Real X-Files, Angels & Zombies, Future Grrrls

Sad to report the April 13, 2018 passing of Art Bell, 72, one of the paranormal’s iconic advocates. Host of the globally-popular Coast To Coast AM late night radio show for twenty years, Art’s show was a seriously presented forum for all things paranormal, demonic, ghostly, cryptid, crop circle-y and all around monsterific. And while Art’s charismatic deep voice and dry delivery wasn’t enough, his callers’ supernatural stories and UFO sightings were the stuff custom made for ratings.

So popular was his radio show, he was syndicated in 500 markets in the U.S. and Canada. (Canada, by the way, is where all things paranormal were born, no doubt fueled by Moosehead beer.) Radio DJ Alan Stock described Art’s show as being “like a Disneyland for sci-fi.” Coast To Coast AM still broadcasts with the super cool George Noory at the mic. (He also regularly appears on the History Channel’s Ancient Aliens.)

So here’s to you, Art Bell — thank you for being the legendary voice for the real X-Files. And while you can hear archived shows on YouTube™, here are a few just released and upcoming horror and sci-fi movies that might’ve been right at home on Coast To Coast AM…. 

AVZ: ANGELS VS. ZOMBIES (available now)
“At the end of days seven archangels arrive to deliver us from evil. Get ready for the resurrection, the dead will rise.”

Never understood the term “archangel.” Does that mean they have osteoporosis? So angels doing battle with zombies. Seems like everybody wants to take a swing at the undead these days. Heck, God’s delivery sycophants have battled everything from Bigfoot to aliens to even other angels. (Angels are like the Amazon Prime™ of religion.) be double awesome if someone would come up with AVS: Angels vs. Sharktopus.

ALONG WITH THE GODS: THE TWO WORLDS (available now)
“Ja-hong, a firefighter, is taken to the afterlife by three guardians, where only after passing seven trials and proving he lived a noble life will he be able to reincarnate.”

Guess if firefighter Ja-hong is in the afterlife, he must not have been that good at his day job. And who wants to reincarnate? Being back on this toilet Earth is the last place I’d wanna return policy. Except my favorite bar, which I coincidentally call “the afterlife.”

HOUSE ON ELM LAKE (available now)
“A couple and their young daughter move into a lake house that remained unsold due to the brutal, ritualistic murder of a family years ago. Soon, they realize that a dormant evil has awakened, a possessive force that has preyed on unsuspecting families like theirs for centuries.”

A house on Elm Lake? Is this Freddy Krueger’s Airbnb™? If I was dormant evil and lived on a lake, I’d wake up, goon out a few ducks and make splishy splash happen. And I’d do it in a Speedo™, you know, just to up the horror factor.

FUTURE WORLD (May 25, 2018)
“Inside a desert oasis, a queen lays dying as her son Prince travels across barren waste lands to find a near-mythical medicine to save her life. After evading violent raiders on motorbikes led by the Warlord and his enforcer, Prince meets Ash, the Warlord’s robot sex companion-assassin who’s in search of her own soul. As Prince is captured by the Druglord, the Warlord’s forces roar in — and Prince fights to save the remnants of humanity.”

The trailer makes this look like a Road Warrior (1981) knock-off, but with lots more riot grrrls. Maybe they should call it Mad Maxine. The drool-worthy Milla Jovovich stars and still looks a sexy fresh as she did in the Resident Evil (2002) six-movie franchise, where she got more attractive with each consecutive sequel. I bet she eats a lot of preservatives. Heh.

Sci-Fi Pizza, Apocalypse Santa, Hungry Sinkholes

If you’re fortunate enough to live in Redmond, WA, you can order your nutrients from Flying Saucer Pizza (“An Experience in Outer Taste”), a restaurant that features silverware-optional stomach-fillers that combine mozzarella with sci-fi. After eating one of their highly-rated pizzas, you’ll have to loosen your Van Allen radiation belt. Heh.

Founded in 2005, Flying Saucer Pizza in Washington State makes perfect (and clever) sense, since modern-age UFOs first originated here when aviator and businessman Kenneth Arnold became globally known for making what is generally considered the first widely reported unidentified flying object sighting in the UFA (United States of America — you’re welcome) back in 1947 — way ahead of my backward-pants wearing neighbor.

