So I wrote a book several years ago called Dalton Hill.
It actually started as a short story that I wrote for a college creative writing class at the University of Iowa. I enjoyed that story so much I took it and expended it to a book length.
The book is set in a fictional city called Dalton Hill and it is one of those types of cities that have so many strange, magical, mystical things happening. It was originally inspired from the NBC TV series, Eerie, Indiana.
Part of the book included an examination of the character of Dalton Hill. There are a ton of fun stories in the town. I love this town.
So I am going to do some creative writing with the tales of Dalton Hill, the odd stories that takes place around the town with the oddball characters that populate the town.
This week was the third of the two character mini-campaigns splitting the six person group into twos. This week we have Jason Spina and Adam Lash. And oh was it great.
With all due respect to the other four players, this mini-adventure, called Odd Jobs 3, was an epic confrontation.
Jason was playing a character named Rory and Adam was playing Victor. They both did an excellent job of portraying these characters prior to the battle. I found myself really interested in both Rory and Victor. Their flashbacks were both fascinating and watching them play their characters was awesome.
The battle they put up was even more amazing, coming through with some unbelievable rolls. The whole creature at the end was scary dangerous and they truly took it out without too much trouble.
This was my favorite of the three Odd Jobs. I really enjoyed the first two, but I was completely engaged in the third one. I am anxious to see all six of the players starting next week.
Artificial Intelligence as a bad guy is a fairly well known sci-fi trope.
This is the seventh episode of the X-Files and, in my opinion, Ghost in the Machine has been the worst of the X-Files episodes so far.
A machine designed by a genius Brad Wilczek runs a building, and the machine ends up murdering one of the partners.
Mulder is brought into the case by an old partner and friend who had been having some trouble with the Bureau. Mulder’s friend also wound up dead from the machine.
Overall I found this fairly derivative and dull. It is basically a rip off of 2001: A Space Odyssey and, honestly, not a good one. Yes, there are some good scenes between Mulder and Scully, as they are always the highlight of these episodes.
The finale of the episode was unintentionally funny at times and the actual last shot of the show was so obvious that it was almost insulting.
Not a good episode. Every series has them (especially those full season orders of 23 episodes in the old days).
One of my favorite TV shows of all time is coming to Hulu this week. October 10th will see the arrival of ABC’s Moonlighting on the streaming service and I plan on adding Moonlighting to the list of shows that I am doing a rewatch for.
However, I decided that I would kick things off tonight by doing a review of the pilot episode of Moonlighting, which was a TV movie which went for an hour and a half and gave us the story of how Dave and Maddie came to be together.
Maddie Hayes (Cybill Shepherd) awoke one day to find that all of her money and assets had been stolen from her. She did have a few businesses that were in place as tax write-offs so she was preparing to close these all down.
When she came to the detective agency that she owned, she met David Addison (Bruce Willis) and the chemistry was off the charts. He was annoying and would not accept being fired. He recognized Maddie as the Blue Moon Girl and he could see how her name and reputation could help the agency.
Maddie was not interested, but David would not give up, following her to a date she was having at a restaurant. Before they knew it, a man with a mohawk hairstyle gave Maddie a mysterious wristwatch and fell dead at her feet with a knife in his back.
With David’s manipulations, the pair found themselves involved in the case, trying to determine why this watch was worth killing for.
David and Maddie were absolutely gold together. The chemistry, the banter, the talking at the same time, it all just worked beautifully. Both had a ton of charm and they were clearly taken with one another. Yet, they were so different that the conflict between them was just palpable and drove so much story.
David was such a BS artist, but you could see that beneath it all was a heart of gold. Maddie was cold and withdrawn, but beneath that was a warm and passionate person. They made an amazing pairing and you could see how this was going to become the phenomenon that it did.
The case was good, which was not always the way with Moonlighting storylines. Many times the story was just an excuse to put Dave and Maddie into certain situations. This one had some good twists and actually highlighted some of the skills Dave and Maddie had.
There is so much good about this pilot that you can tell how it is moving forward. Moonlighting depends on Cybill Shepherd and Bruce Willis and they carry that charisma a long way.
The fifth film of the October 13 was a film from the mid-90s starring one of those characters that I loved as a kid, even though I may have been more of a Hot Stuff kid. Casper the Friendly Ghost was one of the Harvey Comics iconic characters and the creation of a live-action Casper was exciting at the time.
Honestly, I remember really liking this movie when I first saw it in the 90s. After a re-watch today, I still think it was pretty decent, but the flaws in it were much more obvious.
