As I wrote about a couple weeks ago, I went to Wizard World in Louisville this year. While I was there, I met The Glamorsteins: a relatively new group on the cosplay/costumer scene. I had my picture taken with them, and they handed me their business card. They were friendly and seemed passionate about what they do. So, when I got home, I got in contact with them and asked if they’d be open to doing an interview. They agreed. What follows is a short conversation I had with them about the convention circuit and their thoughts on horror films.
If you go to a convention, keep an eye out for them. You won’t be able to miss them. Step up and say hi. Despite what I reported in my Wizard World piece, they really are quite friendly.
As an added bonus, one of them is named Dustin (not Justin). In my experience, you can always count on a Dustin to be cool.
1. How did you decide to get into the world of professional cosplayers?
Sasha: I didn’t. Cosplay was a world that built up around me. Then I realized there was a community that was able to share in the same kind of happiness that costuming gave to me, as well as a strong love for movies.
Dustin: I don’t consider us Cosplayers necessarily. Cosplayers like to act out and be the character they have in mind. Sasha and I consider ourselves costumers and artists first. The love to create with each of us is a common theme. Each has their own niche, but are able to come together as one to create things that are truly breathtaking.
We like to stop the room, so to speak. We allow our art to speak; our characters don’t have to.
2. Your most popular outfit seems to Frankenstein’s monster and his bride. Is that your favorite classic horror? Do you watch modern horror?
Sasha: I like horror from all genres, Universal classics being the favorite. My liking of contemporary horror is normally limited to the content itself. I like my horror with a lot of color, a vibrant story; not torture porn and CGI. It also never hurts to make me laugh. A good horror should have a sense of humor.
Dustin: I have never been a huge fan of realistic gore, torture, and rape films. It seems there have been a lot of those that have come into popularity as of late. I prefer silly kitschy horror films as well as most of the classics, [with] Frankenstein being my all time favorite classic.
3. What are your thoughts on the recent trend of remaking/rebooting films?
Sasha: I believe there is a stark difference in a director that remakes a film because he loves it, instead of one that remakes a film to remake a profit. Generally, I don’t care for the idea, but with the right director, level of creativity, and respect a remake can be pretty special.
4. How many outfits do you have, and how long did it take you to build up your wardrobe?
Dustin: Currently we have around 8-10 outfits. But we tend to mix in elements of our daily wardrobe, depending on the event and situation. So our number of outfits can expand dramatically pretty easily. Sasha has been working on her character for over 3 years. I myself have come into it at about a year and a half.
5. If everything goes according to plan, how many conventions would you go to every year?
Dustin: Truthfully, as many as we can afford to go to. We both work full time jobs and have a home together. We generally pay our expenses out of pocket 100%. We were supplied with free early entry passes for the last HorrorHound Weekend in Cincinnati and that’s about it. If we could get more conventions to at least cover our entry, our options would be greatly expanded. So to anyone reading this that works for a convention, if you want us to come work your convention.. just contact us. theglamorsteins@yahoo.com
6. How long does it take you to get ready?
Dustin: It normally takes around 4-6 hours total. So if we are sociable and hanging out late on Fridays with everyone else, that Saturday when you see us… we are miserable. But we wouldn’t have it any other way. Sometimes we don’t sleep at all. We have gone entire conventions with only 2-3 hours of sleep total.
7. What’s your favorite part of doing what you do?
Dustin: We like having a vehicle for our artistic creations. But just as equally, we love having the respect and admiration for our work. The people, their reactions, and their love for what we do, makes it all worth it. We aren’t in it for the competition. We aren’t in it for the money. We do it because we truly just have a love for what we do and being able to share it with the world.
8. What do you do for a living? Do your co-workers know about this side of your life? What are their reactions?
Dustin: We both work for a local printing company. Sasha has been there about 6 months; I’ve been there 10 years. Some of my co-workers know about it. Some think it’s cool and want to know about it. Others think it’s weird. I work with a bunch of dudes [laughs]. Many of Sasha’s co-workers know about us. She actually works with a lady that’s photographed us many times. They are much more supportive in the office.
On March 29th, my wife, my younger brother and I hopped in my car and headed up to Louisville to attend Wizard World, our first ever comic convention. We had no idea what to expect, but we knew James Marsters and Kristine Sutherland (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) would be there, and that was enough for us.
What follows is what happened once we reached the hallowed grounds of the Kentucky International Convention Center. Most of these words are true.
