Chills and Thrills featuring The Meg, Blade Trinity, Below…

Once Upon A Time

I am so in love with this series. It takes all the fairytales we know and love and creates a new spin on them. The characters are written superbly and although it can be quite formulaic at times — you can’t help enjoying it. It follows Emma, who once gave up her son, Henry, for adoption. The show begins with him appearing on her doorstep, speaking of fairytales. Returning him home to Storybrooke, she soon finds out the town isn’t all what it seems.

He Never Died

Wow, this film blew me away. If you want further details, read my review. But to sum it up, it follows a very anti-social guy who – you guessed it – never dies. One day his plans to sleep all day are disrupted when his daughter and a group of thugs interrupt him. I find it is the most believable portrayal of immortality that one could ever find. Definitely worth the watch for the dry humour and Henry Rollins’ fantastic portrayal.

Blade: Trinity (Re-watch)

This was bad. I am a fan of the first two films, and it is sad that this third film put the nail so firmly in the coffin of that franchise. The original Blade was always a bit kooky but still had that darker feel to it. Trinity unfortunately makes it a joke. It was beset by problems from the get-go – with clashes within the team, reportedly to do with but not limited to Wesley Snipes‘ refusal to work with the others. Though I’m not sure we can blame the terrible writing and directing on him. The addition of two other sidekicks was not needed at all, Whistler was enough. I mean this was a rewatch for me, and it seems I tried to block it out of my memory.

Kindergarten Cop (Re-watch)

I always love any Arnold Schwarzenegger film and this is no different. When I watched it when I was younger, I felt it was a bit cheesy. But now on rewatch, it is quite charming and I would totally want Arnie as my school teacher.

Scream: The TV Series — Season 1 and 2

OK this was never going to match the original Scream film, but I don’t think it was trying to, which made it work for a while for me. Though the original film revolves around teenagers, it felt like a film for young adults and adults alike. However, in Scream: The TV Series (read my review of the first 2 seasons), you are well aware that these are teenagers — they have the usual angst and apparently a lot of sex too. But regardless I was quite impressed with the first season, even though I did guess who the culprit was pretty early on. However, the second season let me down, there was a disturbing lack of screams and deaths in the first half, so it dragged on for a while. And when the eventual reveal happened, it felt more disappointing than anything. And what was with that holiday special? Anyway I will see what they have in store for the third season regardless.

The Glass House

I wanted a mystery to watch, so I ended up going with this. Unfortunately I didn’t feel like there was much of a mystery to solve. After their parents are killed in a car crash, Ruby and her brother are taken in by friends of the parents. But Ruby senses there is something off with their new caretakers. Unlike many other films in the genre, you are never in any doubt that the couple are bad people. I mean the man is beyond creepy and I thought they were going down a much darker route, but then they dropped it.

The World’s End

This film was pretty depressing. Of all of Simon Pegg’s films, this has to be the worst. Simon Pegg’s character is an alcoholic and like all addicts in the throes of their addiction — he ends up lying, manipulating and dragging his friends down the gutter with him. Unlike Grabbers that does a superb job of combining science fiction with pub antics, it fails to deliver any comedy.

I Am Mother

I am always happy to watch another science fiction film. Though it was intriguing up to a point, but I felt I Am Mother showed its cards a little too early – losing a bit of its appeal in the process. I wanted to see more of the clash between humanity and robots, but it felt a bit tame in its storyline. Unfortunately with just 3 characters in the whole story, there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for it to go anywhere.

The Meg

First off what a terrible name for a shark and a film. We are meant to be scared of this massive shark, but they ruin it every single time by calling it “The Meg”. Now it is based on a book, so maybe it was more scary in that, but it felt silly. The Meg is just so generic in every single way, I would only watch this again if I needed something to fall asleep too.

Below

I love a good submarine film when it is done well. This is a mystery, horror, thriller film with less focus on the horror side, sadly. Though there are a few good scares, it doesn’t move beyond that. And unfortunately the mystery reveal wasn’t that interesting – in fact I was more intrigued by the theories of the scared crew, than what they went for in the story. An admirable effort, but it falls flat at the end. If you want to know more detail about Below, you can read my review.

That’s all for this Chills and Thrills.

In case you missed anything this month:

• The Head Review — a mystery thriller mini-series reminiscent of The Thing and The Terror
• He Never Died Review — a cult classic in the making
• DeepStar Six Review — the crew is the real monster
• Needful Things Review — mundane meets gruesome but fails to excite
• The Best Alternative Film Posters
• Below Review — a good effort that betrays itself with the ending