The X-Files - S8:E15 "Deadalive"

[ S8:E14 "This is Not Happening" <<< Season 8 >>> S8:E16 "Three Words" ]

Spoiler Warning: Another mythology episode. More spoilers. Big ones.

Deadalive (more like Dead? Alive!) begins with Mulder's funeral. Perhaps I'm missing out by not watching these episodes as they aired, and thus not knowing how everything would end. Not that I know the details, but just the all-important part where Mulder comes out of it alive and well is enough. So the more they play the "Mulder is really dead" card - which his actual, honest-to-god funeral would seem to serve - the more insincere it feels, and the less emotionally invested I am, because I'm just not buying it (although Gillian Anderson does her damnedest to try to make it real for us, even if Scully's emotions verge at times on the soap operatic). And, the cheaper it makes Mulder's inevitable resurrection feel, because it's like we're being strung along, and we know it. (Buffy the Vampire Slayer did a much more effective resurrection plotline, giving a character a whole season to deal with the aftereffects of returning from the world of the dead). Not that Mulder's life hasn't successfully been put in jeopardy on this show in the past - even when the viewers knew for certain that he would come out of it intact. But I guess then the drama never hinged so much on the "what if", but more on the "how" and the "why" of it (which in this episode fails to captivate).

Right from the start, this episode jumps ahead three months from the last episode. That's really pushing the resurrection angle. How would you like to wake up from death to find your body already three months decayed? This is just one of those things where it's the sooner done, the better. Anyway, Billy Miles (the boy who was introduced in the pilot, and abducted along with Mulder in Requiem - stretching the whole Oregon plotline even further, after I'd already erroneously claimed - but believed at the time! - that it didn't intersect with the show's main mythology in any significant way) is found by some fishermen in North Carolina. Ostensibly long dead, he is actually in some creepy state of being "deadalive", in which his body continues to decompose, but he breathes, and occasionally is even conscious. (Doesn't sound like fun). So, Skinner decides to exhume Mulder's body and, sure enough, he's in a similar state. But this isn't going to be a simple matter of, "oh, he was dead, but now he's alive again" (except that it is, in the end).

As the advance scout for the effects of this "disease", Billy Miles demonstrates the true nature of his condition following a gross shower scene in which he basically rinses off his decaying flesh, and emerges a fresh and new person. Except, as Scully finds out, he is literally a new person, now extolling the virtues of the alien menace (with shades of Cassandra's positive - but misguided - message in Patient X). Apparently, the gestation method demonstrated in the movie, Fight The Future, has now been swapped out for some kind of disturbing amalgam of Night of the Living Dead and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Go figure. That's where Krycek comes in (in his first appearance since Doggett's introduction on the show), once again wielding the nano-powers of life and death over A.D. Skinner (for a reminder, consult S.R. 819). He claims to have the vaccine (is it the same one from before?) to heal Mulder, thus preventing him from becoming an alien pod. But in return for saving Mulder's life, he orders Skinner to make sure Scully's baby doesn't come to term.

Which makes you wonder, does Krycek know something about Scully's baby? Or is he just doing this to watch them all squirm? I could see it going either way. Regardless, he appears to have them all in checkmate, and even Doggett's dogged determination isn't enough to resolve the situation, except that it seems to find a way to conveniently resolve itself. While Krycek maniacally smashes the vaccine against the floor of the parking garage (giving him another great opportunity to be the detestable weasel we all love to hate), Skinner takes Mulder off of life support, ostensibly to kill him so that he doesn't have to sabotage Scully's baby, only to find that the life support was incubating the virus. Taken off of it, and following an antiviral course prescribed by Scully (but presumably not including Krycek's wasted vaccine), Mulder magically recovers by a largely unsatisfying and all-too-convenient form of deus ex why-the-hell-not?

Whatever. I'm kind of beyond caring at this point. The end game, I guess, is getting Mulder back on his feet, and I'm curious to see what the show is going to do with him now. Finding Mulder definitely closes one arc of the mythology (leaving room for the next). Kersh has some nice scenes in this episode, inappropriately (but not unexpectedly) gloating over the news of Mulder's demise. He offers Doggett an opportunity for a transfer to a more respectable division - but to his enduring credit, Doggett hesitates. And by the time Mulder recovers, Kersh is ready to damn Doggett to the fate of the X-Files. But with Mulder back on the scene, you almost feel sad for him (which is again credit to what this show has managed to do with his character, against the odds), because now he's gonna be a third wheel (well, at least until Scully - who is beginning to show - goes on maternity leave, I guess). Only time will tell.

Memorable quotes:

Scully: I think the real tragedy is that, for all of his pain and searching, the truth that he worked so hard to find was never truly revealed to him. I can't truly believe that I'm really standing here.

(Neither can we. Because you're not, really. Not truly. Just give it to the end of the episode and things will turn around).

Scully: Get out while you can, Agent Doggett. Or you may never get out at all.

(Is that a prophecy?)

Kersh: It serves a man to have useful information, John. One never knows when he might find himself having to survive on his wits alone.

Kersh: I'm throwing you a rope. Don't go and hang yourself with it now.

Scully: The truth may hurt, but it's all that matters.

Scully: Do you know...do you have any idea what you've been through?
Mulder: I know what I see in your face.

(As we all do. Each and every line and lopsided grimace and furrowed brow and teary-eyed rivulet of it).

The X-Files - S7:E19 "Hollywood A.D."

[ S7:E18 "Brand X" <<< Season 7 >>> S7:E20 "Fight Club" ]

So this is that other episode that David Duchovny wrote and directed (the first one being The Unnatural). And I can sum it up with two words: sniper zombies. Cool is one thing - like sharks with laser beams. But this is just plain ridiculous. It is very much a light-hearted, comedic episode. It spends a few beats investigating a forgery caper involving religious documents (an alleged gospel of Mary Magdalene that paints Jesus in a more human light), involving an ancient artifact called the "Lazarus bowl", said to have recorded the incantation Jesus used to resurrect Lazarus like the grooves on a record. It's a neat idea, but feels more like the premise for an Indiana Jones movie than an episode of The X-Files. Which, I guess, is kind of appropriate, because the real meat of this episode is the idea that a scout from Hollywood (an old friend of Skinner's) is doing field research for a movie about the FBI, starring characters based on Mulder and Scully. The result is hilariously bad (see: sniper zombies), and I find it very interesting that the entire concept behind this episode is pretty much destroyed by the fact that there was an X-Files movie - it was called Fight The Future - and it was awesome.

Not so much this episode, although if you're into the less serious side of the series, you may disagree. If you think about it, this episode could have been a lot like Jose Chung's 'From Outer Space', in which an author does research for a book on alien abductions. But rather than intelligent deconstruction, this episode seems more invested in telling goofy jokes - some of which are funny, to be fair, but not as consistently as in a Darin Morgan script (and when the skeleton bones started to get up and dance, I was this close to quitting the episode - yes, it's true, I'm no fun). Taking an overview of the series, I really get the impression that The X-Files hit all its strongest beats in the second, third, and fourth seasons, and had been trying to recapture lightning in a bottle ever since then. There's also been way too much of an emphasis on humor since then, which I feel has twisted the overall tone of the show, and not for the better, in my opinion. Vince Gilligan is a talented writer, and he did a couple effectively funny episodes, but even he was no Darin Morgan. Neither is David Duchovny, who has Fox Mulder reciting lines from Plan 9 From Outer Space here.

Still, as easy as it would be for me to just write off this episode, I guess it's fun enough to prevent me from giving it a complete pass (it's even a little meta, with Téa Leoni - DD's real life wife at the time - playing the movie version of Scully) - but just barely - goofy though it is. In fact, it has much of the feel of the ending to The Post-Modern Prometheus. And speaking of endings - not that this really spoils anything - this is the episode where the zombies get up and dance at the end. I was starting to think that I had hallucinated that scene, having come this far in the series and not yet having seen it again - or that I had somehow misremembered the ending to The Post-Modern Prometheus. But sure enough, here it is. I guess that just proves I was still watching The X-Files at this point. I don't know if I had started watching it only intermittently, every so often, instead of religiously every week like in the past, or if much of this season was just not that memorable to me (although I have a hard time believing I wouldn't have had some recollection of Sein und Zeit/Closure, for example, if I had seen it the first time around). Who knows. It'll be interesting to see if I remember anything from the season finale coming up in a couple more episodes.

Memorable quotes:

Scully: Mulder, we should have a warrant.
Wayne Federman: Hey, it's only the Constitution. No big deal.

Mulder: Alright, one more pun and I pull out my gun.

(It had to rhyme, didn't it?)

Wayne Federman: You want my advice? You're both crazy.
Mulder: Well, why do you say that?
Wayne Federman: Well, you're crazy for believing what you believe...and [looks at Scully] you're crazy for not believing what he believes.

Cardinal O'Fallon (reading): "And then Jesus took his beloved Mary Magdalene in an embrace - an embrace not of God and woman, but of man and woman. And Jesus said to Mary, 'love the body, for it is all of the soul that our senses can perceive.'"

Micah Hoffman: I am become Jesus Christ.
Mulder: I am become skeptical.

Micah Hoffman: He is a decent man, but with an overweening pride and sense of responsibility born of a fundamental lack of respect for the human animal. He believes in God, but not in man - in man's ability to choose, to live in freedom. He has Christ in his brain, but not in his heart.

