Werewolf by Night (2022)

Marvel Studios surprised us all with a sudden release of their very first TV special, Werewolf by Night (2022).  I had never heard of it until it was suddenly available for streaming on Disney+, but it was apparently a Marvel comic series that's been running since 1972.  Let's discuss it!

SYNOPSIS:
Monster hunters from all across the globe gather at Bloodstone Temple to honor the recently deceased Ulysses Bloodstone, their former leader.  His ultimate weapon which bears his namesake, the Bloodstone, is up for grabs and his widow has prepared a deadly monster hunt to determine who will earn the right to wield the powerful weapon.

REVIEW:
This TV special is visually stunning! With black-and-white film, spooky music, and a ton of practical effects, it successfully mimics the Universal Monsters horror film genre popular in the 30s and 40s.  Even Werewolf by Night himself looks similar to The Wolfman (1966) in appearance.  They went (mostly) practical effects on the werewolf make-up instead of giving him a CGI body like The Hulk.

Werewolf by Night, in all his horror film glory

Oh yeah - that's his actual comic book superhero name: Werewolf by Night.  His alter ego, Jack Russell (Gael García Bernal), is a timid man who has an impressive monster kill tally.  He joins the hunt for his own personal reasons.

The comic book version of Jack Russell was born with the curse of lycanthropy, inherited by an ancestor who was bitten by a werewolf in 1795.  Interestingly, it was his father who activated the werewolf curse by reading about it in the Darkhold, a powerful and evil magic book.  We actually saw the Darkhold in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022), earlier this year. Do we now have a movie connection between Marvel's new horror monsters and the previously seen Darkhold?  Only time will tell...

Also joining the hunt is Elsa Bloodstone (Laura Donnelly), who is the estranged daughter of Ulysses Bloodstone.  She disagrees with the monster hunter's lifestyle and wishes to claim her (forfeited) inheritance from her stepmother so that she can disband the monster hunters once and for all.

She spends the film being tired of dealing with people, being a badass assassin, or scared for her life.  In an age of female empowerment, it's rare to see lead women scared on screen anymore, for fear of angering progressives.  But she managed to pull off the badass hunter vibe, while also being genuinely scared when her life was in danger.  It added a touch of realism to her character, which I appreciated.  Who wouldn't be terrified for their life when trapped and outmatched by a giant monster?  It also calls back to the days of the Universal Monsters, when women were essentially pretty damsels in distress and constantly fearful for their lives. Granted, Elsa is no damsel in distress and proves she can take care of herself, but it adds to the vintage tone of the film to see her scared and a bit vulnerable when confronted with actual monsters.

Elsa Bloodstone, tired of everyone's shit

We also get a small appearance of a monster familiar to long-time Marvel comic book readers: Man-Thing (Carey Jones for motion capture; Jeffrey Ford for voice).  He's an empathetic swamp monster who normally lives in the Florida Everglades, but he finds himself mixed up with the monster hunters. Despite his well-known monster name, in this special he actually goes by his former human name, Ted.

In the comics, he was originally the biochemist Dr. Theodore "Ted" Sallis, of Omaha, Nebraska. He was in the Florida Everglades, researching the development of a new super soldier serum like the one that created Captain America, but found himself running from the technological terrorist organization A.I.M.  Attempting to evade them, he injected himself with the only sample of his serum.  But while he was on the run, he crashed his car into a swamp, where the scientific chemicals in his blood and the magical properties of the swamp transformed him into the giant, lumbering Man-Thing!  Ted's mind was forever lost in that swamp, but the mentally-stunted monster manages to periodically find himself saving the day, sometimes alongside the Avengers themselves.

Man-Thing, making his live-action Marvel Cinematic Universe debut!

The Bloodstone itself gets the honor of being the only color in this film, casting an eerie red glow among the black-and-white scenes.  Near the end of the TV special, we hear Over the Rainbow, sung by Judy Garland, playing as the black-and-white film slowly turns to color.  A very lovely tribute to The Wizard of Oz (1939), a classic film of the same black-and-white era that surprised audiences by changing into a full color spectrum when Dorothy woke up in Oz.

