Star Wars Holiday Special (Podcast Discussion)

This week we have a special holiday episode discussing the 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special,which Lucasfilm has tried to bury from the beginning. What lessons can be learned from a show that makes one mystifying misstep after another? Hosted by Jason Henderson, writer of the upcoming Young Captain Nemo: Quest for the Nautilus, with attorney Julia Guzman of Guzman Immigration of Denver. 

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Hangout Episode: Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster (1965) & The House That Screamed (1969) (Podcast Discussion)

Hangout episodes are less-structured episodes that come during breaks between our main, structured episodes. In each one we choose two movies to discuss in free-wheeling conversations. This episode, Tony Salvaggio, tech director at Rooster Teeth, chose low-budget, surprisingly engaging SF movie Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster (1965) and writer Jason Henderson chose the grimy, trashy, thrilling Spanish horror The House That Screamed (1969). Along the way we also touch on how picking on bad movies is less fun than enjoying hidden treasures, and what we think of the 1980 Golden Turkey Awards.

(Episode 284)

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Castle Talk: Kathryn Leigh Scott & Steve Smith on Reviving Dark Shadows Audiobooks

This episode we’re chatting about the new Dark Shadows Audiobooks of classic Dark Shadows novels from Paperback classics. We’re talking to Kathryn Leigh Scott, a novelist, nonfiction writer, and of course actress who played Maggie on Dark Shadows and now reads the classic gothic Dark Shadows novels of the 60s. Then we talk to Steve Smith, publisher of the new Paperback Classics imprint of Oasis Audio, who is heading up the effort to bring lost classics like the Dark Shadows book series and vintage Flash Gordon adventures to audio.

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Castle Talk: Tara Westwood Just May Be The Grudge in The Grudge (2020)

This episode we’re chatting with Tara Westwood, who stars in Sony’s new reboot of THE GRUDGE. The film will release in theaters on January 3rd and is a new take on the 2004 film of the same name which itself was based on the 2002 Japanese original Ju-on. The film-- which Westwood calls "a simulquel"-- is directed by Nicolas Pesce and produced by Sam Raimi, Rob Tapert, and Taka Ichise.

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SINT/SAINT: The 2019 Christmas Episode (Podcast Discussion)

This week we bring our 2019 season to an end with the holiday-themed Dutch film Saint, about a murderous St. Nick raining terror on modern-day Amsterdam. (Episode 283)

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Castle Talk: Adam Egypt Mortimer, director of Daniel Isn’t Real

This week we’re chatting with Adam Egypt Mortimer, director and co-writer of Daniel Isn’t Real, which is about a Troubled college freshman Luke (Miles Robbins) suffers a violent family trauma and resurrects his childhood imaginary friend Daniel (Patrick Schwarzenegger) to help him cope. Charismatic and full of manic energy, Daniel helps Luke to achieve his dreams, before pushing him to the very edge of sanity and into a desperate struggle for control of his mind -- and his soul. The film also features Mary Stuart Masterson as Luke’s mom, who suffers from mental illness and Sasha Lane as Luke’s new artist girlfriend . Samuel Goldwyn Films will release the horror/thriller DANIEL ISN’T REAL in theaters, on digital and on demand December 6, 2019.

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A Return to Salem's Lot: The Stephen King Retrospective (Podcast Discussion)

This week we continue our Stephen King retrospective with a look at the 1987 film A Return to Salem’s Lot directed by Larry Cohen.

(Episode 282)

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Castle Talk: "Beyond the Gate" Author Mary SanGiovanni

This episode we’re chatting with Mary SanGiovanni about her new book Beyond the Gate from Kensington Books. Ms. SanGiovanni is the Bram Stoker-nominated author of the Kathy Ryan novels Beyond the Door and Inside the Asylum, and numerous other novels, novellas and short stories. BEYOND THE GATE stars her character occult security consultant Kathy Ryan, who has been called to look into the disappearance of scientists who have discovered a portal to another world, and the mysterious Dead City in the world on the other side.

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Castle Talk: Nicole Tompkins, star of Antrum, The Deadliest Film Ever Made

Actress Nicole Tompkins talks about her role in Antrum, a remarkable horror film that opens with a documentary telling us we're about to see a lost, cursed film from the 70s about a brother and sister who go into the woods to perform a ritual to rest the spirit of their beloved, recently dead dog. 

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Prime Double Feature: Terror Beneath the Sea (1966) and Mark of the Witch (1970) (Podcast Review)

For our two-hundred-and-eighty-first movie review episode we have a special experiment. With regular castmates Drew and Julia out for the Thanksgiving holiday, Tony and Jason relive their days in Austin with a gabfest about a double feature of two films each selected by the other from their recommendations from Amazon Prime's algorithm. Tony's selection was the 1966 monster-sf-bondian spy mashup Terror Beneath the Sea starring Sonny Chiba, and Jason's is the 1970 groovy-coeds-summoning-witches movie Mark of the Witch. (Episode 281)

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Prime Double Feature: Terror Beneath the Sea (1966) and Mark of the Witch (1970) (Podcast Review)

For our two-hundred-and-eighty-first movie review episode we have a special experiment. With regular castmates Drew and Julia out for the Thanksgiving holiday, Tony and Jason relive their days in Austin with a gabfest about a double feature of two films each selected by the other from their recommendations from Amazon Prime's algorithm. Tony's selection was the 1966 monster-sf-bondian spy mashup Terror Beneath the Sea starring Sonny Chiba, and Jason's is the 1970 groovy-coeds-summoning-witches movie Mark of the Witch. (Episode 281)

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Castle Talk: David Moody on Chokehold, Publishing and Zombies

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Castle Talk: Cory Doctorow on Disney's Carousel of Progress

This week we’re chatting with Cory Doctorow about a topic that just fascinated Doctorow—enough that he wrote the amazing novella The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow—and fascinated host Jason Henderson: the Walt Disney World attraction Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress. We talk about futurism, the optimism of the past, and whether forgotten midcentury fears are a match for modern fears of climate collapse.

