Wrapping it up for October!

Hello, my darling readers!
Another month is over, so let me give you a little summary of the amazing posts just to make sure you didn’t miss anything. 😉

As is tradition for the spooky month of October, I spent it reviewing all things creepy, scary, and spine-tingling!

As per usual we have the Top 5 Tuesday and Thursday Movie Pick posts, some with appropriate spooky themes as well!

And last but not least some of my favorite quotes to brighten your day:

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Halloween/ TMP Television Edition: Horror TV Themes/Scores

Hey, guys!
Welcome to another entry for Thursday Movie Picks.
It’s a series hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves, so if you want to join the party, head over to her blog! It’s pretty easy: check out each week’s topic and come up with 3 to 5 movies that fit the theme.
We end the month as we began it but instead of horror movie scores and themes, we look at TV shows!

#1 Twin Peaks

Maybe not 100% horror but Google listed Twin Peaks as such. And I adore the theme song.

#2 Buffy the Vampire Slayer

I watched all of Buffy for the first time last year and kinda fell in love with the theme song!

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What We Do in the Shadows: Seasons 1-4

Hey guys!
Time to talk about I show that I had heard a lot about. Well, I finally sat down to binge What We Do in the Shadows! It’s full of vampires so what better to watch for spooky season?

The Plot (as found on Rotten Tomatoes):

Based on the feature film of the same name from Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi, “What We Do in the Shadows” is a documentary-style look into the daily (or rather, nightly) lives of four vampires who’ve “lived” together for hundreds of years in Staten Island.The self-appointed leader of the group is Nandor the Relentless, a great warrior and conqueror from the Ottoman Empire. Then there’s the British vampire Laszlo — a bit of a rogue and a dandy and a fop, he might say. He’s a lover of mischief and a great soirĂ©e, but not as much as he loves seeing Nandor fail miserably in every attempt. And then there’s Nadja: the seductress, the temptress, the vampiric Bonnie to Laszlo’s Clyde. Also cohabiting in the vampire household is Guillermo, Nandor’s familiar; and Colin Robinson, an energy vampire and day-walker of sorts — he feasts on humans, but not on their blood.

The Rating:

I’ve watched four seasons of this show and I still can’t decide whether I like it or not. The episodes are very hit-and-miss for me. Some are hilarious (like the one with the home makeover show!) whereas others just strike me as very boring and uninspired.

I’m not sure if it’s the format that’s throwing me off. This is set up like a reality show where a camera crew just follows the people around and there are bits where they do little interviews. Personally, I am not a fan of reality TV and there are very few shows from that genre that I watch. While I think it is an interesting concept and it does provide some funny moments, it just doesn’t always work. Simply because it doesn’t always provide the comedic effect it’s supposed to. This could be because it is both the format of the show but simultaneously a joke that is repeated over and over as it’s not actual reality TV. As you can tell I’m still very much trying to puzzle out how I feel about this show.

It’s not all bad, not by a long shot! I mean, I was intrigued enough to watch every single episode so far. And as I said, there are bits that I enjoyed a lot. I appreciate the acting as well as the casting choices. There are some nice twists in the show but I think they’d need to make more use of some of them. However, again, I think it’s due to the format that it isn’t the case. I actually think I like the most recent season (4) best so far as there seems to be the most of a continuous thread throughout the episodes. To some degree that was also the case in the other season but here it jumps out at me more and I think it helps the show. It just doesn’t seem so all over the place anymore.

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Thursday Movie Picks Halloween Edition: New Home

Hey, guys!
Welcome to another entry for Thursday Movie Picks.
It’s a series hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves, so if you want to join the party, head over to her blog! It’s pretty easy: check out each week’s topic and come up with 3 to 5 movies that fit the theme.
Today we’re tackling a classic horror film trope: the new home!

#1 Amityville Horror

How could we do this theme without including Amityville Horror? There’s a bunch of movies in this franchise now, I literally picked the first trailer YT spit out. 😅

#2 Shining

What if you move into your new (temporary) home and turn completely mad and try to murder your family? I guess that is the theme for all of these films.

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Halloween Horror: Willy’s Wonderland

Hello, hello!
It’s October, you all know the drill. Time for horror movies all around. Today we’re gonna talk about a rather weird name: Willy’s Wonderland. I don’t want to say too much about it right away, so let’s just get started!

The Plot (according to RT):

A quiet loner (Nicolas Cage) finds himself stranded in a remote town when his car breaks down. Unable to pay for the repairs he needs, he agrees to spend the night cleaning Willy’s Wonderland, an abandoned family fun center. But this wonderland has a dark secret that this “Janitor” is about to discover. He soon finds himself locked in an epic battle with possessed animatronic mascots that roam the halls. To survive, he must fight his way through each of them.

The Rating:

This movie really was funnier than it had any right to be. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the most hilarious horror comedy of all time that will become a new classic or anything like that. Would I watch it again? Maybe not. But it’s a decent flick.

Nicholas Cage plays the lead here and throughout the entire movie he doesn’t say a word. I like to believe that there was a meeting at some point where Cage said that he doesn’t want to learn any lines for this, so they just kept him stoically silent for the whole film. They probably had intended to do the character like this in any case but I prefer my version. I know some people complained about this and said they “running gag” of him not speaking got old pretty fast but I honestly didn’t mind it. That’s probably because to some extent the movie is self aware. It gets addressed that he doesn’t speak and it’s annoying. As the film circles through just about every horror movie clichĂ© you can think of, it remains rather funny. As long as you don’t go in expecting a serious horror flick, you should be good. I got the feeling that those involved in the project pretty much share this sentiment.

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Halloween Horror: The Hills Have Eyes (2006)

Hello, hello!
Welcome to another spooky movie for Halloween season.
This one is pretty gory, but is it actually worth checking out? Let’s find out!

The Plot (according to RT):

A family road trip takes a terrifying turn when the travelers become stranded in a barren atomic zone established by the U.S. government. However, the unlucky travelers discover to their horror that the wasteland is far from uninhabited, A band of bloodthirsty mutants prowls the area, and there is nothing they like better than fresh meat.

The Rating:

Well, this was decent. Nothing outstanding or impressive, but your typical middle-of-the-road horror flick. I honestly don’t have all that much to say about The Hills Have Eyes. It was a good one to watch around Halloween season but I don’t think I’d take time out of my day to watch it again.

Vinessa Shaw who you might remember from Hocus Pocus is in this film, which Is kind of a nice touch. At least for me, since it means coming full circle: I always start October with watching Hocus Pocus. I’ll still have to check out the original The Hills Have Eyes flick and see how this remake compares. But altogether I wasn’t really impressed. The film sure checks all horror clichĂ© check marks but if I sit down for this kind of flick, honestly that’s what I expect.

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