Independent Reading Response #3

The Beast from the East (Goosebumps)

Response #3: Pg1-151
Response Type: 3. Connection to Other "texts"

The book calls “The Beast from the East” is about a girl who had struggle time during the camp, and she and her twin brother had to play weird tag which they never played before. This book’s ending is not understandable for me because I thought the ending will be finished by happy ending, however it was not. After I read this book, I realize that this has some similar setting as a movie called “Friday the 13th”, but this book is not crueler than this movie.

The first similar thing is the ending which I don’t like. I feel really sorry for Gender, the main character and her brothers because after the climax, they have to play harder game than they played before. I know this book does not end happily because on the last sentence of this book is “Tag! You’re It.”, so this shows me that the tag will continue. If they lose the game, they might get eaten by the beasts which they play against. It reminds me that Friday the 13th because after Jason, the murder in the movie dead, he appears some day and kills many people again. Those stories never ended. Therefore, it has the same ending and makes me unhappy and nervous, but this is not only the similarity between the book and movie.

The enemy of the main characters have same hobby, killing the people. In the book, the main character’s enemy was big beasts and if the beasts win the game, they will eat Gender and her brothers. Also, on the page 36, the beast says to Gender “Free Lunch Place. It means anyone can eat you!” They really like to eat people and animals. For the movie, Jason always has the saw or chain saw to kill the people even though they are innocent. Although, he is different from the beasts, they kill animal or people as much as they want. I realized that both this movie and book’s genre is horror, so it also might have some similar plots.

It is the same that they kill or eat people. Nevertheless, it is different how cruel they are. In the Goosebumps, when the beasts lost the game, they said sorry and let the main characters leave. Also, they followed the rule, even though it is unfair for them and main characters. However, in Friday the 13th, Jason never listens to the people and kills them without any reason. He kills many innocent people. If I compare those, I feel that the beasts are much kinder than him, but they are still mean and killer. Therefore, the difference between Jason and the beasts is that Jason is real murder and the beasts are little bit kinder than him. I don’t like both of them though, because they kill people anyway.

As follows, I compare Goosebumps and Friday the 13th to find some similarities and differences. Both of them are horror, but different fear that I get from the book. I like to read and watch horror books and movies, but I don’t like when it is not happy end. I hope these similar connection might not happened in the world.