It’s October 1, which means we’ve reached my favorite time of year when everything is pumpkin spice flavored and you don’t get weird looks when you talk about planning a costume.

One of my annual October traditions is watching horror movies, and while I love revisiting the classics, like the black and white Universal horror movies and the saturated hued Hammer movies, I like to watch movies I haven’t seen before as well. This year, I’m going to try to get myself into the blogging habit by writing about the horror movies I watch over the course of the month.

Naturally, I had to start the season right, and I decided to start off on a lighter note with the horror-comedy, Cooties. The premise is that tainted chicken nuggets infect kids with a zombie virus while anyone who’s already gone through puberty only experiences stomach flu-like symptoms. Most of the movie takes place in an elementary school and focuses on the surviving faculty members who are trying to escape.

Overall, I enjoyed it, although I can’t say it’s one of my favorites. It straddled the line between parody and social commentary awkwardly at times, and some of the jokes fell flat to me. But there were a few moments that shined, the most notable being when Rainn Wilson, as Wade the hyper masculine PE teacher, dons mirrored sunglasses a la David Caruso and growls, “Nap time, motherfuckers,” as he tosses a lit match at gasoline-drenched zombie kids.

It’s a pretty short movie that keeps up a fast pace, which does leave some unanswered questions, like how Wade and Hitachi survived and successfully followed the other fugitives to Danville, but this isn’t really the kind of movie to waste a lot of thought on. I’d recommend it if you’re in the mood for something that’s a little gory and has a few tense moments and jump scares, but that you can watch alone in the dark and still get to sleep afterwards.