The Book of the Not Dead Enough: Admin Errors from the Other Side (2015) by Richard T. Watson - Zombie eBook Review

I had gotten into the habit of point blank turning down any requests I got sent to review eBooks, this was due to having a backlog five years long. However I received such a polite email from Richard T. Watson about his collection of short stories; The Book of the Not Dead Enough: Admin Errors from the Other Side that I decided I would buy a new eBook reader in order to finally make an effort to get on top of things. I am very rusty when it comes to book reviews, but it is all practice!

So contained within this there are twenty one short stories spread over 171 pages all dealing with a different version of the traditional zombie tale. The stories all take place in a world where due to an administration error in the afterlife a percentage of the world's population upon dying stay in their bodies rather than move on. These N.D.E's (Not Dead Enough's) aside from being dead are no different than when they were alive, they don't hunger for brains or any of the traditional wants the undead have. Most of the stories here explore different issues the dead face, usually to do with bureaucracy such as the issues of life insurance, marriage rights, and job security.

Anoxemia (2015-17) - Horror Video Game Review (Playstation 4)

Anoxemia was first released on the PC back in 2015, though it was only released on the Playstation 4 and X-Box One on 28th March. As this underwater adventure contains moments of horror I felt it was a good enough fit for a review on my blog.

Set in a post apocalyptic world recovering from a devastating distant war you play as an operations drone named ATMA who is escorting scientist Dr. Bailey deep below the waves in a dangerous region covered in acid, in order to retrieve important samples. Unfortunately your submarine crashes on the ocean floor, trapping you there with the Doctor, who decides that despite loosing his sub the mission is too important to abort and so sets off in diving gear. However being trapped isn't your only problem as there are many still operational relics left over from the war, ones that are programmed to kill...

Antibirth (2016) - Horror Film Review

I figured from the title alone that Antibirth (written and directed by Danny Perez) was going to be about a demonic child, yet this Canadian horror delves more deeply into issues of drug use and even has some sci-fi elements to it. This is a slice of life horror in which we get to follow a heavy drink and drugs user as she tries to live as best she can.

Living on the edge of society in a washed out remote town, habitual drug user Lou (Natasha Lyonne from #Horror) wakes up one day after a messy night out in which she blacked out, with all the signs of being pregnant, despite not having slept with anyone in the past six months. As her condition worsens she begins to get hallucinations and lost time, while her skin starts to rot and fall off in places. She is found by Lorna (Meg Tilly - Psycho II) who seems that she may have the answers to Lou's inexplicable condition. Is her strange illness down to the new drug she has been taking, or is there a more insidious cause?

Flesh of the Void (2017) - Horror Film News and Trailer

Indie media production company Sodom & Chimera Productions have recently released a trailer for their upcoming horror film Flesh of the Void. The film is designed to be a provocative and experimental film that tries to deal with the question 'what if death really were the most horrible thing one could experience?' and attempts to show a visualisation of what dying could be like if that was the case. From the blurb in the press release alone this sounds like it is going to share a lot with art house films.

It seems like this is going to be about exploring a theme rather than telling a story, the trailer (included below) is certainly darkly trippy with black and white grainy footage and seemingly unrelated images, kind of like the video that plays in The Ring, but extended out to an entire film, or that was the impression I got anyway. Writer and director James Quinn (previously responsible for the award winning The Law of Sodom) says of Flesh of the Void:
"If death really were something absolutely terrifyingly horrible, I imagine it would probably feel like a long, incoherent trip where all your deepest fears, everything you were ever afraid of, just starts hammering on your mind and senses, in such a traumatic, horrible way that no one could even imagine what it could feel like. I wanted to depict exactly that in this film. An arrangement of primal fears, trauma and anxiety. Something people have never seen before, and will never forget."

It is currently in production with shooting to finish in April. This has been almost entirely shot on Super 8 which will help with the creepy factor. It was only the other day I was saying in my review of The Dark Tapes that the Super 8 scene there added a lot. Flesh of the Void should have it's post production finished in May/June time before heading to the festival circuit and eventually getting released on Blu-ray and VOD. Check out the Sodom & Chimera Productions website (here) for more details, and check out the trailer for this below.

Still (2017) - Short Zombie Film Review

The idea behind award winning English short zombie film Still (written, produced, and directed by Carl Timms in his debut as director) sounded so unique and interesting that even before watching it I had a strong feeling it would be good. Thankfully it was good, it takes a very simple idea and runs...well, limps with it. I have a fondness with shorts as there is so much more scope for them to be enjoyable than feature length films.