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Salem's Lot (2004): The Stephen King Retrospective

This week we continue our Stephen King retrospective with a look at the 2004 miniseries Salem’s Lot starring Rob Lowe, Andre Braugher  and Rutger Hauer.

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Castle Talk: Leanna Renee Hieber on A Sanctuary of Spirits

This week we’re chatting with Leanna Renee Hieber whose new book A Sanctuary of Spirits comes from Kensington/ Rebel Base Books. An enthusiastic public speaker about the history of the Gothic novel, she loves nothing more than a good ghost story and a finely tailored corset, wandering graveyards and adventuring around New York City. Find Leanna at Twitter @leannarenee and Facebook.com/lrhieber. More information as well as free reads, author resources, links to her art and Etsy store and more can be found at leannareneehieber.com.

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Castle Talk: Roger Corman on Making Movies and New Series "Cult-Tastic"

This week we’re chatting with Roger Corman, because Friday November 15 premieres a new series from Shout Factory TV Cult-tastic: Tales From The Trenches with Roger and Julie Corman. Heralded as “the Pope of Pop Cinema,” Roger and Julie Corman pull back the curtain on the Cormans' lifetime of innovative genre filmmaking in this never-before-seen docu-series. The Cormans open up about their iconic pool of collaborators such as James Cameron, Joe Dante, Penelope Spheeris, Pam Grier and more, as well as their notoriously bare-bones production philosophy that created some of film’s most memorable special FX sequences in science-fiction, fantasy and other cult favorites.

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Doctor Sleep: The Stephen King Retrospective (Podcast Review)

This week we continue our Stephen King retrospective with DOCTOR SLEEP, directed by Mike Flanagan and starring Ewan MacGregor as Danny Torrance, the boy who escaped the Overlook Hotel at the end of The Shining.

 

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Castle Talk: Frank Sabatella, Director of The Shed (Interview)

Tonight we’re chatting with Frank Sabatella, writer and director of THE SHED. The Shed is a new movie in which bullied young man Stan (Warren) and his best friend Dommer (Kostro) discover a murderous vampire living in Stan’s shed. Seeing the bloodshed and destruction the monster is capable of, Stan knows he has to find a way to destroy it - but Dommer has a much more sinister plan in mind. It’s directed by Frank Sabatella and stars Jay Jay Warren (“Bosch”), Cody Kostro (“City on a Hill”), Sofia Happonen (Woman of a Certain Age), Frank Whaley (Pulp Fiction), Siobhan Fallon Hogan (Men in Black) and Timothy Bottoms (The Last Picture Show). 

THE SHED comes to theaters and VOD and Digital HD on Nov. 15, 2019.

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The Shining (1997 Miniseries): The Stephen King Retrospective (Podcast Review)

This week we return to the world of Stephen King with the 1997 miniseries written by King based on his own novel, The Shining directed by Mick Garris and starring Steven Weber and Rebcca De Mornay.

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Halloween Discussion: Tales of Halloween

This week have a Halloween episode with the anthology film Tales of Halloween, a 2015 American horror comedy film anthology consisting of ten mildly interlocking segments, each revolving around the Halloween. It was directed by Neil Marshall, Darren Lynn Bousman, Axelle Carolyn, Lucky McKee, Andrew Kasch, Paul Solet, John Skipp, Adam Gierasch, Jace Anderson, Mike Mendez, Ryan Schifrin, and Dave Parker.

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Castle Talk: Alice Waddington, director of Paradise Hills

PARADISE HILLS is Spanish fashion creative and photographer Alice Waddington’s feature debut, in which Emma Roberts plays a girl who wakes up on an isolated island in a facility run by the sinister Duchess played by Milla Jovovich, to whom high-class families send their daughters to become perfect versions of themselves. Director Alice Waddington chats about the film. Samuel Goldwyn Films will release the fantasy/sci-fi/thriller PARADISE HILLS in theaters October 25, 2019 and on digital and on demand November 1, 2019.

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The Wraith starring Charlie Sheen

This week have a request from regular podmate Tony Salvaggio: we’re discussing the 1986 independently made American revenge action-fantasy film The Wraith. The movie stars Charlie Sheen in the story of a young man who comes back from the dead as a supernatural out to finish off the the drag racing gang that murdered him. Does God make cars? Apparently, because this guy comes back with a souped up Dodge with special powers.

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Castle Talk: Drew Edwards on Halloween Man and Comics, School Shootings, And Grappling with Political Controversy

Drew Edwards is writer of the long running underground comic series Halloween Man and winner of the 2018 BEST OF AUSTIN AWARD from the Austin Chronicle. He's launching a new arc of the ongoing Halloween Man series starting this month with Issue #18, a set of stand-alones called Halloween Man: Ugly America. The arc is a satirical look that calls to mind the famed Swamp Thing series American Gothic, in which Halloween Man brushes up against angry citizens out to summon demons and an issue on school shootings. Meanwhile, Edwards will be kicking off a year of celebrating Halloween Man's 20th Anniversary with a "Halloween Man: Road to 20 Years Kickoff Party" in Austin at Flamingo Cantina, evening October 19, benefiting Girls Rock Austin and Out Youth.

