Exhibitionist Horror, Circus Superheroes, Polar Roid-Rage

If there was ever a reason to move to Los Angeles, Burbank’s Mystic Museum is premiering Y2Kills: A Horror Immersive Experience, a tribute to horror of the 2000s. Lots to celebrate here; this was the decade that gave us horror gems like Let The Right One In (2008), The Host (2006), Shaun of the Dead (2004), Paranormal Activity (2007), Dog Soldiers (2002), Cloverfield (2008), Dead Snow (2009), and more than I have space to laundry list here.

From Mystic Museum’s press release: “Y2Kills is a horror immersive experience that highlights the best horror has to offer through the lens of the first decade of the ‘00s. Featuring props, commissioned art pieces, photo opportunities, and everything from collectible art pieces to retro disposable cameras — Y2Kills will offer guests a horrific slice of Millennium nostalgia they won’t forget! The exhibit will also feature items from the private collections of Eli Roth (Hostels Part I & II), Michael Dougherty (Trick ‘r Treat, Krampus) — and an original soundtrack by composer Douglas Pipes (Trick ‘r Treat, Krampus).

Y2Kills opens April 15, 2023 at the Mystic Museum (3204 W Magnolia Blvd., Burbank, CA). Fangoria™ describes the Mystic Museum as “a must-see place for horror fans and freaks alike. Founded in 2013, the Museum has blessed horror fans with a whole range of immersive exhibits ranging from officially licensed (like the awesome The Evil Dead: An Immersive Experience, for one) to their own creations (the amazing Slashback Video, an homage to old-school video stores). $16 dollar admission tickets can be snapped up here. 

So while we all rent a LimeBike™ and head to Los Angeles where there is never any parking (you can leave the bike on any sidewalk for free), here are a few upcoming horror/sci-fi movies that may or may not be an immersive experience…

RIPPER’S REVENGE / April 11, 2023 (VOD, DVD)

“One year on from the notorious ‘Jack The Ripper’ murders, the killings have stopped, but the identity of the killer remains a mystery. Down-at-heel newspaper reporter Sebastian Stubb has moved on to reporting on other scandals, but when a new ‘Ripper’ letter appears on his desk and the killings start again, he unwittingly finds himself at the center of a new mystery. Has the ‘Ripper’ returned, or is it a copycat killer? Or something else entirely?”

Jack The Ripper shouldn’t be that hard to find. Just look for someone with expertly torn britches. It’s how he got his name. Maybe he should team up with Jack The Stitcher.

SHIN KAMEN RIDER / Release pending 2023 (VOD, DVD)

“College student and motorcycle enthusiast Takeshi Hongo is abducted by the evil organization S.H.O.C.K.E.R. and converted into a cyborg as part of their plans for world domination. Before they can brainwash him to do their bidding, he escapes and uses his new enhanced abilities as Kamen Rider to wage a one-man war against S.H.O.C.K.E.R.”

I thought Shin Kamen Rider was a sodium-heavy cup of noodles (just add hot water and the chemically-flavored spice packet. But turns out Shin Kamen Rider is a Japanese tokusatsu superhero fantasy film based on the character from the TV series/spin-offs. I hope this movie is as tasty as those sodium-heavy cups of noodles.

FREAKS VS. THE REICH / Release pending 2023 (VOD)

“Looking to flee the Nazi menace for the shores of America are four super-powered circus performers: there’s beautiful, young, electrically-charged Matilde, Cencio, an albino with the ability to control insects, Mario, a dwarf graced with magnetic powers, and Fulvio, a strongman covered from head to toe with hair. On their heels is the psychotic Franz, an ether-addicted, six-fingered Nazi who runs the nearby circus and believes that the supernaturally gifted quartet will help him turn the tide of the war, delivering the ultimate victory for Hitler and the Reich. Will the ‘freaks’ be able to escape the grasp of the brutal Nazis or will their incredible powers be harnessed in a way that could change both their destinies and the entire course of history forever?”

