Tag: Comedy

Don’t You Forget About The Weird Kidz…. Life Can Be Full of Regrets Afterwards!

When The Weird Kidz knows what it wants to be in its EC Comics style movie poster, everything else about this animated nightmare coming to life simply falls into place!

The Weird Kidz 2022 Poster
After the summer Embrace the Weird Tour, the gang is ready for what’s next, a theatrical run and now streaming on your favourite service.

Now out on VOD is The Weird Kidz, an animated film that feels like The Breakfast Club meets Them! No detention brings these kids together. They’re heading past the highway and into the dark desert just to get away. Whatever’s in the air, they’re going to find out. There will be things to stop them cold and make them scream, “Is this heaven or hell?”

Okay, I’m being vague to avoid spoiling the story. High-school rebel Wyatt (Ellar Coltrane) and his girlfriend Mary (Sydney Wharton) might think they’re getting some private time, but that isn’t the case. Along for the ride are Dug (Tess Passero), Wyatt’s younger brother, and his pals Fatt (Brian Ceely) and Mel (Glenn Bolton). A few of these lads take an interest in Mary too. They’re at that awkward stage of growing up, but thankfully she can mostly keep them at bay.  Continue reading “Don’t You Forget About The Weird Kidz…. Life Can Be Full of Regrets Afterwards!”

Oh the Irony! Dead Media on VOD is Coming Sooner Than You Think!

Who needs a haunted DVD and zombie mayhem when Dead Media on VOD does it all? Namely, a reminder of why physical media still matters.

Dead Media on VOD Movie PosterComing to Prime Video, YouTube, Fandango, and Moonbeem.

With Dead Media on VOD, you’ll be glad watching it on demand won’t cost anyone their soul! This fun throwback reminds audiences why home releases matter. You can read my review here. With VHS, mixtapes and vinyl making a comeback among those who feel the future isn’t friendly, perhaps it’s time to revisit what these formats offer. As long as they’re not cursed!

That’s what Maggie and her friends face when her uncle visits and insists they watch Night of the Lurchers on disc instead of through a streaming service. Watching it digitally feels rather ironic given the story, but it’s still a hoot and a holler for those who love their zombie movies with a meaningful narrative.

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Hop Along Lovecraft! Why Frogman Returns Is an Epic Cryptid Romp…

Anthony Cousins and John Karsko’s cryptid sequel, Frogman Returns, trades DIY roughness for polish, with a Lovecraft twist and a rival cryptid hunter in Ghostbusters gear. It’s camp, it’s creepy, and it might be the perfect Halloween watch.

Frogman Returns Movie Poster
Screened at Toronto After Dark, Sun, Oct 18th Cineplex Scotiabank Theatre

* Spoiler Alert

Anthony Cousins and John Karsko’s sequel, Frogman Returns, raises the bar for campy parody while delivering a love letter to all things cryptid. What makes this film such a solid sell is how the story captures why we love cryptids more than ghosts. With Halloween approaching, there’s all the more reason to seek this film out!

Although familiarity with the original helps, this sequel works reasonably well as a standalone film. Still, I didn’t think it was fair to review it until I’d tracked down a copy of the original to watch, too, allowing me to make comparisons. Hence the delay to this review. The first film tries to be serious, with very strong The Blair Witch Project influences.

Continue reading “Hop Along Lovecraft! Why Frogman Returns Is an Epic Cryptid Romp…”

Welcome to My Nightmare! Or is it Welcome to Ghost Mansion with Alice Cooper Leading the Charge?

Finding tenants is easy when you welcome the dead. Getting them to pay rent is another matter, and Welcome to Ghost Mansion turns that predicament into a spooky, surprisingly sweet comedy.

Welcome to Ghost Mansion Manga Cover
Available to purchase on Amazon USA (Volumes One to Three)

Titan Manga

If Welcome to Ghost Mansion (訳アリ心霊マンション, Wakeari Shinrei Manshon) ever happens to get an animated adaptation, I can imagine it being something like Maison Ikkoku. Although the setups differ, there are some amusing parallels: the building is a worn-down apartment complex whose residents are hardly conventional. They are spirits! The resident manager, Kaoru Shinonome, is hardly fazed by that, and rather than try to convince the living to share the space with the undead, her advertising welcomes spirits who need a place to stay. No, this story isn’t Hotel Transylvania. There’s no young daughter coming of age here, but there is a family gradually coming together.

There’s no big threat yet, but across the three volumes released so far in English, I’m finding that this supernatural comedy has room to grow. In fact, the original Japanese edition is still ongoing as of October 2026, with six volumes, and the English publisher is moving quickly to get the first four volumes out this year. The other two may well be planned for later in 2027 to keep pace.

Continue reading “Welcome to My Nightmare! Or is it Welcome to Ghost Mansion with Alice Cooper Leading the Charge?”

I Love Paris… Just Not All 118 Minutes of Her

A vampire’s body count doubles as an influencer’s engagement metric in I Love Paris, a mockumentary with a clever hook that wears thin long before the credits.

I Love Paris movie poster
Playing at Toronto After Dark Film Festival
Fri, Oct 16th, 6:30 PM @ Cineplex Scotiabank Theatre (Cinema 1)

Having grown up on the classic vampire movies, and skipping the back half of Twilight for good reason, there’s something to be said for how this member of the undead keeps pace with changing times. But when a film tries to be Gen Z, or wants to reinvent the wheel and call itself I Love Paris, it had better not just be headquarters for Vampire: The Masquerade. Yes, I’ve played that role-playing game, and I even have a character I fondly named Amadeus.

After Dark Shadows, Interview with the Vampire, Dracula, Forever Knight, and the various Nosferatu remakes, I feel well-trained on the classics. But after this movie, I may well have to change expectations. So when this movie, written and directed by Nicky Murphy, showed up wearing its mockumentary conceit proudly, I figured I was in for something special.

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When We Still Love Dead Media, Joseph Scrimshaw’s Work Is More Than Another Zombie Film.

Anyone who grew up on those movies of the 50s or 90s will find Joseph Scrimshaw’s film Dead Media honour more than many decades worth of forgotten films, and zombie mayhem in a compact format. And there’s a reason to preserve them all!

Dead Media Movie PosterRoadshow’s Final Stop at Whammy Analog Microcinema on Oct. 17 – Los Angeles, CA

Spoiler Alert

At first, I thought Dead Media might be a horror movie anthology, but instead, it’s a tale within a tale about Maggie Sloke (Sammi-Jack Martincak), who is stuck with the consequences of her poor life choices. One night, she’s with her mates, Daniel (Antonio Teodoro) and Brenda (Jessica Fenton), for a streaming marathon of horrible pulp movies at home, including Night of the Lurchers. This forgotten piece of late-1990s horror has special meaning to her, and when Uncle Heppy (Sam Landman) shows up with a proper DVD version to watch, things shift from a “They’re here” moment to the characters becoming part of the movie itself.

Or is that the other way around? After Maggie goes poking at the DVD’s menu and finds a hidden Easter egg, her excitement turns into an oh sh*t moment as the people and zombies from the film start appearing. And for budget reasons, no, they don’t emerge from the television. I’d have loved to see that, but alas, some effects would blow this film’s budget, and what happens instead becomes a mix of Last Action Hero and Scream!

Continue reading “When We Still Love Dead Media, Joseph Scrimshaw’s Work Is More Than Another Zombie Film.”

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