Dead Review Collection #10 - SPAWN!

I have too many things to say about this album.  2004's The Wretched Spawn is my favorite Cannibal Corpse outing.  To my ears, it's the perfect distillation of every element that makes this band...this band.  Since I'm not stopping at three sentences (don't tempt me, Satan/Jesus), I'll have to whip out the bulleted list.  I'm sorry!  I tried to avoid this route, but if any record is suited for an itemized index, it's this badass daughterfucker.  A scanty digression, if I may; that's my daughter on the cover.  Mary Mary Sue Coccaro (I named her Mary twice because she was conceived on a merry-go-round on Christmas Eve) died during childbirth.  The winged gentleman behind her gurney?  That's me.  As you can see, I was racked with grief.

~ Production!  This one was doctored by a returning Neil Kernon.  I thought that Gore Obsessed sounded adequate, but Spawn fucking blows it out of the cemetery slush.  The guitars are full and massive.  Alex's rumblings are represented well in the bottom end, especially for the grinding riffs in "Cyanide Assassin" and "Nothing Left to Mutilate."  And "Slain."  And the others.

~ The songs!  Songwriting has never been a weakness for these chaps, but variety and the thorny matter of dynamics have been elevated.  The first seven tracks are astonishingly multifarious for death metal carols.  Heh, wouldn't it be funny if all Christmas carols were replaced with CC tunes?  Anyway, "astonishingly multifarious" may seem excessive, but dude, they aren't just seven tracks.  They are seven different approaches to composition.  No theme or concept is repeated.

~ The songs!  Specifically!  "Severed Head Stoning" is an ideal opener.  It's a barrelling blackjack to the cranium.  "Psychotic Precision" cranks up the speed and technicality, which are graded back down for the caveman grooves of "Decency Defied."  A studio video of "Frantic Disembowelment" went viral because fucking holy piss, it's fast.  "Festering in the Crypt" is an all-timer (remember, it's my review, not yours).  The melodies are sickly, and the languid tortoise pacing allows George to enunciate, to really dig into each syllable.  Speaking of which...

~ George!  Individually, the members of CC are operating at full tilt.  There isn't a weak link in the bunch.  But man, Spawn is the album that made me fall in heterosexual love with Corpsegrinder (and his neck).  His vocals are unreal.  The low growls are so brutal, I would believe you if you told me that George was part-chicken.  For the uninitiated, chickens swallow small rocks and gravel for digestive purposes.  That's a stupid way of expressing it, but the guy's voice sounds inhuman, okay?  And the high screams!  This is the last CC set where George uncorks loooong shrieks (he comes close to hitting 13 seconds on "They Deserve to Die").  They were giving him intense headaches, so he had to retire most of his upper range.

~ Smash the scrotum!  The lyrics to "Blunt Force Castration" are hilarious.  That's all.  I'm immature.

I guess that's it.  Spawn sits atop my personal pile of corpses.  By the way, "Skull Fragment Armor" is a bonus track on the digipak edition of Evisceration Plague.  If you're a trained fan (read: maniac), you'll be able to tell that it was recorded during the sessions for The Wretched Spawn.  Of course, it slams.

    

Wormface

How was your summer vaca--er, Thanksgiving?  Honestly, this is my least favorite holiday.  I realize that it's an unpopular opinion, but I don't care for most Thanksgiving food.  Turkey is cool.  It's an upstanding meat, but you can keep your mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, cranberry sauce (seriously, what the fuck?), stuffing, candied yams, and your butternut squash (see my comment on cranberry sauce).  It wasn't made to infiltrate my paunch.  Worms on the other hand...

No, I only gobble gummy worms.  That brings me to today's subject, an extended player (or EP, if you're fussy) cast loose by Cannibal Corpse.  I've mentioned it before, but I won't be scrawling full-length reviews for the band's shorter releases.  I will piddle and put down words concerning 2003's Worm Infested.  When I bought my CC hoodie, this disc was included.  I was awfully hankful, as I doubt that I would have purchased it otherwise.  It's hard for me to justify parting with cash in exchange for twenty minutes (on average) of music.  I would have heard the songs eventually, but then I wouldn't own the artwork.

Typically, I try not to post explicit nudity on the site, even in cartoon form.  Vincent Locke's interpretation of the title is stomach-churning in a groovy way.  Nice color scheme, too.  As for the material, we get two outtakes from the Gore Obsessed studio sessions, three covers, and a re-recorded version of "The Undead Will Feast."  The outtakes make me super curious about other leftovers in the vault.  If there are one or two unheard threnodies for each CC album, holy shit.  Release them now!

At any rate, I'm curious because "Worm Infested" and "Systematic Elimination" kick tremendous ass.  The act of headbanging?  It was invented for these rippers.  The covers are fine.  I could take them or leave them, but they do display George's range.  So I've written more than I thought I would, but I'll be back in a few days to slobber on a long player.  That didn't sound incredibly right.

