Saturday Night Freak Show

Michaela gets trapped with both insufferable theater artistes and an owl-headed mental patient on the loose with Stagefright (1987), an Italian made attempt at an American-style slasher flick. Listen as we make sure the cat survives, grade the body count splatter effects, imagine a use for a prop 'bang flag' gun, make damn sure we "shoot him right between the eyes," and more on this weekend's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly digs up the fossil of a pagan snake god and finds herself drawn to The Lair of the White Worm (1988), provocateur director Ken Russell's comic, psychedelic slice of English folk horror, based on a novel by Bram (Dracula) Stoker. Listen as we find Paddington pair Hugh Grant and Peter Capaldi in their first on-screen teamup, cast suspicion on English food, find Kate McKinnon's on-screen twin, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean gets trapped in an elevator with the Devil (2010), a twisty supernatural thriller dreamed up by M. Night Shyamalan but directed by the guys who did The Poughkeepsie Tapes and Quarantine. Which one of the five people is the Devil in disguise? Will the dedicated cop be able to figure it out and rescue them on time? Listen as we talk about the touchtone television show The O.C. and debate theology on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin tries to figure out who's killing Milan's hottest fashion models in Nothing Underneath (1985), where the Italian giallo meets 80s MTV glitz. A Yellowstone park ranger with a psychic connection to his model twin sister flies to Italy to solve her disappearance. Listen as eat sauceless spaghetti at an Italian Wendy's, play Russian roulette, and learn how to spot a killer on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Although struck color blind by psychological trauma, Michaela gets all hot and bothered by The Color of Night (1994), our late entry into the 90s "erotic thriller" genre. A psychiatrist is murdered, and his psychologist buddy (Bruce Willis) tries to figure out which one of his group therapy patients did it, while becoming involved in a torrid affair with a mysterious femme fatale. Listen as we explore the origins of sexy movies and one that caused a heart attack on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly unleashes The Fury (1978), director Brian De Palma's follow up to Carrie, which features two telekinetic teenagers for the price of one. Golden Age star Kirk Douglas is in a spy movie, trying to rescue his abducted psychic son, while Amy Irving is a girl with a psychic connection to him. Listen as we crack wise about throbbing veins, forgetting location of the Playboy Mansion in Chicago, and then we explode! Cut to credits. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean finds that the worst giant blood-sucking bugs come from space with Mosquito (1994), in which oversized insects swarm a Michigan campground, forcing a scientist, a college couple, a park ranger, and a trio of bank robbers to team up to fight the deadly menace. Listen as we marvel at shoestring practical makeup and creature effects, watch eyeballs and butt cheeks get poked by proboscises, and shotgun a swarm of mutant bugs on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin hits the skeevy underbelly of LA in pursuit of cinema's craziest, scariest, most sadistic psycho pimp with the Vice Squad (1982), with the late, great Wings Hauser at his demented best as Ramrod, who spends the night hunting down the call girl (Season Hubley) who set him up. Listen as we spend time learning about pimp sticks, sugar pimps, toe suckers, and profess a surprising love of sleazy movies on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela can't determine if the products she dreams of owning are because she wants them or because they were subliminally implanted by the advertisements in Looker (1981), in which a plastic surgeon investigates the deaths of his beautiful models and uncovers a corporate conspiracy. Listen as we ask for answers to basic questions, witness the greatest fall onto a car roof in movie history, and lick our debit cards on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly screams "Oh man! Oh God! Oh man!" after a viewing of Tough Guys Don't Dance (1987), a bonkers, sleazy, drug and sex fueled neo-noir from novelist turned director Norman Mailer. The late, demented Wings Hauser co-stars alongside Ryan O'Neal, who plays an ex-con with two severed heads in his drug stash. Listen as we try to sort out the most convoluted mystery plot since The Maltese Falcon featuring grifters, witches, sadomasochists, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean goes to the 90's high school dance with Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992), the original take on the iconic vampire-hunting heroine, long before she became a pop culture icon in the subsequent hit TV series. Listen as we talk about the horror of shared family answering machines, Pee-Wee Herman as a vampire, teen slang, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin wakes up screaming 'Silent Hill!' (2006) and thus packs up the Freak Show on a field trip to the fog enshrouded town made famous by a creepy series of Japanese video games. Join us as we run into sexy nightmare nurses, run from a giant sword-wielding Pyramid Head, and discuss horror games and their movie adaptations on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela wages a scorched earth campaign to protect the hive with The Beekeeper (2024), a Jason Statham action vehicle that finds him playing a retired special operations agent who opens a can of whoopass after his kindly benefactor falls prey to a