Top Ten Films of 2013

For a while, I didn't think I was going to have one of these this year. With the twins born in February, the lifestyle around here is obviously a LOT different. These lists were always on the late side just because it's harder to get to see smaller movies in Connecticut (for the record, I am pissed that I still can't see Miyazaki's The Wind Rises for another month...I'm pretty confident that would have landed on here somewhere, for now let's just assume it tied with one of the movies currently on the list). I watched a lot of films on Netflix during late nights up with babies, but actually getting to the theater was tougher. It's a small price to pay, obviously, for having two cute little men crawling around the house. And yet movies are an important part of my identity, and falling far behind made me feel a bit like I was losing part of myself.

Typically, I recover from my geographical disadvantage with Operation Drink From Fire Hose, the annual December-January binge where I'm watching movies constantly. However, this year it was derailed early on by the wave of ear infections, pinkeye and flu that invaded our house around Christmas. As tough as it was, it didn't last forever, and by January things were mostly back to normal. So I decided not to give up on this tradition and had quite a rally when it came to movie watching. The convenience of Netflix, as well as that ever-shortening window between a film's theatrical release and its DVD release, made things easier...although there's still a handful of films I wish I'd made it to. Still, I ended things with a list I was very happy with. It helped that 2013 was a good year.

Family comes first...but the reason the word "first" even appears in that phrase is because there's other things out there to focus on sometimes. So the next time someone tells you that your interests fade away once you have children, tell them to stop watching Judd Apatow movies and grow a pair. With that out of the way, here's ten movies I really liked.

10. The Lords of Salem
It's not a Rob list without horror, right? There were a few horror films I could have thrown up here, but none were more visually striking than the latest movie from former metal singer Rob Zombie. Back in 2005, he stunned genre fans with The Devils Rejects, an alternately hilarious and horrifying allegory of post-9/11 America that, among other things, had a final scene that used all of "Free Bird." Since then, he regrettably got bogged down with unnecessary remakes of the first two Halloween films, but The Lords of Salem is one formidable comeback. A radio DJ (played by Zombie's wife, Sheri Moon) is sent a sample song from a mysterious new doom metal band, a melody which seems to have bizarre effect on her life. Zombie gets to have some fun with that old cliche about metal being "the devil's music" and also shows just how well he understands the visual language of horror. No cats jumping into the frame or ghosts in medicine cabinet mirrors here, just top notch ambience and imagery so intense I'm not sure I would recommend this one to people without some experience with the genre.

9. Elysium
So here's a movie I really liked that nobody else seemed to care about one way or the other. The second feature from Neill Blomkamp (District 9) envisions a future in which all the rich folks live on a pristine satellite in space while everyone else lives on the ruined Earth below. When a factory worker named Max (Matt Damon) gets radiation poisoning, his only hope is to get to Elysium, where they have machines that can cure any ailment in seconds. The subtext of all this isn't very far under the surface, which often gets a movie like this criticism for being too "blunt" or "in your face." Honestly, I prefer movies that don't sugarcoat things and the whole scenario is a great metaphor for how too many powerful people in America view health care - as a luxury that you only get if you can pay for it, like a big-screen TV that also just happens to keep you alive. Of course, the movie's not just one long sermon about compassion for the least of us. Blomkamp is already a master when it comes to judicious use of digital effects and staging action scenes. It may not be the revelation that District 9 was, but it's still miles ahead of most action films that come out these days.

8. Twelve Years A Slave
Here's why you should never read the comments. While perusing an article about Steve McQueen's slavery epic, I saw someone ask why there were "so many movies about slavery" and urging for a reduction in "negative Black movies." A reaction like that only illustrates the cultural importance of this film. Not only that, there really haven't been all that many films that depict slavery in America, even less once you filter out patronizing bullshit like Gone With The Wind, where all the slaves are just delighted to be trapped on the plantation. There's some exploitation stuff like Django Unchained or Mandingo, and I think the bluntness of exploitation can be well-suited to this subject, but this movie is a whole different kind of experience. The great and (until now) unappreciated actor Chiwetel Ejiofor plays Solomon Northrup, a free black man who is abducted and sold into slavery in the South for a dozen years. It's a beautifully made, chilling portrait of dehumanization occasionally punctuated by the brutal violence that was a fact of life during this era. Based on the real-life Northrup's memoirs, Twelve Years a Slave is a film that feels like a journey, one that will prompt a great deal of reflection when it finally ends. It's a film to be reckoned with - hard to like, but easy to appreciate.

7. Drug War
The story of Drug War is familiar stuff - cops, crime lords, undercover operations - but you rarely see it executed this well. Directed by Hong Kong filmmaker Johnnie To, this remarkably taut adventure is devoid of sentimentality or filler. Louis Koo is superb as Timmy Choi, a scheming, self-serving dealer who hopes to avoid the death penalty by teaming up with Zhang Lei (Honglei Sun), the tough cop (and brilliant mimic) who busted him. The entire film is a master class in building tension up until the no-holds-barred finale. This was the first time To was allowed to shoot on mainland China, and he conjures up a memorable atmosphere, alternately sterilized and grimy. I'm not sure the Chinese government will be in a hurry to let him do it again.

6. Blackfish
A devastating documentary about the tragedy that can come from treating nature too recklessly, similar to the stories of Steve Irwin and "Grizzly Man" Timothy Treadwell. But instead of an individual, the subject is Sea World and its cavalier pattern of abducting wild killer whales and training them to do tricks in front of massive crowds. Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite set out to investigate the shocking death of veteran trainer Dawn Brancheau at the hands of an orca named Tilikum. What she found was that given the whale's violent history in captivity, the incident shouldn't have been all that shocking. What is shocking, however, is the appalling behavior by the Sea World executives, whether it's the CEO blaming Brancheau for her own violent death or instructing tour guides to tell flat-out lies to tourists about killer whale life expectancy in order to mask the reality of the creatures dying young while imprisoned. Several former Sea World employees share powerful anecdotes and the cumulative effect of their stories has already left quite a welt on Sea World, judging from their unhinged gloating on Twitter after Blackfish failed to grab an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary. With or without awards, this is a powerful film that goes beyond the ethics of Sea World and makes us question our own human arrogance for thinking we can bend the natural world to our will.