We got there and immediately hard a hard time figuring out where we should go. “It’s in this convention center, right? Why are these doors locked? I see people in there. That girl is dressed like Huntress, so I know we’re in the right place. Those doors locked, too? How do we get in this place? HUNTRESS! HUNTRESS! I know she can hear me. She looked over this way. Why isn’t she letting us in?”
Eventually we found an unlocked door, and wound our way through a set of dark corridors. After walking through what appeared to be an airplane hangar, we got our wristbands and made our way to the floor.
The first thing we saw was a grown man dressed up as Robin, complete with tight green panties. We all nodded and agreed that it seemed like a decent indicator of what we would find there. He would not be the last Robin we would see that day.
Before heading into the fray, my wife took a look at the map. “It looks like the celebrities are set up in the back. Let’s swing by there and see what it looks like.” We decided to head up a side alley, so as to miss the mass of people in the middle. It was crowded, but not nearly as crowded as I thought it would be. We weren’t packed in shoulder-to-shoulder. We could move relatively freely for most of the day. That was a pleasant surprise. It was hot, but that was to be expected. Just as well. I love sweating in large groups of people.
Pictured: Sweat
We made our way back to the signing booths. Most of TheWalking Dead people weren’t there yet, but pretty much everyone else was. Jason Momoa’s line was long. Marsters’ line was fairly long, but not too bad. Kristine Sutherland had a few people in her line. (We loved that Marsters and Sutherland were right next to each other. During their downtime, I assume they talked about various slayer-related difficulties they encountered. “I hated when she came back and had a zombie party at the house.” “I hated when she beat me up.”)
Voorhees is always lurking.
We saw a man walking out of Marsters’ line looking at his camera, and we immediately accosted him. “How was he? Was he cool? Did you get a picture with him? Can we see it? How much extra for the picture? Did you have to get his autograph to get a picture with him? Oh man, that’s a cool picture. He’s doing his Spike face and everything. Thanks! Off with you.”
A few Deadpools walked by. At least, I thought they were all Deadpools. As it turns out, it was two Deadpools and a Spider Man in a hoodie. I jumped up and down and asked for a picture with them.
We major
We walked past Robert Hays’ (Airplane) booth, and found him sitting with his assistant. No one was in his line. They were talking and laughing with each other, but I could tell he was dead inside. I’ve seen This is Spinal Tap. I know how sad it is for no one to be in your autograph line. I looked around for Artie Fufkin, Polymer Records, but saw no sign of him.
“Should we go up and say hi?”
“It’s $20 for his autograph, and probably that much for his picture. I think you have to pay just to go in his line. Besides, what would you say to him?”
“Dunno. ‘I like that scene in Airplane 2 when you’re painting a picture of flowers, but then the camera pulls back and you see a naked woman sitting there.’ Something like that.”
“That’s not bad. Is that worth $20?”
“Nah. Let him rot.”
We saw a Silent Hill nurse and Elektra walk by, talking about God-knows-what. I desperately wanted to get my picture taken with Silent Hill nurse, but I didn’t want to hurt Elektra’s feelings by telling her to bug-off, so I let them walk on by.
I’d say roughly 40% of the people there were dressed like Dr. Who or a TARDIS. Whovians, as far as the eye could see. And pretty much all the men looked alike. As far as I knew, each of them had been an incarnation of the Doctor at some point. (There have been a thousand Doctors, right? I’m not making that up?)
I looked at a woman with a TARDIS dress and said, “Cindy-Lou Whovian?” I cackled loudly, because I’m the worst.
She looked at me blankly, so I cleared my throat and said, “I said, Cindy-Lou WHOvian.”
Here’s something I learned: Whovians are not to be trifled with. They suffer no fools. And, apparently, all the women pack their purses full of bricks.
When I came to, the woman was gone, but I would always have a broken nose to remember her by.
The entrance to Whoville?
I saw something that said Back to the Future, and immediately started shoving Whovians out of my way to get there, screaming, “Out of my way, nerds!” (I don’t learn lessons easily.)
It was the DeLorean (or, rather, it was a DeLorean). “I put together a model of you,” I whispered as I reached out to trace its aerodynamic lines. “NO TOUCHING,” came a yell. I scampered away like one of Sweet’s minions and never looked back. Comic conventions are scary.
