Horror Host Icon: Baron Von Porkchop

Dayton, Ohio really does have its fair share of Horror Host history, with many of them being household names and each meaning something to their viewers. Names like Dr. Creep, The Creeper and A. Ghastlee Ghoul have graced the TV Screens of many late night viewers and each have inspired and entertained generations of Monster Kids and each of them helped shape my creative mind in their own ways. And in 2010 the Dayton market was pretty dry when it came to Horror Hosts as Iris & Retina of Mondo Smash A’Go-Go had slowed down and reruns of New Shock Theater and The Ghastlee Movie Show were hard to find on the access stations DATV and MVCC, and then that void was filled when Baron Von Porkchop and his Terrifying Tales of the Macabre hit DATV like a frightening freight train! And still to this day Baron Von Porkchop is the cities current King of late night viewing and a fan favorite to many. This Horror Host Icon update will be one that will not only talk about Baron Von Porkchop and his Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre, but will also give a little behind the scenes and facts that many do not know. So it’s with great honor and pride that I bring to you readers Horror Host Icon: Baron Von Porkchop. So let’s travel to Porkchop Manor and see what BVP has in store for us.

Baron Von Porkchop is a ghoul who originally died in the 1800’s after a wagon accident that also left his wife The Baroness dead! The couple was buried in two different locations when their enemy Count Van Lambchop paid for their burials as a fake act of kindness to impress the townspeople of New Burlington. Decades passed and in 2010 Baron and Baroness Von Porkchop where dug up and come back to life and while Ghouls they continue their lives at their now moved Manor as their old town of New Burlington was flooded and the town moved to a hidden location in Ohio. And while their pork meat empire slaughter houses are now closed they did generate money while they were dead and their bank account is well stocked with cash and making it very easy for them to continue on and have all types of adventures around the state of Ohio. Baron Von Porkchop dresses in a nice black coat, with a top hat, blue vest, glasses with a magnifier and has very pale grayish skin. While he is a ghoul he is not a flesh eater and has a very fun loving nature with a hint of an ego. He really enjoys hosting the movies and bringing his viewers his show as his “Piggies” as he calls them are like his close friends. Baron is very much in love with The Baroness as he would do anything to make her happy, and his best friend is the family butler Bean. Baron Von Porkchop besides his show has done lots of cool things in and around Dayton as he has hosted a Halloween Theme Dinner party at Lily’s Bistro, he has been a guest and attended conventions like HorrorHound Weekend, I.C.E. and Cinema Wasteland to name a few. He has hosted movies at theaters Englewood Cinema and Danbarry Huber Heights. He has hosted verity show “Dirty Little Secrets” at Wiley’s Comedy Club. At Gilly’s Jazz club an event called “Baron’s Ball” was held that had many great music acts play for Baron and his guests, not to mention he even hosted the freakshow event called “Captain Johnny’s Whiz Bang” at Gilly’s. He has attended Halloween Parties for fans and even has done charity events. Plus he has appeared in comic books namely “Shocking Macabre Theater” by Sparkle Comics. As you can see Baron does lots of great things for fans to enjoy, and he has no plans of slowing down anytime soon. Stephen Alexander II is the man who plays Baron Von Porkchop and is not only my cousin but also was a founding member of the “Gem City Gentlemen Of The Gilded Beard” a beard club that did events for charity, he also is a writer for comic book company Sparkle Comics and is a pretty creative guy who also makes custom Funko Pop! Figures, creates enamel pins and repairs old smoking pipes.

Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre began in 2010 and started airing on DATV, MVCC and The Monster Channel with host Baron Von Porkchop and took viewers by storm as the area of Dayton, Ohio was in need of an active Horror Host as many of the hosts had taken time away or retired. Out the gate Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre gained a great following with loyal viewers who enjoyed Baron Von Porkchop and the crazy world around him. The show is still going strong as of 2021 and has had a number of regular episodes as well as many specials, showing that BVP is here to stay! The show is one that takes Baron all around the city of Dayton as well as conventions and events and even has guests and story arches…it’s like a Horror Host sitcom wrapped around cheesy films. Baron on the show not only hosts classic public domain films but also hosts many independent films of all types of budgets. Baron has even hosted wrestling matches from Rockstar Pro Wrestling for a special. Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre is a staple of Dayton airwaves and still has many more episodes and specials to come.

But did you know that Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre was original going to be new episodes of Shock Theater and was slated to be the return of Dr. Creep as Dayton’s Horror Host? For years Dr. Creep and I talked about bringing his show back as while his health was on a decline he had the itch to get back to hosting movies and entertaining viewers. So to prepare for his return I wrote out several episode ideas and decided to film a Horror Host show that would be just seen by my friends in order to truly get ready for Dr. Creep’s return. So while chatting with my cousin Stephen we decided that he would act as the host and the name Baron Von Porkchop was created by me due to his sideburns. We came up with an idea of Baron going fishing to capture a Creature From The Black Lagoon type fish monster in order to serve him to dinner guests, Baron was more of a snarling sinister type Host with a toned down voice, in other words he was more played on fear and not laughs. We choose the movie Night Fright to host and once filmed I made generic opening credits for the show we were calling “Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre” and once edited I burnt it onto a DVD and gave copies to a few fiends including Rick Martin and Andy Copp both who brought back Dr. Creep with New Shock Theater back in the late 90’s, and the response we got from the episode and Baron Von Porkchop was overwhelming with everyone saying that we should do more episodes and turn him into an ongoing Horror Host! Andy Copp told me he thought I had something special with Baron and even said that he could get it aired on public access station DATV, and with those kind words among many others Stephen and I decided that we would indeed keep Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre as it’s own series and when Dr. Creep’s health would get better I would do both shows! Sadly Dr. Creep’s health only got worse and on January 14, 2011 the world lost this amazing man and host, and this was very sad for not only Dayton but for all who enjoyed Dr. Creep’s antics.

As the show grew I knew that I had to cast my friend and then co-worker Stephanie Stidham in the show so she became Baroness Von Porkchop, and the show just kept growing from there. While working on Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre BVP has had the pleasure of working with many of the Horror Hosts from Dayton’s past like A. Ghastlee Ghoul, Dr. Freak and Iris & Retina and this to me shows the bond that our area hosts have together. Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre has become a true Friday night tradition for many viewers as we have gotten fan snail mail and emails from viewers as even our home station of DATV has gotten mail about how much the shows means to our viewers and one amazing thing was a local retirement home have movie nights watching Baron! Heck even during the 2020 pandemic we even filmed a few Specials to help our viewers out and give them some laughs during the hard time. I truly love creating the show Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre alongside my cousin Stephen and we have more ideas and spooky, silly adventures planned for Baron coming up over the next few years.

As like all good Horror Hosted shows Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre has it’s fair share of amazing cohosts and sidekicks that live in and around the Porkchop Manor. The lovely Baroness Von Porkchop is the voice of reason when it comes to the decisions made in and around the Manor, she is elegant and stunning and was a former Miss Slaughterhouse Pageant winner and is one of New Burlington’s most beautiful women, The Baroness is played by Stephanie Stidham. Bean is the longtime hunchback butler for the Porkchop’s and is the one who for over a century took care of Porkchop Manor and is responsible for finding them and bringing them back to life, he is a silly goofy man who helps BVP get into all types of wacky adventures and always encourages his off the wall and lazy ways. Bean is played by Bruce Lerma who is the nephew of Horror Hosts Iris and Retina from Mondo Smash A’ Go-Go! Jenkins The Pigman was the first pigman experiment that BVP and Bean created and they decided not to kill him for his meat and keep him as a member of the manor, Jenkins is very strong and also has a darkside and will do whatever he can to protect Baron and Baroness. Jenkins The Pigman was played originally by Gary Wolf and later on by myself among others. The manors cook is JD The Meatman a loyal and skilled meat cutter who has worked for Baron in his old slaughterhouse and now works in his kitchen, JD is played by artist Eric Shonborn. Viola Poison was at one time the maid for Porkchop Manor and was skilled in not only cleaning but also using Poison, she also had a massive crush on the Baron and this is what lead to her leaving the Manor, Viola was played by Emily Marshall. And these are the main sidekick characters that make up Porkchop Manor!

The Baron also has some friends in and around town that includes his neighbors Sleazy Tom a laid back ladies man who while sleazy does have a good heart who was played by Max Ervin (who sadly passed away in 2013) and on the other side is Mr. G the lizard headed mascot form the closed down Renaissance Music Media store who is enjoying retirement and is still played by Geoff Burkman. The Son Of Hercules a strong man of myth and legend and is one of Barons best friends and is played by Mike Ritchie. Melvin is a monster-faced goofball who is the helper of Stephen Von Frankenstein and enjoys hanging out with Baron and is his Halloween buddy, Melvin is played by the legendary local actor Josh Weinberg! And this is just a drop in the hat of the townies that live in New Burlington as names like Oliver The Werewolf, Mr. Pepperton, Susie The DJ, Beerwolf, Wolf Hunter Duke, BK King, Reporter Ted The Fox, Mr. O and so many others make up the townies.

Also Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre has had some review hosts that make up one of the shows segments with the original being Reverend Zealot who brought back The Cult Corner that he use to do on New Shock Theater that was hosted by Dr. Creep! Filmmaker Andrew Copp played Reverend Zealot for the second season and sadly he passed away in 2013 making another loss for the show. Brett does video game reviews on his Bad Or Rad segment that started in the third season and he is blogger Brett Prescott. Both Zealot and Brett help make episodes of Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre more special for viewers and both are vital to making the show even more fun.

But while BVP has his fair share of friends he also has those in New Burlington who dislike him and the fact he hosts movies for viewers of Public Access, and these sticks in the mud want to end Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre…or even take it over! His main nemesis is Count Van Lambchop the poultry King played by Thomas Smith who is extremely competitive and is upset that he did not become the host of Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre as he and his wife the lovely Countess Van Lambchop played by Jaimie Mazzone were resurrected before the Von Porkchops. They also have a very loyal butler named Cornbread who dislikes Baron, but he truly cannot stand Bean! The three of them do whatever they can to annoy and be thorns in the side of Baron as they think they should be the center of attention. The next major hater of BVP is Baron Von Porkchop Jr. played by musician Todd The Fox is a crazy fraud he has the people of New Burlington believing that he is truly his son, he is manipulative as well as short tempered and dangerous! And this is just a drop in the hat of the villains of the show as names like Chicken Man, Fulci Zombie, Headless Horseman, The Sadness, Crazed Fan and David J. Getz also cause issues. Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre is like no other Horror Host show from the area as it truly does have a massive world and tons of characters that make it up.

When Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre started up as a full show I spent so much time building the world of New Burlington and knew that I wanted it to be filled with all types of townies from normal people, monsters, retired mascots and even movie characters from indie made films…and one other character that was planned was Baby Von Porkchop who was going to be The Baron and Baroness’s daughter that was going to be played by my friend KD Cyr, the character would have been stuck in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey and would have sent video messages to her parents about her adventures from the haunted woods. You see KD lived near the barrens and was a creative soul that I meet on social media and we hit it off as both of us loved Horror and cheesy movies, and when creating the character I had her 100% in mind and she as well helped create the attitude and storyline for Baby. I was so excited to have her on board for the show and at one point an episode was planned that would have had Baron, Baroness and Bean heading into the Pine Barrens to find her only to have a run in with the Jersey Devil of course! KD would do some trial run footage with a friend and make-up designs, but would never share as she always said that footage was bad as she was nervous in it, and I would encourage her and of course put no stress on her. We put off the characters debut so that she could find what worked for her with playing Baby, and all was going well. But sadly in 2015 the world lost a truly amazing person as KD passed away from a car accident when a reckless driver crashed into the back of her car. Truly heartbreaking news when I found out and even if she never made an appearance on the show she is still to all of us a part of our cast family, and I felt it was only right when writing about the show that she gets the respect she deserves. My deepest sympathy goes to her family and friends as she was an amazing and creative soul.

One thing that I love seeing is fan art done by our viewers as well as just fans of Horror Hosting and over the years we have gotten some pretty amazing pieces of art sent to us! Crazy even some of the artists have who sent us some of the art ended up being on the show! As a creator of Baron Von Porkchop and Sparkle Comics when anyone takes the time to make art for us it’s very appreciated and we love seeing them! Below is some art from many of the talented artists who have drawn BVP over the years. And I want to also send out a massive thank you to everyone who has ever sent us fan art or done art featuring Baron Von Porkchop or any of the cast of Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre. Artwork below features ones done by Brett Prescott, Eric Shonborn, MonkeyGoatBoy and Bradley Beard.

Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre has had many regular episodes as well as specials over the years and each of them I enjoyed making, being apart of and even watching, but one has always stood out as the most important episode to me and that was Episode 8 as it was the tribute to the late Dr. Creep who passed away before the episode was filmed. The original idea for the episode was it was suppose to be Baron Von Porkchop hosting a dinner party that the guest of honor was to be Dr. Creep who would have taken over the episode sharing stories of his years of being a Horror Host and they would have hosted a Bela Lugosi film. But sadly Dr. Creep who was in poor health passed away on January 14, 2011 at the age of 69, and this was a sad day for all of Ohio and those of use who grew up watching Dr. Creep and knew the man behind the grease paint. And the episode that was suppose to be his comeback to TV ended up being turned into a celebration of his life and memory. The episode was turned into The Baron and Baroness throwing a dinner party to honor Dr. Creep’s memory and had many of his friends on talk about his life and tell fun stories. Many names showed up like A. Ghastlee Ghoul, Dr. Freak, Jeff McClellan, Rick Martin, Geraldo The Hunchback, Reverend Zealot, Mr. G and even characters like Melvin, Duke The Wolf Hunter and Son Of Hercules showed up to pay respects. After the guests shared their stories we showed classic clips of Dr. Creep from Shock Theater. It was very magical hearing each of these guys sharing their stories of traveling, hanging out and working with Dr. Creep. Many also told stories of meeting him for the first time or shared stories he had told them…it was very magical and was something that I hope he would have been proud of. Below is a picture from that film shoot with all the people involved in one shot. Well I need to also say thanks to Juliet Fromholt, Emily Marshall, Maurice Smith, Josh Weinberg and Eric Shonborn all who helped makes the special possible but are not in the picture.