5. Short Term 12
Destin Cretton's first feature takes viewers inside a group foster home, a setting rarely seen in the movies, and it's one of the most convincing and compassionate portraits of troubled young people I've ever seen. In its compact 90 minutes, it gives a glimpse into the lives of teens who have suffered and waiting around while the system decides just what to do with them. Keith Stanfield and Kaitlyn Dever are standouts among the younger actors, but the film's core narrative focuses on the not-much-older supervisors, specifically Brie Larson as Grace, who is forced to examine her own demons after meeting a young girl with a similar life story. It's a tough story to pull off, but the film's blend of hope and melancholy contributes to a genuinely moving experience.

4. John Dies At The End
Two aimless friends discover an alternate dimension that is quietly threatening the human race and have to rely on a mysterious drug called "soy sauce" that can send users across dimensions but also across time. It only gets weirder from there in this sublime horror-comedy from Don Coscarelli, who gifted the world with the one-of-a-kind masterpiece Bubba Ho-Tep ten years ago. Filled with absurd twists, gloriously off-the-wall humor and one very heroic dog, it's an unpredictable joy to watch. The film critic Dana Stevens coined the phrase "artisinal horror," referring to low-budget horror films like this one that refuse to play by any of the genre's rules. I'm not sure if that's the phrase I would use, but she's on to something. Part of the fun of this movie is the gradual realization of just how out there it is, although it doesn't compromise the entertainment value in the slightest.

3. Gravity
How does one define the "movie of the year?" I've thought about this a lot lately and came up with an informal method of evaluating a movie's box office success, critical AND audience response, and impact on day-to-day pop culture. With that in mind, the title would seem to go to Gravity and it's a bandwagon I don't mind jumping on. The movie is a tremendous technical achievement and a vivid story of survival filled with breathtaking suspense. George Clooney shows up for a while to do his smooth-talking-George-Clooney routine, but for the most part it's up to Sandra Bullock as the stranded novice astronaut to carry things along and she makes it look easy. Director Alfonso Cuaron had to invent new technology to make this film possible and the results are so striking that I still have to remind myself that this was not actually shot in outer space. Cuaron's movies are always great demonstrations of what movies as an art form are capable of, with this one's 17-minute opening tracking shot as just one example. It's not perfect, in fact I was surprised by how clumsily the lead character's tragic backstory was handled, but a viscerally thrilling movie experience like Gravity can get away with a lot.

2. Fruitvale Station
The story of Oscar Grant, whose outrageous death at the hands of trigger-happy police officers was captured on video for the whole world to see, has been adapted into a small masterpiece that only needs empathy to drive home just how cruel modern America can be if you're a young black man in the wrong place at the wrong time. With a premise like this, the ending is a foregone conclusion, but the bulk of the movie is simply the last 24 hours of Oscar Grant's life. Grant, played to perfection by the outstanding Michael B. Jordan, is genuinely kind but also troubled, trying to get his act together but prone to fits of pride or anger. In short, he's like a lot of us trying to make sense of the screwed up world we live in. The more time you spend with Grant, the more devastating that foregone conclusion becomes. In a depressing development, the movie was completely shut out by the Oscars, with some commentators looking at the pile of nominations for Twelve Years A Slave and concluding that Hollywood can only focus on one black movie at a time. I suspect that this is part of it, the other part being the notoriously short memories of Academy members. The ceremony is supposed to honor a year's worth of film but nothing released before October hardly ever gets nominated. If they had any brains, you would be seeing about five or six nominations for this July release, including Best Actor for Jordan and Best Supporting Actress for Melonie Diaz, who broke my heart as Grant's girlfriend and mother of his child. The fact that incidents like this keep appearing in the news means that this film's importance will only grow over time. For each of those events, a story like this could be told.

1. The Act of Killing
In the end credits for Joshua Oppenheimer's amazing documentary, dozens of crew members and even a co-director are listed as "Anonymous." These are the Indonesian crew members who didn't feel safe attaching their actual names to The Act of Killing, which deals with mass killings in that country during the 1960s, an atrocity barely known to the outside world. After a failed coup by Communist forces, the country's leaders retaliated by wiping out hundreds of thousands of supposed "Communists," i.e. union leaders, public intellectuals and ethnic Chinese. Fifty years later, many of the perpetrators have gone unpunished and still enjoy protection from the state and are something akin to celebrities. Their cavalier attitudes about the slaughter bring the concept of "cognitive dissonance" to a whole new level and things get even stranger when the director invites them to recreate the genocide as a film that they would have total creative control over. Borrowing tropes from their favorite musicals and crime films, they stage increasingly surreal interpretations of the event. However, revisiting the past brings reflection, and to at least one of the killers, the beginnings of true remorse and shame. It's a bizarre experience to watch, but the human drama becomes positively overwhelming by the unforgettable conclusion. This is a truly dangerous film, but also one that has the potential to change lives and really do good in the world. It has a nomination for Best Documentary, but an Oscar doesn't feel like enough. A movie like this deserves a Nobel Prize.

Happy 2014, everyone. Back to babies!