As fate would have it, that’s where I was supposed to be. I found myself at a table full of weapons. Glorious weapons. I turned to my brother; his mouth was wide open. “Are those Batman throwing knives?” I asked. All he could do was nod. I looked further up the table. Wolverine claws. Honest-to-God Wolverine claws.
When I was a child, I dressed up as Wolverine for Halloween. I took black gardening gloves and used electrical tape to attach white plastic knives. I assume every male has done the same thing at some point in their lives. Needless to say (though I will say it anyway), the prospect of buying Wolverine claws was too good to pass up.
Sure, I hemmed and hawed for a while. “I don’t know. They’re $35 a piece. That’s a lot of halibut.” We tried them out and they looked awesome.
“We’ll knock off $5 if you buy the set,” the man behind the table said, sensing our excitement.
“$65 to realize a lifelong dream? Seems a bit high.”
I originally thought we should wait. “I don’t want to lug around two metal claws all day. They could get heavy. Let’s wait until we’re ready to leave.”
My brother immediately countered with, “What if they’re sold out by then?”
I panicked. I couldn’t live with myself if I left the convention without Wolverine claws. So I bought the set. I couldn’t give the man my money fast enough. I’m pretty sure I was giggling as I handed it over.
Best decision I’ve ever made.
We turned from the table and spotted The Avengers, all walking in the door at the same time. It was glorious. My favorite part was seeing some of the individuals later in the day. They were never all together as The Avengers again. It’s like they didn’t like each other at all, but they just had to make a grand entrance together. I respect that.
After that, we took off for the James Marsters panel. It was delightful. He sat up there for an hour, answering every insane question asked of him with a smile and a funny story. “How did it feel to kiss that Torchwood guy? What did you think about the ending of Angel? How come your hair didn’t fall out from bleaching it all the time? No, really, how did it feel to kiss that Torchwood guy?” He cheered when a grown man told him that he had, “warm fuzzy dreams about Spike,” after watching Buffy episodes. He sang a song that he wrote for a Western. “Was that from High Plains Invaders? I feel like that was from High Plains Invaders.” I could not stop talking about High Plains Invaders.
In a particularly sweet moment, a girl holding a video camera stepped up to the microphone and talked about how her and her mother were never particularly close, but they used to bond over their love of Spike. Now her mother was really sick, and it was her birthday, and would he mind singing “Happy Birthday” to her? Without skipping a beat, he looked directly into the camera, slipped into Spike voice, wished her a happy birthday, sang the entire song, then blew her a kiss. I’ve never seen a girl so happy in my entire life. It nearly melted my cold, cold heart.
We left the room on a Marsters high. “That guy was awesome, wasn’t he? Super awesome. I love him dearly. Let’s kidnap him and bring him home with us. He should be our friend. He’d love it. I have chloroform in the trunk. He won’t mind.” Ultimately, we decided against it, because we’re not monsters, there were a ton of witnesses, and the chloroform was a two-block walk back to the car in the rain.
So it was back to the floor with us. We only took one pass before hitting the Marsters panel, so we decided to take a walk among all the booths. There were tons of great artists selling their work. Others drawing pictures on demand. T-shirts. Key chains. Bumper stickers. Bikinis. Bathrobes. Statues. Backpacks. Recognizable movie characters made from nuts and bolts. A life-size E.T. If you can think of it, they probably had it.
Silently judging. Always judging.
We looked at a lot of stuff, and even considered buying some of it. A lot of it was expensive, but that’s to be expected. I assume you could buy a lot of the stuff we saw online, but buying it there just seemed more fun. Also, there was no guarantee that the product we found online would be exactly like the one in front of us. I’ll be damned if I’m going to buy a set of knockoff Wolverine claws, or a scratchy terrycloth Batman bathrobe instead of the awesomely plush one we felt up at the booth. There was a constant struggle between Frugal Adult Dusty and Giddy Elementary School Dusty. Somehow, Frugal Adult Dusty won out more often than not. That guy is a total buzzkill.
After walking through the booths, we thought we’d head back to the autograph tables and catch a glimpse of some celebrities. I creeped on The Walking Dead’s Scott Wilson for a while, who ended up giving me a sidelong glance and slowly reached down for his boot knife. I moved on before he could plant it directly between my eyes from 100 paces. Scott Wilson is ruthless.
Had I tarried any longer, I’d be dead.