The vibrant red Bloodstone, stealing the scene

RECOMMENDATION:
At 53 minutes, this short film was a brilliant introduction to the Marvel Cinematic Universe's horror genre.  Hopefully it will spawn more monsters and creatures of the night, further expanding the world of the MCU.  We saw Sony fail to introduce Marvel's monsters with the film Morbius, which has become a running joke on the Internet.  But the MCU managed to pull off a vintage-inspired short story, teasing audiences with the darker realm of Marvel and leaving us begging for more.  Surprisingly, this special dodged the TV-MA rating, due to the black-and-white film obscuring the more visceral scenes.  So watch it along with your older children, but you might want to put the young kiddos to bed before putting this on.

Don't Hug Me I'm Scared (2011)

I said I wasn't planning to do a daily Halloween Month Movie Marathon™, but I came across something today that I felt needed a review.  Prepare yourselves for the horrifying YouTube series called Don't Hug Me I'm Scared (2011).

SYNOPSIS:
Don't Hug Me I'm Scared (2011) is a short educational British children's show, only airing six episodes at 3-1/2 to 8 minutes per episode.  Each episode teaches about a fun concept, like being creative, time, healthy eating, etc. But each episode turns dark at some point, changing from a fun, bright kid's program into psychological horror.  What exactly is this show about...?

REVIEW:
If you haven't watched this show yet, I highly recommend you do.  Like, right now, before you read further.  It's so short, you can burn through all of it in about a half hour.  You can find it on YouTube, where it originally aired.  You only need to watch episodes 1-6; the other videos are teasers for episodes, with their first video being an odd unrelated short about "Bad Things That Could Happen."

Red Guy, Duck Guy, and Yellow Guy, waiting for their favorite show to air

The show depicts three puppets: Red Guy, Yellow Guy, and Duck Guy.  Throughout the series, they explore different educational concepts that always end with a dark twist.  Red Guy, losing faith in the show, disappears after episode 4 and Duck Guy, terrified of the new direction the show takes, tries to leave in episode 5, leaving Yellow Guy to have an existential crisis by himself in episode 6.

Yellow Guy drowning after his bed turned into a pool of oil. Symbolic? Literal? I can't tell anymore.

Meanwhile, Red Guy wakes up in the "real world" and experiences humiliation at work and on a stage show, while Roy (Yellow Guy's creepy father) watches him from the shadows.

Red Guy at work in the real world... in widescreen aspect all of a sudden.

So... what's the point of this show?  What exactly is going on in each episode?  This has been an ongoing discussion with fans for many years now.  And the creators aren't helpful, claiming that they've read a ton of fan theories, and "all theories are correct."  Well, as it turns out, the creators believe in art as a personal experience; that is to say, whatever your interpretation of art is, is the correct interpretation. So if they have a point behind their show, it's inconsequential.

This leaves fans to come up with their own theories about the horrors going on within the show, and even behind the scenes.  The Film Theorist, in a 2-part video (part 1 here and part 2 here), has crafted the most popular theory on this show: that it's all a children's show created by Red Guy and sponsored by Roy.  He goes on to claim that the overall series is a critique of children's shows, telling kids to be creative, but only within certain parameters.  They brainwash children into conforming to certain educational boundaries and discouraging any true creativity, held down by sponsors who want to push their own vision to earn revenue.

Roy watching porn as his son, Yellow Guy, sings and dances about it

However, as popular as this theory is, it forgets that the creators themselves have been trying to make a sponsored TV show out of this YouTube short.  As a matter of fact, they finally got their wish, and as of September 23rd, 2022, season 2 aired exclusively on Channel 4, a British streaming service.  It's also only six episodes, but this time, they're half-hour episodes with a full production budget.  I have not seen them yet, so maybe more clues as to what's going on with this show will be shown.