Marvel™ should forget about trying to get the Fantastic Four to work (four box office flops and two tepid seasons as a TV series); these four super-powered circus performers — with magnets, electricity, bugs and hippie hair — are a clear choice to replace the Fantastic Fail.

PAWS / Release pending 2023/2024 (VOD)

“Young scientist Nook is on board a research ship in the Arctic. Reformed oil billionaire Fox is funding the crews’ efforts to fight climate change. Just when Nook learns that Fox’s interest is not so much in saving the planet but exploring and claiming fresh oil fields, their ship crashes. The crew search an abandoned Russian ghost-ship looking for a radio, but uncover a horrific threat: Inside the rusty trawler a monstrous polar bear mother has been trapped with her cub. Not only will the animal defend her nest but has grown very hungry and will seize the opportunity to feed on the survivors.”

They had me at feed on the survivors.

Cash For Monsters, Paranormal TV, Legal Killers

Here’s a slick piece of marketing — Capcom™, maker of video games — has created a promotion around Monster Hunter: World, which has already sold over 5 million copies. Teaming with The Centre of Fortean Zoology founder Jonathan Downes, Capcom™ is offering £50,000 ($70,000 USD) “to anyone who can provide conclusive evidence of one of 10 real-life monsters”.

Fellas, get out your checkbook — of the 10 monsters, I have proof of 11. (I put Bigfoot on there twice, because he’s twice as cool as any other cryptid.) If you wanna get in on this paranormal payday action, here’s the list of Capcom’s™ Most Wanted…

• Bigfoot

• The Loch Ness Monster

• Mongolian Death Worm

• Mermaid

• Earth Hound

• The Yeti/Almasty

• Chupacabra

• The Flying Snake of Namibia

• Yowie

• Cornish Owlman

In their press release, Capcom™ says before they cough up the coin, you must provide proof of one of these monsters by June 20, 2018 in order to clock some dollaz. (After receiving the evidence, Downes and his team will analyze it, and any hunter who provides definite proof will be awarded the prize, with multiple winners splitting the pot.)

Just so you know, I’m not splitting my winnings with anyone. My bar tab ain’t gonna pay for itself. (Hint: In bars is where I found most of the monsters. But look in Taco Bell™ restroom toilets for Mongolian Death Worms.)

While you get an expedition together, here are a few upcoming horror and sci-fi movies that may or may not be worth hunting down…

RED EYE (February 9, 2018)
“Gage Barker, a young man who grew up on the tales of Red Eye as a kid, learns that there could be some truth behind these folk tales. This myth covers a violent, deranged masked murderer, who dwells in the backwoods of Black Creek, West Virginia. With a group of his friends and his camera equipment in tow, they hike into the woods to seek him out or to prove that he is nothing more than a myth.”

Violent deranged masked murderer. Four words that go together as seamlessly as “super fun happy slide.” As for the friends going into the woods to look for Red Eye (he has a conjunctivitis prone sister — Pink Eye), I call dibs on anything cool you might own.

UNSANE (March 23, 2018)
“A young woman is involuntarily committed to a mental institution. She is then confronted by her greatest fear…but is it real or is it a product of her delusion?”

Word around the produce aisle is that this movie was shot entirely on an iPhone™. Pfffft — anyone can do that because everybody in the freaking grocery store has an iPhone™. Want to really make an impression? Trying filming a horror movie using only two empty cans of Del Monte™ Creamed Corn™ tethered by a long piece of wax string. All bars in all places.

THE FIRST PURGE (July 4, 2018)
“Behind every tradition lies a revolution. Next Independence Day, witness the rise of our country’s 12 hours of annual lawlessness. Welcome to the movement that began as a simple experiment: The First Purge. To push the crime rate below one percent for the rest of the year, the New Founding Fathers of America (NFFA) test a sociological theory that vents aggression for one night in one isolated community. But when the violence of oppressors meets the rage of the marginalized, the contagion will explode from the trial-city borders and spread across the nation.”

