Nick Cato's Blog, page 43

Detective Gory...

Raita, a loner detective, gets a new neighbor (also named Raita) who hacks websites for a professional company. WHAT both men having the same name has to do with anything is any one's guess, but before long Raita the hacker is following Raita the P.I. around on a gruesome case: someone is killing local girls, and when a woman who came to visit him shows up dead the next morning (with her liver extracted), things begin to snowball quickly.

Baffled, Raita the P.I. visits a child-killer he jaile...

Comic Update...

Picking right up where issue 22 left off, CONAN THE CIMMERIAN No. 23 (which is part 2 of the 4-issue IRON SHADOWS IN THE MOON saga) provides some tight suspense as Conan and Olivia explore the (seemingly) deserted island they've found themselves on. Huge, black iron statues cause Olivia to have a nightmare that turns into a premonition. Our duo flees for their boat only to find it destroyed.

As soon as they take refuge on the steepest hill on the isle, a ship is spotted, then a rowboat comin...

Fun with a Minor Flaw

My favorite part of 2007's GRINDHOUSE double feature were the mock trailers. While (almost) all of them were great tributes to 70s and 80s exploitation cinema, few captured the spirit of that era like MACHETE. When it was announced that director Robert Rodriguez would be doing a full-film version of his killer short, the wait was on.

While I'm happy to announce the wait was worth it, one part of the film sort-of let me down.

MACHETE features a fantastic opening segment, an absolutely kick-ass...

1980-2010: 30 Years of (arguably) The Greatest Sci-Fi Album of All Time

Hot on the heels of his successful 1979 release THE PLEASURE PRINCIPAL, Gary Numan's next studio album, TELEKON, took topics hinted at on PRINCIPAL and drove them to darker depths. While the absent guitars on PRINCIPAL returned for TELEKON, the album is no less futuristic in its sound and scope, with Rrusell Bell's electric strings (both guitar and violin) used sparingly. Numan's minimoog and piano provide cold, eerie backgrounds for his bleak lyrics; while many are sci-fi in nature...

The Last Exorcism

I was thrilled to fill in for the vacationing Mike Arruda over at CINEMA KNIFE FIGHT this week. Check out L.L. Soares and myself as we review THE LAST EXORCISM:

http://cinemaknifefight.com/2010/08/30/the-last-exorcism/

A Decent Debut

VAMPIRES IN DEVIL TOWN by Wayne Hixon (2010 Grindhouse Press / 368 pp. / tp)

First time novelist Hixon takes several standard horror elements (vampires, werewolves, haunted houses, devils, an ancient evil) and combines them into an interesting yarn.

In the isolated town of Lynchville, Rachel is kidnapped from her bedroom one night and is told she has been chosen to be a human sacrifice. Her friend Jacob is suffering from vivid nightmares, and eventually becomes the target of the town's mythica...

Fish 'n Tits!

[image error]If you're looking for gallons upon gallons of blood, inventive kill scenes, and more boobs than there were at the 9/11 commission hearings, you'll be in your glory here.

SPOILERS BELOW!

-It was GREAT to see Eli Roth (in a cameo as a wet -t-shirt contest host) get his head crushed like a grape.

-JAWS alumni Richard Dreyfus provides a priceless opening sequence in nearly the same character as Spielberg's classic.

-Arguably the BEST use of a severed penis since 1987's STREET TRASH.

-The lead...

Nearly Impossible to Put Down...

THE WHISPERERS by John Connolly (2010 Atria Books / 407 pp. / hc)

This is the first novel by Connolly I've read, and while I went in expecting a standard thriller, I was pleasantly surprised by how much of a horror element the story contained.

A group of Iraq war veterans are being killed, and each one seems to be a suicide. Each one of these soldiers had also stolen antiques from a museum in Baghdad, and smuggled the pieces out of the country. Charlie Parker (this being his ninth appearance ...

Check out my latest column at CINEMA KNIFE FIGHT

You can thank me for seeing this so YOU don't have to!...

http://cinemaknifefight.com/2010/08/19/suburban-grindhouse-memories-bloodtide/

Clark Evolves Again...

BUTTERFLY by Simon Clark (2010 Cemetery Dance / 84 pp. / limited edition hardcover)

In 2001, Simon Clark's novel BLOOD CRAZY had one of the best ideas ever given for a zombie apocalypse: evolution. Now, nearly 10 years later, Clark's latest novella takes another look at evolution, this time with even more horrifying results.

Sickened that most of his students have gone on to join the Hitler Youth, teacher Karl Widderman begins to take walks in the woods in an attempt to clear his mind. He com...