Tag Archives: Horror

Underworld: Awakening Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

This may be the last Underworld review for a little while but it’s been an intense marathon to be sure. Awakening takes the series in a pretty solid direction as I would say it is the best title in the series so far. Now I suppose this is fairly relative as you’ll notice that there really isn’t much of a change in score.

The movie starts with the government finally deciding to step in. Now this is a plot I had definitely been looking forward to because you know that these guys are going to tip the scales. They don’t disappoint either. We learn that they have immediately wiped out virtually all of the Werewolves and even the Vampires are in hiding with only a small handful of bases left. The humans have won once more as always. They even managed to take down Selene and Michael with incredible ease.

12 years have passed and Selene is freed from her deep slumber. She doesn’t know who has freed her and why but now she wants to find Michael before it’s too late. She goes around slaughtering all the humans in her way but is no closer to finding him. She then meets up with a little girl who seems to have mysterious powers and a vampire named David. Together they will locate Michael but they also have to keep Eve (the little girl) safe as she is being hunted.

There’s a lot of action throughout in this film. After all, Selene is now powered by the elders so her power has grown exponentially. She is effectively on par with the hybrids now which is a pretty good power bump. Then you have the fact that she was already one of the most experienced Death Dealers and the villains need to watch out. The war between the vampires and werewolves is over. At this point everyone is scrambling for survival.

I had a feeling that this would be the best film early on. When Selene broke out of the test tube it was like something out of Resident Evil when Alice remembered everything and started a massacre. That’s pretty much how this plays out and it feels like Selene has the highest body count yet. She is not taking any prisoners at all and it’s nice to finally see her using these abilities well. It’s Selene’s best appearance by a longshot.

Fans of Michael from the first two films likely won’t enjoy that he is written out so quickly though. The guy gets less than a minute of screen time here and doesn’t look great. There’s a scene near the end where you have to question what he’s doing. He really didn’t think this one through. Now there is some extra context in the next film that you may feel retcons things to an extent or if not, it’s at the very least a little implausible how this would have went down.

The new main guy is David and he’s pretty solid. He may not be quite as powerful as Michael but he’s determined and does well at defying his vampire community to help Selene out. Then you have Eve who is pretty powerful. She isn’t quite old enough yet to really be able to know what she’s doing like the others but she does take down her share of enemies. Her berserker stage can definitely hold its own with the other characters.

As you can probably guess the fights are on point here. Any time Selene is beating up on the fighters with her twin gun style or just using some hand to hand it’s pretty impressive. I had a bit of a hard time believing that the super wolf at the end could give her so much trouble though. I guess we needed some tension or it would be too easy though. It did make for a great final fight.

At its core this is why the film exceeded the others. It had the best action easily and I would also say the story was the best even if it’s a lot lighter than the others. In terms of scope and mystery then the first film wins but this one was really a good revenge story about her search for Michael. As I mentioned, the army’s involvement was also pretty solid and I like how easily they were able to end this war. It had been raging for hundreds of years among the the two species but the government ended it in 12.

That’s really impressive. It would have been nice to see a bit more of them since they effectively vanish but I think we’re supposed to know that they still have the edge at this point. The vampires need to lie low for a while and the Lycan have been all but exterminated in the meantime. If anything this would have worked rather well as the final Underworld film even with the loose ends that stuck around.

Of course it wouldn’t be Underworld without incredible amounts of gratuitous violence at all times. The series likes to give the fighters as many gruesome injuries as possible before ultimately blowing them up. Because both species have regenerative abilities it allows the films to really go all out in having them get thrown around. If you would just tone down the violence, blood sucking, and biting then this series could have really ended up being close to top notch.

You could probably stand to fix some of the power levels a bit too. After a while Hybrids don’t seem to special if they can be taken out with one hit and how is Selene being overwhelmed by a giant wolf like that? She should still be able to win with pure skill the whole time. The way she defeated the final opponent was quite clever though so it was nice to add some strategy to the mix.

Overall, Underworld: Awakening feels like it has gone back to the roots of the series. We get a lot of excellent visuals and the city is back in the forefront. We get to see the world’s reaction to the beasts which is cool although it would have been even better if they were thrown in a court room or something. Selene’s investigation into what happened to Michael also makes for a great story beat. We’ll see if the series can continue this one’s momentum. While it may be kept as far away from the top as ever, at this point you’re invested in seeing how it all goes down.

Overall 2/10

Underworld: Rise of the Lycans Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

Underworld has returned for another title. This time we’re travelling to the past though so you won’t be seeing Selene and the hybrid fighter running around. While I would say this one’s weaker than the last two, it still delivers on what you would expect to see in an Underworld title. There’s a lot of action here and of course with the Lycans being main characters you can expect them to get a lot of screen time.

The movie begins by introducing us to the vampires dominion which is ruled by Viktor. At the very least he owns the strongest cabal from the Vampire bases and he rules it with an iron fist. The humans all have to bring him their riches and supplies if they want to keep being protected. That said, the Lycans have made this more complicated lately. They continue ransacking these places which undermines the people’s faith in Viktor.

Then you have his daughter Sonja who is having a secret affair with Lucian, one of the Lycan. Lucian is the only one allowed to have at least a little respect and power within the vampire ranks. He shows more reason than the rest of the werewolves and he has agreed to serve Viktor. The other vampires don’t like this though and do what they can to make his days as uncomfortable as possible. This could have been the end of it, but Viktor continually shows that he will never respect the Lycans so Lucian decides they will need to escape. Can he really break all of them free from the vampire shackles?

What this film really underscores is that Viktor is 100% responsible for the war that ends up breaking. His advisors warn him to treat the Lycans a bit better or there could be an issue. They tell him that patrols are needed to watch over the human villages so they don’t revolt either. Viktor won’t hear any of it and continues to say that his way is the best way. Of course this couldn’t be further from the truth.

Then you have the way he treats Lucian. You’d think that he would want to keep Lucian at least a bit comfortable since the rest of the Lycan will follow his lead. That’s not the case though as he punishes Lucian for saving Sonja since the werewolf had to transform in order to do it. Really? So you’re penalizing him for saving your daughter. We all know Viktor would have murdered Lucian if something had happened to Sonja so the game just felt rigged in that sense.

