Happy Alien Day, Dinosaurs vs. Criminals, Rock Mom

Today (Thursday, April 26, 2018) is Alien Day. And yes, it’s a globally recognized religious holiday. Traditional gifts include blurry photographs, night trips to Uranus, watches that stop for hours at a time and unearthly implants.

I’m sure you have a lot of themed activities planned, like going to the YMCA and getting probed in the locker room, inviting fellow abductees over to watch E.T. the Extraterrestrial (1982) and LOLing at that turd-shaped toilet plunger alien, or even stopping by the Museum HR Giger Bar in Château St. Germain, Gruyères, Switzerland (fashioned in part to honor of the late Giger’s Alien concept art) to slug down a few Romulan Ales while trying to score with “female” lifeforms.

I’m headed for Area 51 and taking a few UFOs out for a test spin. It’s important to test drive a few before laying down the big bucks. FYI: Keep the extras like GPS but lose the LoJack™ — the government’s gonna steal it anyway, so why bleed the weasel?

Don’t forget to “phone home” if you party a little too much with your space brothers. Here are  few upcoming horror/sci-fi movies to help you forget tomorrow exactly what happened on your Uranus. (Don’t worry; it’ll all come back to vividly haunt you on Facebook™)…

THE JURASSIC GAMES (June 12, 2018/VOD | July 3, 2018/DVD)
“The film imagines a world set in the near future wherein ten Death Row convicts are chosen to compete in The Jurassic Games, the ultimate virtual reality game show that pits its players against dinosaurs and each other. However, there is a catch; if you die in the virtual game, you also die in reality. As the devious Host continues adding improbable challenges, the characters will find the odds stacked against them as only one victor can emerge as winner and reclaim their freedom.”

The TRUE Hunger Games — heh. So criminals versus dinosaurs. My money’s on the dinosaurs. 

VENOM (October 5 (2018)
“One of Marvel’s most enigmatic, complex and badass characters comes to the big screen, starring Academy Award nominated actor Tom Hardy as the lethal protector, Venom.”

Glad they re-serviced the key art. The first one looked like Mothman horked up a Rorschach test.

EMBRYO (2018)
“Kevin and his girlfriend Evelyn, while camping out in the woods in the Chile countryside, are abducted and Evelyn is impregnated by otherworldly beings. As the entity inside her begins to grow at a rapid rate, Evelyn discovers that the cravings she’s experiencing can only be satiated by the taste of human flesh and blood. When she attacks a doctor, Kevin decides not to hand her over to the authorities, but to go on the run and try to get to big city where they can find help to remove the thing that’s slowly taking over Evelyn’s body.”

Creature feature unsafe sex knocker-uppers aren’t new. A few off the top of the ‘ol untouched condom display rack: The Mole People (1956), Day the World Ended (1956), The Alligator People (1959), Alien (1979), Humanoids From The Deep (1980), The Beast Within (1982), Inseminoid (1981), The Fly (1986), The Terror Within (1989)… I could go on for another nine months. Then there’s the reverse impregnation sci-fi romance tale that is Species (1995). Unfortunately, for you, there is no such thing as a “movie after” pill.

HOLLOW BODY (2018)
“A struggling rock band led by Jimmy Kleen makes a deal with Rick Roland, a shady record executive. Things take a dark turn when the band’s lead singer Rachel Swann and her controlling stage mother, are struck by lightning and killed. Rachel comes back to life, now possessed by the spirit of her dead mother and with strange electrical powers she can’t control. Both personalities struggle for dominance of her body while the band begins to take off. Rachel’s bandmate discovers the dark secret behind the band’s success: Rachel is using her electrical powers to kill men and drain them of their electricity, transmuting it into electrifying performances. He and Jimmy must decide if they will stop her or if the high cost of success is a price they are willing to pay.”

Sounds like Shocker (1989) with guitars. For another struck-by-lighting-and-becomes-electricity “accidents”, look no further than Supergirl’s not-BFF, Livewire on the hit CW hit TV series. Say what you will about her being bonkers and able to throw electricity around like parade candy, she could re-charge your cell phone in, like, one second. That’s pretty neat.

Soulless Hamburgers, Evil Churches, Infected Farmers

I usually don’t get gooned out by stuff I’ve seen in movies. But in real life, stand back — barf-o-rama. In this case, the spew-inducing instigator is the new black Halloween hamburgers from McDonald’s™ and Burger King™ in Japan. The Mickey D’s hockey pucks have squid ink dyed hamburger buns. Whereas the Burger King buns sport not only a charcoal-esque pallor but black cheese as well. I just felt my throat contract.

Japan’s squid ink burger will set you back 370 yen, which translates to $3.40 U.S. bit coins/paper route money. This does not include tar milkshakes or burnt shoestring fries.

The Burger King™ Black Ninja Burger actually has two spin-offs (or “sequels”): the Kuro Diamond and Kuro Pearl, which feature not just black buns, but slices of cheese and a tangy sauce that look dark enough to come from an H.P. Lovecraft novel.

