Horror/comedy movies can be difficult to do. At some times, the tones between the two genres do not mix well and may feel all over the place. However, when they work, you get some highly entertaining moments, and that is what I feel the latest film from writer/director Osgood Perkins (director of Longlegs) accomplished.
The story tells of a winder-up, toy grinder monkey that wound up in the closet of the father of twins Hal and Bill (both played by Christian Convery). It does not take long for the twins to realize that when the monkey’s key in its back is wound, someone near them dies in a shocking and quite gruesome way.
After a close tragedy, the twins decided to drop the monkey down a well to get rid of it forever. Little did they know that this would not be the end of the monkey.
Many years later, the monkey returned to the lives of the now estranged brothers and continued to amass chaos in it wake.
I enjoyed this movie a great deal. I heard some critics claim that the tone was too scattered, but I found the tone to work extremely well. It felt somewhat campy, but I thought that worked for the film.
The design of the monkey was creepy, in particular with the smile that would cross its face just before it started drumming. I thought the creepiness factor was just the right amount to keep this unsettling. I would not call the film scary, necessarily, but the kills of the film absolutely turned in some gory moments. Gore is usually not my favorite type of horror, but it felt like it worked so well with the humorous tone that the gore did not bother me.
Theo James, who played the adult versions of the twins, and Christian Convery did amazing jobs playing the two different characters. They played them with their own original styles that I was not sure they were actually the same actor or if it were just an actor that resembled each other really well.
It was also awesome to see Tatiana Maslany appear as the twins’ mother, Lois. She did not have a long role, but her scenes were very impactful and helped create a feel for this character. Elijah Wood had a brief cameo in the film in a role that really could have been expanded more.
The more ridiculous it became, the more I embraced the silliness and repelled at the kills. I really found this to work well together. Sure the story itself may not have been as deep as one might expect, but that worked within the context of the film too. Maybe I would have wanted a little more depth to the characters, specifically, why Hal and Billy were never close as children. I understand the anger directed as adults, but why did the twins never have the type of relationship one would expect?
Either way, I was entertained by The Monkey and I thought the performances were all really strong, the film was a hoot, and the kills would be appreciated by any horror aficionado. The Monkey was originally based on a short story by horror master Stephen King.
Between this, Silo and Hulu’s Paradise, sci-fi television is hot again.
Jason and Amanda moved through different universes, learning along the way about what they need to do to try and find their way to Jason’s original world. Meanwhile, they are encountering a variety of worlds where that world’s Jason had something tragic happen.
One world was filled with a deadly disease, and Jason found Daniela sick and dying, after they took away her Jason. Another world, Daniela and Charlie reacted to Jason in a terrible way because their Jason was supposed to be in prison.
As they met Blair, from Amanda’s reality, they learned more about the Box. Blair had gone through so much inside the Box that she simply could not go back into it at that moment. She could not face the differing universes and the stress that built on her inside the Box. She warned Amanda that she needed to know what she wanted for herself, instead of just following Jason.
meanwhile, Jason 2 has been moving in and out of the Box easily, including returning to his home universe to grab some more of the drug. He told Leighton that, after he leaves the reality, Jason planned on sealing the Box’s entrance, essentially preventing anyone from coming into the universe. He knew that Jason and Amanda had made it into the Box a few days before and he is looking to keep Jason from finding his way home.
Once upon a time there was a girl named Razzy with brown hair, long lashes and rosey cheeks who loved to make new friends and loved to play volleyball. It was her everyday thing to practice in her backyard and go to her games because she was on a travel team so she loved to practice a lot. Traveling teams are fun because you get to travel and see new things and meet new people and maybe go out to eat after, and also get cool colorful jerseys.
One day she was at her volleyball game and her and her whole team was so happy because they won their game and her mom offered to take the whole team out to eat. Razzy and her volleyball team went out to eat at Chuck ‘E’ Cheese and were sitting down and eating pizza in a hurry so they could all go play some games and get a lot of tickets so they could get cool toys with them when the lights went out. Everyone was in shock and couldn’t see anything and then the lights went back on. Everyone was confused why the lights went out for 20 sec and then went back on, but they ignored it and continued to eat their pizza so they could go play some fun games to get a lot of tickets.
Later that day when it got dark and they were done eating and playing games, they were all getting their prizes and saying ‘bye’ and ‘thank you’ on their way out to the people who worked there, Razzy’s mom, and Chucky the mascot, and while Razzy’s mom was paying and then they were walking out the door, Chucky yelled, “Wait let me walk you guys out.” Jen thought he was just trying to be nice and said “okay”. As they walked out the door Chucky said “ I hope everyone had fun,”
Razzy smiled and walked to the car. When they got to the car they were walking to the other side to get in and, as they opened the car door, Chucky quickly kicked a rock by the tire and grabbed a needle out of his pocket and popped the tire and it made a big *BOOM* and everyone jumped, even Chucky, as he went down to look at the tire. Jen went over to the other side of the car to look at it and she said “Oh no, the rock popped my tire.” She looked stressed.
Chucky said, “I can call someone for you if you would like?”
Jen nodded and said “ that would be nice thank you”
“ Of course,” Chucky said and walked inside and called someone to help her with her tire.