One of my favorite theories is that the whole show is Red Guy's attempt to hold onto his childhood as he's approaching adulthood.  He's the only adult-sized character on the felt-covered "show," but when he wakes up in the real world in episode 6, all the adults look like him and everything is tangible and real, not felt or crafted.  Or animated either.  When he goes on stage to perform with his puppet versions of the show's cast members, a guy comments on how rude he is for being naked on the stage.  But he's wearing the same outfit as his show, while all the other "red guys" wear normal adult clothing. Ever since he left the show, the remaining characters struggle to hold onto their reality as it slowly crumbles, perhaps showing his childhood slowly being forgotten and discarded.

Duck Guy being consumed by a giant can of food. Symbolism for mindless consumerism? I have no idea anymore.

There's a recurring date throughout the show (June 19th), which could be seen as Red Guy's birthday.  The date doesn't change until the end of the show, when he also changes.  As a matter of fact, all the characters change then.  So perhaps it's symbolic of him accepting adulthood and learning to let go of his childhood.  But the next season that just released shows the original cast, with no changes.  So... I guess we'll get more clues in the next series.

Be creative!

RECOMMENDATION:
If you love shows that acknowledge the existential dread in our lives, or perhaps you enjoy a dark psychological thriller with no true meaning, you should check out this web series. Hopefully the new season will reveal more of this dark world, adding or changing current theories about it.  Meanwhile, this show is very re-watchable, because there are so many creepy details hidden in the background for you to discover.  You should definitely check it out!

Hocus Pocus 2 (2022)

Welcome back to my Halloween Month Movie Marathon!  As promised, today I'll be looking at the recently-released Hocus Pocus 2 (2022)!  This film literally released 3 days ago, so if you haven't seen it, go check it out on Disney+.

SYNOPSIS:
A coven of young girls light a black flame candle during the full moon on Halloween, accidentally resurrecting the Sanderson Sisters!  The three ancient witches, intent on surviving their one night alive, decide to pursue a spell that will make them the most powerful immortal witches in the world!

REVIEW:
Note: There will be some spoilers for the ending ahead.  I will mark them so you can skip over them if you like.

In my last review, I mentioned how fun the Sanderson Sisters were to watch and how I kept forgetting they're not who we should be rooting for.  This film humanized them a bit more, opening with a flashback to their childhood.  It showed how they were persecuted by the townsfolk of Salem and set off on their journey to becoming witches.  We learn that Winifred (Bette Midler) values her sisters, Mary (Kathy Najimy) and Sarah (Sarah Jessica Parker), more than anything in the world, despite treating them like a nuisance.  They were a fantastic trio in this film and once again, I felt myself caring for their plight and kind of hoping they'd get some sort of a redemption arc.

Young Sanderson Sisters about to become witches

This new film takes place in 2022, 29 years after the previous film.  Our main children are a trio of young girls who love the occult and performing Halloween rituals.  This amateur coven of witches are dealing with conflict though, as one of them has practically abandoned the others for a boy and his circle of friends.  There's a recurring theme in this film of the importance of "family," whether it be blood relations or your own circle of friends.

A young coven of witches

We're also introduced to a witch at the beginning, credited as The Witch Mother (Hannah Waddingham), which is the "mother" that Winifred continually refers to throughout Hocus Pocus (1993).  She informs the Sanderson Sisters how lucky they are to have a coven, and mentions with a sadness in her eyes that her own coven is long gone.

The Witch Mother, showing off her power

This film has a bit of a subplot concerning female empowerment.  The Sanderson Sisters were only banished from Salem because 16-year-old Winifred wouldn't marry a local boy after her father passed away, and because she refused to honor the Lord and live peacefully and respectfully among the villagers.  Her wild individualism is out of place in the mid-1600s though, and so she's persecuted for it and driven out of society.  In modern times, Becca (Whitney Peak) and Izzy (Belissa Escobedo) two of the three young girls, are harassed by a boy in their class for practicing witchcraft and "being weird." They're upset at their third friend, Cassie (Lilia Buckingham), for choosing to hang out with the boy and his friends.  We also see how the women in this film constantly solve their own problems, while the men tend to be bumbling comedic fodder.  It was a nice change of pace, especially since the first film had a cringey male lead who (somehow) won the heart of the lead female.

