Ouija (2014)

I suspected that this wasn't gonna be a classic when the official trailer repeatedly pronounced the title wrong. I'm a real mark for ouija board movies though, so you better believe that I was first in line to torrent this sucker the weekend after it came out. Besides, its only real competition during the 2014 Hallowe'en movie season was Annabelle, a flick that unabashedly glorifies the (thankfully) deceased Ed Warren (may his soul writhe in torment forever) and his hag, cunt wife Lorraine, who's due to join him any time now, at which point the world will be an infinitely better place. Given the choice between mediocre half-scares and supporting real-life filth like the Warrens, I'll take the former every time. I'm a supervillain, not a monster.

Honest-to-fuck monsters are out there though, just ask
the Warrens. Here's their 100% true account of a real-
life werewolf that they exorcised OMG totally for reals.

And to be fair, Ouija didn't quite deserve the ruthless rub-a-dub-drubbing it got from most critics. The first half, in fact, is pretty okay: it introduces (or at least perpetuates) some fun new ouija lore for middle school girls to try out at slumber parties ("If you look through the little window in the planchette, you can see the ghosts that are talking to you!"); a chick hangs herself with Christmas lights (Is it wrong that whenever a chick hangs herself in a movie, I'm secretly hoping for an upskirt shot?); there's your usual parade of semi-effective jump scares; and while you won't give a whit about the zero-dimensional characters you'll probably want to fuck at least one of them, which is almost as good. (Hell, that attitude got me through two marriages.) Unfortunately, after the one girl is levitated and dropped head first into her bathroom sink (apropos of nothing, she's wearing really cute socks when this happens) things start to bog down, with the remaining kids going all Mystery, Inc. in an attempt to figure out who's haunting them and why, which means research, and as we all learned in college, research is generally boring. Plus, like a lot of ghost movies, this one eventually reaches a point where the obvious solution is to simply burn the house down, which has the dual benefits of solving the problem once and for all while also being kinda fun. Hardly anyone ever does this though, preferring to run up and down the hallways, screaming like a bunch of imbeciles. The all-time ouija board movie champ remains 1986's Witchboard, starring a pre-deranged Tawny Kitaen's tits, but this one easily makes the top ten, assuming there even are ten ouija board movies, of course. I suppose I could look that up, but man, that really smacks of research. Fuck that shit.

Tawny Kitaen in Witchboard. Or possibly at home. Whatever.

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Mr. Satanism Meets Angel Love

BUZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

"It's Mr. Satanism. I'm here to review your comic book, and I'll start out by saying that it definitely needed more tits."

"It's me all right, but don't freak out, baby; I won't be ripping you a new one. Except for the lack of rack, I think your comic is pretty fucking awesome."

"Damn straight, Red. I know it's for chicks and shit, but you've got stories about abortion and doing blow and incest and everything. Not only is that cool in and of itself, but it's also proving to be useful in a more practical sense. See, because the cartoonish art style makes your book look so cute & innocent, I was able to give copies to that stupid single mom who wouldn't go out with me to pass on to her kids, and she won't realize they shouldn't be reading it until it's too late. And then there's the fact that you're unbelievably fine; sure, comic books are full of hot redheads, but why put up with a drama queen like Jean Grey who dies every other Tuesday when you could just hang with Angel Love? I usually go after comics like yours with both barrels, but as far as I'm concerned Angel Love totally fucking rocks. Five stars, A+, three thumbs up."

"It's not luck, toots - you earned it. Now put on something sexy so we can go out and celebrate. And when we get back, I'll stick it in your poop chute."

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Shop Mr. Satanism. So much darker than Black Friday.

Doctor Who, Series 5: Volume 1 (2010)

Despite my best efforts, I've developed a more-than-passing familiarity with most of the subcultures of nerd, from the basics (Star Wars and Trek, Marvel Comics, Dungeons & Dragons) to the second-tier (Firefly, Supernatural, Battlestar Galactica Classic) to the ironic (Manimal, Project Blue Book, Dollhouse), to the hopelessly obscure (She-Wolf of London, Bunnies & Burrows, actually fucking girls). One thing I've managed to avoid up to this point though is Doctor fucking Who, the endearingly quirky British (so far all of these descriptors are terrible) time traveler who's been on the air longer than most people sucking air today have been alive, or almost twice as long as The Simpsons. In fact, here's everything I knew about Doctor Who before I watched this DVD:

• He travels around in a phone booth that shares all the qualities of a time machine, a spaceship, and Snoopy's doghouse.
• His primary adversaries are robots called the Daleks, who haven't had a special effects upgrade since the 1960s.
• He changes into a different guy every time the BBC gets fed up with the current actor playing him.
• His sidekick is generally a young, hot chick, and don't tell me he's not fucking these chicks because why wouldn't he?