After the tire was done Chuck came to tell them bye while he waved and went back inside to close up. Razzy and her mom waved bye back and went home
The next day Razzy woke up to her mom making pancakes,eggs, and bacon for breakfast so she hurried to her room to get ready really quick so she could go and eat breakfast. After getting ready, she sat down at the table ready to eat. After she was done eating she went into her room to watch Tiktok on her phone for a little but videos of Chucky kept coming up. She ignored it and was making a Tiktok video, and after she was going for a walk the all the sudden this random girl she didn’t know with long blond curly hair ,green eyes, and jeans on with a pretty white shirt that was whiter than milk, says, “ You’re the girl people are talking about aren’t you? Is your name Rozzy?”
Rozzy was in shock because she didn’t know her.
“Uhhh yeah? What do you mean? What are people talking about? And also do I know you? “
“Oh yeah, sorry about that. My name is Sally and it was about just how you took your whole volleyball team after the accident there.”
“What accident?” Razzy looked at her confused.
“Well this girl our age and her mom were kidnaped by him and they found them in his basement. They weren’t hurt or anything but if they hadn’t gotten them out soon they didn’t know what would’ve happened. I don’t know if he would always try to keep them there for longer by doing stuff like hiding their car keys under the car or something like that when he saw them. And he just got out of jail” she is in shock while Sally said “Well gotta go bye,”
Rozzy was thinking about how their tire popped that one time and ran home to tell her mom and her mom called the cops to tell them just to keep a lookout, and their life went back to normal after that and never went there again. The end.
Companion is a sci-fi/thriller that flew under the radar. I knew very little about it before it was released in the theaters. I do not recall seeing any trailers for the film. I had heard some positive word of mouth about the film, but I still knew very little when I walked into the theater this morning to see it.
If you can go into this movie with as little knowledge as you can, please do so. Companion was an outstanding film that was a ton of fun and very creative and imaginative.
In the vein of going into this movie as free as you can, I am not giving any spoilers, nor am I going to give a synopsis, as this is one of those films where it is very difficult to give a synopsis without giving away some major plot points.
Starring Sophie Thatcher (Heretic, Yellowjackets) played Iris and Jack Quaid (The Boys) played Josh, a couple who was heading for a weekend with friends at a remote cabin. Both Thatcher and Quaid do a sensational job in this film as our main characters. They had a great chemistry and worked very well together to create a story that kept the audience on the edge of their seats the entire time.
The film was both exciting and funny, blending both together very effectively. The writing was so good in both structure and dialogue. You had feelings for these character, including the secondary characters played by Lukas Gage, Megan Suri, Harvey Guillen, and Rupert Friend.
You may never have heard of this movie, but it is absolutely worth your time. It is a blast and provides such a exceptional experience.
I gave the new Hulu series Paradise a chance. It starred Sterling K. Brown, James Marsden and Julianne Nicholson. The first three episodes dropped on Hulu and Disney + earlier this week.
This political thriller/sci-fi show was very entertaining and was a very intriguing mystery.
It kicked off with an unexpected twist. One of the main actors is murdered within the first part of the movie. The narrative is told in both present day and flashbacks, which really helps to establish background of characters and helped to build characters.
Brown and Marsden had great onscreen chemistry. Their scenes together were some of the best of the show. The writing was solid, providing little details of what was going on as the episodes progressed. The reveal at the end of the first episode, that the world had come to an end but the President and the surviving people live in an underground cavern, dug into a mountain.
I liked the whodunnit style of this with the flashbacks giving us a chance to see important moments instead of just hearing about them. I enjoyed Sterling K. Brown’s scenes with his character’s father. Looking forward to the rest of this series being released on Hulu for the next five episodes.
I started season eight of the X-Files today, with its first two episodes, “Within” and “Without.” I have been dreading the start of this season because I knew that this was the season with David Duchovny departure…sort of.
Mulder was abducted by aliens at the end of season seven. This season, I remember Mulder was gone, but he was still in many episodes, being tortured by the aliens. I think this was the show wanting to move on, but yet keep Mulder in the mind’s eye.
This is one reason I remember hating the character of John Doggett, played by Robert Patrick, because he was the replacement for Fox Mulder and I wanted Fox Mulder back. And with the character still being shown every once in awhile, I could not get over it. John Doggett suffered for it.
Watching these two episodes, I had a much different reaction to John Doggett than I did when I first watched the show, back in the early 2000s. Here, I found him to be an interesting new character with a new dynamic with Scully. Scully as the believer (with Skinner in tow) and Doggett as the skeptic is a new feeling for the show.
The show bought in with the Alien Bounty Hunter once again, as the Alien Bounty Hunter was revealed to be on the ship that had Mulder.
These two episodes were really pretty good. It felt as if it took the story in a new direction while still circling back to the mythology behind the show’s first seven seasons. I know I liked them more today than I did in the past.
Presence is a small movie that may be advertised as a horror movie, but that would not be accurate. This is much more of a psychological drama than anything else. Directed by Steven Soderbergh, Presence takes a different look at the haunted house sub-genre than what we have seen before.
A family moved into a new home after a tragic event struck. Chris (Chris Sullivan) and Rebekah (Lucy Liu) was a troubled couple with two kids, Tyler (Eddy Maday) and Chloe (Callina Liang). Chloe’s best friend had recently died, but the parents seemed to be more focused on moving so Tyler can get into the proper high school for the swim team.
Chloe immediately started getting a feeling, sensing that there was something in the house… a presence.
There were some interesting characters involved here. Rebekah seemed much more connected to Tyler and less connected with Chloe. Chris appeared to be a really wonderful father, being very supportive of Chloe and calling Tyler out on his garbage. There were more issues with the family than there was with this “ghost.”
What I enjoyed the most in this movie was how it was shot. There were a bunch of single-shot scenes that were shot as if it were the POV of the spirit. I really enjoyed that gimmick. It was something that I had not seen before and I thought it was a creative use of the camera.
