fun watch . Geek & Sundry . Spooked

Currently I'm enjoying myself in an old YT series under Geek & Sundry entitled Spooked.

Source

It's a 2014 supernatural comedy about the wonderful drama filled humane adventures of a five group of adults, with one kid as the fifth member.

The show seems to try the unique mash up of unusual tropes, which I found quite interesting in itself. Of course it wouldn't be a comedy that didn't twist the nipples of mainstream stereotypes that seems to swim everywhere, starting with the group itself. Even though there are stereotype roles for each, not that I'm saying that my taste for the uniqueness is shallow (might be...I can't really say...*further pondering*), they blend well that the chemistry of the characters are profoundly prominent and eye catching for viewers (in my humble ow-pee).

The leader that did his job due to righteous underlying sister relation issues concerning his little sister recovering fairly well when the supernatural is involved. Matched up with his completely awkward and morbid asian best friend, crushing on the blonde occult specialist that did not reciprocate said feelings. Rounding it up with the science buff, that one guy who amidst all the evidences would not admit defeat in believing the unknown unless solid evidence is recorded.

The scenarios are the common exorcisms, ghost haunting, the occasional poltergeist and some other mash up from the everyday story of horror movie like. Except in the blight of all this serious issues is the manner of which selected characters dealt with the story. Like a little bit of all the Scary Movie parodies.

Scratch that little bit and make it all over the place method like the Scary Movies parody.

The show was enjoyable. Snippets of everyday life challenges, like sibling relationships, best friends, romance, come to think of it these life challenges were overly conventional that it made the whole show human amidst the horror that never scared the shit out of anyones pants. Good thing such horror exist in the world.

The only thing that might be truly lacking is the plots challenge through out the episodes. Everything was engaging and interesting in a normal point of view, since I guess the aim was just fun during horror times. Yet, yearning to have that plot about a greater scare is what I was waiting for.

Which they did do by the last episode. This is one of those stories I see that just sucks my soul for being satisfied and want me to yearn for some more. Marketing purposes they have succeeded. Other sections of my life just wants to say in a convincing manner to be patient and wait and see when they will give a new season.

(trailer released in June 2014)

Speaking of second season for this show, there seems to be no other new if there will be one. There were mentions of it during it's time of airing but somehow the show must have not garnered enough attention and audience during the release, and like all the other sadly bad timed shows they got the bunk. Never to be seen again.

With the same set of characters and actors, or actresses...(etc., rambling commences).

critique-ing . spoilers . Poltergeist(2015)

So far I've been an avid movie goer (watcher? viewer? fan?) since the dawn of me spending too much time with my mother, yes I haven't moved out of my parents house, and have countless times watched movies good or bad. But it was only when I reached the age of more than 20 and just became aware that almost all movies are remakes from some era, that I became a truly grumpy critique, well, to me its already grumpy. Not that grumpy grumpy though, cause I appreciate what the modern movie production groups and stuff are doing. Hey, it's not bad to see remakes of alot of movies from the era of pioneer, golden, silver, and overly what ever generation. Its a nice opportunity to attract young'uns to get into the cult base, if the movie series or not has one.

(credits for the images: LINK, haven't really read the article but it looks good, sorry for just viewing the images author of the article oTL)

Yet, it cannot escape the horrible truth about the fact of "shallow" content or production. The movie may be "well made" and the modern graphics and stuff technology is considerably used through out. But, it gets me when the movies story flow just goes down a wee bit the drain.

Concerning, my latest example of this would be the movie Poltergeist(2015), which has been recently premiered in our local theatre's (I know it was released earlier in other countries). I've watched the 80's (?, yes wiki says so, such a reliable temporary source that can well be edited in the near future by scumbags that wants to edit the information falsely, maybe) version when it was shown in our local channels back in the 90's. Back then I was still a wee liddle tyke, and watching horror movies contains several covering of my face just so I won't be scared of the possible jump scares.

Eventually I haven't got over with jump scares, OF-COS, but I did have a twisted sense of what makes me laugh and the only difference now is I laugh more at some jump scares than actually be surprised. Back to the movie, we watched it and of course I didn't expect it to try and be the exact copy of its predecessor back in the 80's. So I wasn't THAT disappointed when the tiny woman medium with a tiny voice wasn't in the movie, however I was hoping she was.

Zelda Rubenstein as Tangina Barrons
(source: http://rhinoshorror.com/2012/04/05/a-look-into-the-poltergeist-curse/)
(note: oh gohds, why is her name, when pronounced in the right way is a cuss word in our country LOL)

She was the number one missing essence for me, I mean yes mister Jared Harris' character as that awesome medium that knows all etcetera actually made a nice impression, however I feel like at my age right now I'm becoming tired of encountering the stereotype black coat, black hat wearing, many scars from experience bragging, super mysterious but sometimes light hearted (or not) man that is the needed factor to save your princess from them ugly rotting dragons. I can compare Tangina to the medium from Insidious, but her charm is just different of course, to each their own.

source: http://filmjunkieconfessions.blogspot.com/2015/06/a-screening-of-poltergeist-2015.html

The end result of my reaction, if I compared it to the 80's version:

• The feel of the script, how they entered snippets of modern media "comedy" or "light hearted family humour" doesn't really cut to the 80's version, it just didn't feel natural against the plot.
• Casting was good, rewritten personalities of the characters (if compared to the 80's version) is "lovable" or "adorable" for me. However the seriousness of the plot doesn't seem to fit them to a POINT that when they do take the whole thing seriously there wasn't enough tension to build it.
• The jump scares as usual caught me off guard.
• Elements that were used to scare the children (Elder sister, first child: basement boss where mud glops out of a chip from the cemented floor and the potential bony love interest dragging her to their new home in the alternate dimension. Elder brother, second child: clown toys boss and tree boss. Younger sister, third child: closet boss) were actually cool, just cool. The clown was cute, definitely a keeper. A friend of mine however will not like him / her.
• Ghost science, the normal ghost science enhanced with the modern graphics of today is typical. The ghost history however feels white-washed (was that correct?), there was no intense build up for my opinion. It got lost somewhere. I think.

Over all, in the harshest words I could muster, it was a let down. Giving it a chance, its a good shallow and cheap ride. Don't get me wrong, I haven't read the article of the production groups true true intentions with this movie. However I cannot help but consider this as a remake of the 80's, unless there was an older one maybe I can get newer reaction feels, and comparing the two is inevitable considering the quality of the wasted tension in the story.

I'm surprised actually that I critiqued it, and was let down. Its different when you have feels towards what you knew and suddenly see a remake and hope it was good but was just so-so.