Monster Bites - Make Me Atomic

GODZILLA (1984)

Also known as The Return of Godzilla to avoid confusing it with the 1954 original, the first reboot of the series ignores all those madcap adventures involving Rodan and Jet Jaguar opting instead to be a direct sequel. Which means they skip over big guy becoming a protector of the planet Earth, and choose to revert him back into a purely malevolent force of nature. This parred back approach might not seem like the best idea after all those stories aimed at pleasing family audiences. However this is certainly the strongest entry in the series since the '60s and is at least on par with Mothra vs Godzilla or Ghidorah the Three-Headed Monster. With the original cut available on home video we can at least discuss the intended version and forever avoid any sign of Raymond Burr and the Pepsi logo.

Monster Bites - Mysterious Islands

DOUG MCCLURE'S LOST WORDS (1975-1979)

Time for a small series review albeit a rather loosely connected one, as these are linked by the star Doug McClure and the director Kevin Connor rather than any actual narrative threads. Yes that's right, you might remember him from such films as The Land that Time Forgot, At the Earth's Core, and Warlords of Atlantis. What titles, and what poster art! But do these films really hold up, and do the events on the posters even appear in the films? Luckily for us they're available together as a boxed set so we can easily find out. Let's dive right into a series of stories obsessed with lost civilisations, secret islands and muppets posing as dinosaurs.

Horror Bites - Thrill Me

NIGHT OF THE CREEPS (1986)

Nothing quite says the '80s like a mashup of weird ideas, horror, comedy and science fiction. The neon opening credits accompanied by a score from Barry De Vorzon certainly helps things along. Like Monster Squad this is another iteration of director Fred Dekker's idea to bring a whole bunch of influences into one film, in this case b-movie clichés. So this is zombie story that also includes a prologue involving both a space ship sequence and a serial killer, before it moves into college pranks and then the parasitic creatures right out of Shivers. Throw in a grizzled detective and a bunch of great practical effects and hey a good time starts to form. With so much going on not everything works, but as I'll discuss here it doesn't always matter.

Review Roundup - Cat Power

BLACK PANTHER (2018)

With the Marvel hero roster slowly building up to a bursting point it's always a little concerning when they reel things back in to tell yet another origin story. It feels like a sidewards step and raises questions when certain characters are absent later on. However the introduction of regal warrior T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman) was certainly a highlight during the earlier Captain America adventure, and my similar concerns with Spider-Man: Homecoming proved to be unwarranted. Would my scepticism be warranted here or is this another hit? If anything this avoids being a mid-tier by the numbers spectacle like Ant-Man, but as a film it's aims are more complex and requires further examination.

Monster Bites - Growing on You

MATANGO (1963)

Like a lot of oldschool Toho movies there's something that gets lost when they're given another title. Names like Fungus of Terror and... Attack of the Mushroom People. Oh brother. In most cases of course these would probably be quite apt, but here it's not quite a good fit for the material at hand. Ishirō Honda had just finished Godzilla vs. King Kong marking the big fella's first foray into full colour. However this is a drastic change of pace in terms of the tone and the overall style. At its core this is still island mystery b-movie and a film about people eating mushrooms that have some very bad side effects. But it's certainly not another light hearted monster romp.