Each month we explore pop culture (we kind of have to, it's in our title), 80's and 90's nostalgia, movie and TV trends, old school toys & games, tropes, urban myths, and more. Commentary, criticisms, and opinions abound. Stick around, you might just be entertained.
I've had a hard time recently coming up with anything I felt deserved an entire post.....just a lot of little random thoughts. Finally I realized that if I collected these random thoughts together I might have enough to keep you entertained for a few seconds. So, without further ado.....
Who actually thought Rambo would make a good Saturday morning cartoon? "We have a great idea....let's turn that movie about the Vietnam Vet with PTSD into a cartoon!" "The Deer Hunter?" "No...Rambo! But The Deer Hunter might work for an after school series..."
Seriously.....it makes as much sense as making WATCHMEN or THE TOXIC AVENGER into a cartoon......Oh, wait....
THE ABC'S OF DEATH is not as bad as you have heard. Out of 26 shorts, I would say that roughly half of the are quite good, a quarter are "okay," and the rest "suck." That's in line with just about every anthology movie that has ever been made.
How did MIGHTY MORPHIN' POWER RANGERS last so long? When I was a kid it was merely a show I had to endure so I could get to BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES.
The moment that a NINJA TURTLE gave a villain a "wet willie," it was game over for me and the TURTLES.
BOGLINS were so friggin' cool.
Finally, can someone please put out a decent Blu Ray of CREEPSHOW? I'm looking at you, SHOUT FACTORY.....
I have never been much of a reader, so I often gravitate toward short stories. In my opinion, ten pages or fewer is perfect. Give me the set-up, the background, and then get to the punchline. I feel the same way about movies sometimes. I'm fine investing my time in a full length movie most of the time, but occasionally I just want to watch something for ten minutes and be done with it.
5) MAMA - This little slice of terror is the basis for the underrated horror film of the same name that came out earlier this year. It just came out on DVD and I highly recommend you see it if you haven't already.
4) THE CAT WITH HUMAN HANDS - I can't remember how I came across this, but I seem to forget about it and then run across it again every two or three years.
3) SUCKABLOOD - Sounds like a blacksploitation vampire movie. It isn't.
2) THE WINTER STALKER - Christmas horror films are always the best....so it stands to reason that short films would be good too.
1) STRUCTURE KILL - Hey!!! There's a killer in your backseat....and his ghost girlfriend is clingy!!!
I'm in the process of watching the Indiana Jones movies right now, and rewatching the movies in order has made me even more confused about why everyone hates KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL. Don't get me wrong, I understand a lot of the complaints:
Image source: indianajones.moviesource.com
Yeah, the monkey scene is pretty damn close to a "Jar Jar" level of stupidity.
I agree....Shia Leboeuf kind of sucks.
The Russians are lame compared to the Nazis.
The Fridge.
Why didn't they just make them aliens? What the hell are Inter-Dimensional Beings?
Aside from these complaints, though, I don't have an issue with KOTCS. In fact, it might be my second favorite of the Indy films after RAIDERS. Don't worry....I have my reasons
1) Cate Blanchett is awesome as the villain - In fact, she's the first villain to really make an impression since RAIDERS. Neither TEMPLE OF DOOM or LAST CRUSADE had a villain who stood out, and I was glad that KINGDOM gave the Russian menace a "face." Her performance may have been "over-the-top," but like everything else in KINGDOM this simply a result of a loving homage to the type of movie an audience would have seen in the fifties.
2) Spielberg was very up-front about Aliens being involved due to the 50's setting. - It really does make sense to involve aliens if you are going to set a film in the 1950's. The Nazi's were obsessed with religious artifacts, so that made sense for the 40's, but America was obsessed with aliens in the 1950's. It's not like they dropped the religious artifacts entirely, they just made them less biblical.
3) The basic plot structure is exactly the same as RAIDERS and LAST CRUSADE. - Villain searches for artifact. Indiana searches for artifact. Indiana gets artifact. Villain steals artifact. Villain is destroyed by artifact while Indiana Jones sits back and laughs.
Sometimes movie geeks just can't be pleased. They scream for FAMILY GUY to come back on the air......and then complain when it comes back. The same thing happened with STAR WARS. Poor Indy suffered the same fate. Here's my message to you, movie fans: Don't be so sentimental about the past....RAIDERS was great, but it's just a movie. TEMPLE is just a movie. LAST CRUSADE is just a movie. They are really good movies, but they are....just.....movies. Movies are meant to be enjoyed. Enjoy them.
