With much groaning and bile being spewed over the Hayden Christensen starring action flick Jumper, it was a film that was under my radar. With as much hate as the film garnered and not having much interest in the continuing work of “Mannikin Skywalker”, there was just never any strong urge. I’m generally down with most Samuel Jackson fare but still, not enough to invite myself for pain in suffering. When recently I found myself on the road with little to do and free HBO at my disposal, I figured it was time to take in this little super hero take and found myself mostly frustrated; yet I still found a few things to like.

The basic setup of “Jumper” works. There are definite efforts made to carve off the chaff that typically weighs down films such as these. In some ways it made the film feel rather quick and snappy as far as action films go, jumping straight in to the excitement and wasting no time for heavy character development. We were already privy to the basic plot of the film from the trailers and the film makers take good advantage. At first this process is slightly confusing. We don’t know anything at all about David Rice except for the fact that he can jump around and that Roland the Paladin doesn’t like it. They do a good job mixing in the character backgrounds as the first act progresses and soon you have just enough to make sense. This concept gets pushed beyond effective though as we’re given tiny side plots and characters that fit in well at first, however when we reach the end of the film we realize that they never tied off these side plots. This leaves “Jumper” a confusing story of super hero’s and their evil counterparts.

Sadly, this confusing leaves a bad after taste in the mouth for the viewer and makes the universal panning that “Jumper” received valid. The basic plot points are engrossing and some of the fights and effects are pretty decent yet they pass by too quickly with no chance at depth. There is an entire back story to be expanded on here in further films, but most likely we will never see this exposition on the plot. What exactly are these paladins hunting down the jumpers? What ever happened to the other Jumper, Griffin?

All of these plot holes and unfinished side arch’s could be forgivable if it wasn’t for the complete and utter lackluster quality to the active of all involved. Christensen is wooden at best and fails completely at drawing you in and making you feel sympathetic. When you’ve eschewed plot depth, you must rely on your actors and it simply isn’t here. I found myself more concerned over the out come of the twitchy Jumper sidekick Griffin, played by Jamie Bell. This character was quirky and had edges which Bell used to his advantage. Beyond these two, they’ve packed in some decent named co-stars to bank on but fell short. With the likes of Samuel L Jackson, Michael Rooker and Diane Lane, you’d expect a bit more fireworks on screen. Instead there is a definite feel of actors earning a paycheck and phoning in their performance. No love for the script, no emotion that we’re accustomed to seeing from them, nothing more that working to pay the bills. Again, when you have not plot depth to rely on, you come to place your bets with these folks and they fail to provide the extra support needed.

“Jumper” has sadly lived up to its reputation as a stinker of a movie. The ideas of providing a more stream lined super hero tale with out spandex suits or matching level outfits was a good one, it just fell short in execution. With actors that cared, or could act with emotion, the film could have been a pretty decent way to use up two hours. Instead, we’re left with frustration, confusion and boredom, none of which are signs of a time well spent.

Dynamite Comics has had a successful run at extending the “Armys of Darkness” universe in ink. With an earlier mini series throwing together everybody’s favorite movie monsters battle royale, “Freddy Vs. Jason Vs. Ash”, they’re now set to dive into this slobberknocker once again!

Due out soon is “Freddy Vs. Jason Vs. Ash - The Nightmare Warriors” written by Jeff Katz and James Kuhoric and drawn by Jason Craig.

For those of you like me who missed the first mini, things can be a bit confusing diving into this book at first, but they do a good job of tying the two stories together and setting the stage. We find an Ashley Williams who has retired from monster slaying, content to live at home and throw parties with his bikini clad girlfriend. We gather hints that the Necronomicon was the tie that binds all of the monster world together, government black-ops departments in search of it for weapons testing and a few other small details to help flesh out this well worn universe and make it a little bit of their own.

As a whole, the story seems a bit light and fluff, but when working with a mini series, there’s not that much room to flesh out the heavy details. Here, I found myself drawn in and enjoying the familiar faces with new twists and looking forward to more. There is some decent carnage in issue #1 though it is quick and easy, but its the little touches that make it feel like being back at home at Camp Crystal Lake that make it feel okay. The artwork is enjoyable here as well with Craig doing a good job of conveying these characters that we know every nook and cranny of and bringing them back to life with pretty decent accuracy.