Viktor absolutely sped up the time table of the revolt and he was as oblivious as can be. I thought he made for a pretty hype villain in the first film but here he just looks incompetent at his job. If he had even a little sense of strategy he would have been able to have put the vampires in a good spot.

Meanwhile, Lucian makes for a decent lead. The fact that he basically works to destroy his own kind at the vampire’s orders hurts him for the first half though. It takes a while for Lucian to effectively decide to stand against them and that’s really only when the issue is forced. He does make the right call in deciding to go back to try to save Sonja though. Ultimately there wouldn’t be much meaning in escaping if it meant leaving her behind.

Here we see Lucian fight as more of a warrior than a beast and he looked rather impressive. It’s still hard to see him taking on most vampires but it does look like you keep some of your strength in human form. Ultimately I think his fans will be satisfied with his portrayal here. As for Sonja, you know how her story will end from the start and the film’s more about seeing how the situation unfolds. Her skills were impressive as she even overpowered Viktor. It would have been nice if she would have made a move to escape earlier with Lucian since that started leading things on the wrong path but in a mansion of vampires the mission can be difficult.

The cast is fairly small here as the rest of the characters are mainly just supporting figures who don’t really get much of a role. We do get to see more of Raze here who was the loyal right hand man to Lucian. He’s dependable here as well and you can see why he earned the role. The guy doesn’t fear his opponents the way that most fighters do.

The action scenes here are pretty solid. You definitely have a lot of back and forth and the best battle is either Lucian or Sonja against Viktor. Not surprising since he usually makes for the best fights. The effects are on point and the mansion visuals are good. I do miss the modern aesthetic of the earlier films though. Looking at the forest and a medieval setting just can’t beat a modern city.

There’s not a lot to say about the soundtrack though. This film also gets held down by all the same negatives of the first two films so it’s nothing new in that respect. The film really goes over the top with all the violence everywhere. Characters are eaten, ripped apart, and drained dry. You can expect a high body count here of course. The lucky characters are the ones who are instantly destroyed as opposed to being roughed up first.

The romance with Lucian and Sonja also ends up falling here. It all happens rather quickly although presumably the affair’s been going on for a long while in secret. How they ever got together is not something the film has time for since it’s not the longest. Taking out that subplot and redirecting that to some more politics with the humans would have been nice.

For me the highlight of the film is the ending scene as we get a glimpse into the present timeline. It’s an old scene but with 1 new word of dialogue which was probably cropped from the climax of the first film. It’s just a nice way to end things off with a character being in complete denial at the end. Of course that would soon change in the sequels.

Overall, Prequels are a good way to build lore and many franchises use this tactic. Personally it’s very rare to find a prequel that is super engaging because I’m always more interested in finding out what’s going on in the present. Effectively this would delay that journey 3 more years if I had been watching live. Still, now we know the full origin of the war. I’ll also have the review of the next film up pretty quickly. If you liked the first 2 films then you’ll want to check this one out but otherwise you will already know if this is a series that you’ll want to skip. It really plays out very similarly to the others.

Overall 2/10

Underworld Evolution Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

Time to delve into the sequel to the original Underworld film. It was a film with a very interesting concept. While the movie ultimately ran into a lot of issues, it did capture your attention. Evolution switches things up quite a bit. Ultimately I would say the first film wins but it’s fairly close and the film did some unexpected moves which I thought was admirable.

The movie picks up right away with Selene and Michael still on the run from the vampires. They need to find Markus since he is the last remaining elder alive. Now….they know for a fact he is back at the mansion where the first film’s climax is so why are they searching? Presumably Selene is suckering Michael so she can leave him at the safe house and go on a solo mission but it seemed at least for a bit like they were going to legitimately search. I dunno, just one of those things I guess.

Well, either way they won’t have to search for long. Markus awakens and murders Kraven before attacking Selene. Fortunately she and Michael are able to fight him off. Markus’ main objective is to awaken his brother, the king of the werewolves known as William. Together they can rule the world and create an army of hybrid warriors. Can Selene possibly stop such a powerful threat?

Compared to the first film, this one’s more of an isolated adventure. The war isn’t really the focus here so it’s more of a direct “Stop Markus at all costs” adventure for the heroes. I suppose without Lucian the Werewolves don’t really have a whole lot of backup anyway though so it’s in their best interests to let the vampires destroy themselves. Selene is a little more distracted here than in the first film since Michael still plays a main role. They need to bump that guy off already.

He hasn’t really improved from the first film. Additionally, he may be a hybrid but the guy is still getting absolutely wrecked when he fights another powered up fighter. His super speed from the first film appears to be gone as well. None of the fights in this film are quite able to match up to the climax of the first and I miss some of the bigger gun fights but we do have more battles between the metahumans hybrids so that’s always nice to see.

There’s still quite a bit of action here to be sure. Hopefully Michael ends up getting more of a personality for the third film. Getting weakened and having to drain Selene’s blood isn’t really doing him any favors. As for Selene, she finally gets a power up here which is nice to see. I can only see this being a net positive for her since it means she should be able to dominate most of the cast now. Very few fighters should be able to match up to this level of strength.

As for Markus, he’s not nearly as impressive as Viktor. The guy is strong but you don’t get the feeling that he is worlds away from the others as you did with Viktor. His final fight with Selene is pretty good though. The guy may not seem like much of a hero but I suppose at the very least I’ll give him points for being very consistent about wanting to help William. The poor guy’s been locked up for hundreds of years which is crazy when you think about it. I suppose Werewolves don’t need food the way that vampires do or he would have really been shriveled up by now. William doesn’t really have any character though as he’s a pure wolf meaning he is basically mindless. He only has just enough of a mind to know not to attack Markus.

Underworld: Evolution falls into most of the same cinematic traps as the first film. The violence is quite over the top with all of the characters being hacked to pieces and dying in rather gruesome ways. Nobody ever gets a really happy ending in these things when you consider just how much they had to go through first. The fact that the film’s about Vampires and Werewolves means you’re going to see both species biting into each other the whole time.

There’s also a lot of blood sucking which is always annoying and rather gruesome. Now that this film shows it as the main way to see memories you can expect to see it a whole lot more often than usual. Mix in Michael’s low stamina and you’ll have more scenes of it as well. Some horses even get mixed up in the action which is sure to have you shaking your head.