Flying Saucer Pizza features abduction-stimulating names for their meals, like the “Area 51” (Flying Saucer red sauce, whole milk mozzarella, red roma tomatoes, tender artichoke hearts fresh spinach), “Soylent Green” (FSP pesto sauce, whole milk mozzarella, artichoke hearts, sun-dried tomatoes, basil-garlic topped with pine nuts) and “Crop Circles” (Flying Saucer red sauce, whole milk mozzarella, mushrooms, red onion, green and red peppers, black olives, pepperoncini). In all, FSP features 17 sci-fi themed pizzas — and one Earthly, basic cheese pizza. Prices for a 10” pizza (served on a pan that looks suspiciously like a flying saucer) range from $9.00 to $11.50. Good luck getting those prices on Uranus. Bonus: 27 beers on tap. Beam me up today, if possible.

You can order online at flyingsaucerpizza.com, though if you’re outside of the Earth’s atmosphere, your SOL. (Get the sun joke reference? C’mon, that’s pure comedy gold.)

While you figure out how to have one of their pizzas delivered by UPS™, here are a few just-released/upcoming horror and sci-fi movies to snack on (napkins recommended)…

SWAMP TERROR (available now)
“Two sisters venture deep into the swamp looking for their long lost father.”

Not to be confused with The Swamp Terrorists, a Swiss electro-industrial “music” group from the ’80s, although you can see the disturbing similarities. As for the plot, yeah, the first place I’d look for my missing dad would be a swamp. (Those things are like inside-out unflushed toilets.) IMBd.com lists this one as having been released in 2014. I was combing my hair that year, so I may have missed it — if IMBd is not fake news. So what’s in a bayou swamp besides location-challenged patriarchal figureheads? Assorted floatables that can eat you, that’s what.

BASEMENT: THE TERROR BELOW (available now)
“Shortly after Tim Ritter moves into his new apartment, he hears strange noises coming from the basement. The nightly disturbances and other unexplained events keep him awake almost every night. Sleep deprived and at his wit’s end, Tom buys several video cameras to record whomever or whatever is causing the strange phenomena.”

Dangitall — another found footage movie. Most found footage movies suck camcorder. The only difference here is this one comes from Germany, which means the nightly disturbances in the basement are likely party people binge-watching Der Tatortreiniger on the ’ol fernsehgerät while munching Currywurst flavored chips from an ornate schüssel.

I’M DREAMING OF A WHITE DOOMSDAY (2017)
“Kelly and her son Riley, weathering the end times in a bomb shelter amidst the ruin that once was the world. With supplies and hope steadily declining, Kelly makes a horrifying decision that will cause her to discover just how far she would go for her child, and what lurks outside.”

This may or may not be available now. Couldn’t find it on any of the porn tips, uh, movie database sites I frequent. I think, though, that Kelly’s “horrifying” decision would be to go outside. According to the trailer, there are fat, gas-mask-wearing Santa Claus survivors roaming the waistlands with no one left to give gifts to. (Note to apocalypse St. Nicks — you better not use global destruction as an excuse to not come to my house.)

SINKHOLE 2 (pending 2018)
Angry sinkholes attack a small, nondescript town, engulfing people and buildings one by one. These ravenous monsters appear without warning, sucking terrorized townsfolk into oblivion. Enter a seismological specialist with a secret past, hellbent on revenge. He joins forces with the local sheriff, who is on a personal mission to save his own daughter and town. Can this unlikely duo abort these monstrous cracks of death? Will our heroes survive overwhelming forces of nature with potentially explosive consequences? Can they combat a skeptical mayor with ulterior motives who will stop at nothing to serve his own selfish gains?

Sounds like Dirt Jaws. Sinkholes, by the way, also go by another name: “box office.”

Alien Ranchers, Ghost Tours, Orc Police

According to the New York Post, the “alien-infested” ranch (located in Rainbow Valley, about an hour or “60 minutes” west of Phoenix, AZ) is on the market for a mere $5,000,000.00. Chump change, in other words. Why would I dare say that? Who wouldn’t want aliens dropping by for a sittin’ down gabfest?

Known officially as Stardust Ranch, this extraterrestrial pit stop is where land owner John Edmonds insists he’s engaged in “I know you are but what am I?” confrontation with hostile aliens, whom he dispatched with (wait for it)…a Samurai sword. Edmonds said that in the past 20 years, he has experienced many “strange events” involving aliens and claims to have killed more than a dozen extraterrestrials on his sprawling ranch. (He even has alien bloodstains on his front porch to prove it.)