It was also a major surprise at the end that made something earlier in the film make sense. No spoilers on it, but there was something that happened about midway through the film that made no sense. However, it did make sense by the ending of the film which I appreciated.
Overall this was a decent film. It was not what I expected, but the story was good. The acting was fine. I loved the way it was shot. It may not have been the best movie of the year, and it is absolutely not a horror movie, but it was a good time.
And with this, season 7 of The X-Files comes to a close. Perhaps one of the most inconsistent seasons of the show, with some real highs and some real lows.
The first three episodes on the list were all based in humor. One that really worked well, one that was so-so and one that was maybe the worst episode of the series.
“Hollywood A.D.” was ridiculous in all the best ways. Mulder and Scully being followed by a movie producer, who was full of puns and jokes, and a movie with Gary Shandling and Tea Leoni. This was written and directed by David Duchovny and had enough wink-winks to make the episode work.
“Je Souhaite” was the middle ground episode as it featured a Genie granting wishes. Honestly I got a lot of Twilight Zone vibes from this episode, which ended like the Disney movie Aladdin did. I found this silly too, but the humor worked more than it did not.
“Fight Club,” on the other hand, is one of the worst episodes I have ever seen of the X-Files, rivaling “First Person Shooter”. Kathy Griffin played two characters who were doppelgangers of each other and in love with a man who also had a doppelganger. Oh, and pro wrestler Rob Van Dam appeared. This was one where the humor did not work and the story was so stupid and incoherent that it seemed as if everyone was just going through the motions.
Then in “Requiem,” the season ended with the show going back to its roots, quite literally, as the show returned to the Oregon town that appeared in season one episode one. It also returned actors who had appeared in that episode. Returning as well was Smoking Man, Krychek, and Marita Covarrubias and Krychek apparently murdered a wheelchair-bound Smoking Man by pushing him down the stairs. It sure looked like he was dead this time, but I know he did not die here. Besides, it would not have been satisfying having Krychek be the one to knock off the a-hole.
Mulder then gets abducted by aliens in full view of Skinner, setting up Mulder’s absence moving forward. Scully tells Skinner that she was pregnant, even though she does not understand how (I mean, she knows how… but she was supposed to have been unable to become pregnant after her abduction).
“Requiem” set up the series with some real cliffhangers that allowed the series to continue into the 8th season. Many times during the 7th season, it really felt like it was going to be the final season and that the creative juices were gone. Part of that may have been the end of the conspiracy and wrapping things up, like Samantha Mulder’s disappearance, as they did.
My favorite type of documentary is the ones that have a story that it tells you that is totally unbelievable, but it is true. Previous docs that I loved in this manner included Tickled, The Imposter, Three Identical Strangers, and The Jinx. There is a new doc that shocks you with its twists and turns among this harrowing story of a young girl surviving the Holocaust by living with the wolves.
According to IMDB, “Misha and the Wolves is the dramatic tale of a woman whose holocaust memoir took the world by storm, but a fallout with her publisher – who turned detective – revealed an audacious deception created to hide a darker truth.“
I don’t want to spoil much of this tale, so all I will say is that the story told by Misha in her memoir, which became a huge selling book, is compelling enough, and what happened following its release is even more so.
This doc is well told, with some excellent editing and design. It grabs you with the story immediately and then expertly weaves through what remains for the run time.
There are some questions left at the end which made me want to know more, but the doc is truly surprising.
Misha and the Wolves is available to stream on Netflix.
As a fan of the old Universal Monster movies, I was looking forward to the next one to be remade by Blumhouse. When Blumhouse had done The Invisible Man back just before the pandemic, it was such an enjoyable film and offered some great new ideas for the topic.
Wolf Man did not have a lot of new ideas. It was basically what you would expect.
According to IMDB, “A family at a remote farmhouse is attacked by an unseen animal, but as the night stretches on, the father begins to transform into something unrecognizable.“
Positives: The film looked great. I enjoyed the visuals of the Wolf Man and I approved of how they kept the original creatures reasonably hidden for most of the first act or so of the film. The transformation, which was slow and took its time, was very effective.
The stress-level of the film was building as the transformation happened. You never was sure what was going to happen as the family tried to stay alive.
Julia Garner and Christopher Abbott did a nice job with their roles of married couple Charlotte and Blake. I was impressed with the young actress, Matilda Firth, who played thier daughter Ginger. Her terrified ractions were very solid and worked for the film.
The problem is that this story is so very thin and did not have anything more to it. None of the characters were sufficiently developed, with only Blake having any basic depth to him. The story was so simple that it left me wishing there was more to it.
I do think that this movie has technical aspects that are worth seeing and if you go into it not expecting too much, this is a passable monster movie. Unfortunately, Wolf Man does not reach the heights, especially story-wise, that some of the previous werewolf films do.
Everyone loves summer break, whether it’s getting to play out in the warm sun, hanging with friends, relaxing, and going back to school and telling people about their summer. Everyone thinks that they had a crazy and chaotic summer, but, I don’t think you’ve heard of one this crazy.
“Come on, we’re going to be late!!” I yelled. We were getting ready to go to the second to last football game of the year. Everyone was so excited to go. We have been undefeated!!
We were just about to make a touchdown when billions of people started to say “ooo, that must have hurt.” I looked around to see what had happened, I couldn’t tell, so my friend Chloe pointed out to Billy on the field. Then I saw it, HIS BONE WAS STICKING OUT OF HIS LEG!! The police came and were talking on the walkie talkies to signal the ambulance to come to their location. My brother Sam saw the walkie talkie, and he instantly wanted one, so I told him that we have baby monitors that could work, and he was so excited to go home and find his old baby- monitor.