For me one of the greatest honors of doing and creating this show was when on September 11, 2021 when Baron Von Porkchop was inducted into the Horror Host Hall Of Fame as part of the 2020 class in Ohio! BVP took his place with the other Icons from Dayton that was placed in the Hall Of Fame like Dr. Creep, A. Ghastlee Ghoul and The Creeper! This introduction was well attended and BVP was inducted by “The Mummy and The Monkey” an amazing Horror Host duo from Cleveland, Ohio. It was really cool seeing Baron on stage getting the honor of being inducted in, as the years of hard work paid off and it was awesome to see the fans clap for him to get this honor. While the Hall Of Fame was very odd as it was a smaller event due to the on going pandemic and some audio issues plagued the start of the ceremony it was something very special for BVP and myself.

Baron Von Porkchop and his Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre as you can see is a show that has became a main stay in Dayton, Ohio and has expanded to the world thanks to the online stations like The Monster Channel and even the online viewing streams of DATV and MVCC. And really one of the biggest honors making this show is getting feedback from the fans as well as being inducted into the Horror Host Hall Of Fame thanks to fan votes as well as votes from his peers. And we are now at the point of this review to talk about the episodes and I decided to not cover all of the episodes of Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre as I will cover Baron Von Porkchop again in the future so I decided to cover seasons one and two as well as the specials that went along with those two seasons. The movies plots will be taken from our pals at IMDB with some being written by myself as well as all the hosts segments. So if you are ready lets spend sometime at Porkchop Manor and have some fun with BVP and his friends that make up New Burlington.

TTOTM: House On Haunted Hill
Starring – Vincent Price & Carol Ohmart         Not Rated       1959

Host: Earl The Gravedigger leads Baroness Von Porkchop and Bean to a dug up gravesite and when the coffin opens its Baron Von Porkchop! Once back at the manor that is located in New Burlington they get cleaning as the place is dusty and Baron even meets his neighbor Sleazy Tom for the first time that wants him to watch his 1900 # dating ad. In the end Baron informs the Piggies at home that we will be returning next week with a new spooky film to share with them.

Movie: Eccentric millionaire Fredrick Loren and his 4th wife, Annabelle, have invited 5 people to the house on Haunted Hill for a “haunted House” party. Whoever will stay in the house for one night will earn ten thousand dollars each. As the night progresses, all the guests are trapped inside the house with ghosts, murderers, and other terrors.

TTOTM: Driller Killer
Starring – Abel Ferrara & Carolyn Marz     Not Rated     1979

Host: Baron Von Porkchop and his friend and butler Bean are working in the manors garage on making a pig man in order to raise and then slaughter and sell his meat as Pig Man Sausage! Throughout the episode Baron and Bean work on the Pigman trying to give him life and add organs as well as use electricity to try and start his heart. In the end when all looks as if it has failed the Pigman rockets up to life and runs from the garage…Baron and Bean end the issue by shooting the Pigman dead so that he would not run amuck in New Burlington.

Movie: Reno is an artist struggling to survive in NYC. He draws inspiration from scenes of daily street life and occasional random violence. Under pressure to finish his oft-delayed grand masterpiece, his psychotic alter-ego takes over and he begins killing random vagrants to boost his creativity, not quite realizing that it is happening in reality. When an art dealer grimly rejects Reno’s finished masterpiece, Reno’s mental condition quickly deteriorates.

TTOTM: Frankenstein ‘80
Starring – Gordon Mitchell & Xiro Papas     Not Rated     1972

Host: While walking through the woods Baron Von Porkchop runs into a weird looking creature man named Melvin who informs him that Stephen Von Frankenstein needs his help! As Baron follows Melvin to Castle Frankenstein he is told by Stephen that his Monster is now free and wondering the woods! So Baron along with Melvin go looking for The Monster only to find him in a very bad mood!

Movie: A mad scientist creates a monster called “Mosaico,” who breaks out of the laboratory to hunt down and kill beautiful women.

TTOTM: Ulysses Against The Son Of Hercules
Starring – Mike Lane & Georges Marchal     Not Rated     1962

Host: Baron, Baroness and Bean get a call from The Son Of Hercules that he needs their help in order to get back a golden apple that is in the hands of an old witch that is inside a haunted collage! So brave Baron and Bean take the quest and leave Baroness behind, while on the quest the encounter a zombie and ghosts before coming face to face with the witch…the coward out and run away before getting the apple. On their way back to face The Son Of Hercules they are coming up with a story in why they failed in the quest only to be greeted by the Baroness who had went the quest along and retrieved the apple!

Movie: Ulysses offends the gods by blinding the Cyclops, so they send Hercules to capture him and bring him to them.

TTOTM: Five Minutes To Live
Starring – Johnny Cash & Ron Howard     Not Rated     1961

Host: Baron and Baroness head to grocery store Big Bear in Lebanon, Ohio in order to sell them his freshly made Pigman sausage as when he was alive that chain was very much into stocking his quality pork products. But to their horror Big Bear is out of business and hanging around was one of the stores old managers who tells them they should sell their meat by going door to door…and Baron and Baroness do just that and turn it into a computation on who can sell more! The split up and meet all types of strange people trying to sell them this meat…in the end The Baroness comes out the winner!

Movie: Fred narrates the film in flashback, detailing a suburban bank robbery that goes awry. In his simple plan, he hires a hard-up hood, Johnny Cabot to take the wife of the bank’s vice president hostage. Cabot will hold her until he gets a call alerting him that Fred has been successful in getting ransom money. Cabot waits, and watches the Wilson house as the husband leaves for the bank and their young son heads off to school. Posing as a door-to-door guitar instructor, he forces his way into the house and takes Nancy Wilson hostage. At the bank, Fred talks his way into Ken Wilson’s office, and presents his personal check for $70,000, intending that Wilson will withdraw the funds to cover the check as a ransom for his wife. He has Wilson call home to prove that Nancy is being held by the unstable Cabot, and gives Wilson 5 minutes to make his.

TTOTM: Fury Of The Wolfman
Starring – Paul Naschy & Perla Cristal     Rated PG     1972

Host: Baron Von Porkchop gets the invite of a lifetime as he is able to sit down and have a one of one interview with world famous werewolf hunter Duke! Duke The Wolf Hunter was seen in the second shot on video film “The Wolf Hunter II” and shares is secrets of hunting down werewolf scum. Also along for this amazing interview is Bean who is star struck by the hunter, as well as a heck of a lot of blood sucking Cicadas who are trying to ruin Baron’s show!

Movie: Waldimar Daninsky, a lone survivor of a Tibetian expedition, returns home to find his wife has been unfaithful to him. Carrying the curse of the pentagram (or pentagon, as stated by the monk who nursed him back to health), the fury of the wolfman is unleashed! After disposing of his cheating spouse, he finds himself captive in a castle by a female mad scientist conducting mind control experiments. In a vein attempt at escape, he discovers the freaks left over from past experiments dwelling in the dungeons.

TTOTM: Night Fright
Starring – John Agar & Dorothy Davis     Not Rated     1967

Host: Baron Von Porkchop is going fishing to try and snag a fish creature using Beans brain as bait! He is trying his hardest to capture this creature as he wants to serve his meat to his dinner guests that are gathering the next episode to honor the late great Dr. Creep! In the end Baron is able to snag the creature!

Movie: A government space experiment into the effects of cosmic rays on animal life goes horribly wrong, creating a mutant monster that terrorizes a rural community.

TTOTM: Dr. Creep Tribute
Starring – Dr. Creep & Dow Thomas     Not Rated     1970-1990

Host: Baron and Baroness Von Porkchop are throwing a dinner part to honor Dr. Creep the Dayton, Ohio iconic Horror Host. They have JD The Meatman cook up the Creature Meat and have snacks and treats for the guests as Bean escorts them to the dinner table. Guests include Rick Martin, A. Ghastlee Ghoul, Jeff McClellan American, Dr. Freak, Geraldo The Hunchback, Duke The Wolf Hunter, Son Of Hercules, Melvin, Mr. G and Reverend Zealot and they all share amazing and fun Dr. Creep stories and myths.

Movie: Clips of Dr. Creep over the ages from his shows Shock Theatre, Saturday Night Dead and New Shock Theater. As well as some of his public appearances over the years at events.

TTOTM: Independent Short Films
Starring – Dave Wean & Kipp Poe     Not Rated     1990’s-2000’s

Host: The Baroness wants Baron and Bean to clean up the garage as its getting out of hand with boxes that is filled with old media, toys and forgotten relics…but cleaning is no fun so they decide to dig out some independently made horror short films and share them with the Piggies at home! They also find out that Mr. G has moved in next-door and he as well shares a short film! And when all said and done Baron and Bean do nothing and the Baroness is not very happy!

Movie: Indie short films shown on this episode are “The Cask Amontillado”, “Dreadful”, “Callback”, “Songs In The Key Of Satan” and “Outpost 31”.

TTOTM: Phantom From 10,000 Leagues
Starring – Dave Wean & Kipp Poe     Not Rated     1955

Host: Baron Von Porkchop is very distracted from hosting the nights film as he has gotten himself a video game console and is playing the game Space Invaders as he thinks that by playing the game he is saving the Earth. He is so focused that he is ignoring the issues of the manor as well as his wife The Baroness and friends Sleazy Tom, Bean and Jenkins The Pigman!

Movie: An unusual radioactive rock on the sea bottom mutates the ocean life into a horrible monster. When charred, radioactive bodies begin to drift ashore a scientist and government agent investigate the phenomenon, and it’s connection to a local marine biology professor.

TTOTM: Quiet Nights Of Blood And Pain
Starring – Amanda DeLotelle & Loren Goins     Not Rated     2009

Host: Baron Von Porkchop has cult indie filmmaker Andy Copp over to the manor to chat about his legacy of making films, television shows as well as his work with Dr. Creep. And of course Bean is around to make sure their guest is uncomfortable or is that comfortable?

Movie: The movie deals with two soldiers home from the Iraq war suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, but in vastly different ways. One see’s her life falling apart in night-terrors, flashbacks, insomnia, and a total lack of government support. The other still believes he is fighting the war now that he is back on American soil. Still convinced he is supposed to torture and kill any and everyone who can be viewed as Anti-American. Soon they will be at a crossroads and blood will be flooding the American streets.

TTOTM: White Pongo
Starring – Richard Fraser & Maris Wrixon     Not Rated     1945

Host: Baron Von Porkchop and Bean are on the hunt for a creature that broke into the manor and stole one of the Baronesses little figures! The two head to the woods and soon find that they are looking for a Were-Gorilla, and they try to get the item back as well as avoid its rage.

Movie: Suspecting that a safari guide is a wanted killer, undercover policeman Geoffrey Bishop joins a safari led by the suspect for a scientist that hopes to find and prove that a fabled white gorilla is a missing link.

TTOTM: I Eat Your Skin
Starring – William Joyce & Heather Hewitt     Rated PG     1971

Host: Baron and Baroness Von Porkchop get a visitor who claims he is their long lost son, but the thing is they never had a son! Baron Von Porkchop Jr. starts to be a menace around the manor as well as starts to interfere in the personal life and business life of Baron that causes him lots of issues. But it’s soon seen that BVP Jr. is not stable and Baron must find a way to get ride of him once and for all.

Movie: A cancer researcher on a remote Caribbean island discovers that by treating the natives with snake venom he can turn them into bug-eyed zombies. Uninterested in this information, the unfortunate man is forced by his evil employer to create an army of the creatures in order to conquer the world.

TTOTM: Atomic Age Vampire
Starring – Susanne Loret & Alberto Lupo     Not Rated     1960

Host: Baron Von Porkchop is forced to find a job as Baroness is sick of him just hanging around the manor so he gets hired to be a DJ at New Burlington’s radio station. And of course Baron has no clue what he is doing and causes all kinds of havoc on the air as well as broadcasting dead air!! And as fast as he is hired he hides so they can not fire him.

Movie: A stripper is horribly disfigured in a car accident. A brilliant scientist develops a treatment that restores her beauty and falls in love with her. To preserve her appearance the doctor must give her additional treatments using glands taken from murdered women. His unexplained ability to turn into a hideous monster helps with this problem but does nothing to win her love. The doctor’s woes multiply as the police and the girl’s boyfriend begin to close in on him.

TTOTM: Wolf Hunter 1 & 2
Starring – Matt Hoffman & Jason Gilmore     Not Rated     2001/2006

Host: Baron Von Porkchop heads to the werewolf infested Malice’s Bridge in order to get an interview with the famous Wolf Hunter, but he soon finds out that the hero is not showing up but instead he is being stalked by many werewolves from Independent B Movie films like Scars, Red-Eye, Man-Beast and Oliver. But lucky for BVP his luck foils many of their attempts to make him dinner.

Movie: The Wolf Hunter: Malice king of all werewolves is rampaging in Ohio and a business owners daughter has been kidnapped by her ex-boyfriend who is now a werewolf and the states only hope is The Wolf Hunter. Wolf Hunter 2: Malice is still on the loose and now his biggest rival Ravenger has entered Ohio and a werewolf turf war is about to go down, and The Wolf Hunter who is trying to kill off the werewolves and keep order has his own issues when Duke another Wolf Hunter is called in. Can the two work together and stop this werewolf invasion?

TTOTM: Vampire
Starring – John Beal & Coleen Grey     Not Rated     1957

Host: Baron and Baroness Von Porkchop get sad news that their butler and friend Bean has to leave the manor as he has found a wife and plans on starting his own family. And now Baron and Baroness must hold interviews in order to find his replacement and all types of people show up in order to get the job and some of them are perfect fits while others are weirdoes. In the end BVP shoots them all down before hiring maid Viola Poison strictly on her good looks. Lots of cool cameos in this episode including Geraldo The Hunchback from New Shock Theater.