phishing scam. Listen as we learn myriad facts about bees and beekeeping, unstoppable government agents, the shadow of John Wick, and kickpunch our way to the Queen Bee on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly tries to identify who among us may be the Werewolves Within (2021), an adaptation of a VR video game from Heart Eyes director Josh Rubin. The townsfolk of a snowy mountain community are trapped in a resort and come to suspect one of their number hides a savage secret. Listen as we come to grips with satisfying internet videos, discover Sean is an algorithm terrorist, and discover everyone's a suspect on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean says "once is not enough!" and takes us back in time to revisit TimeCop (1994) in an attempt to obliterate our original 2015 review! Jean Claude Van Damme is a police officer assigned to patrol the timeline after time travel is invented and stop the nefarious politician who intends to use the technology for his own gain. Oh, and save his wife from a tragic death. Listen as we bend our brains around one of the daffiest time-travel plots ever concocted on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin suggests we form a secret society to tell a Ghost Story (1981), an adaptation of Peter Straub's novel about a 50 year old secret that binds together a group of elderly men in a snowy small town in New England, played by some of Hollywood's legendary stars, including Fred Astaire and John Houseman. Listen as we pay tribute to makeup artist Dick Smith, talk about sexy ghosts, and tell each other ghost stories on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela enters into the Shat-tastic world of Impulse (1974), which finds cinema treasure William Shatner playing a homicidal con man fleecing rich women in Florida. Listen as we witness hot dog abuse, childish finger pointing, a deadly game of hangman, a slow motion chase through a car wash, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We try not to get cleaved in half by troglodytes wielding a Bone Tomahawk (2015), the final pick of the 2025 Listener Choice Month! Four unlikely allies ride out from a small frontier town after one of their wives is abducted in this horror-Western. Listen as we talk throat whistles, pull-a-part humans, and our odds of our surviving in the Old West on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If Frank Henenlotter had directed Death Becomes Her it might approximate The Substance (2024). Demi Moore gives a career defining performance as a fading star who takes an experimental substance that promises to create a younger, better version of herself. Listen as we applaud the decade's loopiest, nakedest, goriest body horror splatter opus from the new wave of French Extremism on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We're getting gory with killer clowns and watching Terrifier 2 (2022) because you demanded it! Art the Clown continues his blood soaked rampage, aided and abetted by a supernatural Pale Little Girl, and the only person who stands in his way is a teen Valkyrie! Listen as we explore the appeal of Damien Leone's splatter saga on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We'll be friends 'til the end after revisiting Child's Play (1988), the definitive killer doll movie from Fright Night director Tom Holland, the movie that gave us the first introduction to Chucky and launched one of the longest running movie series in the history of horror. Listen as we talk about 7th Heaven, Cabbage Patch Kid chaos, sequels, shows, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We look back on a year in film with our massive Best and Worst of 2024 episode, with each of us spotlighting the five best and one worst movies that we've seen this year. Grab a bucket of popcorn and settle in for the wildest ride yet that includes honorable mentions and silliest fun time at the theater we've had all year long! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly does her first giallo shot with the Italian whodunnit The Fifth Cord (1971), starring Django's Franco Nero as an alcoholic reporter who finds himself a prime suspect in a series of slayings committed by a gloved madman. Listen as we puzzle over red herrings galore, fawn over Italian fashionistas, and get slap happy with suspects on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean watches a hiss-terical WWE throwdown between an alien cat and a junkyard mastiff in The Cat (1992), a film from the director of the equally bizarro Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky. The cat is part of a trio of intergalactic visitors are just looking for a way home, but in the meantime they have to deal with a shapeshifting alien menace that threatens mankind. Listen as we discuss body melting, grappling hooks, de-tailing, shoe foley, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin digs up corpses in snowy Wisconsin and invites them to the dinner table because he's Deranged (1974)! Bob (Black Christmas) Clark produced this unofficial Ed Gein biopic, which features a memorable performance by Roberts (Home Alone) Blossom and gore effects by a young Tom Savini. Listen as we talk grimy 70s horror movies, Ryan Murphy's serial killer obsession, and horrible ways to die on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela finds a cybercult of killers on the dark web who murder anonymous women and call them Kristy (2014). Star Haley Bennett is left alone at college over the Thanksgiving weekend and has to escape and survive a quartet of maniacs led by Ashley Greene. Listen as we identify the hallmarks of the nihilistic survival horror genre, call b.s. on college security and