Saturday Night Freak Show

Sean breeds an attack cat to take on the soul sucking menace of  Stephen King's Sleepwalkers  (1992). When his owner is killed by a duo of ancient, incestuous, shape-shifting creatures (Brian Krause and Alice Krige), Clovis (Sparks) rises to become the hero he was always meant to be and must save the Sleepwalker's virginal target (Mädchen Amick) from their clutches, while rally...

Colin hopes to survive the melting Hell on Earth of  The Devil's Rain  (1975). William Shatner's family guards a Satanic book from the clutches of evil goat-headed cult leader, Ernest Borgnine, who needs it to enslave all mankind. They do battle in an abandoned Western mining town while Tom Skerritt and his wife hope to save the day from Satan's followers. Listen as we talk about the inv...

Michaela has a bone to pick with the black sheep of the Scream movies,  Scream 4  (2011). Wes Craven's final film reunites the surviving cast of the hit, self-aware series of horror films with a fresh cast of up and comers, while writer Kevin Williamson throws shade at millennials and the conventions of horror movie remakes and reboots. Listen as we talk about horror movie home design, d...

Holly develops a taste for raw meat and a hunger for world domination after being possessed by the aliens of  Slither  (2006), James Gunn's affectionate homage to 80's sci-fi/horror films. When Grant Grant (Michael Rooker) is taken over by a malevolent extraterrestrial intelligence, it's up to the small town sheriff (Nathan Fillion) to save his dream girl (Elizabeth Banks) and the townsp...

Sean tells us a story that happened to someone who knows someone he knows, and an  Urban Legend  (1998) is born. Someone in a winter coat is murdering students at snooty Pendleton University, using the hook of urban legends as his deadly punchline. The late 90's cast of the CW Network has to team up with the Noxema girl to sleuth out the killer's identity before they become his next vict...

Colin cranks the fog machine and creeps around the haunted world of Mario Bava's  Black Sabbath  (aka I Tre Volti Della Paura - "The Three Faces of Fear," 1963), an anthology horror movie hosted by and starring Boris Karloff. In "The Telephone," a beautiful woman is terrorized by threatening phone calls; in "The Wurdulak," a mountain family worries that their elder has returned home as a...

Michaela joins a circle of teenage witches who practice  The Craft  (1996) and makes poor Fairuza Balk lose her mind! Balk plays a sullen, Goth misfit who lures Sarah, the new girl in school, into her coven of witches (alongside Neve Campbell and Rachel True) in hopes of getting revenge on their high school tormentors, but things turn deadly and escalate into a full blown Satanic freak o...

Holly hopes to survive an apocalypse of running zombies as she outmaneuvers Zack Snyder's  Dawn of the Dead  (2004), a remake of George Romero's classic. As before, a disparate group of strangers must band together within an abandoned shopping mall as hordes of the living dead gather outside. Listen as we contribute to the slow zombie vs fast zombie debate, compare and contrast the...

Sean cozies up to the seductive vampire fantasy that is  Fright Night Part 2  (1988), which finds Charley Brewster and the Fearless Vampire Killer, Peter Vincent, re-teaming when the sister of the original film's vampire descends on Los Angeles with revenge on her mind. Listen as we try to uncover how this sequel ended up in movie limbo; discuss the high fashion of vampire chic; and...

Colin uses benign pharmacology and energy sculpting to trip out  Beyond the Black Rainbow  (2011), director Panos Cosmatos' nod to science-fiction and horror films of the 1980's. A mad doctor keeps a young woman with telekinetic powers trapped in an underground clinic, where 60's-era psychedelic experiments have produced inhuman results. Listen as we discuss the merit of pop culture...

Michaela wants to go serial killer-hunting with American Psycho 2 (2002), an in-name only cash grab sequel to the Christian Bale-starrer. This time, That 70's Show 's Mila Kunis plays a college student who killed Patrick Bateman as a child and becomes obsessed with hunting other serial killers, so much so that she's willing to kill her rivals for a teaching-assistant post that guarantees a spot at...

Sean takes us on a Freak Show Field Trip to the sewers of Derry, Maine to scrutinize not one but two screen adaptations of Stephen King's IT - both the 2017 theatrical feature and the television mini-series from 1990. Listen to our IT overindulgence as we compare and contrast the novel, the mini-series, the screenplay for the aborted Cary Fukunaga-directed version, and the final Andy Muschietti-he...

Holly doesn't want to be buried in a  Pet Sematary  (1989), especially not one that once belonged to Micmac Indians and has the power to bring the dead back to life! Louis Creed and his family soon find out that "sometimes, dead is better" after moving into an adjacent home and taking advantage of its evil magic, once tragedy strikes. Listen as we discuss zombie kittens, Zelda, ghostly h...