Movie: A kind, small-town doctor mistakenly ingests pills made from vampire bat blood and they turn him into a dangerous fanged creature.

TTOTM: Legend Of Bigfoot
Starring – Ivan Marx & Peggy Marx     Rated PG     1975

Host: Baron Von Porkchop gets fellow Dayton, Ohio Horror Hosts Iris & Retina to help him hunt down a Bigfoot as he needs the creatures meat in order to make his famous BigFoot Chili to enter into the New Burlington Chili Cook-Off! The Horror Hosts wonder around the woods and hear the yells of the creature as well as find the evidence that they need to know they are on the right track. And in the end Baron is able to take down one of the creatures.

Movie: A documentary about the legendary creature, Bigfoot, with emphasis on him being the missing link.

TTOTM: Undertaker And His Pals
Starring – Warrene Ott & James Westmoreland     Rated R     1966

Host: Baron Von Porkchop has brought his whole crew (Baroness Von Porkchop, Jenkins The Pigman, JD The Meatman and Viola Poison) to the New Burlington Chili Cook-Off as he has entered his famous Bigfoot Chili, but the compotation is heavy as rival Count Van Lambchop and his wife The Countess has also entered their chili in the contest. Viola and Jenkins try to help rig the voting by messing with others chili as Baron and the Count continue their life long feud. With a panel of guest judges that include musicians and comic book artists it’s a chili showdown for who takes first place. This episode also has a cameo from Bean!

Movie: An undertaker and his two friends, who are restaurant owners, drum up business by going out on the town and killing people; the restaurant owners use parts of the bodies for their menu, and the undertaker gets paid by the families to bury the remainder. Their racket goes awry when 2 detectives suspect that something isn’t quite kosher.

Now that we have taken a look at the first two seasons (season three and on will be for another future update) lets take a look at the special episodes that when along with these first two seasons.

Son Of Hercules Power Hours: Samson
Starring – Brad Harris & Mara Berni     Not Rated       1961

Host: The Son Of Hercules hosts his own show that was a failed TV Polit that he was trying to get TBS to air in the 1980’s. This special has Son Of Hercules giving work out tips, arm wrestling an alien as well as showing his love for heavy metal music. A silly fun time with the Mighty Son of Hercules!

Movie: While traveling through the kingdom of Sulom, Samson is arrested and finds that the queen no longer reigns and that a power-mad warlord and his army of mercenaries now controls the kingdom. Samson teams up with some of his one-time adversaries to battle the usurper and restore the rightful queen to power.

BVP Halloween Special 1: The Sadness
Starring – Jason Young & Garrison Kane     Not Rated       2006

Host: Baron Von Porkchop celebrates Halloween by going to the site of The Sadness Collage Murders, and once there he starts coming across bodies and thinks that the students are adding the spooky holiday festivities, but the Baron soon realizes that The Sadness has returned to the scene of the crime and that Baron might just be his next victim.

Movie: A young collage student witnesses the murder of her next door neighbor and makes the mistake of talking about it on her friends radio show, and now the killer knows as The Sadness has shown up to the collage and wants to silence her and her friends forever as he never leaves a witness behind.

BVP Charity Special: Abraham Lincoln
Starring – Walter Huston & Ian Keith   Not Rated       1930

Host: Baron Von Porkchop and Count Van Lambchop are having an argument about the location of Lambchop’s new poultry farm when the zombie of Abbe Lincoln and his subjects come back from the grave and are hungry for brains and both Barons and Counts look good to them, so now the two foes must survive together in order to escape the zombie version of America’s 16^th President. Done for the Gem City Gentlemen Of The Gilded Beard charity event.

Movie: Brief vignettes about Lincoln’s early life include his birth, early jobs, (unsubstantiated) affair with Ann Rutledge, courtship of Mary Todd, and the Lincoln-Douglas debates; his presidency and the Civil War are followed in somewhat more detail, though without actual battle scenes; film concludes with the assassination.

BVP Halloween Special 2: Werewolf Of Ohio
Starring – Josh Weinberg & Matt Hoffman     Not Rated       2001

Host: Baron Von Porkchop and his friend Melvin are going trick or treating and Baron is not following the safety rules and is making all kinds of mistakes, but they soon meet an old man who tells them the story of The Headless Horseman, and little does Baron know that The Headless Horseman is now in New Burlington and has his site on making this Halloween very fighting for our Horror Host.

Movie: Josh is a young man who’s family has been killed by a werewolf and has spent his life trying to track and kill the beast, now with a trusty Cameraman and the world famous Wolf Hunter he tracks down this killer beast for one final showdown.

BVP HorrorHound 2012 Special: Corpse Vanishes
Starring – Bela Lugosi & Luana Walters     Not Rated       1942

Host: Baron Von Porkchop is a guest at the HorrorHound 2012 convention and has decided to leave Viola Posion and Susie The DJ in charge of his table as he goes on a quest to find and win the heart of Horror Hostess Marlena Midnite of Midnite Mausileum. And while on his quest he stops along the way to talk to his fellow Horror Hosts as well as celeberties in attendance including Gunner Hansen and Doug Bradley. And when Baron finds her will he win her over or chicken out.

Movie: Dr. Lorenz, a mad scientist, wants to keep his elderly wife young. He does this by kidnapping young females and extracting fluid from them. He then injects this fluid into his wife.

BVP Arcade Special: Beast of Yucca Flats
Starring – Tor Johnson & Conrad Brooks     Not Rated       1961

Host: Baron Von Porkchop heads to the store Game Swap as they have just gotten in a new Pac Man Arcade Machine for play and he is annoyed that he has to wait in line as all he wants to do is play a game of Pac Man and even has brought his tip book as well as Jenkins The Pigman along for the experience. But will Baron be able to play a game before the store closes as the line is long and his anger is rising.

Movie: A defecting Soviet scientist is hit by a nuclear explosion near Yucca Flats and roams around as a beast.

BVP Halloween Special 3: Indie Short Films
Starring – Stephen Alexander & Zach Prater     Not Rated       1990’s-2000’s

Host: Baron Von Porkchop and Melvin are dared to stay the night in the haunted graveyard of Dr. Freak by JD The Meatman and with snack food in hand and shaky nerves the two hang out and tell each other ghost stories that are really short films from Indie Horror Film directors. But when Horror Host Dr. Freak shows up will be mad about his trespassing guests or will he join in on the spooky tales of terror this Halloween night.

Movie: Indie Films show are “El Toro 2”, “Hellraiser: Warehouse”, “Mummy vs. The Stalker”, “The Return Of Freddy”, “Bark At The Moon: Malice”, “Bark At The Moon: Scars”, “Nightmare” and “High Hopes”.

BVP Black Friday Special 1: Farmer Joe
Starring – Mike Ritchie & Henrique Couto     Not Rated       2001

Host: Baron Von Porkchop has made a half man and half chicken creature that was suppose to be for Thanksgiving but had pitty on the creature and let him live, but now the Chicken creature is a menace and is always on his cell phone and is just rude to everyone he comes across! Baron goes to get advice from the BK and learns that he must kill his creation with an ax, but can he do it?

Movie: Danny is a young kid who is being bullied and on a dare goes to a haunted farm and summons the spirit of the crazed Farmer Joe who is out for revenge on the man who sold him bad seeds and ruined his harvest many years ago, but he also has Danny and his bullies on his radar of death, can Danny’s Dad save his sons life and soul, or is all hope lost now that Farmer Joe has returned.

BVP Halloween Special 4: White Zombie
Starring – Bela Lugosi & Madge Bellamy     Not Rated       1932

Host: Baron Von Porkchop and Melvin this Halloween decided to rent a small cabin in the country to get away from all of the craziness that they have been through the past three years, but unlucky for them the Fulci Zombie an ax swinging undead serial killer is around and wants to make them both dead! But will Baron and Melvin figure out a way to stop this murdering rampage or will they just be more victims on his ever-growing list.

Movie: A young man turns to a witch doctor to lure the woman he loves away from her fiancé, but instead turns her into a zombie slave.

BVP Black Friday Special 2: Razor
Starring – Jason Gilmore & Josh Weinberg     Not Rated       2002

Host: Chicken Man is back and is running all around New Burlington causing issues for all the locals and making them all very angry, and they want to know who is the man behind this menace and many point the finger at Count Van Lambchop and Baron now must stop his creation before the town discovers the truth that this cell phone texting annoying chicken is his doing.

Movie: A young man is plagued with memories of a past he seems to have lived and a father who was pure evil, now Mike must unravel a mystery that all leads to a blood drinking killer that has been around for centuries and try and figure out how his life and past are tied to this psycho.

Baron Von Porkchop is a Horror Host that has brought Dayton, Ohio and beyond viewers laughs, scares and cheesy movies for over 10 years now and the cast of characters that make up New Burlington have all did their part to make this show special. And from the bottom of my heart I want to think every cast member and every fan that has made Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre must see TV and apart of your life, as well as make the dreams of this blogger come true as I have always wanted to create my own show and I cannot think of a better person to create this show with then my cousin Stephen. And like I have said this will not be the only Horror Host Icon update about Baron Von Porkchop so you fans, friends and readers will have more to look forward to in the future. But now lets talk about our next update that will be our Halloween update and will take us away from the world of Horror Hosts and into the world of SOV Horror as we look at a 1990’s gem called “Hatchet”! So until next time, read a comic or three, watch an indie film or two and as always support your local Horror Host. See you next update for some VHS Horror Fun.

Matt Goes To The Movies 2014

2014 was a pretty good year for movies, and while I didn’t get to visit the theater just about every week like last year, I still was able to catch many great films at my favorite theaters. It’s odd that after all these years I still feel the excitement of watching a film in the theater with some popcorn and an Icee. But before we get into my lists, I should say that my favorite theater is Cinemark at the Greene in Beavercreek, but man since they bought the theater from The Rave that place has had some issue and cutbacks that have really taken away from the place. The first thing you will notice is that on many days they are understaffed and many of the faces from last year are no longer working there, although my friend Chris still does so that’s a plus. Plus they did away with the flavor powder to put on your popcorn….so no more cheese popcorn for this movie goer. Others issues I have had is that during John Wick they left the lights on.  When my pal Jeremy Hoyt went and told them they turned off all the lights besides the center one that sadly we were sitting under…I felt like I was being interrogated by Dick Tracy! During November Man almost all the speakers besides the front two didn’t work, and worse, they had the front two cranked and it sounded like crap. During some movies, due to them going all digital with no projectionist when the film would start it would have no sound or no picture. Plus one of the most annoying things is the fact that they cram so many Coka-Cola and Microsoft ads at the start of every movie that it feels like your watching network TV! But to be fair for every bad experience, I have had way more good and that’s why it’s still my favorite theater. So let’s take a seat here at the Rotten Ink Theater lobby and let’s talk films of 2014!

Let’s get those bad films out of the way first, the ones that I left the theater wondering why film or even digital pixels were wasted on making them! So let’s take out this stinky trash before it smells up the joint! This year since I didn’t go and see one or two films a week, I was lucky enough to miss many stinkers but here are at least two that left a fowl smell in the theater.

# 2

A direct follow up to 300 takes place at the same time and after the events of the first film, and instead of land battles, it’s mostly all about water warfare. Themistocles and his brave warriors go to war at sea with Xerxes and his evil sister Artemisia all for the glory of Greece. The film has some fun over the top boat battles and even a few sword to sword fights, but many times the action is pure cheese and some of the green screen effects look as if it was a made for the Sy-Fy Channel film. The scene that has Themistocles riding a horse from boat to boat and throwing fire is down right silly and mind numbingly bad. Highlights include a naked Eva Green who plays Artemisia. Over all, it’s a very poor follow up to the original and was a bland sword and sandal film. The film grossed $106,580,051.00 at the US Box Office for Warner Brothers.

# 1

This film just plan sucked! I saw it with my pal Jeremy Hoyt with a theater semi-full of people, and hardly no one laughed and many groans were heard at the poor attempts at humor. The film follows sheep farmer Albert Stark, who is a weak man with no backbone and no shooting skills, that is until he meets Anna, the wife of a gunslinger outlaw who has set his sights on killing Albert who has fallen in love with his wife! It’s up to Anna to help Albert get a backbone and survive not only a fight with her husband but that also with his ex-girlfriend’s mustachioed boyfriend. The film was written, directed and starred Seth McFarlane, who is a one trick pony with his gross and pop culture humor. So in other words, if you think fart jokes are top of the line comedy than Seth wrote this one for you. The film’s only real highlights are cameos from celebrities playing famous characters they have played in past Western films like Christopher Lloyd as Doc Brown from Back To The Future Part III! At the US box office, this film brought in $43,139,300 for Universal. I hope they don’t make a sequel to this film…as the thought makes my brain hurt.

Those were the only bad films I saw in theater, but I should also note that I saw two really bad ones that went direct to video like Wolf Creek 2 and Dario Argento’s Dracula 3-D. But let’s not inhale any more of this stinky trash!

Up second, we are going to take a look at action.  While last year we called it 80’s action, this year we are going to add more into it besides films starring aging action stars; plus I am going to add action thrillers into this category. So get your Rambo headband ready because I am about to tell you my top 6 action packed films of 2014!

# 6

Arnold Schwarzenegger geared up in this action thriller film that was pretty solid even though it had many plot holes. Breacher is the leader of an elite DEA team.  His wife was murdered by drug lords in Mexico, and he has his team steal money from their busts. When $10 million goes missing from one of their heists, the DEA turns up the heat and disbands the team. But when members of the team are starting to be murdered off, the team must figure out who is killing them and what happened to the money they stole that went missing. The film takes many twists and turns; it also has a solid line up of supporting actors like Joe Manganiello, Terrence Howard and Mireille Enos and some great gun play that all help add to the over all action film feel. The film sadly did very poorly at the box office grossing only $10,508,518.00 in the US for Open House Films, but both Juliet and I enjoyed it.