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Dan Curtis' Dracula: The Sexy Vampire Retrospective

Dracula is a 1973 British television film adaptation of Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula written by Richard Matheson and directed by Dark Shadows creator Dan Curtis, with Jack Palance in the title role. It was the second collaboration for Curtis and Palance after the 1968 TV film The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.[1]

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Castle Talk: Andy Martin, author of With Child: Lee Child and the Readers of Jack Reacher

Andy Martin is the author of Reacher Said Nothing: Lee Child and the Making of Make Me.  He writes for The Independent and The New York Times and teaches at the University of Cambridge. His nonfiction book on surfing, Walking on Water, is a cult classic.  His new book is With Child: Lee Child and the Readers of Jack Reacher. 

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Santo vs. The Vampire Women

Santo vs. las Mujeres Vampiro (also known as Samson vs. the Vampire Women) is a 1962 horror film starring the wrestling superhero Santo. A lot of you may know it because it was also a 1995 episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000. It was brought to the US by one K Gordon Murray, who was responsible for a lot of kids matinee material in the 60s. 

COOL BONUS: This week we're joined by Jen and Dawn of the amazing Women in Caskets Podcast!

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And Then There Were None (1945)

This week we have a standalone episode inspired by our recent discussion of Friday the 13th, the 1945 film AND THEN THERE WERE NONE based on the play and novel by Agatha Christie.

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Remembering Peyton Place

Over the course of a couple of years I watched Peyton Place, the TV series, from its launch on September 15, 1964, to the departure of the show's breakout star Mia Farrow in August of 1966. That's 263 episodes, from a time when the 30-minute, half-hour soap was broadcast three nights a week in prime time. I found my way to Peyton Place because I'd read the book by Grace Metalious, then seen the two Hollywood films of the 50s. For years I put off checking out the TV show because I understood that many of the characters were different. But finally I made the plunge. I'd watch a few episodes at a time, then none for a period of months, then back.

Peyton Place, the novel, takes place in the 1940s, and tells the story of a small town as seen through the eyes of Allison MacKenzie, a girl who wants to be a writer. The whole thrust of the book is one of hope in the face of cynicism, for Peyton Place is a nasty, forbidding place full of shameful secrets. Today people have kind of written the book off because while it was considered racy at the time, it's nothing compared to the trashy soap fiction of the 70s. What's lost, I think, is a genuinely good novel from a genuinely talented, observant writer who died too soon-- Grace Metalious, awkward and uncomfortable in interviews and loathe to get along with Hollywood, died of cirrhosis of the liver in 1964, just eight years after the publication of Peyton Place.
The films Peyton Place and Return to Peyton Place, released in 1959 and 1961 are the stuff that technicolor dreams are made of-- they make the shabby little town beautiful, and though they tap the brakes a little on the adult content, they don't do it by much. Most of the original characters are in place and the movies follow the plots of the books more or less. Allison the girl becomes Allison the writer in Return, and we see her (in a very meta Metalious move) write the book that would become Metalious's own.
Peyton Place the TV Series was a different animal, an attempt by producer Paul Monash to create a "high-class anthology drama" that would play in prime time and look and feel much more like a movie than a soap. And it does-- watching the first couple of seasons, I was struck by the way that expert composition of shots was simply standard on this black-and-white show. And the scripts tend to be literate, even poetic.
There are plenty of plot differences between the TV series and its source material. Selena Cross, the troubled girl from the wrong side of the tracks whose trial for murder occupies most of the film Return to Peyton Place, is nowhere in sight. The characters run from the comfortable middle class to the wealthy, and virtue is generally to be found among the middle class. Whereas the movies had been about the secrets of a small town that was inherently corrupt, the TV series-- dominated by Mia Farrow as the wide-eyed, wispy-voiced Allison-- is about how small towns are always fighting to reveal their essential goodness. The doctors, lawyers and executives of Peyton Place have everyone's best interest at heart. It's like a mirror-mirror universe version of the movie Peyton Place, except the movies are the bad side. That sounds like a critique but it's not, it's a way of understanding where this show is coming from. It's just a nicer small town. But there are still secrets and lies, such as Allison's birth out of wedlock or Betty hiding a miscarriage to keep a husband who doesn't want her.
But man, do we have great performances on this thing. Mia Farrow is so unforgettably odd that it's impossible for her to follow the earnest trajectory of the book Allison. Here, Allison is a quaverying, delicate thing, unable to cope with the drama of life, demanding to shape the world to her own vision. But before she gets so completely strange, you get to see a lot of Allison and Rodney (Ryan O'Neal) as the original supercouple.
 
Dorothy Malone as Constance is a woman who can act with her eyes, a useful talent when many times her eyes are supposed to tell you she doesn't believe someone's lies. Ed Nelson will make you believe a doctor can single-handedly run a small town on moral rectitude alone.
Leslie Nielsen plays twins. Twins!
It's not for a season or two that we get anything at all like the unhappy Crosses of the book, when Norman is accused of murdering the working-class bully Joe Chernak. That's when the show begins to take on some gray, when its class consciousness emerges and we meet the always-sweet Rita, played by LA attorney Patricia Morrow as a smudge-faced, hardworking angel who marries well. Rita is sweet like Tara on Buffy was sweet-- impossibly, dangerously sweet. Her polar oppostite was Betty (Barbara Parkins)-- who begins as conniving and winds up wounded and striving. Parkins, within a year or two, will kill in Valley of the Dolls.



A lot of these roles are so well-handled it's amazing to think they were putting out three episodes a week. Lee Grant returned from a long, unfair acting absence to play Stella, the angry, wounded sister of the deceased Joe. She's simply amazing.
I watched until the end of Allison's tenure, episode 263, August 26, 1966, when Allison walks around Peyton Place like David Tennant on his way out of Doctor Who, peering through windows at everyone before she disappears up a road, gone for good.



There will never be another Peyton Place.