The memory absorption also creates a rather big plot hole to the first film I have to say. Viktor did not believe Selene initially about Kraven because the transfer was blurry. All right…so he could have bitten her at any time to read her mind and didn’t? Clearly this wasn’t thought of until the sequel but it definitely creates a bit of an issue there. Not the biggest thing of course but it’s an element that still sticks out.

One of the biggest disappointments has to be Alexander here though. So this guy has a whole government force working for him as he silences the truth about the war between the supernatural forces. As the father to both leaders he wants to stay neutral. That’s all well and good but he should have incredible abilities right? Well, not really since the guy goes down to a single hit and never even looks slightly intimidating. Now that’s a quick way to make this guy as underwhelming as possible. If he doesn’t want to fight that’s fine, but allowing yourself to get messed up like that? It’s pretty unfortunate to the men who worked for him. I’m still waiting to see a true human force show up to mess with both sides.

Overall, Underworld: Evolution is pretty similar to the first film. So if you liked the original then you should like this one as well. It’s not trying to tackle a lot of the more ambitious plot setups as the first one and is going for more of an outdoorsy vibe than the cool city aesthetic with the characters prowling around. I’d like to see more of a return to form when the sequel comes up but I suppose it’s rather relative since I don’t see the film fixing any of its core issues in the near future. For now this is still a series to skip. With all of the vampire elders down for the count I’m expecting some secret Vampire King or something. If not, perhaps Selene can rule them now since there’s nobody who could possibly oppose her right? Have Michael rule the Wolves and then just like that they will rule the whole planet. Having them join forces against aliens or something would be awesome.

Overall 2/10

Underworld Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

I’ve certainly been aware of the Underworld series for a long time. After all, I saw all of the Resident Evil movies and this has always been its biggest rival. The question is if it could possibly defeat that title. The Resident Evil films typically scored around a 2 so it’s not like that should be a tall order except that vampires tend to be just as bad as zombies if not more so. Ultimately Underworld is about what you would expect and I’d say it’s losing to Resident Evil so far but I am early on in the franchise.

The movie starts with introducing us to the situation on the planet. A war between the Wolves and Vampires has been raging on forever. The vampires have effectively won the war as their numbers greatly overshadow that of the Wolves but they still have to take down the stragglers. The first scene is Selene and a few of the vampire warriors attacking one of the Wolves, but this turns out to be a trap and most of the Vampires are defeated. Selene tells the vampire leader Kraven that they need to take this seriously but he doesn’t care. What can a few Wolves do right?

Meanwhile on the Wolf side, the leader Lucian is planning his big assault to take the Vampires down. His side has been relying on hit and run tactics for a while since they can’t win in a full frontal assault but now he may be able to use a more direct approach. His lead scientist has come up with a special kind of bullet that can destroy a vampire in a single bullet. Mix that in with the vampires’ complacency and now he has a fighting chance. Everything will come down to the human known as Michael. Whichever side obtains him first may end up winning the war as his blood is special.

Selene is the main character here but while you may assume that it means the vampires are the heroes here, the film is quick to remind you that is not the case. Both sides are as corrupt as can be so there are no good guys. Whoever wins, it is still not good for humanity. At least Selene has some sense of justice and duty compared to most but ultimately since she is working for the villains that makes it hard to root for her either. After all, at the end of the day any accomplishments she has will go over to the rest of the group.

As a main character Selene is decently good. I would say she easily beats most of the characters in this film in terms of being likable although since I don’t like most of the characters that may not be saying much. There will likely be a lot of comparisons between her and Alice from Resident Evil as they use similar outfits, weapons, and even their abilities seem similar. They’re both analytical fighters and try to keep up a tough front. Right now Alice is certainly winning in the head to head though as she ultimately doesn’t falter the way Selene doesn’t.

Selene has a scene where she faints after talking tough to Michael which really destroyed her credibility there. Additionally, despite being one of the tough assassins among the vampires, she doesn’t tend to win a lot of fights except against unnamed minions. For example, she was losing against Raze and was unable to take him down in the opening fight. She got a hit on Lucian but was unable to take him out before the guy bit Michael and had to hastily retreat. She was completely no match for Viktor in the end and had to rely on some help.

Now, it’s not as if she is amped up past normal vampire abilities so it makes sense that she wouldn’t be stomping everyone but Alice had a tendency to hit above her weight class. Selene will need to do something similar to move on. All that said, I do like her as a character particularly because of her confidence. She is willing to follow her plans through even if it puts her at odds with the other characters.

Kraven doesn’t make for a good villain though. The guy complains a whole lot and isn’t much of a fighter. He’s only good at sneak attacks and his plans aren’t even that good. Lets say his plan had gone without a hitch, does he really think things would end well for him? The wolves would tear into him at any time. Nothing about his plan made any sense so the guy got real lucky. His obsession with Selene doesn’t help matters either.

Then you have Lucian who does his best to be an interesting villain at least but ultimately the attempt fell apart. The guy just didn’t really stick out and the way he goes down was just sad. Did he not see that coming? His right hand man Raze was a lot more impressive and may have been the best wolf. He looked really good in the opening scene and was really taking down a lot of fighters. He can look back at his achievements proudly.

Michael is the main human here but the guy doesn’t have much of a personality at all. He’s just some guy who gets roped into this and doesn’t really have any feelings about it. The guy is constantly overwhelmed. The romance with him and Selene is also pretty bad, the idea of them getting together so suddenly just doesn’t work and it’s especially a bad idea for him to fall for her. Put it this way, vampires do tend to take prey from time to time and there’s no reason for Michael to assume he would be any different. For all he knew he would just get drained dry so the guy comes off as kind of desperate. Definitely wasn’t a fan of his.

Finally there is Viktor who is one of the Vampire Elders. His strength is immense and it’s easy to see why the vampires had been winning the war with him in charge. This guy is lethal and doesn’t spare any of his opponents. He just goes in and gets the job done without any issues. That’s the kind of guy who commands respect in the end. He’s absolutely twisted and a villain through and through but at least he’s one who can fight.

