Video Monsters

First up in our mAy24 series is a delightful buddy (body?) comedy about love, life, friendship, acceptance, passion, creativity, overcoming self-doubt, and trying to find some measure of happiness in a world that so often leaves us feeling like we’re at the end of our rope. Oh, and farts. It’s also about farts. The Video Monsters are thrilled to kick off mAy24 with a film by Daniels… SWISS ARMY MA...

A new month brings a new theme, and a new theme brings a new POPCORN PUNCHOUT, where we Video Monsters use our patented Video Rack Attack Bracket technology to decide which three films we will be reviewing this month. The theme for May is based around every film nerd’s favorite distribution (and occasional production) company, A24! And because we are bound by the Video Monster bylaws to capitalize...

We interrupt your regularly scheduled movie reviews for another special presentation of CARDBOARD MONSTERS, our occasional series where we review board games from a movie-lover’s perspective! It seems we didn’t quite quell April’s All-Out Alien Attack because today we’ll be discussing Ravensburger’s ALIEN: FATE OF THE NOSTROMO, a cooperative strategy game that is, of course, based on one of the mo...

April’s All-Out Alien Attack comes to a close with the biggest, boldest alien invasion yet! Epic space battles! Gigantic special effects set pieces! Mass abductions across the globe! Freaky alien tech! Horrifying human experiments! And a triumphant win for humanity in the end! Nah, just kidding. We’re actually discussing Jonathan Glazer’s UNDER THE SKIN (2013), which is an altogether different kin...

April’s All-Out Alien Attack continues with the dark horse contender that triumphantly won the chaos bracket in this month’s Popcorn Punchout. It’s finally time to talk about ZATHURA: A SPACE ADVENTURE (2005)! But is it really an alien movie, though? Is it more than just JUMANJI in Space? Could it actually be *gasp* better than JUMANJI?! Would the MCU exist if Jon Favreau didn’t direct this film?...

What do you get when TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE director, Tobe Hooper, joins forces with ALIEN screenwriter, Dan O’Bannon to remake a classic 50s sci-fi horror film? Why, you get a kids wish-fulfillment adventure fantasy about a 12-year-old boy saving the world from intergalactic intruders, of course! But how does it compare to other 80s remakes of 50s science fiction films? Does this film hold up i...

There are two things that we love above all else here on Video Monsters: aliens and alliteration. So it should come as no surprise that our theme for this month is April’s All-Out Alien Attack!!! And, much like we did last month, we’re going to use our game-ified version of the standard competitive bracket system to decide on which three alien films we’ll be reviewing throughout the month, a proce...

Grab your French horn, step away from the wires, and meet us in the barn as we search for meaning with RIDERS OF JUSTICE!! If you enjoy this episode, come join the Video Monsters crew on Discord!! Hangout episodes are live (and unedited!) every Tuesday night starting around 9:00pm EST. Listen and chat along with us in the Discord chat and we’ll even give you a shoutout on the episode! Video Monste...

Put on your dancing shoes, pour yourself a sazerac, and don't forget your life jacket...it's time for us to have ANOTHER ROUND!! If you enjoy this episode, come join the Video Monsters crew on Discord!! Hangout episodes are live (and unedited!) every Tuesday night starting around 9:00pm EST. Listen and chat along with us in the Discord chat and we’ll even give you a shoutout on the episode! Video...

Grab your art supplies, lace up your shoes, watch out for past mistakes, and join us as we chase our soul butterfly through THE DOOR!! If you enjoy this episode, come join the Video Monsters crew on Discord!! Hangout episodes are live (and unedited!) every Tuesday night starting around 9:00pm EST. Listen and chat along with us in the Discord chat and we’ll even give you a shoutout on the episode!...

This month the Video Monsters are celebrating the storied acting career of Danish heartthrob, Mads Mikkelsen. Why are we mad for Mads? Well, for starters, he’s one of the most striking, versatile actors of his generation; the rare international star who has managed to crossover into flashy Hollywood supporting roles; while maintaining an acclaimed, eclectic career in European cinema; AND also star...

SOMETHING IN THE DIRT, the latest mindbender from directors Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, premiered at Sundance all the way back at the end of January. So, naturally, we’re finally posting our review mid-March! (We’re very busy and important people, OK?) The film is ostensibly about two neighbors who experience a supernatural phenomenon in one of their apartments shortly after they meet for th...