Castle Talk: Bridget Nelson of RiffTrax on The Teen Agers Series

Bridget Jones Nelson is a writer and comedian known for her work on Mystery Science Theater 3000 and for the past several years as half of the RiffTrax audio commentary team Bridget & Mary Jo, where she and comedian Mary Jo Pehl riff on features, industrial shorts, often with an eye on the social lives and mores of the United States in the mid-century. Her new short is VACATION DAYS, a 1947 entry into a series about and called TEEN-AGERS.

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IT Chapter 2: The Stephen King Retrospective

This week we return to the Stephen King Retrospective we’re talking about IT Chapter 2 directed by Andy Muschietti. We talk about the meaning of it all, compare this version with the 1990 Tim Curry vehicle, and more. Let us know what you think on our Facebook page!

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Castle Talk: PJ Hoover, Author of The Hidden Code

PJ Hooover is the prolific writer of the new book from CBAY, The Hidden Code.
Eleven years ago, Hannah Hawkins' parents disappeared while traveling abroad. Presumed dead, Hannah and her uncle are shocked when a letter from her mom arrives right after Hannah's sixteenth birthday. By piecing together cryptic hints from the note and other clues left behind, Hannah realizes her parents disappeared while trying to find the mysterious Code of Enoch, an artifact they believed could hold the key to curing disease—or creating it. Hannah's parents had been determined to destroy the Code, no matter the cost. Now with the help of her uncle, her best friend, and another cute but not entirely trustworthy guy, Hannah sets out to discover what happened to her parents and if the Code of Enoch is real.

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Castle Talk: Patrick Greene, author of GRIM HARVEST

Patrick C. Greene is a lifelong horror fan who lives in the mountains of western North Carolina. He launched his Ember Hollow series with Red Harvest and is currently working on the third novel in the series. He is also the author of the novels Progeny and The Crimson Calling, as well as numerous short stories featured in collections and anthologies.

GRIM HARVEST from Kensington Books is the gripping second installment of Greene’s Haunted Hollow Chronicles, continuing a year from where the first book left off. Faced with a monster desperate for revenge and out for blood, this town might just realize the killer is one of them. 

Set in a fictional town loosely based on Asheville, NC, this chilling return to a town cursed by a dark and twisted evil will have you scrambling for the lights.

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Castle Talk: Spooky Spectacle Director Brandy Herr

Brandy Herr is the co-owner of Spooky Spectacle, a convention featuring horror, paranormal, sci-fi, cosplay, fantasy, etc. Spooky Spectacle 2019 will be held September 14 and 15 at the Will Rogers Memorial Center in Fort Worth, Texas. This event will feature Ken Sagoes from A Nightmare on Elm Street 3 & 4, the Giant Green Goblin Head from Stephen King's Maximum Overdrive (making its first ever Texas appearance!), as well as a Pet Sematary reunion with Dale Midkiff and Miko Hughes.

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Castle Talk: Rob Zombie, Director of 3 From Hell

3 From Hell is the long-awaited followup to the crime film The Devil’s Rejects, itself a sequel to the nightmarishly bloody and phosphorescent House of 1000 Corpses. 3 From Hell follows the remaining members of the Firefly family as they run from the law and try to make sense of their future. The film debuts on September 16 in select theaters from Fathom Events, and comes to DVD and Blu-Ray on October 15. We talk about media commentary in 3 From Hell and the value of a director's vision.

Hosted by Jason Henderson, editor of this Summer's Castle of Horror Anthology: Volume 1 and author of the upcoming Young Captain Nemo: Quest for the Nautilus.

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Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (2002)

This week we have a special edition of our Godzilla series in honor of this week’s Death Battle episode, for which our own Tony Salvaggio is on the writing team; we’re talking about the 2002 film GODZILLA AGAINST MECHAGODZILLA, part of the Godzilla Millennium series from Toho.

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Friday the 13th (1980)

This week we have a special look at the 1980 movie Friday the 13th directed Sean S Cunningham. Along the way we try to discern how the movie might have appeared in 1980, and similarities and differences between this and its next of kin, the original Halloween.

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Castle Talk: Satanic Panic writer Grady Hendrix

Grady Hendrix is a popular horror author of such books as My Best Friend’s Exorcism and the amazing nonfiction look at vintage horror, Paperbacks from Hell. He’s the writer of the new movie SATANIC PANIC starring Hayley Griffith (“The Loudest Voice”, “The Mysteries of Laura”), Ruby Modine (“Shameless”, Happy Death Day franchise) and Rebecca Romijn (X-Men franchise, “Star Trek: Discovery”), directed by up-and-coming director Chelsea Stardust (“Into The Dark”, Seeing Green). In SATANIC PANIC, pizza delivery girl Sam finds herself in an upscale neighborhood where a group of classic Satanists decide she will make the perfect sacrifice. The film comes out September 6.

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Burnt Offerings: The Summer Rental from Hell

This week we have a special look at the 1976 haunted house movie Burnt Offerings from director Dan Curtis, starring Oliver Reed, Karen Black and Bette Davis. This movie about a family renting a house that begins to work a dark influence on them was an inspiration for The Shining and The Amityville Horror.

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AnimeFest LIVE Panel: The Ring versus the Grudge (Sadako vs. Kayako)

At this year's AnimeFest in Dallas, the Castle of Horror team discusses The Ring versus The Grudge (AKA Sadako vs. Kayako) before a live audience. The Ring vs. The Grudge is a 2016 Japanese supernatural horror film directed by Kōji Shiraishi. It is a crossover of the Ju-on and the Ring series. Hosted by Drew Edwards, creator of the comic Halloween Man; on the panel are author and professor David Bowles; educator and musician Jamie Bahr, Executive Director of Girls Rock Austin; and professional comic book historian Kevin Garcia.