Ultimately Underworld may have an interesting premise of this war going on but it can’t save the film. I like the idea of introducing two factions and then slowly we see them all converge at the end. It’s good but the massive issues here just tend to come with the genre and style this film is going for. First off, the violence is incredibly over the top. There are a ton of violent moments that will have you shaking your head at how gratuitous they are.

In general that’s part of why Vampire and Werewolf media never really did it for me. Drinking blood and such is just disturbing and the Werewolf bites are always rather graphic. That’s why I was actually on board with both sides using bullets instead. It makes for more stylized fights that don’t tend to be nearly as gritty or violent. If the whole film focused purely on guns then the violence probably would be toned down although it probably wouldn’t matter if they would go in to finish each other off afterwards anyway.

At least the soundtrack is pretty hype though. You’ve got a lot of high intensity beats going on the whole time which helps amp up the battles. The visuals are also on point with the world looking like a normal planet and yet it’s a little extra colorful. The scenery when the heroes are in the town during the opening scene probably had some of the most impressive shots in the film. A rainy backdrop in the city can work quite well when used correctly.

Also aside from the gun fights we did get one true fight in the climax of the film. That was cool since it was like something out of a comic book movie with both characters throwing each other around. This one’s a bit older so you can see how the effects have aged in some instances. Characters sort of float through the air when they’re thrown or hit but it still works well in illustrating that these guys are much more powerful than the average fighter. The whole Speed vs Power match also did a good job of showing how the power could win in the end by tiring out the speedster. Personally I would usually take speed over power but it’s not an absolute.

Overall, The Werewolves seem completely doomed at the moment. They have no senior members that can hope to match up to a Vampire elder and their numbers were already small. I have to assume they have some kind of trump card in order to keep the series going. Otherwise the war will be over as early as the next film. That said, even if the story is interesting, the odds of the series actually working to get better is slim to none. Underworld is content to go for shock value and extra violence over taking the time to construct an excellent story. If you want to check out an interesting story of a war between two sides then you’re better off checking out Captain America: Civil War.

Overall 2/10

From Hell It Came Review

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With a title like this you are definitely ready for quite the scary film experience. That said, the monster itself takes forever and a day to show up. For the most part this plays out more like a classic drama of sorts. I don’t know, the genre would be hard to pick. I wouldn’t call it an action or adventure but slice of life doesn’t seem quite right either. Well, once the monster shows up then it’s fair to say that this goes into full creature feature territory I suppose.

The movie starts with a tribe getting ready to murder one guy. This guy had been accepting medical treatment from the Americans which is a big no no in the tribe. Before they execute him the guy says he will come back to life and curse them out. In particular there are 3 people he wants revenge on. His wife who lied to cement his death, The Chief who ordered his death, and the Witch Doctor who framed him. The tribe doesn’t believe he will come back but just in case they bury him deep underground. As long as nobody takes him out they should be safe…

We then cut to the scientists who haven’t been having a great time on the island. The natives don’t like them after all so they live in perpetual danger. Additionally, they don’t have a lot of good food here so they have to survive on rations and sub-par coffee. Still, they continue with their quest to heal all the natives from the plague. Two of the scientists decide to trample on the sacred burying grounds because “Who’s afraid of a few superstitions” as the girl says. This gives the dead guy some energy though so he emerges as a small tree stump that is glaring at everybody.

One of the doctors says she absolutely has to save this tree since as a professional she must save all lives. The tree has a heart beat after all. The other doctors are dubious but concede so she uses an experimental drug on it. This allows the monster known as the Tabonga to finally regain his strength. He turns into a tree monster and starts going about getting his revenge on those who wronged him. Can anyone hope to stop him?

Now, it may be easy to make fun of the Tabonga right away since he has a lot of weaknesses. He is exceptionally slow to the point where a small child could probably outrun him for a long while. Then you have the fact that his arms are rather small so he doesn’t have a long reach. The monster’s also not that big so the only thing he has going for him is a good amount of strength. Once he grabs onto you then it’s game over but it’s hard to get to that point.

So I guess part of the fun in the film is seeing how he will actually grab his victims. Naturally one of them trips but see even tripping wouldn’t be enough for this guy to catch you. So naturally the guy trips on a rock so he keeps rocking back and forth as he moans about his head. this allows the Tabonga to catch up to him and finish the job. For another character she got her knife stuck on a tree so she spends a while trying to pull it out without realizing that the Tabonga is there. She basically falls into his arm and then faints which allows him time to finish the embrace.

The Tabonga just isn’t impressive as a serious villain but he can be a fun one. The design is absolutely unique so you won’t be forgetting it anytime soon. I do think he should have appeared a lot sooner though as it takes so long for him to appear at all. I want to say over half the movie finishes without him and it’s a short movie as it is.

As for the human characters, well I won’t save any of the tribesman were that good. The Tabonga’s wife was a traitor from the get go and didn’t seem to have much of a plan. She is promptly betrayed as the cycle goes on and then isn’t even able to finish off her opponent before the Tabonga appears. The witch doctor is certainly on the annoying side as well. He does manage to take the Tabonga down for a bit but you’re just waiting for him to go down. At least there were two islanders who were willing to embrace the science that the Americans brought.

Then you have the main scientists. There are quite a few of them on the island. The main one would be William who doesn’t take the trees seriously. His cures have been working but a lot of people don’t believe them. He steps up when he needs to and works as a reasonable main character. There really isn’t too much to him beyond being a nice guy though. Then you have Dr. Terry who is the one that brings the Tabonga back to life. You can’t really blame her for wanting to save it but I do think the heroes should have kept someone on guard duty at least. We know nothing about living trees so you should take every precaution available.

Clark was another scientist and probably the most rational at times. So there’s a scene where the main characters wake up after their nap and see the lab in ruins. The other doctors immediately jump to the conclusion that the tree must have come to life and smashed the place up. Clark addresses the elephant in the room though and says instead of leaping to such crazy conclusions what if the natives just broke in and wrecked the place?

The crazy thing is that it was the tree that did it of course, but why would that be anyone’s first guess? Clark’s made the most sense by far but everyone pretty much dismisses it. So much for that I guess. Finally you have Mae who nearly dies early on but managed to just make it to safety in time. She talks a whole lot and has a certain sense of bravado that the others can’t match. She apparently had a pretty good business on the island trading jewels and materials for a lot of money. So things have gone well for her but you’re almost surprised she has lasted so long on this island. Her two husbands were evidently not quite as fortunate so the next one better beware.