We’re thrilled to have Wolfe MacReady return to the Video Monsters podcast for the final episode of Final February! Our Final Girl Finale, if you will. The topic of today’s episode is “What happens next?” We’ll be taking a look at the current trend of how slasher legacyquels bring back their final girls years later to see how they have coped with their trauma in the time since we last saw them (an...

The Video Monsters are once again joined by John Adams and Toby Poser (The Deeper You Dig, Hellbender) as we continue Final February with our discussion of non-traditional final girls.  So buckle your seatbelt, grab your ballet shoes, and get the coven together for tonight's episode as we discuss some of our favorite final girls that hail from horror outside of the slasher sub-genre! Stay up to da...

If you are a fan of the horror genre, the term “Final Girl” is likely to conjure up a very specific image in your mind. Maybe you think of a character that embodies this archetype. You may see her running through the woods screaming for help; held captive by a homicidal maniac; or quietly cowering in a closet desperately hoping she has evaded her attacker. And of course, there’s a good chance you...

It’s Final February on Video Monsters! We’re piggy-backing off of last month’s SCREAM series by expanding into a series of broader discussions on Final Girl tropes in slasher films. First up is a very special presentation of CARDBOARD MONSTERS, our occasional series where we review board games from a movie-lover’s perspective. This time Nathan and Eric discuss the single-player slasher strategy ga...

We’re sticking a knife in our SCREAM series (for now) and ending on a high note with the first franchise legacyquel (or, if you're Nathan, legasequel), SCRE4M (2011)! The fourth film brought back creator Kevin Williamson as screenwriter and feels like a redemption of sorts after the disappointing end to the original trilogy. It’s also, sadly, Wes Craven’s final film. But, the three of us at Video...

Scooby-Doo shenanigans meets systemic sex abuse in the unfortunate final chapter of the original Scream trilogy: SCREAM CREE…. *Ahem*.... Excuse me. I mean, SCREAM 3 (2000)! The final part of the original SCREAM trilogy was seen as something of a disappointment upon its initial release at the dawn of the new millennium. Fast forward to 2022 and it seems the film has enjoyed a bit of a critical re-...

SCREAM 2 (1997) hit theaters just under a year after the first film and is often regarded as one of the best slasher sequels of all time, and 2 out of 3 Video Monsters agree…. that maybe the film isn’t as strong as its reputation suggests, leaving Eric to fight a losing battle for the soul of SCREAM 2. Along the way we’ll discuss how the film doubles down on the meta elements of the first film, th...

Ah, 2022. We began this year so full of hope and ambition but, of course, it was folly to assume things would work out the way we hoped. The plan was to SCREAM IN THE NEW YEAR and cover the entire SCREAM franchise over the course of the month. Instead we spent most of January SCREAM…ing in frustration due to all the setbacks that delayed the release of these episodes. So instead we’ll be SCREAMING...

It’s become something of an annual tradition now for the Video Monsters to try something really ambitious for our Christmas coverage and put so much extra work on ourselves that we end up releasing our Christmas episodes at some point in the new year, well after Santa Claus has come and gone. That tradition continues this year with our MERRY GEN-XMAS: HISTORY OF CINEMA CHRISTMAS SPECTADEQUATE - 90...

It’s become something of an annual tradition now for the Video Monsters to try something really ambitious for our Christmas coverage and put so much extra work on ourselves that we end up releasing our Christmas episodes at some point in the new year, well after Santa Claus has come and gone. That tradition continues this year with our MERRY GEN-XMAS: HISTORY OF CINEMA CHRISTMAS SPECTADEQUATE - 90...

It’s become something of an annual tradition now for the Video Monsters to try something really ambitious for our Christmas coverage and put so much extra work on ourselves that we end up releasing our Christmas episodes at some point in the new year, well after Santa Claus has come and gone. That tradition continues this year with our MERRY GEN-XMAS: HISTORY OF CINEMA CHRISTMAS SPECTADEQUATE - 90...

Nathan, Dan, and Eric are thrilled to be joined by filmmakers John Adams, Toby Poser, and Zelda Adams to discuss their latest film, HELLBENDER (2021)! Known professionally as the Adams family, John and Toby are the parents of Zelda and together the trio have crafted some of the most exciting, creative, and technically accomplished independent films of the past few years. An especially impressive f...

Now that the table has been cleared from HANKSgiving but before we dive into the rest of our holiday fare, we are taking a break from festivities to highlight one of our favorite movies of 2021! Winner of the Knoxville Horror Film Festival’s “Palme D’Gore” (as well as Best Direction, Screenplay, and the Audience Award), HELLBENDER is the story of a mother and daughter living in seclusion in the Ca...