So why would I bothering delving into the world of Doctor Who at this late date? Two words: this incomparable vision:

I suppose I should be a lot more awed by this chick, but really I'm not. After all, it was only a matter of time before genetics and breeding would, through accident or design, produce the most stunning woman who ever has or ever will exist. I'm just glad that it happened during my lifetime. As for the show itself, the first episode on this DVD is effectively creepy, clever, and funny, sometimes all at once, and I have to say, I was dutifully impressed. The second episode manages the same general tone, but with notably diminishing results. And the third one is pretty awful, clearly just an excuse to roll out the new-year model Dalek, which I half-expected Doctor Who to start pimping for only $2349 down and $199 a month. (Three year lease, with approved credit. Some exclusions may apply.) That averages out to a solid C, and while that is a passing grade it's hardly something to brag about. Thousands of U.K. fans (and thirty-ish U.S. ones) can't be wrong, you say? Sure they can. Thousands of people paid to see 2004's Van Helsing, right? Thousands of people watch Family Guy. Thousands of people voted for Hitler and read John Saul novels. Thousands of people are wrong all the fucking time, and don't forget that Doctor Who is a product of the U.K., the country that gave us Crazy Frog, Filthy Rich & Catflap, a non-porn Spice Girls movie, and the Fast Food Rockers. Their pop culture aggregator is clearly set to "Do Not Filter Results". Sorry, you limey nerds, but, aside from the redhead, I really don't see what the fuss is all about. Oh, and apparently the redhead is actually Scottish, so you can't even hold that over my head.

Final word: Doctor Who = meh

Full disclosure: I would totally fuck the blonde from the Fast Food Rockers.

We'd do it in a tub full of KFC gravy, while crushing several Big Macs between
us. Like a fast food-themed Pink Flamingos. God damn I'm hungry right now.

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Buy my books, where I call all this nerd shit out.

Black Roses (1988)

In the 1980s Americans were afraid of everything: Russia, Dungeons & Dragons, clown vans, even hair metal. That's right, while hair bands were just trying to assure us that it was, in fact, still possible to rock in America, parents from coast to coast were flipping out, convinced that listening to W.A.S.P. would lead to suicide, murder, devil worship, and, worst of all, listening to more W.A.S.P. (Probably in the opposite order though.) Something clearly had to be done, so they arrested that guy from the Dead Kennedys and everyone was pretty much satisfied. Although this did lead to the Dead Kennedys guy inundating us with hundreds of spoken word albums bitching about the whole thing, so, ultimately, who are the real losers here?

Shut up shut up shut up shut up!

Well, in this movie all of Tipper Gore's nightmares come true (except that one where she actually enjoys sex). The band in this movie is so fucking evil that, in the very first scene, their live show turns the audience members into people wearing monster masks. Or possibly actual monsters, it was kind of hard to tell. Either way, they won't be playing that venue again, so they pack up and head for the sticks, where they deflect the adults with a little lite-rock dog & phony show, and then play a series of gigs that infects the town's teenagers with the latex-meets-spandex horror movie version of metal. Fistfights break out, classes are cut, a can of red paint is left in the street with the lid off and someone could have easily tripped over it, possibly ruining their shoes... It's some serious Hieronymus Bosch shit, and it only gets worse: stereos turn on by themselves, a copy of the Mentors' LP Up the Dose bubbles and melts right on the turntable (now no one will be able to listen to classic tracks like "Heterosexuals Have the Right to Rock"), a monster pops out of a speaker and eats a guy, and loitering runs rampant. Can cold-blooded murder be far behind? (Spoiler warning: nope.) Fortunately, there is one teacher who cares, man, so he just casually strolls into the next show with some gasoline and road flares and Great Whites the place. (To the band's credit, even with the venue burning down around them, they continue to rock.) The whole thing is unrepentantly goofy, but there's plenty of violence, some gore, cool rubber monsters, ample tits, a guy fighting a demon with a tennis racquet, and a demon reacting surprisingly poorly to being kicked in the balls when it clearly doesn't have any.

Remade in 2001 as Rock Star.

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