The Devil's Workshop

Kevin Tenney is throwing a party with Night of the Demons (1988), but Nik and Katy are crashing it!   Listen as Katy tries to add some depth to the delightful but underwritten Angela, while Nik tries to make the movie's stock 1980s comedy characters fit more neatly into the incongruent horror setting of this particular Evil Dead clone.  Workshop begins at 11:16.  Revisions begin at 44:12.  E-mail...

Get on those diving suits, folks, because today we're mining for content in George P. Costmatos' Leviathan (1989).   Come for our critique of a movie that implodes under the pressure of its third act, and stay as we try to breathe a little fresh air into a film that can't decide if its a jaunty adventure, tense thriller, grotesque body horror or creature feature! Workshop begins at 7:26.  Revision...

Is anyone else hungry? Because we just watched The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) , and boy, did that meat look good.   Is the (Leather)face that launched a thousand remakes all its cracked up to be? Will the grit and the grime of the all-timer original survive and what will be left of it amidst the early 2000s slasher polish? Workshop begins at 9:14.  Revisions begin at 1:02:01.  . E-mail us at t...

Throw on your straitjacket and poke a hole in that frontal lobe, because we're entering the mad, mad, mad, mad world of Jack Sholder's Alone in the Dark (1982) ! Listen as Katy attempts to make the movie's final siege worth the wait, while Nik cranks the social commentary about a world gone insane up from a whisper to a scream.  Workshop begins at 10:12.  Revisions begin at 49:21. . E-mail us at t...

Have you ever wondered how much cooler The Silence of the Lambs would be if it were shot like a music video? Then boy do we have a movie for you: Tarsem Singh's The Cell (2000) ! Come for the thoughtful discussion of the tactile delights of physical movie sets, then stay for Nik's utter contempt for the theories of Sigmund Freud!   Workshop begins at 10:02.  Revisions begin at 48:30. . E-mail us a...

Evil has never looked more banal than it does in Roman Polanski's The Ninth Gate (1999)... but in a good way! Listen as Katy goes toe-to-toe with her archnemesis, the ending of the movie, then revel as Nik tightens the thumbscrews on that most slippery of snakes: character development.  Workshop begins at 13:48.  Revisions begin at 1:08:04. . E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com.  Find us o...

This episode, we're just a couple of babes in toyland as we cavort with David Schmoeller's Puppet Master (1989) . Cackle with glee as Nik cranks the gore up to 11, and then goggle with delight as Katy gives this movie more of what it really needs: PUPPETS.  Workshop begins at 9:42.  Revisions begin at 55:51. . E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www.instagr...

We're headed into the underworld--that is, the world down under--as we tackle Zak Hilditch's Tasmania-bound zombie-drama, We Bury the Dead (2026) ! In a wild Uno Reverse that no one saw coming, Nik reaches for a classical mythological reference while Katy stays almost suspiciously on task (???). Workshop begins at 8:52.  Revisions begin at 50:35. . E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Fi...

Put on your straw hats and overalls and throw away that toothbrush, folks, because we're headed to the West Virginia mountains for Rob Schmidt's Wrong Turn (2003) . Listen as Katy tries to flesh out the thin as a whisper conceit behind this movie, while Nik takes a movie that is completely contemptuous of southern and rural people and makes it even more exploitative! Workshop begins at 10:47.  Rev...

We're hitting the grimy streets of late-80s New York City to investigate a very upset public servant in William Lustig's  Maniac Cop (1988) . Listen as both Nik and Katy play the role of good cop for a movie that misses the mark - but only just barely - as we attempt to revise the movie from a flawed gem to a would-be slasher masterpiece.  Workshop begins at 9:37.  Revisions begin at 1:02:37. E-ma...

This episode we crash land in flyover country to ask the question, "What if Superman sucked?" with David Yarovesky's  Brightburn (2019) ! Listen to Nik and Katy grab our utility belts and don our super suits to fight the real villain of this story - the screenplay.  Workshop begins at 7:17.  Revisions begin at 42:13.  E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www...

If you thought The Wolfman wasn't self-serious and vapid enough, then boy do we have the movie for you! It's From Hell (2001) ! Listen as Katy physically restrains herself from bringing up the (much better) Alan Moore comic from which the movie is adapted, then "Awww

We see and hear a lot of evil on this podcast, but we'll speak no evil about the brilliant and underappreciated Monkey Shines (1988)! Cheer as Nik cuts this badboy down to a tight 90, then put that cheer in reverse as Katy makes this movie the psychosexual nightmare it longs to be. Which approach will come out on top? Only you can decide. Workshop begins at 20:33.  Revisions begin at 1:08:04.  E-m...