Thanks to the current political climate, this prequel makes perfect sense. But they’re overlooking the irony; the New Founding Fathers of America (NFFA) are the ones creating the public’s aggressive behavior. Why else would the clearly Republican paperboy flip me off every day? (Okay, I may have started it. But he should be the bigger person here, the punk.)

OUR HOUSE (2018)
“A young genius accidentally invents a device that amplifies the paranormal activity within his family’s house, possibly bringing back the spirits of loved ones, and unleashing things far worse.”

Uh, no — the “young genius” didn’t invent a paranormal activating amplification device. It’s already been around for multiple decades — and it’s called a “TV”. While mine doesn’t bring back spirits of dead people, if you get the expanded programming package, you can unleash all kinds of things, far worse and beyond.

Ghost Hotels, Unnatural Disasters and Cigar Zombies

Prepping for my annual solo holiday trek to downtown Portland, OR, my favorite city within 175 miles from where I’m littering. This year will be a bit different as I plan on visiting several Chamber of Commerce endorsed haunted buildings, one of which happens to be the very hotel I’m staying at. (Love the new bathroom upgrades at The Benson, but the ghosts could be a bit more spookier.)

The hotel that’s on my bucket list is, of course, The Stanley Hotel (aka, The Overlook Hotel in The Shining), located at 333 E Wonderview Ave, Estes Park, CO. (And in case you need the zip code: 80517.) Their website has this to say about that: “The Stanley Hotel features a variety of rooms with high paranormal activity including the famous Stephen King Suite 217, the Ghost Hunters’ favorite room 401; as well as 407, 428 and 1302. These are among our most-requested rooms, availability is limited.”

While I polter-hunt/drink in Old Town Pizza, Crystal Ballroom and the White Eagle Saloon, all of which have documented ghost sightings (and tasty snacks), here are a few just released and upcoming horror/sci-fi movies that may or may not scare the Christmas wrap outta you…

DANGEROUS PEOPLE (available now)
“In the early 1970s two murderers pick up a girl in a bar and take her back to their apartment. A moment of brutal violence occurs, which leads to a series of mind games to see who lives and who dies. Dangerous People is a psychedelic trip that is equal parts crazy, scary, sexy, funny, sick and tragic.”

Crazy, scary, sexy, funny, sick and tragic. Aren’t those the ingredients on Fruity Pebbles™ cereal boxes? (That stuff has more artificial coloring than a beauty parlor.)

CHANNEL ZERO: BUTCHER’S BLOCK (2018)
“Inspired by Kerry Hammond’s ‘Search and Rescue Woods’ Creepypasta tale, Butcher’s Block tells the story of a young woman named Alice who moves to a new city and learns about a series of disappearances that may be connected to a baffling rumor about mysterious staircases in the city’s worst neighborhoods. With help from her sister, they discover that something is preying on the city’s residents.”

This sounds a lot better than the fizzled dud, Channel Zero: No-End House (2017). Sure, it got off to a great start, what with some teens going into a reputed spook house that preys on your innermost fears and doesn’t have an exit. But every slow-moving episode that followed felt like a no-end mini-series.

THE QUAKE (2018)
“In 1904 an earthquake of magnitude 5.4 on the Richter Scale shook Oslo, with an epicenter in the ‘Oslo Graben’, which runs under the Norwegian capital. There are now signs that indicate that we can expect a major future earthquake in Oslo.”

You could almost predict this one — it’s being done by the same folks who made the Norwegian hit disaster movie, The Wave (2015). Another prediction: Once The Quake comes out, they’ll start working on The Really Windy Day, A Tree In the Road and The Pothole.

RISE OF THE LIVING DEAD (2018)
“In 1962, Dr. Ryan Cartwright was on the scientific and altruistic path to find a way for humans to sustain life in the event of M.A.D. (Mutual Assured Destruction), a huge topic brought on by the Cuban Missile Crisis. Little did he know that over the course of the next several years of his life, he would take a well-funded and military focused journey to the darkest corners of the world as he creates the ultimate weapon for the government and a curse that will plague mankind for the rest of days.”

