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[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/NewYearEvil_2896.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:300:And you thought [[MillenniumBug [=Y2K=]]] was something to worry about...]]

->''"This New Year's, you're invited to a killer party..."''

''New Year's Evil'' is a 1980 SlasherMovie from Creator/TheCannonGroup, directed by Emmett Alston and starring Roz Kelly (aka [[Series/HappyDays Pinky Tuscadero]]).

On [[NewYearHasCome New Year's Eve]], punk icon Diane "Blaze" Sullivan (Kelly), who has a strained relationship with her husband Richard (Kip Niven) and son Derek (Grant Cramer), is hosting a nationally-televised kickass bash in a UsefulNotes/LosAngeles hotel, which features live performances, a call-in segment which allows people to suggest songs and vote for their favorite one of the year, and countdowns for various US time zones.

At first, things go well, until Diane receives a disturbing phone call from a man who calls himself "Evil". Evil tells Diane that he intends to kill each time it strikes midnight in a different time zone, and that he will eventually target someone close to her. While Diane is shaken by the call, everyone else dismisses it as a prank, until Evil makes good on his promise, and kills a nurse, playing a recording of the murder over the phone for Diane, who he intends to make his final victim...

A relatively early entry in the Golden Age of Slashers, ''New Year's Evil'', despite lacking in traditional gore and nudity, has several things that set it apart; its fairly clever premise, its urban setting, an antagonist with more in common with a regular old SerialKiller (he's a completely average guy who charms his victims, and has a straightforward MO) than a normal slasher, [[SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic and it also has a badass soundtrack]].
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!!Tropes featured in ''New Year's Evil'' include:
* EightiesHair: This movie is a neat time capsule of the decade, and a lot of characters sport these do's, including our protagonist Blaze.
* AbandonedPlayground: Sally and Lisa's bodies are placed in one by Evil.
* AndThatsTerrible: Evil says "And that's not nice!" at least twice during his MotiveRant.
* AssholeVictim: The biker Evil stabs at the drive-in.
* AutoErotica: A couple try and get it on in the drive-in, only to be interrupted by Evil, who steals their car (and the girl).
* BlackDudeDiesFirst: Yvonne is Evil's first victim.
* BreastAttack: Evil's signature is mutilating his victims' breasts.
* CampingACrapper: Yvonne's death occurs in her bathroom, in the shower.
* CardCarryingVillain: "Call me... Evil."
* CarFu: Evil accidentally rams a biker while distracted by some photos in his car.
* CatScare: The police officers looking for Sally and Lisa's bodies are startled by a cat that jumps out of a dumpster they investigate.
* ChaseScene: When an intended victim escapes from his hijacked car, Evil chases her through the woods and to a baseball field.
* ClockKing: Evil is associated with clocks throughout the film.
%%* CollaredByFashion
%%* CoolShades: They're everywhere.
* CreepyMonotone: Evil speaks in it when he makes his phone calls.
%%* CriminalMindGames
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: Sally is suffocated with a plastic bag... full of marijuana.
* CuriosityKilledTheCast: Lisa is attacked and killed while looking for the (now dead) Sally, [[TooDumbToLive after following a trail of clothes to the killer instead of calling the police at the liquor store she was just at.]]
* DeathByMocking: The biker. Really shouldn’t have smashed up the serial killer’s car, even if he did drive into your gang (by accident).
* DownerEnding: [[spoiler:Wearing his father's mask, Derek hijacks the ambulance his mother is loaded into, and presumably kills her, just as it strikes midnight in Hawaii. [[AssholeVictim Though considering Diane has the personality of cardboard and spent most of the movie being a jerk to him, it's not that terrible]].]]
* DriveInTheater: The setting of one of the movie's action sequences.
* DrivenToSuicide: [[spoiler:Evil, who steps off the rooftop he is chased to by the police.]]
%%* DumbBlonde: Sally.
* TheEighties: From its diegetic music numbers to the fashion and the hair, this movie is very, very eighties.
* EvilElevator: Evil tampers with it, and causes it to go out of control. He later straps Diane to the bottom of it, in order to crush her.
* EvilPhone: Throughout the movie, Evil taunts Diane through her phone, even playing a recording of his murder of the nurse.
* EvilVersusEvil: Evil accidentally drives into a group of bikers, pissing them off and causing them to chase him. While most of them are trashing his car at a drive-in, he manages to knife one of them.
%%* FashionableAsymmetry
* FinalGirl: Diane; when Evil taunts her on the phone for the first time, he actually states that he's saving her for last.
* FlippingTheBird: Evil gets the finger from a biker.
%%* FluffyFashionFeathers
* FreudianExcuse: Psychiatrist Doctor Reed assumes Evil has a mother fixation, since the breasts of all his female victims were mutilated.
* GenkiGirl: Sally.
* GirlishPigtails: A would-be victim has them.
* GoryDiscretionShot: Nurse Jane's death; she's just offscreen as the switchblade stabs her.