We craned our necks to see James Marsters, but his table was packed and his line was long. Ditto Jason Momoa (although we did catch Momoa on a small stage for a short interview and got pretty close, which was great. He’s a handsome man). The Whovians were lined up against the wall, waiting for their chance to point their Sonic Screwdrivers at Matt Smith and Karen Gillan. I saw a group of 5 Whovians, all wearing the exact same outfit and actually sharing the same scarf. It was wrapped around all of them at the same time, and they moved in unison. It was like Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Was there a Dr. Who episode that covered that? If not, they probably wouldn’t have understood what I was trying to say. “What’s a body snatcher? Is that like a Dalek?”
We moved on to Kristine Sutherland. There were a few people in her line, but not many.
“She looks so sweet. Doesn’t she look sweet? I just want to go up and give her a hug. How much are autographs for her?”
“$25, I believe.”
“What about pictures?”
“About the same amount, but I think you can only take a picture with one person at a time. And the sign says, ‘Autographs’ for this timeframe, so I think you have to pay for an autograph to get a picture.”
We all agreed that it seemed high, but we still wanted to lurk and stare for a while. So we stood outside of her booth, talking to each other and sneaking glances at her. Since her line was sparse, and the aisle we were in wasn’t highly populated, I’m sure she noticed the three of us standing there for 15 minutes.
Then, an idea.
“What if we get her to wear the Wolverine claws? Do you think she would do that?”
“I don’t know. That’s a great idea, though. I’d pay good money for that. That picture would be awesome. Let’s ask her.”
So we walk up, my younger brother taking the lead.
“We all love Buffy.” We nod vigorously. She’s smiling. This is going well. Or perhaps she’s scared of what the three people who have been staring at her for a solid 15 minutes would do once they approached her, and thought a smile would disarm us. “Can we get a picture of you with the three of us?”
She was still smiling. “Of course!”
“Really? That’s great. How much?”
“Ten dollars.”
“Ten dollars?! A BARGAIN! An extra question: would you be willing to wear Wolverine claws?” My brother removed the claws from the bag and showed them to her.
Her smile never faded. What a pro. “Wolverine claws? Sure.”
And so we watched Ms. Summers grip Wolverine claws, smile sweetly, and pose with us for the best picture in the history of time.
Happiest moment of our lives.
We walked away giddy, and we couldn’t stop staring at the picture. “Let me see it!” We couldn’t stop talking about it. “Can you believe it? Look at how sweet she’s smiling! This picture is amazing. I’VE NEVER FELT MORE ALIVE!”
I felt so good that I threw a recently purchased Tribble into the teeming mass of Whovians.
“What is this?”
“A Tribble. You know. From Dr. Who.”
“That’s from Star Trek.”
“Same difference.”
Those Whovians can glare. I could hear them murmuring among each other and looking in my direction. I could’ve sworn I heard one of them utter the phrase “a reckoning,” but it was probably just my imagination.
We were getting tired, but we weren’t ready to leave. We decided to take one more pass through the throng of people in the middle of the floor, then find a chair and do some people watching.
Of all the fun we had, I think the people watching was one of the major highlights of the day. Here’s a short list of people we saw/interacted with:
Captain Jack Sparrow. Only one of them, surprisingly, and he was always in character. Or maybe he was always drunk. Hard to tell, really.
A shirtless dude in spandex. I have no idea who he was supposed to be, but I admired his confidence.
A gaggle of Harley Quinns. It seemed like every time I saw one, she was posing for a picture. People love Harley Quinn.
Pyramid Head from Silent Hill. Apparently he couldn’t see through the mask, and needed a friend to guide him around the floor. That killed me.
Leatherface, complete with extra-length chainsaw.
Photographer was running for her life.
Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers walking around together. “What’s your favorite stalking tactic? Did you see that time I stuck a knife in a guy so hard he stuck to the door behind him?”
A family consisting of Bender, Lara Croft and Nathan Drake.
A group of Browncoats.
A Lego Man whose arms were so heavy his hands were literally shaking as he stood in one spot, having pictures taken of him. “Why did he make his arms so heavy? That looks like hell. That poor guy.”
And, finally, my favorites: The Glamorsteins, dressed as rockabilly Frankenstein’s monster and his lovely bride.
“Hey, can I get a picture with you guys?”
“Sure. You want us to attack you?”
“Um…what?”