Scully: Mulder, do you think it's at all possible that Hoffman is really Jesus Christ?
Mulder: Are you making fun of me?
Scully: No.
Mulder: Well, no, I don't. But...crazy people can be very persuasive.
Scully: Well, yes, I know that.

Scully: Maybe true faith is a form of insanity.

Screen-Mulder: I love you, Scully - no ifs, ands, or...

Screen-Scully: Bees.

The X-Files - S7:E4 "Millennium"

[ S7:E3 "Hungry" <<< Season 7 >>> S7:E5 "Rush" ]

As you might be able to guess, this is indeed the long-awaited crossover episode between The X-Files and Chris Carter's other show, Millennium - although it had to wait until Millennium was cancelled following its third season to happen. (I'm not happy that Millennium was cancelled, but in hindsight, it seems appropriate that it happened when it did, given that the show relied on the tension created by the coming millennium, which largely evaporated post-Y2K when the world continued to turn as it had for the last thousand years, and the thousand years before that). As such, this is essentially a coda to that other series - a nice opportunity to tie up any loose ends not addressed in the finale. It's admittedly a little weird to watch this episode without having seen all of Millennium first (my rewatch of The X-Files has kindled my desire to rewatch Millennium - but there's no way I'm going to have time for that until after I'm done with this X-Files marathon), but that's how I did it the first time around, so I'm not too concerned. I was aware of Millennium back when I was watching The X-Files, but I never sat down to watch it. In truth, looking back, I thought I had seen an episode of Millennium, but several years later when I made the time to watch the show, I realized it was this episode of The X-Files that I was remembering.

At any rate, it's nice to see Frank Black (the perfectly cast Lance Henriksen) back in action. Well, that might be a slight exaggeration, because this is still by all means an episode of The X-Files, and Frank Black plays only a supporting - if integral - role. Remarkably, it does a great job of constructing the dark, moody atmosphere of a Millennium episode, while still being a perfectly solid episode of The X-Files, from start to finish. Although, these two shows always were just different sides of the same coin in my mind - you can see the genesis of Millennium in X-Files episodes like season 2's Irresistible. And there are obvious parallels to be made between Fox Mulder and Frank Black. Frank is older, and has (or has had) a family, but they're both ace criminal profilers, who have struggled with the dangers of becoming absorbed in their work and/or esoteric beliefs.

In this episode, Frank has checked himself into a mental hospital, and is trying to put his past behind him. Mulder and Scully track him down for consultation on a series of "grave robberies with a twist" that Mulder attributes to necromancy, and Skinner connects to a shadowy cult of ex-FBI agents called the Millennium Group, who were alleged to believe in Biblical prophecies relating to the end time - the turn of the millennium, which is right around the corner. Frank, in a bid to win custody of his daughter, is reluctant to help the agents, and thereby get himself embroiled in the affairs of the Group once more, but being the noble hero that he is, will choose to do the right thing in the end. Or, will he cut his losses and buy into the prophecy when the dead begin to rise? The episode culminates in a creepy basement scene we haven't seen the likes of since Die Hand die Verletzt. I'll have to watch Millennium again before I can comment on how satisfying this episode is as a coda to that series, but for a season 7 episode of The X-Files, it's everything I could hope for.

Memorable quotes:

Skinner: Agent Mulder, what's your take on this?
Mulder: Well, only that I don't think it was grave robbery, per se. It was necromancy - the summoning of the dead. It's a form of magic dating back to primitive shamanism with a long tradition in the Christian church. Through it, the dead are brought back to life for the purposes of divulging arcane knowledge or performing ritual tasks.

(Ah, classic Mulder. How I've missed you. You can almost hear all the eyebrows in the room raising the moment Mulder mentions "necromancy").

Scully: Mulder, you're telling me it's more important to track down four dead bodies than one live murderer?
Mulder: He's not our murderer, and those four dead bodies aren't dead. And the millennium is fourteen hours away.
Scully: Mulder, these people - even when they were alive - mangled Biblical prophecy to the extent that it's unrecognizable. The year 2000 is just their artificial deadline. And besides, 2001 is actually the start of the new millennium.
Mulder: Nobody likes a math geek, Scully.

Scully: Now, as crazy as this sounds, I have to ask. Do you believe that the Millennium Group is actually capable of bringing about the end time - Armageddon?
Frank Black: I understand their beliefs. I've spent years trying to unravel them - make sense of them. Doesn't mean I believe them myself.
Scully: But what if it were true? Good and evil. Which would prevail?
Frank Black: I'm sorry.

Mark Johnson: There's no justice in this world. But there will be in the next.

Mulder: The world didn't end.
Scully: No, it didn't.

(I won't lie, I was very tempted to end this review without any mention whatsoever of "the kiss heard round the world", seeing as it really is an inconsequential part of this episode. I'm not a shipper, but after the schmaltz of last season, I think the way the kiss was handled in this episode - which has been due at least since the movie - was pretty much perfect. No big fanfare. It was sweet, it was nice, and it finally just happened - so now we can all move on. Like I've said before, I don't care if Mulder and Scully do become a couple, I just want it pushed to the background, so this show can get busy doing what it does best - telling creepy science-fiction horror stories about monsters and freaks and aliens and government conspiracies. Whether Mulder and Scully retire to separate beds or the same one at the end of the day doesn't make much of a difference to me).

The X-Files - S5:E19 "Folie a Deux"

[ S5:E18 "The Pine Bluff Variant" <<< Season 5 >>> S5:E20 "The End" ]

We're back to classic sci-fi/horror in this episode about a telemarketer who starts hallucinating that his boss is a giant mantid (Mimic anyone?) turning his employees into brainless zombie pod people. You can't blame him for going crazy working a job like that - didn't we see something like this in the episode Blood? And like that other season 2 episode, The Host, Mulder thinks Skinner's jerking him around again (although with less reason this time). Mulder (whose pinky is still healing from last week - nice continuity!) is skeptical to begin with, but heads out to Chicago to handle the case alone while Scully is stuck on desk duty, in a reversal of the situation we saw in Chinga. But unlike some of Vince Gilligan's latest episodes - e.g., Bad Blood, Small Potatoes - this one isn't dedicated to humor (which, frankly, is fine by me), and Scully soon joins the case - but not before Mulder wanders into a hostage situation (recalling yet another season 2 episode - Duane Barry).

At this point, you think you know where the episode is going, but it switches tracks halfway through. Whereas last week's episode had you second guessing who you could trust, this one effectively has you doubting whether Mulder's crazy theories aren't really just paranoia (for real this time!). Most episodes take a supernatural perspective - even as Scully proffers scientific explanations that nobody watching the show ever really believes, because this is The X-Files, after all. But this episode dedicates itself enough to the idea that this guy is crazy, that when it starts to consider the possibility that he could be telling the truth, it's more of a shock. Even if you still harbor doubts that Mulder could be reacting to some kind of paranoia-inducing agent, and fear that he might end up in another situation like what appeared to be the case in Bad Blood, and end up killing a "monster" that turns out to be an innocent human being.

Of course, it doesn't help that no one can see these monsters (and for once, this could actually be described as a monster-, rather than a freak-of-the-week episode) unless they already believe in them (which is a lot like what the Christian faith claims, but with actual pay-off!). You know, I just realized something. Mulder doesn't come off as crazy as he sounds (or would in real life) because he's usually right. And the viewer is let on to that fact because he gets to see all the supernatural stuff that goes on in these episodes. I bet that if you took an episode and cut out all the scenes of supernatural phenomena, the result would be something like the Garfield Minus Garfield webcomic - Mulder would finally be seen as the delusional paranoiac that he is. You could call it The X-Minus-X-Files!

Memorable quotes:

Mulder: Must have done something to piss him off.
Scully: What do you mean?
Mulder: Get stuck with this jerk-off assignment. Or have I finally reached that magic point in my career where every time somebody sees Bigfoot or the Virgin Mary on a tortilla, I get called out of my basement warren to offer my special insight on the matter?
Scully: You're saying "I" a lot. I heard "we".

Mulder: What if such a creature existed that could camouflage itself by clouding the minds of its victims? There are antecedents for it in nature, right? In the insect world - mantids, for instance. They're said to be able to hypnotize their prey.

Scully: Mulder, he was disturbed.
Mulder: Yeah, but did he see it because he was disturbed, or was he disturbed because he saw it?
Scully: He was mentally ill. This monster was a sick fantasy - a product of his dementia.
Mulder: I saw it, too.

Mulder: Scully, you have to believe me. Nobody else on this whole damn planet does, or ever will. You're my one in...five billion.

All Cheerleaders Die (2013)

Horror movies and high school cheerleaders? A winning combination! That having been said, it's such an easy recipe, I was concerned that this would be a cheap take on zombie schlock riddled with clichés. To my delight, it turned out to be a thoroughly entertaining film, with enough influence from teen high school dramas to fill the spaces between the supernatural violence and gore. Plus, it manages to be genuinely erotic in a few spots, which is so hard to pull off in a genre that seems committed simply to making nods to eroticism just to fulfill contractual obligations and clear the table for the "real feast" - blood and guts!

In this movie, a soon-to-be high school senior, Maddie (Caitlin Stasey, who I swear is channeling Kate Mara in this role), concocts an elaborate plan to humiliate her school's cheerleading squad from the inside out. But at a party on the night before the first day of the school year, in an excellent scene that demonstrates the filmmakers' confident grasp of how to ramp up tension, a freak accident reveals that the real villains in this picture are the football jocks. Maddie's ex-girlfriend just so happens to be Wiccan, and she uses black magick to reanimate her friends (who are really more supernatural vampires than zombies). Now, the girls must put aside their petty differences and band together in order to take down their male aggressors.

