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Thought Provoking Review of the Netflix horror flick The Perfection

It does spoil the movie, although I'd more or less chosen to pass anyhow -- since gross-out body horror/torture flicks are decidedly not my cup of tea. Also, I can do without watching people vomit bugs and think bugs are crawling out of their arms.
That and there are apparently graphic and brutal depictions of rape. So, hard pass.

But...I have seen a lot of films like it. And it is a popular story trope -- ( spoilers )

Anyhow, what she says here is interesting:
( spoilers on the Perfection )

Horror is a fascinating genre, it seems to be the opposite of romance. If we had a diagram, horror would be facing romance, with mystery and sci-fi and fantasy floating somewhere around them.

It's meant to be offensive. You are supposed to be horrified, often by your own reactions to it. That's what I find interesting. Horror will often put the viewer in the uncomfortable position of taking a hard look at their own nasty sensibilities.
After all, what is scarier than the monster looking back at us in the mirror in the morning? Or the monster inside our own head? It's why I love psychological horror -- because that's basically the point of it.

Most good horror films show the protagonists struggling with each other, pointing the finger at each other, and not trusting anyone including themselves. A really good horror film makes it difficult for the protagonist by extension the viewer to trust themselves, or their own actions. (See "Haunting of Hill House", "Get Out", "US", for examples.)

Horror is also a means of reassurring the viewer that they will react well in a crisis and it will be averted. But the horror that sticks with you, often won't end on that clean a note. And demonstrates that we most likely will screw things up.

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1. Tried Little Drummer Girl again -- this is the BBC/AMC mini-series adaptation. I had actually read the book and seen the movie. So I know the story more or less. And each time I try the mini-series, which my brother loved, it puts me to sleep. My brother's taste is odd though...( Read more... )

It could be a mood thing. I may just not be in the mood for convoluted spy/terrorist thrillers?

Speaking of? Tried the first episode of The Americans as well -- all seasons are currently streaming on Amazon Prime. And I went to sleep during it as well.

2. Did watch first two episodes of Deadwood on HBO, and surprisingly enough it held my interest. Although it is hard to hear or understand what the characters are saying and they certainly talk a lot. Very talky show. Low on action, high on dialogue, also they like to feed corpses to the pigs (which is what turned my mother off). Didn't bother me that much...mainly because they look fake, and I don't know the corpses, so hard to care. But honestly -- feeding corpses to pigs -- means you do not want to eat those pigs, so they are sort of worthless. Not that I would eat them anyhow -- I tend to avoid pork -- mainly because pigs will eat anything.

I'm decided to watch it -- because co-worker convinced me that it basically had most of the same cast and creative team as Justified. And Timothy Oliphant was more or less playing the same role. He's right. Except I think Justified was better written, also far less violent, mainly because it was on F/X and this is on HBO.

The first episode, by the way, is better than the second. The second was a bit talky and slow. And I agree Ian McShane is the best thing in it.

3. Also made it through the first two episodes of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina S2 -- which is decidedly better than S1, to date. It's a bit darker. I do with they'd make the Dark Lord look pretty as opposed to a dessicated goat monster, who looks like he was made with cheap twigs from the costume department. He's hard to take seriously. Looks a wee bit too much like a humorous take Riverdale's The Gargoyle King (who was far creepier). Richard Coyle's head priest is creepier than the Dark Lord. Also, I have troubles believing that a fallen Angel would look like that.

It would be more interesting if Nick Scratch were what he really looks like and the other is a costume. But I don't see that happening.

The mythology of Sabrina much like the mythology of well all of the other Berlanti shows doesn't quite work. Every once and a while, I think, okay, what? That makes no sense. And yes, I can handwave with the best of them...but what? That's silly and makes no sense and I'm lost.

This is not a show you want to think about too hard. Just saying.

That said, from a socio-political perspective -- it has some rather intriguing themes regarding gender dynamics. And does work, if you ignore the mythology and some of the plot points. ( Spoilers )

4. Saw the Netflix film Always be My Maybe -- yes, I opted for the trendy Asian rom-com over the trendy gross-out horror movie.
( spoilers )

5. Boom!Studios Buffy Comic #5 -- the artist changed, and he's not as good as the prior artist, and really the art was the only thing I liked about the comics. So I think I'm finally done with them.

This issue did not work for me. You know there's a problem when you prefer fanfic which you can read for free. And I have read some extremely good and extremely bad fanfic from the Buffy verse. This is mediocre fanfic - which means it's not even bad enough to be amusing. And yes, it is fanfic -- approved fanfic by the rights holders, but I think we've already established that the right's holders don't necessarily have the best taste.

6. May have to re-read the Un-Canny X-men comics under Rosenberg. Issue 19 sort of flips the entire series he wrote on its ear. Or is a huge plot-twisty reveal. Also we get the return of Emma Frost, who is the best villian turned hero outside of Magneto. She is sort of the female version of Magneto, except with the ability to manipulate minds.