Hey gang – I’ll be hosting for the smart, sharp and hilarious Ian Harris at the Punchline in San Francisco on Wednesday, November 4th. Tickets available HERE and this is one-night-only, so get your tickets now.

The Ghoulish Plot: Out at sea one lonely night, a Japanese fishing boat finds itself attacked by a giant octopus, which is pretty terrible. Then, just as it seems the octopus might give up and swim away, the octopus is attacked by a gigantic green sea-beast. There’s so much we still don’t know about the oceans, right? 

The green creature then attacks the fishing boat, almost like a child playing with a plastic boat in a bathtub, because this movie was made in 1966 on the cheap. One of the fishing crew survives to tell the tale of the attack, and Japanese authorities realize that it sounds like the work of one creature – a Gargantua! Of course! 

In comes Dr. Paul Stewart, who is supposedly a specialist on the subject of Gargantuas but who seems pretty bored by everything. He’s like one of those old gay men who was alive in the 70′s when everything turned into a coke-fueled orgy who now just stares off into the distance petting his tiny dog at every social gathering. It’s just so booooring. 

It turns out Dr. Stewart and his team had been raising a Gargantua when it was a baby years ago, but it escaped into the wild and hasn’t been seen since. Authorities believe that it’s the same creature attacking boats and airports (and outdoor nightclubs for some reason) but Dr. Stewart thinks there may be more than one, and his Gargantua may be the GOOD one, if they can just find him and have him fight the green one. Cut to: Men in suits smash up tiny model cities, 60′s lazers shoot at things and lots and lots of bad English-over-Japanese voiceover occurs. Is anything resolved? Nope! But you see a lot of things get smashed. 

The Scariest Part Of The Movie: That despite wanton destruction, mayhem and people being randomly eaten, Dr. Stewart never raises above a Klonopin-induced “meh.” 

Our Hero’s Downfall: I’m not sure who the hero is supposed to be, but if it’s Dr. Stewart it’s that he needs to get some Vitamin C and stop taking constant naps whenever he’s not on camera. Or go to rehab for heroin. 

Could It Happen: I’m confident we are safe from Gargantua attacks. 

Spookiness Factor: 2 out of 10. This is an old-timey creature feature at best, although it does have people being picked up and eaten. Which does intensify things a bit, if you’re watching with kids. 

Tomorrow night I’ll be doing a long-ish set at Comedy Oakland. It’s always a fun room and good crowds. Get tickets HERE and hugs at the show (from ME!!!) 

The Ghoulish Plot: Movie tropes are so, like, played out, maaaaan. In this movie, they’re, like, doing the classic horror movie, but it’s like, waaaaay different, bro. 

2012′s Cabin In The Woods carries with it the baggage of several years of being told it’s a really smart play on horror movies by some people and others telling me it’s a really silly version of a horror movie. Turns out, those are both kinda/sorta accurate. 

The movie opens with two middle-aged dudes talking meta-riffically about the upcoming day of work and other typical office drone stuff. They hear there’s an issue at the Stockholm office and they shrug it off and say the Japan group will get it all handled anyway and then use the most horrific of all vehicles, a golf cart, to head to their work station. They’re coming to get you at a par 3, Barbara. 

Cut to college girl Dana, hanging out in her underwear because that’s how all college girls just chill. Right? Girls didn’t hang out with me in college. Dana’s getting ready to go on a road trip with some friends to a cabin…in a place somewhere else, I guess. Her friends include her sluttier friend, her sluttier friend’s hunky boyfriend who looks like Thor, Thor’s slightly less masculine friend who is hunky but polite and then a random stoner dude who looooooves pot and is too silly for girls to waste any vagina on. It’s almost like they’re, like, character archetypes, maaaan. 

The group takes off in an RV to the cabin, then encounters a scary hillbilly at a gas station who warns them to stay away from the cabin, almost as if this were planned out. Then we cut to the two middle-aged guys in the bunker talking to the scary hillbilly after the kids leave. 

The kids get to the cabin, start partying and then somehow unleash a family of scary redneck zombies, who then begin stalking them and killing some of the group. I’ve made a mess drunkenly making macaroni and cheese, but luckily never unleashed zombies. As the attack continues, the stoner has his suspicions that this is all being controlled by some undercover group…but how deep does it go? And why are they doing this to them? You’ll have to watch to find out, and also to see how silly and nonsensical a movie that starts out this promising is willing to go. 

The Scariest Part Of The Movie: Once the redneck zombies are unleashed, this movie gets legitimately scary for a good 20 minutes. Then things take some very strange and silly turns and it’s back to meta-giggles. I never thought I’d be laughing so hard at a relentless bloodbath featuring werewolves, Hellrasier-esque beasts and a Merman, but when it happens it was downright hilarious. 

Our Hero’s Downfall: The story is such that our heroine is literally set up to fail no matter what she does. Just another case of being born to die, brah. 