“I found it!” Sam yelled, “It’s in this box!!”
I ran over there to see if he really did, and he did find it! Chloe came over and helped us get the cords untangled. We sat them up and turned them on.
Kkkrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
The static overwhelmed the room. “Hey!! I hear something. Do you hear that?” Chloe said
“Ya, I hear that too!!” Sam said
“But wait,” I said, “I turned this one off to make the static go away.” “It must be picking up another signal from another baby monitor.” Chloe explained.
“Y, y..ya, I, I guess you’re right.” I said.
“Ashley,” said Sam, “are you ok?”
“Ya, Ya, I, I, I’m fine.” I said
“Well I’ve got to go home, it’s getting late.” said Chloe
“Ok, I’ll call you later.” I said
Later that night we kept hearing those strange noises on the baby monitor. My mom said to put it away, but when Sam got up I started to hear words, English!!
“Wait!!” I yelled “Stay right there!!”
“What?” Sam asked
“Do you hear that?” I said.
My brother swung his hands up, and I heard it more clearly.
“Wait!!” I said, “Hold that up again!!”
“I hear it!!” My brother exclaimed “The higher it is, the more clear it gets.”
We held it up higher, but it was still too quiet, so I put a chair on the table and squatted down on it.
“Stop!!” I yelled, “Nobody move”
Krrrrrrrrr “Yes” Krrrrrrrrrr “That is de plan. Krrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Get more of those earthlings to do more studies. Krrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr “Wait!! Nrrrg nnrrrrrgsssnrrggg”
“Oh man, We lost the signal.” I said, “Earthlings!!”
“What?” Sam asked.
“They said earthlings, so that must mean that they live somewhere else, and not on earth.”
“You mean like aliens?” Sam asked.
“I don’t know.” I said, “But what I do know is that somethings up, and I don’t think it’s good.”
We kept hearing the noises, but nothing was abnormal. We didn’t think much more about it, and went on with our summer. I was helping Sam get packed for camping at our cabin,when I saw the baby monitor on his dresser. We didn’t think much about it, but we still took it just in case.
Afterwards we picked up Chloe and headed to our cabin. When we got there we unpacked and went to bed. When we went to bed I had this strange feeling that something was wrong, or something bad was going to happen, but I still didn’t think much about it. I went to sleep and when I woke up I was outside, so was my brother, and chloe!! I didn’t know why but we were. We were all confused about what happened. I itched my arm.
“What?” I thought to myself, I looked down and there was this strange marking on my arm, almost like a diamond with a line through it.
I grabbed Chloe and Sam’s wrists and looked at them. They had it too. That’s when I really started to freak out. We ran back inside and turned on the baby monitor and there it was, the voices again.
Krrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Those earthlings, they’re perfect!! Krrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr They will make perfect specimens for our labs!! Krrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
“I think they’re talking about us!” Chloe said. That’s when I got this eerie feeling in my stomach.
“Here it comes again!!” Said Sam.
Krrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Them Krrrrrrrrrrr I think they know our plan!! Krrrrrrrrrrrrr Noo!! They must not know of our plan!! Krrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
“Oh man, we lost the signal again!!”
Later on that night, we all three tried to stay awake, I looked down at my wrist to see the sign again, but it was not there!! They looked at their arms too. Theirs was also gone!! We looked outside, nothing was different.
We all eventually fell asleep, but I got spooked or something and woke up. I looked around, and I was in this strange white room filled with these strange creatures with big heads, but little bodies doing some sort of lab work! One looked over at me with these big glowing eyes!!
I tried to scream but my throat felt like it was in my stomach. It hovered over to me and put some sort of mask over my mouth, and I fell asleep.
When I woke up again, Chloe and Sam were at my side yelling my name.
“We have to get out of here!!” Chloe said
“Ashley!!” My brother cried, “I just want to go home!!”
Just then, a loud bang came from the left!
“Come on, we’ve got to go!!” yelled Chloe.
We ran down this very narrow hall to this weirdly shaped door.
“It’s locked!!” I yelled “Come on, this way!! They’re following us!! Quick!! Hurry up!!”
We ran down this hallway to our right that led us to this big circle on the floor. Right beside it was this big red button, and of course Sam pushed it. As we stood on the circle, it shined this big beam of light down towards the ground and we floated down to the ground. Right as our feet touched the ground, we ran towards the trees to hide. The weird creatures floated down from the beam of light right after we ran toward the trees. Just then, the marks on our arms started glowing this bright blue.
“Wait, what if they are tracking us!! What if this is how they know where we are always at!” I said
“Hey, Do you still have that flashlight with the magnet on the bottom?” Chloe asked.
“Ya, In Fact I do, I was going to use it tonight just in case we heard something outside. Why?”
“Because we could rub the magnet on our wrists to mess up the tracking device so they can’t find us.”
“Ya, then we won’t ever have to worry about them ever again! You are so smart!!”
“Thank you, hurry now up, let’s do this fast.”
We all rubbed the magnet on our wrists. Just then a beam of light shined around as if it was looking for something.
“I think it’s looking for us,” I yelled. Come on, go this way!!”
All of a sudden three rays of light shot down at us and we all three floated in the air. We could,’t move, we were like frozen in our place. 2 figures came out from the trees, and hovered right to us. They spoke to each other as if we weren’t even there.