Blood Capsule #117

THE VISITOR (1979)

Did you catch the Lakers game last night?  It was a nail-biter.  With three seconds to spare, LeBron James jumped to dunk the deciding basket when suddenly, the damn hoop exploded.  Okay, that didn't actually happen in reality, but it did happen in The Visitor.  Replace LeBron with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and kablooey!  It's never mentioned again and no one seems to think it's a big deal.  Explosions are fixtures of your average basketball game, I suppose.  That scene is an unmarred reduction of the totality of The Visitor.  It's a kinky, whimsical bite of the 70's, although it's not as cinematic as The Omen or The Exorcist.

The Visitor wants to be as weighty as those genre paradigms, but it's deliriously tipsy.  In fact, if it were a person, it would be a falldown drunk.  There are redeeming qualities here, namely the actors forced at gunpoint to recite amphigory dialogue (I had to laugh at a prepubescent Paige Connor telling her mother to "make love" with Lance Henriksen so that she could have a baby brother).  Lance is detached, but he's still Lance.  John Huston gives the best performance as Jerzy, an interdimensional...warrior?  Wizard?  Shelley Winters, Mel Ferrer, and Glenn Ford round out the cast of confused onlookers.  Of all the "evil tyke" movies I've seen, this is probably the worst.  And yet, it's entertaining enough for a rainy Tuesday night.

Album Cover of the Whatever

Fuckin' Nazareth!  That's all I have to say.

Lamberto Bava's DEMONS is My Spirit Animal

That right there.  That image represents my interests in pop culture.  It's a three-ring hippodrome.  Venom symbolizes (symbiolizes?) heavy metal, Carnage betokens the horror genre, and hey, what are they doing?  They seem to be engaged in a struggle.  Could they be...wrestling?  It's my block of text, so I say that they are, in fact, wrestling.  To me, this ternion of hobbies makes logical sense.  If I loved ghouls (I do), wouldn't it follow that I jammed out to Ghoul (I do), a death/thrash band?

In recent years, it has become fashionable for raw black metal projects to write songs about vampires with wacky, pretentious titles (personally, I favor Forbidden Citadel of Spirits' "Moonlight Cast Upon Thy Waters of Sorrow").  Wrestlemaniac is a 2006 slasher that blends arm drags and arms being dragged from their stumps.  Point being!  Well, I guess my point is obvious, so why is it so hard to find like-minded folks?  I've met metalheads who can't stand horror films.  And vice-versa.  What gives?

Wrestling is an acquired taste.  I can understand not jumping into that cesspool, although I could make the argument that watching old episodes of Nitro is no different than watching a b-movie.  Still, I get it.  This business about metal and horror...guys, they are made for each other.  Peanut butter and jelly!  Burgers and fries!  Yikes pencils and blowjobs!

I had to get that off my chest.  I've got a Blood Capsule and another Cannibal Corpse review in the convection oven.  Stay fucked!

PS-I haven't actually seen Wrestlemaniac.  I apologize.

Dead Space

Roger Corman produced 1991's Dead Space.  It's a remake of 1982's Forbidden World, which was produced by...Roger Corman.  It's common knowledge that the man revels in the act of cannibalizing his own exploits.  Perhaps he gets sick joy out of it.  How sick am I to rent and enjoy these c-movies?  If you use IMDb reviews as your barometer, it would appear that Dead Space is unilaterally seen as residual sheathing left behind by Forbidden World, the high-class pick of the two Alien riffs.  I wish I could stand alone and volunteer an adversarial viewpoint, but in this case, the plurality of nerds is comme il faut.*

However!  I reserve the right to dig trash.  Dead Space is flimsy, but it's not THAT flimsy.  It can be digested as rattlebrained entertainment.  There was a helix of sci-fi/horror cheapies crapped out in the late 80's/early 90's, and you could say that this whirlpool trend continued into the tailpiece of the decade (that sounded too sexual).  I mean, we had Event Horizon and fucking Virus.  The former was divisive as shit, and I still haven't seen the latter.  I should break down and allow Jamie Lee Curtis to transmit bacteria onto my removable, magnetic tape videocassette.  Speaking of infectious agents (that was the kind of segue your parents would love), a virus has blighted a research facility on the planet Phaebon.  Why did they invent a bullshit planet???

Anyway, a distress signal reaches Marc Singer and his trusty robot pal.  Singer's character has a name, but I'm choosing to believe that he played himself.  It makes sense.  The robot is Tinpan, and guys, this fucking bionic borg is the heart of Dead Space.  The nucleus.  The anchor!  He is as fleshed out as much as he needs to be, his morals are verifiable (I'm talking "lawful good" here), and I felt something when he perished.  Don't give me grief over spoiler warnings.  You don't care.  You never cared for Tinpan, not like I did!  Welpers, I'm using slathers of exclamation points.  I know better.

The acting is fine.  Aside from Singer, Bryan Cranston plays a slightly mad scientist, though he doesn't become a true antagonist.  Of course, he's flippin' awesome.  The special effects are typically gooey, and as a millennial might say, I'm here for it.  The creature is essentially a Xenomorph Queen.  I can't defend cribbing, but again, I'm here for it.  I'm not proud of my taste; believe me.  Logically, I look down on plagiarism, but at the end of the day, it's a rubber monster.  It's tacky.  It's great.  I should be admitted into a rehabilitation clinic of some description.