# 5

Who doesn’t like seeing Denzel Washington kicking ass and taking names? This action drama follows Robert McCall, a retired black ops agent who is now working at a home improvement store after his wife’s passing. He comes out of retirement and takes on the Russian Mafia when his young friend Alina is beaten badly by her pimp who happens to be a Mafia member.  The bodies pile up as Robert takes the war to the streets and to crime that he witnesses. It’s a fun action flick based on the old 80’s TV show on CBS, that has Robert killing scum bags with all types of weapons from guns to hammers. Denzel is fantastic as is Chloe Grace Moretz who plays Alina.  In fact I think Chloe is an actress to keep an eye on because if Hollywood gives her the roles, she will pull them off. If you want to see scum bags get what they deserve at the hands of a man who knows no fear, then check this one out! The film did pretty well at the US box office and grossed $99,306,000.00 for Sony. I saw this film with pal David J. Getz, who was way too hard on it and took the stand of Denzel being to old to be an action star, and to that I say he’s wrong!

# 4

The November Man is an action thriller that stars former James Bond actor Pierce Brosnan who plays Peter Devereaux, a retired CIA agent who must go head to head with his former protege David Mason when a large plot involving a Russian general and a young female witness to crimes he has committed’s life is in danger. Throw in a hit woman who has been hired to kill her and you have a race to find out the truth and who is the real bad guy! One thing I like about the film is the good guy Devereaux is not a real nice guy as he lies and even hurts innocent people to make things go his way, but with that said he has his reasons and over all he truly is a “good” guy. Pierce Brosnan is fantastic in the role of Devereaux, and that’s what makes this over all average film a heck of a lot better. Sadly this is the movie that when Jeremy and I saw it at the theater, only the front speakers were working and to “fix” it when Jeremy told them, they turned up the front ones louder…doh! The film grossed $25,018,119.00 for Relativity via the US box office.

# 3

This was the surprise action hit of the year for me as I can safely say that I really enjoyed every bullet riddled moment! Keanu Reeves plays John Wick, a one time enforcer for a crime family who has retired to spend time with his wife who passes away from an illness. After her death, she leaves John a puppy and together they morn the loss. But when the son of the crime lord makes the mistake of stealing John’s car and killing his dog, they awaken “The Boogeyman” who will not stop till the son is dead. What follows next is nonstop action that felt like a video game come to life as bullets and fights break out in clubs and hotels, all ending in deaths! Plus it was funny to see WWF Superstar Kevin Nash in a small role, not to mention the supporting cast was also fantastic with names like William Dafoe, Michael Nyqvist, Alfie Allen, Adrianne Palicki and John Leguizamo all doing great performances for an over the top action film like this. The film did pretty well for Lionsgate at the US box office, grossing in $40,649,000.00 and bringing them in a profit. This is a movie I will buy on DVD when it’s released to show to Juliet and my parents.

# 2

My favorite action star of all time, Sylvester Stallone, returns as Barney Ross for The Expendables 3.  The film has Barney disbanding his old crew when he finds out that Conrad Stonebanks, an old teammate turned enemy, is still alive when Hale Caesar is injured by him in a raid. Barney turns to his pal Bonaparte to get a younger crew that consist of such actors as Kellan Lutz, Rhonda Rousey, Victor Ortiz and Glen Powell, and when they go after Conrad and fail and become his prisoners, it’s up to Barney and his old crew to save them and stop Conrad once and for all. This film has a paper thin plot but is heavy on the action! It was nice to see Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, Terry Crews, Jet Li and Arnold Schwarzenegger all return for a third time. Plus the addition of other classic action stars like Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Wesley Snipes and Antonio Banderas (who steals the movie) was a nice way to spice up the cast. The new crew sadly are all forgettable besides Rhonda Rousey, who is a great looking tough UFC chick who can rock a red dress and bash a head in and look fantastic doing it. Not as great as the other two films in the series, but still a solid action flick that sadly did poorly at the US box office for Lionsgate only bringing in $39,322,544.00, but thank God the overseas viewers loved it where it brought in $166,850,000.00! Here is to hoping Sly will give this franchise a break and focus on a new Rambo film…or a sequel to Cobra.

# 1

A Walk Among The Tombstones is a film that mixes many genres together and does so really well; it takes elements from Action, Horror, Thriller and Drama and sprinkles in elements like Noir, Detective and Serial Killer. The film follows former cop now unlicensed private detective Matthew Scudder, who takes a case that involves kidnapping, ransom and murder, and once he’s involved he becomes a player in this sick and twisted game set up by a group of killers. Along the way he meets a young boy on the streets who becomes his somewhat partner and helps him stop the killings and expose the identities of the killers. I really dug this film and enjoyed the fact that it was a Noir Action film that kept me on the edge of my seat.  Plus the film’s killers are true scum of the earth! I saw this film with a pretty packed house and with my friend Jeremy, and you could hear many people talking at the end about how much they liked it. I don’t want to give too much of the plot away, and the story has some surprises that are best left for you to discover when you watch it. The film did pretty bad at the US box office bringing in a total of $26,307,600.00 for Universal on a budget of $28 Million, and that’s a shame cause this film was pretty badass!

Liam beating Sly on my top action films, I would have NEVER seen that coming! So we whooped some ass with action now let’s get our nerd minds a good workout as we take a look at my top four Sci-Fi and Fantasy films! So charge up your Lightsaber and set you phasers to stun, we are talking Science Fiction now.

# 4

I hate to say it, but I really enjoyed Transformers: Age Of Extinction in the theater while eating popcorn, drinking a blue Icee with my gal Juliet.  That says a lot for me because I was by no means a fan of the other three films in this series directed by Michael Bay. This one’s plot is simple; the people of Earth have turned on the Autobots and have ruled it open season on killing them and taking the bodies away to be studied to see if we could create ones that would become weapons of war. When the Yeager family find and help Optimus Prime, they become the target of the CIA, and worse, Megatron is back in the form of Galvatron! Can Optimus and the remaining Autobots stop them from ruining the world..well of course they can! The film is packed with stupid robot one liners, wall to wall over the top action and the worst cameos for the Dinobots ever, who only have a few minutes on screen and are a waste of film as they really add nothing to the story. The film scored big for Paramount at the US box office bringing in $245,439,076.00 and when adding in foreign gross, it did over a billion dollars! So if you don’t mind checking your brain in at the door and want to see Mark Wahlberg team up with Optimus Prime, then this Sci-Fi Action film is for you.

# 3

I generally dislike remakes of classic films, and when I heard Sony was remaking Robocop, my eyes rolled and I thought here we go again another heartless retelling all for the sake of a quick buck. But after seeing Robocop the week it came out, I must admit I was wrong and I think the people who made this film really tried to capture the feel of the original and update it all at the same time. This time around Alex Murphy is a cop on a mission, and when going after a crime boss he is blown up via a car bomb. OmniCorp, who create robots to fight wars, wants to make a super cop and use Murphy as the test subject and create Robocop! And once he gets revenge on those who originally set him up, he also soon finds that Raymond Sellars, the CEO of OmniCorp, is not a very nice man and wants Robocop shutdown for good when he finds he can’t control his mind and looks at him as nothing more than a computer. Can Robocop stop the evil corporation? Will his wife and son accept him? Will Raymond succeed in pulling the plug? All these questions are answered in this fun PG-13 action romp. Joel Kinnaman plays Robocop/Alex and does a pretty good job, but he is no Peter Weller. The supporting cast is also fantastic with such names as Michael Keaton, Gary Oldman, Samuel L. Jackson and Jackie Earle Haley. The film did weak in the USA box office grossing $58,607,007.00 making the film a miss for Sony. It’s a shame; I would have liked to have seen a part two.

# 2

Maleficent was fantastic ,and when seeing it in IMAX 3D, I felt like a kid again watching a Disney take on a fairy tale unfold before my eyes. My favorite animated Disney film has always been Sleeping Beauty so when I heard they were doing a live action film based around the villain Maleficent my interest was peeked. The film follows Maleficent, who is a fairy, and when a human boy misleads her and cuts off her wings to gain power in the nearby kingdom, she turns mean and waits for her revenge on the day the boy is now King and is going to have his first child.  Maleficent places a curse on the child to sleep forever until true loves kiss awakens her on her 16^th birthday. But the film takes a twist as we see that Maleficent ends up befriending the young Princess and wants to try and undue the curse but can she do it? And worse the King has sent his whole army to kill her. This family fun flick was amazing and added so much more depth to the Maleficent character.  Plus Angelina Jolie does a top notch job as the “evil” fairy Maleficent. The special effects are top of the line with the fairy moors being breathtaking, as is the dragon that appears to help her in her fight against the army. The film did really well for Disney at the US box office, grossing in $241,381,217.00 and proving that the classic characters never go out of style. If you have not seen this film, you should check it out.

# 1

The Planet of the Apes films have always been some of my favorite Sci-Fi films to watch, and these new films being made by Fox are just as great as the originals! This second film in the rebooted series follows Caesar, the leader of the ape population trying to work alongside the remaining humans who have survived a mass sickness that killed off most of the population.  This team up pisses off primate Koba who was abused by man many years back, and he sets a plan in motion where he makes an attempt at Caesar’s life sparking a war with the humans and apes. But can an injured Caesar stop the war or is it too late? The film’s special effects are top notch and throughout the whole movie, you forget that the apes are CGI! Plus with actors like Gary Oldman, Jason Clarke, Keri Russell and Kirk Acevedo playing the humans, you know you’re getting sold acting. My favorite ape in the film has to be Koba; he is so bad yet somehow I think he really thought he was doing good by starting the war and killing any man or ape that got in his way! This was one of the films I was most looking forward to this year, and it was by no means a letdown as I loved every minute of it! The film was a hit for Fox and grossed $208,532,326.00 here in the United States showing that people still love seeing a world run by primates!

I saw a few other films that fit this genre this year that were entertaining but just couldn’t make the cut for this list: “Lucy” starring Scarlett Johansson, a film about a drug that allows a woman to use 100% of her brain after she is used as a mule to smuggle it to the USA when it’s surgically placed into her body.  When the bag leaks she becomes less and less human. “Pompeii” is about the town that was covered in lava and ash via an erupting volcano and follows a gladiator who has fallen in love with a young woman of power, and it turns into a tragic love story starring the likes of Kit Harington, Kiefer Sutherland and Emily Browning. “Legend of Hercules” is about a clean cut son of Zeus who is more of a gladiator than the hero we all know and love. All are entertaining movies in their own right but none were strong enough to make the list.

So let’s trade our phasers in for capes as we now take a look at my top 7 Superhero films of 2014, and man I must say that films based on comics are dominating the box office and shows that comics are more powerful money makers then any company could have ever imagined.

# 7

This follow up to Sin City was laced with all the same techniques that wowed audiences upon it’s release in 2005 and even brought back many of the actors from the first film. Sadly it tanked at the box office and put the nail in the coffin for this series. The film follows many stories from Marv, who can’t remember why he killed a bunch of rich brats, to Dwight McCarthy falling for a woman who is using him and many others to get what she wants. There is also a story line of a lucky gambler named Johnny who tests his luck against corrupt Senator Roark and stripper Nancy who wants to kill Roark for crimes he committed in the first film. All the stories come together in the end and all ends well for some, while others end up dead.  The film was a lot of fun and not nearly as bad as many critics would have you think, but as I said it bombed and only did $13,757,804.00 at the box office for Dimension Films. The film also has an all star cast like Josh Brolin, Micky Rourke, Bruce Willis, Eva Green, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Powers Boothe, Rosario Dawson, Christopher Lloyd and Jessica Alba to name a few.

# 6

I was very lukewarm on the idea of a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie that was a reboot to the series done by those masters of butchering of childhood memories, Platinum Dunes. But I must say the film was way better than I could ever expect it to be, and while it is flawed with a cheesy script and a Shredder who looks more like he should be in Transformers, the Turtles’ banter is well done even if they look like steroid goofy faced mutants. The film follows the Turtles who are going up against the foot clan who are tormenting New York and even have a plan in motion that will poison and kill many thanks to a gas they will be pumping into the air.  Alongside April O’Neil, the Turtles clash with the foot and their leader The Shredder, and of course along the way we learn about Master Splinter as well as a connection they all have to April. Again the film is flawed, but I enjoyed checking my brain at the door and watching a comic book/cartoon inspired film that tried to keep some of the basics of source material and also tried to add more of an update to it for modern fans. For me I would put it on par with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III and say while bad, it was fun to watch. The film did pretty solid numbers at the US box office for Paramount bringing in $191,204,754.00!

# 5

I am pretty sure many people who went to seen Hercules had no idea that it was based on a comic book from Radical Comics and to be honest, much like my cousin Steve Alexander said, this is truly one of the year’s most underrated films. The film stars WWF Superstar Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as Hercules, a mercenary who alongside his friends are creating the legend of Hercules, the son of Zeus. But when he finds out that he was hired to help the wrong side in a conflict, he and his friends stand against the odds and leave everyone wondering if he truly is the son of a God. The film is filled with great Sword and Sandal action as well as likable characters; this is one film I would have loved to seen sequels made about. The Rock as well does a fantastic job as Hercules and pulls off the role of being maybe a con man yet maybe not, making the character tough when needed and light hearted when the mood is right. The film sadly did not do as well as it should have and grossed only $72,688,614.00 for Paramount at the US box office. With the film being out on DVD and Blu-Ray, do yourself a favor and check it out.

