What's New
31 Oct 26
I may not have done much special this Halloween, but I've got something special for you. We close this year's Halloween coverage with the classic vampire vs. werewolf battle. On the vampire side we have East meets West, Shaw meets Hammer with 1974's The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires and 1992's Innocent Blood. In the werewolf corner we have 1991's Howling VI: The Freaks and 1996's Wurrwolf, er, Werewolf. We cap it off with vampires vs. werewolves in Underworld: Evolution. I've been doing a decent bit of reading lately, so expect more detective novels in the near future and maybe some anime reviews as well. Stay tuned.
UTC 18:52:18
25 Oct 26
For this week's bandage buddy feature, we start with 1933's The Invisible Man and 2000's Hollow Man. We then look to have something we can see under the bandages with The Mummy's Tomb, The Mummy Returns and 2017's The Mummy, which was the last attempt to kick off the Dark Universe. Given that Halloween is Saturday, I'm going to have one last entry early, closing with those reliable mainstays of scary movies, vampires and werewolves, to round out the set, so be looking for that. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 16:34:07
20 Oct 26
I know this is quite a bit late, but better late than never. We're going to be looking at Frankenstein, his monster, and assorted relations near and far. We start with 1939's Son of Frankenstein, the third entry in Universal's Frankenstein series. Next, tying back to last week's Godzilla feature, Toho does its own thing with the premise with Frankenstein vs. Baragon and The War of the Gargantuas. We then give Frankenstein('s monster) the Underworld treatment with 2014's I, Frankenstein and then we close with Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein from last year. I'm already behind on next week's work because of this delay, but I'm thinking of bandage buddies with the Invisible Man and the Mummy. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 20:36:04
11 Oct 26
If you thought the Graboids made the ground shake, you ain't seen nothin' yet. Tokyo trembles when out of the seas emerges Big Daddy G. We continue our Halloween coverage with a kaijuu special with a particular focus on Godzilla's greatest rival. We start with 1964's Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster and continue to two more Showa Era appearances with Invasion of the Astro-Monster and Destroy All Monsters. Next is the Heisei Era's Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah and the Millennium Era Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack. For next week, I think I'll be covering our good buddy Frankenshteen, so look forward to that. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 15:45:02
05 Oct 26
Why, what's that rumbling? Welcome to Perfection, ladies and gents. We're kicking off this year's Halloween special with the first five entries of the Tremors franchise. We start with 1990's Tremors and follow it with Tremors 2: Aftershocks, Tremors 3: Back to Perfection, Tremors 4: The Legend Begins, and Tremors 5: Bloodlines. There are two more films in the franchise at present and 13-episode TV series, so maybe that'll come up next year. I'm thinking we'll have the King of the Monsters show up in the next round, maybe with a King Ghidorah focus, so be looking for that. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 07:44:05
27 Sep 26
How do magical girls tossed into the sausage grinder of the Urobutcher whilst being filmed with the warped lens of Akiyuki Shinbo sound? Well, it's what you're getting this week with Puella Magi Madoka Magica. We then do some light chopping and repackage the original series as the two compilation films Beginnings and Eternal and follow them with the third film Rebellion and new release Walpurgisnacht: Rising. There's also a 24-episode gaiden, but I'll have to get to that later. October is starting next week, so I've got to plan out which creatures go where. I guess it'll be a surprise to both of us. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 15:44:33
20 Sep 26
Ahoy, me hearties! The 19th of September be International Talk Like a Pirate Day, so we takin' a look at the Pirates of the Caribbean series this week. Here be all five as we have now, startin' with The Curse of the Black Pearl an' goin' on te Dead Man's Chest, At World's End, On Stranger Tides, and Dead Men Tell No Tales. I'll not be lyin' te ye. Ye not be climbin' the stairway te hea'n but rather sinkin' down te the briny depths. Next week we take te flights o' fancy with magic of a Madoka variety. Be lookin' for i'. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 15:11:21
13 Sep 26
We've got more hardboiled fun this week starting with Raymond Chandler's The Lady in the Lake and its 1947 film adaptation with a neat first-person gimmick. You might notice Lloyd Nolan as Lieutenant Degarmo in said film, who had earlier took Philip Marlowe's place in Time to Kill as Michael Shayne. Well, I went back to watch the other films in Lloyd Nolan's run as Shayne and we'll be looking at the first three of those next, starting with 1940's Michael Shayne, Private Detective and following it with Sleepers West and Dressed to Kill. I was about to announce an anime theme for next week, but I remembered that I had another idea several months back whose time has come, so instead let's sail the high seas with some scurvy scallywags. And I keep saying I'll do it, but maybe this time I'll actually get back into the swing of writing while my kiddos are busy prepping for bunkasai. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 14:21:43
