What If...?

Thank God this was better.

After the tepid at best reception of WandaVision I was hoping for better and I got a pretty solid and dang good show. I mean it's such a simple premise that's been in comics for about 30+ years, tell an elseworlds story with familiar heroes in different situations and realities, and now go one step further to make an anthology animated series involving the MCU. It's super short too, only 9 episodes though it has a semi-standard runtime akin to most animated shows I was surprised how much it could do and even how easy it was to jump into. Granted you do kinda need to know your MCU movies in certain episodes, they don't hold your hand for anything, you either know or don't. I can't begrudge it too much on that factor cause you do have to be a fan of the Marvel stuff to even have any intention of watching it so it gets a pass on accesibility. The animation style is that odd Tron Uprising, Into The Spiderverse style of 2D but actually 3D animation, and while it did take a brief moment for me to get adjusted to it I found it to be very well done and captures the color and spectacle of those movies. Easily my favorite episodes were Agent Carter getting the supersoldier serum, T'Challa being a guardian, Doctor Strange turning evil is the crown jewel for me personally, and the final two episodes which cap it off nicely should this be the one and only season we get. But truth be told, I am 100% down to see more. I know, the guy who gave the majority of the MCU one gigantic ehhhh, actually has some interest and passion for What If. Will wonders never cease. I do actually appreciate how not every story ends happily, obviously with such a multitude of multiverses not all ends in a good way and there is some screwed up stuff that happens. Though that does make me wonder what the demographic is for this, I'd probably put it in the teens to adults category alone due to the zombies episode. I'll never fully grasp society's fascination with the zombie genre, let undead sleeping dogs lie for God's sake, it needs to end quick. Besides that small gripe with the entertainment industry, it's a very good series that while an experiment that has been tinkered with before still tells good stories with good production quality. I give it 3.5 stars, 8/10! Finally, a Marvel movie I have been waiting to see coming up next.

Tales Of Halloween

This hurts.

In a world where we don't get many anthology movies let alone horror anthologies I was very interested to see Tales Of Halloween, and reading through the cast list gave me hope. We get Adrienne Barbeau, Lin Shaye, cameos from John Landis and Joe Dante, and of course Sam Witwer. Sign me up and throw me in, hell yeah! But. But....it was mostly forgettable. And dude, that sucks to say. But it's true, it's a collection of 10 stories over the course of 90 minutes which already is a red flag because with such limited time for these stories there's simply no meat on the bones, what you see is what you get. Which may satisfy some but for me it was a rollercoaster of quality, with only the last two stories being my favorites! Now does that mean there is no artistic, stylistic, well made concepts and executions? Of course not, but that's sort of the catch with anthology movies. You never know what you're gonna get, and it could be a tonal and quality mess. Akira Kurosawa's Dreams is an outstanding anthology, with a handful of stories told with breathtaking visuals, well written stories, and enough substance for the audience to infer and enjoy. But it all came from one source, he directed all the segments and wrote them thus creating a better film. With 10 stories in Tales Of Halloween they had 11 directors and 12 writers. That is a f***ing problem. You get many wildly different stories in concept and execution, some looking like horror movie fluff and some bordering on student film arthouse, all of which are happening in the same town again very much like Trick r' Treat. And there ain't much entertainment value from it, the actors do fine and none are really bad at all, but the stories have no time to grow and breathe to create atmosphere and give us likable characters, it's quantity over quality. I called the twists for about 90% of these stories because I've watched way too much Twilight Zone and a bit of Tales From The Crypt, but even I know if you or someone you know who hasn't watched those shows are smart enough to figure this shit out. Sam Witwer alone saved this movie from being a forgettable and unremarkable film, I just appreciate that man so much already, the handsome devil, but he has such great screen presence and comedic timing that he made me excited to watch this movie. But he's the second to last story. And the last story was my other favorite, again down to the main character this badass cop who gets all these crazy stories down at the precinct and she goes out to try to deal with it. Beautiful! Perfect! That's all I need! Go forth and wreck shit babe. But! Again! We had 15 minutes of film left and surprise asshole, it ends on a cliffhanger and there is literally 6 minutes of credits so have fun with that shithead! And things were starting to look up for me. I just...God I had hope, I had hope it would be good but sometimes the IMDB stars don't lie. 2.5 stars, 6/10, what a f***ing bummer to go out on the day before Halloween. But I got nothing else, no extra reviews, no tricks up my sleeve, no further horror reviews in November. You get nothing! You lose! I hate it. See you in November, happiest of Halloweens to all and to all a good night.

Trick r' Treat

I am genuinely surprised I've never talked about this movie.

Trick r' Treat is a necessity to watch every Halloween season. I have never seen a Halloween themed movie of this magnitude before, the closest thing to come to it was Halloween 3 and even then it was more background than front and center. It's an anthology movie, with 4 seperate stories tied together not only with background cameos of the other characters but with a character named Sam who is pretty much the mascot of Halloween, the same way Santa and the Easter Bunny are for their holidays and he is awesome. So the stories range from, kids going to the scene of a terrible crime to pay respects, a principal with a dark secret, a group of girls looking for fresh dates, and a grumpy Scrooge like character who learns to appreciate Halloween the hard way. The film's true power is in it's visuals, there is so much Halloween scenery to an almost gratuitous degree, from costumes, to pumpkins, to decorations and candy, it really gets you in the mood for Halloween day! And not a lot of people know about this movie, it had a modest budget and an adequate release, but it's a staple of the season just as much as Charlie Brown and more famous horror movies, so it's important to spread the word and hopefully get this film to be a Halloween classic. I've been so busy this month, I plan for October more than any other month both in terms of reviews and personal life so it's almost to the point where I won't know what to do with myself come November 1st. This month has really been my life and it's ending tomorrow. It's sad but I'm excited nevertheless. I highly urge you to check this movie out either today or on Halloween night after you've went to some parties, gotten some candy, and need a perfect send off to the most wonderful time of the year. I'll be out tomorrow before the sun rises and won't be back until after the sun has fallen and then some, so I want to wish you the happiest of Halloweens and I will see you guys soon.