Still stars Joe Capella as a gold painted living statue street performer who finds himself in the midst of an unfolding zombie outbreak. Luckily for him the undead haven't realised he is a human and not actually a statue, but on the flip side he can only hold his breath, and be still for so long before needing to move...

Slashermania (2017) - Horror Graphic Novel Review

Back in August of last year I was provided with a rough copy of Slashermania, one that contained about two thirds of the overall graphic novel. I put up a blog post at the time talking about my thoughts on what I had read, and now I have had the chance to read the whole thing. At the time there was a Kickstarter to get funds to print and distribute the comic, I actually ended up donating some money to that as I enjoyed what I had read, reminding me both of Battle Royale and Slashers. As a result though I don't feel comfortable doing a traditional review as technically I contributed towards it's completion, and so I won't be putting up a score at the end of this, nor shall this be too detailed as I said quite a lot last year about it.

So I summed up the story in my news post about Slashermania, but to recap...A group of fifty teenagers are taken to a remote camping ground where they are told they are to be trained as camp counsellors, in reality however they are going to be the unwilling victims of Slashermania. This yearly event sees a number of serial killers tasked with murdering as many teens as possible with awards giving in a number of categories such as 'Best Male Kill'. As they do so they are watched by an audience of super rich people who pay highly for a ticket to watch the event.

The Dark Tapes (2017) - Horror Film Review

It seems crazy to think it was only last year that each time a found footage horror film dropped in my inbox I would recoil in fear, fear at the 90 minutes I would have to waste watching the (usually) boring movie. The genre felt irredeemable to me, each film a collection of dull day to day life sections and poorly lit shaky cam night sections, just recycling ideas to infinity. Yet award winning (nominated for over 60 awards over 30 different film festivals) indie film The Dark tapes is the fourth found footage horror I have seen in the past 6 months that has really impressed me (Be My Cat: A Film for Anne, A Guidebook to Killing Your Ex, and Capture Kill Release were the others). This is also the first ever found footage anthology film I have seen, a style of film that this type of horror seems perfect for.

There are four different short films contained within The Dark Tapes, each dealing with a slightly different theme, but all centring around the paranormal in some fashion. The wrap-around film is titled To Catch a Demon and has a university professor and a couple of his students using experiments with R.E.M sleep in order to try and capture footage of a demon. This was the most complex in terms of scientific descriptions, it was also really interesting. I have no idea if the facts stated here are real or not, but in terms of describing how people are able to see ghosts, and how time dilates when you are dreaming it was damn fascinating. The British horror show Urban Gothic (2000-1) had an episode where contestants of a game show were stalked and killed by the sandman while trying to stay awake during a multi-day challenge to be the last person touching a brand new car. This wrap around short totally explains that episode in a new light to me, being reminded of that episode was an unexpected bonus. There were some pretty messed up moments in this one that called to mind Silent Hill.

A Little More Dead (2015) by Sean Thomas Fisher - Zombie eBook Review

I have an admission to state; I totally suck at reading eBooks and back in the day I wasn't happy to refuse any books sent my way, and so over the years my pile of shame continued to grow. The main issue I have with eBooks is that they don't feel 'real' to me over traditional books, there is no sense of satisfaction having read what is essentially a file. The other edge of this defeatist sword is that I am kryptonite to eBook readers, they always die on me. Enough was enough though and I brought a Kindle that turned up this morning. Now Sean Thomas Fisher sent me a copy of A Little More Dead two years ago, over that time I had managed to read 78%, so today I mopped up that one, so huge apologies for the slow read! Parts will also be foggy as I have been reading this for so long.

A Little More Dead takes place in the 18 days following a sudden apparently world wide zombie apocalypse. Dan, his best friend Paul, and Paul's wife Sophia are on the road attempting to find a place of safety, along the way they pick up other survivors such as a mother and her two young boys, and Wendy; a woman they find hiding out in a strip club. The group are forever harassed, whenever they stop they come under assault from the furious, deadly undead, things seem quite hopeless...

Tales of Dracula (2015) - Horror Film Review

Obviously one look at the title of Tales of Dracula would tell you this is a vampire film, and one based on Bram Stoker's original blood sucker at that. The most interesting thing about this is that it is filmed in tribute to the classic Universal Studios horror films of the first half of the 20th century, most notably 1931's Dracula in which Bela Lugosi gave what many believe to be his best performance as the titular vampire. Due to being a homage this is filmed in black and white, and is even set out in the same style.

