P-Vock's Music Box: This Is Halloween
Hello and welcome back to P-Vock's Music Box. The spooky season is in full swing, and even P-Vock is joining in the festivities. But, I'm running out of horror-related games. Not sure what more I can talk about at this time of year.
Maybe, I should expand my horizons and play a scary game? Nahhhhh Instead, let's hop aboard the Gummi Ship and go to a town made of pure Halloween.
It's perfect!
Next to my beloved Treasure Planet, The Nightmare Before Christmas is my favourite non-Pixar Disney film ever made, so being able to run around Halloween Town with Jack Skellington gave me so much joy. The field theme being a remix of the second-best theme in the movie (Oogie Boogies song, best Disney villain theme ever, being number one) just made it all the sweeter. Yoko Shimomura's choice of instrumentation for this new arrangement manages to keep it recognizable, thematically appropriate, and with its own unique flair all at the same time.
It's just This Is Halloween if it were made for a video game world, which is all it ever needed to be.
Now, that theme is cool and all. I really enjoy it. That being said, one of my favourite parts of Kingdom Hearts is that each world has its own battle theme.
Only Shimomura could compose something that is equal parts playful and epic while remaining reminiscent of This Is Halloween. The melody is iconic and a wonderful remix of the iconic song. The updated tempo is as intense and energetic as a battle in Kingdom Hearts. The new musical flairs are bouncy and chaotic, perfectly capturing the weird Dr. Finkelstein's monster mash-up of horror and slapstick present in the original film.
While I can never tire of the original music in this series, I also just love the wonderful nostalgic hits of classic themes from movies I grew up with. This world is no exception.
But, because Square Enix loves to make me happy, they also gave us the Town from the movie I love even more than Halloween Town.
Definitely having less obvious connections to What's This than its Halloween counterpart did with This Is Halloween, What A Surprise still manages to hit some similar note sequences and crescendos that take me right back to when Jack first found Christmas Town.
Add to that some Christmas flair with the bells & chimes, the same bouncy vibes that perfectly capture the fun spirit of the movie from which it comes, and an overall warm composition, and you have a theme that just feels like Christmas and puts me in a jolly mood every time I hear it.
Kingdom Hearts is a truly special series that is unlike any other. Whether it be original beats or retreading movies I've watched countless times, I know that Kingdom Hearts is going to deliver a good time whenever I boot up one of the titles.
If my consistent ramblings haven't convinced you to give the series a try by now, I don't know what more I can do, short of coming to your home and forcing you to play it (which, don't tempt me, because I'll hyucking do it).
Thank you, as always, for checking out my content. Happy Halloween, and I hope to catch you back here next time with another suggestion from my Music Box.
Stay Brutal!
PS. I had to also drop the Christmas Town battle theme because it also slaps!