NNtG: Ghosts of Fear Street #8: The Ooze

You know, the more I read of regular Fear Street, then come back to the kid friendly section, the more Ghosts of Fear Street usually wins out for me in terms of giving me what I really expected from the Fear Street name. More of a focus on the supernatural. And given this is one I've heard about before going into it, I'm hoping for the best. But it is about an ooze-like substance. And even if Bob's not the one writing it, I fear for what I'm about to get into. And what I'm getting into is The Ooze. 

COVER STORY

Another awesome cover on our hands. I like the angle, how it's not super warped, but still gives a perspective. How the cat's all freaked out by the glowing orange slime coming out of the beaker. And hey, the slime is making a skull face. What is this, a Shivers cover? Good use of colorization, contrasting the darkness of the room with the bright glow of the ooze makes for a really unique visual. As with most covers, I approve of this. Top stuff.

STORY

Albert "Al" Sterner's got it rough. His dog won't even catch a ball. Though given the dog is named Tubby, unless that name's ironic, I can see the problem here. He also has his brainy older sister Michelle who likes to rub her nose about how Tubby's dumb and her cat Chester is so brilliant that he can count to eight and flush the toilet. Because she wants to potty train the cat. Okay then, this book's already heading into "huh?" territory quicker than I thought. Al heads inside as his mom is making his birthday cake. He laments how his parents are scientists, and Michelle's super smart, but they don't seem interested in what he likes. In this case how he wants a pair of roller blades, especially the ones on sale at... sigh... Dalby's. Look, it's been barely a month and the wounds have not healed. 

Al heads downstairs for his birthday present. Hoping for those sweet 90s roller blades. But instead, the room explodes. Well, that's one way to announce that they decided to get him a chemistry set. What, were the wood burning kits and the lawn darts gone? Al isn't as thrilled about entering the wonderful world of science like the rest of his family, but doesn't make a scene. He just accepts the gift and takes it to his room. He's not allowed to use it until Michelle shows him how. But it could come in handy as Shadyside Middle School is holding a science bowl. 

The next day, Al's friend Colin arrives and he shows off the chemistry set. Despite Al saying he has to wait for Michelle, Colin is all like "screw that" and messes with the chemicals with the intention of making a stink bomb. When they find actual instructions to make a stink bomb, Al thinks it'll be a perfect way to get back at Michelle for her talking down to him earlier. They mix a solution, but it turns out it doesn't make a stink. He gets caught by Michelle so that's a bust. The solution begins to turn orange and before the boys can do anything about it, Chester the cat knocks it over, giving us our scene from the cover. They try to wipe it off, but it doesn't seem to even soak. But they manage to get it into a cooler and try to ignore it for now.

The next day, Al wakes up and trips, which Michelle gets a good laugh of, because she still needs any opportunity to crap on him. Yet the parents do scold her. Now I know Stine didn't write this one. She also tries to get Chester to do a new trick, but the cat doesn't seem interested. Al leaves and runs into his other friend Al, or in this case Alix, his friend and partner for the science bowl. And the two seem to know their stuff, or at least Alix does as she answers all the questions Al asks. Al arrives in class, and after dealing with the class bully Eric Rice, sits down as he seems to have his attention everywhere else. When Eric is on the spot not knowing the capital of Brazil, he asks Al, who says it's Cleveland. Cleveland, Brazil. Eric gets in trouble and promises that Al will pay for that.

Not wanting the eventual handing of his own ass, Al makes a run for it and ends up on, where else, Fear Street. Turns out that Eric has no memory of how to get home. Colin runs into him and points him in the right direction. He makes it home and Michelle mentions that Chester still isn't acting normal. As if the cat got dumber or something. It starts to make Al think that the same is happening to him. Was the exposure to the orange ooze somehow making whoever touched it stupider? He checks the cooler of ooze in the basement and finds that it's starting to glow and has veins and is popping a bunch of weird bubbles. One bubble bursts and hits Al right in the face.

Al tries to tell his parents about the ooze, but when Michelle wins the high school science contest, everyone just ignores him. They all go to celebrate while leaving Al at home. Al tries to read from the dictionary, but suddenly he's finding it hard to read. So now he's convinced that he'll be much dumber the next day. The next day comes and sure enough, he's way dumber. By which I mean he brushes his hair with a toothbrush and toothpaste and combs his teeth. As he leaves home, he gets caught by Eric, who instead of beating him up, decides that Al should do his math homework, because we're just about halfway done and we need more reasons for Al to get his butt kicked.

