What I'm Watching: Late June, 2011
Hello, horrorheads! Happy summer! Anyone up for a trip to camp? How's Crystal Lake this time of year?
Anywho, before diving into what images flicker in front of my eyes, I did want to direct everyone's attention to the Movie Cover Gallery which has a minor, but significant change. I split out movies for 2009-2010, and a seperate page for 2011 as I mentioned earlier. But as I kept looking at the pages, something felt wrong, and it felt strange to visit the 2009-2010 movies first. So, I flopped the pages around, and when you visit the MCG now, the first movies that come up are the current year's fare, and the pre-2011 movies are now archied to a seperate page. Chronological made sense, but moving the older movies to a seperate page made just that hair more sense to me. Your mileage may vary, but it's not difficult to find any movie on those two pages.
But onto the watching part of this post. First up was something that slipped my mind last time, the new Teen Wolf show. Forgetting it did give me a chance to watch a few more episodes, and I wish I had tonight's newest episode to watch as well, but I guess that will have to wait. Still, a few episodes in and I am formulating an opinion. And that opinion is a resounding Meh! They took everything you knew and loved about the classic movie and tossed it right out the window. I'm surprised there's even a werewolf in this movie. The humour is gone, the family curse is gone. About the only things that DO remain are a wolf who is a teen. It is so dark, so brooding, and just so, so meh! I have no other word for it. The characters are whiny, and making the show like every other werewolf story, where a guy gets bit and has to deal, makes it JUST ANOTHER WEREWOLF STORY. There is nothing special here. SO disappointing. It's ok, but so nothing special. And it's barely ok. Maybe I just don't get the show, but it's just so bland and unoriginal. I have hope that it's just growing pains, and they find their voice, but those hopes are low.
Speaking of werewolves, I also watched the big screen horrory reimagining of Red Riding Hood. And even if I didn't know this was from the director of the first Twilight film? I'd be able to tell. It has that same clean, sterile style, and the haaaair. Where did people in medieval times find so much product to slick their hair up into points like that? The world looks very fake, very set-like, and way too storybook. Which almost works for the story, considering the subject matter, but it pushes things a little too far, and almost feels like a play. Look of the movie aside...this isn't bad. The story is solid, well thought out, has some interesting twists, and makes sense. The acting is solid, and Gary Oldman, as always, is a blast. There's problems to be sure, but the movie doesn't deserve the bashing it got, I think. It's fun, and an interesting take on the story everyone knows. I did hate how they brought in the, "My, what big ____ you have" stuff. That was WAY too forced, and I don't think we really needed it, other than to say, "See! See! RED RIDING HOOD! In case you missed the title! And the red hood!" But that aside, it's worth seeing if you've got some time to kill and it comes on tv. Not bad at all.
Another side thing that's what I'm watching, but not exactly that big of a thing, is MST3K. I've mentioned, probably ad nauseum, that Mystery Science Theater 3000 is one of the grandfathers of Trisk, and a few weeks ago I was growing nostalgic, missing those Saturday or Sunday mornings where I'd curl up in my chair and watch the newest episode, and it hit me; duh, I have 20 volumes of DVDs. I can recreate my weekly MST3K fix easily. And so I did. A month ago, I grabbed MST3K volume 1, and started from the start of that set, moving forward one episode a week, just like I originally saw a few years of the show. Granted, this is far from all the episodes, and in no particular order, but order is unimportant. Doing the show in order WOULD be fun to do someday, though. As I'm watching, I'm also posting my thoughts on the episodes each week to my LiveJournal. If you're so inclined, you can follow those posts right over here which links to the MST3K tag for my LJ, so all those specific posts will appear there. I don't guarantee every episode I watch being talked about, but if I have something to say, I will. Nothing major, nothing revelatory, but it might be of interest to some people.
And that's enough for now. See you in a week for a new full review!
J
