I finally got around to seeing 2000’s “Shadow of the Vampire,” after it has been recommended to me so often by people I trust. I had fun with it.
It’s a what-if story that asks what might have occurred during the filming of the classic “Nosferatu” (1922), if actor Max Schreck really had been a vampire (and if director F. W. Murnau was fully aware of the fact).
It’s fun stuff with a stellar cast, and it might make a cool double-feature with the original silent film. 🙂
“Dark Matter” (2024) is easily one of the best science fiction tv series I’ve ever seen. It’s like “Sliders” (1995-2000) got together with “North By Northwest” (1959) to create an homage to Homer’s “Odyssey.” I’d cheerfully rate Season 1 a 10 out of 10.
I had two concerns about whether I would enjoy “Dark Matter,” after it was recommended to me by a college alumnus.
First, I was afraid that it would be too campy. C’mon … a nice guy being kidnapped by his evil twin from a parallel universe? That’s a potentially cheesy plot device, and one I feel certain I’ve seen more than once before … maybe “The X Files” (1993- 2018), or some iteration of “The Outer Limits.” But this is a surprisingly grounded story that assiduously sticks to realism in its tone and plotting (even if it’s occasionally injected with an effective jolt of horror).
Second, I thought it might be too hard for me to follow. Its premise relies not only on physics, but on the enigma of the “Schrodinger’s cat” thought experiment. (I will never truly understand it, no matter how many times I pretend to on Facebook. Reality is objective!) But the storytelling here is direct and easy to follow, even if the (logical) surprises take the viewer happily off guard. If my ADHD-afflicted brain could follow the story, then so can you.
And Season 1 ended so perfectly that I’m not even sure I wan a second season. (It has been renewed by Apple+ TV.)
I definitely get the sense that “Dark Matter” benefitted from having Blake Crouch as the showrunner and head writer. (Crouch is the author of the 2016 novel that is its source material). And it’s got great performances by Joel Edgerton, Jennifer Connelly, Alice Braga and Jimmi Simpson.
It’s really good stuff. Check it out.
Marvel Comics.
It’s FILL-uh-steen in American English; I always thought that was the only correct way to say it.
But it’s FILL-uh-styne in British English. That used to grate on my last nerve when I heard it in movies and on TV. (This includes my beloved “Hannibal” in 2000.)
But I’m the ****-up in this equation and I need to chill. (And I am arguably a Philistine here.)
DC Comics.
I discovered something incredibly cool this afternoon — it turns out that the good people over at Dark Horse Comics quoted me in their 2019 promotion of Matt Wagner’s superb Grendel: Devil’s Odyssey. The eight-issue limited series marked the return of the iconic Grendel Prime, who I last followed as a zealous young fan in the pages Grendel Tales (1993-1997), Batman/Grendel II (1996) and Grendel: Past Prime (2000).
Dark Horse quoted a review I wrote of Wagner’s Grendel: Omnibus Volume 1 (2012), which was a compilation of the writer-artist’s brilliant early work on the title.
I’m thrilled. Wagner’s a genius — and while Grendel’s dark, violent content is not for everyone, it’s always been a seminal title for the medium of comics. I remember greedily snapping up back issues when I was a college student in 1992 — I never thought the day would arrive when a review of mine would be referenced to attract new fans.
20th Century Fox.
Dark Horse Comics.
“Willard” (1971) and its sequel, “Ben” (1972), were another pair of 1970’s movies that got plenty of airtime on 1980’s television. I read both books when I was a kid too.
First I picked up Stephen Gilbert’s Ratman’s Notebooks at a yard sale, because that’s how you found cool horror books during summer vacations when you were too young to drive. (Sometimes adults had few compunctions about what they sold to minors too. I bought a vampire book in gradeschool that was full of nude photos, for some reason, and that led to what I’m sure was an interesting conversation between my parents and the neighbor-proprietor down the street.)
Anyway, I absolutely loved Ratman’s Notebooks (despite its lamentable absence of nude photos) and I finished it in a day or two. The novelization of the “Ben” film by Gilbert A. Ralston was somewhat less impressive, but I still enjoyed it.
If you’re a comics fan, like I am, then it might occur you that “Willard” and his army of trained rats seem to inspire a villain in Batman’s rogue’s gallery — Ratcatcher. Ratcatcher has been a minor league villain since he debuted in DC Comics in 1988, but he’s a pretty neat bad guy when placed in the hands of the right writer.
I feel certain that anyone will recognize Ernest Borgnine in the first trailer below– his face and voice are impossible to confuse with those of another man. If the disaffected, spooky, eponymous Willard looks familiar to you, that’s none other than a young Bruce Davison. He’s a good actor who’s been in a lot of films, but I think a plurality of my friends will know him as Senator Kelly from the first two “X-Men” movies (2000, 2003).
You’ll note the presence of flamethrowers in the trailer for “Ben.” Flamethrowers were a staple of 70’s and 80’s horror films; it was just part of the zeitgeist. They were handy for heroes fighting any nigh-unstoppable nonhuman baddie — think of “The Swarm” (1978), “The Thing” (1982), “C.H.U.D.” (1984), “Aliens” (1986), and “The Blob” (1988), for example. Hell, 1980’s “The Exterminator” featured a vigilante using a flamethrower to kill criminals. It was a weird time.
Artisan Entertainment.
Eric Robert Nolan, Author 