Monday, December 27, 2010

Amuse

And so another Christmas day fades off in the rear-view mirror of history, leaving behind dried pine needles and twenty pounds of leftover Christmas ham. It's always a bittersweet occasion, not least of all because there's only six days to settle one's stomach before New Year's.

It's a time to reflect on the events of the past year, and we here at the Spookingtons Ranch can reflect with the best of 'em. 2010 saw a massive redesign of our site, exciting new comics featuring Hsu and Chan and Violence Man, and the release of our very first -- if not terribly ambitious -- PC game! Rest assured that there's much, much more in store for 2011, and we'll thank you to keep your eyes open for it!

Well, not for ALL of 2011. You're still allowed to sleep.

For now.

Sunday, December 19, 2010

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH" Turns Out To Be Correct

We're less than a week from Christmas Day, gentle readers, and I'd like to share the following holiday message with you: "Home Alone 4," the made-for-television sequel to what can only -- very generously -- be described as "Home Alone 3," will burn out your eyeballs and melt your brain like a butter sculpture of a gremlin in midday July sunlight.

I grant that I only watched about five minutes of it, so the remainder of the movie -- in which the entire family from the first two movies has been recast with less-expensive "actors," shall we call them -- may have been better than the portion I saw would indicate. Also, I may be a unicorn.

What makes it all the more unfortunate is that the original "Home Alone," and its actual sequel, "Home Alone 2," weren't exactly GREAT movies to begin with. Certainly, they're remembered affectionately by those who were children at the time -- kids who, like me, lived vicariously through young Kevin's improbably-successful tricks and traps. But upon watching the movies with older eyes, one realizes that Kevin and his entire family are horrible, despicable, bickering wretches, all deserving of grievous injury. Only the brisk, competent direction saves the audience from dwelling on this.

"Home Alone 4: The Five Minutes I Watched" is not competently directed. Also, I should mention that the movie's star power consists of French Stewart, who has made a small career replacing slightly-higher-priced actors in made-for-video sequels. I don't mock him for this, mind you. Depressing as it may be, "Replaced Matthew Broderick in 'Inspector Gadget 2'" is still a more-notable epitaph than most of us will ever get.

At any rate, "Home Alone 4" is most likely a bad, bad movie, and I hope the vagueness with which I've described it does not inspire anyone to look it up and see, because -- I want to emphasize this -- it's not the FUN kind of bad. It's the bad kind of bad. If you must learn more, you can read all about it in the Necronomicon.