Immediately they fell upon me, sensing my weakness. They took me by my feet and shook all the loose change out of my pockets. I’m certain they would have given me a swirly, but they had a lot more photo ops to get to. So they unceremoniously dumped me on my head, shouted “Poindexter,” over their shoulders, and were off. I loved them dearly. It may have just been in my concussed head, but I could have sworn I heard Link Wray’s “Rumble” playing as they strolled away.
Moments later, I was bloodied and bashed.
We decided to call it a day. We walked out of the convention center and hit up BBC Brewery down the street. Great food. Great beer. Terrific atmosphere. If you’re ever in Louisville, I highly recommend it.
We talked about our favorite moments of the day, and went through all of our pictures. We thought about pulling out our Wolverine claws, but figured that would be frowned upon.
I looked to my left and saw Silk Spectre II. There’s something weird about seeing someone dressed as a comic book character just sitting down among regular people, munching on fries.
As we left the brewery, we heard an angry shout. “There they are!” I looked to see a group of Whovians, pointing their Sonic Screwdrivers at us, bowties glistening in the rain. The one in the front had the flaming Tribble on a spike. They inched forward. We turned and ran to the car, peeling out before they could finish us off.
Before long, my brother was asleep in the back seat wearing his Batman robe, clutching his Wolverine claws.
We all figured we would have a good time, but we didn’t expect to have as much fun as we did.
Our first convention was a good one, and we were already looking forward to the next one.
In this series, I take a look at what happens to characters after the credits roll. Beware of spoilers. There will be spoilers.
You can read about the origin of this series here, and my original review of this movie here.
Before I get started, let me start with this: in all likelihood, the possessing spirit is not the actual devil. Multiple people are being possessed, which would probably make it more of a legion of Pazuzu-type minions descending upon this mountain cave, in search of bodies to inhabit. But, since “The Devil” is in the title, we’ll just keep rolling with that.
When we left Felix and Sol, Sol had discovered that their children had died in the mountains, and the devil had taken their place. (Seeing as how the name of the movie is Here Comes the Devil, this was not the least bit surprising.) She kills the demon-spawn who had taken their form and takes Felix into the mountains to show him their bodies, so that he will see that their actual children had died weeks earlier. Felix is promptly possessed by the demon, and shoots Sol in the head.
The movie ends with the newly dead & possessed Felix and Sol getting into their car and driving away from the mountain, presumably back to the city so they can wreak unholy hell on everyone they come across (and to stand on chests of naked women, because apparently the devil loves to do stuff like that. He’s a real scamp).
The car appears to be a stick shift, which the devil cannot drive. (They say the devil can’t write a love song, and apparently he can’t drive stick, either.) The last scene of the movie is the car, driven by Devil Felix, lurching down the dirt road and swerving back and forth.
What comes next?
It has already been established that the devil can’t drive stick. And apparently he can’t drive in a straight line. So it stands to reason there are a lot of things in this modern world that the devil does not have the skills for.
What follows is a fish-out-of-water comedy, with the devil trying to get acclimated to modern life.
The devil goes grocery shopping! That wacky devil doesn’t even know what a ripe banana looks like!
The devil goes skiing! Watch out for that tree!
The devil meets with clients! Make sure not to mention anything about the Lord of Darkness!
The devil can’t figure out how to use a cell phone! Try navigating that touchscreen with a severed finger!
The devil can’t get those pots put away! And we mean, he really can’t get those pots put away!
This goes for 90 minutes or so, until someone gets wise to the devil and casts him back to Hell.
It’s a laugh riot.
And, honestly, it wouldn’t be any stranger than the actual movie.
You can read my review of this here, and Fremont’s here. If you’re not familiar with my What Comes Next series, you can read about it here.
Due to the nature of these posts, there will be spoilers.
Description from Netflix:
In the frozen beauty of Finland, local reindeer herders race against the clock to capture an ancient evil: Santa Claus. A single dad and his son are caught up in the chaos as scientists dig for artifacts. What they find endangers the entire village.
When we last left our favorite reindeer herders, they had destroyed the 50-foot horned entity known as Santa Claus, rendering all of his naked old-man minions harmless. Where they were once fueled by the love of gingerbread and child abduction, they had suddenly become a gaggle of wandering, confused elderly folk. But, due to the forward-thinking Pietari – with the help of his abducted friends he used as bait – all of these old men were now confined in an electric fence.
