Tag: Anthology

When The Summoning (of Baby Blue) Brings Out Maternal Nightmares….

The Summoning offers a few eerie ideas about motherhood, loss, and urban legends, but its anthology structure feels too scattered. Some shorts bloom, while others leave the larger mythology buried in the soil.

The SummoningBlack Mandala

The Summoning (of Baby Blue) is an anthology of shorts designed to get under your skin. Whether it succeeds depends entirely on your tolerance for fragmented storytelling. It opens with a driver travelling through farm country who encounters a masked scarecrow on a foggy road. The imagery hints at something larger, and the emphasis on agriculture feels deliberate. But once he’s slain, the segment ends, and the film never looks back. It’s a solid hook, and I’m a sucker for a good cornfield tale, but the abrupt shift left me scratching my head.

Directed by a collective that includes Sergio Gonzalez and Felipe Vargas, the anthology eventually settles into a more familiar framework. When Laura (Valeria San Martin) finds herself alone, a small nod to Scream helps set the tone for what follows. Her friends arrive and convince her to test the “Baby Blue, Blue Baby” urban legend. It feels like an evolution of the Bloody Mary myth, shifting the fear away from mirrors and into something tactile. Once the chant begins, the participant feels an invisible burden growing heavier in their arms, and surviving the encounter becomes the challenge.

Continue reading “When The Summoning (of Baby Blue) Brings Out Maternal Nightmares….”

Light Chaser Animation’s Liao Zhai Lan Ruo Si May Well Be Ghosted By Western Distributors, and ….

….it’s easy to see why changes to this narrative is struggling to be visible outside of China. Strange Tales (Liao Zhai Lan Ruo Si) is borrowing from tropes some may say are outdated but not everyone will agree to that accessment.

Liao Zhai Lan Ruo SiLight Chaser Animation

After countless searches and a properly worded query to Claude AI about availability, the elusive Liao Zhai Lan Ruo Si (Curious Tales of a Temple, aka Strange Tales: Lan Ruo Temple) is finally within reach. When it will receive an official release remains uncertain. In a future article, I’ll explore the challenges behind getting Ne Zha 2, White Snake: Afloat, and this work to home video. For now, wht’s offered are my early reactions.

What I’ve managed to see in the wilds of the Internet suggests this is a film worth watching. I won’t dive into a full review just yet, but it’s worth sharing some early impressions. As for how long this fleeting upload remains available is anyone’s guess.

Continue reading “Light Chaser Animation’s Liao Zhai Lan Ruo Si May Well Be Ghosted By Western Distributors, and ….”

Halloween 2025: Our Top Scary Picks of the Season (Finale)

Through haunted pages we’ve roamed, twelve terrors claimed — but one final fear waits this Halloween 2025. Dare to turn the page?

Halloween 2025 Graphic Novel / Comic Book Finale
What’s presented on this list are links to where to buy these graphic novels (where possible). Any sales made helps support this site. We are a member of the Amazon Affliciates Program.

And now, dear traveller, the tour is done;
Through haunted pages we’ve had our fun.
From Western crypts to Eastern skies,
The dead have stirred before our eyes.

But here, at last, the harvest’s deep —
Twelve chosen terrors ours to keep.
With bonus haunts to chill and stare,
We dine with dread in devil’s lair.

So carve your pumpkins as the veil grows thin —
The season of horrors now begins.
Turn the page — embrace the lore,
For OtakunoCulture’s haunt endures evermore…

🇺🇸 North America

Read our Full North American Halloween 2025 Guide Here →

Continue reading “Halloween 2025: Our Top Scary Picks of the Season (Finale)”

Bowling With Corpses Is A Whole Lotta Fun and Fairytale Packed In A Big Book!

Fans of Mike Mignola’s work should really check out Bowling With Corpses and Other Strange Tales From Lands Unknown. It’s a wonderful collection of short stories set in a brand new universe he and his frequent collaborators are making!

Bowling with Corpses and Other Strange Tales TPDark Horse Comics

Mike Mignola’s Bowling With Corpses and Other Strange Tales From Lands Unknown is getting a second printing! Considering the rather macabre sport, I suspect no board game or role-playing system is in the works. Here, the title offers an idea which I consider is nothing like the games we know, like bunnock. Their bones are representations of soldiers or something else.

With this book, the influences are very central European. I often cite Brothers Grimm as a primary influence and here, the tale is no holds barred. The first chapter introduces Yeb the Spoon leaving home to seek his fortune, and who he meets to earn his first coin are three animated corpses! Whether or not they are meant to represent the Fates, my guess is yes! His challenge is to roll a skull at a bunch of bones and make most of them fall.

Continue reading “Bowling With Corpses Is A Whole Lotta Fun and Fairytale Packed In A Big Book!”

Do You Know What Lurks Within The Shadows Of Kyoto? It’s Sure to Scare!

If you’re visiting Japan this winter to experience the various delights this country has, you might think twice after reading the manga, Shadows of Kyoto! This work brings to life various local legends, and they’re frightening!

Shadows of Kyoto Manga Cover
Available to Purchase on Amazon USA

Titan Manga

When one of the best lines from the manga Shadows of Kyoto is “Shall I show you the real Kyoto? (裏京都)” It’s a very chilling hello when the protagonists from each tale meet Kotone, a mysterious woman who appears in each story. That quote is going to be as famous as “They’re coming to get you, Barbara” (from Night of the Living Dead) should a movie producer want to adapt this debut manga by Yumeya.

Although not a lot of information is available online about this talented storyteller, maybe it’s because this artist is relatively new. According to the Anime News Network, Yumeya debuted the manga on the Comic Tatan website in August 2020 and ended it that November. The single compiled book volume shipped in Japan in December 2020. And when Titan Manga published their version with a volume label, this misleading information will have some readers wondering.

Continue reading “Do You Know What Lurks Within The Shadows Of Kyoto? It’s Sure to Scare!”

Will The Real “Lore” Standup? The Struggle When The Title Is No Different Than Other Works.

Not every tale featured in Lore is from some British folk past. Had it been, there’d be more to appreciate from it.

Lore 2023 Movie PosterSpoiler Alert

Not to be confused with other similarly titled films, television series or graphic novels, the latest Lore offers four tales that tell a story over a campfire. Perhaps, if the film had come out in spring-time when the camping season was in full swing, it would have delivered a more chilling message than in October, when people were huddling by the fireplace for warmth.

That’s just my preference. While either season will do for this collection of shorts where four friends meet up with a creepy dude (Richard Brake) to huddle by a fire, I had high expectations. They are on an off-season hike to meet this individual, and pretty soon, he’s setting the mood for the remainder of this film.

Out of the four tales offered, only three of them really hit the mark in defining what British horror is like. One concerns a mysterious demon type thing haunting a building (tentatively titled “Shadows,”) the other is your classical ghost (“The Hidden Woman,”) and the third (“Cross Your Heart”) is with cults. It’s best not to give away all the details, since the last one (“The Keychain Man”) felt like let’s make a slasher film in a movie theatre. I’m not one who enjoys the slasher genre. Continue reading “Will The Real “Lore” Standup? The Struggle When The Title Is No Different Than Other Works.”