Dead Space runs for 72 minutes.  Pacing is not a problem.  Plot holes are a problem, but they aren't dealbreakers.  It's minor league stuff.  This is a minor league flick, so I didn't mind meeting it halfway.  Oh, the asterisk?  I don't know.  It's Spanish.  I don't speak Russian.

  

Rassle Inn #24

I'll get back to splintering horror movies soon, but I don't make the schedule.  Okay, I'm in charge of this website's schedule, dubious though it may be, but I didn't decide to run a wrestling PPV over the weekend.  Okay, I did.  I'm Tony Khan.  Holy shitting fuck, I'm exhausted.  No, but I am tired.  This is Dom talking again.  See that adorable labradoodle puppy being cradled by AEW World Champion (more on that in a sexual second) "Hangman" Adam Page?  I've had a stuffed animal for most of my life that looks exactly like...erm, Unnamed Hangpup.  Isn't it cuuuuute?

Right, so if you follow wrestling media or lurk on message boards (if those are a thing in 2021; I'm desperately out of touch), you have heard plenty of racket about storylines and how long-term prevarication - that's not the right word.  It implies deceit.  Certainly, you can't say that the brain trust behind AEW's main event programs was ever trying to deceive the public.  They basically laid it out three years ago.  Page was going to be their guy.  Omega would have a part to play, and by a punctilious fluke that wasn't really a fluke at all, the two box office attractions have great chemistry.

Page's first title reign should last for at least six months.  He hasn't been injury prone, so you don't have to worry that he'll trot out his impersonation of Kyrie Irving.  Is he photogenic?  It should be obvious, but I can answer that question.  Several female friends have commented on the "hot cowboy" on TV, and some of them don't even watch wrestling (pretty sure they do now).  Merch?  Catchphrases?  Real.  Cowboy.  Shit.  It's fucking brilliant!  Slap it on mugs, shirts, bumper stickers, and marshmallow dispensers.  And caskets.  I mean, why let Gene Simmons have all the fun?

I wanted to focus on "Hangman" Adam Page, but Full Gear offered a full card of exquisite pro-rasslin' action.  There were three Match of the Year candidates by my count.  M.J.F. versus Darby Allin was technically flawless, and I approved of the finish.  That's important.  I have to approve of this (cowboy) shit.  Eddie and Punk?  Wow.  That was a goddamn fight.  I loved every brutal, unfeeling moment.  What was the third epic encounter, you inquire?  The main event!  Do I need to spell everything out for you?

After close examination, I could see myself in a committed relationship with Mr. Page.  He has what I'm missing in my life right now.  Stability.  Also, cock.  Stability and cock.

Top 5: Best Death Metal From the Late 90's

There is a narrative in modern day metal journalism that the 1990's were unkind to our favorite genre of music.  To be specific, the late 90's sucked the muscle and virility out of metal altogether.  But let's get even more specific!  Starting in '96 (I have my reasons, which I'll enumerate later), death metal seemed to shrivel, to exsiccate into a teensy-weensy clump of crud.  Did it, really?  While thinking to myself (do not try that shit at home), I noticed that a couple of my favorite death metal records were birthed in the late 90's.  This warranted further scrutiny.

I posit that death metal was neither burgeoning nor tapering off in the late 90's.  It was holding steady.  Bear in mind, melodic death metal was stirring in Sweden, but I'll leave melodeath out of it.  Not to genuflect to derisive gatekeepers; it's merely for the sake of simplicity.  We can debate the credibility of In Flames all day, but there is no fucking doubt that Dying Fetus is a death metal band.  Because it's my site, however, I'll point out that The Jester Race is my numero uno melodeath album, and nothing comes close to topping it.

So why is '96 my starting point?  Why not '95?  Earlier, I interjected journalism under a critical light.  Those journalists...okay, I admit that I'm fabricating a character for the purpose of this list.  Oblige me.  The writer in my head (and he does exist) holds certain long players from 1995 in high esteem.  Suffocation's Pierced From Within, Death's Symbolic, Morbid Angel's Domination, Deicide's Once Upon the Cross, Vader's De Profundis, a few others that escape my marbles...do you see what I'm driving at?  According to the defeatists who enkindled me to write these words, death metal's dry spell lasted from 1996 to (roughly) 2001.

Thus!  I am playing footsie with those five years.  Obviously, these aren't the only records released during that time frame worth spinning.  I simply love them, and I went to the trouble of ranking them.  As always, my opinion is gospel.  If you don't agree with my picks, what the fuck is wrong with you?