Tales From the Crypt: Season Two, Part Three

Korman’s Kalamity: Tales from the Crypt goes meta with this story about a horror comics cartoonist named Jim Korman (Harry Anderson) whose drawings start coming to life. It’s a fun idea, but in practice is a little too over the top, with intrusive music and lazy characterization. In particular, Korman’s ridiculously obnoxious wife (Colleen Camp), more of a cartoon than anything on Korman’s pages, almost singlehandedly ruins the whole thing. If today’s network of feminist blogs existed in the early 1990s, they would have ripped this episode a new one. Still, it’s salvaged a bit by great creature effects. B-

Lower Berth: The Cryptkeeper’s origin story is actually quite serious, told without the host’s trademark humor, but then again it’s pretty funny in retrospect. It’s a colorful tale full of sideshow freaks and exhumed mummies set in the era of classic horror. The mood and atmosphere are so potent, combined with amazing makeup effects (the show in general is very good at this) that this could be mistaken for an episode of The X-Files. A-

Mute Witness to Murder: This great Hitchcockian episode tells you all you need to know in its title. Patricia Clarkson plays the woman (blonde, naturally) who is so traumatized by her sudden discovery that she loses her voice. The psychologist who ends up treating her…is also the murderer (Richard Thomas). The moody, eerie episode does a great job backing Clarkson’s character further and further into a corner, providing very effective suspense even though some clues about the ending wind up being a little too obvious. A-

Television Terror: The Blair Witch Project is usually given credit for inventing the “found footage” gimmick within the horror genre, or maybe Man Bites Dog if you’re a little more cinema savvy. However, its origins go back a little farther than that. The use of it for one key scene in John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness is arguably the scariest moment in that film, and before that, Ruggero Deodato’s infamous Cannibal Holocaust pioneered the use of it to add verisimilitude to on-screen violence. Early use of it also pops up in this episode, starring Morton Downey, Jr as a megalomaniacal Geraldo-esque TV host exploring a supposedly haunted house. The style was still too new for this episode to use it to its full potential, but that’s no problem. This is crass, cynical fun with excellent pacing up until its epic finale. A

My Brother’s Keeper: Timothy Stack and Jonathan Stark play Siamese twins who are literally joined at the hip. One is a cultured gentleman and the other is a boorish psychopath. When one of them falls in love, it brings tension between them over a potential separation procedure to the surface. Of course, this is Tales from the Crypt and romance is never simple. This episode mines its premise for increasingly silly slapstick and sit-com humor but then shifts dramatically into an ultra-dark ending that’s satisfying even if it doesn’t feel especially earned. B-

The Secret: A melancholy fairy tale about an orphan with a mysterious condition who is adopted by a highly eccentric family. You’ll be able to guess one of the twists right away, which can make this one a bit tedious as you wait for it to get to the point. Still, this episode is strikingly different in tone from most of the series thus far and has a lot going for it. The cast includes David Lynch regular Grace Zabriskie and Larry Drake, who played the evil Santa last season, and it always looks fantastic, thanks to the direction of veteran set designer J. Michael Riva. A-

Nice run of episodes there! In general, Season 2 seemed a lot more consistent, but the series still occasionally has trouble balancing its love of ironic humor with real fright. Not to say that I'm not still enjoying myself immensely. On to Season 3!

Tales From the Crypt: Season Two, Part Two

The Sacrifice: This episode is almost a remake of the film noir classic Double Indemnity, although with a few lurid twists. In this incarnation, the insurance salesman is played by Kevin Kilner and Kim Delaney is the femme fatale who would like her obnoxious husband (Don Hood) to have a sudden “accident.” The lack of supernatural elements signals that this episode is adapted from an issue of the excellent Shock SuspenStories, and yet it winds up being dull and predictable. I can’t help but think they’re picking the wrong issues. C

For Cryin’ Out Loud: The Cryptkeeper, decked out in hair metal attire, introduces this humorous episode about a sleazy rock promoter (Lee Arenberg, who you may remember from “Seinfeld” as the guy who had his thumbs broken by Jerry) about to skip town with embezzled charity funds until he’s confronted by a bank teller (Katey Segal) who had been keeping an eye on him. All the while, he’s tormented by a voice in his head claiming to be his conscience (Sam Kinison). It’s set during an Iggy Pop concert, featuring the real Iggy Pop who’s on hand to drop a lot of F-bombs. Really clever writing makes this episode good fun. B+

Four-Sided Triangle: Patricia Arquette plays a young farmhand who suffers a head injury and then falls in love with a scarecrow. Her abusive employers write her off as just nuts, but does the scarecrow really come alive? I won’t spoil it, but it probably doesn’t play out the way you think it does. It’s a strange little episode, but the over the top performances of Chelcie Ross and Susan Blommaert as the despicable rednecks who run the farm make it pretty fun. B-

The Ventriloquist’s Dummy: This one is packed to the brim with talent. Richard Donner is back in the director’s chair with a script by Frank Darabont of The Shawshank Redemption. The legendary comedian Don Rickles plays a ventriloquist who takes on a hopeless protégé (Bobcat Goldwaithe). It’s so involving that you forget that the supernatural element is coming…but if you think you can guess the twist, you’re probably wrong. It culminates in a spectacularly gory finale worthy of vintage Peter Jackson. Great stuff. A

Judy, You’re Not Yourself Today: Carol Kane plays a rich vain housewife who unwillingly switches bodies with an old witch disguised as a saleswoman (Frances Bay). Her pompous gun nut husband (Brian Kerwin) finds a clever way to switch them back, but that’s not the end of the story. This is a lively episode with fantastic music and an absolutely brutal takedown of gun culture in America. This is the second time the series has given the NRA a tough broadside, could be an interesting pattern. A-

Fitting Punishment: Moses Gunn plays a crooked, cheapskate mortician who becomes the legal guardian of his nephew (Jon Clair). Having another person to deal with interrupts his finicky lifestyle to a dangerous extent. Gunn is so good as this evil bastard that you just can’t wait to see him get his comeuppance. That anticipation drives what would otherwise be a slow episode. The spooky finale is worth the wait, however, as director Jack Sholder (The Hidden) showcases some great images, including a shout-out to The Changeling. B+

"Dear Mr. Watterson" doesn't go deep enough

It's not hyperbole to say that "Calvin and Hobbes" is the closest thing I have to a religion. For all the writing I do on here about important entertainment from my past, none of those TV shows or movies, or even Spider-Man, played as big a role in my life as Bill Watterson's legendary comic strip. Everyone who knows me has probably heard me react to a situation by saying "This is like that Calvin and Hobbes strip where..." As a kid, I enjoyed it at face value for Calvin's mischief and the frequent appearance of dinosaurs. Reading it when I was older revealed the deep meaning behind those panels. I realized I had taken powerful lessons from those comics and it didn't feel like an accident when I came across this illustration of a speech given by Bill Watterson shortly after I left my job. It was a scarily perfect summation of the last year of my life...but maybe I'm getting ahead of myself.