The problem with a lot of amateur or independent films is that the writing and/or acting frequently takes you out of the film, but that's not a problem here. I got lost in the characters, even into their petty high school concerns and girly drama. There were a few places where their attitudes and reactions actually made me smile, or laugh - which is a whole lot better than cringing. The special effects are more than adequate, even if they are suggestive of TV movie quality supernaturalism. Don't expect any kind of a deep film with intelligent commentary on life or human nature, but this movie is perfect for a good, fun time.

The Walking Dead - Season 5 Wrap-up

Warning: This review will contain spoilers up to and including the last episode of the fifth season of The Walking Dead.

At the end of my last review, I expressed optimism for the remainder of season 5, and that optimism has paid off. The first couple episodes of the half-season were indeed experimental as we were warned. I've heard that a lot of people disliked them, but I thought they were great. I think it's good that the show is experimenting. It'd be boring if all the episodes were alike.

The first of the two had a definite artistic feel, which I was able to appreciate. I thought the first-person perspective of the dying process was fascinating, and it was a great excuse to bring back a few characters that have already bit the dust, one last time (especially all those pretty girls the show keeps killing off). It was a great send-off to a character who otherwise never quite matched up to his comic counterpart.

The next episode was very bleak, which is good for a show about survivors in a post-apocalyptic wasteland where the dead walk and feed on the flesh of the living. I loved the scene where they use the landscape near a bridge to fend off walkers with the least amount of exertion possible, and then when they're collapsed by the side of the road, so weak that a pack of wild dogs weighs their chances of making them dinner. Then it climaxes with a stormy night spent in an abandoned shed. So exciting!

All this does an excellent job of setting up the group for their arrival at the next extended residence, the [much anticipated, for comic readers] Alexandria Safe Zone. The next few episodes may have been a little light on the action, but it didn't bother me, because I knew the show was in a necessary building stage. You have to build something up before you can tear it down.

In the spirit of keeping things fresh, Alexandria ought to be different than the settlements the group has built or stumbled upon in the past (notably the farm, the prison, Woodbury, and the TV-original Terminus) - and it is. The unique thing about Alexandria is that, unlike in the past (think of the Governor trying to take over the Prison), when the group gets there, they are the aggressors for once. And there's some serious concern over whether the group is in the right this time, or if it has finally gone too far (a theme that's been dogging Rick for a while in the TV show). And to the TV show's credit, the Terminus story thread did an excellent job of further eroding the group's trust in others by the time they make it to Alexandria.

I thought the TV show did an excellent job of covering the early story lines in Alexandria, while shuffling some of the duties around (Andrea has a major role in this part of the comics, but she didn't survive that long on the TV show). And they picked a great place to end the season. I like the pace they've struck - not binging on filler and taking forever to get to each next step in the evolution of the plot, but also not rushing forward and burning the candle at both ends (especially considering that they're catching up with the comics fast), just because there is some super exciting stuff coming up on the horizon, and that these Alexandria storylines could be considered relatively dull in comparison.

I'm looking forward to watching the show progress next season, and am already anticipating what major events they might use as climaxes for the mid- and season finales (no spoilers here). I'm also super excited that Morgan has finally caught back up with the group, after teasing us the whole length of this season. I actually didn't care that much for him previously, in the two episodes where he played a major role so far, and he didn't make that big an impression on me in the comics either.

Sure, he has the novelty of being the first guy Rick met after he woke up in the hospital, and the fact that they both survived separately and eventually found each other again is remarkable. But beyond that, what can you say? However, I recently watched a TV series called Jericho (which was excellent), and my favorite character was played by none other than the actor who portrays Morgan on The Walking Dead - Lennie James. And watching him act on Jericho was thrilling, so now I'm really excited to see him on The Walking Dead.

At this point, I think there are only really two people who I absolutely would not want to get killed off. On the one hand, one of the thrilling things about The Walking Dead is the idea that nobody is safe, but on the other hand, there are certain characters that really bring a lot to the show, and you wouldn't want to see the show lose them (and who these are will certainly vary depending on who you ask).

Some of the characters, especially at this late stage of the game, seem to have grown plot armor - these are mainly the principals: Rick, Carl, Carol, Daryl, Glenn, Maggie, Michonne. If and when any of these die off in the future will determine whether or not the show has truly become "safe". Some of those characters you could do the show without. As fan-favored as Carol and Daryl are, you could still have a Walking Dead without them. I struggle to imagine what The Walking Dead would be like without Rick, however, and it's not something I really want to find out.

So, at this stage, Rick is one of only two characters I would seriously not want to see die. I don't even care much about Carl - he's important inasmuch as he's important to Rick, and Rick's important, and also because he sort of represents the "new generation" (a role that's being taken over by Judith, who should be dead), but he's practically a minor character at this point. The only other character I absolutely want to stick around now is Morgan, and just because I want the show to give Lennie James some time to act. You can have a Walking Dead without Morgan, so his character needn't last forever, but right now, I think The Walking Dead can only be a better show with Lennie James playing a main role.

Catching up on The Walking Dead

The Walking Dead picks up with the second half of season five this weekend, and it occurs to me that I haven't mentioned it since all the way back at the mid-season break of season two (episode reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7). There's a good reason for that - or, at least, a decent reason. I moved that following February, to a house that didn't have cable TV, and so I got behind on The Walking Dead until I could convince my roommate to start watching it with me on Amazon (she's as obsessed with it as I am now). I also started reading up on the comics, so that marked the significant point after which I was no longer a completely blind show-watcher, and was instead informed of the show's overarching trajectory via the original material it's (more or less) based on.

Spoiler Warning: The rest of this post contains information from both the TV show and the comic, so if you only partake of one (e.g., you only watch the TV show and don't read the comic) and don't want spoilers, then I suggest you skip the rest of this post.

Spoilers: Seasons 1, 2 (TV) / Chapters 1-2 (Comic)

The second half of season two was good, and comparable to the first half, though the climax was slightly less devastating than the Sophia-barn scene (which I still rate as the most devastating moment in the whole series). Some viewers have said that the show drags a bit in spending a whole season at the farm, but it's not too bad, and it's even less noticeable if you binge-watch the episodes.

As far as the first two seasons of the show go, I think they did a great job of adapting the comic, both with the comic material and the original stuff (like the season one finale at the CDC, which was very good). I like that they kept Shane around longer in the TV show, because even though he wasn't the most sympathetic character, he added some good drama and conflict to the group. The season two finale with the herd and the fire was also a great way to end the season on a bombastic climax that upped the stakes (considerably) from what happened in the comic.

Spoilers: Seasons 3, 4A (TV) / Chapters 3-8 (Comic)

But then we get to the prison. In the comic, there are two chapters leading up to the prison, and then a whopping six chapters spent there, the first two of which don't even feature Woodbury and the Governor yet. So the prison is a big deal. Unfortunately, I feel like the TV show just wasn't as good during the prison section. Here are some reasons why:

1) They completely watered down the Governor. I understand why they did this - they wanted to have the drama of showing the Governor turn bad, but it just killed the allure of his character. Particularly the scene where he *almost* rapes Maggie. In the comic, he *actually* rapes Michonne - repeatedly. Removing that kind of hurts Michonne's character, because it gives her less of a motivation to attack the Governor when she gets the chance. And where is the twisted innuendo about Penny maybe being the Gov's sex slave? From the start, The Walking Dead has prided itself on being more extreme than other television shows dare to go, but this is one (and not the only) place where it fails to have the courage that the comic has, to its detriment.

2) They completely destroyed Andrea's character, by making her sympathetic to the Governor (and not because she's evil, but just because she's naive), and then ultimately killing her off. Andrea is one of the best characters in the comic. But they ruined her in the TV show. They aged her up to start with, and completely pissed on her inter-generational relationship with Dale (as it is in the comic). I mean, on the TV show, she shags Shane, for fuck's sake! And then along comes the Governor. R.I.P. Andrea.

3) They also pretty much destroyed Tyreese. Tyreese is also supposed to be badass - kind of like how Daryl (an original TV character) is in the TV show. In the comic, Tyreese is an ex-pro football player, who single-handedly hacks his way out of a gymnasium filled with walkers, and is pretty much Rick's right-hand man. In the TV show, Tyreese is a pushover, a glorified babysitter, who's afraid to do what needs to be done, for fear of losing his humanity.

4) Although it could be considered a relief that Lori dies earlier in the TV show than she does in the comic (I don't know anyone who particularly liked her character), the result is this period in which Rick totally loses his mind, wandering outside the prison, seeing ghosts. Now, conceptually, this isn't entirely off base, as in the comic Rick also goes through a crazy phase (though it's supposed to follow the devastating prison escape), but it's more annoying in the TV show. Also, that period when Rick abdicates leadership over the group contains one of my favorite scenes in the whole comic - his speech which gives the series its name - which I was very sad to find was nowhere to be seen in the TV show. Sad face.

Don't get me wrong, the show during the prison episodes was still fun to watch. There were some good parts - like the whole thing with the flu outbreak. The show did some things right, in their own way - like handling the surviving prisoners that are there when the group first gets to the prison (although, on the other hand, the missing serial killer again takes out some of the bite of the story). And killing Hershel off in the same way that Tyreese died in the comic (since in the TV show, Hershel was a much more beloved character, making the scene pretty much as devastating as it's supposed to be). But overall, it just didn't feel as good as the corresponding chapters in the comic.

