Congruous Sights

      This week three films that pair well together for a part of your October Challenge intake.

     Angela and Jackson Sayers are running a psychic scam on the people of Scotland. Jackson is in murderously deep debt to loan sharks and Angela begins to fear that her mental health is crumbling, just like her mother's years before. Jackson forces Angela to take on a case in what might be the worst possible place for them. Will the frauds see the light? Are there really ghosts in the West Wing? What was the real fate to befall these screaming specters? Will this be another job or are the forces at work Malevolent?

     Riley is a recovering addict living with her brother, his boyfriend, and their roommate. When her boyfriend convinces her to break into a warehouse, they find only a puzzle box. Riley accidentally solves the puzzle and avoids the hidden sacrificial blade. Soon the Hell Priest arrives to demand another sacrifice. After 15 years of development and delays and rights affirming franchise entries, the long promised reboot Hellraiser (2022).
     Chris Cleek, country attorney and extreme misogynist, discovers a feral cannibal woman bathing in a river. He decides to trap her, keep her in his root cellar, and domesticate her. Meanwhile, his daughter is going through issues of her own and his son could be following his father's footsteps a bit too closely. The middle entry in a trilogy following the supernatural feral cannibal, The Woman.

     All that and Tyler begins the Ritual of the Thorne, Dave catches up on hot titles, and Anna argues with the DA that her film choices do not equal elder abuse. Join us, won't you?
   Episode 279- Congruous Sights

The Crystal Blaze

    This week- the music of life and reality (television).

     One of media's more elusive creatures... a musical sequel. Brad and Janet Majors' live a normal life of quiet desperation in their town of Denton, USA. Much to the citizen's enjoyment, Denton has been encased by Farley Flavors and his DTV broadcast network. Everyone in town is either cast, crew, or studio audience for DTV programming. When Bard and Janet are called to participate in a game show, their lives take a turn. Will Janet find that she has always only desired fame? Will Brad ever come to terms with his trauma based emotional blockage? Or will they both be receiving the high ratings with Shock Treatment?
     A biopic about country music artist Blaze Foley. Scenes of his life are cut between recording his final performance and two of his friends being interviewed. Directed by Ethan Hawke and co-written by Foley's real life muse Sybil Rosen, Blaze.
     All that and Kevin enters a blissful hyper reality, Tyler themes it up, and Dave sees some docs. Join us, won't you?

Episode 264: The Crystal Blaze

Digital Chalk

     Two journeys into realms of imagination from the dark recesses of Disney. One a dark and twisted soot covered nightmare of the past, the other a glimpse at some not so far off electronic afterlife.

     When the wind changes on Cherry Tree Lane, a supernatural figure descends from the sky to teach a lesson to a pair of feral children. Also drawn in is a unemployed bystander just trying to scrape enough to not have to sleep on the street. The trio will be force marched through an episodic nightmarescape of delusion and class warfare. All for the twisted amusement of this child obsessed monster... Mary Poppins.
     Not learning the proper lessons from digital Rome, Kevin Flynn finds an easy way to monetize his experience and promises to lead the species into a golden dawn. Flynn promptly disappears. Two decades later his son, Sam, goes looking for him, only to fall into the same trap. Waking in the miraculous though slightly boring looking world of The Grid. A place where things can happen but only things that have happened before. Freed from the constraints of physics but designed by an unimaginative megalomaniac. Can Sam free Kevin and save both world? What is the Tron: Legacy?
     All that and Dave sings, Tyler gets his teens in trouble on, and Kevin feels a shudder. Join us, won't you?
Episode 201- Digital Chalk

Cowabunga-ed in Carbonite

     In the penultimate episode of 2020 we go to two happy places.

     Long long ago in a galaxy far far away, a group of people where chilling, literally, on an ice planet when the evil Empire found them and kicked off a whole bunch of problems for the second to last Jedi, his secret sister, her smuggler lover, his hairy life partner, and their sentient android slaves. Yeah, that's bad but it's The Empire Strikes Back. Hard to find new ways to describe it.
     Long long ago in a city on the East Coast, four teenage ninjas had just taken out the vicious leader of a criminal gang driving the worst petty crime wave in history. Unfortunately, their rest and celebration is cut short as their enemies return thirsty of mutated revenge shenanigans. Also Vanilla Ice is there... what will be revealed by Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze?
     All that and Kevin had higher highs and lower lows, Dave does Santa right, and Tyler loves like a loving lover who loves. Join us, won't you?

Episode 184- Cowabunga-ed in Carbonite

City of Mant

     This week a pair of celebrations of cinema from two very different perspectives. 

     Key West, the Cuban Missile Crisis, teen hormones going crazy from the heat when the fourth greatest showman in the world, Lawrence Woolsey, rolls into town to exhibit his newest masterpiece of radioactive horror! THRILL! as the Greatest Movie within a Movie is Unveiled Before Your Eyes! Witness!! the Terrifying Power of Rumble-Rama!! BEHOLD!!! the Simmering Passions of a People Enthralled by Terror!!! RotP Proudly Presents a Celebration of B-Movie Spirit.... MATINEE!
     People once believed that when a movie died, a Producer carried to the land of the dead. But some times, something makes so much money that a terrible sadness is carried with it, and the Producers can't rest. Then often, far too often, the Producers bring that movie back and put the right things wrong. The sequel to one of the decade's longest shadowed films. A lead who can't emote in English or fight. A villain who seems to have been ripped out of a different movie entirely. The lovely Mia Kirshner in daily fetish wear... THE CROW: CITY OF ANGELS.
     All that plus Dave endures, Kevin likes to watch, and Tyler rolls in a tub of vegan Jell-o. Join us, won't you?

