The Pod and the Pendulum

This week we kick off a brand new franchise with the greatest horror movie of all time, Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. This episode promises to be a massive one, and we've broken our talk down into multiple parts. For part one, we talk about the confluence of events that went into Hooper and writer Kim Henkel's script, the absolute hell it was to make this movie, where Hooper ranks amongst the masters of horror and start breaking down some of the iconic moments of the movie. Mike is joined by regulars Devaughn Taylor (The Bloody Blunts Cinema Club), Brian Keiper (Movies For Life), and guest Nichole Goble (Bodies of Horror) to talk Leatherface and family. We also ask, "Is Franklin as bad as we all say he is?" (Mike says hell yes). We'll be back with another massive installment and the second half of our talk soon.

It's the last two weeks of spooky season and that means binge watching horror movies (okay, pretty much every day means that for sure). We have a special bonus show with our picks. If you're someone who is TERRIFIED of all the streaming options and end up freezing like you're were getting stared down by a pack of werewolves instead of trying to decide which Halloween movie to watch, we have our picks from a number of platforms including Shudder, Screambox, Peacock, HBO Max, and Disney+. Mike, Stephen, Jessica, and Bryan are joined by Sarah Stubbs (Final Girls Feast pod).

This week we wrap up our latest franchise with one of the most controversial movies we've ever covered. The Child's Play remake had longtime fans of the series up in arms as the movie and characters were ripped from series creator Don Mancini in an attempt by United Artists to cash in on the Child's Play IP. This seemed to doom the reboot from the start, as horror fans wanted little to do with s Chucky that didn't feature Mancini in a creative role, or Brad Douriff as Chucky's voice. Even casting Luke Skywalker himself as the voice of the killer doll did little to appease fans.

Controversy aside, how does the movie fare on its own merits? What do we think of Chucky as an Alexa gone bad versus the product of a voodoo spell? What do we think of the over the top gore and kills? Would this movie have its stans if it was just about a killer robot that only wanted to be loved? Mike can't handle these questions on his own, so this week we have our first crossover episode with our friends Stephen and Brett from the DISENFRANCHISED podcast to talk about all this and more.

Rate, subscribe and review Disenfranchised over on Apple Podcasts: link

We bring you the second half of our dive into 2022's SCREAM. This week we look at how the legacy characters fare, why this is Dewey's movie, explore the nature of fandom, talk about what we want next, and ask what the hell a requel is anyways?

Is this going to be one of our most controversial episodes? Possibly. The Michael Bay produced remake is one of the most talked about horror movies of the past twenty years, and it's responsible for the deluge of remakes and reboots that followed over the course of the next decade. For some horror fans, "Platinum Dunes" were fighting words, like someone insulted their mother. Does this movie get lumped in with the less than stellar efforts that followed it? Does it manage to stay consistent and honor the spirit of Tobe Hooper's classic original film while offering up its own unique take? That's what Mike, Nicole, Brian and Rachel are here to talk about tonight.