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Castle Talk: Robert Patrick, star of Tone-Deaf

 

Jason talks to Robert Patrick about his role in TONE-DEAF and advice for young actors. TONE-DEAF is written and directed by Richard Bates, Jr. (Trash Fire, Suburban Gothic), and stars Robert Patrick ("Scorpion," Terminator 2: Judgment Day) and Amanda Crew ("Silicon Valley," The Age of Adaline), about a young woman who rents an ornate country house to get away for the weekend only to discover that the eccentric widower Harvey is less eccentric than he is angry and homicidal. Running through the whole thing is a very sharp wit and a lot of 4th-wall monologuing from Robert Patrick as Harvey, a man losing a grip on his sanity and eager to share his many thoughts about what’s wrong with young people today.

Hosted by Jason Henderson, editor of this Summer’s Castle of Horror Anthology Volume 1, available now.

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Brides of Dracula (1960)

This week as the weather grows colder we turn to gothic horror with the 1960 film Brides of Dracula directed by Terence Fisher-- one of the most important gothic horror films of all time. 

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Special Bonus: Once Upon A Time in Hollywood

For a special episode, writer Jason Henderson (http://jasonhenderson.com) and immigration attorney Julia Guzman (http://abogadadenver.com) are joined by UT Rio Grande Valley professor David Bowles (https://davidbowles.us/) to discuss Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, with a special view towards the film's problematic presentation of race, gender-- especially the film's presentation of Sharon Tate-- and the politics of the 60s.

Hosted by Jason Henderson, author of Young Captain Nemo and editor of this summer's Castle of Horror Anthology, available now.

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Godzilla versus Mechagodzilla: The Godzilla Retrospective

This week wrap up our retrospective on Godzilla (for now) with the old-school Godzilla movie Godzilla versus Mechagodzilla (1974).

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Castle Talk: Dale Beran, It Came From Something Awful, Trolls and Trump

DALE BERAN's new book IT CAME FROM SOMETHING AWFUL, How a Toxic Troll Army Accidentally Memed Donald Trump Into Office (All Points Books/Macmillan) is here and it explores the toxicity of the online culture that bred the alt-right and wonder what could have gone differently. We chat about the origins of online trolls and why it's difficult for everyone else to understand the culture.

Hosted by Jason Henderson, author of Young Captain Nemo from Feiwel & Friends/Macmillan Children’s Books.

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Return of Godzilla (1984): The Godzilla Retrospective

This week we look at The Return of Godzilla, also known as Godzilla 1984 or, in the US, as Godzilla 1985, complete with a serious, at times poetic performance from Raymond Burr reprising his role from the original 1956 American release of 1954's Godzilla. Also, a few words on Once Upon a Time in America and The Haunting of Sharon Tate.

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Godzilla vs. Gigan: The Godzilla Retrospective

This week in the Godzilla Retrospective, Godzilla meets the strange, visor-wearing, buzz-saw bellied cyborg monster Gigan! Plus, cockroach aliens.

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Godzilla versus Megalon: The Godzilla Retrospective

This week we continue our retrospective on Godzilla with 1973 movie Godzilla versus Megalon. It's a controversial film for its use of stock footage and the clear "backdoor pilot" introduction of giant robot Jet Jaguar, but we have a lot of fun discussing it.

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Monster Zero: The Godzilla Retrospective

We continue our Godzilla retrospective with Monster Zero, in which Godzilla is hauled to another planet to face King Ghidorah, the three-headed monster introduced in the previous film. 

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Godzilla: King of the Monsters: The Godzilla Retrospective (Re-Post 06-28-19))

We kick off a new summer retrospective on Godzilla movies with Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)-- discussing what people get wrong about Godzilla and why we love these movies. (Encore Re-post 06-28-19)

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Godzilla: King of the Monsters: The Godzilla Retrospective (Re-Post)

We kick off a new summer retrospective on Godzilla movies with Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)-- discussing what people get wrong about Godzilla and why we love these movies.

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Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster: The Godzilla Retrospective

This week we continue our retrospective on Godzilla with 1964 movie Ghidorah the Three-Headed Monster. We discuss how absolutely bonkers the 60s Godzilla movies were. Join us!

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Godzilla: King of the Monsters: The Godzilla Retrospective

We kick off a new summer retrospective on Godzilla movies with Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)-- discussing what people get wrong about Godzilla and why we love these movies.

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Castle Talk: Ashleigh Morghan of Head Count

Head Count is a horror film from Elle Callahan that premiered at last year’s Los Angeles Film Festival, where the pic won a special jury prize for actor Ashleigh Morghan. It hits theaters and digital on June 14 and we're lucky enough to talk to Ashleigh, who talks about how she approaches her craft.
Hosted by host Jason Henderson, editor of this Summer's Castle of Horror Anthology featuring fiction from David Bowles, Dark Shadows' Lara Parker, Kevin J Anderson, Leanna Renee Hieber and more.

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Castle Talk: Amina Mae Safi on her sweet "Gay Rory+Paris" book Tell Me How You Really Feel

Amina Mae Safi is the author of the new novel Tell Me How You Really Feel, which comes out this month and which Bustle already called "the queer hate-to-love story you've been needing in your life." Tell Me How you Really Feel is her second novel after 2018's Not the Girls You're Looking For. Safi was the winner of the We Need Diverse Books short story contest, and that story appears in the anthology Fresh Ink. We talk about writing gay romances for teens, the importance of representation and process.

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Castle Talk: The Cleaning Lady co-writer Alexis Kendra & Exec Producer Jim Nelson

Boy, is The Cleaning Lady disturbing-- the story of a lovesick woman who befriends her badly-scarred cleaning lady, only to become the object of her new friend's dangerous obsessions. Jason chats with Alexis Kendra, who co-writes and stars, and Jim Nelson, Executive Producer, on playing obsession and the slow burn.