Colin prays for daylight after hanging with the grimy vampires of Kathryn Bigelow's  Near Dark  (1987), which follows a farmhand named Caleb (Adrian Pasdar) who is seduced by a sexy Southern belle (Jenny Wright) into joining a group of fangless, hillbilly vampires who prowl the American Southwest. Listen as we spend way too much time talking about the  Twilight  movies, contras...

Michaela kits up, heads into the brush, and howls at the moon with  Dog Soldiers  (2002), which sees a squad of British squaddies (that's soldiers to you) who, during training exercises in the wilderness of the Scottish highlands, come under siege from a pack of werewolves. Listen as we discuss the career of director Neil ( Game of Thrones ) Marshall, learn new English slang, rate t...

Holly is bitten by a Sumatran Rat-Monkey and finds herself  Dead Alive  (aka Braindead, 1992)! After his overprotective mother is bitten by the aforementioned rat-monkey, her grown son, Lionel, finds himself over his head in a pile of zombies, romance, zombie babies, and anthropomorphic entrails in what has been called "the goriest movie ever made".  Lord of the Rings  dir...

Sean refuses his right to remain silent after choosing to watch  Maniac Cop  (1988)! As brutal murders shake New York City, a jaded detective (Tom Atkins) begins to suspect a uniformed cop is the suspect, while another officer (Bruce Campbell) unwittingly finds himself the number one suspect. Can these two team up to stop the Maniac Cop?? Listen as we marvel at the historic team-up of tw...

Colin squirts 3-D hallucinogenic acid in the eyes of his Freak Show family with Charles Band's  Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn  (1983)! On a remote planet, a ranger named Dogen (Jeffrey Byron) teams up with a plucky blonde (Kelly Preston) and a washed up soldier (Tim Thomerson) to hunt down an evil magician (Mike Preston) who is leading the indigenous cyclops population (lead b...

Michaela goes for a ride along with the cure for crime himself:  Cobra  (1986)! When the mysterious Night Slasher begins terrorizing Los Angeles, the only man who can get things done is an officer from the L.A.P.D.'s "Zombie Squad", Marion "Cobra" Cobretti (Sylvester Stallone). Here, he's charged with protecting the only witness (Stallone's wife-at-the-time, Danish model Brigitte Nielsen...

Holly turns to the life aquatic with this week's pick of  Waterworld  (1995), the notoriously expensive Kevin Costner spectacle. Here, he plays a half-man/half-fish mutant loner who lives on a flooded, futuristic Earth, pursued by evil Smokers (literally - they smoke at least a pack and a half a day) while ferrying his charges - a woman and the mysterious child she cares for - in search...

Sean says it's open season on Predator 2 (1990) as Danny Glover subs for Arnold Schwarzenegger, fighting a technologically advanced killer from another world through the concrete jungle of L.A. This time, the cops - already fighting Mexican and Jamaican gangs - find themselves being chased by an alien trophy hunter who's in town with a few days to kill. Listen as we imagine the pre-safari Predator...

Colin wishes he was as cool as  The Lost Boys  (1987), a vampire classic that finds brothers Sam and Michael relocating to the beachfront community of Santa Carla with their mother, only to discover that its the hunting ground for a pack of ultra-chic teenage vampires; only with the help of the vampire-hunting Frog Brothers does humanity stand a chance. Listen as we celebrate the film's...

Michaela hopes many kicks to the head will cure her hunger for  Bloodsport  (1988), the movie that unleashed Jean-Claude Van Damme upon the world. Here, JCVD portrays a martial artist who sneaks into a forbidden, underground tournament known as the Kumite to compete to become the World Heavy Weight Full Contact Kumite Champion! There, he must fight the formidable Bolo ( Enter the Dragon...

Holly hopes exposure to spider-men will help cure her  Arachnophobia  (1990). When the residents of a friendly small town start dropping dead, the newly arrived doctor with an acute fear of spiders (Jeff Daniels) suspects the worst - that they are victims of a never-before-seen, super-poisonous species of arachnid. Listen as we discuss childhood enthusiasm for entomology, the importance...

Colin unwraps 85 years of Universal horror with  The Mummy  (1932). Members of an expedition to Egypt accidentally bring to life a 3,700-year-old priest named Imhotep (Boris Karloff), who immediately sets to work on resurrecting his forbidden love. We'll have you shouting "Show me the mummy!" as we guide you through Universal Studios' Dark Universe (old and new) and address at least a do...