The SomethingSomethingCast

Hey Somethings… PCR here.

I know a while ago I gave you my thoughts on AHS : Double Feature and.. at the time, it was rather rosy and hopeful…

Oh how the mighty have fallen.

I have no idea who pitched Season 10, or who OK’d it, but whoever pitched it needs a raise, and whoever OK’d it needs to be fired.  If you can pitch something that turned out like Season 10 did, and can get people to buy into it.. you need to be doing/selling/pitching bigger things than a season of a TV series that.. at this point.. may have gone on too long.

Don’t get me wrong, Red Tide had a lot that I liked (as noted in my previous blog) but they way it was ended was waaaaayy too rushed.  A majority of AHS seasons have been 10 or more episodes, and I think Red Tide could have been a much better story had they given it a full 10.  I know that cancels the whole ‘Double Feature’ vibe they were going for…but when it was done as shitty as this was, things need to be rethought.

That being said, I was really digging the thought and concept of Death Valley…until I found out it was only 4 episodes.

In my opinion, AHS needs to take a long, hard look at itself in the mirror and figure out what worked and what didn’t over the 10 seasons it’s been on.  My biggest fear is that “American Horror StorieS” have given them the idea that they can tell short, non-connected stories that are just as entertaining as their full seasons…and it’s my belief that that kind of thinking is what got us Double Feature.

I can’t even call Double Feature my least favorite season because, to be honest, it didn’t feel like an actual season.

Whatever you call it, and whatever you thought of it…this is one “Double Feature” I wish I had walked out of.

Do you enjoy the Evil Dead series? Or are you a goody two shoes? goody two shoes goody goody two shoes

You don’t like that? ………..screw

Ok, I swear, I’m not just being pithy – it’s just hard to not get an edge of snark in your voice when you are talking about Bruce Campbell in his most famous role of none other than the chainsaw wielding, S-Mart selling, boomstick threatening, words sayin, Ash!

Did his three seasons of horror comedy knock those Deadites down or was that just pillow talk, baby?

Find out on this, the last of our SpoooOooktacular October episodes on, The End: Ash vs. Evil Dead

Ok here we……… groovy!

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Before I get into this week’s topic – let me just say that this post includes some spoilers for Halloween Kills.  If you haven’t seen it and you don’t want to have some of it spoiled for you – I suggest you skip this one.

Are they gone?

Ok, good.  We didn’t want them here anyway.

I didn’t want to review Halloween Kills as much as I wanted to talk about what it did right and wrong. You see, the 2018 relaunch/new timeline/thing was, quite literally, the best Halloween movie I have ever seen.  Of course it is hard to compare it to the 70’s original, but that movie defined the tropes of the ‘unkillable monster kills kids’ genre, but with that said, it did what no other Halloween movie had done other than the original… it engaged me.

Now, I love slasher flicks, obviously – but the reason you just don’t see that many is because the genre is stale with a rare exception (See: Terrifier, The Strangers) and there doesn’t feel like much more you can staple on to the old classics of Jason and Michael. But Halloween turns itself around. It isn’t a movie about a monster hunting a woman – it is about a woman who is prepared to kill the monster. It’s Laurie Strode’s movie. She isn’t the final girl – she is the protagonist.

Halloween Kills, as the middle chapter of the preordained trilogy, had hard shoes to fill.  How do you keep the two away from each other so you can get to the actual really real final showdown, but also continue to try and turn the genre on its head?

You show what the PTSD of this monster caused to the town, the collective character of Haddonfield.  With literal pitchforks in hand, this is a story of a hundred people who think they are just like Laurie Strode. They feel guilt about surviving, fear over Myers’ inevitable return, pain at what they’ve lost… and collectively they try and face Michael — and inevitably, they fail.  It really is a brilliant concept, and I bet a few passes around with great writers could have evolved it into a movie just as strong as 2018’s was, but it can’t help but lean into its tropes, bury itself like a hatchet into the skulls of its viewer, and misses every mark along the way.

Somehow, the first film subverts its tropes and has ascended to easily the greatest slasher film of the last decade – and yet, even with a brilliant take on a sequel, the most recent film can’t help but feel like it has taken a step right back into what made people bored with the slasher genre to begin with.

I hope the final act continues the trend of giving us a different story than the one we expect. We’ve seen slashers die before, hell, we’ve seen Michael Myers die a couple of times.. the key is to make us still surprised by the idea.

Sure, Raimi did shakycam first… but did he give an actor a camera and tell them to just act like a dickweed for a few days and then scare the bajeezus out of him?  No, that is Blair Witch territory – a movie franchise you either love or hate.

Maybe you love it because you fell for the gimmick of a movie that might have been real. Maybe you loathe the handicam films that it spawned. Perhaps, you love the whole mythos of the Burkittsville, MD creepy cryptid and need to know everything…

No matter what your stance is, they did a movie in 2016 that you didn’t see – and we’re going to review it. Is it as original as the first one? Does it answer the questions we threw into the damned river? Does it blow snotbubbles and apologize?  Find out on Something In Review!