Naturally, these former reindeer herders decided the next logical step was human trafficking. “We’ve got all these naked old men. Let’s train them to be Santa and sell ‘em.” Can’t find a flaw in their logic.
They arrived at the price of $85K per Santa, using a sophisticated system of pricing (“If dozens of reindeer are worth $85K, a single old man dressed as Santa is worth that same amount”). I doubt they’d be able to get that much. Actually, I doubt they’d be able to get much at all. Here’s why:
They’re selling old men. I’m not sure what their business strategy is, but I doubt they’re sending these old men out on loan. They are being purchased. But who is buying them? They’re being purchased to play Santa Claus. Are stores buying them? Are individuals buying them, then loaning them out to stores? For the sake of argument, let’s say stores are buying them and reusing them every year. What do they do after Christmas? Outside of sitting quietly and allowing children to tell them what they want (while creepily stroking the children’s hair), these Santas have no discernible skills. They have no way to make money. Which means the stores will either allow their Santa – the guy they just spent $85K on – to go homeless, or to house/feed them for the entire year, just for the purpose of playing Santa for a few weeks every year. Combine the cost of housing and feeding a man for an entire year with the initial investment of $85K, and you’re spending an awful lot on a mall Santa every year.
Let’s say that it costs $900/month for an apartment and $100/week on food (which are both less than the American average). That’s $16K per year on your Santa. And that’s without factoring in medical costs (which these old men are sure to have quite a few of). When you can slap a beard on a local fella and pay him peanuts, why would you pay that kind of money for a Santa? They could charge $5 per Santa and it still wouldn’t be worth it.
However, it appears as though they were able to unload all of the Santas at $85K a piece, seeing as how the movie ends with them putting labels on boxes and shipping them out. Someone ordered those Santas. I don’t know why, but they did.
And then there’s this. It took these converted reindeer herders a year to turn confused old men into serviceable Santas. They had talked about how the lack of a reindeer herd that year would bankrupt them. How did they survive for a year with no income? Beyond supporting themselves, they had to care for 198 old men. If they were just barely hanging on as it was, how did they suddenly have the money and resources to take care of an additional 198 people?
The movie assumes that they made it that year (seeing as how we see them the next year and everything seems to be going fine), but it’s worth pointing out the ridiculousness of it.
In a logical world, they would not have been able to sell those Santas. The figurative wolves at their doors would have taken everything, while the literal wolves at their doors would have picked their frozen bones clean.
In this world, they make a cool $16.8 million by selling confused old men to a world full of suckers. Seeing as how they don’t have a ton of stuff to spend money on in their current village (pig heads aren’t overly expensive), they all move to Helsinki and spend a ton of money on hookers and blow, until they find themselves broke and wrangling reindeer again a decade or so.
Or perhaps they live happily every after. Maybe there are no hookers and blow in Helsinki. As near as I can tell, there are no women at all in Finland. And, according to Charles De Mar, you can get just as high on pure snow as you can on coke, and snow is everywhere in Finland.
Most likely, they managed their money wisely and lived a life of luxury for a time, before eventually being arrested for human trafficking and spending the rest of their days in prison.
10.The Battery – Took me a couple viewings to really like it. It’s slow. It drags in parts. The characters aren’t overly likable. But it feels like a realistic depiction of the impending zombie apocalypse. It’s a different look at the genre, so it’s something even Renfield may be able to appreciate.
9. The Last Will & Testament of Rosalind Leigh – If I ever finish editing the film club entry on this, you’ll see my full thoughts. Slow, but a good sense of tension throughout.
8. Star Trek Into Darkness – Exactly what I expected. Lots of fun. Great performance by Cumberbatch.
7. Best Friends Forever – Kind of cheesy in parts, but I really loved this. Had a great feel to it. Loved the interaction of the two main characters. A cool little apocalyptic road-trip movie. I adore this film.
6. World War Z – Nothing like the book, but I didn’t expect it to be. It starts fast and doesn’t let up. I could’ve done with less of the pointless cut-backs to Gerry’s family (because I’m a heartless fiend), but that didn’t really ruin it. Just a fun, fast-paced action movie.
5. The World’s End – The weakest entry into the Cornetto trilogy, but I still loved it. Much better the second time around.
4. Mama – I totally understand the complaints about this movie, but I didn’t have those same issues. I choose to overlook the ending and the glaring plotholes and look at the story and the performances of everyone involved. The final showdown on the cliff looked like something straight out of a Universal monster movie.