Both hell-spawn sandwiches are available now if you live in Japan. For those of us not adventurous enough to stick one of those things in our collective black holes, will just have to settle for these just released and upcoming (and hopefully digestible) horror and sci-fi movies…

SCALER, DARK SPIRIT (available now/VOD)
“A paranormal researcher is given video footage that reveals clues to an ancient evil residing in catacombs beneath the old city church.”

Reminiscent of John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness (1987), wherein a college theoretic physics team and professor with one squint-y eye investigates a sentient, swirly green liquid in a large glass mayonnaise jar in the basement of an old Catholic church. It turns out to be wet Satan, but those with a degree at first deduce it to be a septic tank for the church’s unholy leavings. Close.

TRAUMA (2017)
“Four friends visit a rural locality of Chile, are brutally attacked by a man and his son. After not finding help in the town, they decide to confront these men with the help of a pair of policemen. But in this way, they will discover that their attackers have in their blood the direct legacy of the darkest period of Chilean history and will have to face the most brutal enemy.”

Try not to confuse this Trauma with about, oh, a dozen other movies with the same title, dating back to the ancient days of 1993. So you can watch this and have a bowl of Chile. Or not watch it and have a bowl of chili. Without beans.

3 HOURS TILL DEAD (available now/VOD)
“An AWOL soldier with PTSD goes into hiding along with his brother and a few friends. They retreat into a rural farm area unaware that the outside world has ceased to function. On their way back to civilization, his brother is attacked by an infected farmer. He quickly morphs into a rabid animal and lives for exactly three hours. Realizing they are in grave danger, they head back to the forest trying to outlive the legions of the infected.”

This may have come out in the year 2016 on some sort of physical media, but these are things I know not of which I speak. That spoken, the be attacked by an infected, rabid farmer is not new. With all the chicken/cow/pig/horse dropping farmers get on their hands and then rub their eyes (probably due to hay fever), it’s a wonder we’re all not infected from the farm food those guys handle without using convenient moist towelettes and anti-bacterial soap from a push button dispenser. Still, a zombie farmer — that’s kinda neat.

DEAD BODY (2018)
“Several friends decide to celebrate their high school graduation at a lake house in the woods. One of the classmates recommends that they play the old-fashioned game of Dead Body. In the game, one player is ‘the body,’ one player is ‘the killer’ and all of the other players try to figure out whodunit. Unfortunately, on this particular night, the game ends up featuring a real-life killer. The bodies begin piling up and, in an ‘Agatha Christie And Then There Were None’ style mystery, the survivors are forced to figure out who the killer is amongst them — before there is no one left standing.”

This one’s been banging around the film festival circuit since 2015. Still, sounds like the classic board game Clue (called Cluedo in the UK), which first came out in 1949. I don’t think that one had a real-life killer in it, though. Those guys cheat all the time.

Sharks, UFOs, Butchers, Ghosts

Presented for your consideration are four new horror/sci-fi movie posters indicating the imminent arrival of four new horror/sci-fi movies. I like it when sentences come together like that.

These posters are important. The cooler the graphics, the likelier it is I’ll go see the movie. And by I’ll, I mean me.

Here we go: The first teaser poster for Raiders of the Lost Shark was so inept, it looked like an Art Institute™ final. Somebody got a clue and came up with something more VOD rental-inducing. Click here to see the super horrible icky crap first poster.

Up next is Hangar 10, a new sci-fi offering that nicely nails the subject of UFOs and the threat of five-finger probing. Available November 7th, 2014, Hangar 10 goes like this: “33 years after the infamous Rendlesham Forest UFO incident, three metal detector enthusiasts hunting for Saxon gold in the same region capture incredible footage of UFOs whilst filming their expedition. As night falls the trio finds themselves facing a terrifying encounter with an unforgiving alien presence.” And by unforgiving, they probably mean five-finger probing.

Sendero (aka, Path) is a Chilean horror movie with a meaty poster – literally. Looks like someone probed a meat-grinder. Here’s why: “Ana goes with some friends to a cabin located in a rural area of ​​Chile. After helping a badly injured woman on the road the group is kidnapped by a family who follows the orders of a power group in the region. To survive and escape they will have to resort to betrayal among themselves in an atmosphere of violence, abuse, and sadism.” Like I said, meaty.

Available October 21st, 2014, Hollows Grove looks to follow in the cookie cutter footsteps of the spate of recent paranomal/found footage film flicks. Behold: “A young filmmaker, Harold Maxwell, a young filmmaker, is shooting a behind-the-scenes documentary about his friends – the Spirit and Paranormal Investigation Team, (S.P.I.T) and their ghost hunting reality show. They set out to film Hollows Grove, an old, abandoned and supposedly haunted orphanage. Soon after arriving at the orphanage the team begins to realize that what they thought would be a routine investigation is turning in to a nightmare from which they can’t escape.”

Hollows Grove is making me crave cookies for some reason.