5) Broken Hope ~ Loathing (1997)

Verily, my knowledge of these Chicago autochthons is limited.  I didn't start listening to them until - hold on, I must consult my calendar - the year of our lard, 2021.  Their discography is patchy.  Not every punch connects, but Loathing is a goddamn knockout.  The set immediately kicks your nethersphere with the fuming grooves of "Siamese Screams."  If you're new to Broken Hope, "The Cloning," "Auction of the Dead," and "I Am God" are worth sampling.  Expect gut-shuffling riffs, creative leads, and a nice variety of beats (thankfully, they don't rely on blasts).

4) Martyr ~ Warp Zone (2000)

Do you love latter-era Death as much as I do?  How about early Pestilence?  Early Atheist?  Principally, I'm sick of calling attention to a band and then specifying which version of the band I'm aiming to showcase.  It's not critically relevant.  I just felt the need to vent.  Anyway, yeah.  Martyr specializes in technical death metal and their material is sweetened by Canadian pluck.  It's impossible to describe, but it's there, mainly because Martyr hails from Quebec.  Songs such as "Virtual Emotions" and "The Fortune Teller" admix superlative musicianship with woeful melodies that cradle all four chambers of your heart.  Conclusion reached?  I'm pretty sure that Warp Zone gave me a stroke.

3) Dying Fetus ~ Destroy the Opposition (2000)

Never has a band's name been so damn appropriate.  Their music crushes the listener.  No, pounds!  No, it murders you!  And it's clear that Dying Fetus is behind the murder.  They make no effort to hide the evidence.  The riffs are bullets, and serendipitously, your head was whittled with exit and entrance wounds already in place.  It's no coincidence that those wounds contain drums.  How else can I stretch this analogy?  Okay, I can't.  John Gallagher's seismic growls are insane.  Each element is seismic, and I suppose you could consider the groups that DF influenced to be aftershocks.  I can't say with certainty that these embryo liquidators invented a microgenre, but for my money, they are the reigning kings of slam.

2) Morbid Angel ~ Gateways to Annihilation (2000)

This isn't my favorite Morbid Angel dish (that would be Domination, a classic that missed zero hour by a matter of months), but hey, my second favorite does gel with my purposes.  Pete the Feet's contributions are a trifle clicky, although that's bound to happen when chunks of your performance are replaced by a drum machine.  That's the sole cleft to be found.  These ditties are fucking perfect.  Everything from the monster solo in "Summoning Redemption" to the stuttering rhythm section of "I" rules, and you know it.  No one talks about "God of the Forsaken."  Guess what?  It rules, too!  I'm quite fond of Formulas Fatal to the Flesh, but in my book, this is Steve Tucker's finest offering as MA's bassist and lead throat.

1) Death ~ The Sound of Perseverance (1998)

I literally remember my first twirl of Death's swan song like it was yesterday.  It was my first Death record period.  I was slogging away at mindless homework when halfway through "Scavenger of Human Sorrow," I had to stop and pay attention.  Were these...humans?  I had heard technical metal before, but Jesus Christ.  Did I finish my homework?  No, I'm asking.  I don't recall, but I do recall being torpedoed through my bedroom window by "Spirit Crusher" and "Flesh and the Power it Holds."  Procrastination is the only factor keeping me from adding "Voice of the Soul" to my living will.  That's right; I plan on having it played at my funeral.  I would also ask that you play "Story to Tell" if you ever violate my corpse.

Eh...

It's taking longer than expected to write the piece I'm writing.  So, um, patience?  By the way, am I the only one who thinks that Season 4 of Stranger Things looks a tad boring?  It's just a trailer.  I get it.  But as far as trailers go, it's not very exciting.  And that's coming from a huge fan of the first three seasons.  Eh.

Oliver Reed Hates You

This isn't a review per se.  I got shit to do!  But I did feel compelled to make note of the fact that I watched 1989's The House of Usher (a.k.a. Oliver Reed is Inebriated and Wants Fuck).  There are eleventy billion adaptations of Poe's short story, but only this one claimed both Reed and Donald Pleasence in its ranks.  The latter gets to transort against type as a blackguard with a power drill for a hand.  Just like in the story!  The film is rated "R" for libidinous petting.  No, I have no earthly idea why it's rated "R," aside from Oliver Reed being himself.

TRUE STORY: Oliver Reed once yelled, "Shit!  Bitch!" at waterfowl.  Anyway, Usher was halfway decent.  A 3-Z'Dar affair, if you're keeping count.  Currently, I'm in pre-production (lol) on a listicle.  I hate making lists, so this is a big step for me.  And for mankind.

Album Cover of the Whatever

Let's kick November off the right way.  Of course, that involves four pallid, bloodless chaps from the Czech Republic straddling broncos and looking...ugh.  I'm seeing a combination of aloof and beleaguered.  I wasn't tipped off as to where they are riding, but I do know that Barbarians is their debut long player.  Maniac Butcher play raw black metal.  If that's your bag, you could do worse.  As for the cover, it's adorable.  I'm cooing over here.  Cooing!