“Freddy Vs. Jason Vs. Ash - The Nightmare Warriors” isn’t going to blow your socks off, especially for new readers that aren’t familiar with where they’ve been before. For longtime fans of the characters however, the story is fun and put together well enough to feel comfortable and familiar and most importantly, enjoyable. Just remember it’s not canon and you fans should be all right.

“Freddy Vs. Jason Vs. Ash” #1 should be available now at your local comic shop running at $3.99.

Zuda Comics, an online home for aspiring comic book creators has run a regular contest for people to vote on submitted comics, the ultimate goal being a chance to win a published comic. A grand idea and a good fit for those of us out there that dream of being comic book creators. A branch of the comic stalwart DC Comics, the ultimate prize is having your comic digested and published by the big house themselves. Such is the case of Bayou which landed on my desk this week.

Written by Jeremy Love and drawn Patrick Morgan, the cover sets the tone for the story. A tale told in the days of the late 1800’s in the times of plantations, slave relations and the like, the book have so many facets that they cover in the pages, it’s simply amazing. Unfolding like a classic fairy tale touched with bits of “The Wizard of Oz”, “Brer Rabbit”, and other such bits of entertainment history, it manages to be pretty enthralling throughout. To add to the fantasy nature of it, they play up the horror side just a bit more than others giving the book a great spooky tinge.

“South of the Mason-Dixon lurks a strange world of gods and monsters born of years of slavery, civil war, innocent blood, hate and strife. The daughter of a poor black sharecropper, Lee Wagstaff, joins a blues-singing swamp monster name Bayou on a southern odyssey through a mythic combination of depression era Mississippi, African mythology and American folklore in order to rescue her childhood friend and save her father’s life.”

While the horror is lighter than most would consider for a ‘horror comic’, it is still there in a few different forms. There is the horror of black vs. white relations during the time such as the horror of small minded individuals whose first reaction to any problem is a lynching. There is a great creepy vibe as we begin to venture ‘through the bayou’ to the fantasy world that lies alongside the town of Charon filled with large swamp trolls, talking blood hounds, a boss man that runs the swamp with an iron fist, and the return of dead individuals in main character Lee’s life.

I love comics, I love to read. I do both quite a bit. It’s been awhile though since a 160 page book has captured me so hard that I’ve sat down to finish it in one reading. The book feels pretty magical over all and I simply can’t wait for the next volume.

“Bayou Volume 1″ is available from Zuda Comics or wherever comics are sold. It contains the first four chapters of the online comic. For more info, be sure to check out the book’s page at Zuda where it appears there is even more content available!

Coming in at the tail of 70s fashion and atmosphere, “The Last Horror Film” is quite quirky in its appearance. Disco clothes and decorations lay the wacky atmosphere on thick. While it definitely feels dated, there are many aspects to the story that help connect the movie with modern sensibilities of unprecedented celebrity access in the age of Internet journalism, which lets the movie still feel relevant despite its corniness. There are a few gruesome murders here, a touch of gore and heaps of post 70’s excess, but its not the type of horror film that sets out to disgust the viewer. The most disturbing aspect of the film comes from the extremely sweaty Vinny and the unhinged portrayal of a man obsessed.

For the full review, head over to Bloody Good Horror.com…

This week we finally get the chance to dig into Sam Raim’s “Drag Me To Hell”, and Mark kills the mood with the creepiest Google search ever. SPOILERS ABOUND here, so don’t listen unless you’ve seen the movie.

If you have seen the movie, “Drag Me To Hell” was pretty much universally loved by the BGH crew, so tune in and comment your thoughts!

The Bloody Good Horror Podcast has hit the mile marker of 76 Episodes! That’s a lot of episodes and with bandwidth charges being what they are, it’s nearly impossible for us to keep back epsiodes on line past about three months.

With many requests from you listeners, we’ve finally launched Bloody Good Horror Classic! Essentially, as the fancy strikes, we’ll be posting our most requested back episodes for download, with one request. We ask that if you want us to continue posting back episodes, that you either make a donation using the Paypal button below, or sign up for Netflix through us, which you can do without spending a dime! Consider it an investment in the future of the Bloody Good Horror Podcast. If you want to request a back episode, take a look through our archives and then tell us what you want using our contact form over at Bloody Good Horror. We love doing this podcast as much as you guys love listening, and a little love goes a long way to make sure that this stuff doesn’t sink into the abyss. Thank you for listening!

