Monday, February 14, 2022

RAR #57: ASTA TWELVETREES

Though her character in RESIDENT ALIEN usually looks fairly mundane, here's Asta in full Native American regalia during a shamanic vision with her dad.



MONSTER MASHUPS #77

Just finished this review of BOA VS. PYTHON, which, as I explain in the review, counts as a mashup but not a crossover.




Sunday, February 6, 2022

MONSTER MASHUPS #76


 


It's been six years since I reviewed the two WAXWORK films, both of which are chock full of monster mashup goodness, though in slightly different ways. The following is excerpted from one of  my ARCHIVE essays:


In the first WAXWORK, the protagonists are menaced by assorted doppelgangers of evil entities. Two segments are devoted to generic versions of a werewolf and a mummy, and there's a climactic fight-scene in which the good guys contend with a small army of freaks, also mostly generic like zombies and vampires, though there are some very loose visual references to figures like The Invisible Man and Audrey II of LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS. Yet there are two extended sequences devoted to the protagonists contending with both the canonical Dracula and a very fictionalized version of the Marquis de Sade-- both of whom count as "monsters" in my system. So by the terms I've used earlier, WAXWORK qualifies as a "high-charisma" crossover, even though none of the evil entities are "real."

The second WAXWORK, which includes a markedly different origin for the doppelgangers, also includes lots of generic types: more zombies (with an obvious hat-tip to DAWN OF THE DEAD), a disembodied hand, various aliens (including The Aliens), and a "ghost girl" possibly patterned on the spirit from THE HAUNTING. However, this time the "high-charisma" entities include versions of Doctor Frankenstein and his Monster, Mister Hyde, Jack the Ripper, Godzilla, Nosferatu, and a sorcerer based on the villain from Roger Corman's 1965 film THE RAVEN. To be sure, the sorcerer fits the persona of a "villain" rather than a "monster," but the others all register as monstrous presences, even though all of them, except for Frankenstein and his creation, only appear for a minute or so. 

Still, it's not hard to imagine the WAXWORK concept being done with no strong references to any established characters. Had this been done, the movies would not be crossovers, only mashups, like the one seen in the monstrous adversaries in the Mexican kiddie-film TOM THUMB AND LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD-- though that film is a "hero-crossover" because of the teamup of the titular fairy-tale protagonists.