Overall, From Hell It Came is a fun enough film. You can’t take the living tree all that seriously but that doesn’t bring down the overall movie experience. The writing is pretty solid here and it’s over in the blink of an eye. The execution in the opening scene is a little intense but after that the film is rather tame. The cast of characters hold up well and this is a film that really captures the essence of the creature feature genre. The characters must all gang up to take this guy down or they are finished. We have supernatural elements and even a bit of a mystery as the heroes figure out how to stop him. If you like this genre then this is a good movie to check out. It’s not all that well known but perhaps that will change if it ever gets a sequel.

Overall 7/10

Slender Man Review

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The Slender Man was definitely a character who got pretty big for a while. Perhaps not as big as Freddy Fazbear but since Slender Man was involved in court proceedings and such he may have gotten more screen time for a while. Naturally the movie came out very late once most of this was already done. It’s not a very impressive horror film though. Slender Man himself doesn’t even get to do anything for the longest time and the film is more about setting up the atmosphere than doing anything with it. Slender Man just doesn’t stick out.

The movie starts with the 4 main girls Katie, Wren, Hallie, and Chloe deciding to have a girls night out to summon Slender Man after hearing that the guys were going to do it. Little did they know the guys decided not to summon him in the end. So the girls watch the tape that summons him and immediately they all feel the fear. Usually after something like that you would expect the characters to just laugh it off or something but they take it deadly serious. You can already tell that the film is going to be rather dramatic the whole time. They figure they will go about their lives as normal except then Katie goes missing a few days later. Can they possibly rescue her from Slender Man or is it already too late?

You feel like it probably is too late at this point since usually you aren’t able to do much against these supernatural creatures but at the same time since a lot of focus is put on trying to bring her back then maybe there is a slight shot. Mainly Wren is the one trying her hardest as she does a lot of research to the point where she basically goes insane and manic over a lack of sleep. She does well in learning about him but also takes far more chances then you would want.

For example, she goes to the message boards that Katie was posting in about Slender Man. The main user there quickly lets her know that Katie is gone and the only way to try and bring her back is to make a deal with Slender Man. As part of this deal she needs to go into the wilderness and blindfold herself in the dead of night along with her friends. Here’s the problem, based on the videos that Katie sent in the chat, this user knows roughly where she lives.

The user would also then know where the forest is so saying that you will go there at night blindfolded is not a great plan. Even if Slender Man isn’t real, the alternative is that this user may have had something to do with her disappearance. If that is the case then you’re pretty much throwing your life away by following his advice. It’s also a shame to see the characters throwing away their prized possessions. Of course if you actually think this could be real then it’s admirable to take these risks to try and save your friend.

Wren is definitely the best character in the movie. She easily takes the most chances and puts in a lot of work to save Katie. Without her the other characters probably wouldn’t have done much of anything. After all, they were doing their best to avoid even thinking about the video. Even when Wren was being up front with them about the nightmares and such they kept trying to act as if it wasn’t happening. They weren’t too convincing about it either.

Slender Man throws in a bunch of jump scares of course but nothing too noteworthy. You have people looking distorted or Katie’s drunk father breaking into the house but for the most part it’s all rather standard like that. You figure Slender Man himself won’t try anything for a while. One scene that was at least visually interesting was when Slender Man started rewriting reality so the library started looking off. He would extend the distance to go anywhere which sort of locks you in a bad spot.

This helps to offset that his design doesn’t look very intimidating. Not only has he skipped leg day for decades but he doesn’t have any real muscle either. He does have one moment where he causes someone’s face to be empty like his which certainly seems like a tough trick to get around since you can’t talk at that point. His actual screen time is so small though. For a film called Slender Man you would expect to see him a little more right? It’s not like we’re ever meant to think he’s not real. It’s clear from the start that he is actually around.

By the end of the film there really isn’t much of a happy ending considering the body count. At the same time, there was never any way the heroes could have defeated him which makes this an exercise in futility. It’s something that particularly happens in horror films a lot that can be annoying. If you write a villain out to be absolutely untouchable then what is even the point? Slender Man has no weaknesses. You can barter with him but that’s about it.

When you remove any chance of even damaging the guy then it’s like the heroes are fighting against an abstract force. At least with films like Friday the 13th and Scream you can see the heroes putting up a fight. You figure they’ll lose in the end anyway but at least it’s close. Although supernatural forces are more interesting to battle with, it’s nullified if the whole journey is pointless.

I’ll give Slender Man the slimmest of credits for at least being fairly tame though. It’s not throwing out gratuitous violence or super gritty deaths at you. There isn’t a lot of crazy language which is usually the norm for these films. All in all it’s a lot tamer than you may think although it’s still quite dark. Slender Man seems to always be going after kids and teens after all which may also mean that he’s nervous about getting adults. That’s pure head canon though since his abilities would suggest that this would be easy as well.

Overall, Slender Man set the tone early when the characters got super disturbed after watching a low quality video about Slender Man. It was just a few images looping at high speeds so it’s hard to see why they were so affected. Apparently they all felt something as Wren would later state but that’s when you knew that the characters were doomed. They were terrified long before they met Slender Man. Katie also seemed to have made a rather iffy choice once we learn more details about what happened with her. She could have at least left the other characters a note or something right? It’s certainly nice that Slender Man got a film I suppose but it’s really just a standard horror film about a group of teens trying to survive for as long as they can against an utterly invincible foe. The characters aren’t particularly likable and there’s just nothing to hook you on the film.

Overall 3/10

Greta Review

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This review is of the edited TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

Greta is one of those films where the whole plot is effectively about punishing someone for doing a good deed. It’s certainly a unique premise there although it also serves as a cautionary tale of why you should always do things through anonymous mail or something rather than going to the home of someone you’ve never met before.