After failing to do that (and going up a down staircase at school) Al's even more convinced that he's gotten even dumber. The next day, his dad wakes him up as it's the big science bowl day. And it's something Al really doesn't want to be a part of now given his continued dumbing down. His family's excited, but Al realizes he's going to make an idiot out of himself, which given the current events isn't very hard to do. He then thinks that maybe his science teacher, Mr. Gosling, will be able to help him get an answer about to ooze and why his brain is short circuiting. So he takes some of the ooze with him to school. Meanwhile, given he screwed Eric over again, now he's really worried about what's to come.

At lunch, Alix ends up seeing some of the ooze that Al brought and starts to touch it. Which leads to his entire science bowl team now having made contact with the slime. As in they all start to throw it around and rub it on each other. So, this is the team of the supposedly smartest kids in school rubbing an unknown orange substance on one another. Are we sure that it's Al who's the idiot here? The team gets ready and the science bowl begins and sure enough, none of the team can remember what anything is. Yet it's Al that manages to get one question right. 

Al's family is disappointed, though given that Al literally tried to tell them about the ooze, this isn't entirely his fault. More like 97%. Al gets grounded for failing so badly and, you know, not being Michelle or his genius parents. After trying to pull open a push door, he realizes that things are going to get worse and he has to destroy the ooze before things get worse. Colin arrives and the two head back to the cooler where now the Ooze has grown a heart and is still getting bigger. The ooze grows and covers Chester, the cat getting sucked into its mass. Even when Stine isn't writing these books an animal still gets abused. They soon see the cat again, only now it's completely dumbfounded. As if the ooze straight up stole its brain.

The ooze then forms hands and starts to grab at Al and Colin, but can't reach due to being stuck on the basement floor. They then see the ooze's massive brain. The boys run to the kitchen, but the ooze continues to follow them. They manage to get outside (though Al again forgets how to open the door), but the ooze follows them outside, now a fully formed creature with a mouth and a giant head showing its exposed brain. It then tells the kids that they did exactly what he wanted them to. The "stink bomb" instructions were actually instructions to create this alien slime creature. In other words... BOOM! SECRET ALIEN SLIME MONSTER THINGS THAT STEAL YOUR BRAIN AND MAN DOES THIS PLOT FEEL CONTRIVED... bitches.

The ooze grabs Al and is ready to steal the rest of his brain, but Tubby tries to come to his aid, only for the dog to have his brain taken too. The ooze then continues to steal Al's brains when suddenly it begins to grow smaller and smaller and bark. Turns out that the dog's brain was so dumb that it reversed the growth process. The dog's fine, I guess given he was always dumb. Al and Colin then decide to bury the cooler full of ooze to ensure this doesn't happen again.

TWIST ENDING

Al and the others get their smarts back. Michelle ends up finding some of the orange ooze on the ground. Al tries to warn her, but given she's still a jerk, Al then realizes that maybe when god closes a door he opens a window.

CONCLUSION

This is another one by Stephen Roos, and of the three I've covered from him, this one might be the weakest of the three for me. Not that there isn't some cool ideas with The Ooze, but they all feel super rushed by the end. And a lot of that comes with trying to add alien elements or that this was an intentional creation instead of simple dumb luck. Which is something given how dumb Al gets. I think sometimes trying to force an explanation ultimately hurts the intended horror of the story and maybe the case being more that Al created life by accident was a more interesting way than just this being some alien plot by planting failed stink bomb recipes with chemistry sets.

And, while this one came first, the obvious comparison is Brain Juice, only instead of a formula that made its protagonists smarter, this one makes them dumber. And while that book too can get contrived, I like Brain Juice more as its just more fun. This one feels more mean spirited, thanks mostly to Michelle just treating Al like garbage. So it makes the twist ending predictable, but satisfying. Speaking of Al, he's a decent protagonist and you do feel his plight as he gets dumber and dumber. Although, again, these supposed genius kids are just going to rub orange goop that they barely know where it came from on each other? Even without the brain drain they definitely deserved to lose. 

As for the monster, I like the idea of the Ooze. This slime monster that syphons the brain power of whoever comes in contact with it, eventually turning it into a sentient being with a giant brain. And the bits we get with the creature gives us some genuinely freaky moments for the book. So on the horror front, it certainly works, I just wish the explanation had a chance to breathe and not feel forced in as a reason for its existence. So we're left with a decent book overall. Far from perfect, definitely could have fixed some things and not dragged a little, but overall, it's a book that may not be genius, but is still fine enough. The Ooze gets a B+.