maintenance practices, and get triggered by FAFSA forms on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly discovers that mixing laced marijuana and tainted turkey can turn anyone into a Blood Freak (1972), a no-budget anti-drug monster movie about a guy who imbibes the aforementioned cocktail and wakes up with a giant turkey head. The only thing that can sate his monstrous hunger: the drug blood of addicts! Listen as we struggle to interpret the signs and portents and learn key life lessons on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean's "got to dig" because a ghost commands it with Stir of Echoes (1999), a working class ghost story set in Chicago, in which Kevin Bacon's doors of perception are blown open after he volunteers to be hypnotized and a specter from beyond the grave attempts to make contact. Listen as we discuss unfair comparisons to The Sixth Sense, creepy kids, horror legend Richard Matheson, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin scrambles to escape from the fish people who worship Dagon (2001), director Stuart Gordon's long gestating adaptation of HP Lovecraft's "The Shadow Over Innsmouth." A shipwrecked couple end up running from their lives after seeking help in a rainy, Spanish seaside town that holds a terrible secret. Listen as we chant "Ia! Ia! C'thulhu Fh'tagan," squirm from tentacled monsters, and are lucky to escape with our skins on this week's episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela trains to become a cyberhacker on a night when all crime is legal with The Purge: Anarchy (2014), a sequel that takes the action out onto the mean streets of Los Angeles during the annual dystopian holiday. Listen as try to survive the night with action star Frank Grillo providing defense, all the while dreaming up scenarios for future Purge movies and TV shows, like Seinfeld Purge, Pirate Purge, Day After the Purge, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly wanders into an underworld just as real as ours, but not as brightly lit with Tales from the Darkside: The Movie (1990). The spiritual third Creepshow movie boasts stories by George Romero, Stephen King, and Arthur Conan Doyle, and includes mummies, cats from hell, and lovetorn gargoyles. Listen as we tally off screen cat deaths, eat the rich, and get our brains pulled out through our noses on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean tries not to lose his head while visiting the haunted hamlet of Sleepy Hollow (1999), which recasts schoolteacher Ichabod Crane as a police inspector investigating murders committed by a headless horseman. Listen as we delve into the big screen version of America's first ghost story, witness Christopher Walken's first on-screen kiss, and visit a bog witch on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin dances with the body-and-wife-swappin' Devil in The Mephisto Waltz (1971), in which Alan Alda plays a pianist who's body is taken over by a dying Satanist and his wife doesn't care who's in that body - she just wants more! Listen as we talk horny housewives, suburban black magic, Shakespearean dog acting, aging backwards, and blue goo on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela says 'Do your thing, cuz!' and cheers on her cannibal cousin Leatherface with Texas Chainsaw 3D (2013), a direct sequel to Tobe Hooper's horror classic which finds statuesque Alexandria Daddario inheriting a plantation manor with a chainsaw-wielding psychopath hidden in the basement. Listen as we imagine Clint Eastwood beaming with pride at son Scott's first major role, and learn we can't get around the Good Book on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly thinks we all go a little mad sometimes with Psycho II (1983), a belated sequel to Alfred Hitchcock's classic shocker that brings Anthony Perkins back to the Bates Motel, supposedly cured... but is he? Listen as we talk the path from Psycho to Halloween to Psycho II, honoring a horror classic, and overbearing mothers on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean goes on a limb-from-limb ripping rampage to get back the Body Parts (1991) that were stolen from him in an unethical medical experiment! Jeff Fahey is the unlucky recipient of one appendage after losing an arm in a horrifying car wreck; he soon begins experiencing the dreams and nightmares of a serial killer. Listen as try to determine the physical location of evil, talk about haunted arms, and survive and improbable car chases on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin returns from the dead to tap at your window, begging to be let in with Salem's Lot (1979), Tobe Hooper's classic adaptation of Stephen King's small-town vampire story as a writer who returns home and finds the arrival of two mysterious antique dealers presaging a bloodsucker apocalypse. Listen as we talk picket fence drama, childhood traumas, and a love for practical fog on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean goes batty for Bats (1999), a late 90s eco-horror flick that turns a cloud of genetically engineered killer bats loose on an unsuspecting town, and it's up to sheriff Lou Diamond Phillips and bat scientist Dina Meyer to stop them. Listen as we fawn over puppet bats, discuss the best potato bats in cinema history, and react in horror as we find ourselves up to our chests in bat guano on this week's exciting episodes! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly uses fairy magic to battle an evil bog witch in Eyes of Fire (1983), in which American settlers follow an adulterous preacher away from civilization and into a haunted woodland where they are bedeviled by evil spirits. Listen as we learn about dirt you can eat, get chased by naked mud covered ghosts, get our souls sucked into trees and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean conducts unethical medical experiments and tries to turn Holly into a snake with Sssssss (1973), in which crazy herpetologist Strother Martin tries to do just that to his unwitting lab assistant. Freak Show wall-of-famer Reb Brown co-stars as a football meathead who ends up confronting a Black Mamba in the shower. Listen as we relate tales of our real-life snake encounters and imagine better solutions to a global energy crisis than turning people into King Cobras on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin opens the atrocity exhibition that is The Crow: City of Angels (1996), a cynical cash grab that followed the original monument to Goth/Industrial subculture. This time, a mechanic is resurrected to get revenge on the goons who killed him and his son. Listen as we talk about the lost art of "crowfitti," detail uncomfortable moments in a peep show booth, and light our initials on fire in the street on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela claims she cried three times witnessing Godzilla Minus One (2023), Japan's latest but Oscar-winning entry in the 70 year old monster series. It's really about a cowardly kamikaze pilot who finds a reason to complete his mission after the Big G threatens those he loves. Listen as we contemplate Godzilla's cat-like appearance, question black-and-white re-releases, and contemplate erectile dysfunction for giant lizards on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly wants to see if she's got what it takes to be Best of the Best (1989), by representing Team USA in a Korean martial arts tournament. James Earl Jones is the coach, and the team of karate superdudes consists of Eric Roberts and Christopher Penn. Send prayers! Listen as we explore the dubious methods of winning gold in the high-stakes world of Tae Kwon Do championships on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean takes us to the beach so we can grow Old (2021) together, since vacationers who visits said beach never leave. Instead, they age rapidly, children grow to adulthood, psychological and biological medical conditions bloom, and Abbey Lee wears a swimsuit. Listen as we put Benjamin Button on the island, overexplain the plot until we're blue in the face, and consider M. Night Shyamalan a Secret Genius in this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin sees psycho killers in double double after watching Wicked, Wicked (1973), the world's first movie presented in Duo-Vision (that's "split screen" to you). A murderer is preying upon statuesque blondes at a seaside resort and it's up to the hotel detective to stop him before he targets the hotel's new lounge singer. Listen as we split our attention between two screens, find people living in the walls, learn of Michaela's distrust of blondes, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela won't let anything stop her from being a Hollywood star, following in the footsteps of Ti West's antihero, Maxxxine (2024). Porn star Maxxine Minx tries to go legit with a role in a low-budget horror film but events from her past and the Night Stalker's murder spree threaten to derail her career. Listen as we talk scrotum skewering, cocaine geese, neon slime, and more on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly's not sure if she she may have photographed a murder with Blow Up (1966), a movie set in "mod," Swinging London, about an easily distracted photographer trying to find something to stimulate him out of his boredom. Listen as we give legit film criticism the old college try as we surround ourselves with a gaggle of "far out" and "groovy" models and work to if a murder was committed and why, or if it matters at all, on week's arthouse edition of our show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sean celebrates our 600th episode with a rewatch of Tango & Cash (1989), the adult action cartoon that partners Sylvester Stallone with Kurt Russell's hair, about two wrongly accused rivals who have to take down the syndicate that set them up. Listen as we break out our measuring sticks in the prison shower, send rats through a desktop maze, and visit the Q branch of the LA police department on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Colin thinks just by wearing a hockey mask he can call himself Jason, since it was so easy for a guy named Roy to do it in Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning (1985). Listen as we yell "He hurt me, ma!" while riding our motorcycles in circles, serenading each other with renditions of "Ooh Baby" and cursing "those damn enchiladas" as we trot to the outhouse on this week's exciting show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michaela cuts the cake while surrounded by corpses of her friends, and finds herself singing Happy Birthday to Me (1981)! Little House on the Prairie star Melissa Sue Anderson is a prep school student plagued by repressed memories and blackouts as members of her rich-kid clique are murdered by a black gloved killer. Listen as our brains explode from over-processing a overly complicated plot on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holly becomes a fire whisperer with Backdraft (1991), Hollywood's ode to firefighters, with Highlander/The Prophecy scribe Gregory Widen pitting two adversarial Irish brothers against each other and a serial arsonist who's been terrorizing Chicago. Listen as we turn to a Hannibal Lecter stand-in to gain psychological insight on the anthropomorphic monster on this week's exciting episode! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.