Summary
“The Golden Arm (Michigan) Part 3” caps off a classic horror story that was nothing special provides a nice start.
This recap of 50 States Of Fright Episode 3, “The Golden Arm (Michigan) Part 3”, contains spoilers. You can check out our thoughts on the previous episode by clicking these words.
So 50 States of Fright Episode 3 opens with a stormy Michigan night, and Dave is on the way to the grave of his beloved wife, as times are tough and he could really use that golden arm.
Dave digs his way down to Heather’s corpse, and as he prepares to remove the arm, again, Heather’s eyes seem to open in horror. Dave is undeterred though. He closes her eyes and chops the arm off, but when Heather’s eyes flash open again he grabs the arm, panics, and runs for home.
So this third act is obviously where Raimi gets to have a bit of fun with some horror lynchpins. We have the storm outside, a photograph of Heather that seems to move before her image disappears from the picture altogether. How and why this should happen is, frankly, not important. Raimi is ramping up the tension and preparing us for the reveal that we all know is coming.
When the crumbling crusty one-armed corpse of Heather does arrive, it is accompanied by the line “Where is my golden arm?” And I wonder if there are any other fans of Creepshow out there, you know the first movie by Stephen King and George Romero, who couldn’t help think of the first story in that anthology, with a zombie stalking the family home asking, “Where’s my Father’s Day cake?”
Needless to say, Heather disposes Dave with his ax, and both bodies are discovered by locals, who rebury them together, while the narrator of this story tells us that nobody would dare try to steal Heather’s golden arm again.
This is a classic short horror story, that ticks all the right boxes, and though nothing special or extraordinary, it’s a nice start to this series, and I will tune in for more.
