The Last American Vampire – Seth Grahame-Smith — CRITICULT – Telling you what to think since 2003.

A goofy, gory journey through American history!

via The Last American Vampire – Seth Grahame-Smith — CRITICULT – Telling you what to think since 2003.

5 short King reads

king king 2

So the other night during a “staff meeting” for Saviorgaming (we played Titan Fall 2 (PS4) ) and Savior told me a reason he doesn’t read much of King’s work because of the sheer size of most of his work and how sometimes they take a long time to really get into. This is a common complaint I hear. So I want to give a list of King books under 500 pages for those who don’t have the patience for giant novels, so in no particular order let’s begin with..

1. Carrie bk Carrie – King’s 1st major novel and a totally powerful first hit for the future legend. Around 200 pages, I couldn’t put it down.

Salems lot 2. Salem’s Lot – One of the better vampire stories out there, King’s 2nd major story is a little over 400 pages and it’s a slower read but suspenseful read.

tower1 3. The Gunslinger: the Dark Tower , The Drawing of the Three: Dark Tower 2 , Dark Tower 3: the Wastelands – I’m counting the first 3 books in the series in this slot. They are my favorites of the series; the first book is roughly 200 pages and books 2 and 3 are around 400 each. A must read for King fans.

Pet Sematary 4.  Pet Sematary – My first intro to King and one of the rare movies that never stopped creeping me out. The book is somewhere 300 pages and is just as creepy as the movie.

cujo book 5. Cujo – Another one of my favorites, this story of a good dog gone bad stacks up with about 350 pages and moves pretty fast as the bloodthirsty fiend himself.

I hope you enjoyed my list. This time I do have a few honorable mentions including Misery , Dark Tower 6: Song of Susannah , Revival, and Cycle of the werewolf . May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Cycle of the werewolf

cycle of the werewolf

Here’s a book many don’t really talk about; most of us are more familiar with it’s film counterpart, Silver Bullet, more. I can also say this right now, if you want to read King but you’re put off by the fact a majority of his work is so thick, this is probably the shortest book you’ll find from him. I read it in one day back when I hardly read. Cycle of the Werewolf is about a reign of terror a werewolf goes on over a year ( I believe), every chapter being a different month. About half through we meet our protagonist,  a boy confined to a wheelchair who encounters the beast and survives and afterwards tries to discover who it really is.

I’ve got to be honest, while the shortest King book I’ve read, it’s one of my least favorites. The illustrations are great and actually pretty badass. The boy was a fair enough character and so’s the main antagonist, but I feel like more could’ve been done. That’s what I  feel hurt the book the most to me, it feels like the skeleton of a what could be a good book. If you want anything other than a quick, bloody read I wouldn’t really recommend it. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

House of Wax (05)

house of wax 05

Warning, though named after the Vincent Price classic, there is pretty much nothing relating the two.House of Wax was a eerie, gothic tale of obsession and revenge staring a legendary actor…the remake has Sam from Supernatural and Paris Hilton. Yep.

So we get  group of stereotypical horror kids going somewhere (who the hell cares where), partying all the way. So pretty much the car breaks down in the woods and a couple of the kids have to look for help, first from a creepy redneck who takes them to an abandoned town with an ancient wax museum in the middle. It becomes clear what people are in the town are waxed over corpses and there’s a deformed wax faced killer running around.

House of Wax the remake is simply ass. It’s not so bad it’s good, it’s just lame. It tries to use the killer’s backstory of an abused childhood to be edgy but it’s just annoying. The characters are stock as hell and nothing really stands out about the movie at all. You can forget this remake and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Breaking Dawn

breaking dawn

So with Let the Right One In I basically concluded my best part of this little best/worst of vampires segment. So with worsts including Twilight , New Moon , and Eclipse it’s damn obvious the final segment would of course be Breaking Dawn (or Breaking Dump as I used to call it). Well, in one fell swoop, Breaking Damn killed my fandom and freed me to better things, but why the hate?

So basically Bella and Edward are getting married and there happy ever ending is just around the corner. The wedding comes and all the background characters  you barely remember and pretty much meant jack shit to the series gather, except Jacob who shows up to dance with Bella, be emo, and go away. So Edward takes Bella to a tropical island the Cullens own for there honeymoon (sure, why not.) They finally get freaky and Edward damn near breaks her in half, but she’s still into it. Well, somehow, though Edward has been dead for about a century, he somehow knocks up Bella with a freak, psychic hybrid baby that is killing her. She wants this baby, even though she has to drink blood to feed the kid in her stomach. The werewolves see this act as treachery to the pact with the Cullens and so they decide to forcefully attack them so they can kill Bella; Jacob ain’t about this shit so he splits with a couple friends and makes his own pack. After a whole lot of waiting for nothing, Bella gives birth to daughter ReneeEsme and Edward makes her a vampire. Instead of something dark and interesting, Bella is able to just ignore her kill instincts and just crunch on animals, she’s able to keep her family near and no one notices she sparkles and has red eyes now  cuz that’s a thing. But hey, the Volturi are coming to kill the baby because it’s an abomination- an abomination Jacob imprints on and falls eternally in love with (eww) and so Bella has to gather witnesses to prove the kid ain’t dangerous and master the lamest power of all time just to talk to these bastards the end!