Cool title for YET ANOTHER zombie movie. Interesting to frame it around the Cuban Missile Crisis, which, I always thought was a near miss catastrophe about the Cuban cigar shortage. (Cigars are missile-shaped, hence, I assumed, the term.) Warning: this is what beer does to you.

Grandma Zombies, More Sharks, Hollywood Bigfoot

Got a kick out of actor Rob Lowe’s recent statement that he and his sons had a face-to-face encounter with Bigfoot in the Ozarks while shooting a new docuseries called self-servingly, The Lowe Files (premiering August 2, 2017 on A&E). From the press release: “The reality show follows Lowe and his two teenage sons, Matthew and John Owen, as they travel around the country investigating mysterious phenomena and paranormal activity.”

This is what happens to your career when it runs out of gas. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Lowe told the celebrity gossip magazine, “We had an incredible encounter with what locals call the ‘wood ape,’ which is in the Ozark Mountains. I’m fully aware that I sound like a crazy, Hollywood kook right now.”

Looks like Rob just wrote his show’s first review.

Speaking of kooky Hollywood things, here are a few upcoming horror/sci-fi movies that you may or may not come face-to-face with on your TV/movie theater screen — whether you live in the Ozarks or not…

GRANNY OF THE DEAD (July 14, 2017)
“Regular guy Ed awakes one morning to find that his Grandma has become one of the living dead. Trapped in his home, Ed struggles to handle the situation. When he discovers the rest of the town’s elderly have also been infected by the zombie plague, Ed must become a hero in order to save his family and friends.”

Aren’t old people zombies already? I mean, minus the flesh-eating part? Then again, I suppose it’s easier to chew human flesh with dentures, provided said cheap meat has been cut up for you and served around 4PM at Royal Fork Buffet restaurants.

OPEN WATER 3: CAGE DIVE (August 11, 2017)
“Three American tourists are making an audition tape of a shark cage dive for a reality TV show. A catastrophic turn of events leaves them stranded in the waters of South Australia surrounded by hungry great white sharks.”

When aren’t great white sharks hungry? As oceanographer Matt Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss) expertly pointed out in Jaws (1975), “What we’re dealing with here is a perfect engine, an eating machine. All this machine does is swim, eat and make little sharks.” So yeah, looking forward to the sharks graphically doing at least one of those things. (Sorry, nature pervs — this is a PG-rated affair.) And while it sports the Open Water moniker, it’s only related to the previous two Open Water movies in name only. Odd, as the plot is nearly identical. This one, though, is found footage crapola, which in this case, probably works.

P.S. I wrote about this back on October 13, 2016 when it was merely called Cage Dive. With a title that uninspired, not surprised that they added “Open Water” to it to cash in. All things being equal, I would’ve done the same thing, but changed it slightly: Open Water: The Eatening.

DEATH NOTE (August 25, 2017/Netflix)
“Intoxicated by the power of a supernatural notebook, a young man begins killing those he deems unworthy of life. Based on the famous Japanese manga.”

I wrote about Death Note: Light Up The New World, the Japanese sequel, on April 25, 2017. You’re welcome. This Death Note is the American remake of the first DN movie, which came out in 2006. The new trailer is crazy cool nuts, the premise being that a “death note book” drops out of the sky and when you write someone’s name in it, they soon expire. My neck keeps hurting from looking up at the sky for falling books.

BLADE RUNNER 2049 (October 6, 2017)
“Thirty years after the events of the first film, a new blade runner, LAPD Officer K, unearths a long-buried secret that has the potential to plunge what’s left of society into chaos. K’s discovery leads him on a quest to find Rick Deckard, a former LAPD blade runner who has been missing for 30 years.”

The original Blade Runner (1982) has long been considered one of sci-fi’s greatest movies ever in the history of the future. Hence (from Wikipedia™), film critics Chris Ridley and Janet Maslin theorized that “Blade Runner changed cinematic and cultural discourse through its image repertoire, and subsequent influence on films.”

