Call me Cat (she/her) World's okayest goth hippie. I like long walks on the beach, spooky movies, and writing about vampires. Find me on ao3 @ Spectral_Cat
Shout out to my sister's friend we went to see Hokum with who, upon walking into the theater during the Leviticus trailer, asked "Oh is this Heated Rivalry??"
They Will Kill You was fun! It reminded me a lot of a Quentin Tarintino movie (very violent, lots of dramatic zooms, female protagonist spends a majority of the movie barefoot).
Was reading the trivia on Van Helsing's imdb page again, and I've always thought that the sheriff in this show was going to be Quincey Morris. I have no evidence for this other than that he's a cowboy from America. Yeah he's not a sheriff, but it'd be less of a change than what they did with Van Helsing.
Either way I would've watched the hell out of it. Yet another reason why this movie flopping is my Roman Empire.
So every year I tell myself that my New Year's resolution is to review every horror movie I watch in order to keep a record of them. Have I done that every year? No. Have I done that with every horror movie I've watched this year? Also no. I think it's because a lot of my opinions on the ones I do watch can just be summed up as "good" or "fine, along with my autistic ass not wanting to be accused of having bad media literacy. But I decided to compromise and just talk about the ones I have a lot of thoughts on.
So of course I'm starting with one that is very divisive and has a lot of media literacy discourse. I'll be blunt and say I'm one of the people who didn't care for it, but there were parts I liked and it WAS effective in that I still feel slightly off 24 hours after watching it, so I need to talk about it in order to exorcise it like a demon from my mind. Putting my thoughts under a cut, as they do contain some spoilers.
I'll start off by saying I never played the game, because just from the gameplay I saw I could tell I would not be good at it. And maybe that's part of the reason it didn't work for me, because I think it can be confusing for people who aren't familiar with the game. But I knew the basic parts of the story - convicted felon gets sent to explore a moon's ocean of blood in a tiny submarine after most of humanity has been wiped out, thinks he'll gain his freedom but is really there as more of a sacrifice, scary monsters and chaos ensues.
I did think going into it it was more alien/sci-fi than eldritch horror, which isn't a genre I have a lot of experience with or a good understanding of, so I think that contributed as well.
While I've seen people say it's meant to be confusing, part of my confusion stems from the fact that I couldn't understand what any of the characters besides Simon was saying a lot of the time, and I don't think all of that was intentional. Especially when it came to stuff like Simon's backstory. Apparently some theaters were having audio issues? Either way I'm filing this along with Oppenheimer under "movies I probably would've understood better if I watched them with subtitles."
I knew going into it that it was a slow burn, and while I can definitely appreciate a slow burn when I'm in the mood for it, I do think there were some shots that lasted too long and some stuff that could've been cut out, but I'd probably have to watch it again to decided exactly what.
I'm not big on single-location movies either, but I understand why they did it that way. It really does help with making it feel claustrophobic. All the flashing lights did give me a legit headache though. Maybe part of why it made me feel off is because I'm still recovering from being overstimulated.
I did enjoy the use of blood though, and thought there were some cool visuals with it. The part where he rips his own arm off was also epic, not gonna like.
All that being said, I think Markiplier did a really good job! He's a good actor, which not a lot of Youtubers can say. He felt less like Markiplier than he did in the one other thing I've seen him in, The Edge of Sleep (which I did enjoy). He also pulls off the grungy long-haried look very well.
I can tell that he's genuinely passionate about what he does and puts 100% into whatever project he takes on, which makes me feel bad about not liking the movie. But I AM glad that others are enjoying it and that it's having success. I don't regret supporting it, and I'll gladly watch him in another horror project if he ever does one, which I'm sure he will. And I'd be lying if I said I wouldn't jump at the chance to make an adaption of one of my favorite games if I had the clout, skills and resources for it.
In summary: I didn't like it, but good for him anyways.
When something in a story goes over my head that was apparently obvious to everyone else and I can't tell if I have bad media literacy or it's just the Autismâ„¢
Fun fact: In the original script and novelization of Van Helsing, Dracula mentions Van Helsing having triangle-shaped scars on his back. For a while I thought they cut that out of the movie because it would make it too obvious he was a fallen angel, but now I’ve realized it might have been because of the implication that Dracula has seen him shirtless.
Regular human guy x vampire he’s trying to kill: boring, tired, seen it already
Being that has existed since time immemorial but has forgotten everything, a pure servant of God incarnate in human form searching for purpose and family in a world he will never belong in x the only person he had ever befriended who was ultimately betrayed by the same power that being served, having become a prince of darkness resurrected: perfect.
The Horror Virgin just did an episode for Van Helsing 2004 and I wanted to share the photos I took of the props that were on display back in 2004 when I went to Universal Studios Orlando.
Still kick myself about not getting a shirt for the movie when there or taking more photos. Didn't have a lot of room though back then on cameras so had to pick and choose.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Wrote yet another drabble in my quest to procrastinate writing my longer fics, but hey, at least I actually have Gabriel and Vlad interacting this time.
theartofmadeline
ellievsbear
baratheonpilled
discoholicmusic
prguitarman