Ok, here we go.. standing in the corner…

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Who out there can say they are a documentarian, comic book writer, and vampire hip-hop mogul?

Only one guy we know, and if you are a fan of Vampire: The Masquerade or Geek & Sundry, you know him too – it’s B. Dave Walters!

With LA By Night finishing up with its fifth season, and this, the Something Spooktacular month, there is no better time to join in to see who lives, dies.. or dies again, rather..

We talk Vampire, his work on the Dungeons & Dragons comic ‘A Darkened Wish‘, his documentary ‘Dear America, from a Black Guy‘ and his upcoming work ‘ElectroPunk‘ – and if you want to keep track of everything B. Dave Walters does, the best place to find him is on Twitter: @bdavewalters

So grab some 10-sided die and spend some blood points, ok, here we go!

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I’m so proud of the world… it finally discovered one of my favorite sub-niche’s of entertainment: Games of Death

Everyone has gone crazy recently, the meme machine is pumping out hits, for Netflix’s newest gift from across the ocean, Squid Game.

Now, this premise may have some similarities to other things you’ve seen: A group of people are in a game that when they lose.. they die. Of course the similarities are there to be drawn to a dozen other things: Battle Royale, Hunger Games, Roller Games, Running Man, Gladiator, Alice in Bordertown, Saw… it’s a pretty lengthy list of weird movies that I have an affinity for.

In the month since it’s come out, it has already done the life and death of an internet trend. Some people notice it. Some people meme it. Some people declare it is the best thing that has ever been created and that nothing has ever been as unique. Some people hate those people. Some people get sick of it being mentioned and promptly hate it without ever having seen it. And they are the usual round of reactions.

Is it good, yes, but that’s not what I wanted to talk about here. It’s about how cool I am. You see, it’s a weird thing when something you’ve loved since you were a kid hits the zeitgeist. I get why the hipster mindset of ‘I was there before it was cool’ comes out because it feels like something special that you’ve owned for so long and now it isn’t part of your personal entertainment genetic code. There is this gut reaction of, ‘Yes, I know you like Squid Game, but have you ever seen…’ that makes you sound like a complete tool. I mean, they like Squid Game, sure, but don’t they understand that the trope of the character that can’t be good at the game or the bully are simply common features of the genre? Geez people, come on!

If you look inside yourself, you know you’ve done the same thing. Maybe it was when everybody started loving comic book movies and you stared at your longbox full of X-Force #1 and wrote a lengthy angry Livejournal post? Or when everyone got into Sharknado and you, the foremost authority on horrible ‘animals in disaster’ movies felt horrible when nobody called you for an interview.

Here’s the thing you need to hear though: don’t be that person. It’s great to discuss the origins of a genre or note all of these other movies that people who enjoyed Squid Game may have liked, but guess what… you don’t own a niche or a sub-genre. Yes, it’s frustrating that more people are ignorant to the nuance of people being flayed alive by board games, but you get to be the ambassador. Tell them how fantastic Tag is or find interesting comparisons to make about the characters. Use your obsession for the power of good.. and be happy the popularity of Squid Game means you may get a lot more games of death to watch in the future.

It’s spoOooOoOokytime! 

So how better than to bring in the Autumnal Season of Horror than with two of our favorite people out in the internet’o’verse?

This week, the Somethings are talking about a very particular topic. Some horror movies are good.. some horror movies are bad.. but, what SECOND horror movies are worth giving a shot? Of course anyone can talk about Texas Chainsaw X: Leatherspace or Leprechaun: Bring It On, but when you are only limited to the sophmore outing of your horror series, what’s out there that triumphs?

Joining us are none other than the Silver Screams (@Silver_Screams) – Megan Salinas (@themenguin) and Katie Cullen (@kiaxet) – two internet savvy fear fatales that you can find anywhere fans are talking about the things they love.

So get yourself some Pun’kin Spice, and ok, here we BOO!

Full Episode

Hey Somethings, PCR here!

Now.. fair warning, if you haven’t caught up with the 1st half of AHS S10, you may want to pass this by…….

If there is one thing that the Somethings don’t do.. it’s pitying fools.  We don’t pity the fools, and we have, and will always have a ‘no fool pitying’ rule.

That said, we have somehow stumbled into this pit of fools, specifically the finale of the classic action adventure show, The A-Team.

So settle in as we look back to the finale of this beloved cult classic and ask whether it was worth the journey to get to this moment?  From helicopters to Italian food names. From anchovies to exploding cars – did the A-Team go out with a bang, or more of a disgruntled Mr. T grunt.

There’s only one way to find out… join us for THE END: A-TEAM

Ok, here we go!

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