Not everyone liked Blade Runner…or even understood it when it first came out (me included). But re-watching the seven different film cuts (including one where filmmaker Ridley Scott had full artistic license to edit), Blade Runner holds up surprisingly well, and makes the future look as bleak and doom-y as it does today.

ROAD OF THE DEAD (2018)
“Road of the Dead takes place six years after 2005’s post-apocalyptic Land of the Dead and is set on an island where zombie prisoners race cars in a modern-day Coliseum for the entertainment of wealthy humans.”

A return to the zombie genre he kinda started with Night of the Living Dead back in 1968, George Romero’s Road of the Dead is being described as Road Warrior (1981) meets Rollerball (1975) at a Nascar™ race, with significant inspiration from Ben-Hur (1959). That seems pretty dang awesome, especially since his Land of the Dead arrived DOA. So zombies driving race cars — can you say “morning commute”?

Demonic Possession, Foreign Weather, Avocados

Watching a bunch of haunted house documentaries on YouTube™. Loving the footage of alleged paranormal activity. Every time I pick up a camera, all I get are blurry pics of UFOs and Bigfoot. No photos of ghosts, though as I’m not too keen on wandering around houses that are reputed to be haunted. I hear there are poltergeists in a lot of ‘em. And that pretty much goons me out.

Speaking of not-so-scary things, here are a few upcoming horror and sci-fi movies that may or may not make your vision go blurry…

AMERICAN GUINEA PIG: THE SONG OF SOLOMON (pending crowd-funding)
Mary witnesses the brutal suicide of her father. His death unleashes the savage forces of demonic possession in her. The End of Days is upon the world, famine, drought, looting and chaos is ripping the world apart and the Catholic Church is trying to save an innocent soul from the ravages of satanic possession. Wave after wave of holy men are sent to confront the possessed. The Song of Solomon’s true nature is to unleash an evil the world has been waiting for since the beginning of time.”

And to think all Mary’s father had to do to keep all this from happening was to call the Suicide Hotline. (And for those considering the chickensh*t way out, you might wanna make the call: 1-800-273-8255.) That aside, I do like the line, “Wave after wave of holy men are sent to confront the possessed.” Sounds like security at a Liverpool vs. Manchester United football match.

LAKE OF SHADOWS: THE LEGEND OF AVOCADO LAKE (pending crowd-funding)
“Three aspiring filmmakers venture to a mysterious lake resort to uncover a story on a local legend. As they get closer to the truth, the danger follows. Before they know it they are thrust into a fight for their lives and the truth about Avocado Lake. Based on true cases.”

Yes, avocados are true. I’ve seen them. They look like alien dinosaur eggs filled with some sort of green mush. As for the legend in the lake, it’s not a spoiler to tell you it’s a man-eating monster fish. If you didn’t already know that, like a five day old avocado, you’ve just been spoiled.

THE RAIN (2018/Netflix)
“Set after a devastating biological catastrophe, the world as we know it has ended. Six years after a brutal virus wiped out almost all humans in Scandinavia, two siblings join a group of young survivors set out to find out whether a new world has begun somewhere else.”

A new foreign (Danish) horror series by movie streaming giant, Netflix™. For another really good horror series from a different country than the one I’m being over-taxed in, try The Returned (2015). It’s French, sub-titled and très bien.

HOUSEWIFE (2018)
“Holly’s mother murdered her sister and father when she was seven. 20 years later and slowly losing her grip on the difference between reality and nightmares, she runs into a celebrity psychic who claims that he is destined to help her.”

I went to a psychic once. After handing her $20, she divined there would be a need for me to drink a beer in the near future. That I was drinking a beer at the time while fuming over losing the crazy cool Troll doll at the carnival’s ring toss, had nothing to do with it. I believed her and mere minutes later, I was drinking YET ANOTHER beer. Uncanny, true and thus money well spent. P.S. Screw you, rigged ring toss.

Rent-Free Ghosts

Have to give credit to the Italian made Ghosthouse (aka, La Casa/1988). What it short sheets you in acting, dialogue and plot, it’s delightfully gory. Just the opening sequence alone has a slaughtered family cat, a hatchet through the top of dad’s formerly functioning head, and mom getting her face shredded and eye blown out by an exploding mirror before getting her neck sliced into lunch meat. A family slayed together, stays together.