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Evil of Dracula: The Bloodthirsty Trilogy

We wrap up our discussion of the Bloodthirsty Trilogy with the amazing 1974 film Evil of Dracula, a perfect mesh of Britain's Hammer and Japanese folklore. 

Plus: Be sure and pre-order The Castle of Horror Anthology, Volume 1, coming in July!

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Lake of Dracula; Avengers: Endgame

We continue our series of 1970s vampire horror with Lake of Dracula (1971) and then spend a special segment on a spoiler-filled discussion of Avengers: Endgame.

Also: don't forget to order the Castle of Horror Anthology today!

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The Vampire Doll: The Bloodthirsty Trilogy

We kick off a brand-new retrospective on the Bloodthirsty Trilogy, a tryptic of supernatural horror films from Japanese director Michio Yamamoto. This week: The Vampire Doll, about a girl who goes looking for her missing brother at a spooky mansion haunted by a murderous vampire ghost.

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The Green Slime

We discuss the 1968 science fiction film The Green Slime directed by Kinji Fukasaku, which was shot in Japan with a Japanese director and film crew, but with the non-Japanese starring cast of Robert Horton, Richard Jaeckel and Luciana Paluzzi.
After destroying a huge asteroid that was on a rapid collision course with Earth, a group of astronauts discover they have accidentally returned to their space station with an alien slime creature that feeds on radiation and can reproduce rapidly from its own blood.

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Castle Talk: Master of Dark Shadows Director David Gregory

David Gregory has made documentaries about a slew of films and filmmakers, most notably 2014’s terrific LOST SOULS, which detailed director Richard Stanley's travails on his big screen adaptation of The Island of Dr. Moreau. Now his subject is Dark Shadows, which starred Canadian actor Jonathan Frid as vampire Barnabas Collins and inspired the 2012 film of the same name. The film features interviews with cast members like Lara Parker, John Karlen and David Selby, famous fans like Whoopi Goldberg, partners of producer Dan Curtis like Barbara Steele, and is narrated by Deadwood’s Ian McShane.

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Castle Talk: Charles Rutledge on the novella "Dracula's Revenge"

Charles Rutledge is the author of Dracula's Revenge: A Jennifer Grail/Carter Decamp Novella that mashes up hard-case-style crime with gothic horror.  Rutledge is the coauthor of three books in the Griffin and Price Crime/Horror series, Blind Shadows, Congregations of the Dead, and A Hell Within, all written with James A. Moore. We talk about the rebirth of novellas and gothic, and how to keep writing consistently.

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Castle Talk: Mike McPadden on Teen Movie Hell

Mike McBeardo McPadden is the author of TEEN MOVIE HELL: A Crucible of Coming-of-Age Comedies from Animal House to Zapped!, an extensive look at the pre-internet era of teen comedies. We talk about why there's no longer such a thing as a teen sex comedy, and why some people think Ferris Bueller is the worst.

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Castle Talk: The Haunting of Sharon Tate Actors Jonathan Bennett & Lydia Hearst

The Haunting of Sharon Tate directed by Daniel Farrands is a new movie  that tells a fictionalized story of the final days of actress Sharon Tate and her friends, including  celebrity stylist Jay Sebring and coffee heiress Abigail Folger. Jason chats with Jonathan Bennett and Lydia Hearst, who play famous stylist Jay Sebring and coffee heiress Abigail Folger. 

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League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: The Captain Nemo Retrospective

This week we wrap up our retrospective of movies featuring Jules Verne’s immortal creation Captain Nemo with the 2003 steampunk literary mashup The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

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Choose Your Own Adventure - Saving the Ocean

Nemo literally has to save the ocean in my new book, Young Captain Nemo. He has to battle in the mysterious Great Pacific Garbage patch, and “Lodgers” — giant hermit crabs that have made their home in old World War II plane wreckage. 

But guess what? In real life, saving the ocean is everyone’s job! So this choose-your-own-adventure can lead you through a maze of choices that can help you make the small decisions that could mean BIG changes for sea life! 

Chapter 1: Dinner with the babysitter.

It’s six-o’clock, and your stomach is rumbling. After a busy day of school, followed by tuba practice with Mr. Humperdink, and walking home the long way to avoid Mrs. Feldman’s snappy poodle, you are feeling practically weak with hunger! 

You walk in the front door and your babysitter greets you. Great. Maggie-the-maniac is babysitting again. You’re convinced that Maggie is trying to re-live her youth through you and your little sister. She’s always insisting that you build blanket forts, or play freeze tag, when you and your sis usually just want to lay around and read, or watch TV. 

“Jakey’s home!” Maggie shrills as you open the door. “Jakey! Put that tuba down and come over here. We’re just about to order dinner. Your parents left some money.”

You look at the two menus that Maggie laid out. One is for “King Shrimp,” where they deliver way more fried shrimp than any human being could ever eat for only $9.99. The other is for a place right down the street that promotes that it imports responsibly-raised seafood. It’s a little pricier. Which do you choose?

A) You vote for the slightly more expensive restaurant, and skip your usual appetizer of lobster tails to afford it! 

B) You vote for the cheap fried shrimp and get extra lobster tails.

If you voted for option A, you helped save the seas—and probably enjoyed tastier food! Go on to Chapter 2.

If you voted for option B, you might have a tummy ache right about now… Go on to Chapter 2. 


Chapter 2: Beach Day!

