I just finished up Marvel Zombies: The Return the five part series in the Marvel Zombie Universe and I have to say, well I’m kind of burnt out on Marvel Zombies.  When these side stories first hit the stands I was blown away by the thought of all of the Marvel Universe being turned into Zombies and the only survivors would be the super humans.  The first two series were pretty good.  I enjoyed them and looked forward to them.  Then I picked up Dead Days an off shoot of the main title.  And I started to fall behind and get lost.  I got caught up thanks to Rob at Limited Edition Comics on the Hill in Cedar Falls and I also picked up the Marvel Zombies 3 Trade at one of the book stores closing at the mall for like $5 bucks.  So I’m all up to date on it and the final verdict.  I’m done with Marvel Zombies.

In Marvel Zombies: The Return Zombie Spider-Man has teamed up with Zombie Wolverine and eventually Zombie Hulk in an alternate universe battling Zombie Fantastic Four, Zombie Hank Pym and a cast of thousands of known and little know Marvel Superheros searching for food on alternate universes.  This is where the plot starts to lose me and where Marvel jumped the Shark on this.  So by the end of the this we are right back at square one with no resolution and no real conclusion.  Not to mention the Marvel Zombies one shot that I also picked up that had the zombies crossing over to two different Monkey Universes with superheros from those universes being apes.  By the end of this series and the one shot I was completely lost on and had no idea who was who and what universe they were suppose to be in and who was a good guy and who was an ape or gorilla.  AHHHHHHHHH!

So that’s it Marvel.  Stop with Marvel Zombies already.  It’s run it’s course and you know that too.  Of course if you decide to make a movie based on this franchise I will be first in line to watch Galactus and the Silver Surfer get eaten alive by Spider-Man and Giant Man (keep that in mind and also since you kicked me in the jimi by removing Sam Raimi from Spider-Man 4 and deciding to reboot the franchise in 2012 using the Ultimate comic books as your source material bring Sam in to direct this would you?).

So that’s it folks, the guy with a Zombie Spider-Man T-shirt and a Marvel Zombies Universe T-Shirt is saying no more to the Marvel Zombies.  I’ll leave my zombie reading to the best ongoing zombie series out there which happens to be The Walking Dead (read this immediately, in fact stop reading this blog right now walk, no run to your nearest comic book store and buy every thing you can find on The Walking Dead).  On top of that I just learned that AMC is a go on Frank Darabont’s adaptation for The Walking Dead to come to the small screen!

So there you have it folks, brave into Marvel Zombie’s territory if you must, but avoid most of it after the fourth trade paper back.

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One of my Netflix buddies saw this when it hit theatres and had good things to say about it so I was anxious to finally see this one for myself.  After I finished watching it I thought to myself “man I really wish that would have been better”, but unfortunately it wasn’t.  Moon (by the way try not to read too much about the film on IMDB there is a huge spoiler on there) places it’s self squarely in the realm of Kubrick’s 2001.  It really has that same kind of vibe of space and loneliness.  It also shares a similarity with HAL in the voice work by Kevin Spacey as GERTY the computer that knows more than it’s letting on.  To talk much about the plot would be a disservice to my readers and give too much away that might hinder your own enjoyment of this quiet little film.

There are a few things to note about this.  Sam Rockwell does a great job with the character, he’s alone on a space station after three years with out live human contact.  You can sense his paranoia and stir crazy mindlessness through out the performance.  Second the film was directed by David Bowie’s son Duncan Jones.  The film has a lot of promise with its quiet atmosphere and building tension (which I think should have been leveled up to make this film really memorable).  Jones shows some real promise in the future especially since this was his first major motion picture and the first film in a planned trilogy of Moon films.  Lastly the score was done by Clint Mansell, while that name may not be a Howard Shore or Danny Elfman music nerds like myself will recognize Manell’s name from his stint in the pioneering sampling/hip hop/industrial/punk band Pop Will Eat Itself.  Mansell has done well for himself after the demise (or at least on hiatus) Poppies with lots of great scores for films including Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream (if you haven’t seen that movie do so now).

All in all Moon is a time killer with some good atmosphere but by the end you’ve got it all figured out and there really isn’t any sense of resolution or conclusion to the story.  Which makes since now seeing as how Jones wants to make three of these movies.  I’d give it a go but don’t expect fireworks.  *** Stars.