According to IMDB, “Furious that her late father only willed her his gloomy-looking mansion rather than his millions, Carrigan Crittenden (Cathy Moriarty) is ready to burn it to the ground when she discovers a map to a treasure hidden in it. But when she enters it to seek her claim, she is frightened away by a wicked wave of ghosts. Determined to get her hands on this hidden fortune, she hires afterlife therapist Dr. James Harvey (Bill Pullman) to exorcise the ghosts from the mansion. James and his daughter, Kat (Christina Ricci), move in, and soon Kat meets Casper (Malachi Pearson), the ghost of a young boy who’s “the friendliest ghost you know”. But not so friendly are Casper’s uncles Stretch(Joe Nipote), Fatso (Bead Garrett), and Stinkie (Joe Alaskey), who are determined to drive all ‘fleshies’ away. Ultimately, it is up to James and Kat to help the ghosts cross over to the other side.“
This film was not very well balanced. At times, there were some real deep, potentially emotional ideas in the scripts, but then it went off on a slapstick, cartoonish direction that buried the ideas that were here.
The specifics between the characters and their back stories were really well done and could have been expanded to make this a better film. Casper’s past story, the relationship with Kat and her father, the absence of Kat’s mother, and Casper and Kat’s connection could have been more than enough to make this an enjoyable movie.
Unfortunately, just about everything with the film’s villain Carrigan Crittenden was over-the-top and did not feel as if it fit in with the part of this film that was the strongest. It was cool to see Eric Idle as her sidekick/flunky Dibs but he could not save any of this material.
Then the whole idea of the treasure hidden in the castle was so worn and wasted, it felt like a ghost story told by the Goonies. And not in the cool way.
I was also not a fan of the trio of Casper’s ghost uncles. The only voice I recognized was Brad Garrett but these characters were more annoying than they were interesting. I wondered what their unfinished business was and why they just stuck around to torment Casper.
Christina Ricci was charming, doing her best imitation of Wynona Rider in Beetlejuice. The special effects looked great, especially Casper. It was a nice little family film that has its share of flaws, but that has a good message and some strong actors in these roles. I think most of the problems are overcome by the positives.
Welcome back to EYG Comic Cavalcade. I started this week finally getting that final missing issue #3. I had a bunch of independent series that I missed issue #3 of and this week, I got The Seasons Have Teeth #3, which I then was able to read #4, that I had had for months. I did not even really believe issue#3 existed, even with Todd’s pics of the issue that he sent me. After reading it, I did enjoy these two issues.
Then, there was some intriguing events occurring involving signatures. First of all, Todd got me a signed copy of Local Man Gold, from creator Tony Fleecs. He went to a con last weekend where Fleecs was appearing. I have been a fan of his work on Local Man and Stray Dogs. It was a bit strange because he signed the book “AMF,” which is his initials. I guess it is just a quicker way to do it. Thankfully, he personalized it for me.
Then, I had purchased a copy of Howard the Duck #1 over eBay, and when I went to read it, I opened the first page and do you know what I saw? Two signatures at the bottom of the page. One was the writer Steve Gerber and the other was the artist, Frank Brunner. I was shocked as there was nowhere on eBay indicating that this was a signed copy, nor were there any pictures of the signatures on the site. The person had said that he was not an expert and that he had purchased this out of a large collection so my guess is that he never even opened the comic. I find this a treasure that I did not expect.
The rest of the books this week:
G.O.D.S. #1. Written by Jonathan Hickman and art by Valerio Schiti. Mateus Manhanini did the cover art. Jonatan Hickman’s newest creation for Marvel, deals with the mysterious Wyn and the world of magic in the Marvel Universe. This was an intriguing book with the typical Hickman convolution.
Parasocial graphic novel. Written by Alex De Campi and drawn by Erica Henderson. This is like the movie Misery meeting social media. A former TV star of show Rogue Nebula gets kidnapped by an obsessive fan and has to try to survive the situation. This was an easy read and quite the commentary on toxic fandom.
The Enfield Gang Massacre #3. “Chapter Three: The Rooftop Gambit.” Written by Chris Condon and illustrated by Jacob Phillips. How could you go wrong with a big standoff in the old West with a line gun? This book continues to be one of the more original books each month.
Doctor Strange #8. “The Doctor, the General and the Warlord.” Written by Jed MacKay and drawn by Pasqual Ferry. Alex Ross does the cover art. Last issue it seemed as if Clea was betraying Stephen for General Strange. This issue, we see that she was not intending to betray him. Instead, she was going out of her way to try and help Stephen by going undercover. Looks like there is a big showdown next issue.