You spend a day at the beach with an incredible picnic. You’ve got sandwiches, you’ve got chips, you’ve got soda. And when you’re done… you’ve got trash! You stuff some of it in your bag, but when your bag gets full you look around and realize there is other trash strewn along the beach. You could leave your trash and no one would ever know. You decide to…

A) You leave your trash—who cares? No one will notice.
B) You pick up your trash, and some of the other trash on the way to the parking lot.

If you voted for option A, you’re being a litterbug—that’s kind of a bummer. Next time you have the chance, pick up a few extras to make up for it! Now it's time to read a great book!


If you voted for option B, you’re saving the seas! Way to go—you should feel great about making the world a little bit safer and cleaner. I'm guessing you need a new book to read.

"Armed with his wits, his friends, and his Nemotech submarine, a twelve-year-old descendant of Jules Verne’s famous antihero is determined to help make the ocean a safer place one adventure at a time in Jason Henderson's Young Captain Nemo, first in a new middle-grade series."

The Amazing (AKA The Return of) Captain Nemo: The Captain Nemo Retrospective

We continue looking at famous Nemos with the 1978 Irwin Allen SF adventure The Amazing Captain Nemo AKA The Return of Captain Nemo, starring Jose Ferrer and Burgess Meredith.

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Captain Nemo & The Underwater City: The Captain Nemo Retrospective

We discuss the UK 1969 film Captain Nemo and the Underwater City, starring Robert Ryan and Chuck Connors.

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Castle Talk: Travis Stevens, Dir. of Girl on the Third Floor

Travis Stevens talks about his writing and directing debut, GIRL ON THE THIRD FLOOR, which premieres in March at South by Southwest.

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5 Great Adventure Books

My daughter (one of my daughters, there are two around here) and I were talking about the kinds of books we like to read. If you’re serious about writing you should read anything you get your hands on, but you still find your favorites. She likes historical stories with a little romance but can’t stand contemporary romance.

I love to read adventure books and thrillers. I’ve published a lot of what I’d call fantasy-adventure—the Alex Van Helsing books are basically spy adventures with some magic. But I’ve never actually published a straight, no-magic-involvead adventure until Young Captain Nemo, which comes out in March 2019.

Young Captain Nemo comes from a long tradition of adventure novels that revolve around expeditions: the main character gathers his or her crew and sets out to learn or bring back something. It’s a story as old as the Golden Fleece, which Jason had to go find in his ship Argo. I’m a sucker for anything where you tell me, “okay, they hear there’s this thing across the world and they gotta go get it, but they only have a few days.” If it could include a map and a dotted line, I am so there.

So Gabriel’s first adventure is one of those, but it’s not here yet. If you’re looking for a list of great adventure books, here are 5 Great Adventure Books to keep you busy until then!

1. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne - This book and the next, as I’ve written before, are the source of the story of Captain Nemo and his great ship Nautilus. 20,000 Leagues is a classic quest adventure: Professor Arronax sets out to discover the mystery of a sea creature only to discover the creature is an experimental submarine, which he joins for a journey that includes unknown caverns, escapes from collapsing ice floes, and the sunken city of Atlantis.
   
   
   
2. Mysterious Island by Jules Verne - Forget what you might know from movies involving giant crabs and things, Mysterious Island is a straight adventure about a group of men trying to survive on a desert island. You can learn so much from this book, but the best thing is the team’s relentless optimism in the face of their challenges.
   
   
   
3. Congo, Michael Crichton. Another one where you should pretend there never was a movie. Congo was Crichton’s pitch-perfect homage to classic jungle adventures. In this one, a team including an intelligent gorilla go in search of a lost city. Just fantastic.
   
   
   
4. The Odyssey, Homer + Translator. At some point everyone who wants to be a writer needs to read the Odyssey, because so much of our references in Western Civilization come from here. In modern terms, the Odyssey is a fast-moving fantasy involving dangerous sirens who try to hypnotize Odysseus and his crew to the giant Cyclops. (By the way, Odysseus uses a fake name at one point, giving Jules Verne the name of his antihero: Nemo.
   
   
   
5. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain. People forget how beautiful this book is, the story of a boy making his way down the Mississippi River with a runaway slave he loves like a father. Often tense and sometimes shockingly violent, Huckleberry Finn is one of the great American classics. And man, Twain is great with a voice.
   
   

Those are my Top 5 Best Adventure Novels, but I’d stand to be corrected. I’m always looking for more to read, so send them along.

And don't forget to order your copy of Young Captain Nemo. Keep the adventure going, and share it with the kids in life. 

"Armed with his wits, his friends, and his Nemotech submarine, a twelve-year-old descendant of Jules Verne’s famous antihero is determined to help make the ocean a safer place one adventure at a time in Jason Henderson's Young Captain Nemo, first in a new middle-grade series."

Castle Talk: Eyal Kless, Author of The Lost Puzzler

Eyal Kless is a classical violinist who currently teaches violin in the Buchmann-Mehta School of Music at Tel Aviv University, and performs with the Israel Haydn String Quartet, which he founded. He calls in from a visit to Stuttgart to discuss his new post-apocalyptic book The Puzzler, a rich vision about the search for a boy who can unlock any puzzle.

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Mysterious Island (1961): The Captain Nemo Retrospective

In anticipation of the release of Young Captain Nemo by Jason Henderson, we kick off a new retrospective on movies featuring Jules Verne's immortal Captain Nemo with the 1961 film Mysterious Island, featuring the amazing special effects of Ray Harryhausen.

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The Scariest Sea Monsters

You can’t have a sea story without sea monsters. Oh, sure, they don’t have to be literal monsters—in the original 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, the most dangerous “monster” turns out to be the submarine Nautilus. But the one people remember is the giant squid—a natural creature that sure seems like monster when it’s overwhelming your crew and ship. Monsters are in the eye of the beholder.