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Well as most of you are probably figuring out by now.  I’m a music and movie nut.  I love Netflix.  It’s the greatest thing since the invention of the wheel.  Seriously.  I can watch tons of great movies for one low price per month.  I’m on the three at a time unlimited plan, and while some things about the service aren’t great, most of it is including their large amount of foreign films and hard to find films. 

I love Netflix.  I have been a member of Netflix since 2004 and at the time, there wasn’t even a peep about streaming.  YouTube still was getting off the ground.  No one was really doing a lot of video work on the web.  The files where too big and the amount of server space it required was ridiculous.  Jump ahead about two years and Netflix starts to offer streaming from their website that you could watch on your computer.  Hum, things are getting interesting.  Jump about another year forward and Netflix offers the first device to stream directly to your television, the Roku.  Ladies and gentleman I present to you the future of media.

My birthday is December 5th, don’t worry you didn’t have to get me anything, but my wife got me the Roku box for my birthday.  Not only did she get me just any Roku box but she got me the HD one with wireless interweb and HDMI outputs to my HD TV.  Have I told you lately that my wife knows me pretty well.  She does.  What she got me are the keys to the kingdom.  A virtual world of unlimited entertainment 24/7/365.  It’s always open, it’s always on and there is always something I want to see!

So you maybe asking yourself, “I’m not techy is this thing hard to use?”  Well it’s not hard to use, but it was hard to get set up for me at first.  The Rokubox my wife got me can either be used directly with your modem, just pop out your ethernet cable and pop it into the Roku and your ready to go, given that your ethernet cable is close you your TV or you have a REALLY long RCA video set up like I do.  It all seemed to be working but for some reason the Rokuwouldn’t connect to my local network.  After a quick google search of their forums I discovered that the modem provided to us by CFU is the only modem that doesn’t work with the Roku device.  Crap.  Crap is right.  Well I decided just then and there to make my house wireless!  See new technology is forcing me to forward my progress whether I’m ready or not!

So I do some research on the interweb.  Frantically email one of my tech buddies on Facebook looking for suggestions and then search the Roku site for acceptable wireless routers.  It took my facebook buddy pointing me in the right direction to actually find the routers that Roku recommends but no biggie.  So armed with a list of routers, the Roku manual and basic knowledge of routers and what the do I head to Best Buy.  I chat with a sales guy about routers and he assures me this is the one I want.  I purchase it and run home and try and set it up.

Failure.  The first thing I notice is that the router is for dial up modems.  DIAL UP MODEMS!  Of course cause that’s so 2010 right?  I put it back in the box and wait until my wife gets home from work and rush back out to Best Buy.  This time they get a geek squad member to answer my questions.  And presto I walk out the door with the right router and I even got money back!  Nice!

I get home and in a matter of minute the router is set up, passwords in place and we are off to the races.  It was seriously that easy.  In 20 minutes my house was wireless.  I’m kicking myself for not starting this sooner.  So then I take my Roku upstairs to the good TV and type in a couple of passwords.  Activate my device at the Netflix home site and PRESTO there is my entire instant queue available to watch any time I want!

And that’s what I’ve been doing folks. Watching movies and TV shows right and left in my free time.  It’s unbelievable how easy it was and it’s also been very very dependable with great picture quality.  There are a few drawbacks.  There are little to no new releases.  The studios still want you to buy DVDs so streaming them to you from Netflix isn’t at the top of their priority list right now, and the studios control the content.  Secondly there isn’t a ton of HD stuff available yet either.  I know that will change soon.  That has a lot to do with servers and bandwith and as that stuff gets bigger and more affordable I’m sure Netflix will increase those too.

All in all Netflix and the Roku box have changed my entertainment experience.  Think of the future, a world of entertainment just a click away and you’ll never have to own a physical piece of media again.  That seems scary to some, but to me that sounds like a Brave New World.

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Artist: Cesium_137

Album: Identity

Genre: Industrial, EBM, Synth-Pop, Trance

Vocal Style: Distorted, Clean, Melodic, Male and Some Female.