The movie starts with introducing us to Frances who finds a handbag on the Subway one day. She decides to take it home and finds an ID in it for a lady named Greta along with a lot of money. Her roommate Erica says they should just spend the money but Frances wants to return it. The lost and found is closed so she goes in person. Greta is really happy to have had this returned and they end up swapping numbers. Before you know it, Frances and Greta are the best of friends. Erica tells Frances to watch out but the lead isn’t worried. Things take a turn when she sees that Greta has many other copies of the same purse with names on them. Could it be that this was a trap?

Not, it’s a horror film so of course Greta is as evil as possible but even if she wasn’t it’s true that Frances didn’t take a great many precautions. For starters, if you’re returning something from the Subway, you definitely should mail it or hand it to the local authorities to sort out. Bringing the purse on her own to a stranger in a house she’s never been to is absolutely not the right way to go about this. Even more I wouldn’t have given my phone number, that’s all you need to find someone’s address although as soon as Greta had the name that was game over as well.

For the record, returning the bag was naturally the right thing to do even if in the film that’s what got Frances. That said, you just need to give it to a third party or mail it anonymously. As Greta begins stalking Frances everywhere there was also one more scene that stood out to me because it didn’t make sense. So Frances knows that Greta is right outside waiting to tail her. She should leave with some of the other employees when it’s closing time right? Instead she is somehow all by herself when she leaves that night. I doubt they would only have one person closing for such a huge restaurant so how did she end up leaving all by herself after everyone else? It just seemed a little iffy to me considering that she knew how much danger she was in the whole time.

Greta the film also makes another misstep when the main villain adopts a dog. I think everyone knows exactly how this will end the instant that it happens and I was wincing over here. The film handles the end as painlessly as possible which is good but it’s absolutely an element that did not need to be in the film. Why throw in animal violence so randomly like this?

Greta also doesn’t make for the most imposing villain since she is quite old after all. It’s hard to see how she is moving so quickly when chasing Erica. Either Erica also has very poor eyesight or Greta is just that agile. At times there is no place to hide when looking around so that’s one of those scenes where it’s there for the scares but doesn’t make sense.

The other scene that’s particularly iffy is when a private agent goes to scout out Greta’s place and she naturally takes him on with ease. She’s literally dancing around the bullets as if she’s a superhuman fighter while he is getting completely embarrassed. Yeah he got drugged but the whole thing was definitely not a good look for him. It’s not surprising though since you know exactly how his character arc will end the instant he appears.

So you can’t really take Greta seriously and since she is really just insane and barely has a motivation there isn’t much to her. Her goal may be to have another daughter on the outside but really from how she’s acting you can tell that’s a hollow goal and she just wants chaos. I wasn’t a big fan of Frances either though. She really should have at least listened to Erica a bit. I also thought she should have done way better against Greta. We see a montage suggesting she was captured for quite a while and played the role of dutiful daughter until she finally made a move. I’d argue she should have attacked sooner.

Still, at least she attacked and got in a rather solid blow. Frances needed to finish the job there or at least put Greta in a state where she would be unable to fight back. Instead Frances gives Greta her back as she wanders around and gets taken out. In a way this is a horror film that harkens back to the old days where the main characters always made a lot of questionable decisions leading to it being known as a trope in the first place.

Erica is easily the best character in the film. She may be a bit harsh at times but she does look out for Frances. She was also ready to square up against Greta if not for a speeding car that arrived at the last minute. She took a lot of risks in the climax of the film as well. Ultimately she was the only character who could actually give Greta a run for her money. Her bravery alone is enough to make her a solid character and I think the film probably would have gone a lot differently if she had been the lead.

Overall, Greta is one of those horror films where you can see all the story beats coming a mile away. Predictability isn’t a bad thing when they’re good story beats but this film is far from it. Greta’s certainly a very deranged villain who has been in the game for quite a while so the whole situation is rather tragic the more you think about it. She doesn’t seem all that strong physically though so I would have liked to have seen Frances make more of an attempt to escape or fight back more throughout the movie. Her friend Erica was definitely great though and we do get one of those classic horror twist endings to set up the sequel. It makes Frances look pretty bad again though. I definitely would not recommend this one and you should keep looking if you want a solid horror thriller.

Overall 2/10

The Skull Review

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Whenever you have one of these old horror films with Peter Cushing you can expect a lot of drama and tension. He doesn’t scare easily from the villains but they do give it their best. Having a villain be an actual skull is definitely a bold move for sure. It’s not every day you have a skull floating around like this is some kind of Youtube fan video but it works rather well.

The movie starts with a guy running home because he finally got this skull he was going for. He’s so focused on the skull itself that he even tells his friend to go away after she went to the trouble of preparing for his arrival. When he tries melting the skull, it quickly takes him down for the count. It proceeds to mind control another guy to destroy the friend.

In the present, Christopher is competing in an auction with Matthew on a bunch of items. He ends up losing on a batch of evil looking dolls since Matthew overbid for them by a large sum. When asked why, the guy says he has no idea. Ah well, Christopher heads back home to his business of writing about the occult and accepting odd gifts from suspicious characters. This time the guy has brought him a skull belonging to the most dangerous murderer in existence. This could be the break Christopher has been looking for, but will it only bring him doom and despair? Only time will tell.

The film isn’t afraid to get rather crazy as well. At one point, a group of fake police show up and kidnap Christopher. They take him to a church where these guys are having a crazy ceremony and force him to play Russian Roulette several times. Fortunately luck is on his side so Christopher is able to escape and live another day. Things definitely could have been a whole lot worse for him so he should really consider himself fortunate.

Now, he does make some dicey moves like keeping the skull even once he knew it had been stolen. It seems like he’s not very particular about where he gets his objects from so long as it helps is research. So in that respect it’s not like he’s a hero or anything. Still, he is a fun character in large part due to how confident he is. Nothing shakes him in the slightest. Even as he sees multiple dead bodies he keeps it moving.

At one point he even notices that the Skull seems to keep being in a different place but he just rolls with it. The skull stares at him all night and Christopher doesn’t really care. In fact, they even have a staring contest at one point and you could argue that Christopher won that one. Of course, ultimately you get the feeling that he’s probably doomed but at least he put up a good fight.

As for the Skull, well it’s not very scary. You have doubts on if it is even alive for most of the film. It seems like it emits negative aura or something which is why anyone associated with the skull starts going around murdering people. You can make a strong case that this doesn’t have to mean that it’s sentient though, but that it’s cursed. Of course, all the stare downs do give the impression of it being alive of course.