The "Calvin and Hobbes" phenomenon is explored in the documentary Dear Mr. Watterson, which just opened in a handful of theaters but is also available for purchase and download via Itunes. It's an entertaining watch and I would happily recommend it to any fan of the comic, but I couldn't help but feel like it missed a few major opportunities. But I'll quickly sum up the best parts of the film - the section detailing the visual resemblance between the world of "Calvin and Hobbes" and Watterson's hometown of Chagrin Falls, Ohio, other comic strip artists giving their perspective on why the strip is so memorable, and a moving conclusion that analyzes the famous final Sunday strip ("It's a magical world, Hobbes old buddy, let's go exploring.")

Anyone who has knows the strip's history won't be surprised that the elusive Watterson never appears on camera. He tends to give one print interview per decade and it appears no picture of him has been taken since the 1980s, to the point where his elusive nature has given "Calvin and Hobbes" a whole new layer of intrigue. The director, Joel Allen Schroeder, respects Watterson far too much to mount some guerrilla attempt to ambush him for an interview and spends a lot of time on screen himself. It doesn't surprise me given this particular subject matter. "Calvin and Hobbes" is one of those special treasures that feels deeply personal to each fan even though it's been enjoyed by millions of people all over the world. Actually, I said something similar about Iron Maiden's music and I believe that's the measure of a truly great work of art. However, my main disappointment with the documentary is that it never gets at why it feels so intensely personal to those who read it. The movie leaves you with the impression that it was simply because of great illustrations and a sharp wit, and while those things are certainly integral to its success, it goes far deeper.

Seth Green, co-creator of "Robot Chicken," describes the strip as "so subversive," but the movie never follows up on exactly why that is. Naturally, it covers Watterson's relentless battle to prevent "Calvin and Hobbes" from being merchandised, a rejection of what would have surely added up to hundreds of millions of dollars. However, it isn't mentioned that his decision was completely in line with the overriding themes of the strip. The reason "Calvin and Hobbes" is subversive is that it completely rejects the rat race and the idea that success is defined only by acquisition of wealth. Calvin's adventures drive home that real fulfillment comes from play and leisure, rather than work, and is there anything more taboo in modern America than that? This country is obsessed with productivity and profit and has no concern with the mental and emotional well-being of its people. Then we wonder why so many people here snap and go on murderous rampages. Those who make unprofitable activities like leisure or vacation a priority get called lazy or indulgent or, my favorite, "entitled."

The wave of dogshit articles using "entitled" as a pejorative against anyone who would like a life that doesn't suck demonstrates how hard it actually is to actually live the philosophy of "Calvin and Hobbes." If you're not working at some terrible job, you're expected to be looking for some terrible job full-time, rather than taking time for things like walking in the woods, sledding down a hill, playing with a cardboard box, or anything else Calvin enjoys doing. The irony is that the word isn't even being used correctly. If you really think you're "entitled" to something, you won't make any effort to get it since you think the world owes it to you. But I think that anyone who was a kid in the heyday of "Calvin and Hobbes" knows by now that society isn't going to give anything to you, ever. If you want a meaningful life, you have to fight against conventional wisdom and very powerful interests to take it for yourself, and that's the opposite of "entitled." In the end, I think Watterson's decision to avoid licensing altogether was not just to protect the artistic integrity of his work, but also to maintain the life he wanted. If "Calvin and Hobbes" became a multimedia empire like "Garfield," he's not just a cartoonist but a manager. It just wasn't how he wanted to spend his days.

"There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want," Calvin once said. Time for rest and reflection is treated as a luxury but Watterson knew it was essential. This is the reason I believe the strip connects with people the way it does, because deep down most of us know what's really important, we just ignore it in the name of sensibility. Perhaps it's a bit foolish to expect a documentary to delve that deep into the strip's meaning, but then again, there was one particularly interesting scene where the director analyzed a strip towards the end of the comic's run. Calvin imagines sledding off the top of a huge mountain but the end reveals it was just a tiny hill and he looks back, disappointed by the brief sled ride. Schroeder reads this as a metaphor for Watterson realizing that the thrill of creating "Calvin and Hobbes" was fading and now we know it didn't last much longer after that. In the end, I think I wanted more analysis like that...less discussion of the strip's popularity and more about its actual content. Maybe next time.

Tales From the Crypt: Season Two, Part One

Dead Right: While mostly known for more traditional horror, the EC comics often told stories that dialed down the supernatural elements in favor of familiar human cruelty. In this episode, Demi Moore plays a greedy, bitchy secretary who meets a highly accurate fortune teller. She’s given a prophecy that she will become rich if she marries a lonely slob (Jeffrey Tambor in grotesque fat makeup), but the way this unfolds is highly unexpected. This episode has a lot of clever visual touches, but what makes it work is the acting. Moore is highly committed to her anti-heroine – she was a major star at this time, so it’s impressive that she was willing to play such a miserable human being. Meanwhile, Tambor gives a joke character some humanity that gives the final twist a touch of tragedy that usually gets buried by this show’s love of irony. A

The Switch: You’ll never guess who’s in the director’s chair this time. Give up? It’s none other than Arnold Schwarzenegger, who upstages the Crypt Keeper in this episode’s intro. A rich naïve old man (William Hickey) falls for a young woman (Kelly Preston) and seeks out a mad scientist who can make him young again. Schwarzenegger does well with the story’s escalating absurdity right up until an ending that’s pure EC Comics. I’m not sure how good he is with actors, however, both Hickey and Preston give very awkward performances. B+

Cutting Cards: Walter Hill’s back to direct an instant classic episode about two gamblers (Lance Henriksen and Kevin Tighe) who have an epic pissing match you have to see to believe. You might think a game of Russian Roulette would settle things, but what comes next (“Chop Poker”) is even more gruesome. Full of masterful suspense and plenty of macho banter from the two leads, this is probably the best episode I’ve yet seen. The thirty minutes feel like three. A