Label: Metropolis Records, 10/06/09

Parental Advisory: Yes

Recommended if You Like: 80′s New Wave, European Techno, Pet Shop Boys

There isn’t a ton to dislike about this record, but then again there isn’t a ton to love about it either.  Most of the time it’s by the numbers synth-pop with hints of industrial sounds scattered through out.  It relies heavily on the synths and the clean vocals.  The vocals are strong and melodic but they are kind of a one trick pony.  If you’ve heard one song on this record you’ve pretty much heard them all.  It’s not a terrible record, and perhaps if there weren’t a lot of bands out there stealing a bit from Cesium_137 sound recently it would be more memorable than it is, it’s not terribly interesting either.  It probably plays better in a club than it does sitting here in my office.  It’s good background music, but not something you would throw on to pump yourself up for a night of clubbing.  The album boasts solid production though.  I prefer my synthpop a little darker and my vocals a little more dynamic.  If you stick with the record long enough there is a nice little payoff with a certain king sample that is down right awesome though.

2.5 out of 5 Stars.

Cesium_137: Photo by Jerry Bennett

Cesium_137: Identity courtesy of Metropolis Records.

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You’ve probably heard of and maybe even seen Guillermo del Toro‘s movies like Hellboy 1 & 2, Mimic, Blade II and maybe even the Oscar nominated Pan’s Labyrinth but you’ve probably never seen his film The Devil’s Backbone.  Guillermo says that Pan’s Labyrinth is the spiritual sequel to The Devil’s Backbone (which I can kind of seen his point but) it’s a far superior film than Pan’s.

The Devil’s Backboneis a ghost story set during the Spanish Civil War.  The civil war is a metaphor for what is happening in the film as well.  This film is a beautiful tale of children who are lost.

The film is beautifully shot, beautifully acted and beautifuly directed.  It’s a quite film that gets under your skin and unnerves you.  When I first saw this I had read a lot of hype about it.  I’m not a huge fan of ghost story movies, most fail to even garner a scare from me, but this one moved me on an emotional level.  It’s sad and haunting, and deeply affecting.  It gets into your heart and mind and it lives there.  I’ve only seen the film once and I’m still talking about it, so that has to say something for it.  Every other film on this list I’ve seen at least a dozen times.

If you thought The Sixth Sense was creepy and had visual cues to watch for, The Devil’s Backbone makes M. Night look like a kid out of college.  I can’t talk a lot about the film because it will ruin it for you so I’ll skip out on any more of the chatter and just tell you to go out and rent this today, don’t even rent it, just buy it.  As a side note a great double feature night would be The Devil’s Backbone paired with The Orphanage(which was produced by del Toro).

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I guess you know by now that I am a Sam Raimi fanboy, so it’s probably no surprise that Raimi’s horror/comedy Army of Darkness is also on my list.  From beginning to end this movie is instantly quotable, and if you see me on the street ask me and I’ll quote any line from it.  I have it memorized.  A couple of years ago, or maybe it was last year The Core along with Marcus Theatres had a midnight showing of this on the big screen and you can believe I was first in line to see this project high and mighty!

So Army of Darkness is really Evil Dead III, but that’s not what they ended up calling it.  It’s not really a scary movie at all, it’s pretty much a straight forward slapstick comedy.  Think Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein or The Three Stooges meet an army of the dead.  There are a ton of references in the movie as well.  You’ll notice stuff from Gulliver’s Travels, The Day the Earth Stood Still, The Three Stooges, Ray Harryhausen and so much more.  Sam really through everything and the kitchen sink into Army of Darkness.  The really funny thing about it, it was basically a box office failure and has been re-cut at least four times by Universal to get what they thought was the right movie.  I actually saw the theatrical cut first on home video back in the day and still kind of prefer that cut to the Director’s cut which I eventually picked up on DVD.  Not so much for the ending, but some of the better lines are cut from the theatrical cut for the director’s cut, including the best line in the whole movie; “Good, bad, I’m the guy with the gun”.  Classic.

The movie also stars genre workhorse and all around awesome chin, Bruce Campbell.  I had the pleasure of meeting Bruce a few years back on a book tour and well, let’s just say I was less than articulate when I met him!

Army of Darkness is just a ton of fun.  It’s pure mindless entertainment for no purpose than to make you laugh for 90 minutes.  Get yourself a copy today.

This is the movie that nearly scared me out of horror films for life.  I was pretty young when I happened to catch this one with my parents back in the day.  People often credit Carpenter for changing their lives with Halloween, but for me it was The Thing.  A loose remake of the 1951 film The Thing from Another World, Carpenter’s version pushes the paranoia and gore to new levels with terrifying and sickening effects.