That sets up the premise twenty years later of a young Boston ham radio operator and his emotional rollercoaster of a girlfriend intercepting an ominous call for help, along with an eerie cackle over looped spooky music. Using some sort of math he triangulates the signal and it leads them right to the very long-abandoned house the opening sequence murders took place. Seems some grandfathered evil still lives there rent free.

Teaming up with some age-similar squatters, they try to Scooby-Doo the crap out of the mystery. At the core of it is eleven year old Henrietta and her demoniacally-possessed jester clown doll. Even though she died all those years ago (locked in the basement and left to starve to death), she still has work to do. This includes showing up on TV with bleeding eyes, popping up in hallways and any one of the house’s 14 bedrooms in blinding white light, and packing around that evil-cackling clown doll.

The dialogue is so painful it makes your crevices itch. The acting ranks somewhere between “just graduated from junior high school to “will you please just stop talking?” Thankfully, Henrietta and her demon doll unleash double heck, turning the old mansion into a non-stop parade of haunted house cliches and gore.

Other than the entire thing, Ghosthouse’s paranormal activities are outright LOL: a bedroom where toys and pillow feathers encircle a victim as if an indoor tornado; An running unplugged and motor-less fan’s blade coming lose and frisbee-ing a new throat hole in another victim; Floorboards giving way to a bubble bath of thick milky goop that dissolves skin; A melt-y face skeleton wearing a Grim Reaper robe and brandishing a knife. But it was the blood coming out of a bathroom faucet that really put the frosting on this cadaver cake. And if you can get through it, the ending will put a grin on your non-sliced face.

Interesting note: The house featured in the film is the same one used in the splatfest The House by the Cemetery (1981). Wonder what it rents for on Zillow™?

Paranormal Training Bra

Need a Halloween fix? Well, tie off horror junkies because here’s two new ones for you…

First up is a comedy horror movie that pays homage to horror movies that ripped off other horror movies. My head hurts. Caesar and Otto’s Paranormal Halloween, releasing October 27, 2015, gives a laugh-shaped mouth shout-out to the pop ghostly culture likes of Insidious (2010), The Conjuring (2013), Amityville Horror (1979), Sinister (2012), and Paranormal Activity (2007). Kind of redundant as all those movies are full of funny stuff, intended or not.

If you haven’t seen the trailer for Caesar and Otto’s Paranormal Halloween, here’s what materializes…

“It’s Halloween Eve and Caesar and Otto find themselves house-sitting for the world’s most unpopular Governor, Jerry Grayson. But after a series of ghostly visions, strange phenomenon and a demonic possession, the half-brothers call upon renowned exorcist Father Jason Stieger to help put a stop to this new nightmare. But in this house, nothing is what it seems and everyone is fair game for the mysterious forces at work…”

Who hires guys to house sit? That in itself is kinda scary, especially if there’s an unattended liquor cabinet full of spirits waiting to be released. Heh.

Next is Out There In The Dark (2015), a ’tweener “horror” movie, starring two young teens gals who use their cell phones to try and Scooby-Doo a ghost in a big mansion. Thus: After visiting a haunted house, two teenage girls are plagued by supernatural phenomena that lead them to uncover a chilling secret.”

I bet the chilling secret is they discover why they call ’em training bras.

The Unending Horror of Amityville

It isn’t schedule for release until 2016, but already red flags are going up around the impending Amityville – The Awakening, another coattail rider in the beleaguered Amityville Horror franchise, which started in 1979. (Amityville: The Awakening is the 14th offering in a once-kinda cool but now painfully laughable series.)

And they haven’t decided what to call it. Wikipedia has it listed as Amityville: The Reawakening, but the ad posters simply have it titled as Amityville: The Awakening. The irony here is that the sequel will probably put you to sleep (if the trailer is any indication). Here’s some more knuckleheadedness – Wikipedia™ states that the movie was released on January 2, 2015, yet IMDB.com says it comes out in April of 2016. Somebody needs to re-awake, pick a lane, and drive in it.