Episode 179- City of Mant

Halloween- Timeline Turmoil

 Drawing October to a close with the final five nights He came home.

After falling down a well last year, Michael Myers finds himself fully recovered and tries to take custody of his traumatized niece. He finds all of the town once again standing against him. Will he finally get The Revenge of Michael Myers?

While trying to bring home a troubled teen, Michael finds himself having to deal with an obsessed Tommy Doyle and a new generation of Strodes. Fortunately, this time he has some help from a druidic cult. Unfortunately, Dr. Loomis is trying his best to bring about The Curse of Michael Myers.

Timeline 2!!!!

Laurie did not have a daughter and did not die in a car accident in 1980. Instead she faked her death, spent the last 18 years living under an assumed named, and has been teaching English at a rich kids prep school while raising a son. A son who has just turned 17... the same age Laurie was when Michael appeared... the same age Judith was when she met her tragic end. Will Michael finally find the loving relative he has craved or will he have to wait for H20: 20 Years Later again?

Three years after failing to make amends, Michael goes home to try and find comfort as he mourns Laurie, who died in a mental care facility after murdering a poor EMT who tried to help Michael. Unfortunately, Haddonfield refuses to not torment him. Finding his home overrun with college kids competing in a new streaming reality show. No matter how hard you try to run the past is always waiting for Resurrection. 

Timeline 3!
The Darkest Timeline... the Rob Zombie Timeline!!!!! If you want to hear out thoughts you will have to go all the way back to 2017 and listen to episode 23, Popstars Go to Haddonfield.
Timeline 4- Current until inevitable 2025 reboot!
40 years after meeting Michael Myers, Laurie Strode has been planning and preparing. Tragically, her innate survival instinct has been a wedge between her and her family. Fortunately, she was right to listen to herself as 62-year old Michael has escaped from his incarceration and is roaming the streets of Haddonfield... in obvious need of assistance because dude keeps walking into the wrong homes and has no idea where or who he is. Let's Halloween (2018) again.

Episode 177- Halloween Timeline Turmoil

Halloween: 3 Hard Mikes and A Drunk Doctor

     October Horror gathers speed as we crash through the first four films in the Halloween franchise!

    After fifteen years in an asylum, Michael Myers decides its time to take a small walk around his hometown and take in the decorations on Halloween.
    Michael walks to the local hospital, after wounds received earlier that evening, and doesn't receive anything resembling quality care in Halloween II.

    A doctor with a drinking problem and sexual addiction has a breakdown and imagines a ridiculous conspiracy involving the better masks his ex bought for the children he emotionally abuses due to his never ending midlife crisis... or not. Halloween 3: Season of the Witch.

    Finally Mike wakes up from a decade long coma inflicted on him by an obsessed doctor in his last appearance. He decides to go home and try to forge a relationship with his only remaining living relative. Unfortunately, the niece's adoptive sister decides she can't share her with anyone in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers. 

    All that and the existential dread the rest of the series conjures gnaws away at the crew. Join us, won't you?

Episode 178- Halloween: 3 Hard Mikes and A Drunk Doctor

Second Time Around

     We kick off October with a four pack of sequels.
    After surviving a night of demon attacking in the possessed bodies of his friends at a lonely cabin in the woods, Ash Williams emerges, triumphant, out into the light of day. Tragically, for him anyway, that's just the first 7 minutes of the first sequel in a franchise that will still be going, in various media, for the next 40 year. Can Ash hold off Evil Dead 2 or will he be dead by dawn?

    What happens when you like puns, have Google to quick search references, and think your cat is WAY cuter than she actually is? You make a film series about her misadventures. Duh. Behold a thing that only Kevin and the most cat obsessed corners of the meowiverse could love. Is there no end from the torment brought by A Meowy Halloween?

    Courtney Bates, preteen survivor without a Southern accent, was so traumatized by the events of the first film that she stopped growing vertically, affected an accent, and started the fourth worst band in film. Which seems like a fair enough way to deal with trauma until the band goes for a weekend getaway and Courtney's demons are made flesh. Behold the wonder of The Driller Killer in Slumber Party Massacre II.

    One of the darlings of the 2000s torture porn era, possibly Eli Roth's magnum opus, and nearly a solid indictment of toxic masculinity. When three friends studying art in Italy decide to hop a train to go clubbing in Prague, they find themselves off the beaten path, and in a very deadly manifestation of class warfare. Beautifully filmed and strongly cast, with at least one stand out scene that has forever burned itself in the minds of genre fans, try not to take a nap during Hostel: Part II.

    All that and Craig ponders how long until he and his dogs start merging into a single being, Kevin and Dave face off over a new streaming offering, and Tyler gleefully does his thing with an innocence that you just can't stay mad at... Join us, won't you?

Episode 173- Second Time Around