Spoilers: Seasons 4B, 5A (TV) / Chapters 9-12ish (Comic)

The final straw was the TV show not killing off Judith at the climax of the prison section. They even did the whole thing with Rick mourning Judith, only to later find out she's still alive, so there's not really any dramatic potential left in killing her off, which means they'll probably keep her around. Is this another case of the TV writers wussing out - not wanting to kill a baby on television? I don't know. But it's one more nail in the coffin of the prison episodes.

Seeing as the comic went a whole six chapters at the prison, and the TV show had been milking about one chapter per season thus far, the TV show could have easily done two whole seasons at the prison, if not more. However, the way those episodes were going, it was a relief when the show bailed out of the prison only halfway through the fourth season (only the second season at the prison), instead of continuing at least to the end of that season. And the second half of that season was actually very good. A dramatic improvement over the prison episodes.

The whole thing with Carol and the girls, in particular, was dramatic and memorable (probably the second most emotional scene in the show, for me, after the Sophia-barn scene), and really redeemed Carol in my eyes (who has been an annoying hanger-on ever since she lost Sophia). On the Daryl front, I enjoyed his interactions with Beth, although I think the show totally copped out when they didn't consummate their affection for one another at the end of that one episode. (I know, I know, Daryl's a virgin and an abuse survivor - gotta milk his soft, vulnerable side for all the female viewers! And keep him available to every middle-aged female viewer's surrogate on the show, Carol...). The introduction of Abraham and Eugene (and Rosita - not my fault she isn't a more important character; I actually like her) was exciting, also.

I really liked what the show did with Terminus, and it marks another successful TV original season finale, even if the real excitement would come in the season five premiere that resolves the cliffhanger. It was also an inspired way to get the gang back together after the prison, since the farm (where they meet up in the comic) was already destroyed. I was really excited about the following episode(s) introducing Father Gabriel, and featuring the (remnant) cannibals, which played out pretty much exactly like the comic (with some of the characters shuffled around). Although the TV show axed my first favorite quote from the comic, I was glad to see the inclusion of the line, "tainted meat!" here. The TV original parts explaining Beth's disappearance were a little shaky, though (hard to follow all these new characters all of a sudden) - and I'm annoyed that they killed her off (but especially in such a moronic way) - but they weren't too bad.

Spoilers: Vague speculations only, judging from Chapters 12+ (Comic)

I'm very excited to see what happens next in the show, and to see some of the stuff coming later in the comics brought to life. Post-prison, the TV show has once again done an excellent job of covering the comic material (if often in its own way), while mixing in some original stuff. Having just reread the comics last month, I noticed that the TV show has pretty much already milked everything leading up to the next big settlement the group arrives at (even including the revelation of Eugene's lie, which isn't supposed to happen until they're much closer to D.C.). So I'm wondering if we'll see that in the second half of this season, or if we'll have to wait until next season for that.

Either way, there's some great stuff coming up, and I can't wait to see how the TV show handles it - even though I have a little trepidation, after what happened with the prison episodes, and the series' last big villain (the Governor). So far, the show has been consistently better when the group is out on the road, but we'll see what happens in the future. This has been a good enough show, and has redeemed itself well enough after the prison episodes, that I'll be a dedicated viewer. And I'll be hungrily devouring the comics in the meantime.

Highschool of the Dead (2010)

Highschool of the Dead has the distinction of being a Japanese anime series on the subject of zombies. While this may be a plus for zombie-obsessed Western audiences, as an anime fan AND a horror fan, I have to say that it is a very mediocre entry into the worldwide collection of zombie stories that are out there.

To be honest, I thought the idea of a zombie outbreak occurring in a high school, with a focus on several high school students (and maybe their teachers) - which is a popular theme in Japanese anime but not many Western zombie stories - was intriguing and original. But the setting of the story does not remain in the high school for the entirety of the series, and it quickly becomes an average attempt to tell the same kind of formulaic zombie story that any zombie fan has seen a hundred times before - with boring, cliched characters that an anime fan has seen a thousand times before.

If that were all, it would simply be a mediocre series. But I have a problem with the excessive fan service on display. Don't get me wrong, it's not the fact that there is fan service in this series, or even that there's a lot of it, that bothers me. I enjoy scantily clad female characters, and I don't believe that nudity or even sex scenes ever need to be "justified" in any type of media, as they serve as their own justification. But the fan service in this series is ridiculous.

The point of view frequently goes so far out of its way to exhibit this or that character's striped panties or perpetually jiggling boobies (along with the typical, annoying "boin boin" sound effect - I have never once heard a breast make this noise in real life) as to take me out of the show. And the juxtaposition of the psychological trauma of mutilating the reanimated, flesh-eating corpses of the dead, with the copious sexual objectification of the show's female characters is confusing and a little bit concerning. I honestly can't decide if the creator was more dedicated to writing a show about zombies or a show about women's underwear and big boobs; sticking them together is an odd choice.

I wouldn't have a problem with a zombie show where all the (living) characters were naked for no reason at all (why is it only ever just the women?). And I wouldn't have a problem with a zombie show where the (living) characters had sex at every opportunity (who wouldn't, in that situation?). Hell, I wouldn't even have a problem with a zombie series that shatters the taboo surrounding necrophilia, as long as it was done effectively. But the fan service in Highschool of the Dead (which, in typical teaser fashion, never actually shows you anything of significance) is ridiculous and draws too much attention to itself. And the zombie story hiding behind it, while not being complete garbage, isn't really good enough (and doesn't have the chance to develop far enough) to really be worth watching.

Dead Snow (2009)

Finally made the time to sit down and watch Dead Snow, a Norwegian film about Nazi zombies, tonight. I've seen a lot of movies in my day, so I wouldn't put it past someone to make a serious movie about Nazi zombies, but obviously the first thing you think when the plot synopsis mentions "Nazi zombies", is, "are you serious?" But actually, the movie does start out pretty seriously, setting the stage for what looks to be a fairly standard horror flick in the teen slasher vein (albeit from a Norwegian perspective).

But the movie's self-awareness quickly becomes evident in the form of a character who is a movie buff, with some early explicit references to horror classics like Friday the 13th and Evil Dead, and who wears a Braindead (a.k.a. Peter Jackson's Dead Alive) t-shirt, all of which this movie makes copious homages too, and which informs the tongue-in-cheek brand of black humor that infests the latter half of the movie - for better or worse (probably better, since I think this movie would ultimately have been less successful as a serious movie than simply as a fun one).

Before things get too silly, the Harbinger - as The Cabin in the Woods would undoubtedly label him - appears unexpectedly at the cabin in the woods (actually a snowy mountainscape), and gives one of the better performances of his ilk (among the myriad slasher films in existence), with a history lesson that plays out more like an around-the-campfire ghost story and that sets the scene for the coming appearance of the frozen reanimated Nazi corpses. After they show up, the film ramps up the scares and the gore, but also the straight-faced and situational humor. Meanwhile, the blood keeps getting poured on in good Braindead fashion, and many of the characters face humorously ironic ordeals and demises, that might elicit a chuckle but will definitely induce a grimace (or four).

It's hard to say how I actually feel about this film, given my preference for the serious over the humorous (despite my tempered appreciation for the Braindead-style over-the-top approach). And let's be honest, this film had what was probably the least erotic sex scene in a slasher film I've probably seen in...ever. The humorous appropriation of Nazi imagery doesn't offend me in the least, but it doesn't particularly get me excited, either. The locations, however, were suitably isolated and really very beautiful, offering something unique in place of the typical wooded lake kind of setting, even if it meant less scantily clad coeds. But, purely as a zombie film, Dead Snow is a bit too frantic, and lacks the shambling feel of a classic zombie movie. It's really more of a monster-in-the-woods slasher kind of flick, especially of the tongue-in-cheek, self-aware variety. Whether that's a plus or a minus is up to you.

6 Films To Keep You Awake (2008)

I didn't know anything going in to 6 Films To Keep You Awake (a good substitute, perhaps, for the discontinued 8 Films To Die For? -_^), but I learned soon enough that it is a collection of six Spanish horror films, that I think may be based on some older series, that possibly ran on television in Spain, called Films To Keep You Awake, or something similar. Regardless, I pretty much had zero expectations about these films, and wasn't sure what kind of quality they'd be, from hit-and-miss indies to solid genre staples, but I was generally impressed with the series and had a very good time watching them. Allow me to say a few things about each one. I will try to keep spoilers to a minimum.

1. La Culpa (a.k.a. Blame)

A single mother and her impossibly adorable little girl are taken in by the obstetrician (who runs an abortion clinic in her own home) she works as a nurse for. The female doctor's unwelcome advances, a devoutly religious neighbor, and a creepy attic, along with the subject of abortion and the anxieties that come with it, all contribute to a suspenseful atmosphere. But where this film is heavy on mystery, it is light on action. The story unfolds slowly, and while it teases some very disturbing implications (like what that little girl is carrying around in her tin box), it ultimately fails to come together in the end and deliver on its promise of being a pro-lifer's wet dream (which, for the rest of us, would make for a pretty chilling nightmare). It might keep you awake, but mostly for real-life psychological - and not scary, supernatural - reasons.