Red Goblin #9. Written by Alex Paknadel and penciled by Chris Campana. Kendrick “Kunkka” Lim did the cover art. The out of control Rascal takes on the Gold Goblin, trying to stop those things that make Normie sad. There is also a cameo by Normie’s father, Harry’s skeleton. Weird, I know.
Peacemaker: Tries Hard #6. Written by Kyle Starks and art by Steve Pugh. Kris Anka did the cover art. Peacemaker wraps up his series with the end of the story of the Red Bee and a birthday party for Peacemaker with a passel of special guest stars.
Ghostlore #5. Written by Cullen Bunn and illustrated by Leomacs. This issue, we get a close look at where Harmony wound up. She finds herself with a group of people who can also see and talk to the spirits.
Transformers #1. Written and illustrated by Daniel Warren Johnson. A brand new series featuring the battle between the Autobots and Decepticons. It wound up with what looked to be the death of Jetfire, which is sad for me considering he was one of my favorites ever. A new series from Image and a new shared universe.
Strange Academy: Amazing Spider-Man #1. “Solve for X” Written by Carlos Hernandez and art by Vasco Georgiev. Nick Bradshaw & Edgar Delgado did the cover art. This wrapped up the Solve for X storyline. Honestly, I did not find this conclusion that interesting and there was just not enough Spider-Man in it for me.
Fantastic Four #12. “Saur Winners” Written by Ryan North and art by Iban Coello. I have to say that I have really been enjoying this latest run on Fantastic Four with the team in Arizona. With this issue, the FF find themselves in an alternate dimension where everyone, including Tony Stark, Captain America etc. are dinosaurs.
Things continue to go poorly for Anna, who just had a miscarriage last episode (Because of a mysterious nurse?) and now, she keeps seeing weird things and it seems as if no one around her believes her.
To make matters…’worse’???, Anna is feeling kicks from her baby, which she was supposed to have lost.
There are a couple of women that seem to be stalking Anna and they are dressed in black dresses with masks. These two women are very eerie and create a mysterious tone for the series.
There are also hints that Anna should not trust Dex necessarily. Maybe I am misreading this, but it I think the show is hinting at an affair that he is having with one of his assistants.
Anna is starting to become more defiant in her stance as these weird things keep happening to her. She does not seem to want to suffer the fools around her.
She is also starting to take steps to see if she can determine exactly what is going on, specifically with Ms. Peecher. Is Ms. Peecher trying to help?
Or is this all just a paranoid rant?
We got a new character his week, the house manager Nicolette, who just showed up. I do not trust her even a little bit (although there are not many characters on this show that are trustworthy) and I do believe she is one of the women in black.
Still lots of things going on that I’m sure about, but this continues to be interesting as the season progresses.
Stephen King has had adaptations of his writing that have worked and several that have not. The Mist is one of those adaptations that brings fear, tension and anxiety from the moment that the mysterious mist enveloped the little town in Maine.
A strong cast led by Thomas Jane as David Drayton are put through the wringer as a group of horrifying Lovecraftian monsters trapped them inside a supermarket. Unfortunately, the monsters on the outside of the store are just one of the tribulations that these people had to face.
Marcia Gay Harden is creepy as the religious zealot Mrs. Carmody, who had decided that this is Judgment Day and everything that is happening to them is God’s will. Her decent into extremity is one of the more frightening aspects of the film. Andre Braugher does a great job as Brent Norton, who is one of David’s neighbors who has had some conflicts with him. It made Norton distrustful of what was happening. Toby Jones played Ollie, an employee of the supermarket who comes through big time during the film.
Other cast members include Sam Witwer, Laurie Holden, Jeffrey DeMunn, William Sadler, Frances Sternhagen, Nathan Gamble, Robert Treveiler, David Jensen, Chris Owen, Alexa Davalos and The Walking Dead’s Carol, Melissa McBride. McBride’s character had no name listed but I absolutely wanted to stick with her because I know Carol is a survivor.
Of course, I cannot talk about The Mist without addressing the ending of the film. I want to try to address it with as few spoilers as possible. If you have seen The Mist, you know to what I am referring. As heartbreaking as it is, the irony and the absolute heart-wrenching that the scene makes it one of the most standout conclusions of a horror movie I have seen in many years. This is totally crushing and makes what was a strong and scary film into something more.
The Mist is a horror movie that works on several different levels and shows us that there is more to be afraid of than the unknown.
