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Star Trek Original Series Season 1 highlights Part II

Posted in movies, pop culture, Star Trek, TV shows, Uncategorized with tags James T Kirk, movies, pop culture, reviews, Star Trek, TV shows on November 11, 2009 by Paxton

This is the long awaited Part II of my look back at highlights of the Season 1 of Star Trek the Original Series. I posted Part I back in September. However, thanks to AWESOME-tober-fest, I couldn’t get this one posted until now.

To refresh everyone’s memory, after the awesome JJ Abrams reboot of Star Trek back in May, I wanted to watch the original TV show episodes again. I’d seen a few episodes in reruns, but never really sat down to watch the episodes back to back. I wanted to see if they are as good as I remember. And since the first two seasons were recently released on Blu-Ray, I thought it was no time like the present (Season 3 will be released on Blu-Ray December 15).

Last time I looked at three of the best episodes from the first half of Season 1 of the Original Series (Where No Man Has Gone Before, The Enemy Within and The Corbomite Maneuver). Here are three more episodes from the middle of that season.

The Menagerie (Part I and II) — The first and only 2 part episode in the original series’ 3 year run. This episode makes extensive use of the unaired pilot, The Cage, to tell its story. I imagine Roddenberry walked into the writer’s room and announced, “Dudes, I went on a bender of coke and whores this weekend and totally forgot to write this week’s episode. Any ideas?” So the writer’s cobbled together this episode using a minimum of new footage and letting the old pilot pad out the run time. This episode is okay, but it reminds me of the ’80s sitcom device of the “flashback episode”. The events of the pilot, within the context of this episode, are said to have happened 13 years prior when Christopher Pike was the Enterprise captain and Spock the science officer. In the new footage, Spock hijacks Kirk’s Enterprise to bring Capt Pike (now blonde and a paraplegic due to an accident) back to Talos IV, the planet visited in the pilot. Spock gets court martialed while the Enterprise makes the journey and clips from almost the entire episode of The Cage are screened during the court proceedings. In the older footage, Pike gets trapped on the planet Talos IV and the aliens residing there put him in a type of zoo for observation. The aliens use holograms to make Pike feel more comfortable by making him believe he’s living a different life, even going so far as to give him a hot chick to mate with. Pike, not being Kirk, is outraged that the aliens would try to make him comfortable with a cool, imaginary life and then also have the temerity to give him hot women in which to have copious amounts of sex so he sets out to destroy the entire observatory/zoo. Many, many years later, in the new footage, after having become a quadriplegic, Pike is totally fine with living a fantasy life with lots of hot chicks so works with Spock to break every Federation rule and bring him there, even risking Spock’s career for his own comfort. After seeing this episode I have no desire to watch the full pilot. I’ve probably seen 90% of the footage anyway. And the actor who played Pike in the pilot, Jeffery Hunter, didn’t return for The Menagerie, hence Pike being an invalid, blonde mute (it’s like they didn’t even try to make him look the same) in the new footage.

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Happy Halloween from the Cavalcade

Posted in Halloween, holiday, movies with tags AWESOME-tober-fest, AWESOME-tober-fest 2009, Halloween, holiday, movies on October 31, 2009 by Paxton

Happy, Happy Hall-o-ween.
Hall-o-ween, Hall-o-ween.
Happy, Happy Hall-o-ween.
Sil-ver Sham-rock.

I challenge you to watch the above YouTube clip from Halloween III and NOT get that tune stuck in your head the rest of the day. You’re welcome.

So, I know you are all waiting with baited breath. What did I dress up as for Halloween this year? Glad you asked, I was Capt Kirk from the new JJ Abrams Star Trek movie.

And here’s an action shot.

Pretty awesome, I know. Thanks to Debi for taking the pics of me.