2. Regreso A Moira (a.k.a. Spectre)

Following the suicide of his wife, an old man returns to the small town of his youth, and reminisces about a relationship he had with an older woman the superstitious villagers all believed to be a witch, and that ended in tragedy. The details of that event are revealed piecemeal, and prove to be a rather intriguing mystery. The movie drags on a bit long, but it has a satisfying payoff. The last fifteen minutes or so had me perched on the edge of my seat - in more of a mental than an adrenal sort of way. Spectre is an exercise in subtlety, but it's pieced together very well. It serves as a textbook example of how to construct an effective atmosphere with scares that do not rely on loud noises and things springing at the screen from out of the shadows. I recommend it.

3. Adivina Quién Soy (a.k.a. A Real Friend)

A young girl with a fascination for the macabre carries her favorite movie monsters around with her like imaginary friends. But danger mounts when she meets a real life monster - a sociopath who takes advantage of her vivid imagination and easy embrace of the strange to infiltrate her home life. This movie accomplishes an impressive homage and imitation of several horror classics, namely Nosferatu, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Night of the Living Dead, and most especially The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. There is an element of surreality to it, that has you questioning what's real and what's imagined, but it all comes together in a twist ending that doesn't feel cheap, but actually suits the story. The actors' performances all contribute to the eerie atmosphere of the piece, including a subtle but delightful performance by the young Nerea Inchausti. I think I liked this one even more than Spectre.

4. Cuento de Navidad (a.k.a. A Christmas Tale)

Five kids find a Santa Claus impersonator trapped and lying unconscious in a ditch, and when they discover that she's a dangerous criminal, they decide to keep her as their secret pet (in the way that only 12 year old logic can do). But things go from bad to worse when a couple of the kids decide to imitate a voodoo ritual from a cheesy zombie flick (shot as a film within a film in a humorously over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek fashion). Directed by Paco Plaza of [Rec] fame, A Christmas Tale takes a comedic approach (and thus is more in line with [Rec] 3 than the original). The interactions between the kids, who all give natural performances, are fun to watch in a Goonies kind of way, but with more horror and less adventure. I'd say it's a good flick for a little bit of fun and some gross out, but it's not going to keep me awake at night.

5. La Habitación del Niño (a.k.a. The Baby's Room)

A young couple and their infant son move into an old house where they begin to pick up some paranormal phenomena on their baby monitor. At first thinking it's an intruder, the father's obsession with protecting his family may lead him to put them in grave danger instead. Halfway through the movie, you think you know exactly where it's headed, but to its credit, it goes off in another direction entirely, trading the conventional haunted house narrative for some speculation about parallel universes via a discussion of quantum physics (no fooling!), and the perils of opening a door between them. The Baby's Room utilizes some Paranormal Activity-like techniques, in a natural variation that lends itself to some humorous passages like when the father rigs up the house and then sits down behind a bank of baby monitors like a professional security guard. But even those scenes are played with a straight face, and the scares are pretty effective; I'd say this is probably the scariest movie yet in the series.

6. Para Entrar a Vivir (a.k.a. To Let)

An expectant couple meets a real estate agent to check out an apartment in what appears to be an abandoned building, when their visit turns into a real-time nightmare from which they can't escape. Directed by Jaume Balagueró, the other half of the creative team behind [Rec], To Let may be the most "conventional" horror movie in the series, but that doesn't mean it isn't any good. In fact, it's probably the best and most terrifying of the movies in this collection. It's not entirely free of horror cliches, but it balances them with style and substance and a very grueling pace, that avoids even finishing with a happy ending. There are some exciting twists along the way, and it is very much a tense movie that keeps you on the edge of your seat. It may not be as subtle or intellectual as some of the other titles, but it's a good, solid horror movie to fill out the collection, and is a welcome addition to the roster, as well as a great title to finish the series on.

V/H/S/2 (2013)

Last year, V/H/S brought the anthology format to the found footage subgenre of horror films. Opinions on found footage films vary widely, with lots of people lambasting them for their cheap thrills and amateurish production values. Personally, I'm a fan of found footage. Whereas other genres might not benefit so much from the first person perspective - I can't imagine a drama, for example, being any more effective by viewing it from the point of view of one of its characters - it seems particularly suited to horror.

I'd long wondered at the fact that survival horror video games manage to scare more effectively than most traditional horror films, and the reason is because it puts you right in the middle of the action. Which is what the first person perspective does. It makes you feel more vulnerable, and more paranoid, too, about what could be lurking just outside the frames - whereas a director would be inclined to carefully place his monsters and script the action, there's an element of chaos in some random bloke capturing the nightmare he's stuck in the middle of, and that's unpredictable and exciting.

There are, of course, pitfalls to the found footage format, like the unfortunate prevalence of shaky camera work - I thank my lucky stars that watching such footage doesn't make me sick, because otherwise I'd be missing out on some great stuff. Also, as is frequently complained about, there are many times when a found footage film builds up atmosphere only to let down in its payoff. The Blair Witch Project was guilty of this, although I hesitate to criticize a film too much for it, because the "imagination is worse than reality" approach bears considerable weight (Paranormal Activity, for example, was mostly tease, yet it was by far one of the scariest horror movies I've seen since the day I decided to stop believing in the monsters that live under my bed).

The anthology format is itself marred by too frequently mediocre entries - as, after all, a motley collection of pieces will inevitably vary in quality, and so rarely yield consistent brilliance. On the other hand, if not taken so seriously, an anthology can be more fun than a feature piece, and the diversity of its offerings has the potential to appeal to a wider audience, as everyone will tend to gravitate toward the entries that best suit their tastes. The short story (or film) format also provides an opportunity to experiment with new and exciting themes and modes of storytelling, and to create narratives that come quickly to their point without being bogged down by unnecessary filler.

All of this is to say that you never know what you're going to get. And while V/H/S was an exciting and competent - if flawed - foray into the found footage anthology piece, its sequel manages to be even stronger, and even better than the first, while maintaining the same formula. The first V/H/S suffered from an overabundance of immature, misogynistic characters. That aspect is downplayed here, to better results, while not completely shying away from the topic of sex and nudity that, for many of us, adds that extra spice and flair to entertainment that is otherwise mostly violent in nature. But where V/H/S/2 really shines is in the strength of its pieces, which are both clever and exciting to a surprisingly above average degree. I want to talk about each of them briefly now, and I warn you that there will be spoilers from here on out. So if you haven't seen V/H/S/2 yet and plan to, you should go do that before you read the rest of this review.

Tape 49

The "wraparound" story takes pretty much the same basic form as the one in V/H/S, albeit with less annoying characters. As far as I know, there is no direct connection to the events in the first V/H/S (although it probably allows for its existence in the same narrative universe), and this is an independent case of somebody exploring an abandoned(?) house recently occupied by a fanatic collector of obscure and esoteric VHS tapes featuring some of the creepiest home videos you'll ever lay your hands on. This time around, it's a private investigator who specializes in blackmail, and apparently has a camera fetish, if the way he carries around multiple cameras to film everything he does is any indication.

It's a little ridiculous, and you kinda feel like it's all just a (somewhat unconvincing) ruse to deflect the viewer's typical criticism of "why is he filming this?", but as usual, I have a tendency to consider that sort of thing within the purview of my suspension of disbelief when I'm watching a found footage film. The point isn't so much how realistic the filming of the action is, it's how effective that filming is in putting me in the middle of the action and scaring my pants off (if I'm wearing any). Tape 49 may be the least compelling of the shorts in V/H/S/2 (it is the wraparound, after all), but it does its job well enough, and is probably slightly more coherent than the wraparound in the first V/H/S.

Phase I Clinical Trials

The first tape we're shown doesn't do a great job of quelling our concerns about realism, as it turns out to be the recording of a guy's cybernetic eye implant. I'm not kidding. You have to ask yourself, with that kind of state of the art technology, the recording had to be digital. So who actually took the time to dub it to a VHS tape, and why? I know, you could say the same thing about the webcam footage in The Sick Thing That Happened To Emily When She Was Younger from the first V/H/S (and that might not be the only one), but still.

I actually think the whole VHS approach works well, because it's like, they're harder to copy and share than digital videos, so there's more of an esoteric feeling about them, like they could have been hiding in a cardboard box in somebody's basement for years, and nobody knows about them, rather than them going viral on YouTube or something, totally evaporating the mystery. But in our technologically advanced age, the whole VHS thing is becoming more and more antiquated, and you have to wonder how all these originally-digital recordings are finding their way onto VHS tapes.

Anyway, like I said, I can file that in the back of my head and just focus on the story. And as ridiculous as the idea of a cybernetic eye implant is, it has the potential for some pretty creepy implications. When the doctor mentioned glitches, I thought maybe it would be another approach at the creepy fx in Tuesday the 17th from the first V/H/S, but - although I think that direction had a lot of potential - it instead chooses to go in the direction of a ghost story.

Now, the idea that a piece of advanced technology would let you see ghosts is a little wonky in my opinion - mixing science with superstition - but I guess if you think about it, if there really are ghosts, it's not completely insane to think that maybe the right kind of scientific advancement would let us see them. So I'll let it slide. It's a pretty scary thought anyway. I mean, imagine if you knew your own eyes were conspiring against you, and even if you convinced yourself that what you were seeing wasn't real (even worse if it is), just seeing it would be enough to unnerve you.

I actually found the ghosts themselves to be less than entirely effective when they actually showed up on screen (except the creepy uncle dude), but just the very setup of the story, with the ghosts and everything, probably scared me more than any of the other shorts in V/H/S/2. So that's saying something.