We get another song and dance number from the Sanderson Sisters, putting a spell over a crowd.  Unfortunately, we don't get an original song like the previous film, but we get a pretty fun variant of Blondie's One Way Or Another.  The sisters find out that Mayor Traske (Tony Hale) is the descendant of Reverend Traske (also Tony Hale) who cast them out of Salem, so they bewitch a crowd to seek him out.  The modern-day mayor is oddly obsessed with getting a caramel apple on Halloween night; that's probably his biggest character arc in this film.

Bewitching a crowd with a fun song; a Sanderson special

Fun trivia: While searching for the mayor, Winifred peers in the window of a couple who are watching the original Hocus Pocus.  Specifically, the scene with the Devil (Garry Marshall) and his wife (Penny Marshall), a real-life brother & sister who have passed on since the first film.  The scene was considered a tribute to the sibling actors.

We get the return of the zombie Billy Butcherson (Doug Jones), who has apparently been resting awake in his grave for 29 years.  He claims no one properly laid him to rest after the Sanderson Sisters were vanquished, so he's just been chilling underground all this time.  We get a lot more scenes with him this time around, and his mouth is not sewn shut for most of it.  The one time he gets re-sewn, his stitches now spell KILL.  Doug Jones claimed that he got to re-wear the original Billy Butcherson wig from the first movie in this role.

A more talkative Billy Butcherson

We have another new character: Gilbert (Sam Richardson), who has turned the old Sanderson home into an occult shop.  He is very excited to meet the Sanderson Sisters, until they force him to do their bidding.  He does a lot of their dirty work, along with Billy, while the sisters spend their time seeking out revenge on the mayor.

I should note that Mary Sanderson's crooked jaw is on the other side this time.  At first, I thought it was a mirror-image print of the film poster, but I realized that her mouth gap was on the wrong side for most of the film too.  In a blink-or-you'll-miss-it scene, right after the sisters are resurrected, Winifred slaps Mary across the face, shifting her crooked jaw from one side to the other.  Kathy Najimy (who plays Mary) claims this was due to the fact that she can't really perform the crooked jaw on her right side anymore, so they came up with a canon way for her to switch sides.

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Spoilers ahead: skip the next 4 paragraphs to avoid

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I actually love the end of this film.  Winifred gets all the ingredients for her powerful spell and the three sisters perform the ritual, empowering all three of them.  Becca, one of the young girls, turned 16 on Halloween and discovers she has the gift of magic, so she attempts to fight back against the witches.  But she's no match for their new power.

However, Winifred learns the hard way to read warnings on spells: the all-powerful spell claims that which she cares for most in the world as its price.  She has to watch as her sisters evaporate in front of her eyes.  She turns to Becca in desperation, begging for a way to reunite with her sisters. She offers to give up all her power if it would bring back her sisters.  She gets her wish, and through an incantation by the young coven of friends, is sent to her sisters in oblivion.  It's not much of a redemption arc, but it's pretty close.  Maybe if there's another sequel, we'll see a slightly reformed trio of witch sisters.

The Witch Mother can shapeshift into a crow with red and yellow fringe on her wings.  We see her, not only in the beginning of the film, but a couple times in modern-day Salem, in her crow form.  When she takes human form, we see her eyes briefly glow purple.  As Winifred completes the all-powerful witch spell, her eyes also glow purple.  It's thus assumed that the Witch Mother performed the same spell herself and likely lost her coven to the spell.

Unlike the Sanderson Sisters, though, she is much more subtle of a witch and has managed to live at least 300 years undisturbed.  She claims Salem will belong to the witches one day.  Maybe she'll be a new villain in a sequel?  I would love to see the the Sanderson Sisters become white witches and fight against the Witch Mother in the next film.  It would give them the redemption arc I've always hoped for and wrap up their story nicely.

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End of spoilers

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Finally, there's an after-credits scene that leaves this film open for a potential sequel.  Don't forget to wait through the credits!