Set up as a sequel to Universal's Dracula this has the count (Wayne W. Johnson from Night of Something Strange and Brackish) fleeing England and heading back to his castle in Transylvania after his defeat at the hands of Von Helsing. Meanwhile in a village nearby to the castle arrives a man named Creighton Reed (Tom Delillo) who is looking to go to the estate of Victor Frankenstein to look for a cure to a dark secret he holds within him. Meanwhile Victor himself is away on a mission of his own, in his stead is his grand daughter; Victoria (Courtney Bennett) who is looking after Frankenstein's monster (Joe DeMuro who also co-wrote and directed this) and sees an opportunity to make him stronger by injecting him with the blood of Dracula, something which the Lord of Darkness is none too happy to discover...

Life (2017) - Sci-fi Horror Film Review

People have been saying that Life is the best Sci-Fi horror since Aliens and after watching it I would agree, not that there have been too many of note over the years. The original Alien has been stated to be a direct influence on this and it really shows with the plot being in a way almost identical in a broad sense, though stuck into a modern setting rather than the far flung future. Of course this can't be said to be a better film than Alien, personally I have never rated that one too much, though it has been decades since I last checked it out.

A team of scientists are aboard the International Space Station awaiting the return of a probe which had headed to Mars to collect soil samples. When they start analysing the findings they are shocked to discover a dormant alien life form. This life form is so small it is invisible to the naked eye, yet a huge deal is made back on Earth with the being lovingly named 'Calvin'. After managing to reanimate this creature it quickly begins to grow in size until soon it has little tentacles. However an accident occurs which results in one of the scientists getting attacked and the creature escaping from the lab it was contained in. With the creature continuing to grow and getting more intelligent the crew are faced with the task of killing it, however Calvin is seemingly indestructible, and is determined to kill everyone on the I.S.S and escape to Earth where it will be unstoppable...

Reyes (2017) - Horror Film News and Trailer

The official trailer for German horror film Reyes is now avaliable to watch online. If you have never heard of that film then don't worry, me too! The film that's currently still in production is directed by Patrick Templin and Rene Wiesner (ABC's of Superheroes) and stars the prolific Kim Sonderholm (Sinister Visions, Little Big Boy: The Rise and Fall of Jimmy Duncan). It is also going to star Bill Hutchens (Human Centipede 2 and 3), Shawn C. Phillips (The Corpse Grinders), Antonio Monroi (Texas Rising) and Patrick Jahns (Bunker of the Dead) among others.

In Reyes Sonderholm plays Mick; an author in a slump who is looking for inspiration for his next book. While on this quest he stumbles across something very sinister occurring in his home town. Apparently the film is going to feature occult rituals and human sacrifice. The trailer has a nice sense of atmosphere to it, though as always is hard to gauge the quality, though Sonderholm always puts in a solid performance. Check out the trailer for Reyes below and see what you think.

The Walking Dead: Season 7 (2016-17) - Zombie Horror TV Show Review

With season 6 ending on a huge and devastating cliffhanger my impatience was high for the return of The Walking Dead. I would class myself a huge fan of the show, yet with recent seasons I had started to become too irritated by plot decisions and a lack of any real new ideas. This irritation does continue with season 7, yet I found myself better able to look past the flaws due to the fresh feeling this new season brought. There has been a lot of online moaning about the direction The Walking Dead has gone to, with many people feeling this was a mediocre season, to me though I would say it is definitely up there with the best. There will be spoilers from previous shows, as well as mild unavoidable spoilers for this season in my review.

So Rick and his band of followers were last seen having just been captured by The Saviours and their leader Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan). The new show picks right off with Negan enacting bloody vengeance on at least one of Rick's group. Completely defeated Rick agrees to surrender to the band of thugs. With Rick and New Alexandria now under The Saviours control it is up to the rest of the group to try and fight on. Maggie heads to the Hilltop colony where she starts to assert herself as the new leader, meanwhile Morgan and Carol end up at a bizarre Medieval styled place called The Kingdom, ruled over by King Ezekial and his pet tiger (!). It soon starts to become clear to all these places that living under Negan's law is no way to live at all, and that they need to unite to defeat him...

Empire State of the Dead (2016) - Zombie Horror Film Review

For someone who has the word 'zombie' in his blog's title I sure don't watch as many zombie films as I should do. So it was refreshing to have an excuse to watch one when I got sent the undead anthology film Empire State of the Dead. This movie is made up of eight short films featuring everyone's favourite rotting cadavers that all take place in New York State, and that were all directed by New York filmmakers.

The plot comes mainly from the wraparound segments (directed by Ron Bonk). In this story a zombie outbreak has occurred in New York. A local crime boss named Ray has used the opportunity of the chaos the outbreak has caused to try and consolidate his power over the region, mainly by battling the local military forces, and by sabotaging all the local civilian refugee centres. A small group of soldiers are tasked with travelling to these centres in order to bring any survivors back to military HQ.