Author Archives: Doc

Grotesquerie S1 E7

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Spoilers

“Unplugged”

WTF?

I mean… WTF?

This episode started off with Lois being just a totally vicious bitch toward her daughter and her new fiancé, Travis Kelce. She was so cruel that I found myself hating her so much. Then she pulled the plug on Marshall. Then we found out that Father Charlie was Grotesquerie and that Sister Megan was his accomplice. Megan got into a massive fight with Lois, where she stabbed her multiple times.

Then things changed.

Lois is in the coma. Marshall is alive and in the Lois role from the beginning. Lois had been the one having the affair. Sister Megan was the police chief. Marshall decided to pull the plug on Lois. Travis Kelce wanted to say goodbye, but Marshall wanted no part of that, keeping him from the room. When they pulled the plug, Lois floated up and seemed to get her heartbeat back.

What the hell is going on?

Is this show implying that Lois has been in the coma the whole time and the first six episodes were all in her head? I think that is what is going on here.

Does that mean that everything prior to Lois waking up from her coma in this episode means nothing?

That is a massive sized twist if that is the case. It is also extremely confusing in this episode. Where does this story go from here? Is this a totally different story than the one we have been watching?

Only one episode released this week, but it was nearly an hour long, and it was totally insane. I am not sure what happened or where it goes from here. There are three more episodes remaining.

Yellowjackets S1 E6

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“Saints”

Man, there are some things going down on this show.

There were several huge things that made me feel fairly anxious from both the crash site and the present day. Just to touch on a few of them…

  • What the hell is up with Taissa and the dirt eating? She seems very feral-like when she is doing it. She is the one terrorizing her son? Why?
  • The whole almost-abortion scene with Shauna was tense as could be.
  • Every time they are in the water and they shoot from that outside perspective just above the water level, I anticipate something attacking them, like it is some creature watching them. The baptism scene was wild. Not sure what is going on with that.
  • Um… how crazy is Misty? A little kidnapping between friends.
  • The whole scene with Natalie and Travis in the past was nice.
  • We find out for sure that Jackie is dead in the present. How and when is a mystery.
  • Lottie is having visions. The maggots inside the deer they just killed shows this. She also had one as she was underwater being baptized by Laura Lee.
  • The blackmailer has texted instructions to Taissa and Natalie. It’s go time…
  • Supernatural events are becoming more involved in the story.

This is wild and it still reminds me very much of LOST. In fact, every time I write one of these up, I want to say that the survivors are on an island. Funnily enough, young Taissa, who wanted to go off to try and find her way for help, said that they were not on an island. Ha ha.

Shrinking S2 E1, E2

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“Jimmying”

“I Love Pain”

Season one of Shrinking on Apple + was one of the great unexpected treasures on streaming. Jason Segal, Harrison Ford, Jessica Williams, Christa Miller, Ted McGinley. Luke Tennie and Lukita Maxwell are a great cast that brought these stories of grief, loss and recovery to life.

The first two episodes of season two dropped on Apple + this week.

“Do you know what sucks about your baby carrots? They make you think they’re Cheetos”- Paul (Harrison Ford). I laughed out loud at this line. This is a perfect example of some of the great writing on this series. The dialogue is special and they are delivered by amazing actors.

I have to say specifically that the writing for Harrison Ford is unbelievably amazing in this show, and this episode is a prime example of that.

Episode one had a shocking surprise cameo at the end as Brett Goldstein (Roy Kent from Ted Lasso) showed up at Jimmy’s office. His name was Louis and he was the drunk driver that was involved in the car crash that killed Jimmy’s wife, Tia. This was just as Jimmy was getting past the loss, but dealing with his own worries over his patient Grace who pushed her husband off a cliff.

These first two episodes reminded me just how awesome this series was. It is so well written and acted that it is both deeply poignant and outrageously funny. I am happy that it is back again.

Smile 2

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The original movie Smile was a surprising hit a couple of years ago. With it making a lot of money, you knew that there would be a sequel. This weekend brought us Smile 2.

Skye Riley (Naomi Scott) is a hugely loved pop star who was preparing to make a return tour after being involved in a tragic accident the year before. When she was trying to get pain killers from her drug dealer friend, he brutally killed himself in front of her, transferring the parasitic demon to her. This demon goes into the victim’s head and slowly drives them crazy.

Naomi Scott does a fantastic job in this lead role. She carries so much of the movie on her shoulders, with so much fear and confusion and anger. She is easily the strength of the film.

The film keeps the audience on the edge of their seats, filled with anxiety as you want Skye to get through the problem. There may be too many jump scares in the film, but a lot of them are effective.