Then by the climax it is clear as the skull is able to fly around with some retro special effects and even summon a book. So, I have to give the film kudos for making one of the most surreal villains of all time. Being unique doesn’t always mean good though. I’ll take most creatures over this guy but as a one time adventure it works well enough.

I would say how effective the film is will really depend on how much you enjoy the suspense. The characters are very slow to do much of anything. The movie is on slow burner mode the whole way through with only a few jump scares to break things up from time to time. The writing is really solid though which helps. It’s why a modern remake would have a hard time matching up to this one. At least here you get the solid dialogue between the characters and everyone talks in a rather distinguished way.

It would have been nice if Matthew had appeared more. A lot of the best scenes in the film are the dialogue scenes between him and Christopher. For example, the auction scene was handled really well. Both of these guys are rich and used to winning. So when it becomes a bit of a challenge none of them back down. They also seem to have a good working relationship when they aren’t competing. It’s part of what makes the climax rather emotional, or at least as emotional as this can get.

You can kind of tell how this film is going to play out from the start though. In these kinds of films where the villain relies on mental hypnosis to take the heroes down, they ultimately never end up standing tall against it. Without fail you can always count on the hero succumbing to the darkness which is unfortunate. Otherwise you can applaud their determination about not believing in such superstitions. It just falls flat once they actually lose to it.

Overall, The Skull is a pretty solid horror film from back in the day. The whole thing is built around a lot of suspense as each scene is played quite dramatically. The score is good with each tune underscoring how scared you’re supposed to be. Even Christopher’s character goes from being absolutely confident to slowly starting to feel some terror as he knows that the Skull cannot be beat. The very final scare scene is almost a bit humorous in how over the top it gets. So next time someone tries to give you a skull that is supposedly haunted and lets you know that it has also been stolen, you should probably stay on the side of the law and refuse it.

Overall 7/10

Escape Room Review

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There are probably less than 10 horror films I’ve ever seen that got a positive score not counting creature features of course. This would be one of the few to make it as it was quite a bit better than I expected. The cast is actually pretty solid which is extremely rare for a modern horror title and the premise is utilized well. You can see the appeal of escape rooms after watching this although I’ve still never tried one.

The movie starts by introducing us to the 6 people who are going to get trapped. First there is the genius Joey who isn’t very good at hanging out with other people. She prefers to keep to herself. Well, one day her professor sends her a cube so that she can try out an escape room to pass the time by. She is supposed to try something challenging over the break as part of her homework so this makes sense. Next up is Jason who is a wealthy investor who probably isn’t using Robinhood so he won’t be frozen out of his sales. He doesn’t really need the $10,000 prize but is doing this for fun and since one of his best investors recommended he try it…the guy can’t say no.

There’s Ben who is at a pretty tough time in his life so he is eager to get some money. It’s all pretty simple to him, win the challenge and get $10,000. It’s similar for Mike who is a truck driver with a big family so he admits the money would be pretty helpful. There’s Danny who just loves escape rooms in general so he is eager to see if this one lives up to the hype. Finally there is Amanda who is the most mysterious of the bunch. We don’t know exactly why she is here beyond the fact that she got invited like the rest.

As you would expect, the 6 characters get stuck inside the room. They must now try to solve each puzzle before the various death traps wipe them out. If they don’t solve the puzzles quickly enough then they will be melted, squashed, and destroyed in short order. The main difficulty here will be working as a team. This is the kind of challenge that is meant to throw some tension in between the members. Survival is often your first instinct after all and all of these characters want to live. Plus they’re strangers so it’s not like they are attached to each other all that much. Can they survive this?

Horror films and survival thrillers usually go by fairly strict logic of over 50% of the cast must die minimum. If you have 10 characters starting off then 5 will due. If you have 6 then at least 3, etc. Part of the intensity here is always figuring out which characters will die and which will live. Of course that’s assuming that at least one lives but it’s extremely rare for everyone to die. That’s usually left for pure slasher films or supernatural entities like the Grudge. For a survival horror like this one you figure at least one would live…right?

Of course I can’t say who lives here. Still, I think what stands out about the film here is that the premise is actually pretty fun. The idea of everyone being stuck in a crazy puzzle house like this and having to escape is a real blast. Each character is tested to their limits and you feel like the puzzles are fair for the most part. You’re actually given opportunities to solve each one if you put your mind to it. I guess at most the only puzzle that seems like it would be a stretch to figure out was the one involving the medical equipment. That one didn’t seem very fair and balanced.

As mentioned, I also thought the characters and writing were pretty good here. Joey is a solid main character and her high intelligence was established early on in the film. She’s able to contribute quite a lot. Now, she does have a cheesy scene at one point in the film where she comes up with a plan. The plan really should not have worked no matter how you slice it since without plot armor that would be game over so even though it was kind of portrayed as she made the right call, I would disagree.

Then you have Jason who is the most confident member of the group. Even when someone dies he is ready to keep on moving. He certainly seems the most uncaring among the group but at the same time you do realize that each second counts here. Several times just 2-3 more seconds would have made the difference in each round. So every time when the characters want to stop and reflect on what just happened and hold a mini funeral in their heads, you can’t blame Jason ducking out of there. You can hardly blame the others for grieving either since it’s hard to just pick up and move out but it’s why Jason was tough.

Mike was another really fun character. He’s having as good as time as he can with this and is clearly a glass half full kind of guy. Mike’s not going to get depressed and he comes in handy with the fishing. He clearly doesn’t take well to be disrespected either so he keeps the others in line. Next up is Amanda who looks really good as well. She started off rather rocky but we gradually learn more about her character. Physically she can hold her own with any of the others as she has a lot of formal combat experience. Amanda’s another likable character here.

Then there’s Danny who loves Escape Rooms and video games as I mentioned. You feel bad for him the whole time because he’s probably the only one aside from Mike having any fun. As he said “I’m playing the funnest game but with the meanest people” which really sums up his experience here. The others are always insulting him or being sarcastic. Yeah, he’s a little slow to realize that this is for real and not just for fun but it is hard to realize that this whole thing is a scam.

