Category: Horror

The Store

Bill Davis is an average guy with a regular, loving American family living in a quiet little town of mom n pop shops and a generally nice atmosphere. Until the The Store comes. The Store is a major retailer that has everything for ridiculously competitive prices that takes his town by storm. Having the businesses of town strained and the albeit rapid expansion of its premises is nothing out of the ordinary when it comes to big business, it is just the beginning. Disappearances, unexplained deaths, and a cult-like devotion to the Store is sweeping through the town; no matter the Store does, they find a way to buy themselves out, becoming a plague not only destroying the town but Bill’s own family, leaving him to question how far will they go?

Ok, so this story hit me in a nasty personal spot much like HORRORSTOR did, just on a way grander scale. I spent almost a decade of my life working for a certain evil empire I can’t name and I can tell you, anyone who’s ever worked retail, this is your worst nightmare. Unlike HORRORSTOR, this book goes to some outright disturbing places that somehow don’t feel out of the realm of possibility. What I love about the story is the Davis family and the townspeople are simple, relatable folk; the book is written with an easy, friendly style that lures you in instantly. Bently Little genuinely freaked me out while I read this and I give him a lot of credit for making a story that stuck with me and actually helped me leave the evil empire. In the end, I highly recommend this surprising read for a rare and unexpected kind of scare. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Phantoms

Snowfield is a peaceful, picturesque, mountain town. Young Doctor Jenny Paige is traveling back home with her little sister Lisa after their mother just died. The two get along really well but Jenny can’t help feeling guilty over staying away for so long and avoiding her family. The town suddenly and eerily feels deserted as Jenny and Lisa uncover bodies all over town, each looked to have died in tremendous horror but nothing seems to make sense as each death defies rationality. The sisters manage to call reinforcements from the neighboring town but it becomes soon clear something deadly is lurking around Snowfield that defies more than just rationality.

I got to start by saying this is the first time I finished with a Dean Koontz book; I’ve tried several others but none really vibed with me until Phantoms. For positives, Koontz has really good flow and pacing. The characters and atmosphere are pretty good and their is even a few really good suspenseful moments. I really like the beginning and I was engaged to find out what the hell was going on. Around the third act the book started losing me and I couldn’t help feeling grateful the alien from The Thing wasn’t able to talk. The ending was basically your standard Hollywood ending and I felt a bit miffed like I did after reading IT (the novel). In the end, Phantoms is a good read. Not great, but I enjoyed it for a few long nights at work. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Tokyo Ghoul: √A (season 2)

We pick up right where Tokyo Ghoul (season 1) left off, the 13th district has become a warzone as the radical Ghoul terrorists of Aogiri Tree clash with the human Doves of the CCG openly. Kaneki, though free, has changed. No longer timid and quite harmless, after awakening his true powers he’s become a truly brutal force. He leaves his friends of the Ghoul sanctuary Anteiku in pursuit of power, knowing g he needs more to keep his friends safe in the growing war- joining Aogiri to do it. Kaneki faces his own horrors as his body starts changing and his urge to kill dramatically increases as he becomes the scourge of human and ghoul alike, but can he stop the war to come before losing everyone he loves?

I adored the first season with all my heart and still do but all my friends warned me the series gets…different to say the least. Admittedly this season is a hard call. Overall I like it but I think it’s definitely a mixed bag. Overall I’m ok with the story but some parts of it really do feel like you’re watching fanfiction then a part of the series; characters do things that make no sense and sadly you really don’t get as much of the Anteiku group but more of the Aogiri group which I was nowhere near as interested in. There are great fights but the pacing overall feels bloated even though the season is only 13 episodes. The animation and score are great but I don’t really like the new opening theme ( I do love that Unravel returns for the very end.). In the end, I get if you liked or hated this season so I urge you to keep an open mind after season 1. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Wonder Egg Priority (season 1)

Ai, Neiru, Rika, and Momoe are four lonely girls dealing with depression, loneliness, guilt, and the traumas of experiencing suicides in their lives. What they have in common is finding a seemingly normal egg, an egg that opens another world. From that egg spawns the tortured soul of a suicide victim and it’s up to the girls to slay the monstrous tormentors of the victim to free, with the promise that enough freed victims will return their own loved ones. In the acts of battle, the girls find friendship and the strength to move on but are they willing to face the costs of a second chance?

Seeing the sunny exterior in the horror section of the Funimation catalog intrigued me; if it hadn’t been for When they Cry I would’ve cast this deep series as a miscast. This show beautifully covers some really bleak subjects and does them with genuine humanity and depth. I loved the four main characters and their own private struggles; I love the main theme of using dark fantasy to combat the real traumas of the world as well as mental illness. The artwork and score are fantastic. One of my only real complaints is I found it really hard to gauge if the series if merely over or meant to return in some way. There are a lot of unanswered questions I have and I feel like Frill was set up to be a great antagonist that we didn’t get a full conclusion to and Ai was a heroine we didn’t get a full resolution to either. I really hope we get another season so I don’t have to feel the ache of Deadman Wonderland all over again. In the end, I highly recommend checking this series out on Funimation. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Ms. Marvel trailer

I actually really liked Kamala Khan in the comics so this trailer hurts. Why Disney felt the need to change her powers and make her a Green Lantern knockoff is beyond me. I’m kind of flabbergasted about who the villain is supposed to be and I’m kind of shocked how cheap everything looks, especially being a Disney MCU show to boot. I’m really not looking forward to the show now but I’ll keep an open, if not ultra-cautious mind. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Jurrasic Park (novel)

After being surprised by Jaws (novel) I was really curious how much Spielberg changed for the movie. While I have reviewed the Jurassic Park series and while the movie is pretty much a cultural phenomenon, I’m not going to regurgitate the plot because the general plot is the same. What I’m going to do is basically talk about the differences and while I actually really enjoyed the book for some pretty damn different reasons.

