Horror fiction (as a genre) owes a lot to cinema. This relationship is often mutually beneficial, though not always. As literature informed the early days of terror on the silver screen, the evolutions and trends of on-screen horror raised and informed the writers that toil away in its fertile soil. With Ellen Datlow’s newest anthology Final Cuts: New Tales of Hollywood Horror, I think we can see true evidence of that. The language and images within this book capture some of those terrors in their own unique fashion.

I enjoyed every story in the collection. I think that some are stronger than others, but as I always state in my anthology reviews, this is to be expected. I’ve captured some thoughts on individual stories here, but know that Ellen Datlow has once again assembled a marvelous TOC.

We start the anthology off with Dale Bailey’s Das Gesicht. It’s a poignant remembrance of the early days of the film industry, which makes a lot of sense considering this book’s subject matter. I love that the horror on display here isn’t overtly supernatural; the mistakes and pain we create during our short lives are horrific enough.
Kelley Armstrong (Drunk Physics) next gives us a modern ghost tale that uses the complications of the Youtube age to great effect. This is a relatable character piece that has some memorable twists on the way to its conclusion. Nothing ground-breaking, but I enjoyed this contemporary tale quite a bit.

I also enjoyed the multi-layered madness of both Insanity Among Penguins (Brian Hodge) and Altered Beast, Altered Me (John Langan). I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about the devastating Folie À Deux, Or the Ticking Hourglass written by Usman T. Malik. This story is about the horrific melding of memory and trauma; the fears we have as children that we must now witness as adults. Like many of the stories in Final Cuts, this one focuses on the vile actions of a murderer. This is a powerful and vengeful piece, and may very well be the stand-out of the collection.

Nathan Ballingrud’s Scream Queen and Gemma Files’ story Cut Frame offer up compelling views of women in the world of film. Each story is about the horrors these women have to endure and the wild harm that comes from vile (men) people. Hungry Girls also plays in this same realm, told with Cassandra Khaw’s lyrical style. This is where we see the major theme crop up for this book: the horrors that Hollywood can inflict on women. Most of the aforementioned stories (including Garth Nix’s pulp-tastic Many Mouths to Make a Meal) have overt variations on this. In the age of the Me-Too Movement, this anthology comes at the right time. Bravo and yes.
For those of us that love to watch cinema and fiction mix, Final Cuts is a treat. It’s a timely work that truly brings something for everyone.

A good, if not groundbreaking, themed anthology of horror stories about movies and moviemaking. Excellent collection of authors, but stories don't have too many highs and lows. Like many themed anthologies, stories hit the same ideas over and over again; the majority of the stories end up hitting the cursed/lost film theme. But some of the stories really do bring out unique ideas or hit on very specific aspects of film history. Stories about a studio fixer in the 1930s, the Canadian horror movie boom of the 1970s, and a lost Werner Herzog documentary stand out for bringing something unique to the table.

Ellen Datlow is notorious for putting together great anthologies and that is exactly what this was.

In my opinion, the best stories in this collection were Exhalation #10 by AC Wise, Scream Queen by Nathan Ballingrud, The One We Tell Bad Children by Laird Barren, Lords of the Matinee by Stephen Graham Jones, Hungry Girls by Cassandra Khaw, and Cut Frame by Gemma Files. All the stories in this anthology kept me entertained, so I’d recommend it.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free copy of this ebook in exchange for an unbiased review.

I was so grateful for this approval! I love anything movie related. Each story was great and I didn’t even want to skip around!

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of Final Cuts.

I love horror movies, anything scary, so when I saw the premise for Final Cuts, I had to request it.

Final Cuts is a collection of short stories where the basic plot revolves around movies, theater or moviemaking.

Short story collections are like a box of chocolates; I usually end up getting a coconut one. I don't like coconut.

But, I was pleased with the majority of the stories in Final Cuts. For the most part, they were all enjoyable, creepy, bloody, gory, and suspenseful.

There were a handful of stories I wished were longer, since the premise was so intriguing, like the one by Kelley Armstrong. I wanted more!

I was glad there were a few more female writers than usually appear in collections, though a couple more women authors wouldn't hurt.

Anthologies when done right are amazing and leave you wanting more. They have you researching the authors hungry for more of their work or you seek out more short story collections just like it, not wanting to devour a full book by just one fantastic writer but to stay in that groove of individual chapters. This is one of those books. Ellen Datlow hasn’t let me down yet and when I saw that this was A Blumhouse Books Horror original I was all the way in.

This collection is an ode to horror movies from China to Hollywood to the black and white era to live-streams. The stories vary and diversify themselves in all sorts of ways but no matter how you slice and dice it you leave each one feeling a chill, maybe some more than others. There are definitely some stories I had certain favoritism towards. But I also took away some new authors whose writing I took a shine to which is something I always enjoy.

What I loved about this anthology is that there isn’t a story that I wanted to skip. Usually there is one or two in every anthology that I just can’t get into but that wasn’t the case with this one. This is a solid work of art and I am happy I had the chance to read it.

Thanks very much to Netgalley and the publisher for this copy of ARC. All opinions are my own.