Moving back a week on the release calendar because of Taylor Swift next week, The Exorcist: Believer was released as a sort of sequel to the original classic horror film from 1973. Blumhouse gave the reigns of this new version of the franchise to David Gordon Green, who was behind the recent Halloween trilogy.
Sadly, this film was about as good as those Halloween movies.
Two young girls, Angela (Lidya Jewett), and her friend Katherine (Olivia O’Neill), walked from school, going into the woods and disappeared. Angela’s father Victor (Leslie Odom Jr) desperately tried to find his daughter. Three days later, the girls returned without knowing how long they were missing.
It does not take long to realize that there was something terribly wrong with the girls. Ann Dowd played Ann, who directed Victor to go see Chris MacNeil (Ellen Burstyn) who was an expert in the possible situation.
I’ll start off with the good things about the movie, because this was not a total failure in my opinion. The two little girls did a nice job with their performances. I enjoyed Leslie Odom Jr. a lot. He carried himself as a star.
The start of the film spent a decent amount of time building the character of Angela and Victor. Of course, the film did almost nothing for Katherine or her family. They were just there.
That is about it. The film’s story was derivative. There was nothing different or new about the film, outside of the fact there were two possessed children instead of one. Very original (sarcasm).
Ellen Burstyn was forced into the story in an attempt to make this connect to the original. Burstyn played the mother in the original The Exorcist and she is so wasted in this movie. She was barely in the film. In fact, most of her appearance in the film was found in the trailer.
The ending of this movie was just terrible. I did not like that third act at all. No spoilers, but it did not work for me at all.
Overall, I did not hate myself for watching this, but I did not enjoy the film. I am not sure why this is considered a sequel to The Exorcist because it could have been any generic possession movie. There was nothing new or worthwhile about doing it.
I do love the X-Files, but re-watching these in 2023 make a few things stand out. There was a scene in this episode that had Mulder and Scully searching through the microfilm for info from a newspaper. That had happened a few episodes before too and I couldn’t help but think about how much easier it is these days to just check Google.
There was also a cell phone call Mulder received where he had to put up his phone’s antenna.
Then, some of the hairstyles were so 1980s it was amazing.
I know it did not matter, it was just an observation.
As for “Shadows,” we get an X-File dealing with a murderous poltergeist, one that was protecting his secretary/friend from dangers.
It is amazing how Dana Scully always just never sees anything that happens. She is in the wrong place every time. The ghost is killing people, floating them off the ground, and Scully just misses out. I think you could consider that a trope of the series.
This is an entertaining episode that doesn’t really jump out. It is just a fine, solid episode.
The fourth episode of The Boys spinoff, Gen V, dropped on Amazon Prime Thursday night and the series showed us the ramifications of Emma’s rescue attempt. The trail of dead bodies and the massive dents in the wall revealed to us that it was not just Emma who was involved. Sam came to and went feral on the guards.
I will say that I thought this episode took a bit of a step back from the first three episodes. I still enjoyed it a lot, but this felt lesser in my opinion.
However, the chemistry between Emma and Sam was not one of the issues. They were great together and, in just a few scenes, they have become a couple worth rooting for. Everything involving these two, especially the attack on the doctor’s home, was epic.
I guess my issue stems with the inclusion of Tek-Knight, a super hero detective who arrived at Godolkin University to film an expose on the ‘truth’ about the suicide of Golden Boy. He was a horrible person, clearly, as he used some kind of super power to interrogate the interviewees. The problem was, they spent the first two-thirds of the episode making this guy seem to be so sinister, so dangerous only to turn him into a dick joke. Was it funny? Sure. It just felt like the waste of a threat.
It did help elevate Dean Indira Shetty, showing that she was not to be underestimated just because she did not have any powers. Still, I feel that they could have done the same without completely destroying that character that could have been something special.
There was also some surprises with Marie and Jordan as they end up in bed at the end (which, by the way, was a very weird edit/cut). The end of the episode felt off too and it left out some seemingly important things.
I still enjoyed this a lot, but there is no doubt in my mind that this was not the same level as the first three of the series. It’s not as if I think it is going to suddenly be a disappointment, but I do hope this will not fall into these techniques regularly.
I loved season one of Loki. With season two now starting on Disney +, I can start looking forward again.
Okay, this was epic.
One of the best parts of this was the fact that I did not have to either stay up until 2 AM Central time or wait until the early morning to see the new Loki episode. Prime time, Bae-beee! Apparently Disney + had success with the release of Ahsoka in prime time so they decided to do the same with Loki. I loved it. The anticipation as the clock slowly moved toward 8 PM. Watching it without being half asleep. This is the way they should release all shows.