RECOMMENDATION:
Bette Midler is credited with getting this film off the ground, by harassing the studio every year about making a sequel.  She saw how popular the original film had become, so she insisted on reprising her role again.  All three Sanderson Sister actresses have agreed to come back if yet another sequel is made.  I really hope they make another one because I absolutely love these films!  Bette Midler is turning 77 years old this year, yet she, Kathy Najimy (65 years old), and Sarah Jessica Parker (57 years old) continued to bring so much energy to this film.  I need more Sanderson Sisters!  If you're a fan of the original film, you need to check out this sequel.  It was a lot of fun.

Hocus Pocus (1993)

Hey all!  It's been a long time since I posted a film review.  I was scheduled to retire from the US Air Force in July 2022, so my life got very busy last year in preparation.  I meant to do a full Spider-Man film marathon, leading up to the climactic Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021).  But even though I did marathon all those films with my wife, I didn't have the energy to review every single one.  So it's on hiatus for now and I'll get back to it eventually.  You'll just have to live with the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man trilogy reviews for now.

But October is here, which means... Halloween Month Movie Marathon!!  I probably won't be reviewing films daily, but I do plan to write as many reviews as I can this month.  First up on the docket: Hocus Pocus (1993)!

SYNOPSIS:
On October 31st, 1693 in Salem, Massachusetts, three witches known as the Sanderson Sisters were hung for the crime of witchcraft.  Before they died, they uttered a curse, ensuring they would return one day.  Exactly 300 years later, Max (Omri Katz), a kid from LA, moves to Salem with his little sister, Dani (Thora Birch), and as a skeptic of witchcraft, Max asks his classmate, Allison (Vinessa Shaw), to show them the old Sanderson house on Halloween night.  While exploring the house, Max accidentally resurrects the three witches!  The kids have to find a way to stop the sisters, before they capture all the children of Salem!

REVIEW:
This film originally released to mediocre reviews and low box-office earnings, but subsequent replays during the Halloween season has slowly made it into a cult classic.  The screenplay was actually sold to Disney back in 1984 (and was a much darker tale), but they sat on it for 8 years before finally deciding to make a family-friendly film of it.

Still, there's something haunting for me about the mortality this film plays with.  Here are three witches who were attempting to brew a potion that would make them immortal.  Instead, they end up being captured and hung by an angry mob.  But they find a way to return to life for a single night, in which they need to recreate their immortality potion or else they'll turn to dust at dawn.  There's a scene later in the film where the witches believe they've failed and they accept that their one shot at life is over.  They cry and mope about their home, waiting for the end to come.  The hopelessness, even hammed up for comedic effect, still stung a bit for me.  I could feel their pain and anguish at losing.  They had only a few hours left to contemplate their own mortality before returning to oblivion, and I truly felt it.  I was kind of hoping they'd find a way to live on regardless, even though they were the villains.

On top of that, they "curse" a boy with immortality (ironic, I know), but he must live out eternity as a black cat.  I wondered why they didn't just use that curse on themselves instead of the complicated potion that requires child sacrifice, but I guess the curse came with shape-shifting, and they wanted to keep their human forms.

You can tell that the three actresses had fun in their witch roles.  Winifred (Bette Midler), Mary (Kathy Najimy), and Sarah (Sarah Jessica Parker) were the most energetic and entertaining parts of this film. Halfway in, I forgot I was supposed to be rooting for the kids; I was having so much fun watching the three Sanderson Sisters exploring the modern world that I kind of started rooting for them.  Until I remembered their plan was to consume the life force of all the children of Salem.  Oops.

The Sanderson Sisters, putting a spell on you!

My wife and I agreed that the scenes with Max and his little sister, Dani, were super cringey.  It was hard to watch them sometimes.  Mostly, it was Dani, who would run her mouth and say super embarrassing things to everyone.  But she's like 7 years old, so that's kind of expected.  Max's most cringe-worthy scene was actually near the beginning, when he talks shit about the Sanderson Sisters story in school, then when Allison corrects him, he walks up to her and gives her his phone number.  Right in the middle of class, in front of everyone.  Dude!  Not the time nor place.  She played it pretty chill though, taking his number, then later giving it back to him.

