with a puzzle box that calls Cenobites into the real world where they torture those who called them and pull them into Hell. While the later sequels in the series left a lot to be desired, never matching up to the original movies, the franchise itself has a lot of reasons to watch it and follow even the lackluster sequels. From the body horror aspects to the unique storylines surrounding the demons, there is a reason Hellraiser has survived for so long.

A Masterclass Of Body Horror

When horror movie fans talk about body horror, the king of the mountain remains David Cronenberg. However, no one can deny that Clive Barker doesn't hold that same role in the realm of horror fiction novels. When Barker directed his own novella, he brought his love for body horror to the big screen.

Hellraiser stands up with any other body horror movie of its era, and it's often even more shocking than others. Barker loves to add beauty to his ugly violence, and he did that in spectacular form when he created the movie based on his nightmares.

Brilliant Practical Effects

The lure of the Hellraiser series is only partially on the story of sadomasochistic torture. The real lure here was seeing the Cenobites and hoping for the best. When it comes to the ones that worked, it was the creepy Cenobites that stood the test of time.

That is where Hellraiser stands above many other horror movies that tried to follow its lead in recent years. The best Hellraiser movies didn't use CG, and did everything with some pretty brilliant practical effects. Whether it was the simplicity of Pinhead or the complicated creations like Butterball and Chatterer, the great effects made even the bad movies worth a watch.

It Subverted The Slasher Genre Tropes

When Hellraiser came along, many horror fans lumped it in with slasher movies like Halloween, Friday the 13th, and Nightmare on Elm Street. However, in reality, Hellraiser subverted so many slasher movie tropes that it barely fit into that genre.

For one thing, Pinhead and the Cenobites were not slasher serial killers. Instead, people summoned them when they wanted to leave this world, although the fact that some innocents accidentally summoned them on occasion was frightening. There is also the fact that the Cenobites didn't care about murder, and it was all about torture. The Hellraiser movies that ignored these rules were usually the ones that failed with audiences.

The Imagery Of Their World

The slasher movies of the 1980s mostly took place in familiar places. Halloween took place in a small town, Friday the 13th was on a campground, and the one that subverted things still took place on Elm Street. However, Hellraiser had its own mythical world that was unlike any other in movies.

Pinhead and his fellow Cenobites lived in a special corner of Hell, and when Hellraiser II took fans to that world. It raised the entire franchise to a new level. The demonic realm was almost as scary as the Cenobites, and it created a world so much bigger than almost any horror franchise of its kind. The series also liked to switch up locations in the real world to ensure things never looked the same in any of the movies.

Clive Barker

The entire multimedia franchise sprung from one short story written by one of the masters of the horror genre, Clive Barker. A short story titled "The Forbidden" was the basis for the Candyman franchise. Hellraiser was based on Barker's novella, The Hellbound Heart. Barker also wrote and directed the original 1987 film. His vision and storytelling skills are what made this franchise so interesting.

Unfortunately for Barker, he signed the story and character rights away to the production company before the release of the first film. The intellectual property no longer belongs to him, and he hasn't been involved with Hellraiser since 1987.

Cenobites

Unlike most horror franchises, Hellraiser is not the story of a solo slasher killing people off one by one. It's about a group of demonic creatures called the Cenobites from another dimension who are simply searching for carnal pleasures in other realities. Those pleasures are pretty gosh darn violent, especially for fragile humans.

Most people are familiar with Pinhead as the leader of his ragtag group of sadomasochistic interdimensional explorers. His gravitas is a big reason that the movies succeeded at all.

Making New Friends

In most of the previously mentioned horror franchises, the goals of the slashers killing people are usually related to some sort of revenge or inspired by a previous horrific act. As time goes on, they kind of just transition to being mass murderers and serial killers. In Hellraiser, the goals of the Cenobites are much different.

They're not looking to kill people out of a need for revenge or even for the sake of killing. They're really just looking for a good time. Unfortunately for the people they meet when their puzzle box is opened, that "good time" is pretty gruesome.

Angels Or Demons?

What the Cenobites are is certainly open to interpretation. In the first film, the Cenobite who would eventually be referred to as Pinhead described how they have been viewed as both angels and demons in the past. He also goes on to describe how they're actually neither and are simply just interdimensional travelers.

Simple, every-day interdimensional beings who look really evil and are hoping more than anything for the opportunity to flay someone. The complexities of the Cenobites just get more pronounced as the series goes on.

Religious Undertones

While the first movie seemed to push away from the idea that the Cenobites were demons, at least in a religious sense, later movies kind of leaned into it. As the franchise grew, the Cenobites almost became full-fledged demons in the biblical sense, though still extradimensional beings.

They targeted sinners, essentially punishing them for their misdeeds. Pinhead in particular actually came face to face with angels fighting for the humans he tormented. The last movie released in 2018 showed fans more about this than past movies had.

Pinhead

At the core of the movies is Pinhead, the leader of the Cenobites. As previously mentioned, the name Pinhead didn't pop up until the second movie, reputedly a nickname given to the character by the crew on the set of the first movie. It really stuck. Like the rest of the Cenobites, Pinhead used to be a human.

In Pinhead's case, he was formerly Elliot Spencer, a Captain in the British Expeditionary Force suffering from PTSD when he found the puzzle box. Unlike contemporary slasher horror antagonists, Pinhead was written to be intelligent, articulate, and coercive. This made him more frightening and engaging than other characters like Freddy or Jason.

Doug Bradley

For eight out of the ten Hellraiser movies, Pinhead was portrayed by Doug Bradley. He's one of only a handful of actors to play the same horror character in six or more movies, a list that includes the iconic Freddy Krueger actor Robert Englund. Bradley's portrayal of the franchise's main antagonist is why it has the following it does. He played Pinhead with an air of unsettling intelligence that permeates every scene.

Bradley got so good at working with the Pinhead make-up and prosthetics, he was actually credited as an assistant make-up artist. Bradley did not return for the 2011 and 2018 installments of the franchise, which might be why they have gotten so little attention.

The World's Worst Puzzle Box

One of the best parts of the Hellraiser movies is the puzzle box, also known as the Lament Configuration. This box is how people summon the Cenobites, for the most part accidentally. Some people open it because they have heard rumors of exotic pleasures beyond their imaginations.

The problem is that the Cenobites can't really differentiate between pain and pleasure anymore, so begins the torments. The puzzle box is one of the best objects of its kind in any film and is a key part of the story. Investigating its background has been huge in some of the films as well as the overall mythology.

Almost Has A Message

While other contemporary slasher horror franchises were focused on killers taking people out for almost no reason, there were times that Hellraiser almost had a message. The keyword here is "almost." The Cenobites frequently targeted sinners, people who were likely to fall for their trap.

Some people would try to manipulate the Cenobites in various ways, only to find themselves at their mercy. They don't make deals. When they do, it's just a setup for whatever comes next. In that way, the series has a subtextual message about not trying to screw people over.

Not For Everyone

The reality is that Hellraiser stands apart from other horror franchises for a number of reasons, but it's also not for everyone. It's a different take on the genre that steps away from the slasher horrors that typified the era. This is due in no small part to Pinhead, and the actor that played him for most of his on-screen outings.

The Hellraiser franchise has a much different vibe to it and is far more unsettling than most other horror franchises because of it. Because of that, and the sadomasochistic content, this franchise just doesn't appeal to all horror fans. But that's also one of the things that makes it great.

NEXT: Hellraiser - The 5 Most Terrifying Scenes In The Franchise (& 5 Unintentionally Hilarious Ones)