The film does feel too long at 2 hours and seven minutes. I think it could easily have shaved off 15-20 minutes of playtime and it would have helped the movie. However, the finish of the film was just horrifying. I really thought the final shot of the film worked very well.

Smile 2 was a worthy sequel to the huge hit. Is it better than the original, I’m going to say no, but this is very solid. Naomi Scott does tremendous work and the effects are great. The film will keep you thinking.

3.75 stars

We Live in Time

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I do love Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield so I had planned on seeing this movie after seeing a trailer for it. However, the title was not recognizable so as I was looking at the Cinemark movie list this week, I almost missed it. I saw the title and thought, “What is that?”

After seeing the movie poster, I realized that this was the Pugh-Garfield film, and I knew I wanted to go to it.

According to IMDB, “Almut (Florence Pugh) and Tobias (Andrew Garfield) are brought together in a surprise encounter that changes their lives. Through snapshots of their life together — falling for each other, building a home, becoming a family — a difficult truth is revealed that rocks its foundation. As they embark on a path challenged by the limits of time, they learn to cherish each moment of the unconventional route their love story has taken, in filmmaker John Crowley’s decade-spanning, deeply moving romance.”

Starting off, the film’s narrative structure is told in a non-linear manner. It was as if time is not a line, but a flat plane. The film leapt around from all parts of this relationship, from where they meet to where they are giving birth. It did make following the story a little challenging for awhile until Florence Pugh cut her hair (thanks, Florence!)

The chemistry between Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh was absolutely off the chart and this is the main reason this movie worked as well as it did. Both showed their acting chops in these roles and I loved them together. Every scene with them in it was wonderful.

The story was very emotional at several times and it worked well. The melodrama of the film was over-the-top at times, but it worked because of Garfield and Pugh. Perhaps the time jump storytelling technique kept the emotion in check.

This was a solid film with great performances.

4 stars

I Was a Teenage Zombie (1987)

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The October 9 of 13

I found this on HBO Max and, because of that, I mistakenly believed, this movie would be a good one to include for The October 13, or at least was a real movie. It was five minutes into it when I discovered that this was the most amateurish, ridiculously bad film I have seen in a long time.

When the sound quality of a film does not reach the quality level of Birdemic: Shock and Terror, you know there is something wrong.

According to IMDB, “Six high school buddies accidentally kill a drug pusher and dump his body in toxic waters. When the pusher returns as a zombie and goes on a killing spree, their only recourse is to dump the body of one of their own recently dead, and have him return as a “good” zombie to face off with the “bad” one.“

I have seen this referred to as a cult classic, but if this is a classic in any form, I have to question the choices of the viewer. I know film is subjective, but I don’t think anything should be that subjective.

The budget of this movie must have been $25 dollars and a box of donuts.

I take that back, they did have some real music involved in the film, with a soundtrack involving real bands and musicians. At times the music was played so you could not hear what was being said. Best part of the film.

I seen better acting on SNL, you know when the host clearly has not learned any lines and is just reading off the cue cards off screen.

How bad was the dialogue? I don’t know, you could barely hear it.

This was not fun. There was a time or two where I laughed at the movie. Not because it was funny, but because it was so embarrassing that the only thing you could do was laugh.

The zombie make-up was more like blackface. Or eventually green face.

Then there was a zombie rape scene. I’m not kidding. Offensive as it could be.

The quality of the movies in this year’s October 13 has been really down. With Piranha, Sorry About the Demon, and this film, I really need to find a good film for #10.

EYG Comic Cavalcade #120

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October 18, 2024

It is time again for the EYG Comic Cavalcade. A little early this week since I had today off from work since we had to have parent teacher conferences the last two days. Today was a comp day. I left school last night at 8 PM feeling really brain dead. I enjoyed reading through these books today.

Absolute Batman #1. “The 200.” Written by Scott Snyder and art by Nick Oragotta. Cover art was done by Oragotta & Martin. The new Batman story in the DC’s Absolute books is an interesting read. I did enjoy the new take on Batman, but especially Alfred. I am giving these new Absolute books a chance to see if they will hook my interest. I found this to be a good book, and I may want to give it a few more issues.

Mystique #1. “Intelligence.” Written, drawn and cover art by Declan Shalvey. Mystique is involved in a mission involving Maverick. A lot of action and shape shifting. Nick Fury Jr. appeared in the book too, and there was a shocking end to this book. Something that I did not see coming.