Could It Happen: Much like when people think 9/11 was a conspiracy, I point to the tradition of typical bureaucracy – there’s no way any organization has their shit this together to pull it off. More than likely the intended victims would just start getting random bills, then have to file form 8899-B with the Refunds Department within 90 business days to submit for a reversal, but only if they’ve already filed form 88Y-3 with the head office and received receipt of its acceptance. Of course, that receipt must be sent to Refunds within 30 days of processing…and then everybody dies of old age. SCARY.  

Spookiness Factor: 5 out of 10. Redneck zombies – scary as shit. Rampaging plastic costume Merman? not so much. 

The Ghoulish Plot: As all Asian parents know, there is nothing more terrifying than having a disappointing child. Single mother Amelia lives with her somewhat odd 6-year-old son Samuel. Samuel is not popular with other kids, is prone to saying weird things and screams his head off if he doesn’t get what he wants, although as best as I can tell from random kids I encounter they all do a lot of those things. Samuel also likes to tell people that he doesn’t have a dad because his father died in a car crash while driving Amelia to the hospital to give birth to him. Sam is a real outcast, as opposed to the cool outcast kids now purchase a kit for at Hot Topic. 

One evening Amelia tells Sam to pick a book to read at bedtime, and he chooses one called The Babadook, because he’s a weird kid. It tells the story of a mysterious black figure who comes to a child to try and get let into their home, and if the child refuses the Babadook will try to go to the mother and then haunt them forever. Samuel is terrified of the book and then starts blaming all his bad behavior on the Babadook, like kids do. Or alcoholics. Alcoholics do that too. It was the Whiskey! 

Samuel gets kicked out of school and keeps having nightmares and refuses to sleep, keeping Amelia awake for days on end and resulting in lots of people saying to her, “you look tired,” which every tired person loves to hear. She has less and less patience for Samuel and his antics and begins to fantasize about hurting him, instead of just waiting until his back is turned and mouthing bad words at him like most normal parents. 

As more and more of the bits of the story in the Babadook come true, Amelia begins to believe in the story herself and starts seeing the figure in the darkness around her home, which for some reason she keeps shadowy and dark. But the true Babadook may have already found its way inside Amelia herself. 

The Scariest Part Of The Movie: I’m guessing to a parent it’s the thought that you could ever hurt your own child, because kids can be annoying. To somebody like myself who doesn’t have kids, it’s that kids are pretty much that annoying all the time. 

Our Hero’s Downfall: Gettin’ knocked up. Seriously, Amelia could be well-rested and not knowing anything about the Babadook the entire movie. 

Could It Happen: Probably not, but if I ever do have kids I’m going to show them this around age 4 and then threaten them with some Babadook constantly. Can’t you kids see daddy’s napping? 

Spookiness Factor: 8 out of 10. I have never been so scared of something in a top hat. 

The Ghoulish Plot: Beautiful, young and adventurous, Scarlet is on a hunt for a mythical object and doesn’t care how she finds it. So obviously, somebody wanted to make a documentary about her. Scarlet is hunting for something called a “Philosopher’s Stone,” an object of biblical legend which can supposedly change any metal into gold and also grant the owner eternal life. It also has a terrible name and was supposed to be part of the title of the first Harry Potter book but was changed because people don’t like poor, smelly philosophers.  How about you philosophize some rent money, jerk? 

Scarlet finds a clue as to the stone’s whereabouts while on a fun jaunt to lovely Iran and barely makes it out with her life. She high-tails it to Paris for the next clue, but she can’t translate from the Aramaic. What a dummy! So, Scarlet hunts down her old associate Benjy, a fellow history nerd who happens to be in Paris fixing an old clock tower illegally because that’s the kind of thing quirky, nerdy history guys do. Benjy says he’ll help translate but nothing else because Scarlet is dangerous to be around, which means you’ll be seeing Benjy for the rest of the movie and he and Scarlet will probably be in love by the end. 

The clues lead them to the catacombs underneath Paris, where the bodies of the dead were put for centuries. They find a crew who claims to know the underground system well, slap some cameras on their heads and head in. Oh, and the clues mentioned something about how the stone was being kept on the road to Hell. FYI, guys. Now you have fun on your descent into the abyss! 

As soon as they enter the mysterious catacombs things start to get creepy, and then things get dangerous as people start getting injured, mysterious people start showing up and then members of the crew start dying. 

The team begins to shrink as people die in shocking, scary ways and as they go deeper, the path behind them seems to disappear. Finally they come across a tunnel with the infamous “Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here” etched above it, in a nod to those who read the epic poems of Dante. The team has no choice but to enter and confront their fate, kind of like when you’re hungry on a long drive and the only restaurant for hundreds of miles is a Denny’s. Abandon all hope, indeed. 

The Scariest Part Of The Movie: That it takes place in an underground cave filled with dead bodies. Talk about setting the scene! “How about a haunted house?” “How about a terrifying cave filled with Satanic symbolism and never-ending darkness?” “You win.”  

Our Hero’s Downfall: Scarlet was confident she could handle anything the world could throw at her, except maybe if it threw Hell at her. 