Kid sisters are super cringey and embarrassing. I know; I had one!

There was a little subplot with a couple bullies who harass Max and steal his shoes.  They made several appearances throughout the film, but I felt like their story never really went anywhere, except to exact some bully revenge near the end, when they're captured and caged by the Sanderson Sisters.

Some interesting related trivia: there was a sequel book written in 2018 that revealed that the two bullies straightened out their lives after running into the witches.  One became the principal of the local high school, while the other became a park ranger, hoping to rescue lost and trapped people, since he had experienced it first-hand as a teenager.  So they actually got a bit of a redemption arc, which is awesome!  That's a good story to tell!  I wish they had included something like that in the film.  But this was the early '90s, where the only story resolution that mattered was the main characters'.

Jay and Ernie, the two bullies, get a redemption arc in the book sequel!

Some more interesting trivia: Sarah Jessica Parker found out in the mid 2000s that her 10th great-grandmother, Esther Elwell, was accused of witchcraft in Salem, MA in the late 1600s.  Her case never went to court, and the accusation ended the Salem Witch Trials.  So she has some personal ties to the Salem Witch Trials, and is closer to being considered a real witch than any of the other actors.

Billy Butcherson (Doug Jones), is a zombie resurrected by Winifred to hunt down the main children. I never realized it until this viewing, but his back story is that he dated Winifred, until her sister, Sarah seduced him.  As punishment, Winifred poisoned him and sewed his mouth shut so he couldn't tell any secrets, even in death.  If you look closely, the stitching across his mouth is sewn in the shape of XIII, or the roman number 13.  You may not recognize his actor, Doug Jones, but he does a lot of famous creature work in films.  He also plays Abe Sapien in the Hellboy films, the amphibian man in The Shape of Water, and Fauno and the Pale Man in Pan's Labyrinth, to name a few.

Billy Butcherson, freshly resurrected

There was also the curious case of Thackery Binx (Sean Murray/Jason Marsden).  He was a boy from 1693 who was cursed by the witches to live immortal as a black cat, and he helps the children fight back against the witches.  They had an actor, Sean Murray, play his human role.  But they cast Jason Marsden to do all the voice work, both for his human and cat forms.  I guess they wanted a more accurate voice for the time period Binx comes from, but had a different face in mind for the actual actor.

The cat's head while he's talking was all CGI, and for 1993, it was excellent work!  I read that it was even more realistic originally, but the studio decided it was too real and might scare children, so they had to soften up his features and make the cat's fangs smaller and more rounded.  I would've loved to see their original CGI effects.

Amazing CGI for the early '90s!

This film also had some excellent original music, including the fun I Put a Spell On You and the haunting lullaby Come Little Children.  It's rare that a film will have a song so good that I add it to a playlist, but this film has two!  You should search them out on YouTube for a listen.

Maybe my only true negative critique of this film (besides the cringey interactions of the main children) is that the kids spend an inordinate amount of time running around town, trying to convince adults that the Sanderson Sisters are back.  It's Halloween night, in a town that (in this movie universe) is famous for the urban legend of the Sanderson Sisters.  Did you really think anyone would believe you?  It just feels like wasted time that could've been spent coming up with a solution for the problem. But I guess they gotta pad that runtime somehow...

RECOMMENDATION:
This film is so much fun to watch! It could've just been a film about resurrected witches hunting kids, but they decided to add in several scenes with just the Sanderson Sisters discovering the modern world.  Learning about paved roads, grasping the concept of a city bus, figuring out electronic devices... they were truly out of place in the modern world and there were so many scenes of learning and discovery that really makes this film enjoyable to watch.  I would hope that you've seen this film by now, but if you haven't, it needs to be on your bucket list!

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to see Hocus Pocus 2 (2022), which just released a couple days ago.  Hopefully it lives up to the energy and spectacle of the first film.  Expect my review of it tomorrow!