# 4

I feel like Amazing Spider-Man 2 was judged way too hard by critics and fans who seemed to want to try and nitpick it to death.  I for one really enjoyed it and found it better than the overblown Spider-Man 2 made by Sam Raimi that I think was praised way too much by fans and critics. This time around Spider-Man is locking horns with three super villains who are all gunning to take Spidey down for the count! You have the Rhino, a man in mechanical suit who feels as if he has been wronged by Spider-Man; you have Electro, a man who was a one time Spider-Man fan who after an accident finds that he has the power of electricity; and Green Goblin, who is really his long time friend Harry Osborne who is slipping into madness! And worse as Peter Parker is having issues coming to terms with the death of his girlfriend’s father to whom he made a promise that has him staying away from her. Action, Drama and Spider-Man one liners help make this one a good Super Hero film! Andrew Garfield is fantastic as Spider-Man, and Emma Stone makes one hell of a Gwen Stacy. The strangest casting had to be Paul Giamatti as The Rhino…his performance is down right silly! The film did pretty well for Sony at the US box office grossing in $202,853,933.00 even though they try and act as if it wasn’t a hit for them. I for one am looking forward to Amazing Spider-Man 3 as well as the spin off Sinister Six movie.

# 3

Guardians Of The Galaxy is the Marvel Comic team that showed the world that you don’t have to be a triple A team to have a hit movie! The film is about Starlord, a goofball outlaw who teams up with other misfits of space like the living tree Groot, talking raccoon Rocket, psycho brute Drax The Destroyer and green skinned female assassin Gamora to protect a infinity stone from getting into the hands of Ronan The Accuser, who is an evil Kree alien who is back stabbing the powerful Thanos in order to collect the jewel and become all powerful. The movie has lots of sci-fi action, drama and comedy and has some of the most likeable characters of any movie this year! Plus I really liked Ronan as a bad guy, and he is a prime example of a cold blooded super villain who will kill whomever gets in his way. When Juliet and I went to see this movie in the theater, it was a pretty packed house and it was clear that everyone in that theater that day had a blast watching it.  The overly positive remarks of people leaving their seats when it was over was a clear sign that Disney and Marvel Studios did something very right. The film did fantastic for Disney at the US box office grossing in an impressive $332,309,276.00 making this a huge hit. If you have not seen this film yet, do yourself a favor and check it out!

# 2

Captain America is one of my favorite Super Hereos of all time and has been ever since I was a kid.  This second film from Disney and Marvel Studios was a fun kick butt action film laced with enough drama to make the film feel very important in the over all movie universe they are creating. This time around Captain America, Black Widow and Nick Fury have became a target by a group controlled by a very high official in America, and they even bring Cap’s old World War II buddy Bucky Barns back from the “dead” and call him Winter Solider, a well trained killing machine. Can Captain America stop this evil group and talk sense into his one time friend? Watch and find out! While the original film was set during World War II, this second film takes place in modern times right after the events of The Avengers and trades in Red Skull for The Winter Solider and does a nice job of making the odds looking against Cap at every twist and turn. I must say Christ Evans makes the perfect Captain America/Steve Rogers and who would have thought that was possible? The film did great for Disney grossing in a massive $259,766,572.00 at the US box office. If your a fan of the star spangled Avenger like myself, make sure to give this film a watch.

# 1

The X-Men films, as well as the spin offs like “First Class” and “Wolverine,” are fun comic book action films that make for some amazing popcorn munching theater watches, and “X-Men: Days Of The Future Past” was just that and more as I found it to be my favorite Comic Book film of 2014! I know what those of you who know me are saying, the X-Men beat Captain America? But let me tell you, while Cap was amazing, X-Men was a fun thrill ride filled with some great faces from the franchise’s past. The film follows the future where mutants are being hunted and killed by Sentinels made by Bolivar Trask, and their only hope is to send Wolverine to the past to unite the mutants and stop an event that triggered the mutants’ death sentence. The whole mess is started by the younger Mystique, so can Professor X and Magneto put aside their differences and stop the terrible events to happen in the future…watch and find out. The film is based on one of Marvel Comics’ top story lines for the X-Men and FOX did a fantastic job of making it come alive on the big screen. The film stars all the classic characters from the series rich history with many actors returning such as Patrick Stewart (Professor X), Hugh Jackman (Wolverine), Ian McKellen (Magneto), Halle Berry (Storm), Shawn Ashmore (Ice Man), Daniel Cudmore (Colossus) and Ellen Page (Kitty Pryde) all returning from the first three films as well as actors who played the younger characters in First Class like James McAvoy (Professor X), Michael Fassbender (Magneto), Jennifer Lawrence (Mystique) and Nicholas Hoult as Beast. Not to mention the addition of new characters like Bishop, Quicksilver, Blink, Sunspot and Warpath. I don’t want to ruin the end but let’s just say it feels like a High School Reunion, and all the faces you see are ones that make you smile and feel good about the journey you made to get there. The film did pretty well for Fox at the USA Box Office grossing in $233,921,534.00 and even more overseas! While I like the First Class actors, I am hoping that the next film based on The Age of Apocalypse story will feature more of the originals.

So now that we are retiring the cape, let me talk a little about some cool things Game Swap Kettering did this year for me.  They allowed us to have private screenings of Baron Von Porkchop specials. The first one was near Halloween, and we set up a projector, screen and big speaker as well as a buffet of wings, pizza, chips and cookies. Friends in attendance included Juliet, Stephen Alexander, Maurice, Joe G, Garrison, Todd The Fox and V and we all watched Baron host White Zombie as he tried to enjoy a peaceful Halloween that’s interrupted by an ax murdering zombie named Fulci! They also got a sneak peak at an episode for season three that has Baron hosting the film Face Of The Screaming Werewolf. Then around Thanksgiving we did it again, and they got a sneak peek at the new Baron Von Porkchop Black Friday special where he hosted the Independent B Movie film Razor as well as the First Black Friday special whose film was Farmer Joe. Those specials has his feud with a Chicken Man he made that has become a thorn in the Baron’s side. But a big thank you goes to Game Swap in Kettering for allowing us to do these fun screenings. Whenever I get a bigger place to live with a basement I would love to start a Horror Host Fan Club that has meetings once every two months and we project and watch host shows…who knows maybe 2015 will be that year! Below is a cellphone pic from the Halloween episode screening.

So while doing a rundown of the films of 2014, I figured I would take a brief moment to give you my top three best Survival Horror Games of 2014 as well as the worst, because those of you who know me understand that I love to play a good solid Survival Horror game! Now I need to state that of the “modern” game systems, I have a PS3 and will soon get a PS4 so all games on the list are ones I got for PS3. I also want to say that the games I buy are on physical disc, and I do not download games so while many horror themed games did come out as digital only games, I have not played them and won’t unless a disc is released.  I like to own what I pay for. So let’s start off with what I found to be the worst of the horror games that came out in 2014 that I have played. And I won’t ramble much I promise…okay, maybe a little rambling.

# 1

Escape Dead Island is one of those games that just reeks of a quick cash in with boring fighting mechanics as well as a storyline that is a little weak. This game follows Cliff, a party boy who wants to get his dad’s respect so he goes to the island of a zombie outbreak along with his friends Linda and Devan and finds out that the stories are true and zombies are running wild on the island! Along the way he also meets Xian, a woman who is looking for her friend Rob who went missing while getting intel on the corporation responsible for the outbreak. While the other two games in the series “Dead Island” and “Dead Island Riptide” are first person shooters, this game changed to a third person game.  In the two games that came before you could customize your weapons multiple ways, and in this game your weapons are very limited and barely upgradeable. Plus I can’t help but notice the style of animation is clearly trying to rip off Tell Tale Games’s style with the more cartoonish look. Over all this is not a bottom of the barrel game, but it’s close.

So now that I spoke about the “worst” Horror Game this year that I would more label at “weakest,” let’s move onto what I considered the three best games that helped make 2014 a pretty good year for horror themed games!

# 3

After the complete mess that was “Aliens: Colonial Marians,” Sega redeemed themselves with this fun moody game that allows the player to take control of Amanda Ripley, the daughter of Ellen who travels to a space station that has been sending out distress signals.  Once she gets there, things go wrong as she is separated from her small crew and finds that Xenomorphs are on the prowl and hungry for a human host! The game stacks the odds against you, and the player must use their wits in order to survive this terror in space. The downside to the game is that I felt it took forever for the story to really kick in and that slowed the scares from coming in. The game is a first person shooter and plays much like Call of Duty and so many other shooters like this. I must also say that some of the cut scene graphics are really ugly on PS3, and it’s clear that the development team spent more time on the newer generation consoles versions. A major plus for this game comes via DLC that allows you to play as Ellen and has many of the original characters from the first film like Dallas and Ash back, and they are voiced by the actors who played them in the film! While not a perfect game, it was a fun game that helped make 2014 in gaming a little spookier!

# 2

The Walking Dead Season Two is a great follow up to Season One and helps add more to the story it created. This is a point and click adventure game made by one of the best independent game companies, Tell Tale Games, who have made some of my top favorite games of the past 4 years and this game adds another hit to the list. This time around we follow Clementine (who was a major character in the first game), a young girl who is trying to survive this zombie outbreak.  Along the way she meets people and she loses people all of whom are running from Carver, a man that use to lead them in a group.  All comes to a head when she meets Carver herself, a jerk of a man who runs a camp that is held up in a home improvement center and who takes Clem and her friends hostage and makes them work for the group’s needs putting them in danger. Your choices impact the story so when playing make sure to choose wisely. One cool aspect of this game is some returning faces from the first game as well as references to choices you made. The downside is the new characters seem to have less development then those from the original and the settings are a little less impactful as in the first game I truly felt like I could be zombie food at any moment. But with that said, this is a great game and one hell of a fun play.  So if you liked the first or just want to play a fun story driven point and click adventure horror game, then this one is for you.

# 1

Take video games Resident Evil, Silent Hill and Clock Tower and mix them with Horror films like As Above So Below, and you have the new Survival Horror Game by Shinji Mikami, the mastermind behind the original Resident Evil series as well as Dino Crisis! This game is about Sebastian Castellanos, a detective who along with his partners Juli and Joseph, go to a distress call at the Beacon Mental Hospital.  When they get there, everything is in chaos and the world as they know it has changed and infected people and monsters are wandering the world above as well as below. Can Sebastion get to the bottom of what’s going on as well as unearth the truth of why and who is responsible! The game is packed with great atmosphere and at all times I feel as if the odds are against me as ammo comes in only ones and twos and most the time it’s better to run than to fight. So if you’re not too scared, get this game and beware of Safehead!

It was very hard to pick between Evil Within and The Walking Dead Season Two for the # 1 spot as both are solid and super fun games, but in the end I had to go with Evil Within as I felt that it truly captured what a Survival Horror Game is all about and at all times I felt as if the odds of survival were against me. One game that came out that while I bought I have not played yet is Castlevania: Lords Of Shadow 2, so who knows where it would have placed.

So we talked a little about screenings of Horror Host Baron Von Porkchop as well as Survival Horror Video Games, now let’s get to the bloody meat of this update and take a look at the Horror Films of Hollywood!

# 11

Tusk was so close to being on my worst films of the year list as once more Kevin Smith smoked a bunch of pot and unleashed another over the top film onto the small masses who still watch his films. But then I read some interviews with Smith and he explained that he wanted to make this film because he wanted to and not for a studio or for quick cash.  I began to see that the film is labor of love much like the film The Wolf Hunter is to Matt Hoffman. It’s about a podcast host who travels to Canada for an interview with a kid who is a Youtube sensation after cutting off his own leg with a samurai sword.  When he gets there, he finds the kid has committed suicide, and he then travels to an old mansion to talk to an old man who has a story to tell or so the letter left in a mens room says. The rest of this film has the old man turning the podcaster into a human walrus as his co-host and his girlfriend try to find and save him.  Oh yeah and throw in a dimwitted investigator, and you have the film. When the podcaster is turned into full Walrus, I laughed out loud in the theater and thought to myself what and why am I watching this! I should also note that Juliet and I were the only people at the theater watching this film at the time. It stars Justin Long, Johnny Depp, Haley Joel Osment and Michael Parks and all do fantastic with the silly parts they are given. Again when you see Long, who plays the podcaster, as a walrus you can’t help but to laugh as he swims and grunts around. The film did poorly for A24 and only grossed $1,826,705.00 and didn’t even get a foreign release. If you are to watch this cheesy thriller/comedy horror film check your brain at the door and be prepared for long goofy dialogue and unlikable characters.

# 10

Hollywood horror films are lacking mummies, and when The Pyramid was announced I was hyped believing that we got a mummy film in 2014…I was sadly wrong. I first need to say that I was hyped to see this film and was ready for a creepy Egyptian found footage film taking place in an old pyramid where the viewer was not sure what was stalking our characters.  So when this film was a disappointment, I think it’s because of my own hype I made for it. The hype I made for it was the fact it was the last theatrical horror film of the year and again the setting and the possibility of it being about a Mummy. The film is about a father and daughter team as well as her boyfriend being followed by a documentary crew who are in Egypt during stressful times who find a pyramid that could be the oldest one ever found.  When they are told to leave due to the outbreak of civil uprising, they send in a robot real quick to get a sneak peek and when the bot looses contact, they go in to retrieve it and soon find the pyramid was a place to keep something in and not things out! One by one, they fall victim to the hunter who is a jackal headed god who has been placed there because it went mad after the death of its father. Can any of them survive and can they also dodge the evil cats that are roaming around…yeah the film has evil cats. The characters all seem brain dead with the cameraman and father being the worst two.  The CGI for the cats and jackal god are downright eye rolling, and the film was just kind of boring.  I was not the only one who felt this as Juliet and several others in the theater also expressed these feelings. The film was pulled from wide release to limited, and we had to see it at the Regal Cinema in Beavercreek.  Doing this made the film only gross a small $ 2,638,300.00 for FOX at the US box office. No Mummy but a heck of a lot of CGI Cats is what I got in The Pyramid.

# 9

Ouija is a film based on the Hasbro board game and produced by those masters of crap Platinum Dunes.  It’s your typical paint by number ghost story. When a young woman commits suicide, her friends don’t believe it and soon find that she was messing with a Ouija Board on her own and had unleashed something terrible, but they only learn this after they themselves use the board to try and speak to her. Now the evil is after them, can they find the answers on how to stop the spirit or will they all become victims? No major gore, some cool spirit effects, some good creepy shots, pretty actresses, released at Halloween time and a fun film to torment my friend Jeremy with as he had to be dragged to this film kicking and screaming! The film did $50,856,010.00 for Universal and is clearly a teen PG-13 horror film that was nothing special and not fully terrible.

