Buffdiver

Hi everybody. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a lesbian now.

And she didn't even join Team Pink with Willow. That's kinda cold.

Masters of Horror, Season 2

Ready for round 2?

I know I was. Despite the fact that much of MOH 1 was flaccid at best, I still find myself riveted to the concept of a weekly horror anthology show. The hope it gives me in inextinguishable. It has to be. Cuz let’s face it, as horror fans we put up with a lot of crap. For every THE EXORCIST, there are ten thousand SLEEPAWAY CAMP IIs waiting to sodomize what few precious cinematic standards we cling to. We need to know that there are “masters” at work, keeping this ol’ dead horse alive and eating brains, and that the next EVIL DEAD or PSYCHO or GINGER SNAPS is right around the corner.

Let’s see what sort of hope MOH 2 brought us.

THE DAMNED THING
I assuming that the title is actually referring to this episode’s script, which is clichéd, predictable and lacks an ending. The story just stops – which after an hour was okay by me. When I saw Tobe Hooper’s and Richard Matheson’s names in the credits, my eyes totally made that ah-OOGA sound. Those two geniuses are given an hour to play and they do this? I remain bewildered and twitching to this day. After the stumbling DANCE OF THE DEAD last season, Hooper is 0 for 2.



FAMILY
John Landis has still got it, and directs George Wendt in a likeable performance as a lonely, suburban psychopath. FAMILY is a popcorn-worthy hour and one of this season’s best. The performances were even diverting enough that the relatively predictable ending snuck right by me. Landis, you sly boots, you. With DEER WOMAN under your belt, you’re 2 for 2.

THE V WORD
Ernest Dickerson did as well as could be expected with Mick Garris’ bipolar script. The first half of this vampire yarn is wonderfully suspenseful and creepier than the repressed memories of an inappropriate uncle. Spooky ol’ Michael Ironside is nothing short of perfect as the alpha vampire. But despite this strong hand, the second half makes a hard right turn into SappyTown. The young hero, now a vampire himself, is emboldened by the power of loooooooove and overcomes Ironside’s eeeeeevil influence in order to save his own baby sister. Turn your volume up loud enough and you’ll still hear the echoes of my dry heaving. I’ve seen Scooby Doos that didn’t have that pat of an ending.

SOUNDS LIKE
Brad Anderson wrote and directed SESSION 9, which is easily one of the best and most underappreciated horror movies of this decade. He also directed THE MACHINIST, which, while not a horror movie in the strictest sense, rocks. Like these two gems, SOUNDS LIKE follows Anderson’s trademark theme of creeping insanity that may or may not have supernatural causes. Unlike the two films, Anderson is not given a feature’s worth of time to develop the story. As a result, SOUNDS LIKE feels rushed and I was often left with that ‘um...whaaaa?” feeling. This includes the climax, which balances being a cop out and a gory crescendo at the same time. I’m nitpicking, though, and SOUNDS LIKE is an entertaining cerebral palate cleanser between monster episodes. Hell, compared to most of the episodes this season, SOUNDS LIKE walks on water.

PRO-LIFE
Myself, I support the right to choose. In this case, I chose to fast forward through the most contrived script and hammiest acting in the whole series in order to get to a cool looking monster. John Carpenter not only screwed the pooch on this episode, he shaved its back and stole its chewtoy. It's hard to find dialogue delivered this badly outside of an Oxy Clean infomercial, but PRO-LIFE pulls it off. Carpenter’s average for the series stands at .5 for 2. CIGARETTE BURNS was one of last season’s best, but there needs to be a penalty for this subcrap turdtacular. You’re John Fracking Carpenter, man! You know better.

Back to the monster – or better, all the monsters. The most consistent masters of horror of the series - the artists that manage to not only deliver but deliver with a smile and a side of fries every episode - are Howard Berger, Greg Nicotero and their legion of astoundingly talented flying monkeys from KNB EFX Group. Perhaps even more critical to each episode than Garris himself, Berger and Nicotero are the delicious reason I keep licking this lollipop every week, even though half the time it tastes like honey on a hairball.

