During last night’s episode, Director and co-writer Shane Meadows was trowelling on the misery to a point where it crossed the Rubicon of believability, and descended into the depths of self-indulgent ridiculousness. The aggravated rape of a teenage girl by Lol’s paedophile dad signalled the low point of a plot that unsuccessfully juxtaposed farcical horse play with abject misery. This robbed the characters of their verisimilitude and I consequently lost all empathy for them. It’s what I would dare to call the ‘Angela’s Ashes’ effect’ where a character is the victim of a series of increasingly unhappy, and therefore increasingly unlikely, experiences. At the beginning of the episode I was eager to find out what would happen to Woody and Lol, but by the time the credits rolled I couldn’t care less, because they didn’t seem real anymore.

Whilst the first two episodes were funny and engaging, I worry that this third episode signals that the best the audience can expect form next week’s finale is a feeling of smug scepticism or profound schadenfreude. It’s a real pity because the acting is exemplary and up until last night I had real feeling for the characters. Meadows needs a harsh editor to excise ruinous elements from the final cut.

C.H.U.D.

“They have the power to shut the sky.”

Daniel Stern (Marvin from Home Alone 1 and 2) stars as ‘The Reverend’. He uncovers evidence that disappearances of homeless people living in the city’s sewers are the result of a government illegal dumping conspiracy. Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers or Contamination Hazard Urban Disposal? You’ll never sit near the window in a restaurant again!

Night of the creeps (on DVD for the first time in the USA this September)

“The good news is your dates are here. The bad news is… they’re dead.”
This summer, slugs from space will infest your body and possess your mind. Yes, alien slugs on a university campus that turn people into crazed zombies. Just watch it!

Return of the Living Dead Part II

“OK no more brains… for now.”

A hoard of zombies with a culinary penchant for brains cause havoc and overrun a city after a barrel of zombifying gas falls off a military truck. The original comedy zombie film franchise.

If you also wore this tape down to the spools then maybe you will remember the trailers that came before the green ‘Lucasfilm Ltd’ banner. I’m certain that Mischief, Cocoon and Ladyhawke were on there and 50% sure that the others were on it. If you know better, please post corrections below. I’m also not sure about the order they came in, so if you know, let me know.

Trailers:

• Mischief
• Cocoon
• Ladyhawke
• Colour purple (may have been a different trailer – there are many variations)
• Enemy Mine (The UK trailer was different and had a Tom Baker voice over. it started with a dead pilot floating in space – not available online)

YouTube trailers below. (They may not be in the right order – damn you WordPress!)

*No one in Europe ever heard of the word ‘dork’ until after the 1988 release of Police Academy 5: Assignment Miami Beach.

Night of the Comet (1984)
“The last time it came the dinosaurs disappeared!”

A comet wipes out pretty much everybody on Earth, and turns most of the rest into zombies, leaving a girl, her cheerleader sister and that guy from Star Trek Voyager to fight for survival in downtown LA. Oh yes, and there are white-coated survivors from a military base who want to dissect them. What more do you need?

Expect fast cars, piles of dust that used to be people, a girls’ shower room visit from an undead cop and a looting trip to the mall which ends when zombie store detectives intervene.

From beyond (1986)
“Humans are such easy prey”

Don’t go messing with your mind! That’s the message of ‘from beyond.’ Scientists do something to their brains to try to soup the things up a bit and end up in a spot of bother. It turns out that we are always surrounded by these nasty airborne piranha type things. They are deadly, but they normally can’t see us, except if you upgrade your brain. Then they eat your flesh!

Expect flesh-eating things, horrific ‘The Thing’ style creatures and Reanimator’s Jeffery Combs with a little third eye stalk thing growing out of his forehead. This show scarred me for life, so best stick to Shrek if the kids are around.

Troll (1986)
“Worlds of Magic, Mystery and Menace.”

An ancient troll king moves into an apartment block and, with the aid of a magic ring, he sets about turning everyone in the building into plant pods. There goes the neighbourhood!

Expect short-arsed slimy hate-fuelled puppets who commit the ultimate horror movie act: turning you into something. There’s even a puppet-heavy scene with bohemian rhapsody.

Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)
“It’s Craaazy!”

Small town America is invaded by aliens, but no one notices until many people are slabbed, because the aliens look like circus clowns.

Expect gruesome circus clowns who will sip your brains out with a curly straw. There’ll be candy floss, big tops and possibly an amusing dog wearing a ruff. Also, the movie starts with some teenagers making a visit to legendary necking zone, Makeout Point!

Nightflyers (1984)
“Where they’re headed isn’t the mystery. What’s taking them there is.”

Some guy hires this Blake’s Seven style spaceship to go in search of some fabled space creature. They never actually meet anyone belonging to the ship prior to departure apart from a hologram of the original guy from the Robin Hood TV series. (The Clannad one!) Well. It turns out he was born in space and is too week to leave the ship. His evil mother or possibly girlfriend had herself downloaded into the ship’s computer and she gets jealous when her son/lover falls for one of the girls on board and, fearing he’ll leave, starts killing the crew off.

Expect a dismembered head attached to a computer saying ‘ello dawleen’. The dad from the Fresh Prince being cut to bits, stereotypes aplenty and many blatant rip-offs of every other sci-fi horrors you’ve ever seen. Still, I liked it!

Killer Klowns

Troll

I read the novel and, despite the crappy name, it was entertaining. The story catches up with the visitors and the resistance twenty years after the original series. It completely ignores the events of ‘V – the Final Battle’ (The one with the red dust) and ‘V the TV series’. (The one with the visitors driving cars instead of spaceships) The resitance finally gets a repsonse to their call for help, but, can they trust their newfound allies or could they be worse than the devil they know? I’ll say no more! You can buy a copy of the novel from Amazon for just over a fiver.

The truth is that the novel was too true to the original series. It was as if Johnston had been cryogenically frozen since the 1984, remaining oblivious to the ensuing events and culture-shifts. Flying motorbikes feature heavily! Most of the old characters were back, including Mike Donovan, who had been hamstrung by the visitors and held, drugged, in a cell for twenty years. Resistance leader, Juliet Parish also makes a comeback along with friendly klutz visitor Willy.

Warner Brothers ultimately decided not to commission Johnston’s script. He wasn’t happy about the decision and is continuing to explore other avenues to get his V film made. I don’t think that’s going to happen!

Despite the rejection, Warner Brothers evidently saw the potential for a re-make, especially in the wake of the very successful Batllestar Galactica revival. Additionally, sales of the original V franchise on DVD had also been excellent. They ‘farmed’ the rights out to the ABC network, who have now produced a pilot which will be aired in the USA during the autumn.

The ABC remake, from Scott Peters, Emmy-nominated creator of The 4400, looks very smart, modern and business-like and the alien leader, previously a grey haired ‘John’ is now a smartly dressed ‘Anna’. Red uniforms have been ditched for casual clothes and a blue uniform for the ‘Visitor ambassadors’.

Initial critical reaction to the screenplay has been positive and the pilot trailer has attracted lots of positive comments on YouTube.

For what it’s worth, I quite liked the trailer and I’m pretty keen to see the pilot.

You can view the full trailer and even register to become a Visitor Ambassador at http://abc.go.com/fallpreview/index?pn=V

You can read a review of the pilot episode script from Futon critic here http://www.thefutoncritic.com/rant.aspx?id=20090309_v