That said, the first episode of Bloody Good Horror Classic is Episode 23: Prom Night! By far our most requested back episode, we tackle the “Prom Night” remake and Eric and Schnaars get into it for the very first time, sparking their now infamous bromance.

Check it out, enjoy, and as always, thanks for listening!

A man; by himself, pitch black surroundings. He has no idea where he his, who he is, or how he got there. All that can be seen is a random strobing light. As he gropes around through the dark, he comes across the corpse of another man. More of a dried husk than a corpse really. He continues to pick his way through the rocky darkness in search of the source of the strobing light. Soon, he stumbles on the broken down remains of some kind of base or fortification in the depths of the cave. As he prods about, he activates a large wall sized view screen. Various voices in a multitude of languages assault him until he is able to focus in on the English speaking voice, which says to him; “Welcome to Eden Log”.

For the full review, head over to Bloody Good Horror.com!

Writing idols, heroes, visionaries, etc. Most writers have them, I’m no exception. For me, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson has stood at the top of my list of writers to idolize for years. I don’t fancy any notions that I do in fact write as good as he does; that’s a lofty goal to reach. Especially with him carving out his own genre, fans and place in literary history. Still, he always wrote with a mind towards stark naked truth and aimed to achieve that truth by experiencing it and never backed down from anyone who tried to keep him from reaching that goal. All traits to admire in a writer as far as I’m concerned.

With the event of the good doctors suicide in February of 2005, there were a number of documentaries that came out dedicated to the life of this man. I recently took in the film “Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride” and was taken down a nice, if light on detail, little trip of the writer, both as the character of Dr. Gonzo that he created about himself and as Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, the man behind the curtain.

For detail oriented historians, “Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride” will not necessarily meet your needs. While it does touch on all the important points of Thompsons career, they focus more on the friends and people he surrounded himself with and their memories. We are treated to visits from such Hollywood stars as Johnny Depp, John Cusack, Benecio Del Toro, Bill Murray and others and their times with the writer. There are other notables that make appearances as well such as Gary Busey who doesn’t really seem to add anything worthwhile to the conversation, but it is worth a laugh. All of these moments however serve to show us how deep the well ran with Thompson and a glimpse of how his mind worked. It’s just not a fully detailed accounting of his career. This is fine, there are other films for that.

If you’re a new fan of Hunter S. Thompson, “Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride” will be a good indoctrination of the man responsible for revolutions and groundbreaking movements in writing. For old fans, it is a touching recounting that shows us the life of Raoul Duke. If you’re of the type that thinks of a purple creature with a large nose and a fondness of chickens when I mention ‘Gonzo’, you’ll sadly not get much out of this documentary. It’s worth investigating though because if nothing else, the man will make you think.

Let’s get this out of the way. This movie? It made me giddy. It made me enjoy a night at the theater more than I have in quite awhile. And I go a lot. “Drag Me to Hell”? Loved every minute of it. Sure, it sounds fanboyish for certain and I’ll be honest, it really is. At the same time though, getting Sam Raimi back behind the camera for a horror flick is an event worthy of dreaded fanboyism. I’ll do my best to tell you why I liked it with minimal squeals and giggles.

There are many types of horror films out there. Some have a slow building brand of fear that gets under your skin, gives you goosebumps. Others aim to repulse you with blood and guts and other disgusting attributes. For “Drag Me To Hell”, Raimi dove into his well worn bag of tricks and gave us a jump scare thrill ride that got to even the hardest of horror nerds. The key element to “Drag Me To Hell” is to catch you off guard and startle you quickly and surgically. Kicking it off straight from the opening title screen, they leave no doubt that you’ll be jumping out of your chair repeatedly, and they do it pretty damn well. It got me to jump several times. Ask the Mrs.; I’m pretty desensitized to it all.