“Those earthlings are too smart for us, we’ve got to hide their GPS trackers better, and where they can’t find them, like in their nose or on their tung.”
“I got a great idea for a place.”
“Really? What?”
“What about on the surface of their eye or behind their eye socket?!”
“Great idea!!”
Just then, one snapped their finger and everything went black.
When I opened my eyes Sam, and Chloe were laying at my side. All three of us looked around, and we couldn’t remember what happened. I looked at and at Chloe and Sam. I could see tears in Sam’s eyes. I couldn’t believe how hard it must be for a 7 year old boy going through this. I went over to him and gave him a big hug. Then all of a sudden, This big eerie screech came from the night sky. All three of us jumped.
“We’ve got to go find your parents!!” Chloe yelled
“I know.” I said
“And after that, we should go tell the police!!” Sam cried
“Good thinking, we will.” I said “I promise you, I will never let anything happen to you. Neither of you.” I said
Scr Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
“Did you hear that? It’s getting louder!!” I yelled, “Come on, let’s get to the cabin!!”
“Where is the cabin?” Chloe yelled
“What do you mean?” I yelled
“Where are we?” She yelled
“I don’t know where we are?” I yelled
“I just Want to go home.” Sam yelled, “I want mom, and dad.”
“I know buddy, We just got to find..
Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
“Ahhhhh” We all held our ears from the loud screech.
“It’s gettin closer, RUN!!” I screamed
We ran for as far as we could, when Sam collapsed.
“Sam!! Are you ok?” I yelled
“I can’t run any farther!!” He yelled back
I put him on my back and kept running. When we reached this pond I just remembered that I read this book that said Aliens don’t like water, it kills them!!
“Jump in the water!!” I yelled
“Are you crazy?” Chloe yelled
“Just do it!!” I yelled back
We all jumped in the water and that’s when we heard the most gut rotting, the most eerie, the most terrifying screech ever!! Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!! It sounded like 200 or more screeches all at once. All of a sudden I saw something swoop down and grab Chloe. Chloe screamed as loud as she could, but nothing worked. Then something swooped down and tried to grab me and Sam, but I dogged it, then a second one came and grabbed me by my arms as I was still holding Sam on my back. We screamed, and kicked but nothing worked. We were brought into the ship, and into this very little room with three hard plastic looking beds. All I remembered was that Sam was taken off of my back, and all three of us were placed on the bed like things and we were strapped down to them and about 13 figures circled around us and I blacked out. When I woke up, I was at home lying down in my bed. I couldn’t remember anything that happened.
“Was it all a dream?” I thought to myself, “It seemed so real. Did I dream my whole summer? That’s impossible!! You can’t do that.”
That’s when I had the idea to go to sam. He didn’t know what happened either so I called Chloe and asked her to come over to our house, but she was already here. She had no idea what happened either. I went down stairs.
“Mom, Dad?” I yelled “Where are you?”
“Ummm, Ashley, don’t you mean where are we?”Chloe said as she looked out the window.
“What do you mean?”
“Look!”
I looked out the window and we were not at home. There were stars, and a dark sky.
“We’re in space!!” Sam yelled “But why?”
“I don’t know Sam, but…”
Something interrupted me and woke up.I was sitting up against a mailbox. I was all alone, I started freaking out and I started yelling for Sam and Chloe. Nothing, nothing but silence. I looked around in this nearby field. I saw something lying on the ground, and to the right of it was another one.
“Sam!!, Chloe!!” I yelled, “Sam!!, Chloe!!” I ran over there, and sure enough it was them. I shook them until they woke up.
“Where are we?” Sam asked
I ran back over to the mailbox to read the address. It read “San Diego, California”
We are in San Diego, California!!” I yelled to them as they ran towards me.
“Why are we in Calla, fonia?” Sam asked
“It’s pronounced California sam, and I don’t know why we are.” I said
“Wait!! California is the state with the most alien sightings!!” Chloe said
“But why would they take us over 1,800 miles away from home?” I asked
“I don’t know.” Chloe said as she looked down
“Wait!!” she said “what if this is where the ship is located, what if this is where we’ve been this whole time!!”
“Is 1,800 a lot of miles from home?” sam asked
“Yes buddy, it is. But the real question is how do we get home? What if we don’t get to see our parents ever again!!” I panicked
Sam started to cry.
“Oh buddy, I’m so sorry. I never should have said that.” I said
“You promised we would get home!! You promised!!”
“I know buddy, and I will keep my promise.”
“How are you going to keep your promise?” Chloe asked me
Chloe looked at me funny.
“What?” I asked
She didn’t answer me.
“What? Answer me!!”
“At the corner of your eye!! She said
“What about it, is there an eyelash? I asked, “Chloe!!”
“There is a tiny blue shining diamond with a line in it.” She said
“What do you mean?” I cried
I itched my eye
A large ship hovered above us.
“Hide!!” I yelled!!
We hid behind this bush, as if it was going to do anything.
“We’ve gotta get out of here, make a run for it!”
“ Where are we going to go?” Sam asked
“Wait!! I know where!! My aunt Edna lives in Los Angeles!!”
“But that’s about 130 miles from here!! How are we supposed to get there? We don’t have any money, we haven’t ate anything for over 3 days, we are tired from running, what are we supposed to do now?”
“I didn’t think of that.”
“I know you didn’t, you never think about what’s happening, you only think about what could happen.”
“So that’s how you feel about me.”
“No, Chloe, I didn’t mean it.”
“No, I get it, I always try to find all of the good things, or the good possibilities that could happen.”
“I know, and that’s what I love about you, that’s what makes you, you!!”