# 8

The Quiet Ones is a Hammer Horror Film that follows a camera man who takes the job of documenting a college professor who, along with his helpers, are trying to cure a sick and possessed young woman named Jane whom they have locked in a room and wont allow her to sleep for any long period of time as well as keep her human interaction to a minimum. But when her treatments become more and more cruel, the camera man must come to a decision on whether to help Jane escape who he has fallen for or stay true to his assignment as the Professor thinks she can be cured. So is she possessed or being abused…watch and find out. The film is a little slow and while well acted for the most part, many decisions characters make are annoying and add to frustration as a viewer. Olivia Cooke plays Jane, the sick girl, and she is fantastic and probably the best actor in the film. I saw the film with Stephen, Garrison, Todd and Josh, and all of us felt the same way about it and that’s it was okay but way too slow and a little too long as a good 15 minutes could easily be cut out of the 1 Hour 38 minute run time. The film at the US box office brought in $8,509.867.00 for Lionsgate.  All I can say was much like Ouija, it was just okay.

# 7

A group of soldiers from Iraq have come back and are acting very aggressive and all have strange behavior. New York cop Ralph Sarchie is called in to investigate the crimes and soon learns the truth that demons are real and want to teach him a lesson for butting into their plans. Along with a Castilian priest, he must find faith and save the souls of the infected as well as save his wife who has been kidnapped by the possessed. It also shows that Sarchie is gifted and can spot evil. The film is said to be based on a real case and the real life of Sarchie. The film stars Eric Bana as Sarchie as well as the likes of Olivua Munn, Sean Harris and Edgar Ramirez with music by Christopher Young. The film was nothing special and for the most part is a run of the mill possession film with no surprises and a few gross moments. I watched the film with Jeremy and watching him go crazy with the overly religious tone of the movie made me laugh. The film didn’t do so hot at the box office only grossing in $30,577,122.00 for Sony on a 30 million dollar budget in the US. Not much more to say about this one, besides if you’ve seen one modern possession movie, ya pretty much have seen em all.  It’s not bad and has some good creepy moments – worth a watch to fans of this horror film topic boom.

# 6

I have been a fan of Godzilla since I was a kid and can remember watching the films all the time on TBS on Super Scary Saturday hosted by Grandpa Munster. But when Godzilla is made by Americans, it tends to not be so good; I mean just look at the over blown 1998 film that Hollywood spewed out to the fans that seemed like it was made more to sell toys and Taco Bell Cups than to entertain the movie goers. So when Warner Brothers said they were releasing a Godzilla film, I was stand offish even though in the back of my mind I was scream YES, a new Godzilla film on the big screen,  The more time passed and after seeing the trailer I became very hyped to watch it! The film has an accident that happens at a power planet in Japan that’s caused by a giant monster who is looking for its mate and when it wakes up it causes havoc and destruction.  As this is going on a US Solider is trying to get home to his family, and Godzilla has come from the sea and is on a path to clash with the other two monsters. You see Godzilla is acting as Earth’s protector! The human parts are what they always are in my opinion in giant monster films, and that’s filler. The major flaw I had with the film is more time is spent on the boring solider trying to get home and less on Godzilla who is why we all went to see this film in the theater. I must also say the shaky camera and pull away shots of the early monster fights was annoying and didn’t add suspense for me as much as it added frustration. Even with those small flaws I really enjoyed the film for the most part and am looking forward to part two as well as the announced Japanese Godzilla film in the works. The film did great for WB at the US box office bringing in a whooping $200,676,069.00, making it a hit for them this year.

# 5

Frankenstein’s Monster was back on the silver screen this year with an Action Horror film called I, Frankenstein that followed The Monster who was a pawn in a war between Heaven and Hell who need him to find the secrets of life created by man and not God. The good side is gargoyles who at first want to protect or kill The Monster, and the Demons who are working for evil and they want him to study and make soulless husks so demons straight from hell can take over the bodies of the newly made soulless bodies. But what none of them counted on is that The Monster is a fighter, and he will be pawn to no man or creature! The film has a real Underworld feel to it, and the action is fun and over the top, plus for the most part is well acted. I think this film is pretty underrated and was judged way too much just by the trailer, the fact it’s PG-13 and that Aaron Eckhart plays The Monster. The film did terrible at the US box office and only grossed $19,075,290.00 for Lionsgate on a $65 Million Dollar budget, and it’s a shame as it’s not at all that bad of a film.

# 4

As Above So Below is a “found footage” style film that follows Scarlett, an alchemy scholar who wants to find the famed philosopher’s stone that is said to be able to heal the sick and dying among other amazing things. She follows clues and finds that the entrance to achieving her goal is inside the catacombs below Paris, and along with her camera man and friend they hire some local urban explorers and find that this quest is more then they bargained for as they face sins of their past and find the gateway to Hell. This film was packed with some solid acting and atmosphere that was downright spooky and well done unlike The Pyramid that had a very similar type of feel. All the characters are likable and while they do make some dumb decisions, I still found myself hoping they all make it out okay. The film is by no means a bloodbath but what it lacks in the red stuff, it makes up for with heart and mood. I saw this film with Juliet, Todd The Fox and V, and we all left the theater thinking the film worked and was okay. Universal released this film and at the US box office it grossed in $21,321,100.00 on a $5 million budget. If you are a fan of the found footage horror genre then make sure to check this one out, oh yeah liked this one so much even bought the DVD when it was released.

# 3

The first Purge film was my # 9 horror film of 2013 out of thirteen and while I enjoyed it, I found it lost among many other solid horror pictures. The sequel The Purge: Anarchy in my opinion is a way better film and that’s why it’s locked itself as the 3^rd best Horror film I saw in theaters in 2014! The film follows a man named Leo who is going out to purge a man who killed his son in a drinking and driving accident, but he gets side tracked from his task when he saves a mother and daughter as well as a young couple all of whom are being targeted by what seems like a government elite team hired to reduce the population not to mention a rag tag bunch of mask and makeup wearing youngsters who have set their eyes on them as well. Leo does his best to keep them all alive as well as get to his goal. The film is filled with surprises as well as a positive message in the end and that’s why I think I enjoyed it so much.  It was not your typical modern downbeat horror flick. The film is also well acted with actors like Frank Grillo, Cameron Ejogo and Zach Gilford. The film did great for Universal at the box office here in America grossing in $71,962,800.00 and making it that a part 3 is in the works. More action and suspense then the original and a solid good sequel, check it out if you liked the first one. I saw it with Juliet who also really liked it!

# 2

The Conjuring was my # 1 Horror film of 2013, and this off shoot titled Annabelle is my # 2 for 2014 showing you that the makers of this film series are doing something right. It’s the 1960’s and satanic cults are all the rage, and a young couple is attacked in their home by cult members that leave the would be attackers dead.  When the female attacker dies in the baby’s room holding the Annabelle doll the odd events start happening. It gets so bad that something seems to be trying to hurt the woman and her unborn baby, even at one point setting the house on fire! After the baby is born, they move and find that whatever it is followed as the doll the cult woman held when dying is possessed by a demon who wants to take a soul real bad! Can they get rid of the demon before it’s too late? The Annabelle doll is the same one used to open The Conjuring and is over all creepy looking.  That’s one thing I really liked about the film, the longer it went on, the more sinister looking the doll became. And while the doll is never seen moving on its own, the dead eyed stare of its porcelain face is what terrified the audience. The demon who is the real baddie of the film is not seen too much, but when he is, it’s effective. This is supposed to be based on a true story and is a nice appetizer for the next Conjuring film that should be out in 2016. The film did well for New Line Cinema at the US box office bringing in $84,273,813.00 making it a hit for them. For some reason the film also seemed to get a lot of hate from Horror fans, but most of the ones I knew who trashed it, I question their taste anyway as they go to see Seth Rogen movies! I saw the film with Juliet, who loved it.

# 1

Universal is trying to breath new life into their classic Monsters, and the first on the list was Dracula.  This film, Dracula Untold, is about how Prince Vlad became a vampire! I was really hyped for this film that was set to release in October…yeah finally Hollywood gets that Horror Films and Halloween go hand and hand. The film follows Prince Vlad whose people are being bullied by the Turks and the sultan who want all the male kids to be given to them to become soldiers in the large Turkish army. So Vlad makes a deal with a Vampire that lives in a cave to gain powers to stop the Turks.  By doing so, he is putting his own soul at risk, but he gains the powers to single handedly kick the butt of his enemies. But when things go wrong Vlad goes full vampire, and once he does that, there is no going back. This film is filled with horror and a heck of a lot of action and is really well done. Luke Evans plays Dracula and does so with grace and it’s the first time that I can remember that you find yourself cheering for Dracula as he is not the bad guy and only takes the curse to save his son as well as the sons of all his people. I saw this with Juliet and Jeremy Hoyt, and both of them really enjoyed it as well did all the others in the IMAX Theater as praises were being said as people left. This film ends as well with a lead up to a sequel or to link to another Universal Monster film, and this makes this Monster Kid happy. The film did okay for Universal at the US box office bringing in $55,991,880.00 and did more overseas. If you like your horror mixed with action and enjoy classic monsters, then check this one out, because I really enjoyed it locking it in as my # 1 Horror Film of 2014.

2014 in Horror Films was filled with lots of ghost/possession films, and I have a feeling this trend will continue for awhile as they seem to be films that can be cheaply made and return a big profit. While sitting in the theater this year the two films that I noticed seem to have the audience in it’s grip were Annabelle, that had a few people gasp and jump when the evil things would happen on the silver screen, and As Above So Below where the audience had an eerie hush as the characters went deeper into the catacombs. Ouija had the worse response as people laughed at many of the scares and many of the younger people in the audience seemed to be having a fun time teasing the young ladies with them. 2014 was an okay year for Horror in the theaters, and I for one am looking forward to seeing what 2015 has in store to send shivers up my spine. Well the next update is something terrifying as we take a look at another Draculina Photo Comic based on a film of Jess Franco called Tender Flesh! So until then, support your local theaters, read a comic or two and always support your local Horror Host and see you next update.

Spend Halloween With Universal’s Frankenstein’s Monster!

Happy Halloween! I hope you’re having a spooky and chilling good time today. I can hear all the little ghouls and goblins running around outside looking for some free candy. I can also hear all the loud parties and mayhem going on in and around 5^th Street. This year for Rotten Ink’s Halloween update we are going to be taking a look at comics based on Frankenstein by Universal that include a very cool Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man one that was translated and put together to be a comic via stickers just for this update! Plus I will be reading these comics alone in an abandoned science lab that’s still filled with lots of odd machines and glass bottles. Not to mention we will also be talking about other fun scary and Halloween related things.  So with the chill in the air and the Jack-O-Lantern lit, let’s open the door to Dr. Frankenstein’s lab and see what’s on the slab!

I’m going to start this update by taking a brief look at Manuel Oritz Partida, a luchador who goes by the ring name Halloween.  So I figured we should at least mention him on an update that goes up on the holiday he is named after! Halloween started his wrestling career in 1990 working for independents in and around Mexico, but he got his big break in 1996 when he signed with WCW and changed his name to Ciclope.  He was a mid-card wrestler for them and had some great matches against the likes of Chris Jericho, Rey Mysterio Jr. and Dean Malenko. Once he left WCW, he returned to Mexico and worked for AAA as well as a few independents. Halloween has had many Mask vs. Hair matches and has lost many of them including losing his mask to Super Parka in 1999. After losing the mask, he began painting his face like a Jack-O-Lantern! Throughout his career he has also had many allies that include Damien 666, Super Nova, Extreme Tiger and Mari Apache. At the age of 43 in 2014 he has slowed down some, but Halloween still haunts the rings of Mexico. When I was a teenager I was lucky enough to see Halloween wrestle during a taping of WCW Saturday Night that was at Hara Arena.  If memory serves I think he took on Dean Malenko and lost!

One creepy internet story aka Creepypasta that has been floating around for some years now is called “Squidward’s Suicide,” a truly disturbing story that should be talked about this Halloween season here at Rotten Ink. The story goes that an intern at Nickelodeon had the duty to watch an episode of Spongebob Squarepants with some fellow workers that would have kicked off the new season and when they started to watch, the title card read Squidward’s Suicide.  They thought it was a joke title card, and they all chuckled it off. As they continued to watch, it was nothing special at first and was about Squidward preparing for a clarinet concert when Spongebob’s annoying laughing echoes into his house and Squidward runs him off to keep practicing, but when things get really strange is when at the concert all the fish people in the crowd start booing Squidward with malice and even Spongebob joins in the booing! Squidward goes home and starts to cry sadly to himself as sounds of wind and white noise echoed from the speakers, and then laughing started up as Squidward’s crying became louder and louder and more heartbreaking. While all this was disturbing what the workers found in frames mixed in is what caused them some chills and distress as pictures of freashley murdered children (three in total) would flash for small frames across the screen! These pictures would come inbetween Squidward still crying at the edge of his bed with all the weird sounds going on in the back ground.  It got so bad that they called the creator of Spongebob to watch the remaining episode that ended with Squidward pulling out a shotgun and committing suicide as the image remained on his dead body and then ended. The creator was mad and demanded that they watch the episode again, and he was horrified at what he saw and called the FBI, according to the intern none of the children in the clips were ever identified and no one knew who made the cartoon as the time stamp said it was made just minutes before they watched it! I saved you many of the gory details of what the kids bodies looked like as I didn’t think that this fun blast from the past blog was the right place for it, but if you’re looking for the full well written story search the net and you’ll find it. Another Creepypasta by the name of “Red Mist” is based on Squidward killing himself and has a salesmen fish coming to his door and telling him the red mist is coming…the red mist of course being the blood from his wound…when he shoots himself…man this is some depressing stuff! The major differences between the two stories besides the salesmen and title is that in Red Mist many of the characters sport realistic eyes and also the cartoonist of the episode was said to be a serial killer who had worked for Nickelodeon and was on the run. Fan made animated versions of the episode can be found on youtube, and the story while most likely fake, it still makes me wonder did Squidward really kill himself?