The image of the doctor doing chest compressions and what happens next will forever be stuck in my mind and always available for instant recall.  This is another one of those films that is fun to watch in the dead of winter too.  All the action takes place at a research outpost in the antarctic.  The white vastness along with the isolation is just too much at times.

This is easily my favorite Carpenter film and in my humble opinion his best work to date.  While Carpenter has done some great movies, nothing is quite as good or visceral as The Thing.  I also don’t think that Kurt Russell has ever given a better performance.

This is truly a terrifying movie that should be watched with the lights on!

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By now you’ve figured out that I really like Werewolf movies.  So up next is a great werewolf film from across the pond: Dog Soldiers.  Written and directed by Neil Marshall, Dog Soldiers basically took the werewolf genre and turned it on it’s ear in 2002 when it was released.  I don’t think I actually got around to seeing it until probably 2006 or 2007 after my Netflix addiction was in full swing, but I had caught bits and pieces (pun not intended) of it on SyFyor Sci-Fi or what ever that channel was called back then.  What I had seen was brilliant so I finally rented the movie.

What was laid out before me was one of the smartest, most intense horror movie I had seen in years.  It simply floored me.  When I post the trailer you’ll see how they kind of say it’s like Alien, and it is.  Military personnel being forced to deal with an unstoppable and largely unseen force.

Great action.  Great acting.  Great humor and an extremely smart script kept this sucker flying for me and always guessing what was around the corner.  Mr. Marshall really made a huge debut in the horror community with this film and then the two of the one two punch, The Descent which has to be one of the most terrifying films of the last few years.  We won’t talk about his latest one, it’s a travesty of epic proportions.

If you are looking for an amazing werewolf movie that will leave you scared and hurting, then rent Dog Soldiers tonight and be prepared to be scared.

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This is the box art I have for the VHS of the film Severed Ties.  Apparently I’ve stumbled upon something extremely rare in my home video collection.  Up next is a look at the German film poster.

I’ve never seen that German poster before and thought I would share it with you all, it’s a completely misguided take on the film itself for no other reason that the whole look of the background.  Not once do I remember seeing anything resembling that shot in the whole movie.  So any way about the film.

During my heyday in my first few years at college and my discovery of Premier Video’s 5 nights, 5 movies $5 dollar promotion I stumbled across this title.  It has a couple of things going for it.  The VHS box art was pretty cool, it was presented by Fangoria and it stared genre workhorse and Hammer films actor Oliver Reed.  Released straight to home video in 1992 there doesn’t appear to be a wealth of information about this movie out there, at all.  Which in all honesty is surprising.  It’s a nifty little film that was shot up there in Wisconsin.

In it we have a money obsessed mother and her son who’s scientist father was killed work in his lab trying to discover away to help people who’ve last limbs in accidents (for all my comic book buddies think Dr. Connor).  Harrison decides to pick up where his dad’s research left off and then all hell breaks loose.  I don’t want to give away too much of the movie just in case you can actually track down a copy of this winner.  It’s got tons of great moments and line after line of quotes for any B-Movie film buff.

Harrison escapes to save the girl that he loves and in the meantime meets up with Stripes the street wise hustler that helps Harrison find his way in the underbelly of homeless freaks and geeks inhabiting this world.  If you like Peter Jackson’s Dead Alive or Stuart Gordon’s Re-Animator than you are going to love Severed Ties.  With healthy doses of black humor, gore and straight up blasphemy this film is a ton of fun.

For about 8 years now I’ve been bugging Tony Timponeat Fangoria to release this to DVD, and every year he tells me to expect an announcement shortly.  I’ll keep my fingers crossed to finally see this on DVD!

Also I know I have a habit of throwing trailers up here but this one doesn’t have one on YouTube so we are just out of luck this time around!

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The Unnamable is the second H.P. Lovecraft adaptation to grace this list here, and folks I’m going to go out on a limb here and say, it’s probably not the best movie ever made or one of the greatest horror film for all time, but I saw this at the right time in my life and I still love watching it today!

You know the story, college jocks take sorority girls to spend the night at a haunted house.  Turns out the house isn’t haunted but a monster does live there and it takes the nerd to save the day.  This movie is steeped in 80′s nostalgia and has a WONDERFUL performance by Mark Kinsey Stephenson as Randolph Carter(a reoccurring character in the Lovecraft Universe).