Normally I’m against spoiling but damn this book. It’s around 800 pages and essentially there’s no gravity as a last installment of a already weightless series. By now, you know no one’s life is really at stake and literally most of this book is nothing but talk. The characters are just as dumb as before, only this time there’s a lot of logic gaps and padding. I actually threw the book at the window after I finished it. I avoided the movies like the plague and I hope Twilight 5 never comes to fruition. May the gaming gods bring you glory and may you never experience the boring horror of Breaking Dawn.

 

Let the Right One In

let me in bk

So, it’s been forever since my last edition of my best/ worst of vampires; the previous three entries for the best were Dracula , Salem’s Lot , and Hellsing Ultimate and here we get to the fourth entry on the list. Savior covered the American adaptation of the movie, Let Me In (2010) so I’m basically going to stick to the book.

Oskar is a lonely kid. His parents are divorced, there’s only one person he can loosely call a friend, he’s chubby, and he get’s bullied a lot. He has a morbid fascination with murder and killers to a unhealthy degree. One late night, he slips out of his house to a peculiar site. A little pale girl, barely clothed for winter alone with a Rubix cube. This quiet girl is Eli (pronounced E-lee), who moved into the apartment complex with her “dad” next to Oskar. Life becomes interesting for Oskar, as he becomes fascinated and close to Eli though she pushes him away because she’s “sick” and it just so happens a brutal killer is running around town, draining there victims of blood. Oskar realizes Eli doesn’t go out in the day, her appearance changes in correspondence to the killings, and her “dad” looks nothing like her. Part of a darker set of truths about Eli is she is a vampire; can Oskar accept Eli, even if it puts them both in danger?

This is perhaps one of, if not my favorite vampire story. This story was unusual in a lot of different ways and pretty refreshing. Being a vampire in this world is pretty torturous and I was able to feel the character’s pain which is a rare feat for me in literature. There’s a lot of twists that come I don’t want to spoil regarding Eli’s identity but I can say it adds to what this book does best, introduce some really dark real life topics with fictional making them feel more real. If you want a real down to earth and gritty vampire story that also says volumes on real friendship, I’d seriously recommend this book. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

American Horror Story: Hotel

ahs 5

When I heard the theme for the 5th season of American Horror Story was going to be Hotel, I was kind of skeptic. Like many, you think of hotels and horror, you  automatically think of The Shining . Of course there’s tiny hints to it, but of the series I found this the most surprising.

The Hotel Cortez- old, beautiful, full of years and majestic charm and dark history . The founder, a suave killer whose actions influenced years of real life horror, ghosts of sad souls lurking the house ( not to mention a mattress) , and the current appetite of the seductive Countess that runs the hotel. As a family discovers, once you check in, there’s almost no checking out from the Hotel Cortez- and it’s bundled history…

Hotel, as I said, is full of surprise. First, I was skeptical of Lady Gaga heading g this season instead of series veteran Jessica Lange but damn I give her props for her portrayal of the Countess. Wes Bentley also turned areally good performance as a detective losing his mind trying to find his missing child. There’s twists I found d smart and one I found to be one my favorite of the series- I don’t want to spoil it. The performances and scenery are great. I’d definitely suggest it to newcomers as it flows well and the characters are cool. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

 

South Park: Bring on the Crunch DLC

south park dlc 2 A couple weeks ago I reviewed the trailer for South Park: Bring the Crunch DLC trailer and about a week ago I jumped on the opportunity. The price is $11.99 on PSN which is a little steep but overall feels pretty worth it. We venture off to Lake Tardicaca, a summer camp for the special needs kids of South Park but there’s mischief afoot, so we join Dr Timothy (Timmy), FastPass (Jimmy) , Prof Chaos (Butters), and a new hero, Mint-Berry Crunch as you summon the powers of the Final Girl class and take down monsters and aliens in a nefarious plot.

There is a lot of fun to be had but I had a issue with it. The Final Girl class is Op as hell and easy enough to pick up. For the horror crowd, there’s a lot of great Easter Eggs you’ll enjoy. The only problem I had was the amount of environmental puzzles that they are. A couple of them really irritated the living shit out of me. Mint-Berry Crunch is a epic partner once you learn how to use his abilities. In the end, the Bring the Crunch DLC is a fun time I recommend for horror or fans of South Park: The Fractured But Whole  and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

House of Wax

house of wax

House of Wax was way beyond it’s time and let’s be honest, Vincent Price was spectacular in basically every movie he was in. He’ll always be my favorite classic actor and this is why…

House of Wax stars Vincent Price as a famous and talented wax sculptor who looses everything in what appears to be accident that burns down his studio, destroys his hands, and destroys his beautiful works, including his beloved Marie Antoinette. Years later, he resurfaces with a new studio. He’s confined to a wheelchair and his hands are horribly burnt but with the help of his assistant Igor, he opens a museum of torture with wax. But while his life gets back on track, a deformed killer stalks the gothic streets, talking the bodies after he’s done. Everyone joyously remarks how the wax sculptures look so lifelike, is it just a coincedence or something darker?

For a movie so old, it still openly gives me the creeps and I love it. Price steals the show, being sympathetic while being menacing and crazy at the same time. I love the creepy atmosphere and booming score. The other characters are solid and the time period adds to it. While not showy, the effects are pretty damn ahead of there time. It’s a classic and I’d recommend it for a old school horror fan. May the gaming gods bring you glory.