Till Death: A scumbag developer (D.W. Moffett) needs money to finance a dream land deal, so he turns to a voodoo priestess (Will Smith’s TV mom Janet Hubert) to try and snag a rich bride. But the idiot doesn’t listen to her and gives his target an overdose of the love potion, which leads to all sorts of mayhem. This episode boasts some phenomenal makeup effects, but the first half is somewhat dull and the “gold digger” thing already feels old. B

Three’s A Crowd: Another tale of human frailty. A working class sad sack (Gavan O’Herlihy) competes with his rich friend (Paul Lieber) for the affections of his wife (Ruth de Sosa). Lieber plays his character as such an alpha-male dipshit that you’re practically rooting for him to get killed, but there’s a lot more to this episode than that. In the end, it’s a deeply sad story of insecurity. It’s a bit manipulative for my tastes, but the episode is helped by a vulnerable performance from O’Herlihy and some great direction from David Burton Morris. The lighting in particular is noticeably excellent. B+

The Thing From the Grave: Most of the classic images from the old EC Comics involve the undead – beautifully illustrated panels of corpses covered with maggots as flesh falls off their bones. This seminal moment in horror history is translated beautifully in this episode, as a murdered man (Kyle Secor) comes back from the dead to protect his love (Teri Hatcher) from a psychotic boyfriend (Miguel Ferrer). The veteran character actor owns this episode as the villain, making it all the more fun when this abusive prick gets what he deserves. This one also has one of the more amusing opening bits – the Crypt Keeper is caught looking at a corpse porn magazine. A

There's a lot of Season 2 left to go, but things have already gotten much better. The best ones here channel the vibe of the comics in a way that would do any fan proud. I'm quite excited to get further into it!

Tales From The Crypt - Introduction and Season One

Despite all my years as a huge horror film buff, I somehow never got around to seeing Tales from the Crypt, the iconic HBO anthology starring an animatronic corpse who cracks himself up with his own ridiculous puns. My sudden interest in checking it out came after I read a fantastic book about the legendary 1950s horror comics called "The Horror! The Horror! Comic Books the Government Didn't Want You to Read!" That title is anything but hyperbole, by the way, but we'll get to that in a minute.

I knew a bit about the 1950s horror comics beforehand - I had seen some of them and had been impressed by how frighteningly brilliant they still are. The book made a compelling case that society needed this kind of grim entertainment to process the horrors of World War II, something not allowed by the stifling entertainment that typically defines this decade. The surrealistic gore and dark twist endings weren't all they had to offer, either. Many took on issues of the day, including racial discrimination in an era when it was not politically correct to do so. The comics were hugely popular and eventually attracted the attention of the usual suspects who can be counted on to spoil the fun for the general public. Since video games wouldn't be invented for a long time, the so-called "moral guardians" decided that horror comics were single-handedly turning children into murderous delinquents and the issue even led to Congressional hearings.

Eventually, the criticism became so intense that the comics industry adopted a system of self-censorship. Every issue could be evaluated and if deemed acceptable, would receive approval from the Comics Code Authority. When it first began, the rules were so strict that you couldn't even have the word "horror" on the cover. Of course, you didn't have to get the seal but most retailers were unwilling to put comics on the shelves unless approved. It's a bit like how the MPAA can use the NC-17 rating to banish independent films from the majority of movie theaters if there's too much gay sex in them. This ultimately destroyed the horror comics...they were gone, but definitely not forgotten.

By the time Tales From the Crypt, which adapts a comic for each episode, premiered in 1989, everything had changed. The groundbreaking intensity of 1970s horror films, followed by the gore-crazy 1980s, had demolished many of the taboos of the past. The comics were reborn with all the violence, swearing and nudity that's still a hallmark of HBO, but instead of being ostracized it was welcomed with open arms and lasted for seven seasons. Major movie stars and directors couldn't join in the fun fast enough. The Cryptkeeper began showing his ugly face all over the place, including a few movie spin-offs and a Saturday morning cartoon version where he introduced stories that actually had happy endings. A more detailed look at the story of those comics can be found in a fantastic hour-long documentary on the Season 1 DVD. But let's talk about the episodes! I gave up using letter grades for reviews a while ago, but I'm going to bring it back for now just because there's so many episodes to discuss and it could get hard to make comparisons eventually.

The Man Who Was Death: The pilot was directed by Walter Hill, the distinctive filmmaker behind cult classics like The Warriors and Streets of Fire. His sensibility meshes well with the story of Niles Talbot (Bill Sadler), an executioner who enjoys throwing the switch far too much. When his state unexpectedly abolishes the death penalty, he finds himself out of a job and decides to hunt down and electrocute acquitted murder suspects in his spare time. It’s fairly predictable, especially the final twist, but the story really couldn’t end any other way. Sadler is entertaining in the lead role and there’s a nice satirical point here – Talbot is just doing his job when pulling the switch on behalf of the state, but killing people in the exact same fashion outside of work makes him an outlaw. A-

And All Through the House: Directed by Robert Zemeckis (Who Framed Roger Rabbit?), this is a morbidly funny tale of a scheming wife (Mary Ellen Trainor) who murders her husband on Christmas Eve and plans to indulge in his money with her new boyfriend, who inexplicably refers to himself as “The Dick Monster.” She gets her comeuppance when the house is invaded by an axe-murdering lunatic dressed as Santa (character actor Larry Drake). Zemeckis stages the mayhem very well and the ending evokes classic horror films by not showing the money shot and leaving it to your imagination, where it’s sure to be much more gruesome. It’s ridiculous, but that comes with the territory when you’re dealing with evil Santas. One thing’s for sure, it’s a lot better than Silent Night, Deadly Night. B