It was a well publicized fact that this one was going to get the dreaded PG-13 rating and the worry was palpable across the internet. There have been very few *good* PG-13 horror films to come out. Whether it was the fact that it was Sam Raimi, superstar director, causing the ratings boards to slack a bit or the fact that he really is that good, the boundaries of the PG-13 brand of mediocrity was pushed to the edge and perhaps over some. Gone is any bonafide snot-like pus and gore that the man is known for from such classics as “Evil Dead” as well as over the top violence. It wasn’t needed though. He still manged to paint a distinct and clear picture as to what happened and in many cases, we still got to see it. For me, what helped him to redefine the PG-13 boundaries was the use of audio to make the viewer uncomfortable. At times it is overly loud which is the point. Dissonant chords swelling into a blasting cacophony forces the viewer to cringe along with our star Alison Lohman. This takes the place of the blood and guts spewing forth for an hour and a half and works well. At other times, the sound is used effectively with the demonic presence that is stalking our starlet making the moments even more unsettling. An all around good show that helped to accentuate the positive in the mix of old fashioned latex and CGI effects.

In the acting department, star of the movie Alison Lohman centers herself solidly in a new found role of scream queen. Fully engrossing in her tormented state yet still managing to capture the goofy humor that is a trademark of Sam Raimi horror, she fit in well. The rest of the cast are meant to be not much more that set pieces, but they do quite well. Especially in the case of Lorna Raver, the lady cast in the unfortunate role of Mrs. Ganush, the gypsy lady who gets Lohman in trouble. No offense to Ms. Raver, but she was downright nasty in this flick and the lady fully engrossed herself in the role and did a stellar job. She’ll make you feel for her and turn around repel you in disgust in the same breath making the film all the more enjoyable.

An important note to those that have not been indoctrinated to Sam Raimi or the “Evil Dead” series. “Drag Me To Hell” is a cousin to these early films in every way. It is not a straight up serious horror flick. It’s not a flick that is meant to make you think or to force you to dig into it deeply. The entire film is there for you to enjoy on the surface and they have only one thing in mind; to make you jump. Repeatedly. At the same time, there is a trademark sense of humor that comes with a Raimi film too and it is present here as well. You’re going to laugh. You’re going to laugh a lot. It is all a delicate balance and with this movie, it is the perfect example on how to do such a thing well.

“Drag Me To Hell” is a great flick and the best time I’ve had at the movie theater in quite awhile. I jumped a lot, I laughed a lot. I even enjoyed “Mac Guy” Justin Long. This is a perfect date movie in that I guarantee you that your girlfriend (or boyfriend) will be holding on for dear life through out the film. This is a movie that you definitely want to see in the theater with a large crowd, it ads to the experience.

With all that said, Sam Raimi and Alison Lohman can drag me to hell anytime they want.

“True Blood” made a big splash when it hit airwaves. Author Charlaine Harris brings a heavy following from her long established book series, Anna Paquin brings in some of her own and HBO series pretty much scream quality. So, it seemed like a given. Mix in the supernatural aspects what with Vampire politics, shape shifters and who knows what else out there, the series more or less hit the ground running.

For myself, I enjoy TV series a lot with one caveat; I tend to enjoy watching television on my own pace. There’s something special about being able to blow a Sunday afternoon having your own personal marathon. When “True Blood” first came on the air I watched the first two episodes but couldn’t be bothered to have to schedule my Sunday nights every week. Now that the Season 1 DVD set has finally landed, I can enjoy my own little marathon which I have.

“True Blood” lends itself to the back to back viewing. The writing flows together in such a way that when viewed as such, the story comes across as a better whole. In hindsight, I don’t know that I could have enjoyed the show as much as I have watching them back to back. Regardless, it’s all still a great show.

As far as the DVD set goes, we have a hefty six disk set containing all eight episodes. The transfer quality is fine and dandy as is the audio. This set is light on extra features aside from some audio commentaries from the likes of creator Alan Ball, but there isn’t much else that you haven’t seen before on HBO. If you’re a fan though, then don’t hesitate. Snatch it up.

If you’re like me and have been waiting to watch this series at your convenience or are a non HBO subscriber, grab the set. For Sookie Stackhouse fans this is a no-brainer.

Stay tuned here to Cinema Fromage for a more detailed look at the series as a whole once my season 1 viewing is complete!