Bobbing For Motivation

I'm frozen to the bone.  I'm cold-natured anyway, but yowza!  I just got back in from handing out candy to trick-or-treaters.  To be honest, I wasn't expecting a prosperity of costumed squirts, but we were dealt a decent turnout.  I didn't actually DO much to celebrate Halloween this year.  If I can manage to save my duckets, I have a stupendous idea for next year.  I mean, shit.  I always say that I want to do something special for my favorite holiday, but those aspirations never survive beyond the talking stage.

My idea?  Procure a projector.  And a screen.  I want to hold an outdoor b-movie marathon and invite cool people (and kids, I guess) from my neighborhood.  Technically, the attendees could be from any neighborhood.  Refreshments will be served.  Clearly, I'm stargazing, but this could easily become a reality.  You'll split the costs with me, right?  Right???  Oh, I almost forgot...HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Blood Capsule #116

PRINCE OF DARKNESS (1987)

I didn't intend on curating a John Carpenter-themed month, but if it was going to happen, I couldn't pick a month more apropos than October.  Prince of Darkness is an outlander among the auteur's classic 80's masterstrokes.  It doesn't get much prattle from horror hamlets.  It's held in high regard, sure, but where is all of the merchandise at conventions?  I haven't seen one person cosplay as Priest, nor have I heard a quip lifted from the film's quotable dialogue.  Like...um, that famous line.  I don't know, something about being shot six times?  Regardless, Prince is a creative, highbrow cut of religious frights.

You know the part in the Bible (the King Booker version) where Jesus shouts "BOO!" at his disciples?  If you thought that was scary, just you wait.  Okey-dokey, I'll try to be cold sober for this paragraph.  A priest (literally credited as Priest) solicits the opinion of a science professor at the local university.  It's revealed that a cylinder containing neon green fluid (no, it's not the reagent serum) has been concealed beneath a church for years.  It might be Satan.  In vapor form, I mean.  And that's approximately 12% of the synopsis.  The script is talky, but the subject matter is honestly fascinating.  I enjoyed the exposition.  It goes without saying that the cast is illustrious, from the marquee players (Donald Pleasance, Lisa Blount) to Alice Cooper.  Everyone is game.

Prince of Darkness burns slow (a little too slow at times), so demonstrate poise.  Your patience will be rewarded with a cool, creepy chiller to freeze your blood.

Dead Review Collection #9 - GORE!

I really, really don't want to rank all of Cannibal Corpse's studio albums.  I fear that in time, I may have to bite that bullet.  I'm going to stall as long as humanly possible.  I can't use my feet, but I can drag them!  Heh, I made a funny.  Right, so I have no idea where I would place 2002's Gore Obsessed in formation.  It's a favorite, yet I have said the same for five or six CC records.  Confound it, I believe I've even referred to Outback Steakhouse as a damn fine outing from the death metal stalwarts.  The Bloomin' Onion is no joke, friends.  The trick is to interlace the petals with bites of your steak.

Great, now I'm drooling.  As for the seasoning, the dish is never too piquant--oopsy!  I momentarily forgot what I'm reviewing.  Following Bloodthirst, it's clear that the objective was to obviate sterile production.  "Coffinfeeder," for instance, sounded so sanitary, I wouldn't be opposed to dining on the mixing board that was used to capture those unsullied riffs. Obsessed doesn't sound sullied per se; it's beefier, and devotees of Alex Webster will be merry to learn that it's bassier.  I dig the production (as twiddled by Neil Kernon), but some of the choices made pursed my temples.  The guitar solos are pushed way back when they should float atop the rhythm tracks.

Bassier?  Probably not a word.  At any rate, let's dissect the songs.  The songs!  "Savage Butchery" is a shot of epinephrine to the sinoatrial node that sets the metal in motion.  And look, if you're wanting a definition for every single medical term that I deploy, I'll be here all day.  Speaking of ill health, I remember "Hatchet to the Head" being an instant classic.  The addictive chorus drives George's near-staccato delivery into your skullcap.  This is also one of the more technical numbers, what with tempo shifts bobbing up at vital ticks.

"Pit of Zombies" is about a pit of zombies.  It's cool.  It was bound to be cool, on account of its title and the band playing it.  I suppose you could say that the album tromps over a downswing in the middle of its runtime, a slight slump in momentum.  You could say that, but I won't.  Cuts such as "Compelled to Lacerate" and "Sanded Faceless" are fucking fun, and I haven't mentioned the jerky, spurtive drumming in "Hung and Bled."  I swear, Paul must have lost weight pounding his kit for these sessions.

I'll touch on Corpsegrinder's throat-rending screams in greater depth when I launch into The Wretched Spawn, but I did want to highlight the neverending wail towards the end of "Mutation of the Cadaver."  Yes, I tried to mimic it in my bedroom (I was seventeen...Daddy said I was too young, but I was old enough for Kip).  Yes, I nearly blew out my voice.  The trials and tribulations of being a Cannibal Corpse freak, y'know?  In summation, Gore Obsessed is killer.  It's undervalued, which is a shame.  The mid-period of George's era is worth a look, if only to prove that this band is more than Kill and Tomb of the Mutilated.