A friend of a friend of my cousin's babysitter told me that this episode, we're covering Urban Legend (1998). Listen as we chant the name "Wes Craven" into a mirror three times, hoping a better movie will appear!  Workshop begins a t 10:50.  Revisions begin at 1:19:53.  E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ thedevilsworkshoppod/ And Bluesky...

This episode we don our top hats and straitjackets as we're involuntarily committed to Joe Johnston's troubled remake,  The Wolfman (2010). Werewolves are such rich fodder for metaphor and the filmmakers made perhaps the bravest choice which was to make no choice at all. Listen to us try to pack some meaning into this violent transformation.  Workshop begins at 12:46.  Revisions begin at 1:11:06. ...

It's back to 1941 as we climb the Carpathian mountains for Michael Mann's would-be masterpiece, The Keep (1983). Come to hear Nik read history's longest tagline - stay to hear Katy try to fix World War II.  Workshop begins at 13:02.  Revisions begin at 1:18:47.  E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ thedevilsworkshoppod/ And Bluesky! https:...

We're headed back to Nik's awkward high school years for Geoffrey Wright's Cherry Falls (2000)! Listen as we do everything we can to make sure this episode - nay, this entire podcast - is never monetizable!  Workshop begins at 9:00.  Revisions begin at 1:27:37.  E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ thedevilsworkshoppod/ And Bluesky! https:...

We have orders to head to an Alabama military base to witness the high speed collapse of the blended family in Abel Ferrara's Body Snatchers (1993) .  Listen as we spend an hour gushing over what is undoubtedly the best movie we've so far featured on this podcast - a refreshing change from the abject stupidity of A Cure for Wellness - then enjoy our feckless struggle over how best to gild this par...

We're checking ourselves into the Swiss Alps for a dose of Gore Verbinski's visual feast,  A Cure for Wellness (2016) - an appopriately timed subject not because Verbinski's next movie is out in theaters right now (Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die) but because Nik has a sinus infection while recording it. Listen to him get worse throughout the episode and laugh at his pain!  Workshop begins at 11:38...

We're heading back to the 80s to survive the apocalypse with Regina and Samantha Belmont in the dusty, red-tinted world of  Night of the Comet (1984) .  Listen to us agree that there are tonal problems, and then pick a side as to whether the movie needs to stay heightened and ridiculous or become more somber. Choose carefully, because which side you take determines who gets custody of you in the d...

We're doing a postmortem on Johannes Roberts' Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City (2021) . As fans of the Capcom source material, we appreciate the 90s setting and the 1:1 recreation of the R.P.D., but as writers, we have to ask: can you really cram two legendary games into one 107-minute script without catching a case of narrative whiplash? Workshop begins at 12:27.  Revisions begin at 1:14:02...

It's Hannibal (2001)! Workshop begins at 25:52.  Revisions begin at 1:52:07.  E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ thedevilsworkshoppod/ And Bluesky! https://bsky.app/profile/ thedevilsworkshop.bsky.social Theme music by Nihilore.  Dark Horror Opener by Arctsound --  https://pixabay.com/music/suspense-dark-horror-opener-242644/   Ethereal...

It's The Frighteners (1996)! Workshop begins at 12:07.  Revisions begin at 1:08:05.  E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ thedevilsworkshoppod/ And Bluesky! https://bsky.app/profile/ thedevilsworkshop.bsky.social Theme music by Nihilore.  Dark Horror Opener by Arctsound --  https://pixabay.com/music/suspense-dark-horror-opener-242644/   Et...

It's Ghost Story (1981)! Workshop begins at 7:58. Revisions begin at 1:33:23.  E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ thedevilsworkshoppod/ And Bluesky! https://bsky.app/profile/ thedevilsworkshop.bsky.social Theme music by Nihilore.  Dark Horror Opener by Arctsound --  https://pixabay.com/music/suspense-dark-horror-opener-242644/   Ethereal...

It's Vampires (1998)! Workshop begins at 10:31.  Revisions begin at 1:16:05.  E-mail us at thedevilsworkshoppod@gmail.com .  Find us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ thedevilsworkshoppod/ And Bluesky! https://bsky.app/profile/ thedevilsworkshop.bsky.social Theme music by Nihilore.  Dark Horror Opener by Arctsound --  https://pixabay.com/music/suspense-dark-horror-opener-242644/   Ethereal...