The only bad character here would be Ben who is constantly raining on everyone’s parade. He goes into the games with a bad attitude and never gets better from there. Despite this being life or death he is never interested in helping out or doing anything like that. He really needs the money so you’d think he would be more interested in helping out.

Having good characters gives the film a nice dilemma. In a lot of other films you don’t care about which character survives because they’re all bad. Think of a film like “The beast must die” where every character is a cannibal or into evil practices or “I know what you did last summer” where every character was complicit in murdering an innocent guy by the road. You aren’t invested in seeing who survives because they’re all just that bad. Here you’re just waiting for Ben to be defeated but that’s about it.

As the film goes on tensions continue to rise of course so things aren’t very smooth for the characters. I also liked the scenery a lot. In particular the ice level really stands out. A lot of effort was definitely put into the backdrops. The upside down level was another fun one with the phone ringer being a signal for something to happen. Even the opening level modeled after an office building was a blast. The final level’s probably the most boring one since there’s no time to explore with the walls closing in but on the whole this was visually a very impressive film.

Overall, Escape Room was considerably better than I expected. Maybe it’s in part because this is a horror film that doesn’t feel like one. There’s not a bunch of excessive violence for no reason. The film doesn’t revolve around shock value twists. (There are shocking twists for sure but nothing that’s just there to be super insane) The characters are good, the writing is solid, and the visuals are nice. The whole challenge thing is also a really fun gimmick like Tower of God, Phy Brain, or other titles like that where you have to clear a challenge quickly or die. Even for franchises I’m not a big fan of like Hunger Games, I always like that kind of survival aspect when it’s handled well. The film’s ending is also pretty great so this really makes for a complete package. I’m hoping the sequel is able to keep up the momentum since this is a rather high bar to keep up with.

Overall 7/10

The Crawling Eye Review

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This movie’s definitely a little interesting with the promotion. See, the name of “The Trollenberg Terror” sounds a little more hype to be honest and also doesn’t spoil the final boss too quickly. Although if the poster is the same then it doesn’t matter either way I guess. I decided to do a quick check and the Eye doesn’t appear until the final 17 minutes. Of that time I’d guess its screen time is probably more like 12 minutes or less when you factor in all the planning and the ending after him. To think people said Godzilla didn’t appear much in his films…

The movie starts with showing us a mountain climbing “accident” where one of the climbers quite literally lost his head. A lot of people don’t want to come to Trollenberg anymore and why should they right? Climbers are vanishing left and right and there is rarely even a trace of them. Now, that part was interesting since they explicitly say that people always vanish entirely so I guess the alien monster got sloppy on that one?
We then get our main characters Anne, Sarah, and Alan. Alan is a UN worker who has dealt with the occult before and it didn’t exactly go very well for him the last time. It was a very similar circumstance with clouds showing up and then people going missing. He gradually lets us know more about the last incident but conveniently always waits until events happen. For example, last time he also witnessed zombie survivors who tried to murder everyone but doesn’t tell anyone here until someone is nearly murdered.

Still, while he knows that this is real, he is hesitant to actually make a move due to the fact that last time there was no evidence. Then you have Sarah and her telepathic sister Anne. Anne feels some kind of urge to want to stay in Trollenberg. Unfortunately, she is a telepath who is quite susceptible to the alien’s attacks so she keeps trying to climb the mountain where she will be murdered. Fortunately, each of her attempts are always foiled or things would have gotten pretty dicey for her. I’m glad she is trying hard but you wish she could do better. In general that’s the issue with telepaths at times.

Throughout the movie she keeps on saying things like “Watch out!” “Stop!” and things like that. The problem is that her warnings are never very specific and if you listened to them then the heroes would never make a move against the villains. Additionally, she is trying to fight the enemies on her own so of course when she tries to climb the mountain then it makes the others think it can’t be that dangerous right? Even by the end of the film she just gets choked by one of the villains so her powers never end up helping. Sarah does her best to help Anne but doesn’t end up doing much in the film.

From the main characters I would say Alan is the best one. Put it this way, he didn’t want to try and tell people or the government about what was going on but only because when he did the last time he got burned for it. So at least he tried once and in this film he punches out the villains several times so you have to give him some credit there. He is also the one who comes up with the fire bombs plan which ended up being incredibly effective as well so there’s that.

As for the eye monster…well it doesn’t look great. Like I said, he barely even gets to appear and is defeated almost instantly. I have no doubts that he is actually very tough of course but….you just can’t go down that easily. Aside from the people he took out off screen he basically beat like 2-3 people max. That’s not a very impressive number. The monster’s yell is pretty intense though, it really has quite the voice so you’ll hear it for miles.

Part of the plot here is that the monster can mind control people for a limited time after murdering them. Of course…this only works if it doesn’t rip their heads off like the first guy so again I have to admit that the first scene just seems like it’s just there for shock value. The bodies all vanishing makes a lot more sense for what the villain is going for here. The humans look terrible though as two of them lose to a dead guy with an axe. The first guy you could give the excuse of being caught off guard but the second guy? I don’t think so….

The writing is pretty solid as you would expect for a retro film like this. It builds up the suspense pretty well and this could even feel like a Twilight Zone episode. You see the fog coming over to the mountain although probably due to budget reasons don’t expect to get a clear view of it. You may be reminded of The Fog horror films but just remember that this one came first so it actually had the initial idea. That’s what I like to see, it’s most impressive.

Aside from having low screen time though, the creature should have been buffed a little more though. The main characters should not be able to push it back with a single axe. That just looks pretty bad for it and one stick with some fire at the end of it should not be enough to do much of anything. Nah..I can’t buy that. It’s a giant monster, it should be causing massive damage right? If you ask me that makes the most sense so we should have had it completely crushing the mountain and storming the base. Of course the humans would be a little doomed of course.

Overall, The Crawling Eye is a good creature feature movie. Lets face it though, the movie would be even better if the monster had gotten to appear more of course but as it stands, it still made for a pretty interesting villain. What the film should have done was just reduce the amount of time put into the intro. The dialogue is all pretty compelling but we’re here for the monster. Alternately, extend the run time of the film by around 20 minutes which should cover you pretty well on that avenue and then also get you more time for the hype action.

Overall 7/10