“Thanks!!”
“Now come on!! We need to get a head start to your aunt Edna’s house!! Come on Sam!!”
We went into the big city to go find Aunt Edna.
“Guys!! Look!!” Chloe yelled as she pointed to the jumbotron.
“Hey, that’s the big ship that we were on!!” Sam yelled
“ That’s us!!” I said, “We were all shot down towards the ground!!” I said
“Hey!!” A man yelled, “Those are the kids that were in the UFO and got shot down from that ray of light!!”
“No, we’re not!!” Chloe said
(She doesn’t like crowds)
“Wait, Yes we are the kids!” I yelled
“Ashley!!” Chloe said
“I know what I’m doing Chloe, trust me.” I said back, “Hey everyone, We were taken over 1,800 miles from home, and these weird creatures have done so many studies on us. We haven’t eaten in over 3 days, and we are so tired. So will somebody be so kind as to take us home or at least to Los Angeles?” I asked
“Ya, and some food!!” Sam added
“Hey, I will!!” Yelled a woman from the crowd, “Just come with me and we can stop and get some burgers and fries!! Does that sound ok? Then I will take you home!!”
“Thank you so much!! You are so kind!!” I said back
“ Ya, thank you!!” Sam said
We ate for about an hour, and then we headed for home. The woman of course asked so many questions, and I was very comfortable sharing everything with her, especially for how much she has done for us!! We stayed at a hotel for the night because we still had over 1,200 miles to go.
“How do you have so much time to help us?” I asked the kind lady
“Well, I recently lost my husband in a car crash and then I realized how precious life is, so don’t waste it all and enjoy your life. My husband always told me to “live as if this was your last day.” I never knew what that meant until he passed away. So now, I want to travel the world and live my life!!” She replied
“I’m so sorry.” I said back
“Oh, that’s ok, it feels good to let it all out.
I couldn’t sleep that night. I didn’t know if it was because it was weird sleeping with a stranger, or if it was because of what she said.
We traveled for 2 days and we finally got home. My mom and dad were so happy to see us, and They thanked the kind lady for bringing us home. When she left, they sat us down and we told them everything. They didn’t really believe us, but they were just happy that we were home. I heard my mom talking to dad in her room, and she said that she thinks that the real reason we left was because we were mad at them for taking the baby monitor away. Even if they don’t believe us, we will always know the truth about what happened.
We tried forgetting about it, and I sort of did for a little while, until one day after school, I got an itch in my eye, and could see a little blue diamond with a line in it at the corner of my eye.
Sarah Konalie was a 5 ‘8 , sixteen year old girl who had deep blue eyes, curly brown hair and skin that stayed tan all year around. Sarah was a very talented cross country runner who was ranked number one in her conference. Sarah Konalia was born in Boston Massachusetts, but at the age of four, she moved to a small town in Iowa. The same year Sarah moved she started running to help take off some of the stress of joining a new school and having to make new friends. Sarah went undefeated last cross country season even going on to win state.
Just when Sarah thought her season was over she got a call from the Olympic Cross Country team head coach Bertha Johanson.
“Sarah I am so glad I was able to get a hold of you, you accomplished great last season, and I am excited to inform you that a spot on our Olympic team has opened up, and I would like to personally invite you to come to the meet where we will choose who our next member will be,” said Bertha
Sarah said, “Thank you so much for this opportunity! This is a dream come true, I can’t wait!”
Bertha Johanson sighed over the phone and then said, “Sarah, I am happy to know you are excited, but you will be going against people that are almost double your age, and have been training for this their whole life. Now that being said, you do have the best time out of all of these people, but you still need to train hard and keep improving.”
“I completely understand, and, if you don’t mind me asking, who has the next best time behind me?” Sarah said.
“That is a great question and it is actually someone that is your age, and you have gone against often this past season,” Bertha said.
“Oh, do I know them personally?” Sarah asked.
“Umm yeah you actually know them very well. It is your teammate Karen Shoop.” Bertha said.
“Oh, Karen, as in the one that in our last meet I only beat by a couple seconds?” Sarah said in a worried tone.
Betha Johanson then said, “Yes, I thought it would be a great competition, and motivation to challenge the both of you. I was talking to your coach and she said the two of you really pushed each other during the season.”
Sarah was too stunned to speak but then got the words out, “Uhh yeah something like that.”
Coach Bertha then said, “This isn’t a problem for you is it?”
“No, not at all!” Sarah quickly said.
“All right, good, I look forward to seeing you two weeks from now on Saturday.” Bertha Johanson said.
“See you in two weeks,” said sarah. “Oh and thank you so much for this opportunity!”
After the phone call ended Sarah couldn’t help but worry about Karen being at the race. Although Sarah had always beaten Karen, recently Karen had been getting closer and closer to beating Sarah. Even to the point of Sarah only winning by two seconds at their last meet.
That was not the only problem Sarah had with Karen. Although they would always treat each other with respect, in the second grade, Sarah’s boyfriend at the time, Mike who she had been dating since kindergarten, was playing at recess with Karen, and did not come over by Sarah when she walked outside. This was something he did everyday, so when he did not it really hurt Sarah’s feelings. After that day Sarah and Mike broke up and shortly after he started dating Karen.
Sarah knew she needed to start training immediately to improve her time, as well as give her body some time to heal. The race was only two weeks away which is not a lot of time for her to improve her time as well as give her body the amount of rest it will need to perform at it’s best of abilities. There was no way Sarah was going to let that boyfriend stealing witch get in the way of her making the Olympic team.
