History YMMV / PolterGeist

* AwesomeMusic: [[AwesomeMusic/JerryGoldsmith Jerry Goldsmith strikes again.]]

* CompleteMonster: [[SinisterMinister Reverend]] [[BigBad Henry Kane]] was the insane leader of a utopian cult in the early 19th century who his "flock" into an underground cavern under the premise that the world was about to end, but in actuality, his only intention was to harvest their souls for his own power. As a ghost, he absorbed the energy from his followers, which fused with the evil in his heart and turned him into a monstrous apparition a demon called "The Beast". When the Freeling family moves into the home built where the cavern once was, Kane tries to abduct the young Carol Anne and bring her to the realm of the dead, dubbed the "Other Side," where he could use her to attract more souls for his energy. In the second movie he keeps on tormenting the Freelings, possessing Steven's body in order to rape Diane while taking a proactive role in psychologically and physically tormenting the family as he seeks to take Carol Anne. At the end of the third film, Kane apparently abandons his pursuit of the Freelings and accepts the mystic Tangina's offer to show him into the light, but the film ends with a flash of lightning and Kane's demonic laughter, showing his supposed redemption as a sham.

* AwesomeMusic/JerryGoldsmith

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: There are some hints during the film, stronger during the second half, that Dana goes on dates with guys and has sex with them, without her parents knowing: Just the day after they [[spoiler: recover Carol Anne from the other side of the closet]], Diane tells Dana that later, they'll go to a hotel, when she tells which one, Dana just goes like "oh, yes", and giving some fun smile, looking like she's daydreaming, letting us know that she knows it and that something special for her happened there and Diane saying "what is it?", or something like that. Then Dana leaves and we don't know anything of her until the very end of the movie, when she gets out of the car screaming "WHAT'S GOING ON??!!". Look for her neck, to the left and to the right of it, you can see lovebites.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: There are some hints during the film, stronger during the second half, that Dana goes on dates with guys and having sex with them, without her parents knowing: Just the day after they [[spoiler: recover Carol Anne from the other side of the closet]], Diane tells Dana that later, they'll go to a hotel, when she tells which one, Dana just goes like "oh, yes", and giving some fun smile, looking like she's daydreaming, letting us know that she knows it and that something special for her happened there and Diane saying "what is it?", or something like that. Then Dana leaves and we don't know anything of her until the very end of the movie, when she gets out of the car screaming "WHAT'S GOING ON??!!". Look for her neck, to the left and to the right of it, you can see lovebites.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: There are some hints during the film, stronger during the second half, that Dana goes on dates with guys and having sex with them, without her parents knowing: Just the day after they [[spoiler: recover Carol Anne from the other side of the closet]], Diane tells Dana that later, they'll go to a hotel, when she tells which one, Dana just goes like "oh, yes", and giving some fun smile, looking like she's daydreaming, letting us know that she knows it and that something special for here happened there and Diane saying "what is it?", or something like that. Then Dana leaves and we don't know anything of her until the very end of the movie, when she gets out of the car screaming "WHAT'S GOING ON??!!". Look for her neck, to the left and to the right of it, you can see lovebites.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: There are some hints during the film, stronger during the second half, that Dana goes on dates with guys and having sex with them, without her parents knowing: Just the day after they [[spoiler: recover Carol Anne from the other side of the closet]], Diane tells Dana that later, they'll go to a hotel, when she tells which one, Dana just goes like "oh, yes", and giving some fun smile, looking like she's daydreaming, letting us know that she knows it and that something special for here happened there and Diane saying "what is it?", or something like that. Then Dana leaves and we don't know anything of her until the very end of the movie, when she gets out of the taxi screaming "WHAT'S GOING ON??!!". Look for her neck, to the left and to the right of it, you can see lovebites.

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: There are some hints during the film, stronger during the second half, that Dana goes on dates with guys, probably having sex with them, without her parents knowing: Just the day after they [[spoiler: recover Carol Anne from the other side of the closet]], Diane tells Dana that later, they'll go to a hotel, when she tells which one, Dana just goes like "oh, yes", and giving some fun smile and Diane saying "what is it?", or something like that, then Dana leaves the house and we don't know anything of her until the very end of the movie, when she gets out of the taxi screaming "WHAT'S GOING ON??!!". Look for her neck, to the left and to the right of it, you can see lovebites.

* DirectorDisplacement: It's directed by TobeHooper, not Creator/StevenSpielberg.

* MemeticMutation: "This house is clean."

* NightmareFuel: A bit of EnforcedMethodActing, said to have been Spielberg's idea. Some of the corpses in the final scene were ''real.''

** One poster atop a little boy's bed says "1988 SuperBowl XXII", which is kind of eerie when you realize that [[http://www.cracked.com/article_19927_6-movies-that-predicted-disasters-with-eerie-accuracy.html this was the exact date that the film's star, Heather O'Rourke, died]].

** Actually, the dude who directed the first two ''Film/TheTexasChainsawMassacre'' films directed this... though people have their theories about who directed what.

* DirectorDisplacement: It's directed by TobeHooper, not StevenSpielberg.

* NightmareFuel: A bit of EnforcedMethodActing, said to have been Spielberg's idea. Some of the corpses in the final scene were ''real.''

** To make things even more interesting, according to David Hughes' ''The Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made'', originally E.T. and Poltergeist were one film, the never-produced ''Night Skies''. The mind boggles.

* HighOctaneNightmareFuel: A bit of EnforcedMethodActing, said to have been Spielberg's idea. Some of the corpses in the final scene were ''real.''

* WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids: Yup. Written by the same dude who did ''Film/ETTheExtraTerrestrial''. And, you know... ''{{Jaws}}''.

** Actually, the dude who directed the first two ''TexasChainsawMassacre'' films directed this... though people have their theories about who directed what.

* HighOctaneNightmareFuel: And [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel/{{Poltergeist}} HOW.]]

* {{Tearjerker}}. Julien Beck was dying of cancer during filming of ''Poltergeist II'', and it's plainly evident. It's more sad when you knew Julian and what a great guy he was in real life.

* {{Tearjerker}}. Julien Beck was dying of cancer during filming of ''Poltergeist II'', and it's plainly evident. It's more sad when you knew Julian and what a great guy he was in real life.