06 Sep 26
Prompted by Time to Kill, I started watching the other films in the Michael Shayne series, but I haven't actually written the reviews yet, the anime watching I was doing didn't quite reach the end of the series, and I've still got a ways to go before I finish reading The Lady in the Lake, which leaves me once again dipping into the movie review backlog. We'll go chronologically and start with Peter Lorre in 1941's The Face Behind the Mask. We then go to another entry in the Gay Falcon series with Tom Conway taking over for George Sanders in The Falcon Strikes Back and our girl the Yorktown in the 1944 documentary The Fighting Lady. Next is the 1954 costume epic The Egyptian and the kung fu dream team of Jackie Chan and Jet Li in 2008's The Forbidden Kingdom. I'll carve out some time to get those Mike Shayne reviews written and get more anime viewing done so we can have a more eclectic selection in the coming weeks, hopefully. Oh, that's right. I have an idea for the week after next, so I need to hop on that. With all that, you think I can get any story writing done? We'll see. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 16:01:38
05 Sep 26
I still haven't gotten back to writing like I should, but at least I can add to the pile to put a little more pressure on me to get the ball rolling again. In other words, we've got a couple more teasers. First is from the Alkoresh Cycle is Not All Devils Have Hooves and Horns, which corresponds to JJ2 if it collided with the end of EM3, NagaTen and Tico3. What fun. Next is the Else Arc story The Hand-Me-Down Doll for those of you who want to see if "more human than human" is more than just a tagline. Look for reviews tomorrow. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 16:28:56
30 Aug 26
So guess what I managed to do? Yes, I finally finished reading The High Window, which means I can now cover Time to Kill, an adaptation of said novel with another character taking Philip Marlowe's place. Speaking of other film detectives taking Marlowe's place, we also have The Falcon Takes Over, an adaptation of Farewell, My Lovely with the Gay Falcon taking the lead (and George Sanders' last time to play the Falcon). Another thing I watched recently was the 1974 BBC drama Fall of Eagles. We close on a double feature because we might as well get both of them out the door at the same time. It's the two Divergent sequels: Insurgent and Allegiant. Remember the YA boom of the Tens? I can't say it was a good time, but it was a time. I was about to say I wasn't going to cover the TV series cobbled together to salvage the ending after the lead actress pulled out, but that actually got cancelled, so the movie-only crowd was left hanging. Well, so much for that. Anyway, I've actually started doing some anime watching, so hopefully I'll have some stuff ready for next week. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 12:49:19
23 Aug 26
As I mentioned before, I did more sleeping than watching on my hops across the pond this time around, so I don't have that much to present in terms of viewing, but here's what I have. First is the 2020 documentary miniseries Washington, the Tensura movie That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime the Movie: Tears of the Azure Sea and the Chinese animated film Nobody. While I still haven't finished The High Window, I did just finish reading Volume 7 of The Eminence in Shadow. To round things out, we have the 1959 film The Devil's Disciple. Looking to next week, what I put together will depend on whether or not I can finish The High Window by then. Maybe getting some anime viewing done would be nice as well. I'm also thinking about getting some more teasers out. We'll see what all I can get up to. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 13:33:50
17 Aug 26
Well, my vacation kept me pretty well occupied. Even my fooling around with AI was somewhat curtailed. I did a lot more sleeping on the plane and running around the rest of the time, so I don't have much of a haul for you, and even that needs to be delayed until next week. Also, I still haven't finished reading The High Window, so that additional feature I had planned last month also needs to be placed on hold a bit longer. I've got a couple weeks of what should be slow days at work, so maybe I can make up for lost time a bit. Anyway, what I've prepared for you today is another selection from the review backlog. We'll go chronologically, starting with Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in 1941's The Corsican Brothers. Next is the 1959 detective story The Crimson Kimono, with its delightfully tacky tagline on the poster. Next is 1973's The Day of the Jackal, and don't ask me to review the 2024 TV series. Chuck Norris bursts onto the scene in 1986's The Delta Force and we close with George Romero branching out from zombies to do the Stephen King adaptation The Dark Half. There are only two things I watched on the plane, so if I can finish The High Window over the course of the week, I might roll the two plans into one. Feel free to hope for me to resume writing on any of my stories as well. Stay tuned.
Posted by: JamesUTC 13:11:17