It’s 1976, and the film crew for the TV Show “The Six Million Dollar Man” had rented out the haunted house from the Nu-Pike Amusement Park in Long Beach California.  As they were moving and dressing the “set” they moved the hanging mummy man prop and by accident they broke off the mummy’s arm and to their horror a human bone was poking out! The crew, along with the police, took the mummy to a coroner who verified that the mummy was in fact a human body…the haunted house for years had a real dead body on display. It took some time but they were able to figure out who the body was and when and how he died, and the identity of the mummy was that of criminal Elmer McCurdy who was killed in 1911 in a shootout while trying to rob a train. The undertaker in 1911 decided that since no one claimed his body, he would go ahead and embalmed him and place it on display as “The Bandit Who Wouldn’t Give Up” and would have people place nickels in the corpse’s mouth that at the end of the day he would collect.  At some point a carnival owner tricked the undertaker into thinking he was Elmer’s brother and he took the body and placed it on display for years. After his worth was used up at the carnival, the corpse was sold many times to several haunted houses, wax museums and carnivals making it the traveling mummy! Elmer’s corpse even was shown in the 1933 film Narcotic directed by Dwain Esper and at one point the owner of a haunted house in South Dakota refused to buy the corpses as he felt it was a fake and nothing more then a mannequin. Elmer finally was sold to Nu-Pike Amusement Park and sometime later was discovered again to be a real corpse by a shocked crew member who broke his arm off! In 1977 Elmer McCurdy was finally laid to rest in Summit View Cemetery in the Boot Hill section in Oklahoma ending the traveling mummy’s long and strange trip around the USA. Many joke that Elmer made way more money in death then in life, and for years this story was thought to be an urban legend but was proven to be true. So the next time you go to a haunted house, take a closer look at that corpse hanging or in the coffin cause who knows you might just be looking at the real thing!

In 1999, my friends and I use to run the roads at all times of the night.  We would drive around with the windows down while blaring music and being just rowdy late teens who were out to have a good time. Most of these nights would just lead to us going to a friend’s house where we would spend the rest of the night playing Goldeneye 007 on N64 and listening to music and all crashing at the same home very late in the night. Brandon Womeldorff drove most nights as he had a red convertible, and on this particular night it was just Brandon, David Wean, Rion Neeley and myself driving through Patterson Park or as it’s also called Hills And Dales.  It was around 11:00pm, and we had no real reason to be in the area besides driving fast on the dark roads near Frankenstein’s Tower and enjoying the cool night air. Rion was telling us that one night when he was driving alone near these two stone pillars on the opposite sides of the road and that he could have sworn that he saw what appeared to be a shadow man that was watching him on top of a wooded hill near the pillar.  Of course this made the rest of us to want to go to the spot and see if we could spot this strange man/shadow for ourselves.  As we pulled off the road near said spot Brandon killed the engine, and we all just sat and listened and waited, the sounds of the night filled our ears and then we heard something that sounded like a person running down the hill crunching fallen leaves as it moved fast towards us, Brandon turned the car back on and sped away as we could hear this thing keeping up with us…odd thing being all we could make out was a shadow. We all went back to Rion’s house where Brandon was also living, and we all sat around and talked about what we thought it was, and myself and Brandon went back that night and didn’t see anything. Whatever it was stuck with us as Brandon even wrote a song called “The Man In Black” for a short lived band we were in called X-Mortis. For many years after I would go back to that spot with many of my friends like Andrea Seay, Kevin Kinsley, Matt Hoffman, Jason Gilmore, Misty Altick and Josh Weinberg and almost everytime we would hear or see something…sometimes we would drive away only to return in minutes to find a dead animal propped in the middle of the road, most the time the necks were twisted so the head was facing backwards. This Shadow Man became a spooky icon to us, and we would even play pranks on each other out in the woods near the pillars and hill.  The best one is where Dave Wean, Linda Webb’s boyfriend and I all hid in the woods and made noises as Josh Weinberg dressed in a WWE Kane Mask and a hooded robe stood by a tree near the small road and scared the crap out of Matt Hoffman who was being driven around by Brandon who was in on the prank, but one thing I must say is as we waited in those woods, we all did hear many odd things. Josh and I many nights would go back to that place and like clockwork we would hear and slightly see the Shadow Man.  One night we really pissed it off as we got out of the car and challenged it to a fight, while from the car stereo we played the battle music from the Star Trek episode “Amock Time” and carried ball bats ready to knock it’s block off. For a short time it did not respond but once we heard it come running down the hill full blast we left before the “battle” could happen. Over the years I went less and less to hear and see The Shadow Man, and the park got lots of remodeling and the last handful of times me and Josh went there had been no sign or noise of the Shadow making us wonder what and where did it go. We never could figure out just what and why it was and what would have happened to us if it would have caught us, but one things for sure Shadow Man will forever live on as one of my favorite unknown things I have witnessed. Bellow is a drawing by me of what it looked like.

On October 6^th and 7^th Juliet and I decided to have our own Horror Movie Marathon, an event that I used to hold all the time that would have all my friends over to watch horror flicks all day and eat junk food. On Monday the 6^th we had what I would call the pre-show where we watch a few Horror films to gear up for the next day, and the films selected were the made for TV cheese-fest “Werewolf of Woodstock”, smart and artistic 80’s slasher “Curtains” and low budget succubus flick “Dreamaniac.”  We both agreed that Curtains was the best film of the pre-show.  It was about actresses meeting at a film director’s mansion in the woods on a snow filled weekend, and someone is killing them off one by one. And we both agreed that the worst turkey of the night was Dreamaniac that was about some goofball song writer who allows his girlfriend and her sister to party at a house he is watching as a succubus is killing off the guests. On the 7^th we started our marathon at 8 am and kicked it off with the Universal Horror film “Black Friday” that stars Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi and is about a mobster’s brain being transplanted into that of a professor and the doctor who did so wants to get his hands of some of the mobsters’ hidden money. The 1957 low budget film “From Hell It Came” was next and is about a tree monster and the battle between USA doctors and the natives of an island. The original 1980 “Prom Night” was next about a killer on the loose at a High School prom. 1989’s own low budget camping slasher film “Moonstalker” was next followed by “Legend of The Werewolf” a 1975 film starring Peter Cushing that follows a young man who is cursed to become a werewolf. Evil Dead inspired film “Demon Wind” was next and follows a group of friends stuck in an old house as demons want to take their souls. 1971 Hammer Film “Hands of The Ripper” was the next shocker to be shown and was about the daughter of Jack The Ripper and that was followed by Universal Sci-Fi giant spider film “Tarantula!” that shows man should not mess with mother nature. Next was Fullmoon Entertainment’s 11^th film in the series “Puppet Master X: Axis Rising” where the puppets must stop Nazi’s and evil puppets from harming America. The next film shown is a pure cheesy guilty pleasure for me, 1995’s “Project: Metalbeast” starring Kane Hodder as Metalbeast and is about a metal skinned werewolf running wild in a military lab. As we headed into the late night we ended it with two vampire films, the first being “Dawn Of Dracula,” a low budget film made by the cool cats who make the horror host show Midnite Mausoleum and follows Victoria Van Helsing played by the lovely Marlena Midnite as she looks for missing people.  Then we watched “ Dinner With A Vampire” where a group of actors are stuck in a mansion with a real life vampire! The evening was super fun, and we snacked on Peanut M&M’s, Mike-Sells Beer Can Chicken Potato Chips as well as homemade Hot Wings and had a great spooky time just hanging out and enjoying all the horrors of the movies. My top three films of the day would have to be as follows: # 1 Hands of The Ripper, a film I think was well done and added a spin of the Jack The Ripper tale, # 2 Project: Metalbeast for some reason I have been a fan of this film for a long time and use to watch it on VHS when I was younger and feel it stills holds that charm till this day! And # 3 would have to be Legend of The Werewolf a great classic style horror film that has a simple plot and holds such a Hammer Horror feel that I have always found it to be entertaining. I would also like to note that this top three was really hard to pick as I also really enjoyed Dinner With A Vampire, Prom Night and Demon Wind allot! My Golden Turkey of the night would have to go to Moonstalker, while not a bad movie it was just really slow paced with moments that really seemed to drag. Juliet’s top three were # 1 Hands of The Ripper, # 2 Dinner With A Vampire and # 3 Legend of The Werewolf, she had a hard time as well as she truly enjoyed Tarantula! that almost made her list. Her Golden Turkey was Moonstalker for the same reasons I stated. This was a fun event that I look forward to doing again soon as well as maybe one update I will give a history of the event and how the Horror Movie Marathon tradition started with me and my friends.

 

So what would Halloween be without having another 5 Questions with a Horror Host, and this time I think we are going to talk to Dayton, Ohio’s own Baron Von Porkchop! If you remember last year we chatted with Chicago Horror Host Count Gregula of Count Gregula’s Crypt.  So I figured that this year I wanted to do a Dayton Original Host who I also consider a very dear friend and that’s the good old Baron. Baron Von Porkchop started his show Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre in late 2010 and would air on DATV with his first episode where he hosted the Vincent Price classic House On Haunted Hill.  After this he has shown no signs of slowing down as he is working on his 3^rd season as well as a number of Holiday and other type of specials. I traveled to Porkchop Manor and met with Baron Von Porkchop on a chilly night, and here are my 5 Questions with Baron Von Porkchop.

Me: So Baron tell me about your show Terrifying Tales of The Macabre, as well as about Porkchop manor?

Baron: Well my show is about… me. I’m just trying to live my life as an undead ghoul the best I know how, but it seems like everyone and everything wants to try and ruin it! My manor is a little run down, but I love the place. It has all the comforts of home with a little added creepy.

Me: I always have a good creepy time here at the Manor! So what Horror Hosts of the past have influenced you as a host yourself?

Baron: I would have to say since the day I was dug up, I have seen many different horror host icons and most of them have influenced me a little bit, but I would say The Crypt Keeper and Mike and Joel from Mystery Science Theater 3000 would be the most influential.

Me: Great choices, and Crypt Keeper is even in the Horror Host Hall of Fame. So being an undead ghoul and all, do you ever get urges to eat human flesh or brains?

Baron: NO, NO SILLY! That’s zombies, we ghouls just try to get by from day to day we don’t need anything as far as sustenance goes… well except a terrible movie from time to time.

Me: That’s a relief that no flesh eating is in your future! So you have been to quite a bit of conventions and during these travels, what celebrity were you most happy to meet? As well as what other Horror Host?

Baron: Well I did get to meet the Hellraiser himself Doug Bradly and that was kind of a dream come true. As far as horror hosts goes, I did get to meet The Crypt Keeper and that was pretty exciting. But all and all I have to say that all of the horror hosts I have met I have liked in different ways.

Me: Bradley is such an icon of Horror. Well sadly we are at the final question so with my topic for this years Halloween update being about Universal Frankenstein, what other actor besides Boris Karloff would you say is your favorite actor to play the Monster?

Baron: Wow there are so many to chose from…. let me think….. Aaron Eckhart I think from “I, Frankenstein”, I believe would be the best for sure! HAHAHAHAHA! No, no I kid, I kid. This is kind of a hard one though because so many great actors have played the creature. Like Christopher Lee, Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney Jr., Peter Boyle and so many more. Honestly I have to say that David Prowse is probably my favorite portrayal, because Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell is a great movie and a pure scare fest.

Me: Agreed, choosing who is the best actor who has played The Monster is a very tough question, but I would agree that Prowse would be high on my list as well as Frankenstein And The Monster From Hell is one of my favorite Hammer Horror films. Well thanks for spending some time with us here on Rotten Ink and thanks for doing what you do and keeping Horror Hosting alive in Dayton, Ohio. Anything you wanna say to the readers before we go?

Baron: I will see you soon on the Terrifying Tales of the Macabre, until then have a spooky time piggies, HAHAHAHAHA!!

Airing the day this goes up, October 31^st 2014 Baron Von Porkchop will be hosting the Bela Lugosi classic White Zombie for his fourth Halloween Special! I don’t wanna spoil to much but Baron alongside his pal Melvin (Butler to Stephen Von Frankenstein) come face to face with a zombie who has an ax to grind. The special will air on DATV in Dayton on Channel 5 via Time Warner Cable and should be a very fun and spooky episode. I must also say that I am VERY proud of Baron Von Porkchop and Terrifying Tales Of The Macabre, and I am very thankful that I am able to do the show along side a very talented host, cast and crew. If you’re looking for a little more on Baron check out his website at www.terrifyingtalesofthemacabre.com or look him up on Facebook. Man, Horror Hosts are so much fun, and I will continue to have 5 Questions with one every Halloween update so that’s something you readers can always look forward to.

October 24^th 2014 marked the 18^th year of Horrorama, and I was happy to once more be a part of the event that showed four great films “Frankenstein And The Monster From Hell”, “Rawhead Rex”, “Hell of The Living Dead” and “Bride Of Re-Animator” and once more was held at the great local theater the Englewood Cinema. Juliet and I, on our way to the theater early to check the prints of the films as well as eat at the chinese restaurant across the street that has become a tradition, also came across a truck with a propped up coffin with a life size mummy in it on Highway 70…this was a great way to kick off a very long night of film watching and mayhem. The event was hosted by A. Ghastlee Ghoul, the legendary horror host of Dayton, and he helped keep the night moving and filled with laughs.  Rick Martin this year co-hosted and with him being the remaining original event creator, it’s always nice to hear him keep the spirit of the event alive and honor what he started with Andy Copp and Dr. Creep. This year thanks to theater owner Mike, I was able to be the projectionist and wow, that was a lot of fun.  I think one of the coolest things for me that night was being able to peer out the projection window standing next the very old 35mm projector and watch my favorite Hammer Horror film, Frankenstein And The Monster From Hell, a very cool moment for me. Plus at the event were many of my family and friends as besides Juliet, my brother Bryan along with his wife Bel and daughter Abby were there as well as my cousin Stephen. Lots of my friends as well like Josh Weinberg, Mike Ritchie, Garrison Kane, Todd The Fox, Victoria Harper, Nick Williams and Mandie Brown were watching the flicks and having fun. Another great event done and I must say a big thank you for everyone who came and supported this event as well as everyone who helped. Below is a pic of the mummy truck, the event’s poster, and a picture taken from the projection room of the Monster From Hell.

