Thanks to the keen eye of SF Signal’s John DeNardo, we have word that the auteurs at The Asylum or offering their homage to Terror of MechaGodzilla: Mega Shark vs. Mecha Shark.
It looks like pretty much everything we’ve come to expect from The Asylum…
Looks like I’ve been falling down on my Giant Spider reporting duties. A retro black-and-white giant spider film has been released called, oddly enough, The Giant Spider.
Many of you reading this blog will be attending LoneStarCon 3, the San Antonio Worldcon this year.
Many of you reading this blog have also watched the SyFy Channel’s film Chupacabra Vs. The Alamo.
I know it may come as a shock to some, given the painstaking technical accuracy evident in other SyFy films like Mansquito and Arachaquake, but Chupacabra Vs. The Alamo does, in fact, take certain liberties. As such, to avoid disappointment among those visiting San Antonio for the first time, and given that it’s Cinco de Mayo, which plays an important role in the film, I want to offer up some clarifications on errors made in the film.
The Mexican border is southwest of San Antonio, not southeast. Southeast is the Gulf of Mexico.
There are no green mountains near San Antonio. Unlike, say, Vancouver.
Many people in Texas ride motorcycles, but they do so on roads, not against badly-composited bluescreens.
DEA Agents in Texas do not typically ride motorcycles with unsecured shotguns.
DEA Agents generally drive to crime scenes in cars, not motorcycles.
Especially not riding on the back of another DEA agent’s motorcycle.
People do not typically need to wear jackets in San Antonio in May. Unlike, say, Vancouver. (Though this year may be an exception…)
Animals the size of a Scottish Terrier are not typically capable of dragging away 200 pound police officers in full SWAT gear.
As the seventh largest city in the United States, San Antonio has a large, modern police force. They would not need a random assortment of DEA agents and rogue gang members to take out a few hundred wild dogs.
While many San Antonians are bilingual in both English and Spanish, seldom do they pepper their English with the very most common Spanish words, as though to say “Look, ese, I speak Spanish!”
Police interrogation rooms do not generally look like small business conference rooms.
Most Hispanic gang members in San Antonio don’t look vaguely Asian, and don’t speak with a slight Brooklyn accent.
It is very doubtful that repeating long rifles can be found in display cases at the Alamo, as the Spencer Repeating Rifle was not invented until 1860.
Even if they were in said display cases, it is very unlikely that they would be stored with live ammunition, ready to be used by anyone who broke open the case.
Even if the gunpowder hadn’t gone bad after almost two centuries.
There is no basement in the Alamo. (A point that I think has already been definitively established.)
There is no secret escape tunnel underneath the Alamo. If there was, I’m pretty sure 177 years of urban infrastructure development would have found it.
Especially if it was wide enough for 10 people to walk abreast.
Especially if it lead to a giant metal hatch in a parking lot near the Alamo. (Or, more specifically, a stage in front of a bad bluescreen projection of a parking lot near the Alamo.)
Chupacabras or not, DEA agent or not, if you blow up the Alamo, expect to spend a lot of time in jail.
As the 7th largest city in the U.S., San Antonio also has a large, modern Fire Department, so if you did blow up the Alamo, it would not still be giving off a plume of digital smoke well into the next day.
I hope this has cleared up any confusion anyone might have about San Antonio or the Alamo. Happy con-going!
In his tomb in upthrust Lapland
Dead Kris Kringle lies dreaming
If you’re looking for a weird Christmas horror movie, you could do a lot worse than the Finnish movie Rare Exports. The son of a reindeer herder/butcher finds out that a team just over the border in Russia are drilling into a mountain they believe to be a tomb.
It quickly becomes apparent that the tomb is that of Santa Claus. And the real Santa Claus is not the jolly fellow of Coke commercials, but a fearsome punisher of the wicked that looks a lot more like Krampus:
What makes the film work is its cold, gritty, unsentimental realism. It really does look like it was filmed in a tiny village in Ass End of Nowhere, Finland. Save an unconvincing CGI helicopter at the end, and the strange coda that gives the film its name, I thought everything about the movie worked pretty well. Of recent Scandinavian horror films, I thought this worked better than Dead Snow, but not as good as Let the Right One In.
Worth viewing, and available on Netflix.
I was going to do a longer review, but I’m running out of Christmas.
Watching Hammer Film’s 1964 Evil of Frankenstein, several thoughts occurred to me:
You would think Baron von Frankenstein would be a little more circumspect about hiring a corpse-snatcher.
I wonder why Frankenstein needs two orange fountain drink machines in his lab.
“Hey, I’ll just go back to the castle they ran me out of ten years ago! I’m sure there’s no chance they will have looted all my expensive belongings!”
“Hey, my enemies are now the mayor and chief of police! I’m sure accusing them of theft couldn’t possibly backfire on me in any way.”
A mute, blind beggar women just happens to lead Frankenstein to his frozen monster. If she could speak, I’m sure she’d say her name was “Deus Ex Machine.”
Sure, a hypnotist is the obviously the first person you think of for reversing severe brain damage.
Somehow the mute, resurrected monster who’s never been spoken to understands every command given by the hypnotist. What a stroke of luck!
“There’s no way the monster could possibly misinterpret my vague command!”
“There’s no way they could possibly trace back the crime spree of a monster back to the castle he was created in!”
After the “incident,” I’m sure the Karlstaad police added “bottles of chloroform” to the list of things not to let people keep in jail.
Pretty much every major character in Evil of Frankenstein is an idiot. With the possible exception of the Burgermeister’s wife, who has a pretty sweet gig as bosomy eye-candy.
Important Safety Tip: Do not get Frankenstein’s monster drunk. Just not seeing a lot of upside to that brilliant decision.