Which beats the hell out of a hairball without honey.

But I digress.

PELTS
Speak of honey-covered hairballs and they shall appear. Italian director Dario Argento has a rep for weaving offbeat supernatural phenomena into tales of brutal violence. But the ghosts of raccoons haunting an evil furrier? That’s not offbeat, that’s guh-hey. Argento ends up 1 for 2, saved by last season’s JENIFER.

THE SCREWFLY SOLUTION
Bingo! Big fat gold star to Joe Dante and writer Sam Hamm for delivering the series’ second best episode ever. Although the title telegraphs the ending to anyone that's ever watched a National Geographic special, this is one of the few episodes that would make a fantastic feature length movie (if you can overlook the relative buzzkill of the extinction of the human race). Inventive, violent, suspenseful, well directed and acted – with a dark twist on current trends of “green living” that I for one found very welcome. Paired with HOMECOMING from last season, Dante proves to be the series’ most dependable director. I’m calling it 3 for 2.



VALERIE ON THE STAIRS
Mick Garris pens and helms this tale of figments of the imagination that don’t know their place. Our hero learns too late that beautiful naked women that magically appear on staircases can’t be trusted the same way you’d trust, say, a beautiful naked woman throwing up in the bushes outside of a nightclub. Remember kids; drunk and naked, yes, magic and naked, no. Tony Todd appears as the episodes monster du jour, an old school demon straight out of HAXAN. Berger and Nicotero wove their usual makeup magic on Todd but honestly, his voice and demeanor alone are enough to empty the bravest of bladders. VOTS isn’t outstanding but since neither this nor CHOCOLATE went so far as to actually suck, Garris’ directorial average is kicking around 1.3 for 2.

RIGHT TO DIE
Rob Schmidt? Seriously? How did the guy that directed WRONG TURN get to be a “master” of horror? Was George Romero too busy doing comic book conventions? Jesus wept, people.

Ironically (and I really, truly mean that), this episode was turned out okay. The skinless apparition of the scorned and scorched lady burn victim was ghastly and inventive and when the antagonist is force-fed his just desserts, the story proves satisfying. And while I am not usually a fan of gratuitous sex being shoehorned into a script as filler, Julia Anderson’s soft-core hot tub scene is hotter than a Rolex on a hobo. PARENTS: if you’re concerned about that horror addicted, comic book reading, Warcraft playing, mathlete teenage son of yours, rent him this. If that hot tub scene doesn’t have him grabbing his inhaler for dear life, face the fact that you’re never going to have grandchildren.

WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM
I didn’t even have to eject this DVD. My player vomited all by itself.

How director Tom Holland and writer David Schow were able to take something as universally creepy as the killer ghost of a retarded clown and make it, well, more retarded is beyond my capacity for forgiveness.

THE BLACK CAT
prediktabul nding. I haz it.
But the good news is Stuart Gordon isn’t sodomizing another Lovecraft story. And the better news is he’s not rolling Poe over, either. This BLACK CAT is an original tale that features Jeffrey Combs as Poe himself in a fictional tale of the hardship and inspiration, lovingly sprinkled with murder and animal torture, leading up to the penning of the title story. And guess what? It didn’t suck at all. Better than that, even – I’d watch it again. Gordon managed to put aside his trademark lack of subtlety and direct Combs in an atmospheric tale of spiraling self-destruction that’s actually reinforced by the gratuitous gore instead of being distracted by it. I enjoyed it enough that the utterly formulaic ending didn’t even faze me. Congratulations, Stuart. You ended up 1 for 2. You may have a cookie.



THE WASHINGTONIANS
Cannibals? Creepy. Old guys in makeup and powdered wigs? Also creepy. George Washington used his wooden teeth to eat virgins? Creepy trifecta! Congratulations, you have my attention. The actors delivering their lines like a community theatre production of PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN? Oopsie doodle, you just lost it. Time for a sammich.