Sarah decided to make a schedule for her training. On Mondays she would run four miles at her race pace, eat a good meal, and then do arms at the gym. On Tuesdays she would do five easy miles, and then go straight to the gym where she will do legs. On Wednesday Sarah would go for a walk, and then go to a yoga class. On Thursday Sarah was going to do integrals, sprint half a mile, walk a fourth a mile, sprint a mile, walk a half mile. Sarah would do that a total of three times. On Friday Sarah is going to go on a seven mile long run, then go to the pool to relax. On Saturday Sarah will go to the gym and do a full body workout followed by yoga afterwards. On Sunday Sarah will clean, and do stuff around the house, but no workout.
Now that Sarah had already created her schedule for training, she started right away wasting no time at all. It was Saturday so that meant Sarah needed to go to the gym and do a full body workout accompanied by some yoga after words.
Sarah got dressed in her workout clothes and headed out the door to the gym. When Sarah arrived she stretched, and proceeded to grab the 20 pound weights to start with arms. Sarah did 10 shoulder presses, rest, 10 bicep curls, rest, for a total of three rounds.
After arms, Sarah did abs because as a runner it was super important for Sarah to have a strong core. Sarah did 10 crunches, 10 sit ups, rest for 30 seconds, one minute plank, rest for 30 seconds, 15 leg raises, and repeated three times.
All that was left for Sarah to do at the gym was legs. Sarah did 10 squats, 10 left leg split squats, 10 right leg split squats, and repeated it for three rounds.
After the gym Sarah was a little sore so she was excited to go to yoga and stretch.
When Sarah arrived at yoga she grabbed one of the mats and started stretching before the teacher arrived. When the teacher walked into the dimly lit, lavender-scented yoga room they all started to stretch together. Throughout the yoga class they proceeded to stretch, and hold poses that helped work on flexibility. Sarah loved yoga because it helped her get longer strides, and made her body feel refreshed.
After yoga, Sarah went home and prepared a steak, with potatoes, and five cut up strawberries. While Sarah was going to sit down to eat, she got a call, a very unexpected call, from Karen. Sarah answered the phone with a sweet, welcoming tone, “Hi Karen it has been so long since I have talked to you! How have you been?”
“I am doing great, I actually wanted to call and tell you that I got a call from the Olympic head coach, Bertha Johanson saying that she wants me to go to the Olympic Cross Country team tryouts, and that I have a really good chance of making the team. There is only one person with better times than me. Can you believe it? This is a dream come true!” Karen said with an excited but also arrogant tone.
“Oh, that’s great Karen, I am so happy for you!” Sarah said with excitement, even though in her head she was annoyed with the fact that Karen had called her to brag about her accomplishment.
“Oh I am glad you feel that way because I was actually calling you to ask for your help. I was wondering if you know who the person that has a better time than me could be? Coach Bertha told me that they were my age but I was too scared to ask her who,” Karen said.
Sarah smiled over the phone, barely able to keep in her excitement about how Karen was going to react when Sarah told her that the person with better times is actually her. Sarah took a deep breath and then said, “I actually do know who you are talking about, and I know them very well.”
“Oh really, that’s great Sarah! I am so happy we are able to put our past behind us, and you are willing to help me out.” Karen said excitedly.
“Yeah no problem at all, and you actually know them too. In fact you are speaking to them over the phone right now.” Sarah said smugly.
Karen, after being too stunned to speak, finally managed to say, “Oh that is great, I am so happy for you.”
“Yeah I am happy for you too, well I have to let you go and get back to training, and I am sure you have to do the same. So see you in two weeks!” Sarah said
“See you in two weeks.” Karen said still in shock from finding out that Sarah was going to be at the Olympic tryouts too.
After the phone call with Karen, Sarah worked hard for the next two weeks of training. During the two weeks of training there was only one problem Sarah encountered. She kept replaying the race that Karen was so close to beating her over and over in her head. Sarah would replay this moment and then get in her head and not focus on her breathing and strides.
This problem caused Sarah to only improve her time by five seconds, opposed to the ten seconds she was planning. Although five seconds is a really good improvement in cross country, the ten seconds would have given Sarah more reassurance to be able to beat Karen.
The day of the race quickly occurred. and it was time to see if all of Sarah’s hard work was going to pay off. Before the race started Sarah stretched and then went on a slow one mile run to get her body moving. After the run Sarah stretched again and took her box at the starting line where she did stride outs.
With only one minute till the race would start. Sarah walked to her box and got ready to start. Just as the starting guy was walking to the stand, he shot his fake pistol from to signal the take off of the runners, Sarah looked to her far right and saw Karen Shoop.
This was not good. Sarah started thinking about the race that they were neck and neck, and could not help feeling that this time it was going to be different. Before Sarah could replay that moment in her head for a second time she got interrupted by the starting guy counting down.
“On your marks! Get set Go!” The pistol went off and so did the runners.
Sarah was off to a great start. She was feeling the wind in her face, and she had a great adrenaline rush. Sarah had a pretty decent gap in between her and the group of people behind her, but when she looked back to double check she noticed that there was a person getting closer to her. That person was Karen.
This time instead of letting Karen get in her head Sarah embraced the freeing feeling she got when she ran and ignored Karen behind her.
Sarah had just finished mile one of the race and her time clocked in at five minutes to be exact. This was good, but for mile two Sarah has to pick up the pace a little and try for a four minutes and fifty five seconds mile.
Sarah focussed on her breathing and strides for mile two. When Sarah finished mile two she was still feeling good and was able to run that mile at a four minute and forty five second mile pace. At the two mile marker Sarah looked behind her to see Karen holding her pace and only a few feet behind.