And… Ke Huy Quan brings every ounce of charm you expect from him. The title of the episode is named after his character, Ouroboros, or O.B. as Moebius called him (apparently).
We are reminded immediately how much chemistry and charisma Tom Hiddleston and Owen Wilson have together as Loki and Moebius. They are the ultimate buddy cop duo in the MCU. Putting themselves on the line for each other, this is one of the big reasons that Loki season one was so great. And Ke Huy Quan fit right in with that pairing beautifully.
Kang… or, I suppose He Who Remains, as Loki knows him, is all over this episode without ever showing up. Statues, murals, recordings, he is totally enveloped in the TVA and the frantic dread and sinister nature of the world.
This looked amazing, with unbelievable sets and a beautiful direction. The music was spot on.
I can’t believe I have to wait until next Thursday. This is the feeling I used to have with some of the early Disney + shows. I have enjoyed them all (except Secret Invasion) but with WandaVision and Loki Season 1, there was a different feel between episodes. I remember counting down to the next episode, looking forward to the next one.
The October 13 continued tonight with the Laika stop motion animated film Coraline, based on the book of the same name from Neil Gaiman.
Coraline is a beautifully animated movie with some amazing visuals and some of the most creative and creepy images that were truly scary, especially for the younger viewers.
According to IMDB, “When Coraline (Dakota Fanning) moves to an old house, she feels bored and neglected by her parents. She finds a hidden door with a bricked up passage. During the night, she crosses the passage and finds a parallel world where everybody has buttons instead of eyes, with caring parents and all her dreams coming true. When the Other Mother (Teri Hatcher) invites Coraline to stay in her world forever, the girl refuses and finds that the alternate reality where she is trapped is only a trick to lure her.“
This film is a classic and it really works well. It is very easy to relate to the young girl who is just looking for something that she is missing from her parents who are not engaging with their daughter. The curiosity of the mysterious dimension was too great to ignore. Coraline found something that filled the gap, although she did not realize that there was trouble with it.
There are some great voice talents involved here besides Dakota Fanning and Teri Hatcher. Others in the cast included Jennifer Saunders, Dawn French, John Hodgman, Robert Bailey Jr., Keith David, Carolyn Crawford, and Ian McShane.
Coraline is an excellent film that creates a wonderfully creepy tone and it is highlighted perfectly with the character design and the imagery. Coraline is a great Halloween film for the whole family.
I watched the third of the four new live action shorts from Wes Anderson on Netflix, shorts that adapted work from author Roald Dahl.
Tonight’s film was The Swan, and it had the same original presentation that the other two films that I had watched so far on the streaming service. The actors, in this case, Rupert Friend, was our narrator and walked through the story. I love this style for these shorts as the narrators seem to be telling us the story and we see other actors almost pantomiming the situations as he explained it.
There was not much of a cast behind him though. Only a young boy named Asa Jennings who played the main character, Peter Watson. Peter was tormented by a pair of bullies who wound up killing a swan and strapping the wings to Peter, forcing him up a tree in an attempt to fly.
I was quite engaged with this story, which was fairly shocking to me. When they made poor Peter lay down on the train tracks as he was tied up, I was really rooting for these bullies to get there’s. Sadly, that did not happen, which left me a bit empty after the end of the short. It did feel like one of those darker endings that Roald Dahl was known for.
Three for three so far with these Wes Anderson shorts.
I went to see Sleepy Hollow originally back in the Voy Theater when it was released in 1999. I remember coming out of that screening being very unhappy with the film and I have never revisited it since. That is, until tonight.
Johnny Depp starred in this film, a reimagining of the classic folk tale of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow and the Headless Horseman. Depp played Ichabod Crane, a constable from New York sent to the small town of Sleepy Hollow to investigate the series of murders that had seen victims’ heads decapitated.
Once in Sleepy Hollow, Crane, not the bravest of souls, came across several notable gentlemen in the town involved in some mysterious discussions. Crane also met and fell for Katrina Van Tassel (Christina Ricci), the daughter of one of the men, Baltus (Michael Gambon).
It does not take long for Crane to realize that there was something supernatural going on with these murders.
This film turned out to be better than I remembered, but it was not a great one. There were some terrible choices for tone as it had some silly moments of humor that did not work well at all.
The action was decent, but there were also some ridiculousness, particularly with the stagecoach chase scene.
So basically, I started off thinking that this was better than I remembered, but as the film progressed, I liked it less and less. In the end, I did not hate watching this but I would not recommend it.
EYG- Embrace Your Geekness 