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.

Sharkenstein

Sharkenstein. I don’t know why I’m rolling my eyes; this was of course bound to happen. Then again, when the film-making community regurgitates stuff like Sharkula (2015), Sharktopus (2010) and Shark Exorcist (2016), any chances for the great white shark to be nothing more than a pounded-into-the-ocean-floor punchline went out with the tide.

So here’s what someone had swimming around in their head…

“In the final days of World War II, a secret experiment to weaponize sharks is shut down and destroyed by the Third Reich. But now, 60 years later, a small ocean town is plagued by a bloodthirsty, mysterious creature, one built and reanimated using parts of the greatest killers to ever inhabit the sea – the Sharkenstein monster!”

Yeah, I’ll watch it when it comes out in August 2016. It’s part of my sickness.

FYI: Nazis using sharks seems to be the go-to plot these days. Check out Sky Sharks, due 2017…

“Deep in the ice of the antarctic, a team of geologists uncover an old Nazi laboratory still intact where dark experiments had occured. In order to conquer the world, the Nazis created modified sharks who were able to fly and whose riders are genetically mutated, undead super-humans. A miltary task force called Dead Flesh Four – reanimated US soldiers who fell in Vietnam – is put together to prevent world downfall.”

Holy Shirt – It’s Whalewolf!

Hate to resort to filthy gutter talk to vent my frustrations, but gosh ding dong dang it – every time I come up with a new horror/sci-fi movie monster, somebody else has beaten me to the punchline.

Such is the case with the upcoming Sharktopus vs. Whalewolf, airing on the SyFy Channel™ on July 19, 2015. I thought up Whalewolf – a cross between a whale and a werewolf – several years ago. Even then I was too late as the The Field Guide to Doomsday blog created their own Whalewolf as a creature of the Apocalypse back in 2011. Son of a beehive.

I shouldn’t get my panties in a pinch; Sharktopus (2010) was coined by Futurama in 1999, long before the ratings winner turned up in a feature “film.”

So here’s how Sharktopus vs. Whalewolf goes down: “When a mad scientist mixes the genes of a killer whale and a wolf, it creates the Whalewolf, and it’s up to Sharktopus to stop it.”

I recently came up with Snoa Constrictor and even designed a fake movie poster for it, only to find out Adventure Time got there first. Flippin’ flap. I better brew up some Chamomile tea so I don’t get further stressed out.

This Shark Is The Bomb

It used to be we were justifiably afraid of sharks, what with their emotionless biting off of limbs and/or employable extremities. Now that our ferocious friends of the foamy sea have been tornado’d, tomato’d, super-sized and mechanized, the continuously-mocked apex predator has been relegated to a one punch line cinematic joke. Shame on everyone except me.

And the knee-slapping continues with the impending Atomic Shark (coming 2014), wherein a terrorist and a biologist devise a device that makes great white sharks attack a variety of anything. As if sharks ever need an excuse to chew you out.

To add some padding to the plot, criminal humans attach bombs to the sharks, kinda like what the Navy’s been doing with delicious dolphins for decades now. The terrorist’s target? A nuclear sub that, once bitten by a shark that thinks it’s a heavy metal hot dog, would explode and smear everyone except me in a cloud of radioactive hair product.

I’ll say this about Atomic Shark, though – at least they didn’t turn the hapless eating machine into a comedy act hybrid, ala Sand Sharks, Sharktopus, Ghost Shark, Snow Shark, Psycho Shark, Avalanche Sharks, etc., etc., etc. Why can’t we pick on oysters for a change?

P.S. Do not confuse this movie with The Atomic Sharks, the educational kid’s music  ukulele duo comprised of Kris Hensler and Kenny Taylor, both of whom still have employable extremities.

Ski-Rex

Even as much as creature DNA swapping horror movies suck (Sharktopus/2010 instantly comes to mind), these mega cheesy quickies with digital monsters so lame they couldn’t cut it in video games from 1990 somehow manage to become guilty pleasures all the same. (Thank you, beer, for making me even more easily entertained.)

Take the latest God cocktail: Poseidon Rex (2013), or “P-Rex,” which makes an aquatic hybrid out of a presumed extinct tyrannosaurus rex. Awaken the monster via a limp plot about divers searching for lost treasure, cut him loose on some vacationing bikinis and you’ve got yourself another SyFy Channel™ floater.

A creature like Poseidon Rex, though, is nothing new. In fact, a land/sea multi-tasking beastie named Titanosaurus has been around since 1975, making his big scream debut in Terror of MechaGodzilla. Titanosaurus can breathe under and on top of the water, has a roar that sounds like a trumpet firmly submerged in your Mariana Trench, and has been known to kick Godzilla in the nadzillas.

Titanosaurus has been around nearly 40 years. Let’s see how long Poseidon Rex can hold his breath. In the meantime, don’t hold yours.

Dead Sea

Hard to not be a fan of water-based horror movies. The ocean, as it turns out, is full of awesome life-hurting creatures, like Dinocrocs and Sharktopuses, all designed to make you ruin your bathing suit. So it is with great anticipation I look forward to Dead Sea, arriving on the outdated DVD platform April 15, 2014.

OK, so everything about Dead Sea seems generic, from the title (how about H2O-Noooo!?), to the DVD cover art (yet another chick in a bikini moments prior to being devoured – see Piranha 3D / 2010 and spin around from there), the kicker line: “It’s Feeding Time” (how about: “You’ll Wet Yourself”?), to the plot: “A marine biologist is thrust into the violent paranoia surrounding a town preparing for the return of a legendary serpentine creature.” All “meh” stuff. But c’mon – sea monster!

But judging by Dead Sea’s art, the monster’s mouth (at least I hope that’s its mouth) looks suspiciously similar to the alien octopus creature(s) in the hysterically cool Grabbers (2012), in which a coastal Irish fishing village defends themselves from sea monsters by getting as drunk as possible. (The creatures react to booze like vampires do to garlic. They must be from Utah.)

A great primer for multi-tentacled mega creatures of the deep is 1954’s 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, based on a novel (book with extra pages) by sci-fi fantasy author Jules Verne and adapted by Disney™, a corporation long known as being a monster factory.

Anyway, regardless of Dead Sea’s perceived shortcomings, I will dive headfirst into this ocean of terror – and this time I might even wear someone’s swim suit.