A Ride In The Park

This one starts out pretty gently. I was watching this guy get ready to go biking in the woods, thinking to myself, I have absolutely no idea which direction this story is going to go. There could be absolutely anything waiting for him in these woods. And, well, it turns out to be zombies. Which is always fun. The rest of the story is relatively conventional, except for one very important twist: we get to watch the majority of the zombie rampage (including a small horde ambushing a little girl's birthday party in a picnic pavilion), from the point of view of one of the zombies.

It sounds so simple, but I don't think I've ever seen that before. It's a brilliant idea! And man, when that zombie digs into the guy's torso, and starts chowing down on his viscera like it was a turkey dinner - it's not that I haven't seen that in a zombie film before (many times, actually), but the first person perspective gives it a whole new freshness, and for the first time made me sympathize with the zombie's hunger, and not simply recoiling in disgust at the thought of it. This was a story that had to be told, and I can't believe I'd never even thought of it. Bravo.

Safe Haven

Then we come to my favorite short in the whole movie. It starts with one of the better premises for a found footage movie I've come across - infiltrating a secretive religious cult under the guise of filming an unbiased documentary. This is one of those ideas so ripe for found footage that it makes you think, "ah, finally!" You're not sure, of course, exactly which direction the story will go. Will it be human atrocities, as cults in the real world are known to commit? It certainly touches that base. But in the end, it goes so much further, revealing the cult to actually be one of devil worshippers with supernatural powers of demon summoning and resurrection.

So often, and especially in the realm of found footage, I find myself thinking at the end of a movie, they didn't go far enough. There was a lot of tease, but not enough delivery. This is true for many themes, but as frequently for stories about Satanism as anything else. Safe Haven doesn't have that problem. It probes the depths, and comes out the other side dripping with blood. Too many times I've seen devil worshipping cults emasculate themselves with all-smoke-and-no-fire rituals that are no more impressive than your local pastor's latest sermon. But this cult leader, he must have done something right. I'd say that V/H/S/2 is worth watching for this segment alone, but it's not like the other segments aren't pretty good themselves.

Slumber Party Alien Abduction

I'll be honest, I was a little disappointed that this one turned out to be a boys' sleepover, and not a girls' slumber party like I was hoping. Interestingly, we find a more natural home for the immature pranking spirit of V/H/S's douchebags in the adolescent boys in this segment. But the concept behind this segment is so perfect (is this really the first time it's been done?), that it's hard not to like it.

Truthfully, there is little buildup, and it's largely one big thrill ride, but there's nothing wrong with that - it is quite thrilling. This alien abduction has more in common with Incident in Lake County than your typical riding-a-beam-of-light nighttime affair, with aggressive aliens that are effectively intimidating by being larger than usual (more man-sized), while still retaining the expected general features (lean body, large eyes), and utilizing bright lights and loud sounds to confuse their prey.

The one significant complaint I have is that, unlike Safe Haven, Slumber Party Alien Abduction didn't go far enough. There's a scene where a boy is being dragged off by an alien, and you know they're taking him to their spaceship, and I'm like, come on, come on, a little bit further - but they never get there. Maybe I'm too caught up on the idea of a found footage alien abduction film that actually goes aboard the spaceship. Oh well. Someday. It's a good segment, but it's such a good concept, that I feel it deserves a full feature treatment, and not just a short anthology segment. Any filmmakers listening?

The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988)

In 1969, George A. Romero popularly revolutionized the zombie subgenre of horror by reinventing the zombie threat as a horde of flesh-eating, shambling corpses. Previously, as evidenced in movies like 1932's White Zombie starring Bela Lugosi, zombies were most frequently envisioned with a voodoo slant, created by black magick to do the bidding of the warlock master who commands them.

Directed by accomplished horror auteur Wes Craven, The Serpent and The Rainbow is a post-Romero zombie film that resurrects that voodoo lore, repositioning the emphasis on the horrors of death and what happens to one's soul when trapped in a limbo between death and living, instead of the threat that armies of the walking dead pose to the fabric of society. It is a more personal, psychologically chilling fear that this movie conjures. As such, it is not a "zombie movie" in the contemporary sense, and is very much flavored by the exotic locales and superstitious traditions held by the cultures that are featured.

Bill Pullman stars as an anthropologist hired by a pharmaceutical company to investigate rumors of zombism in Haiti, with an eye for the medical discoveries (in the field of anesthetics) that could be made if a folk remedy exists to re-animate the bodies of the dead. (Incidentally, this movie is an adaptation of a book written by real life anthropologist Wade Davis, allegedly setting it up as a "true" story - but you know how that goes). Pullman's character inevitably gets mixed up in the political turmoil of the country, with rumors flying that the secret police may be using zombism to debilitate its enemies, and naturally not taking kindly to a foreigner rooting around asking too many questions.

For me personally, one of the pivotal questions underlying my experience of this movie was whether it would be a starkly realistic account of a less dramatized form of "zombism" than Romero pioneered. It is, in a sense, but it also embraces the supernatural, especially toward the end, to ultimately tell a pretty sensational story. However, the themes involved, and the frightening situations our hero gets himself into (including the infamous climactic situation that you've probably already heard all about, but I'm not going to spoil it anyway), are all too real. Meanwhile, Zakes Mokae makes a deliciously diabolical villain that I'd say gives Bela Lugosi a run for his money. Ultimately though, The Serpent and the Rainbow owes quite a bit to the classic tradition of voodoo zombie stories, but it's a pretty effective and scary update to the format.

Re-Animator (1985)

You know something's gone horribly wrong when an adaptation of an H.P. Lovecraft story is described as a "campy send-up". Or, in the opinion of some, horribly right. Stuart Gordon, who also directed that other, somewhat better H.P. Lovecraft adaptation, From Beyond, recycled some of the cast there that he directed in this piece - in particular, Jeffrey Combs and Barbara Crampton. And the Re-Animator's tongue-in-cheek approach is inspired in no small part by the former's over-the-top acting style. It was forgivable in From Beyond, since his character had been driven mad, but here as the mad scientist Herbert West, it's a little more conspicuous.

Granted, there is no shortage of gallows humor to be derived from the premise, which involves a scientist's success at re-animating dead tissue (in a way that is more Frankenstein than Night of the Living Dead). And I can't say that the Re-Animator is a bad movie. It's actually a lot of fun, with some great gore effects and an exciting climax. There's definitely room for movies like this one among the horror genre. Certainly, it's garnered an enthusiastic cult following. It's just that, the tone is all wrong for an H.P. Lovecraft story. Not to say that I think it's blasphemy, per se, but you'd think they'd at least try to downplay the fact that it's based on an H.P. Lovecraft story, not put his name right in front of the title...

[Rec] 3: Genesis (2012)

[Rec] 3 is kind of all over the place. I can't tell if it wants to be a horror film, an action flick, or a romantic drama. It doesn't even stick to the found footage format, shamelessly ditching that conceit twenty minutes into the piece. Still, it's hard to hate this movie, because it has a tongue-in-cheek stylishness that you can't help but smile at. But as a film that follows in the footsteps of the harrowing and groundbreaking [Rec], you can't help but be more than a little disappointed, too. I want to say that I'd have liked it better if it took itself a little more seriously, but honestly, when I started to watch it, I was thinking to myself, how could they possibly match, let alone top, the brilliance of the first [Rec]? So perhaps the filmmakers did the right thing by going in a different direction, and instead of competing against the series' prior brilliance, decided to use the framework they'd built up to poke a little fun at themselves.

[Rec] 3: Genesis isn't actually a prequel or an origin story, as you might surmise from the title, but appears to be a parallel encounter that developed from the same source that resulted in the events of [Rec]. This time, the infection breaks out during a wedding reception. The larger, open area kind of eliminates the claustrophobic feeling of the previous films in this series. One positive thing I can say about this movie is that the makeup effects are really good. Unfortunately, the religious elements from [Rec] 2 are still in effect here (somehow, making churches impenetrable fortresses of safety undermines the despair of a zombie outbreak). Actually, rereading my [Rec] 2 review, it seems that the filmmakers were intent on giving the series an over-the-top, fantasy-tinged style even then. With that in mind, it becomes more apparent than ever that the brilliance of the original [Rec] may have actually been a fluke...

My initial impression of the film ditching the found footage angle was pretty negative, but then I started thinking about how useful a dual approach could be. One of the trickiest parts of making a found footage movie is explaining (or choosing not to explain) why somebody is going around taping everything you're watching. Personally, I understand it as one of the inherent limitations of the format, and am therefore pretty forgiving of filmmakers as long as they have some kind of plausible set-up (I tend to include that as part of the film's suspension of disbelief). (However, I could really do without the required "why are you taping this, put the camera down!" exchange - I guess its supposed goal is to establish a sympathetic rapport with the audience, but in my opinion all it does is point your attention to a flaw you're probably better off not focusing on).

I had actually been thinking earlier that it might be a suitable experiment to create a film that mixes traditional film-making with the found footage style, for example by recording the narrator in a traditional style, to frame the found footage, that is then presented within the framework of the greater movie. Let's be honest, after you've seen one or two found footage films, you no longer buy the whole "this is really real" baloney. However, the first person perspective does still lend a realism that is particularly effective in scaring audiences (i.e., is great for horror). So, I don't see why you couldn't integrate it into an otherwise regular film. Regardless, the way the format switch is used in [Rec] 3 is far from effective - the change is too jarring, and the fact that both perspectives are used to document the same scenario emphasizes the artifice of the technique.

[Rec] 3: Genesis is not a terrible movie - I may have actually appreciated it more than [Rec] 2, in the end. But it's not a great movie, either, and you're in a much better position to enjoy it if you go into it understanding that it's an over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek zombie flick (i.e., more parts Dead Alive than Night of the Living Dead), and not expecting anything remotely approaching the brilliance and horror of the first [Rec].