    

Rassle Inn #23

In late August, CM Punk concussed the wrestling world into a jouncing vibration when he debuted on AEW's Rampage.  It was big.  Big enough, in fact, that if the two leading promotions engage in a real war to secure their perch (and the adjuvant eyes of viewers) in the marketplace, the press will circle his debut date as the cannonade that opened said war.  And no, there is no war yet.  Give it a couple of years.  It's going to get bloody.

So four matches later, here we are.  As a wrestling nerd, I can tell you that all of Punk's skirmishes have been awesome.  There was a speck of rust, but it disappeared with a flick of his taped wrist.  I'm loving it.  However (don't roll your eyes), these columns I write tend to be transmissions from the command post of Satan's advocacy council.  You get it, right?  I'm playing the Devil's advocate?  Forget I brought it up.  Anyway, I was wondering...the die-hards who clamored for Punk to return to WWE, the same adherents who chanted his name during lulls (or otherwise disastrous segments) on Raw...are they satisfied?  How many of them tune into Dynamite or Rampage each week?

They probably became fans of Punk because he was the rebel standing up to authority.  Of course, I'm not talking about the folks who watched him in Ring of Honor.  I'm not even talking about the folks who latched onto him because of shared beliefs (straight edge, the DIY punk aesthetic, etc.).  I'm talking about the - sorry, I hate this term - marks who found themselves captivated by the "Summer of Punk."  If they decide to give AEW a shot, they will not find a sweeping storyline that pits Punk against corporate evils.  It's a completely different booking style.  Thus far, Punk has wrestled one-off matches, half of which have been against fellow babyfaces.

Like I said, it's a different style, but I didn't say it was better or worse.  Me, I'm cool with it.  I'm not the casual mainstream fuckhead, though.  How will fuckheads - er, I need to use a less degrading designation; how will non-nerds (there we go) take to this flavor of professional wrestling?  I'm playing the Devil's advocate, but in all candor, I think it will work out alright.  I simply don't have an intellectual reason for believing that.  Call it a gut feeling.  Punk's next bout?  Bobby Fish.  I'm already fangirling.

Halloween Kills

I wanted to have this review up earlier, but I was sick and bedridden all day yesterday.  That's not an excuse; it's...no, it's definitely an excuse.

Is there a general consensus on Halloween Kills yet?  I haven't found one, so I don't know which viewpoints to rail against.  No, I'm only joshing.  I have my own personal consensus, but in truth, reviews for this scrappy, pitiless sequel are mixed.  They are, shall we say, interdenominational in a panoptic way.  On second thought, let's NOT say that.  It's hard to believe that this isn't the final film in the franchise.  Characters have done everything to Michael Myers.  The Shape has been hacked, cleaved, set ablaze, severed, snapped, and downright demolished.  Yet our coterie of protagonists seems resigned to the fact that they cannot kill the bastard.

So what's left for Halloween Ends?  This speaks to a problem I had with Kills.  Well, the latter half of Kills.  It runs out of steam and relies on repetition.  The first half felt different.  Again, this is just my perspective.   I haven't seen too many fans share my attitude.  It actually feels like the film was directed by two people.  The opening fifteen (or thereabouts) minutes are framed beautifully.  The credits?  Badass.  The flashbacks?  I was convinced a couple of times that they crammed unused footage from 1978 into this bubbling cauldron.  Masks off to director David Gordon Green and...well, the whole damn crew for taking every measure to preserve the picture's timeless qualities.

As Kills nears its denouement, it loses a great deal of its visual flair.  Action and dialogue take precedence over prismatic pizzazz.  Maybe I need glasses.  This isn't even a big deal, but it becomes conspicuous when the pace slows and the script protracts the inevitable.  I mean, we know what's going to happen.  Either get there quicker or throw a gnarly curveball into the mix.  Man alive, this review is more negative than I had intended.  I dug Halloween Kills!  I'm giving both movies three and a half Z'Dars, but I do prefer the 2018 original by a cowlick.  Can everyone define "cowlick" or is that a southern thing?  Ack, look it up.

Mr. Myers is an incensed, forcefully vehement motherfucker, and I wouldn't change him for the world (aww).  The kills in Kills are brutal.  I can't remember for certain, but I'm pretty sure that I used the same adjective to describe the obliteration in 2018's Halloween.  Dude is not fucking around.  Of course, I appreciated the nods to previous installments.  If only they existed in this cinematic universe.  The atmosphere is ghostly, the acting is adequate, and the first half...I'm not kidding.  If Kills could have stayed the course, I would be gushing plaudits and proclaiming this to be the best Halloween picture show ever.  I know, right?

Alas, it trails off.  At some point, I'll give Halloween Kills a second whirl, and hey, who knows?  I may form a brand new opinion.  I must confide, this is easily the sharpest Rob Zombie joint since The Devil's Rejects.  I barely recognized Sheri Moon as Laurie Strode.