DREAM CRUISE
Norio Tsuruta’s DREAM CRUISE is the last of season 2 to come out on DVD. I won’t lie: I haven’t seen it yet. I’ve yet to read one favorable review and from all accounts it’s another case of a vengeful, watery Asian ghost girl with long, magic hair tentacles. Come on, Asian directors! Isn’t there anything else you’re scared of? Giant lizards? Declining math scores?

O sure, I’ll see DREAM CRUISE eventually. With the Writer’s Guild still on strike, I’m even amazing myself at the crap I’ve been watching. If DREAM CRUISE exceeds my expectations – which are currently hovering at none – I’ll append this.

That’s it for season 2. Not half bad, but not really half good either. Luckily, horror fans tend a ‘glass half full’ kinda bunch. Which has always struck me as odd.

And now, we wait.

Showtime, a CBS company, has kicked MASTERS OF HORROR to the curb and this summer it resurfaces, reinvented, as 13 episodes of FEAR ITSELF on NBC. It’s an interesting move for NBC. MOH is not exactly small screen gold: edited for network TV, most of the episodes would either be unwatchably dull or unworkably short. That means that story alone will have to fill the gaps left by gore and boobies. As if such a thing were possible.

Still there’s hope. NBC is obviously comfortable subjecting its viewers to unreasoning, mind-numbing horror. After all, this is the network that greenlit JOEY.

Masters of Horror, Season 1

When I first heard about THE MASTERS OF HORROR, I started giggling like a Japanese schoolgirl on Red Bull. This, I thought, is why Prometheus gave us television.

As of this writing, MOH has been on the air two seasons on Showtime and the third season is migrating to NBC under the title FEAR ITSELF. That…will be interesting. Both of the Showtime seasons have been available on DVD for a while now and since this effort was pretty significant for horror fans I’m chiming in, late as opposed to never. After all, it’s part of my mission here to save you $3.79 at Blockbuster whenever possible. Think of me as your seeing eye dog that’s specially trained to keep you from stepping in another dog’s poop.

Here’s what Season 1 had to offer. Keep in mind that these men have the eggs to call themselves “Masters” so I see no reason to cut them even a shred of slack.

Entertain me, monkey boys!

INCIDENT ON AND OFF A MOUNTAIN ROAD
In the series’ premier episode, director Don Coscarelli weaves a tale about a young girl being menaced by a deformed serial killer. Way to hit the ground yawning, guys.

DREAMS IN THE WITCH HOUSE
You know the story about Rumpelstiltskin, the elf that spins straw into gold? That’s how I feel about Stuart Gordon, except that he is not an elf. He is a wheezing bridge troll that takes the gold of Howard Phillips Lovecraft, the greatest horror author in the history of ever, and serially spins it into mule vomit. I could not hate this episode more if it had shot my dog and stolen my truck.

DANCE OF THE DEAD
Directed by Tobe Hooper and starring Robert Englund, this episode literally brought me to my feet. So that I could walk over to my DVD player, take out the disc and throw it as hard as I could at my cat. I needed something to share my pain.



JENIFER
aka Night Of The Butterface. The main problem with JENIFER is that unless you’re making a sammich during the first three minutes, you already know exactly what the next 57 minutes lead up to. But if you’re a fan of the old CREEPY magazine and are familiar with the source material by horror überartist Berni Wrightson, you’ll appreciate Dario Argento’s faithful adaptation as much as I did. Not too shabby.

Here’s a fun bit of cocktail party banter: although the MOH directors are generally given free rein, Argento scored the series’ first censorship with two scenes of graphic oral sex that never made it to air (but supposedly are on the DVD special features). Personally, just watching Jenifer eat a Twix would be enough to stimulate my gag reflex so I might have to side with the angels on this one.

CHOCOLATE
MOH series creator wrote and directed this episode about a food designer lab guy that develops a unique psychic link with a murderess. My guess is that they were running short on the effects budget and needed an episode that didn’t have a cool monster in it. Luh-hame.

