PopCult Reviews

TV Review – Ripley

Ripley (2024)
Written and directed by Steven Zaillian

There are few protagonists in modern literature as challenging as Tom Ripley. He’s a captivating figure because he’s pretty pathetic yet so cunning. In many ways, Ripley is the shadow underdog, a guy who, by all evidence, should lose, yet he manages to commit multiple murders and steal millions while evading capture. Despite coming from a poor/working-class background, Ripley has evolved refined tastes mainly because he believes he deserves to live the best life possible. Other people are inconveniences most of the time, hindrances to him enjoying the luxury offered to the wealthiest among us. If ever there was a character to highlight the negative aspects of sociopathy, an actual condition that isn’t as one-dimensional as much media would like you to think. Ripley can’t seem to care about anyone other than himself; it troubles him, but it is not enough to stop his pursuit of comfort.

Movie Review – Martin

Martin (1977)
Written and directed by George A. Romero

While most know George Romero as the director of the zombie films Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, and Day of the Dead, he also made other films during the 1970s. Between 1968 and 1978, Romero wrote and/or directed five non-zombie films, including a romantic comedy. Most of his interests stayed firmly in horror, and of these pictures, Martin is the one you’re most likely to hear about, and for good reason. Having seen only three Romero pictures to date, I can say Martin is the one that kept my attention the best. It is a character study and vampire movie that plays with our perceptions by centering us entirely in the mind of the protagonist, who is definitely a murderer but may also be a literal monster.

PopCult Podcast – Robot Dreams/Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

A lonely New Yorker mail orders a companion but a series of complications split them apart and they dream of being reunited. A woman haunted by strange encounters in her adolescence returns to the old house where it all started.

Movie Review – From Beyond

From Beyond (1986)
Written by Brian Yuzna, Dennis Paoli, and Stuart Gordon
Directed by Stuart Gordon

Stuart Gordon was a well-regarded name in American horror cinema, particularly in the 1980s. Born in Chicago in 1947, Gordon was drawn to acting and live theater, which he majored in at university. After graduation, he started his own theater company and engaged in highly provocative stagings. One of these, The Game Show, was designed as an attack on audience apathy. With plants in the audience, Gordon’s cast would begin to provoke the viewers, and each show would conclude with an audience riot that brought the play to a halt. He put on a politically charged adaptation of Peter Pan in 1968, which got him and his wife arrested for obscenity. Live nude actors and allusions to pixie dust being a substitution for LSD seemed to draw ire from the community. Gordon would come around to film in the mid-1980s, with his first production being The Re-Animator and From Beyond as his follow-up.

Solo Tabletop RPG Actual Play – Solo Liminal Horror Part Three

You can purchase Liminal Horror here
You can purchase Jeansen’s Machines here
You can download the Liminal Horror Solo Starter here

Read the previous chapter here

Scene #6 – (Confrontation 5/8)

Modified: Cristian is in the local jail as the police process him trying to convince them he’s innocent – Add some trouble or bad news.
The GM asks you to: Explain what’s currently happening – activities around.
Oracle: Eliminate Prison
Doom Clock #2 – The Promethean Fire (4/6)

Cristian sits in a cell at the Sevier County Sheriff’s Department. Officer Fletcher discovered a body hidden in the back room of the crawlspace. During his interrogation, Cristian learned that it was an adult male, so it was not the missing child, and that it had been in the crawlspace for about a week. He told them he had an alibi, to call his secretary, and she would confirm that he had been to work every day for the last week until today. It’s around one in the morning, and he sits in his cell, hoping they get ahold of her ASAP. But he’s wracked by the thought of how a dead man ended up in the crawlspace under his late grandparents’ mountain cabin. And where is cousin Albert?

Podcast Mini-Series Preview: Love at First Laugh Episode 1 – His Girl Friday

Ariana and Seth kick off their six episode podcast mini-series exploring romantic comedies. This first episode sees them sharing their thoughts on the genre (what they love, what they loathe) and talking about the classic Howard Hawks comedy His Girl Friday starring Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant. All upcoming episodes will be available exclusively to our Patreon subscribers.

Movie Review – Hour of the Wolf

Hour of the Wolf (1968)
Written and directed by Ingmar Bergman

I can’t say I’ve fallen in love with the work of Ingmar Bergman. I’ve seen four of his works – Persona, Scenes from a Marriage (television version), Fanny and Alexander (film version), and now this movie. Of the four, Fanny and Alexander is my favorite because it feels like a mature take on the Christmas movie. Otherwise, I find Bergman’s work to come from an emotional place that isn’t culturally the same as mine. It makes sense. Sweden is very different from the United States. Even more so, Ingmar Bergman is very different from me, especially in how he treated his wives and consistently cheated on them with actresses he worked with. I feel at odds with Bergman, but I am still open to watching his films to try and understand what he is saying through his work.

Movie Review – House

House (1977)
Written by Chigumi Obayashi and Chiho Katsura
Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi

Following the phenomenal success of Jaws at the box office, Japanese film studio Toho went to Nobuhiko Obayashi and proposed he develop a similar script. Obayashi was an odd choice. His filmmaking career focused on personal, avant-garde experimental movies and TV ads, not big commercial hits. The director discussed the script with Chigumi, his preteen daughter, positing that telling everything from an adult perspective is limiting for films. From young Chigumi, he got several of the set pieces that would end up in House, including a mirror attacking the audience and a house eating a girl. The final product doesn’t have much in common with Jaws, but it is a film you won’t forget after watching it.

PopCult Podcast – Cuckoo/His Three Daughters

A teenage girl is taken to a strange German community by her family where dark secrets are hidden away. Three women gather in the apartment of their dying father to grieve and figure out who they are to each other when he passes.

TV Review – Northern Exposure Season Four

Northern Exposure Season Four (1992-93)
Written by Robin Green, Michael Katleman, Diane Frolov, Andrew Schneider, Jeff Vlaming, Mark B. Perry, Sy Rosen, Christian Williams, Mitchell Burgess, David Assael, Jeff Melvoin, Denise Dobbs, and Geoffrey Neigher
Directed by Dean Parisot, Michael Katleman, Nick Marck, Charles Braverman, Rob Thompson, Joan Tewkesbury, Randall Miller, Michael Fresco, Daniel Attias, Win Phelps, Joe Napolitano, Bill D’Elia, Adam Arkin, Michael Lange, Jim Charleston, and Frank Prinzi

Northern Exposure was coming off season three, for which it won several Emmys. Season Four was to be the largest season order for the series, with twenty-five episodes. These days, most shows we get on the variety of streaming services come in around 8-10 episodes per season. Thirteen episodes feel like an indulgence. One of the downsides of having such large season orders was that quantity did not equate to quality. There are some utterly fantastic parts of season four. Then, some episodes are cringingly wrong and outdated. Even so, I’d rather watch this season again than watch much contemporary television, especially the fare that leans into cynicism.