3. Evil Dead – I was so excited about this coming out that I figured I would be disappointed. That was not the case. I loved this movie (it helped that I went with a squeamish friend). It had a myriad of problems, but I really don’t care. It was crazy and bloody, and I had a lot of fun watching it.
2. Maniac – Gave a sleek makeover to the scuzzy original. Kind of felt like Drive, but with a more scalpy protagonist. I had no idea what to expect going in, and this absolutely blew me away.
1. Pacific Rim – MONSTERS AND ROBOTS FIGHTING! I felt like a little kid watching this. I giggled during every fight. I excitedly punched my knee during a few parts (“They have a rocket that makes them punch harder!”) I’ve seen this 4 times now, and I get excited every single time.
Honorable mentions: Kill Me Now, John Dies at the End, Grabbers, You’re Next, American Mary, Inside Shadows
I don’t have a hated list, but here are a couple I didn’t love.
Escape From Tomorrow – I had such high hopes for this. It just feels like a waste opportunity. Instead of a slow descent into madness at Disney World (which would’ve been amazing), we were treated to a middle-aged man trying to bang every woman he sees. Kind of surprised he didn’t use pick-up lines like, “Hey baby, you wanna see the real Magic Kingdom?” Then point to his johnson (“Johnson?”). Anyway, this movie was kind of terrible.
Lords of Salem – Decent idea. Absolute mess of a film.
Frankenstein’s Army – I heard this was good. “The creature effects are amazing.” They weren’t bad. The rest of the movie was wretched.
The Purge – Not horrible. Just really boring. Again, a really cool idea, but not a very good movie.
Top 10 Albums of 2013
10. Frightened Rabbit – Pedestrian Verse. Part of it may be the thick Scottish accent, but I really love these guys.
9. Jake Bellows – New Ocean. Former lead singer of Neva Dinova, a great and under-appreciated band from the early 2000s. Cool little pop songs occasionally dressed in noise.
8. Lissie – Back to Forever. She takes a step back from her folk leanings and heads towards a more 80s inspired path on this one.
7. Sigur Ros – Kveikur. The huge, thundering drums and dark chords make this a more sinister (yet more energetic) than some of their previous records.
6. Action Bronson – Blue Chips 2. Wasn’t a huge fan of his first Blue Chips record, but this is fantastic. Great production from Party Supplies, and top-notch rapping from Bronsilini. Catchy stuff.
5. Noah and the Whale – Heart of Nowhere. Upbeat pop songs with loads of strings. Honestly, I thought this was a bit cheesy at first, but I can’t stop listening to it now. Lovely little record.
4. Ghostface Killah – Twelve Reasons to Die. Produced by the great Adrian Younge – and taking inspiration from giallo films – this is possibly the best record of Ghostface’s career. Dark and slinky and a little terrifying. This record is amazing.
3. The Lonely Wild – The Sun as it Comes. Feels like a Western in a post-apocalyptic world. All open spaces and scorched earth and tumbleweeds.
2. Josh Ritter – The Beast in its Tracks. One of my all-time favorite songwriters deals with his recent divorce. It’s simultaneously heartbreaking and beautiful. Bitter and optimistic. In a career full of great records, this may be his best.
1. The National – Trouble Will Find Me. Probably my favorite band currently working. They deliver the goods here. I find something more to love about this album every time I listen to it.
Honorable mentions: The Next Day (David Bowie), Dig Here Said the Angel (Daniel Amos), Automechanic (Jenny O.), Long. Live. A$AP (A$AP Rocky), The Worse Things Get…(Neko Case), Departure and Farewell (Hem), Once I Was an Eagle (Laura Marling), Hold Back All My Dark (Minor Birds), MBV (My Bloody Valentine), Girl Talk (Kate Nash), In Rolling Waves (The Naked and Famous), The Silver Gymnasium (Okkervil River), Modern Vampires in the City (Vampire Weekend), Waiting For Something to Happen (Veronica Falls), North Americana (Leif Vollebekk), Cerulean Salt (Waxahatchee), Versions (Zola Jesus)
Catchiest Song of 2013
The 1975 – “Sex”.
This just narrowly edges out Miley Cyrus’ “Wrecking Ball”, of course.
Two bonus categories:
Most Disappointing New Show Bates Motel. My problems with this are too numerous to list here.
Most Disappointing Ending to a Show Dexter. Just…man…