HOMECOMING
Finally! Joe Dante starts his streak as one of the season’s and the series’ best contributors with this thinly veiled jab at the Bush administration by screenwriter Sam Hamm. Zombie soldiers rock the vote. I love this episode.

DEER WOMAN:
A series of bizarre trucker murders leads a detective to a Native American were-deer woman. In theory this sounds gayer than Allan Cumming getting his own fragrance but in practice, director John Landis turns this into one of the season’s best episodes.

CIGARETTE BURNS
Zeus of horror, John Carpenter, continues the show’s winning streak with this story about a movie that drives its audiences insane. (Hell, he got plenty of practice doing the same thing in IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS in 1995 so this should have been a walk in the park.) This episode also features the disturbingly puffy and fish-eyed Udo Kier, a one-man atmospheric slam dunk for any horror film. Udo Kier could do an IHOP commercial and I’d still feel like I needed a shower afterwards.

THE FAIR HAIRED CHILD
How the epileptic chimpanzee that directed FEARDOTCOM was able to keep the MOH streak going is an utter mystery to me, but director William Malone delivered this solid episode about a warlock couple that just want something to hug. The creature in this episode is delicious and could have carried its own feature. My favorite bugaboo in the whole series so far.



SICK GIRL
MAY is one of my favorite horror films of the last decade and I’m sure I’ll ramble on about it at some point, so of course I let out a high pitched squeal when I found out that director Lucky McKee was reuniting with Angela Bettis for this one. Add in horror porn star Erin Brown (aka Misty Mundae) and a vicious beetle that can scramble your DNA and baby, you got yourself a stew. A little campy at times, but fun.

At this point, I'm encouraged. There's been a streak of five episodes ranging from entertaining to legitimately good and I've almost got the dry, grainy taste of the season’s first three episodes out of my mouth.

PICK ME UP
WHAMMO! Larry Cohen delivers the series’ best episode by a wide margin. Who would have thought that the guy that did IT’S ALIVE III had this in him? Now, I’m not a fan of torture horror. I usually need something supernatural in a movie to really grab my attention. But this story, written by David Schow, about a turf war between two serial killers is original and captivating, and casting Fairuza Balk as the mouse caught between the cats was genius. If you only see one episode of MOH, blar dee blar blar blar.

I can’t wait to see how good the next episode is, can you?????

HAECKEL’S TALE
O goddammit. Who gave a Clive Barker story to the guy that directed WILD THINGS? You know it's just gonna be about dicks. What, was the title NYMPHO WITCH ZOMBIE GANGBANG already taken? After loving every second of PICK ME UP, enduring HAECKEL’S TALE was like my TV punching me square in the Adam's apple.

IMPRINT
Takashi Miike is going to get his own blog here someday. Oh, you can bet on that, pumpkins.

But I digress.

IMPRINT was the object of much buzz because SHOWTIME REFUSED TO AIR IT! Sweet buttery jeebus on a cracker, what unearthly visions of mind-wrenching madness and gut-churning mayhem could Miike be trying to jam into our horror holes?!! He couldn’t have come up with something more horrifying than his film AUDITION, could he have?

Well, yes. And no. Here’s my theory. Mick Garris called Miike. “Takashi. Babe. Listen. I’ve got this series on American television and you can do whatever you want for an hour. Interested?” So Miike thinks for a second. “Let’s see…what would creep out an American audience? How about extended prostitute-on-prostitute torture sequences with needles, incest, vestigal twins and a Civil War grade abortion clinic set next to a clear mountain stream so that I can film the deformed feti struggle for life as they bob on their way out to sea? Groovy, let’s do this.”

So while IMPRINT is chock full ta’bustin’ with truly ghastly sequences and imagery, they don’t hold together as a story. It’s just too much for one hour. Your enthusiasm is appreciated, Miike-san, but seriously, try decaf.

Next up – Masters of Horror Season 2.