I saw this movie on VHS probably around 1988 or 1989 at my buddy Charlie Shirk’s house (we used to go on Nintendo and Horror movie benders back in the day) and well this movie floored me.  The monster is truly terrifying and the effects work and gore were really well done.  I’m not sure how well it stands up to the standards of today’s effects but believe me, when I saw it it scared the crap out of me.

It’s got a great back story and some real genuine performances.  I dig this movie a lot and I’m hoping a few of you might just share my enthusiasm for it as well!

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So yesterday I was too busy at the grind to get in a blog so today I’m going to do a double shot for you!  First up a little known 2000 Canadian film that captured my heart a few years ago!

Ginger Snaps.  Now I’m a big fan of werewolf movies.  I have been my whole life and when I first saw this movie I was blown away by it.  The film is one giant metaphor for puberty, and not only that but it’s done from the female perspective.  Not only is Ginger getting her period for the first time, but she’s just been bitten by a werewolf.  Here sister Brigitte utters this line just before the werewolf bites and as Ginger discovers her ascent into womanhood “You’ve got the curse”.

This film was to be released around the same time that Columbine happened and the film was marred in controversy, unnecessarily too if I may be so bold as to say so myself.  What we have here, more so than a horror film, is a character study in high school behaviors and even more so a character study on high school girls.  This film is wonderfully written (I bet Diablo Cody [holy cowbell Batman, Cody went to the U of I!] has this DVD somewhere in her house and watches it at least once a year) and features some real shocking images.  But the strongest work here has to be the work of Katharine Isabelle and Emily Perkins (she played the receptionist in Cody’s Juno hence proving my point).  Both deliver solid performances as the two sisters and their travels through puberty and high school together.  This film is also steeped in dead pan black humor.  When the Pamela (Mimi Rodgers) discovers what has happened to Ginger and B she matter of factly states “I’ll turn the gas on and let the house fill up and then light a match and we’ll start over fresh some where else”.  At that moment you don’t know whether to laugh or cry or wonder if all the women in this film related to Ginger and B are a little nuts?

Ginger Snaps does have a few short comings, namely the practicle effects fall short of Rick Baker was doing nearly two decades earlier with An American Werewolf in London, and not all of the young actors can deliver good performances, but Ginger Snaps is a modern classic and should be required viewing for any fan of horror films.  If you like films like Heathers, you’ll love Ginger Snaps (and yes, that pun is intended).

Re-Animator, man I don’t even know where to start.  The director Stuart Gordon?  Barbra Crampton?  Jeffery Combs?  H.P. Lovecraft?  David Gale (a John Kerrylook a like or vice versa)?  All I know is that when I saw this film for the first time, my life was changed forever.  Perhaps this was the film that really married my love of black humor to the horror genre.

From the opening scene this film doesn’t let up until the very end and even then you’re not quite sure exactly what you’ve just seen.  Is this film gory?  Absolutely yes.  It’s really one of those films that just hits you in the guts.  There are so many unbelievable moments in this film that you just can’t pick one favorite moment. 

A year before my son was born I traveled to Chicago for the Fangoria Weekend of Horrorsand Stuart Gordon was one of the directors there.  I’ve been a huge fan of all of his work, but that love affair definitely started with this movie.  So Stuart is sitting there at a table with his writing partner Dennis Paoli and I nervously approach these Masters of the Macabre and hand Mr. Gordon my Millennium Edition DVD cover of Re-Animator and sheepishly say “This film changed my life.”  Stuart and Dennis look at me and get a big grin on their faces and Stuart says “Mine too.”  And then signs my DVD cover and hands it back to me.  Later the next day Stuart is checking out of the hotel the same time I am.  I’m right behind him and we strike up some chit chat about the Chicago weather in February (stupid me should have known better he’s from Chicago and started the Organic Theatre Company there) and he checks out and walks down the hall.  I get a second wind of courage and chase him down the hall and give him my business card and say “If you’re ever shooting in Iowa and need a hand, give me a call.”  I still haven’t heard from him.

Well I haven’t talked much about the movie, and in all honesty, I don’t know what to say other than to tell you just to watch it.  You will be shocked, you will be scared, you will be disgusted, you will be entertained.

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