   

Blood Capsule #115

GONJIAM: HAUNTED ASYLUM (2018)

I'm going out of town for a wee bit this weekend, so I wanted to tide you over with a capsule.  Of valerian root laced with chloral hydrate, but I decided to write this instead.  Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum made boys and ghouls scream in South Korea.  We heard the startled, tremulous bellows all the way from America.  We had to know ~ okay, I'm going to drop "we" ~ I had to know if this "found footage" caboodle was worth the heightened hurly-burly of grapevine reviews.  Remember, evidence via hearsay is not admissible in a court of law.  "Well," you impatiently articulate.  "Were you scared?  Did you leave a wheelchair-shaped hole in the wall behind you?"

First and foremost, I'm not a fucking cartoon.  And I can't say that I was frightened because I haven't been stricken with genuine terror by a movie since I was a kid.  I'm not trying to sound macho; it's the Satan-honest truth.  However, I can avouch for Gonjiam as a fun, creep-a-minute jaunt.  Without divulging key plot details, a popular horror website picks three ordinary civilians to tag along on an excursion into the titular asylum.  It's a real location, by the way.  The cast and crew were prohibited from shooting there, so the sets were exact facsimiles of the real McCoy.  The art direction is phenomenal.  I never would have guessed that Gonjiam was pieced together inside of a fabrication.

The acting is spot-on.  I particularly dug Je-Won Moon as the budding Hollywood starlet.  The ghosties are ghostly, but this is where I touch on a dour, unfortunate cloudburst.  Um, I can't place a name...the central specter (nice save) who assails one of the few remaining girls with rapid whispering is just dumb.  Dense!  Took me right out of the moment.  Axe her, as the other final boss is infinitely more effective.  I typed too much.  Shit, I'll wrap it up by recommending Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum.  It's atmospheric, suspenseful, and it's perfect for Halloween parties.  That's coming from a genre nerd who doesn't care for "found footage" spooks, as a general rule.  Have a grim weekend!

Did you hear that?

Babe, I heard something.  Get up and check!  It could be a spooky phantom.  Or a serial rapist.

As you may have noticed, I added a tiny widget to the site.  Nothing major, but it does play spoooooky sounds.  I turned off autoplay out of respect for you, my dear reader, but of course, I recommend checking it out at least once.  Loop it to add atmosphere to your Random Review reading experience.

Halloween ('18)

Five.  Counting Season of the Witch, the Halloween franchise has five timelines.  Which one is considered canon?  Well, I guess the current docket would have 2018's Halloween listed as the second chapter in the official series, following the original.  This is cinematic perjury.  I mean, I'm pissed off.  Hollywood doles out these psychologically ruinous falsehoods (i.e. movies) that are shifty and isochronal in nature.  You know what they are?  Those producer types?  Those suits?  Wascally wabbits!  I didn't want to use that kind of language, but here we are.  My biggest problem with this Halloween flick is the fact that it exists.  Seriously, will any horror icon be able to rest in peace?

I tried to judge this film on its own merits.  It wasn't easy.  In my opinion, the 106 minutes of digital celluloid attempting to pass itself off as the "real" sequel to Carpenter's humble classic were no more dignified than Jamie Lee's endorsements for Activia.  She can sell yogurt, but she cannot peddle an autumnal slasher whose success hinges on the theory that the viewer will efface their memories of ten entire motion pictures.  I get it; I'm dwelling on minutiae.  Hear me out!  The sibling dynamic between Laurie and Michael that served as the backbone of this saga?  Gone.

I realize that Carpenter never envisioned a link tying The Shape to his victims.  No motive.  Just evil.  But if any residue from the sequels actually clabbered as canon, it was the revelation that Laurie was Luke's father.  Hardy har-har, but no, hear me out (again).  What if George Lucas sanctioned a sequel to Star Wars that negated Darth Vader's pedigree?  Maybe it turns out that Luke's daddy is goddamn Chewbacca.  You're telling me that wouldn't bother you?  Granted, it's a different set of circumstances, but is it really?  I need to change the subject.  For me, it was important to illustrate where I'm coming from in relation to the Akkads' handiwork.

For the record, my favorite entry is Halloween II.  The first Halloween II (urg)!  I'm not sure where this episode will rank, but it's more than serviceable.  My nerd rage did not blind me to verifiable truth.  Director David Gordon Green crafted himself an attractive genre package.  At times, the wrapping paper bests its contents, but that's bound to happen when you're dealing with the copper sunlight of fall and the lovingly garish kitsch of Halloween decorations.  The shots of Mikey walking amongst trick-or-treaters are a spruce callback to the original.  Y'know, THE original.

The acting is solid.  I'm honestly surprised that Curtis agreed to tackle the project.  I'm not seeing what she saw, but her performance is murderously firm.  Derivative of Linda Hamilton and Sigourney Weaver?  Maybe, but character-wise, she has earned her "badass bitch" stripes.  Andi Matichak is bland as Allyson.  She's adequate, but she isn't terribly memorable, and I thought her rapport with Laurie could have been explored.  In regards to the interplay between roles, I'll be lenient, as this is the first part of a trilogy.  I'm nervous.