So here’s how they go to the cursed well one more time: “Belle, her little sister Juliet, and her comatose twin brother James move into a new house with their single mother Joan in order to save money to help pay for her brother’s expensive healthcare.”

“But when strange phenomena begin to occur in the house including the miraculous recovery of her brother and Belle’s increasingly horrifying nightmares, Belle begins to suspect her mother isn’t telling her everything and soon realizes they just moved into the infamous Amityville house.”

Weak. Clearly, after 14 movies, they ran out of ways to cash in other than to cram “Amityville” in the title and make leap of believability to place everyone back in the most infamous haunted house in the world. They should call it Amityville: The Re-Sleepening.

Ghost Dimension

Just about gave up on the Paranormal Activity franchise after Paranormal Activity 4 (2012) aimed straight at ‘tweeners, and the ill-advised/painfully clumsy spin-off, Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones (2014). But all the lingering questions from the series that bubbled to the surface of my clearly damaged thought process look to be answered with the release of Paranormal Activity: Ghost Dimension, releasing October 23, 2015 on – get this – Imax™ 3D, as well as all the other 115 formats only tech nerds care about.

In PA:GD (the final installment), a new family gets brought into the otherworldly mix, who move into a house and discover a video camera and a box of tapes in the garage. (Nope, not suburbia porno, unfortunately.) When said tapes are viewed, they begin to see the paranormal activity happening around them — including the re-emergence of young Kristi and Katie, the two little girls from Paranormal Activity 3 (2011) prequel, who hooked up with the invisible demon Toby (he’s mean) and started the whole supernatural familial curse thing hinted at in the first two flicks.

Toby better show himself in the new one. And I gotta know if anyone cleaned up the baby powder they sprinkled on the floor to see invisible demon footprints. While I’m on the subject, did anyone wash those sheets after some unseen thing yanked them off the bed and probably blew its nose in ’em like some paranormal hanky? And would it kill someone to properly dispose of all those bent in half bodies laying around? Talk about germ magnets.

There’s no reason a haunted house can’t be a clean haunted house.

Door-To-Door Alien Ghost

In the horrifically genric-titled The Night Visitor (2013), a suburban couple (i.e., upscale snobs) hire a New Age spiritualist (i.e., creatively employed hippie) to assist with their troubled marriage (i.e., not enough time to shop for the latest things to outdo their neighbors.)

The lazy “spiritualist” advises them to videotape their lives, 24 hours a day to get a visual on why they can’t seem to get along. What they discover is their son is having conversations with an unseen entity (i.e., cheap special effect).

Didn’t see that one. Apparently, not deemed worthy enough to play at the multi-screen cineplex at the mall where I should for things I don’t need to show up my snobby neighbors.

Now comes the sequel: The Night Visitor 2: Heather’s Story (2015), which tells us about Heather, a “special” (i.e., more supernatural powers than everyone else) young girl who must protect her family and the planet from the same other-earthly being.”

So there’s the hook – it appears Ricky, the kid from the first movie, has been talking to aliens, not ghosts, even though the new trailer looks like it was photocopied from Paranormal Activity (2009). (I’m not sure how I feel about that. But hey, the sequel is said to delve deeper into the mysteries that originally plagued the Stevens family and their son with the help of a psychic/medium (i.e., creatively employed hippie with slacks).

Might have to go back and watch the first one and, by extension, the second one, just to find out how much the spiritualist and psychic medium charge for their services. Might be time for a career change as full-timin’ it on my couch watching horror movies ain’t putting gluten on the table.

P.S. There are eight movies titled The Night Visitor, dating back to 1971. Maybe even earlier, but you get my snarky insinuation. There may even be a pile of books with that title as well. I don’t know for sure as I can’t read. Oh, I fake it good; but I’m the type of guy who moves his lips while looking at pictures. It sometimes helps to sound things out.