Cockneys vs. Zombies (2012)

Just for the record, I probably wouldn't have sought out this movie on my own. Though I love zombie movies, I'm not usually much for comedies - they just don't get me excited like serious movies do. And I want zombies to be scary, not funny. Nevertheless, my roommate has been on something of a zombie binge lately (we saw World War Z together a few weeks ago), and it's practically the only subgenre of horror she sincerely appreciates, so I like to encourage it as much as possible. That having been said, she likes comedies a whole lot more than I do. But, I didn't want to pass up the opportunity to see another zombie movie (hey, I even gave Zombie Strippers a chance :p).

In short, Cockneys vs. Zombies does exactly what it says on the tin. It's a humorous, tongue-in-cheek movie about the zombie apocalypse centralized in East London, populated entirely by a cast that speaks with Cockney accents. As someone who doesn't totally appreciate comedies, I can, however, say that it's a well put-together and entertaining movie, and I couldn't in all honesty say that it was a waste of my time. I still maintain that the only zomcom I really like is the original Return of the Living Dead. But, if you're into comedic zombie movies, and especially if you liked Shaun of the Dead, I think you'll probably dig this movie. If that sounds like you, then by all means, give it a try.

World War Z (2013)

So I took advantage of an opportunity to go out and see the big new zombie movie that's out in theaters. After what I read about it, I was partly expecting it to be a jumbled, disjointed mess. As it was, it turned out to actually be a really good, coherent story. I'm not about to rate it the best zombie movie ever, but it's not the worst, either, and if you get a chance to see it, I recommend it.

One thing World War Z does is take a slightly different approach to the zombie apocalypse. In the beginning, it builds up a really convincing panic state as the shit hits the fan, and for a while, it feels just as much like one of those blockbuster disaster movies (like 2012 or The Day After Tomorrow or what have you). But, the disaster is zombies.

The narrative takes a very smooth and interesting path starting from one family's experience of the apocalypse. The father, Gerry (played by Brad Pitt), is an ex-UN agent, so he's at an advantage when it comes to having friends in high places who want to keep him alive. He and his family make it safely to a ship out in the ocean, but he's soon split up with them as he's put to work trying to fight this zombie outbreak.

The story then goes to various places as Gerry accompanies a brilliant young doctor to investigate an alleged patient zero, and try to figure out if the zombie 'disease' has a weakness. We also get to visit Jerusalem which, remarkably, has built a wall to keep out the zombies, and may well be the last human city to resist the outbreak.

From there, things get a little more personal, involving a plane ride, and a WHO (World Health Organization) facility, as Gerry desperately racks his brain to devise a way for humanity to fight back against the zombies. The solution he comes up with is actually pretty clever, even though it seems to highlight some of the premise's flaws.

Spoilers:

Like, the part where the one doctor says they already tried to infect the zombies with known lethal diseases - but that it's impossible to get a dead person sick (because the disease agent needs a living host). But that, of course, leaves the question of what's causing them to reanimate. If it's a virus like everyone's saying, then how does it live in a dead host? They never get around to answering the question of what's causing the zombism, but unlike other films, this one is very scientific and down to earth which would seem to preclude a supernatural explanation.

Then we come to the solution itself, which I said was very ingenious. But the part where the zombies are somehow able to smell whether a person is infected with a terminal disease kind of stretches my suspension of disbelief. Still, the idea of using it as 'camouflage' is very clever and not one I think I've seen used in quite that way before.

End Spoilers!

Which brings us to the zombies themselves. As this movie is sort of a cross between a zombie movie and a pandemic movie, the zombies are not your typical shambling fare. They are fast and angry, like the zombies in 28 Days Later, but they move in what I couldn't help but consider unnatural ways. This is allegedly one of the movie's strengths - as it presents a new kind of zombie we've never seen before, one that swarms like insects - but frankly, I found it to be largely unappealing. As I said, it didn't seem natural, the way these creatures threw themselves around, they were more like indestructible supermen than reanimated corpses.

But, the rest of the movie has enough going for it that it doesn't totally spoil the experience. And as I said, it's interesting to see zombies that are different than the ones you've seen so many times before. I enjoyed the movie quite a bit; it has its share of tension and fear, and a good deal of intelligence, too. In fact, I feel inclined to read the book it was based on now, and feel kind of guilty for not having already read it several years ago when my friend tried to push it on me. Then again, if I had read the book first, I might not have been able to enjoy the movie adaptation as much (which is kind of what happened with The Hunger Games).

Masters of Horror: Season One (2005)

Masters of Horror is a series of one-hour short films that ran on Showtime, directed by many of the seminal horror directors of our time. The idea originated from a series of cordial dinner outings shared by a group of directors (many of which are represented in this series) spearheaded by Mick Garris. The project is unique in that it gives each director a clean slate to work from, to produce a short film in ten days, with practically nonexistent interference from any studios or higher-ups, to be run on television. I have just finished watching the first season, so I will review each of the episodes below. It may be worth noting that I did not watch the episodes in the order that they aired, but rather in the apparently random order they came in my box set.

Title: Jenifer
Director: Dario Argento
You might remember his film...Suspiria (1977)

Premise: Steven Weber stars in a screenplay he wrote based on a short comic about a man's unhealthy obsession with a feral creature that possesses the body of a beautiful woman, coupled with a monstrous face.

Opinion: I suppose I was expecting something a little more "colorful" from Dario Argento, but Jenifer left me feeling kind of lukewarm. It's a good story, and I really like that it approaches the topic of sex and sexual obsession, but the story really isn't that deep, and you can pretty much see where it's going after the first five minutes. Still, it is an interesting premise, although I'm not convinced that the male libido is so strong that a man would protect a carnivorous monster just because she's got a great rack, unless there's something supernatural at work. Dario brings his Italian sensibilities to the picture, which means he's not squeamish about the marriage of sex and violence like so many Americans are, although the result is that he was one of the only directors on the project who had to make a few cuts to his picture. In spite of the theme and the unflinching gore, I found this episode struggling to lift itself above "TV anthology horror" quality.

Title: Cigarette Burns
Director: John Carpenter
You might remember his film...Halloween (1978)

Premise: Norman Reedus (Daryl on The Walking Dead) stars as a cinephile and rare film finder hired to track down an obscure French film (La Fin Absolue du Monde, "The Absolute End of the World") which is rumored to have the power to whip everyone who watches it up into a mad frenzy of ultraviolence.

Opinion: I was genuinely impressed with this episode, which kept my attention glued to the screen throughout. Credit goes to the actors and director, of course, but also to the story, which, as an artist keenly attentive to issues of censorship and the power of art over people's lives, I found to be utterly fascinating. I agree with the director that the idea of a film being a weapon that induces violence is cockamamie, but as a fantasy it thrills the mind, and this episode explores under what fictional consequences might such a thing actually be possible. It is, in a Cartesian sense, a horrible vision of the natural progression of the idea that art moves people. Furthermore, it plays on the excitement every film buff experiences when in search of rare and infamous films.



Title: Pick Me Up
Director: Larry Cohen
You might remember his film...It's Alive (1974)

Premise: Two very different but equally charismatic serial killers match wits against one another when they both encounter a bus full of travelers broken down by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere.

Opinion: I wasn't familiar with Larry Cohen going into this episode so I didn't know what to expect, but it turned out to be really excellent. The two killers - one a hitchhiker and the other a trucker (named Walker and Wheeler) - are both really captivating on screen, and despite being villains, become your favorite characters. I suppose that means this episode isn't all that scary, as you're never particularly rooting for their victims, but it is lots of fun. You get to see their two different approaches to the trade, and how they clash when they both set eyes on the same prey. Very much recommended.


Title: Incident On And Off A Mountain Road
Director: Don Coscarelli
You might remember his film...Phantasm (1979)

Premise: A woman tries to escape a mutant serial killer in the mountains after a car accident, while thinking back on her relationship with the man who taught her the survival skills she'll need to stay alive.

Opinion: A fairly straightforward premise proves to be a rather clever and interesting juxtaposition of storylines, chronicling the lead actress' evolving relationship with a survivalist, and how those experiences have given her the knowledge and confidence to face her life-threatening chase through the woods with strength and ingenuity. For once, we get a heroine who is not helpless - even if some of her MacGyver-meets-The-Goonies antics (challenge: build a tripwire slingshot with a stick, a pocket knife, a pair of panties, and a length of skirt, and do it in the dark, before that deformed homicidal psycho catches up to you!) at times stretch the audience's credulity - that ultimately leads to a fresh and original ending. The balance of suspense and comfort between the two interposed storylines is handled exceptionally well. If this episode did not engage me quite as enthusiastically as Pick Me Up or Cigarette Burns, in the end it proves itself to be a worthy addition to the Masters of Horror series.


Title: Homecoming
Director: Joe Dante
You might remember his film...The Howling (1981)

Premise: The dead rise - but it's not brains, it's suffrage they want in this political satire condemning the Bush administration's unpopular war in Iraq.