Moon Knight: Fist of Khonshu #1. “New Moon.” Written by Jed MacKay and art by Alessandro Cappuccio. Cover art was done by Davide Paratore. Mister Knight and Achilles Fairchild face off in a tense war of words over a new drug being sold by the latter. The new Moon Knight series kicked off with a reintroduction of Mr. Knight and the Midnight Mission.

Miles Morales: Spider-Man #25. “Birds of a Feather, Part Three.” Written by Cody Ziglar and art by Federico Vicentini. Vicentini & Neeraj Menon did the cover art. Black Panther comes to give some help to try and help Miles with his vampire tendencies. New suit, by the way.

Avengers Assemble #2. Written by Steve Orlando and penciled by Scot Eaton. Leinil Francis Yu & Romulo Fajardo Jr were the cover artists. Cap, Hawkeye, Herc and Night Thrasher went to a small town being beseeched by ghost apes. The story brings the Red Ghost into the mix.

Uncanny X-Men #4. “The Eye of a Hurricane.” Written by Gail Simone and art by David Marquez. Marquez & Matthew Wilson did the art for the cover. This has been a really great new X-Men book so far. Rogue goes to rescue Logan, and stays behind to do battle with Sarah, the frightening creature that has a background with Charles Xavier.

Ultimate Spider-Man #10. Written by Jonathan Hickman and art by David Messina. Marco Checchetto & Matthew Wilson did the cover art. Ben and Jonah are investigating a story that brings them into conflict with Harry Osborn. Who is behind Kingpin?

Big Guns Stupid Rednecks #1. Written by Austin Allen Hamblin and illustrated by Mariana Meira. Cover art was done by Kurt Belcher. From Band of Bards, this is a strange new series that followed retired detective Clint search for his white trash brother. It made me think of Mojo some, and it was a very bizarre issue.

Spectacular Spider-Men #8. “Triage” Written by Greg Weisman and art by Emilio Laiso & Andres Genolet. Cover art was done by Humberto Ramos & Edgar Delgado. After the trauma inside the Arcadium, the people who had been taken joined together for some group therapy. That included Peter Parker and Miles Morales.

Dark Knights of Steel: Allwinter #4. “Descending” Written by Jay Kristoff and art by Tirso. The second story is written by Tom Taylor and art by Riccardo Federici. Cover art was also by Tirso. Rose caught up with Slade and bad things happen.

House of Slaughter #26. “Azure: Part One” Written by Sam Johns and illustrated by Letizia Cadonici. Cover art was by Jorge Fornes and Werther Dell’Edera. New story arc in this series. Honestly, this has never been my favorite of these series. I much prefer the Someone is Killing the Children series. Still, there are some interesting things going down.

Blood Hunters #3. Written by Erica Schultz and art by Robert Gill. Ema Lupacchino & GURU-eFX did the cover art. The Blood Hunters are in some real danger as a bunch of vampires are swarming them. Dagger is in bad shape. Miles is trying to contain his vampire side.

The Department of Truth #26. “Deviation Seven: Fictional Women.” Written by James Tynion IV and art by Alison Sampson. Cover art by Martin Simmonds (Silver Medalist). The book takes yet another turn… this time to Marilyn Monroe. Is she real? Or is she like bigfoot? Only in this book.

Spider-Man: Reign 2 #4. Written, drawn and cover art by Kaare Andrews. Peter finally gets rid of the big white beard! YES!!! However, things are not going great for him otherwise. He has discovered that he is not able to save Mary Jane and he is preparing to head back to his own time because his presence can jeopardize the reality. I believe there is one more issue in this mini series.

Profane #5. Written by Peter Milligan and illustrated by Raul Fernandez. Cover art by Javier Rodriguez. This series comes to a close with the mystery of the murder of Spud Coltrane solved and Profane returned to the land of fiction. This was a fun series with an intriguing hook.

Wolverine #2. “Blood and Debt.” Written by Saladin Ahmed and art by Martin Coccolo. Martin Coccolo and Bryan Valenza did the cover art. This issue of Wolverine gives us a bit of a twist on the character of Wendigo, which is one of my favorite characters as is. I really liked how they used Wendigo here.

Daredevil: Woman Without Fear #4. Written by Erica Schultz and art by Michael Dowling & Ivan Fiorelli. David Yardin & Romulo Fajardo Jr. are the cover artists. This mini series ended with Elektra and the new Punisher teaming up after fighting each other.

The Creeping Below #1. Written by Brian Azzarello and illustrated and cover art by Vanesa Del Ray. I am not sure what this is, to be honest. I might have to give this one another read because I am just not sure what is happening.