** In fact, ''any'' death that could potentially involve too much blood uses this. The only onscreen deaths are Sally's and that one biker dude.
* HorrorDoesntSettleForSimpleTuesday: Set on New Year's Eve, as the title implies.
* HospitalHottie: The Crawford Sanitarium nurses.
* ImpersonatingAnOfficer: To get into the hotel and to Diane, Evil steals an officer's uniform.
* ImprobableInfantSurvival: Downplayed, but [[spoiler:out of the five women Evil attacks before Diane, the only survivor is the youngest one, a teenaged girl]].
* MirrorScare: Richard does this to Diane, as a prank.
* MonsterMisogyny: Evil has only one male victim, killed in what could be arguably considered self-defense. Every time he has the chance to kill another man, he either just threatens them (the moviegoer and the two drunks) or non-fatally injures them (Sergeant Greene, and the two other officers).
* MotiveRant: [[spoiler:Shortly after Evil is revealed to be Richard, he gives a misogynistic speech, claiming all women are selfish, deceitful scum, and that Diane "castrated" him and Derek, and that he did all this to remove her from their lives... yeah, it's lame, but they at least say he has a history of mental problems and was in an asylum.]]
* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: Evil and Blaze.
* NewYearHasCome: The film is set on New Year's Eve and features the clock striking midnight in several locations and time zones.
* NoPeripheralVision: Yvonne somehow fails to notice Evil is standing in her bathtub when she turns off the leaky faucet.
* OutWithABang: Evil kills Nurse Jane after seducing her.
* PeekABooCorpse: Shortly after the cops find Sally's corpse, Lisa's body tumbles down a nearby slide. Additionally, on her way up after being chained to the bottom of the elevator, Diane spots Yvonne's corpse.
* PleaseIWillDoAnything: The teenager Evil kidnaps at the drive-in becomes even more frightened when he says he doesn't want her money. She says in a quavering voice that she'll do anything if he doesn't hurt her, even promising not to resist if he wants to rape her. That is exactly the wrong thing to say to a misogynistic SerialKiller.
* PoliceAreUseless: Up until about the end, when they destroy the elevator control panel, saving Diane.
* PornStache: Evil dons one as apart of his second disguise.
* PrecisionFStrike: When Evil tries hijacking a car, he screams "Where are the keys?! Where are the ''fucking'' keys?!"
* PrettyInMink: Sally had a rabbit fur jacket for going out in the evening.
%%* ReactionShot
* RecycledSoundtrack: What sounds a lot like "[[Franchise/FridayThe13th ki-ki-ki... ma-ma-ma]]" is heard in a few scenes.
* TheReveal: [[spoiler:Evil is Diane's husband, Richard.]]
* SelfMadeOrphan: [[spoiler:The ending heavily implies Derek kills his mother.]]
* SequelHook: [[spoiler:Derek apparently decides to follow in his father's footsteps.]]
* TheScourgeOfGod: Evil specifically targets "immoral" (i.e. loose) women.
* TheShrink: Doctor Reed, a psychologist brought in to analyze Evil in the movie's second half/
* SinisterMinister: Evil's third disguise.
* SinisterScrapingSound: While looking for a victim who got away, Evil taps and swipes his switchblade across some bleachers.
* SinisterSuffocation: Evil suffocates Sally with a plastic bag.
* SinisterSwitchblade: Evil's main weapon is a switchblade.
* SlashedThroat: Seems to be how Yvonne and the ambulance driver die.
* SlashersPreferBlondes: Zigzagged. The first victim is an African-American woman, and Diane (who Evil is saving for last) is a redhead, but Evil attacks four blonde women between them.
* SoundOnlyDeath: Yvonne and Lisa's deaths.
* TheStinger: An ad for ''Be My Valentine, Or Else...'', aka ''Film/HospitalMassacre''.
* StrawMisogynist: Dr. Reed describes Evil as a sociopath "with a mother fixation", and Evil himself gets a motive rant in tune with that assessment.
-->'''Evil''': Ladies are not very nice people. They are manipulative, and deceitful, and immoral, and very, very selfish.
%%* {{Stripperific}}: Diane's stage wear.
* TakeMeOutAtTheBallGame: Subverted, the cops scare Evil off before he can kill the girl he chased to a field.
* TapOnTheHead: Outside the hotel, Evil lures and knocks out an officer with a brick. Later, he knocks Sergeant Greene out with a kick to the head.
* TitleDrop: "Now, this is your last chance to be bad before you make those New Year's resolutions! That's why we call our celebration New Year's Evil!"
* TooMuchInformation: Sally mentions her roommate Lisa got over her nervous diarrhea via meditation.
* TooDumbToLive: Nearly everyone in this movie, but particularly Lisa. Seriously, did it ever occur to you your roommate's shoes might've been a ''trap''?
%%* TotallyRadical: Throughout the film.
* TwoAliasesOneCharacter: The SerialKiller "Evil" is eventually revealed to be a character who has been mentioned in several previous scenes. [[spoiler:Diane's husband Richard.]]
* VoiceChangeling: Evil uses a device to change his voice while on the phone.
* WhenYouComingHomeDad: Derek is heavily ignored by Diane.
* WhenTheClockStrikesTwelve: Evil times his kills to the clock striking twelve in various American time zones, from the East Coast to Los Angeles.
* WhiteMaskOfDoom: [[spoiler:Richard wears one during a prank on Diane, and when he commits suicide. Derek later takes it off his body, and [[SequelHook puts it on]].]]
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