Could It Happen: I’m sure some locals in Paris would be fine if Hell swallowed up a few of the tourists taking selfies at the Eiffel Tower. 

Spookiness Factor: 7 out of 10. It’s dark, stuff jumps out all over the place, it’s very quiet but then suddenly there’s shrieking and screaming. Plus, Hell stuff. That Satan really nailed it with his branding. 

The Ghoulish Plot: OMG LOL! Thanks to modern technology, nowadays teenagers can always be talking shit about each other. In one such instance at a Fresno high school in 2013, a girl named Laura is caught on video getting wasted at a party and soiling herself. The video is posted on YouTube and in the wake of all the bullying and lots of fun, lighthearted “you should kill yourself” messages Laura gets, Laura publicly kills herself. GTFO! 

Exactly one year later, a group of teenagers who had been at that party is using the miracle of internet technology to avoid doing anything of substance and instead are just flirting, cracking jokes and being generally worthless online. What a miracle age we live in. In the midst of a group Skype chat, a mysterious unseen stranger joins the conversation and won’t leave. 

Members of the group start getting private messages from somebody claiming to be Laura, and then the stranger starts to reveal their secrets. In the wake of one secret being revealed, one of the group’s camera goes black, then returns to show her standing perfectly still, and then suddenly in a flash she drops to the ground in an apparent suicide. STFU indeed. 

More and more secrets are revealed and one-by-one, people in the group die by apparent suicide. At one point it is brought up that angry spirits can possess people they are seeking revenge against and force them to kill themselves, and that this happens after you are contacted by the dead, and the only way to save yourself is to confess what you did wrong. 

Finally down to just Blair, Laura’s supposed ex-best-friend and her boyfriend Mitch, the person claiming to be Laura presses them on who posted the video that drove her to suicide. Will there be a confession or just some totes online trolling? 

The Scariest Part Of The Movie: That this is how most people under 25 see the world – through a screen. The entire movie takes place on a laptop screen with Skype windows, IM’s popping up and Facebook. In the 70′s and 80′s horror movies happened at campgrounds and lakes, now kids don’t even have to get out of bed to get murdered. 

Our Hero’s Downfall: Hella lying, yo. 

Could It Happen: As long as your WiFi is working. 

Spookiness Factor: 6 out of 10. The movie gets pretty intense as it chugs along, although some of the deaths are a little silly and the ending is a bit anticlimactic. 

The Ghoulish Plot: In the mid-90′s, a comedic man-child grabs the attention of the world with his silly voices, sophomoric jokes and generally harmless shtick. As time goes on, the man gets older but the jokes do not. Movie by movie, he continues to offer the same, tired shtick of a shlumpy man who endlessly wears cargo shorts, always loves some band from the 70′s and somehow always wins the day and gets to walk into the sunset with a beautiful woman. 

Then, the unthinkable happens – the man-child decides to try something new and take risks. He acts in serious movies where the quiet, seething rage underneath his flubby exterior is brought into full view for the world to see, in an attempt to prove he has more value than just silly sports movies where fat guys fall down. 

Alas, by then it is too late. Much of the world has written him off and his fanbase will not dare see their sweatpant-clad hero as anything else. It is then that his rage finally takes over and the man begins making movies even more awful than ever before, one after another, filled with scant plotlines, jokes that simply refer to older jokes from older movies and recycled visual gags from other movies. 

With every hateful, angry film a concoction of such putrid garbage is unleashed in cineplexes all over the world, and as each dollar rolls in the man sits in his Hollywood home, laughing at how he has proven the world is stupid, meaningless and without concern for the sanctity of the few moments of life each is granted. As time goes on he swears that he will continue to rob these poor souls of every penny he can, so that his children may enjoy lives of quiet solitude on private islands far away from those wretched, meandering sacks of meat on which he profits from. His soul grows darker with each passing film, but there is nobody on Earth whom he hates more than himself. 

The Scariest Part Of The Movie: It made $77 Million Dollars. 

Our Hero’s Downfall: Believing in his heart that humanity is empty, careless and stupid. 

Could It Happen: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, IT WILL NOT END

Spookiness Factor: 10 out of 10

See more Cinema of Spookeries:
2015
Day 4: The Blair Witch
Day 2: Alien
Day 1: Monster Squad

The 2014 Archive

The funniest person in the office gets their chance! 

One Comedy Fan and Wannabe has been selected to headline this new show at Lost Weekend Video, and we’ve got a great lineup of comics helping them to write material and get ready for the show. 

The Comics:
Allison Mick
Adrian McNair
Ben Feldman
Chelsea Bearce
Red Scott
Sean McKenzie

And the Comedy Newbie:
Introducing Dan Hamilton, a comedy fan from San Francisco!

Tickets are available on Eventbrite now. It all happens at Lost Weekend on October 20th at 8pm. 

New episode of Chucklepedia ready to spook you out, featuring the tale of a group of Russian hikers who mysteriously disappeared on Dyatlov Pass. The show is HERE, and also on iTunes and Stitcher.