Other stuff I dug...the gore (kudos for the head explosion), the score, and the brutal death of an innocent child (I need to start seeing a therapist).  Stuff that rubbed me the wrong way...the "new" Loomis (his homicidal tendencies were way out of character), the vapid ancillary players, and THE FACT THAT THIS THING EXISTS.  And yet, I liked 2018's Halloween.  Will Halloween Kills kill me?  Thanks to Peacock, it won't be long before I find out.  Just in case, tell my wife that she's a whore.

   

Woof

Boy-o-boy, I'm doing something super special for Halloween this year on the site.  I've done it before, but I think...I think I can hack it again.  So what am I doing?  Nothing!  Well, that's not entirely true.  I do want to hit more movies, but I'm not watching a flick per day.  That's goddamn lunacy.  You loons.  As with every year (ideally), I want to enjoy the season.

Currently, I'm working on the next review.  Then I continue with my Dead Review Collection.  Busy, busy, busy!  Give me chocolate!

Blood Capsule #114

THE VAST OF NIGHT (2019)

I'm glad that I decided to spend an evening with this quiet, minimalist sci-fi film.  An Amazon Original, The Vast of Night is set in 1958 in the fictional town of Cayuga, New Mexico.  A switchboard operator and her disc jockey buddy are faced with a strange signal, a dismaying frequency that obstructs radio transmissions.  They labor to get to the bottom of it, and they do, but very little actually happens until we make it to the resolution.  By hook or by crook (or perhaps by gobbledygook), that isn't a bad thing.  I was so immersed in the arcane plot and nimble dialogue, that I wasn't nonplussed by the lack of action.

First-time director Andrew Patterson must be a wunderkind.  Vast is visually sublime, especially those night-time exteriors.  The long takes are flipping brilliant.  I loved the "scene" where the camera roves around all of Cayuga.  Apparently, it was accomplished by sewing four shots together with CGI, but what do I care?  The cast is terrific.  Almost everything is terrific.  I'm raving, but this isn't a perfect picture.  The bits with the elderly woman feel pointless in hindsight.  She didn't add layers of intrigue to the storyline, and that's what the inclusion of her character seemed to promise.  Eh, you can't win 'em all.  You can watch The Vast of Night, though!

Album Cover of the Whatever

Polish death metal!  Fuck yeah!  It kicks ass!  It's funny how each country's metallic crop has its own distinct flavor, its own twang.  By the way, what do you call country pussy?  Poontwang!  I apologize.  Sincerely.  I--hold on a second; my phone is ringing.  Okay, I just sat back down in front of my computer.  The call was from the magisterial brass at Blogger, the host of this very "blog."  Apparently, my blue joke offended eleven people in Arkansas.  Random Reviews Incorporated has been axed.  It's been real, gang!

God, can you imagine?  Anyshit, Deivos play technical death metal.  From what I've heard, this record isn't too shabby.  I love that impious cover.  Look, the demons' tongues are tied.  I bet they tried to say a tongue twister simultaneously.  Something like Peter porked Peggy with a pickle that he picked from a periwinkle patio garden lounge  Looks easy, but repeat it ten times.  It's...it's still easy.

Tiny Terror Con

I made a doggy friend!

It's been a hot minute since I've attended a true horror convention.  Usually, I have to schlep myself to Charlotte to feed on brazen vendors, but this one cropped up in my hometown.  It was co-organized by a friend of mine.  I'll link you to the information (see below), but of course, it's over now.  There will be a second edition next October, however.  I have been told that it will be bigger and better.  2021's Tiny Terror Con was already pretty damn rad, if I do say so myself.

This won't be a meticulously in-depth dissertation, but I did want to bluster about the cool swag I copped.  It begs the question: is it considered bragging if I spent a stupid amount of money?  I'm either broadcasting the fact that I have awesome shit OR I'm a fool who parted with *cough* $100 *cough*.  Anyway, I found an episode of Skeleton Warriors (y'know, the old Saturday morning cartoon) on VHS.  Mint condition!  I picked up issues of Eerie and Vampirella.  The latter is quite captivating; I read half of it while waiting for my chicken tenders at lunch.  I'm five.

Movie-wise, I procured 1993's The Good Son (I've always wanted to see this flick-a-dee...expect a review later in the year), 1978's Die, Sister, Die!, and 2014's Mostly motherfucking Ghostly.  Um, it's the Ghoulfriend installment.  Did I say that I was five?  I meant four.  But folks, my big ticket item is a Creepshow figure.  It's the window creep from the iconic prologue!  Fucking righteous!  Also, I am now the proud owner of a fanny pack that looks like a VHS tape.  Dreams.  These are the things that dreams are made of.  Grammar.  That was bad grammar.

All in all, I had a great time blowing my wad at Hickory's first horror convention.  THIS is their website.  Thanks to Bobby for the heads up!  I'm wiped.  Man, that birthday cash came in handy.  I figure, I might as well profit off of the encroaching sweep of mortality.  I'm still winning, sweet Death!

An actual photograph of a skeleton warrior.  This is NOT a cartoon.  This is real.  This is serious.