Sarah knew that for mile three she would have to give it all that she had left. Sarah slowly started picking her pace up and widened the gap between her and Karen. Sarah was feeling good about herself and started to focus on the trail ahead.
After a minute Sarah looked behind her to see that Karen had gotten really close, maybe five feet behind her. Sarah knew that with only three quarters of a mile to go she would have to widen the gap before the final stretch. Karen was a great sprinter so when it came down to the final stretch between the two, Karen would have been able to sprint right past Sarah to win.
Sarah picked up her pace even more, and with only a half mile left Karen was still behind her so close that Sarah could hear her breathing.
That’s when Sarah decided to pick up the pace. Sarah started to practically sprint; she was bound and determined to beat Karen. Sarah practically sprinted for a fourth of a mile and that gave a huge gap between her and Karen, there was at least fifteen feet between the two of them. Since Sarah was practically sprinting, she used a lot of her energy, and now she had to hold a good steady fast pace while also leaving energy for when she sprinted at the end.
Sarah was able to see the finish line now. There was still a good ten feet gap between Sarah and Karen, but Sarah knew she had to pick up the pace because when Karen started sprinting that gap would shorten drastically. Sarah took off and now there was only fifteen feet between her and the finish line, but there was also only ten feet between Sarah and Karen.
Even though Sarah was in pain she sprinted as fast as she could and that’s when she heard people cheering. They were cheering for her. Sarah had done it! She had made the Olympic Cross Country team! A dream she had since she was just a little girl. Sarah had run the best race of her life. Her old personal record was 15:55, and she ran a 15:30!
Sarah was happy she made the Olympic team and not only that, she was happy to have learned a new lesson that she has never forgotten, and used it for the rest of her running career and everyday in her life since. Sarah learned that no one can stop you from reaching your goals except for you, and your own mindset. Not even a boyfriend-snatching, evil, backstabbing, witch!
There were a lot of controversial themes hidden in this X-Files episode. Okay, maybe not that hidden, but when the story swings on the choice of a doctor to end the suffering of a patient who could not be saved, it can create a lot of intrigue.
Picket Fences dealt with the concept of Euthanasia several times, but one would not expect it to appear on an X-Files episode.
The episode also featured “hexing” which seemed to be a backwoods form of voodoo, including the voodoo doll, called a poppet which was how the episode villain was using this pwoer.
The villain, Orell Peattie, was played by Billy Drago, and he was excessively creepy. He played the father of the girl who had been given the excess morphine by the doctor, Robert Wieder, played by James Morrison. Both of these actors did a great job in the episode.
The only issue could see was making Orell Peattie apparently not very highly educated, making the whole character a stereotype. The misspelling of the word “thief” being the title of the episode and something written after his victims.
I do not remember watching this episode when it first aired in 2000, but I did enjoy this one now. As I said, there were several themes in this episode that could be looked at deeper yet including not only Euthanasia but also modern medicine vs. practical magic.
Scully keeping Mulder on his toes is a fun moment in this overall creepy entry.
I have been disappointed with the new Dexter show since the first couple episodes. This new one, episode six, was the best one since the first two.
The show limited the amount of silly Dexter action, though there was some of that as he was getting his first blow job. Still, it was kept to a minimum and the cases were compelling.
The captain’s son was snatched much like the judge’s son earlier in the season. We met the captain’s son recently as he spoke with Dexter. That made this more powerful than just a kid who we had never met. The tension of the cop shop during this episode was at an all-time high.
I am not in love with the flashbacks, but these were fairly significant. We see the birth of Debra and Harry’s wife told him no more affair. Another awkward moment.
Dexter set himself up as a serial killer (officially killing his third victim). The alligator dumping was not going to work any longer as the police have discovered the arm floating in the swamp that we saw a few episodes ago. I figured that was coming back, and I am glad it made it.
Of course, Dexter is not going to be caught or even implicated because we know he does not get caught or implicated for years. The dangers of a prequel.
I hope the remainder of this season is able to match this quality more than it has been lately.
One of the most well known documentaries of the past 25 years is on the agenda for the Genre-ary DailyView today: the Oscar-winning doc An Inconvenient Truth featuring a presentation by former Vice-President Al Gore.
The term ‘Global Warming’ is no longer used because the opposition forces have jumped on the semantics of the term, pointing to terribly low temperatures that have happened. The term these days is ‘climate change,’ which, as I said, is just semantics.
The science Al Gore presented in this doc is very compelling and hard to argue against. Contrarians might claim this is meant to be a political presentation, but it does not feel that way to me. Gore speaks about misconceptions during the film and how opponents try to build on doubt, and this feels more accurate.
Al Gore is undeniably an engaging speaker on this topic. He has always been presented as being stoic and stuffy, and, while one can see some of that in this doc, he showed himself knowledgeable and effective in providing info on this topic in compelling ways.
I thought the moments where they connected parts of Gore’s life, whether that be his presidential run, his sister’s death to lung cancer or the near death of his son, were very strong parts of the film that were then tied neatly back into the film’s overall narrative.
As a movie, this is a thoroughly entertaining work, but its relevance in the world today is undeniable unless there are motivating circumstances that prevent you from accepting the dangers that climate change can bring. Gore quotes Upton Sinclair in the film who said, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
I am happy to have finally watched this two-time Oscar winning film (it also won for Best Song) and I wish people would stop looking at this through the spyglass of politics.
EYG- Embrace Your Geekness 