Dig That Cat…He’s Real Gone: The first great episode comes courtesy of Lethal Weapon director Richard Donner, who employs a lot of flashy editing tricks reminiscent of comic book panels. A homeless man (Joe Pantoliano) undergoes a mad scientist’s experiment to give him a cat’s nine lives and becomes a sideshow sensation as “Ulrich the Undying.” It’s a hilarious episode with great twists and a dim view of human nature that’s consistent with the comics that inspired this series. As a bonus, there’s also an incisive NRA joke that’s even more satisfying now than it was in the late 1980s. A

Only Sin Deep: A weak episode about a vain prostitute (Lea Thompson) who sells her beauty to the local pawn shop owner/sorcerer for a small fortune. After she uses the money to insinuate herself into the 1 percent, she suddenly begins to age rapidly. It’s meant to be an indictment of the character’s greed, but the details of the deal sound so harmless (he only asks to make a plaster mold of her face) that even the most virtuous person would have agreed. It’s a lot more interesting when someone makes a devil’s bargain knowing full well what they are getting into, with Ariel in The Little Mermaid as just one example. Aside from that, the episode also suffers from clumsy dialogue, a weak ending and Thompson’s obnoxious New York accent. C-

Lover, Come Hack to Me: This ridiculously sleazy episode makes me glad I never watched this show growing up with my parents in the room. Directed by Tom Holland (Child’s Play), it’s the story of a sad little heiress (Amanda Plummer) and her obnoxious gold-digging spouse (Stephen Shellen, a rare male example of this trope) who get lost in a storm on their wedding night and find shelter in a creepy abandoned mansion. While there, he finds out more than money runs in her family. The ending is satisfyingly gruesome, but the rest of the episode drags like crazy. It illustrates the potential problems of adapting those 50s comics – many of the stories were only about 4 or 5 pages, which means you’ve got to be creative while stretching them to a half-hour of television. Didn’t work so well here. C+

Collection Completed: The golden years aren’t so great for a retired workaholic (M. Emmet Walsh) and his crazy-cat-lady wife (Audra Lindley). Slowly driven insane by a series of petty domestic slights, he adopts a twisted new hobby. Walsh is great as the miserable old bastard and director Mary Lambert (Pet Sematary) captures the necessary buildup that was missing from the previous episode. It’s a great example of the pitch black humor that seems to be an early strength of the series. A

Only six episodes for Season 1...they were just testing the waters. There are a lot more in Season 2, so we'll see if things become more consistent. Then again, anthologies in general tend to be pretty hit and miss. If I don't get another one of these up before then, Happy Halloween!

Gargoyles Season 2, Volume 2 Finally Available!

So this happened.

My previous posts about Gargoyles are the most popular in the history of this blog, but I wasn't sure the situation would ever be resolved. After eight years of fans waiting and pleading with Disney, they finally just put this baby out with no fanfare whatsoever. Perhaps this was the set that was originally going to be released last Christmas but didn't show up for whatever reason. I first heard the news on Facebook, of all places. For the last six months or so, the Gargoyles page (which previously had been mostly inactive) was offering links for fans to stream the episodes one at a time. It seemed out of the blue and I suspected something was going to happen with these DVD releases soon.

Technically, this doesn't complete the series, but it's close enough. After the mammoth second season, the show was changed to Gargoyles: The Goliath Chronicles and continued for another short season. However, series creator Greg Wiseman only wrote the first episode and Season 3 is considered vastly inferior and outside of the canon. Plus, if I remember right, the epic three-parter that concludes Season 2 ends on a satisfying note.

So what are we waiting for? Here's the link on Amazon. The price is steep, even after being reduced by Amazon, but I guess Disney wants to be sure they turn some kind of profit on this since that's the reason they dragged their feet for so long. If you remember the show, you know it's worth it. Mine's already on the way.

Maximum Carnage - 20 Years Later

In the summer of 1993, the various Spider-Man comic titles teamed up for a huge fourteen-part crossover featuring the massively popular villains Venom and Carnage. As a kid, I dragged my mom to comic shops all over the place to make sure I had every installment. Today, "Maximum Carnage" is remembered more for the popular beat-em-up video game it inspired and those who recall the actual comics tend to derisively refer to it as "Maximum Garbage" and present it as a brainless poster child for the excess of 1990s comics. I'd argue The Clone Saga is a much better example of the latter (plenty about that here), but I still have a bit of soft spot for "Maximum Carnage." When it first came out, my younger self thought it was the most epic and awesome thing I'd seen in comic books. My reaction to it is much more complex as an adult - there's a lot to criticize but there's also more meat to this story than it's usually given credit for. You can call it many things, but "brainless" isn't one of them.

Setting the scene for this storyline requires a ridiculous amount of explanation, but I'll try to be as concise as I can. Everything really starts with Venom, the name Eddie Brock took for himself after bonding with the sentient costume briefly worn by Spider-Man. Brock was clearly unstable, but not necessarily a danger to the public in the way that other supervillains are. He didn't want to take over the world, he just had one goal - kill Spider-Man. What made him especially dangerous was that he knew Spidey's secret identity, although he kept to himself since he didn't want other villains taking him out first. At one point, the living costume breaks Eddie Brock out of prison but leaves behind its child. This creature joined with Brock's cellmate, the certifiable Cletus Kasady, and Carnage was born. This was a vicious serial killer with the ultimate weapon and Spider-Man and Venom decided to put aside their differences and deal with him. Not long after Carnage's defeat, the two of them reconciled and Brock went to San Francisco to start over.

"Maximum Carnage" starts immediately after the death of Harry Osborn, the second Green Goblin and Peter Parker's longtime friend. It was also during the storyline where his parents, presumed dead for 20 years, suddenly reappeared. They would later be revealed as robots, but let's not get into that. It's a stressful time for the Parkers and Mary Jane manages to persuade her husband to take a break from the Spidey activities. He begins this vacation on the same day Carnage breaks out of the asylum - typical Parker luck. Perhaps he could have kept his promise if more traditional villains were on the loose, the ones who were more prone to petty theft than murder, but Carnage was far too dangerous for him not to intervene. Worse still, he begins assembling a team of other murderous villains to join him in his bloody rampage through New York. They include Shriek, a drug addict and former groupie (probably with Kiss, judging from her makeup) who can fire blasts of sound energy, Spider-Man's evil doppelganger from the "Infinity War" event, Demogoblin, the physical manifestation of a demon who had once possessed The Hobgoblin, and Carrion, a failed genetic experiment with a decaying touch. They take on a grotesque "family" relationship that's clearly meant to draw comparisons to Charles Manson.