So let’s see so far we have covered wrestler Halloween, Creepypasta about a cartoon suicide, the traveling corpse of outlaw Elmer McCurdy, The Shadow Man of Hills and Dales Park that used to chase me and friends, a Horror Movie Marathon that Juliet and I had as well as Dayton Ohio Horror Host Baron Von Porkchop.  So now I think it’s time we talk a little about Universal’s longest classic monster series Frankenstein. In 1931, after the success of Dracula starring Bela Lugosi Universal was quickly looking for another classic horror novel to turn into a film.  That novel was Frankenstein by Mary Shelly, and the first choice to play the Monster was Bela Lugosi! The story goes that Lugosi didn’t want the role because he thought it was no real acting as the Monster only grunted and was not too keen in the fact his face would be covered in makeup so the part ended up going to Boris Korloff, a character actor that the director James Whale liked. The film had a budget of $262,007.00 and made the studio $12,000,000.00 opening many studios eyes that horror films can make money. Universal made a sequel, Bride of Frankenstein, in 1935 and it was followed by Son of Frankenstein in 1939, and for these three films Karloff played The Monster but for the remaining films in the series many other actors stepped into the role including Lon Chaney Jr., Glenn Strange and even Bela Lugosi in such films as Ghost of Frankenstein (1942), Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man (1943), House Of Frankenstein (1944), House Of Dracula (1945) and Abbott And Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948) making The Frankenstein Monster the first franchise horror character to have so many sequels. Growing up I loved watching the old Frankenstein films from Universal and in fact the first ever VHS I ever owned was Frankenstein! So with this I am really ready to tell you about the Lab I will be reading these comics at so that I can head that way and read some comic adaptations of the classic Universal films!

The place I will be reading these comics is an old science labs that was used for plant experiments and is located in Yellow Springs.  I promised I would not tell the exact location but let’s just say it’s near downtown. The Labs are still filled with all types of odd machines as well as old racks and trays that use to hold the planets. The sight was also used for animal testing and has cages frozen in time as well! I chose this location due to the nature of the Frankenstein story being so heavily science based and what better way to read these comics then an old lab with poor lighting and not a soul around as well as glass pipes that running over head that use to hold acid used in experiments. Below are some pics of the location just so you can get a feel of what the atmosphere for me will be like.

The night I choose to read these comics was a very dark one with clouds in the sky, it had a nice chill in the air and the labs upstairs were a little cold. So let’s find a nice spot among the dust and old equipment and read these adaptations under the flickering lights, Remember that I rate the issues on the 1-4 scale and base it on art, story, how close it stays to the source material and over all entertainment value. I want to thank Bell, Book And Comic for having Dark Horses Frankenstein in stock and Juliet and Eric for helping with the other two. So the thunderstorm is coming in, so let’s prepare for the Monster to come alive!

Frankenstein # 1 ****
Released in 1993   Cover Price $3.95   Dark Horse   #1 of 1

Henry Frankenstein and his assistant Fritz are stealing dead bodies and stitching them together.  Fritz even breaks into a lab and steals an abnormal brain after dropping that of a normal man, and this is all for Henry who wants to create a new life with his own hands in a dusty old tower. During a terrible thunderstorm Henry wants to use the lightning to jolt his creation to life but is interrupted by his fiance Elizabeth, his best friend Victor and his old medical teacher Dr. Waldman who all witness the experiment that works! Victor and Elizabeth return home and try to keep Baron Frankenstein from visiting his son as Waldman begs his former student to kill his Monster before it’s too late. The Monster at first seems to listen and understand commands but when Fritz comes in with a torch the Monster goes crazy, and they must knock it out and put it in the cellar, where Fritz continues to bully it with a whip and a torch.  Finally the Monster snaps and kills Fritz by hanging him. Henry and Waldman knock out the Monster and with the help of Victor, they hide it from his father and Elizabeth. Henry goes home with his father as Waldman is going to dissect and kill the Monster who wakes up and instead kills Waldman! On Henry and Elizabeth’s wedding day, the Monster breaks free of the tower and kills a little girl on accident and even attacks Elizabeth! The townspeople and Henry form a posse and hunt the Monster down.  Henry comes face to face with his Monster who knocks his creator out and takes him to a windmill and throws him off it hurting him badly, as the towns people rush Henry home for medical care they also set the windmill on fire and the Monster is believed to be burnt alive. In the end Henry is getting better at Frankenstein Manor and Elizabeth is at his side while the Monster’s region of terror has came to an end….for now!

This is a great adaptation that captures the mood and story of the classic Universal film and was a great way to start the reviews off! The plot follows a scientist who wants to play God and creates a monster who has a bad brain that does bad things but don’t really understand that it’s doing so.  In the end creator and creation must come face to face with only one making it out alive! Henry Frankenstein is not a bad man, and while he does get wrapped up in his experiment and does create a monster, he had good intentions. It’s clear that Henry loves his girlfriend Elizabeth as well as hid friends and father but that he really wants to be known in the world of science. Dr. Waldman is a wise scientist who sees the dangers in playing God and wants to try and help his student by talking sense into him. Fritz is just a troublemaker and a screw up who seems to take joy in tormenting the Monster.  His worse blunder is stealing the wrong brain and not even telling his boss of the mishap. Victor is a loyal friend who don’t understand why his best friend is acting this way but stands by him when the chips are down and it’s clear Henry needs help. Elizabeth is a loving fiance who understands her man and tries her best to allow him to balance his work and social life with her.  She is the kind of woman who is always by the side of her loved one. Baron Frankenstein is a ass who is more stuck on himself then anything else.  The way he speaks down to others makes him not a very nice person and a character that this reader kind of hated. The Monster is pretty one dimensional in this comic and it’s clear to see that Boris Karloff in the movie is who gave the Monster a personality and made him sympathetic.  In the comic you just don’t pick up on any of its emotions, and The Monster really just comes off as a lumbering brute But that’s the only minor flaw to this amazing comic that I really enjoyed. The art by Den Beauvais (who also adapted the story) is fantastic and it really makes the comic pop as The Monster looks just like Karloff in the movie and in fact most the characters look like the actors who played them in the Universal film. If you’re a fan of the movie or a Universal Monster collector this comic is made for you.  Pick it up you won’t regret it. Check out some of Den’s amazing artwork below.

So the second film in the series is “Bride Of Frankenstein” and sadly no official film adaptation has been made…yet. I am proud to say that talented artist and friend of mine Jeff Potter will be doing a exclusive Bride of Frankenstein just for me to review here on Rotten Ink! So look for that sometime in 2015. But our next comic in the Universal Frankenstein series is a photo comic made by National Periodical that was part of a comic that had several adaptations of movies.  This comic I will be reading in this cold science lab is a custom one that takes just the Son of Frankenstein part and made it into a issue of its own! So let’s get into it shall we?

Son Of Frankenstein  # 1  **1/2
Released in 1939   Cover Price .10   National Periodical   #1 of 1

Wolf Frankenstein, the son of Henry returns to his family’s castle after being away from it for over 20 years and finds that his wife and young son Peter are only warmly greeted by the hired help as the villagers look at them with hate over his father’s Monster. Inspector Crogh visits the castle and tells Wolf that he and his family are not welcome and that he thinks the Monster is alive and killing.  This sparks Wolf’s interest in his father’s old lab where Wolf meets a twisted shepherd named Ygor who shows him that the Monster is indeed alive but very weak. Wolf becomes obsessed with trying to make the Monster better as he believes that this will clear his family’s name, but when more deaths happen, Crogh goes to arrest Wolf as he himself finds that Ygor is using the Monster to kill a jury that convicted him some years back.  This leads to Wolf shooting and killing Ygor. The Monster ends up finding the body of his friend Ygor and this sets him into a rage and he kidnaps Peter.  Crogh tries to help save Peter but is tossed to the side by The Monster! The Monster becomes scared by the villagers who now have become an angry mob, and Wolf kicks him into a lava pit saving his son and causing him to leave the castle for good.

First I have to say I love the movie and that’s why it breaks my heart to read this half butted attempted at a photo comic that tries to cram a 99 minute movie into 8 pages, but then again at least in 1939, they tried to give readers the chills with this comic. The comic changes the plot of the movie in many ways and even how it ends is different.  While some changes, like the fact Inspector Crogh is a very angry and unfriendly man, are interesting other changes like The Monster being frozen with fear by just the sounds of a mob is silly. Wolf Frankenstein is a likeable hero who in this comic really just wanted to return home and clear his family’s name. Young Peter Frankenstein is less annoying in the comic but is just used as bait for the end of the story. Ygor is just kind of around, and while he orders The Monster around he really isn’t given much to do. The Monster also spends most the issue with nothing to do and spends much time just standing to on the slab. I wish the Monster would have had a little more to do and would not be defeated like he was a coward. Plus how brutal is it that Wolf kicks The Monster into lava and watches him burn to death! The art in the comic is mostly photo comic style but does have slight art work added to the photos, and the dialogue is hard to read as the person who did lettering has pretty sloppy hand writing at times. To be honest, this is a nice throwback comic but doesn’t really offer much besides slight old school horror chills. So I think it’s time to move on and will just sum it up as okay but pretty disappointing.

So next in the film world would be “Ghost of Frankenstein” and once more a comic adaptation was never made so I went to my friend Eric Shonborn, and he will be making Rotten Ink one to review along side Jeff Potters Bride of Frankenstein! So let’s move onto the next comic in the series “Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man,” one of my favorite in the Universal Frankenstein series.  The movie is gracing my t-shirt as I sit and write this in the lab. This comic is a custom comic that was put together and translated by Juliet from an old Spanish sticker book based on the movie! So let’s jump into this one as the lab area is given off some odd nosies that sound like keys jiggling!

Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man  # 1  ***
Released in 1946   Cover Price .10   Bloodline Comics   #1 of 1

Two grave robbers go into the crypt of Larry Talbot on a full moon night allowing him to turn into The Wolf Man and escape his tomb and once more set out for blood! Larry wakes up in a hospital in the care of Dr. Mannering and is being watched by cops who don’t believe that he is Larry Talbot as all records say he is dead. That night Larry transforms into The Wolf Man again and kills a cop.  In the morning when the medical staff look at him as if he is crazy, Larry escapes and finds his friend the old gypsy woman Maleva, and they set out to find the diary of Doctor Frankenstein as they think it will hold the answers of finding a cure for Larry’s curse. As they travel, they stop at an inn and are run off by the locals all who hate the name Frankenstein.  After leaving night falls on them and Larry becomes The Wolf Man once more and kills a woman and is hunted down by locals and falls into a hole knocking itself out. Larry awakens in the frozen cave and finds the body of The Monster in ice and frees it, and the pair become unlikely friends. Larry even tries to convince Elsa Frankenstein to help him find her grandfather’s diary, and she wants nothing to do with it. But when The Monster and Larry make a big scary scene at the town’s festival after being confronted by Dr. Mannering, the pair escape to the ruins of the old castle. Elsa, Maleva and Mannering come to the castle and all together they work along side Larry and The Monster and find the diary and set up to cure him of his curse and even drain all the energy from The Monster. This does not go as planned as Mannering makes a mistake that leaves The Monster in a rage and Larry turning into The Wolf Man.  The monsters fight in the old castle ruins as the villagers blow up the near by dame, drowning the two monsters and ending the terror.

When two monsters collide, I the reader won in this fun cheesy comic adaptation that’s packed with so much cheese that it was busting at the seams. The story follows the film for the most part and follows Larry who wants to find a cure for his werewolf curse and gets the help of the remaining Frankenstein as well as befriends The Monster, but when he changes into a beast his urge to kill comes through and he fights his monster friend until they both go swim with the fishes. Larry Talbot is a man who you as the reader feel bad for, but you also find yourself very happy when he turns into The Wolf Man and stalks around and kills whatever he can find. The Monster for the most part just lumbers around and shows he has zero tolerance for people. Dr. Mannering, Maleva the Gypsy and Elsa Frankenstein are good supporting characters who add to the story in their own way but none are really flushed out. The comic has zero blood and gore and is truly a classic horror thriller comic that relies on the fact that monsters are scary, and I love that about this comic. The artwork is done by an unknown artist but I really dig the almost cartoon style, with the Wolf Man looking pretty good and The Monster looking like a skinny kid dressed up for Halloween. While the comic follows the film pretty well, it as well suffers from the fact they tried to rush the plot and rushed way too much character development. With all that said I must say I really enjoyed this comic and wish that some day Dark Horse will get into gear and make Official Universal Monster Movie adaptation comics! Check out the artwork below.

 

So with the lab being the perfect place to read these comics and with all the spooky sounds and the chill in the air, I think it’s time for me to leave this area…never to return again…well that’s until maybe next time I read Universal Frankenstein comics for Rotten Ink. I really enjoy horror comics and love the Halloween season, and this update has just really made me look forward to doing next year’s countdown to the spookiest holiday. So once more I want to thank Eric and Juliet for their help on this update, and I want to also remind all you Horror Host fans that Baron Von Porkchop’s Halloween Special airs tonight on DATV (Time Warner Channel 5) or can be watched via stream at www.datv.org! So I am sure your all wondering what’s the next update, and I must confess that it’s a Debbie Downer as we take a look at the death of the Spider-Man villain The Tarantula! So until next time, read a horror comic or three, support your local Horror Host and watch the skies for its Halloween and the ghosts and goblins are on the loose…you have been warned….Happy Halloween!