Opinion: One of the great things about Masters of Horror is that - especially in conjunction with the DVD special features - it places an emphasis on the director, giving him more of a character and a personality than you might get by just watching movies through the years. Joe Dante was an unfamiliar name to me, but in addition to working on the Roger Corman-spearheaded Jaws knock-off Piranha, he also directed one of my favorite werewolf movies - the classic The Howling - as well as Gremlins, which, despite its comedic approach, gave me nightmares when I watched it as a child. Even though politics isn't really my thing, I respect Joe Dante for having the guts to tell a story with such a blatant political agenda. And despite it's - what some may call 'preachiness' - it's pretty entertaining, too. Although the premise's requirement that the zombies be sympathetic and not frightening characters detracts from its horror value, it does on the other hand present a refreshingly original (if irretrievably dated to the Bush administration) take in what has become an oversaturated subgenre of horror.


Title: Chocolate
Director: Mick Garris
You might remember his film...Stephen King's The Stand (1994)

Premise: The mastermind behind Masters of Horror Mick Garris writes and directs this psychological horror about a man who develops a psychic connection with a woman and is able to experience her feelings and sensations from the inside out.

Opinion: When I started watching Masters of Horror, the main question that hung on my mind was, knowing TV's reputation compared to film, could these master filmmakers manage to create a series whose quality exceeded that which one would expect from a TV anthology show? And so far, the evidence has been pointing overwhelmingly to "yes". Chocolate, despite being more of a psychological thriller than a straight horror, is no exception. In fact, it manages to conjure one of the creepier and more believable middle-of-the-night intruder-in-the-house scenes I can recall seeing. The premise is pretty interesting, and invokes a good bit of mystery, if it is a fairly arbitrary device to provide most of the piece's horror. Still, the character and his experiences are fascinating, and this story does include some sex and nudity. So, it's definitely no waste of an hour.


Title: Dreams In The Witch-House
Director: Stuart Gordon
You might remember his film...Re-Animator (1985)

Premise: In this adaptation of an H.P. Lovecraft story, a graduate student rents a room in an old house that is haunted by a witch hiding out in an alternate dimension who seduces victims into committing heinous deeds.

Opinion: I don't know whether to credit H.P. Lovecraft for the story - and his uniquely effective approach to horror - or Stuart Gordon (who has directed several other H.P. Lovecraft story adaptations in the past), but this episode of Masters of Horror was excellent. The crossing of these two minds is, perhaps, a match made in hell, as Gordon's approach to horror is equally impressive. He doesn't believe there is such a thing as "going too far", and he thinks the most effective horror stories are those where the creator breaks the rules, so you don't know what to expect (an opinion with which I wholeheartedly agree). In this story, the life of an innocent baby is in jeopardy, a witch takes advantage of string theory (for real!) to manipulate space and time, and her familiar - a rat with a human face - crawls around creeping people out. Plus we get a glimpse of the Necronomicon! Leave it to Lovecraft to get the creative juices flowing: I feel inspired to finally get around to reading his stories, as well as checking out some of Stuart Gordon's other films.


Title: Dance of the Dead
Director: Tobe Hooper
You might remember his film...Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

Premise: Robert Englund (the original Freddy Krueger) stars in this adaptation of a Richard Matheson story as the MC of a gothic night club in a war-torn, post-apocalyptic, urban wasteland.

Opinion: Jessica Lowndes is illuminating as the last piece of innocence in a land ravaged by chemical warfare, even as she is seduced and corrupted by a group of punk thugs. This story is a dark and energetic look at an apocalyptic world where everyone has lost something, and few have the luxury to cling onto any sense of decency or morality. It's a pretty good story, but I unfortunately have to count the erratic cinematography against it. I know Tobe Hooper (who also directed Steven Spielberg's Poltergeist) has good reasons for making that stylistic decision - and it does put you into the zero-to-sixty mindspace of these characters - but it really detracted from my enjoyment of the episode with the constant camera movement and double, triple, quadruple images. A more judicious use of that device might have proved less annoying, but at least, the quality of the material underneath that filter was very good.


Title: Deer Woman
Director: John Landis
You might remember his film...An American Werewolf in London (1981)

Premise: A Native American legend about a half-woman, half-deer seductress comes to life in this tale of a jaded police officer's hunt for redemption.

Opinion: As to be expected from the man who directed Animal House and The Blues Brothers, John Landis mixes some humor into his episode of Masters of Horror. But, I'm happy to say, it's an intelligent and straight-faced humor, that doesn't undermine the horror of the piece. In fact, I like what he said in the interview special feature about trying to approach [both comedy and] horror with realism - not in terms of the supernatural themes, but in terms of the character's reactions to what's going on; that also has the effect of making them both more likable and more relatable. In this case, the characters recognize the absurdity of the concept of a deer woman seducing and then murdering men, but they're forced to accept the premise by the evidence that appears before them, while the mythical killer's own credibility and dangerousness is not reduced by its statistical and scientific improbability. The result is a pretty fun, if silly, story - and in truth, horror isn't always about being scary, it's about having a good time, too.


Title: The Fair Haired Child
Director: William Malone
You might remember his film...House On Haunted Hill (1999)

Premise: A schoolgirl is abducted by a distraught couple to feed a monster they summoned in a Satanic ritual to bring back their drowned son.

Opinion: To be honest, this was the first episode in a while that I felt was struggling to lift itself above TV anthology quality (in spite of that premise). However, the monster was very creepy - thanks to an effective design and the director's unsettling use of camera tricks. It looked and felt almost like something that could have escaped from The SCP Foundation. There is also a surreal element to this episode, sometimes bordering on the absurd. It wasn't bad, at all, but the basement ordeal drags a bit, and the ending, while twisty, just has too much of a happy-positive feeling. The bad guys aren't supposed to get their comeuppance, and the good guys aren't supposed to live happily ever after - as rarely happens in real life - that's part of what makes a good horror so unsettling.


Title: Sick Girl
Director: Lucky McKee
You might remember his film...May (2002)

Premise: A quirky entomologist enters a sweet romance with an erratic artist, which is disturbed by an aggressive monster bug that impregnates humans.

Opinion: The odds are against Lucky McKee. He's one of the newest and least experienced directors called on to the Masters of Horror project, his episode's story - about a parasitic bug - could easily fall into TV anthology territory, and his episode is as much romantic comedy as it is horror. And yet, he manages to churn out one of the more entertaining episodes in this series. He decides to make the protagonist female, thus allowing himself the opportunity to tell a somewhat more unusual story of an endearing lesbian romance. And the actress opposite the lead is none other than Erin Brown a.k.a. Misty Mundae - my favorite softcore porn actress! I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw her in this role, and she was perfect for it! The constant presence of the bugs that the lead is so enamored with maintains a creepiness factor throughout the story, even before the real horror erupts - and when it does, it's suitably devastating. I'm really impressed with what this unfamiliar director has done with his opportunity to join the Masters of Horror, and I'm intrigued by the other directing projects he's done so far.


Title: Haeckel's Tale
Director: John McNaughton
You might remember his film...Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986)

Premise: In this period piece adapted from a Clive Barker story, a man in mourning seeks the aid of a necromancer to bring back his deceased wife, and learns of the horror of love that transcends death.

Opinion: I was very excited to see Clive Barker's name attached to an episode of Masters of Horror, as he is an excellent writer, who writes disturbing and original stories. And John McNaughton succeeds at bringing this story to life, without shying away from the disturbing element of sexual perversity that flavors many of Barker's stories (not least of which includes the sadomasochistic overtones in Hellraiser). In this case, we have what I can enthusiastically report is the most erotic zombie sex scene I have ever seen, thanks in no small part to the casting of Leela Savasta who, as an art model, is not only comfortable with nudity, but possesses a flawless physical beauty. Other horror contained in this episode includes some re-animated dogs, which have that same excellently creepy feel as the dog in The Fly II which I love to fear so much. Additionally, the story is structured in a way - not unfamiliar in Clive Barker's stories - that it doesn't quite go in the predictable and cliched direction you might expect, instead ending up somewhere disturbing on a wholly novel level. Excellently done.


Title: Imprint
Director: Takashi Miike
You might remember his film...Audition (1999)

Premise: An American visits a notorious brothel in Meiji era Japan in search of his lost love. But the story he extracts from a prostitute gets increasingly disturbing the closer he comes to the truth.

Opinion: I had been looking forward to seeing Takashi Miike's episode of Masters of Horror ever since I started watching the series, after he impressed me with the deeply disturbing Audition years ago. Here, he does not disappoint. Imprint is easily the most unsettling episode in this series, which has the crucial distinction of being the only episode that Showtime wouldn't air. The setting of a seedy Meiji era brothel is intriguing, and the story just gets darker and darker as the protagonist plunges down the rabbit hole, delving into the past of one of the prostitutes - beautiful, in spite of her disfigured face - and her cohabitation with the woman he loved. The torture scene is brutally uncomfortable, in that uniquely subtle Japanese way, which distinguishes itself from the more aggressive American approach. I'm very happy that the Masters of Horror made a point to include a director to represent Asian horror in their series, and I couldn't be happier with their choice of Takashi Miike. If there is one complaint I have against this episode, it's that the actors' thick Japanese accents are at times hard to understand. I would just as soon have watched the episode in Japanese with English subtitles, but I understand this episode was filmed with an American audience distinctly in mind.

In conclusion, I can say that I am very impressed with the first season of Masters of Horror. It exceeded my modest expectations of a television anthology series, and lived up to its promise given the level of talent involved. Most importantly, I had a lot of fun watching these short films, and learning more about the directors behind the camera. Doing so has repeatedly sparked my inspiration, and led me to seek out many of the other titles several of these directors have previously worked on. I look forward to getting an opportunity at some point in the future to see the second season of Masters of Horror, and I urge all dedicated horror fans to give this series a look!