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AWESOME-tober-fest 2009: Star Wars and Zombies

Posted in Halloween, holiday, monsters, movies, pop culture, Star Wars, Uncategorized, zombies with tags AWESOME-tober-fest, Halloween, holiday, monsters, movies, Star Wars, zombies on October 30, 2009 by Paxton

Okay, one more day until Halloween. I’m going to break with the Frankenstein theme today because, honestly, I’ve done enough Frankenstein. I love the big, lumbering, green guy, but I’ve been up to my pooper in Frankenstein stuff for 2 months now and I’m ready to just put that whole thing on pause for a second. Don’t worry, I’ll go back to Frankenstein (and Boris Karloff) in mid November for the Boris Karloff Birthday Blogathon.

Right now, though, I want to talk about Star Wars…and zombies.

Star Wars and zombies go together like Lennon and McCartney. Magic Johnson and Larry Bird. Peanut Butter and laaaadies. One thing makes the other better. And for this Halloween season, there are a couple projects that bring Star Wars and zombies together like some awesome Halloween version of the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup commercial (where someone gets their chocolate in someone else’s peanut butter).

The first cool, Star Wars zombie item is the book Death Troopers

The book takes place just before Episode IV (A New Hope) and involves a derelict Star Destroyer and an unknown virus. I got the book from my friend, Dr Mike, and I am currently reading it. It’s pretty much as bad ass as you think it is. I’m not sure why Star Wars and horror (and more specifically, zombies) hasn’t been done before, but count me in. EXCEPT, Star Wars really needs to tread lightly here. A virus that makes characters zombie-like is awesome, but I’m not sure I want vampires or werewolves popping up. Actually, I KNOW I don’t want vampires popping up. I love this idea, but it has the potential to get very bad, very quickly.

Unlike every other Star Wars book that is published, this book is a one-shot. It’s not part of some multi-arc storyline in which you have to read 6 other books and 2 other comic books to fully get the story. It’s completely self-contained, like all Star Wars books USED to be in the ’90s. And I love it because of that. These ridiculous 19 book series with in a series are why I stopped reading Star Wars fiction to begin with.

Another cool zombie item? Star Wars zombie posters. There is some really cool zombie artwork on the Official Star Wars Blog Flickr Photostream. There are several zombie versions of the Star Wars posters, like Zombie Wars and Episode III: Revenge of the Zombies (click images to see them BIGGER).

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AWESOME-tober-fest 2009: Watching a bunch of Frankenstein movies

Posted in Frankenstein, Halloween, holiday, monsters, movies, pop culture with tags AWESOME-tober-fest, AWESOME-tober-fest 2009, Frankenstein, Halloween, holiday, monsters, movies, pop culture on October 29, 2009 by Paxton

So, I watched the Edison Frankenstein and the first three Universal Frankenstein movies with Boris Karloff. What next? I decided to check out some other Frankenstein movies that aren’t the classic Universal monster movies. For instance, Hammer Films made like 7 Frankenstein movies. Andy Warhol made a near pornographic one and even Roger Corman took a shot at a Frankenstein movie.

There are literally dozens of Frankenstein movies to choose from. I chose three. I was really close to picking the Andy Warhol one because I heard it’s really weird, but I instead opted for three fairly mainstream choices. One a direct adaptation of the novel, one a classic horror film and, to change things up a bit, a parody version of Frankenstein.

Let’s see how I did.

Gods and Monsters
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1994) — Directed by Kenneth Branagh, this movie takes its story solely from Shelley’s original novel. It is very faithful to the book, however, there are some changes Branagh made, one of which was to add a mentor character for Victor. The movie is packed with stars including Branagh, Helena Bonham-Carter, Ian Holm, John Cleese (playing the aforementioned mentor) and Robert DeNiro playing the titular creature. However, despite the pedigree, and the faithfulness to the book, the movie was a tad boring. Except for the creation sequence, I had trouble staying focused on the action. Also, I had trouble accepting Bonham-Carter as Elizabeth as I imagined her character differently while reading the book and DeNiro was somewhat wasted as the creature. The movie wasn’t bad, it just didn’t come together for me as a whole. So, I say check it out if you are interested, but don’t expect too much. I guess I was also disappointed because I thought a straight adaptation of Shelley’s novel would somehow be better. I guess not.