Where Monsters Lie: Cull-De-Sac #1. Written by Kyle Starks and art by Piotr Kowalski. Piotr Kowalski with Vladimir Popov did the cover art. This new series is a follow up to the Dark Horse book from a few years ago involving a group of serial killers and monsters living together in a neighborhood. They’re in a cull-de-sac now with the former agent from the last series.

Grim #20. “Strangelove.” Written by Stephanie Phillips and illustrated by Flaviano. Cover art by Flaviano (Bronze Medalist). Lots of weirdness going on as we see Death and his relationship with Jess’s mother. Lots of soap opera-like drama in the hell dimension.

You Won’t Feel a Thing Ashcan. The DSTLRY upcoming series released an ashcan, which, funnily, is a smaller, undersized book, unlike the oversized normal issues from DSTLRY. There is also part of the new series from James Tynion IV, The Cit Beneath Her Feet, in this ashcan.

Local Man #25. Story and art by Tim Seeley & Tony Fleecs. Hold on a sec… #25??? Um… what happened to issues #14-24? This is the final issue of the series (for now?) and there is a time jump in the story, but why change it to issue #25? I don’t know, but I always did enjoy the series so it will be missed.

The Oddly Pedestrian Life of Christopher Chaos: Halloween Special #1. Cover art by David Talaski (Gold Medalist). Several short stories featuring the main characters of the regular series. There was some fun stuff in here with creators including Tate Brombal, James Tynion IV, Soo Lee, Morgan Beem, Isaac Goodhart, and Fernando Blanco.

Other books this week: Sam and Twitch Case Files #7, Domain #4, Crypt of Shadows #1, Black Cloak #9, Anansi Boys #3-4, and The Mammoth #4.

Piranha (1978)

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The October 8 of 13

Piranha, a movie directed by Joe Dante, was a film that I never had any interest in seeing. Those type of B-movies were never in my taste. However, for the October 13, I decided to watch the original Piranha on Prime to see if it was more enjoyable than I thought.

It was pretty much what I expected.

According to IMDB, “An insurance investigator and her local guide search the Lost River Lake area to find too missing teenagers. When stumbling on an abandoned military facility, they release by accident in the river some flesh-eating piranhas that were bred to use in the Vietnam war. The piranhas are heading straight to a nearby summer resort’s lake and its guests.“

A Jaws rip-off, Piranha is a low-budget film that had some terrible special effects and the story about as simple as you could get. The acting was not very good either, especially with the secondary characters. The dialogue was atrocious for most of the film.

I have seen reviews of Piranha saying that it is a parody of Jaws or that the film was tongue-in-cheek humor. I didn’t think much of any of this film was funny, and the time when the film tried to add humor, it fell flat.

I can see why this may have become a cult classic, because there is so much awful about this that you can look at it an laugh… not with it but at it.

This would be a perfect film for Rifftrax Live as there is so much comedy to mine around what is on this screen. It was actually worse than I had thought and proved that I was right for avoiding it all these years.

Agatha All Along E6

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“Familiar By Thy Side”

After last week’s big reveal at the episode’s end, I figured this week would be the back story of Billy Maximoff. And I was right.

I loved this episode. We went back and discovered how Wanda’s mind reading son wound up in a teenager’s body.

I had heard this speculation before. How the car accident that was reported earlier in the series, and was the back drop to the credits when Joe Locke’s name was up, would be tied to Billy’s resurrection (or rebirth?).

That car crash they shot was spectacular.

The crash came because Billy Kaplan’s parents, from Eastview, were distracted by the Anomaly created by Wanda was disappearing. I felt bad for the Kaplans but their son was gone. When he died in that car crash, Bill Maximoff took over the body. This is a decent origin for the Teen in the MCU considering how messy Wiccan’s Marvel Comics origin is.

We also get a special guest star… everyone’s favorite… Ralph Boner! Ralph Boner was the albatross around the neck of WandaVision. When he turned out to NOT be Pietro Maximoff from the X-Men universe, that was universally hated. However, we all still love Evan Peters and having him back is always welcomed. Ralph’s appearance was a little inconsistent here. I wish they had chosen a tone and stuck with it instead of trying to do both the fearful/intense tone and the funny/silly tone. Still, it was great to see him.

The discussion between Agatha and Billy at the end was really some great writing. Interestingly, no Aubrey Plaza. Where was she? I also hope the others in the coven are not gone for good. I know they are involved in other aspects, but I hope it is not just in flashbacks.

Three more episodes. One next week and then two on Halloween eve.

EYG Favorite Comic Cover of the Week

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Week of October 14

So, I am a little later today because of parent/teacher conferences today, plus Agatha All Along episode six…and the Dodgers are on. So I am getting to this right now.

