6WH: Saturday, September 27th

Chef Gregory was supposed to swing by for this second week of Halloween -- a full year after his last trip down here -- but illness had him cancel at the last minute. With just me and the missus, we replaced the traditional pizza and bacon cheddar fries with a slightly healthier pizza and salad and dove into a random selection of watchin'.

Bubba Ho-Tep trailer (2003)
Maximum Overdrive trailer (1986)
Paranoid (2001)


30 Days of Night (2007) directed by David Slade
The premise is excellent: why don't vampires winter in the arctic when the sun never rises? The vampires could move into town and walk around like normal folk, all the while people would start to mysteriously disappear. Great plan! Such high hopes probably made the movie even more disappointing than it should've been. I hate -- absolutely hate -- the vampires in this flick. They're one step away from mere animals. They're the type of vampires that seem to spend most of their free time hissing and making noises like Jurassic Park dinosaurs. They like to pose dramatically in the street while making these noises, showing off their ridiculous, teeny-tiny yellow teeth. Worst of all, they are incredibly stupid.

Things started out promising. The vamps sent a human slave into town on the last day of daylight to sabotage communications and transportation. Miles and miles from the next town, the residents would be nicely confined for the month-long night. It's a guaranteed 30-day meal ticket for the vamps. So, what do they do? They go freakin' apeshit on day 1 and kill most of the people in town. This sends the few remaining people into hiding and the vamps are forced to spend the rest of the month trying to lure them out so they can eat. Nice going. Meanwhile, the humans make their obligatory noble sacrifices, stupid decisions and "when this is over" speeches, all the while seemingly unaffected by the -10 to -30 temperatures outside. Bah. I'm very glad I never blind-bought the graphic novel. (5/10)


New Nightmare trailer (2004)
High Tension trailer (2003)
Looney Tunes: "A-Haunting We Will Go" (1966)


Tales from the Crypt: "Seance" (1992) directed by Gary Fleder
Scammers try to scam a guy out of money, accidentally kill him, and he kills them back as a ghost. The best part of the show was John Kassir doing the Crypt Keeper's voice with a '40s film noir accent layered on top. Weird. (6/10)


Prince of Darkness trailer (1987)
Willard trailer (2003)
The Simpsons: "Treehouse of Horror: Terror at 5½ Feet" (1993)


The Twilight Zone: "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" (1963) directed by Richard Donner
I had to pop this one in after watching The Simpsons version. Lots of good stuff in this episode. Bill Shatner trying to contain his freak-out over the gremlin. Bill Shatner realizing that what he's telling his wife is making her think he's nutso. Bill Shatner smoothly dropping his pack of smokes so he can steal the policeman's gun. Bill Shatner agonizing over whether to open the emergency door and shoot the gremlin. Bill Shatner in a straight jacket. Bill Shatner. (7/10)


The Old Dark House (1932) directed by James Whale
Camp in the disguise of a traditional horror movie, not at all unlike Bride of Frankenstein. In this one, a bad storm forces some travelers to take shelter in a nearby house. The house is inhabited by a queer old man (pun intended), his grumpy sister and their dumb butler Morgan (played by Boris Karloff). It's really hard to describe this movie. It's a horror movie, but there's nothing supernatural in it at all. It's just a spooky house, a rainy night, and group of kooky characters. Probably, it works so well due to the skills of the actors involved. They have a ball, but never play things too broadly to wake you out of the reality of the movie. Very fun (7/10)

The Halloween Jones Soda flavor of the week was Monster Mojito. I hate this flavor every year, so I drank it early in the season to get it out of the way. Yep, same taste as always: a fruity alcoholic mixer.

Also not very good: Harvest Moon Pumpkin Ale. The missus bought it in an appreciated attempt to get something appropriate for the season. But, urg, beer made with pumpkin flavoring is just not very tasty. It tastes like a bad ale with some vegetables mixed into it. I downed two, anyway.

Pinhead Gets Into the Spirit of the Season