Curse of Frankenstein (1957) – Hammer Films’ classic monster movie starring Peter Cushing as Victor Frankenstein and Christopher Lee as The Monster. It was originally to star Boris Karloff but Universal threatened a lawsuit if any element came near their Frankenstein movie so Hammer rewrote the script and changed up the makeup for the Creature. Also, this was the first Frankenstein movie to be filmed in color. It would launch Hammer Films as a horror powerhouse and garner six sequels. It would also launch Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing into the just as popular Hammer Dracula series. The story in this doesn’t follow the novel, it actually is a variation on the Universal movie, almost a remake or reboot of the Universal movie. And thinking of it that way, it really works.
I see why so many people like these Hammer Horror films. They are good. The atmosphere is creepy and the horror is actually horrific, despite the effects being less than top shelf. Peter Cushing is great as the obsessed Dr Victor Frankenstein. He really brings across Victor’s obsession with creating life. Christopher Lee brings something different to the monster. Different, but just as good. I really enjoyed the pacing of the plot and the acting in this movie. I would definitely watch the next few Hammer Frankenstein movies as well as start the Hammer Dracula series.

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AWESOME-tober-fest 2009: Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948)

Posted in Dracula, Frankenstein, Halloween, holiday, monsters, movies, Universal Studios, Wolf Man with tags AWESOME-tober-fest, AWESOME-tober-fest 2009, Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, Dracula, Frankenstein, Halloween, holiday, monsters, movies, pop culture, reviews, The Wolf Man, Universal Studios on October 28, 2009 by Paxton

Yesterday, I watched the first three Boris Karloff Frankenstein movies, the last one being Son of Frankenstein in 1939. Today, I’m going to jump ahead almost 10 years to talk about my next movie, 1948’s Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein.

This movie was a horror comedy (Horr-edy?!) staring the comedy team of Abbott & Costello. It is notable because it features three of the Universal monsters, two of which are played by their original actor. Lon Chaney reprises his role of The Wolf Man and Bela Lugosi returns as Dracula (this is the only time Lugosi played Dracula apart from the original 1931 classic). Karloff, however, had stopped playing “The Monster” after Son of Frankenstein in 1939, so Glenn Strange played the titular monster in this movie (as he had for The Ghost of Frankenstein a few years earlier). Karloff would actually appear with Abbott and Costello in another movie, Abbot and Costello Meet The Killer, Boris Karloff, one year later. This movie is considered the “swan song” of the original Universal Monsters as the popularity of the Universal Horror movies had waned towards the end of the ’40s. As a matter of fact, Bud Abbott did not even want to do the movie, but Universal offered him so much money he couldn’t turn it down. Also, Universal was set to cast another actor as Dracula because it believed that Bela Lugosi had died! However, Lugosi’s agent had informed Universal otherwise (his movie career was almost non-existent at this point) and convinced the executives that they owe Lugosi the role he originated. As for the Wolf Man, it is the only character to be portrayed by the same actor (Lon Chaney) throughout the original Universal monster movies (including this one). Despite the pedigree, this movie was a cash grab for Universal. And it kinda shows.

I can see why Abbott didn’t want to do the movie. It’s dumb. Apart from the novelty of having the original Universal Monsters all together, this movie is silly and hard to watch (even boring at times). Having Dracula try to reanimate The Monster and being opposed by Abbot, Costello and Larry Talbot (The Wolf Man) is a good idea on paper, but the execution is lacking. I’ve watched this movie twice and I barely made it through each time. The idea is definitely better than the result. Abbott and Costello are funny, but I prefer the Universal Monsters in a horror setting where they are taken seriously, not in this comedy setting where they seem more ludicrous and out of place than scary.

Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.