Bronze Medalist

Grim #20

Cover art by Flaviano

A creepy cover with that big scythe behind makes this cover stand out really well. The dark red and black work well together…as will the next cover.

Silver Medalist

The Department of Truth #26

Cover art by Martin Simmonds

What a great cover with the singer on the cover and the black and red coloring forming the familiar Xs in the background. This one stands out for fans of this book.

Gold Medalist

Christopher Chaos Halloween Special #1

Cover art David Talaski

The blue signifies Christopher Chaos, and the lightning and the electricity creates a cool image of Christopher Chaos charging up a jack o’ lantern. This is really an attractive cover.

Bonus Action Vol. 2 E7

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“Welcome …to Fey Country”

A gigantic episode of Bonus Action this week… over 2 hours and 18 minutes worth of action. David the DM immediately split the six people of the group apart.

They spent most of the time one one one with David, playing all sorts of weird characters including a human faced bird, a disappointed marionette, and a not quite killed Minotaur.

David also left the group on several cliffhangers including Bar’B’s father about to reveal his deal.

So entertaining and exciting, these are some wonderful D&D players who understand that the key to the story are the characters, not just the power you can have.

Only Murders in the Building S4 E8

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“Lifeboat”

We basically cleared the Westies this week. Honestly, I was not as enthralled with this episode as I have been with every other this season.

It just felt too much. There was out regular cast, pus the actors, plus the Westies and flashbacks with Milton Dudenoff as well. Plus, we got to meet Helga and see her back story. The entire Dudenoff story is resolved, as we discover that he was dying and took a handful of pills, talking the Westies into putting him into the incinerator.

So no murder of Dudenoff, but Sazz is still a question. The show hinted at a new suspect this week, Paul Rudd’s Glen Stubbins. I do not believe for one second that he is not just another red herring. The main reason is this killer, who has been stalking and taunting them, feels way more sinister than Glen ever felt. Could he have been playing? Maybe. Except, wasn’t he in the hospital when the last text message came through?

There are so many pieces pulling the focus away from Oliver, Charles and Mabel. I would want to see more about them than seeing all of these other characters.

I have loved this season so much until this episode so I am sure that things will pick up once again with just two more to go.

Psycho II (1983)

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The October 7 of 13

One of my favorite Alfred Hitchcock films of all time was 1960’s Psycho. Twenty three years later, there was a sequel to the film featuring the return of Anthony Perkins as Norman Bates.

Of course, I have been watching Bates Motel for the last several months, which is not necessarily canon in the Psycho universe. It gave me the opportunity to start to love the character of Norma Bates. So with this October 13, I thought it would be a good thing to watch the sequel to Psycho.

While this is nowhere near the level of the iconic original, Psycho II was not bad. Anthony Perkins was wonderful in his return to the role of Norman Bates. You could never be sure whether or not Norman had actually regained his sanity. I wasn’t sure until the very end, which was nice.

The story had an impressive twist to start off that I did not see coming. I am not sure it worked all the way through, but when we found out the surprise, it worked for most of the middle of the story.

It did feel like it went a little too long and I am not sure I loved the resolution of the film… at least part of it. No spoilers from me, but I did like the very end of the film… just not what led to it.

This was better than I expected it to be, but if you were to only watch one Psycho movie, make it the original Hitchcock classic.

Battlestar Galactica S2 E18

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“Downloaded”

This episode showed us what it was like for the Cylon resurrection. We saw the rebirth of Six after the initial attack on Caprica and the rebirth of Sharon after she was shot aboard Galactica. Both were very traumatic for the Cylons.

Sharon had her baby on Galactica and President Roslin decided that the baby girl could not be raised by a Cylon and so she had the doctor pretend that the baby died, and she had the baby given to another person, secretly. This felt like a cruel decision from Roslin because the show has done such a good job of redeeming Sharon from the early days of her betrayal.

However, Sharon had serious reaction to the baby’s supposed death as she believed that they had killed the baby. She had no idea about the truth of the situation.

We also got some connection between Six and Sharon on Caprica. Funnily, the Six that was reborn after the initial explosion was also seeing Gaius Baltar in her head just like he was seeing Six in his aboard Galactica. That was not what I was expecting and it changed my POV of that character as well. Six and Sharon both admitted to their love for human men and have decided to try and make it better. Not sure how that is going to come about or how the news of the baby’s ‘death’ will change that perspective.

It had been a long time since I saw the last episode of Battlestar Galactica, so it was awesome coming back to the series.