So the book for Jurassic Park, while having a lot of the splendor and wonder of the movie, there is actually a lot of smart ethical questions and corporate evil in the book. In fact, Hammond is actually an eerily evil sociopath that is hell-bent on basically being his own god, no matter who dies in the process. The book never feels preachy about the ethical issues and the science but expertly feels like a grim kind of foreshadowing of how everything goes belly up. Another huge difference is the body count and gore in the book which is definitely past the pg-13 boundary and a lot of characters die in the book that don’t in the movies. The climax is more intense and well, a bit more brutal but also more realistic and fitting. Pretty much the only part of the book I couldn’t stand was Alex, Tim’s now younger sister (in the movie she was the older); she’s annoying and I swear she almost gets her, Timmy, and Grant killed at least half a dozen times in some pretty idiotic ways. Hammond maybe my favorite part of the book, starting as the kindly if not delusional grandpa figure he was in the book to becoming a heartless bastard as the story unfolds. The book is reasonably paced and Crichton had a great way of not talking down to his readers but not dumbing his themes down. In the end, I highly recommend the novel for Jurrasic Park, especially on Audible like I enjoyed it. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

The Snowman

I have returned dear readers with glorious purpose and such horrors to speak of. Let me begin with a movie I was actually pretty interested in back in 2017, so much so I ran out and bought the book and was genuinely perplexed when the movie’s reviews came back as scathingly bad. But how? Michael Fassbender as a gritty detective searching for a sadistic killer who buries his victims in snowmen, how could this possibly go wrong?

Harry Hole is a broken man. While a talented detective, he struggles with alcoholism, depression, and his estranged wife and son. When a series of people mysteriously vanish and their bodies turn up strangely, it’s up to Hole to dive into a strange world of corruption and broken hearts to discover the truth behind the Snowman killer.

Ok, so they wanted to make Seven but instead they made an absolute mess. I truly regret complaining about the editing in X-Men: Dark Phoenix because this movie is a dumpster fire turned nuclear by the editing. It’s a jumbled mess of things happening, characters appearing with plot threads that go nowhere and I feel like there is a megacut somewhere that’s probably like 4 hours long but this movie isn’t worth saving. Poor Fassbender tries his ass off to save this movie but Harry Hole is such a trainwreck I can’t really take the guy seriously (his name sure as hell doesn’t help either.). I pegged the killer super early and when the mess of a story comes together, it’s meh. This movie isn’t gory or disturbing, it’s a not really a good noir, and holy shit drags. The only really redeeming feature I can really say is some of the cinematography is nice, not great but nice. The only other thing I can say is I laughed my ass off alot because of how unintentionally hilarious the movie is- so there is that. In the end, unless you are like Savior and I and enjoy super bad movies, I can’t recommend this movie at all. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

The Batman Joker deleted scene

So I got to say as I’m sure many of us are, but I’m tired of Batman and Joker stories. When I heard there was 0 Joker in The Batman I was pretty glad. That being said, I love this scene. I’m not really familiar with Barry Keoghan’s work but holy shit I love his portrayal as Joker; him and Pattinson have great chemistry in this scene and I like the Hannibal Lector callback. His design is very unsettling, and I love how degraded and ghoulish he looks. I hope we get some more of the duo in future films. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

How I Met Your Father Impressions

How I Met Your Father is a spin off of one of my favorite shows of all time, How I Met Your Mother. So clearly going into this I had low expectations it would be something I enjoy but very high hopes.

It’s a fine line to walk honestly, you need enough of a connection to make people coming back to say hey this is familiar enough to make me want to watch but new enough so they don’t say hey this is a rip off cash grab.

You also need it to be just be a copy and paste because let’s be honest here, if How I Met Your Mother came out in 2022, it would have gotten destroyed. It’s been off the air since 2014 and already Barney Stinson would probably be canceled as a rapist and Robin as being abusive to Ted. And don’t even get me started on Marshal and Lily. Even towards the end the show was acknowledging how messed up the group was.

Honestly that was half the charm of the original and much of that is missing here. Most of us knew a toned down version of all the people from HIMYM. One of the characters from HIMYF however is a very rich British guy (Charlie) that ran away to be with another character ( Valentina) and a third (Sid) legitimately owns the bar they all hang out at.

The main character,Sophie, (Hillary Duff) is equally as unrelatable, while she struggles with dating in the world of Tinder and hangs out with her friends she mostly whines about turning 30 and not knowing what to do with her life, even tho she already has a career.

That’s not to say the show isn’t entertaining, the show is actually quite entertaining. It has it’s laughs and I enjoy that the first episode they out right tell you that’s how she met the father even tho they never tell you which character it is. Some of the characters also live in the same apartment from the original that they got off an older married couple (clearly meaning Lily and Marshal)

The show is by no means bad, it just lacks much of the character of the original. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.