Sound familiar? It should — this is practically a direct lift from Sherman Ranch, aka Skinwalker Ranch, located a few rock throws from southeast Ballard, UT. The story was the basis for the Skinwalker Ranch movie, released in 2013. That one not only had not-so-neighborly aliens trespassing through land mines of cow/horse patties (yo, space dudes — you ever hear of wiping your feet?), but UFO sightings (duh — the aliens had to get there somehow), crop circles (see “cow/horse patties”), ghosts, glowing orbs and even a Bigfoot-esque creature. (In the movie it was a werewolf.)

So ridiculously enticing is this place, it was purchased (or “bought”) by the National Institute for Discovery Science to “study anecdotal sightings.” I should like to apply for a job with the National Institute for Discovery Science.

While they process my 400-page résumé, here are a few just-released and upcoming horror/sci-fi movies that may or may not leave animal business tracks on your carpet or “floor”…

THE UFO CONCLUSION (available now/VOD)
“What is the alien agenda? And why has the government gone to such great lengths to stifle the overwhelming evidence that otherworldly creatures exist? Some of our greatest minds unveil the truth behind this massive cover-up.”

Don’t need a massive mind to know the existence of aliens has been covered up by REPUBLICANS for decades. Still, nice to see somebody besides a drunk redneck talk in complete sentences about extraterrestrials.

RAVENSWOOD (available now/VOD)
“When four American tourists go on a ghost tour, they get much more than they bargained when the spirits of an evil doctor and his last victim trap them in an old abandoned psychiatric ward.”

Um, when you go on a hot dog farm tour, you pretty much expect to see hot dog trees, yes? So it stands to reason a ghost tour is gonna have some transparent entities. They better — I’d hate to pay all that money and not see one. (I’m looking in your direction, Hot Dog Farm Tours.)

INCIDENT IN A GHOST LAND (October 28, 2017)
“A mother of two inherits a home from her aunt. On the first night in the new home she is confronted with murderous intruders and fights for her daughters’ lives. Sixteen years later the daughters reunite at the house — and that is when things get strange.”

So they give away mom was killed, simply by telling us the intruders were “murderous.” Thanks, jerks. Wonder if mom’s ghost comes back to see her daughters when they go back to the murder house?

BRIGHT (December, 2017/Netflix)
“In an alternate present day, humans, orcs, elves and fairies have been coexisting since the beginning of time. Two police officers, one a human, the other an orc, embark on a routine night patrol that will alter the future of their world as they know it. Battling both their own personal differences as well as an onslaught of enemies, they must work together to protect a young female elf and a thought-to-be-forgotten relic, which, in the wrong hands, could destroy everything.”

They had me at the forgotten relic that could destroy everything. Word around the grocery aisles is that the budget for this Netflix™-made movie is $90 million fun bucks. Pffft — I could make TWO movies for that price and STILL have enough left over to take a tour of that Hot Dog Farm.

Aliens Taking A Crop

In the time waster Silent Warnings (2003), a nutbag survivalist in Oregon gets himself blown up real good while chasing aliens invading his remote farm.

So his cousin, just now graduating from college, rounds up five friends (three of which are supermodels) to clean up the inherited property, sell it, then probably buy drugs with which to get high.

These city hippies discover crop circles all over the farm’s cornfields and notice that everything is starting to smell electrical. Then there are the nightly visitations, abductions, then ultimately a confrontation with the aliens who are using crop circles as a means of transportation. A sort of Old McDonald Stargate, if you happen to be partially standing in a spot where the circles suddenly appear, you’re vertically cut in half, as illustrated with the Cuisinart-ing of one post-grad student.

By the time the sheriff arrives, everybody’s screaming and shooting at the aliens, neither of which are doing any good. Somebody figures out that iron is the only thing that’ll kill the spacey farmjackers. Once again, metal saves the day.

The aliens are digitally transposed into scenes and look like 1980s cartoon figures. I offered to put on an alien suit to scare the smug outta those thugs, but the movie’s producer said aliens don’t have beer guts. How the hell does he know? He ever been to Mars? I have. In fact I’m going there as soon as I gas up the ’ol Stargate.