After hearing of Carnage's return, Venom heads back to New York and stupidly takes on Carnage's posse by himself. Barely able to escape with his life, he is forced to turn to Spider-Man for help. The question of just how to deal with Carnage's gang, and the New Yorkers who are beginning to riot as the city destabilizes, forms the backbone of the story. "Maximum Carnage" is ultimately about the conflict between classic "truth and justice" heroes like Spider-Man and the new, more popular violent antiheroes represented by Venom. During an introduction for the collected saga, writer J.M. DeMatteis comments that "I'd had my fill of the pyschos and mass murderers running through the pages of half the comic books on the stands, and those were the heroes." The storyline becomes a lot more interesting with this in mind - it pushes back against the increasing popularity of lethal enforcers like The Punisher in the same way that DC's more polished "Kingdom Come" story would a few years later.

Spider-Man and Venom gather a large team of heroes to help their effort, but they just can't see eye to eye. "You're too soft, too weak!" Venom snarls at one point. "You'll never be like us!" Spider-Man quips, "Best news I've heard all day." The heroes split into two groups to try and deal with the crisis in their own ways. On Team Venom is the vampire Michael Morbius, a former enemy of Spider-Man, Spidey's ex-girlfriend The Black Cat, and Marvel's Spawn rip-off Nightwatch. The vigilante Cloak fights alongside Venom for a while, but is so distraught over the death of his partner Dagger at Shriek's hands that he grieves on his own for a long time before eventually switching to Team Spider-Man. Spidey's allies include his longtime friend Firestar, the cyborg Deathlok, the mystical martial artist Iron Fist, and Captain America himself. It's a stretch to believe that he didn't bring the rest of the Avengers with him, but I guess the writers knew Carnage wouldn't last long against the likes of Thor and The Hulk.

The ethical conflict also plays out among Spider-Man's loved ones. His father, Richard Parker, was left with a dim view of humanity after his experiences during the Cold War and would certainly be sympathetic to Venom's methods. Meanwhile, saintly old Aunt May knows that Spider-Man's compassionate approach is the right one. Mary Jane, incredibly stressed and conflicted, drifts back and forth but ultimately sides with Aunt May.

So we've established that "Maximum Carnage" is surprisingly rich in its themes, but that doesn't make it perfect. It's frequently compromised by an inconsistent tone that resulted from four different writers working on the various parts. This is especially problematic when you're dealing with material as dark as mass murder and urban chaos. You can definitely tell this was made during the early 1990s, a time of relative peace and prosperity. In today's world, a story like this would be told with drop dead seriousness. As an example of how wildly the writing varies, I'll show two excerpts. The first is from DeMatteis and depicts a turning point in the saga. Click here and then here.

You have to admit...that's an awesome moment. On the other side of the spectrum is the writing from Terry Kavanagh, whose writing I knew was awful even as a 10-year-old. I had to scan this one myself, for some reason the internet's not in a hurry to share this moment. Check it out here.

So Carnage, the working class nutcase who didn't even finish middle school because he was too busy killing people, suddenly sounds like Dr. Doom. "Your pathetic arrogance, fools, will be your very downfall!" Jeez, with lines like that, it's no wonder people made fun of me for reading these comics. That groaner is a good example of the major issue with this story - some of the writers are just not taking it seriously and going on autopilot with the usual trading of punches and lame quips even though the subject matter demands more.

The ending of the story, which really stretches the suspension of disbelief, gets a lot of ridicule from Spidey-fans. First, Dagger uses her light-based powers to reconstitute herself in the depths of Cloak's huge cape. Her attempts to reach out to Shriek, who nearly killed her, inspire the others. They run off and grab a crackpot device that's described as a "biofeedback machine designed to amplify the brain's calming alpha waves." The contraption causes most of the villains to pass out, but Carnage uses the confusion to fake his own death. When most of the other heroes have gone home, he emerges one last time to confront Spider-Man and Venom. As they both battle Carnage, they have their final philosophical debate. Finally, Venom defeats Carnage by grabbing him and then throwing himself into a generator. Both survive the resulting explosion and Carnage is placed in the custody of The Avengers while Venom skulks off and begins his long trek back to San Francisco.

As for the final verdict on the dueling schools of crime-fighting thought, the story seems to arrive at something of a compromise. Venom's final act shows that even deeply flawed "heroes" are still capable of real selfless acts, but it's also clear that his rival's philosophy has left an impression. "I find myself haunted by Spider-Man's words," he admits, wondering if the insane Carnage is "an object of hatred...or pity?"

It's easy to see why this story still has so many detractors. During an era when Venom and Carnage were grievously overexposed, "Maximum Carnage" was their most famous appearance. The 14-part length can be exhausting, especially when you get the sense the story could have been told in half the time. It's also a little odd that the writers come out so strongly against the dark violence of that era's comics when they take so much time to depict Carnage's rampage. Then again, would the uplifting conclusion be effective if the readers hadn't been dragged through darkness for so long? Tough question. In the end, I think its detailed commentary on the creative trends of the time it was made in will continue to interest those who explore the history of superhero comics.

Roar

The late Heath Ledger is known primarily for playing the sullen cowboy Ennis in Brokeback Mountain and his anarchist take on The Joker in The Dark Knight. The former got him an Oscar nomination while the latter earned him a posthumous win, a first for an actor playing a comic book character, but Ledger was just that good. He got his start in 1997 with the lead role in the short-lived television series Roar that hooked me one summer before it abruptly vanished.

Roar followed in the footsteps of popular fantasy shows like Hercules and Xena, using 4th century Ireland as its locale. The major struggle was between the Celtic tribes and the invading Roman empire, although this show was far closer to fantasy than history. It treated both Celtic and Christian mythology as absolutely true, leading to all sorts of oddball plots. The unique setting pulled my teenage self in, especially when the last three episodes shown on Fox considerably raised the dramatic stakes. The next week, it was gone, replaced by Ally McBeal. I watched that for a while just because I didn't want to give up the ritual of watching at that time, but it obviously wasn't the same. This was during an era where Fox became notorious for canceling shows prematurely (with Joss Whedon's Firefly being a more infamous example). The complete series came out on DVD shortly after Ledger's Oscar nomination for Brokeback and, to my great surprise and delight, included five episodes that never aired!

Ledger plays Conor, whose family is killed by the Romans and reluctantly takes up the fight against them. His partners include Fergus (John Saint Ryan), a middle-aged badass with an epic Fu Manchu mustache, former Roman slave Catlin (Vera Farmiga, who has since become a very successful actress), Fergus's estranged daughter and Druid apprentice Molly (Melissa George), and token black guy Tully (Alonso Greer). I don't use that phrase lightly - Tully contributes nothing to the overall storyline. The writers seemed to realize this towards the end of the series since he's absent from the last three episodes. The villains are pretty far from what you expect on a show like this. I don't really know what to make of Lisa Zane as Diana, the self-appointed "Queen" of the invading Roman force. She takes a pragmatic approach to her villainy, which I like, but there's never a moment where she becomes intimidating. Her adviser, Longinus (Sebastian Roche), is the Roman centurion who finished off Christ on the cross with a mercy kill and has been cursed with immortality as a result. In the fascinating "Red Boot" episode, one of the show's best, he coerces a Roman historian to paint him in a positive light, assuming correctly that he will eventually be granted Sainthood.

It was fun to rediscover this show, but it was quickly clear that it doesn't hold up to the high standards people have come to expect in today's era of television. The tone is surprisingly inconsistent - sometimes deadly serious, other times campy and whimsical. Ledger and Ryan are the only actors who even bother with the Irish accent. The show was filmed in the Queensland region of Australia, which is very pretty but looks nothing like Ireland. The show often manages to be compelling in spite of all this - my favorite episode is still "The Eternal," the last one that aired on Fox, which features a full-tilt performance by Ledger during its epic ending.

As for the previously unseen episodes, it's mostly a mixed bag. The last episode, "Sweet Brigit," is just bizarre...not to mention unnecessary, since the penultimate episode, "The Cage," is a far better finale. Gripping, full of twists and surprisingly hilarious, "The Cage" offers an awesome ending to the Longinus storyline plus an out-of-nowhere musical number (really). Even though I was let down as a kid when it left the airwaves, I'm not sure where it would have gone in a second season after these episodes. I was surprised at the amount of closure I got from this DVD set, unlike the woefully unfinished Pirates of Dark Water. Of course, it must also be said that returning to Ledger's debut drives home just what a skilled actor the world lost when he died so abruptly. He was only 17 when this was filmed, but the talent was already there and at moments, it's almost blinding. Rest in peace.

The Nostalgia Series is done for now, but I have some more stuff coming up - another Spider-Man thing (don't worry, it will just be a one-off) and then a brand new series I'm pretty excited about. Keep reading!

The Labyrinthine Dreams Kickstarter is on!

If you click this link and help us out with a donation, you'll have my eternal gratitude!

Nerve-wracking stuff, this crowdfunding business. We've put a dream of ours in the hands of the masses. But if it works out, Mark (ArtBane) and I will be able to work towards a major milestone in our personal and professional lives. The short version of this is that we're seeking $6,000 to enhance our puzzle game Labyrinthine Dreams. Most of the funds would go towards hiring a couple of professional artists, with other portions meant for expected business and marketing costs. If we're able to secure the money and get this work done, we'd have a real commercial game that had a chance in the competitive independent game market.

Regular readers of this blog know that I've got a long history with RPG Maker. Our six-year collaboration on Master of the Wind was how Mark and I made a name for ourselves in the RPG Maker Community, who bestowed a highly generous amount of acclaim and awards on us that remains humbling. Since then, we haven't been quite as focused. I took some time to write my novel The World Beyond and later, we began to work on our detective game X-Noir. We had some thoughts of a commercial future for X-Noir, but now that we're about two-thirds done with it, it seems that will not be its destiny. It's a little too odd, too tough to refine into something with a feasible commercial future. We needed something that would be ambitious and unique without being too sprawling and difficult to polish. Enter Labyrinthine Dreams.

We had seen a few of our friends successfully put together games that were fairly short, but highly focused in their story, gameplay and art style. Meanwhile, we had spent 2005 to 2011 on one of the longest completed RPG Maker games ever released. X-Noir was meant to be on a smaller scale, but the highly detailed nature of the game's story has turned into a fairly big undertaking itself. This time, the game would be designed so that players could complete it in about an hour and there would be one consistent gameplay mechanic throughout - mazes. With this project, Mark had a chance to tackle an idea he'd been holding on to for a while - a game set inside a dream. He had briefly worked on a previous game with this concept called Vacant before we determined that I'd be back in the writer's seat.

It was interesting timing to be sure - I had just returned from the hospital after the birth of my sons. Vacant had been dark and sinister, but I wasn't necessarily feeling dark and sinister. My mood was something like exhausted triumph. The year that led up to the birth was packed with drama, adversity and confrontations, but my wife and I had gotten past them all and now we had two cute little guys. I could go into more detail, but one of the Kickstarter rewards is an audio commentary so I should probably save it until then. But in general, I wanted to distill my experience into a story that was vague enough so others could relate to it. I'd say there's two main themes of Labyrinthine Dreams - one is an old-fashioned arc of perseverance and redemption, the other is a critical look at the toll that our cultural obsession with productivity and profit takes on quality of life.

We've got a full playable version of the game now that gives a good sense of the story and gameplay, but as with all our projects, it's art that we need some help on. There's a four-minute video on the Kickstarter page that gives a few more details. I hope you'll decide to help out, either by donating or by spreading the word. Thanks!