When I set out to write Young Captain Nemo, I knew that the story would revolve around a monster very much in the way 20,000 Leagues did. 

The adventure unfolds because a lot of people— including young Gabriel Nemo—want to investigate a mysterious creature (actually a lot of them) that have been spotted in the Pacific Ocean. The creatures are called Lodgers, crustacean-like beings from the bottom of the Pacific that tend to put on old ships and plane husks as armor the way a hermit crab puts on an old shell.

Something was rising from the waves. Gabriel saw the propeller first, looking like a nose as eyes protruded above. Four wings emerged next, two stacked on each side. The creature whipped its wings and rose, plastic beads and water streaming down it as it took to the air. It was a World War I biplane. For a moment Gabriel was stunned, taking in the strange tentacles hanging from the body of the plane and the faded blue barnacled tail, split into sections and pulsating with strange flesh and tendrils, swishing from side to side as it swooped toward them.

The biplane was approaching swiftly, angrily, flapping its wings in a way biplanes were never meant to do.

And that’s not even the scariest one in the book.


So in honor of those newcomers to the mythical world, I wanted to present a list of the Top 5 Scariest Sea Monsters throughout time (excepting the Lodgers in Young Captain Nemo). 


Leviathan - This creature gets referenced everywhere from the Bible to Dark Shadows and everywhere in between. Leviathan was considered so dangerous a sea creature that were he to breed, his progeny would destroy the world—thus God killed the only female Leviathan and preserved her body for a future feast.




The Kraken – If you’ve been a kid in the last forty years, the first thing you’ll think of when you hear The Kraken is the big one in Clash of the Titans—as in “Release the Kraken!” 

It’s really a Norse monster—a giant Octopus. But the Kraken’s appearance in Clash never bothered me in slightest, especially because as seen there he’s more a giant fish-monster.




Jörmungandr – On of the great foes of Thor, the Jormungandr is the world-serpent who wraps itself around the entire world and could crush us all at its whim. Technically Thor didn’t fight such an enormous creature, he just had to lift it in a feat of strength. Lift some of it. One of its feet.




The Scylla – The Scylla is one of two monsters that Greek sailors had to carefully avoid, because they were right across from one another in a narrow channel of water. Scylla was a beautiful being transformed into a monster with multiple heads and eyes. She would seize and eat 6 sailors for every ship that passed by. 




The Charibdis - the counterpart of the Scylla, the Charibdis was an angry, flippered monster that controlled a vicious whirlpool.





If you have your own favorite, please share it. Let me know what I left out!

"Armed with his wits, his friends, and his Nemotech submarine, a twelve-year-old descendant of Jules Verne’s famous antihero is determined to help make the ocean a safer place one adventure at a time in Jason Henderson's Young Captain Nemo, first in a new middle-grade series."

What is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch?

An excerpt from Young Captain Nemo (on sale March 12th) 

“Where were these photos taken?”

Gabriel pulled out a tablet and called up an atlas, then tapped in the coordinates as he spoke. When he was done, he spun the tablet around so they could see the image of the ocean, with the coordinates highlighted. “One hundred thirty-five degrees West . . . thirty-five degrees North.”

“The Eastern Great Pacific Garbage Patch,” Peter whispered.

Misty seemed to be searching her memory banks. “I’ve heard of that.”

Peter spun his fingers in a swirl over the tablet. “There’s a current called the North Pacific Gyre that swirls through the Pacific in a circle. And this, the Eastern Garbage Patch, is a giant whirlpool of plastic trash smack between Hawaii and California.” A large oval representing the gyre glowed and revolved slowly in the middle of the ocean. “A lot of what we throw away breaks down and winds up there.”

“Right.” Misty remembered now. “It’s a disaster for sea life, too. So how big is it?”

“About the size of Texas,” Gabriel said. “Three hundred thousand square miles. Give or take.”

“Yeah, so that’s . . . big.” Peter looked off. Gabriel could see him running calculations in his head, and then he looked back and laughed. “It would take the Obscure thirty hours just to get to the edge of that thing.”

*****

“Gabe? We’re reaching the Garbage Patch.”

“Really?” 

Gabriel reached the bridge a minute or two ahead of Misty, who rubbed her face and shook off whatever sleep she’d had as she reached her console. The Obscure was running along the surface as Gabriel gazed at the view screen, which still showed endless Pacific blue ahead.

“Yep.” Peter threw the sonar up and it took over half the screen. As the sonar line swept around the clocklike circles, countless speckles flickered dully. “It covers the ocean up ahead. And it’ll keep going.”

A new ping appeared at the top edge of the sonar screen—a thick mass that indicated something with a lot of weight. “Hello,” Gabriel said. “What’s that?”

Peter touched his headphones. “It’s not making any noise. If it’s a craft, it’s not running.
In fact it’s not moving.” 

“Could it be a fishing vessel?” Gabriel asked. “Maybe they’re anchored.”

“If so, I’d be hearing all kinds of things. Tools, machinery, generators.”

“Besides,” added Misty, “would a fishing boat be all the way out here?”


Gabriel shrugged. “Could it be a whale?”

Gabriel felt the ship rising as water rushed out of the walls and tanks, and something caught his ear. “What’s that noise?”

*****

According to National Geographic, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a "collection of marine debris in the North Pacific Ocean. Marine debris is litter that ends up in the ocean, seas, and other large bodies of water." This marine debris is mostly plastic, as you can see from the photos below.

In Young Captain Nemo, the characters, including the descendent of Jules Vernes's famous character Captain Nemo, have to work to save the ocean.

"Armed with his wits, his friends, and his Nemotech submarine, a twelve-year-old descendant of Jules Verne’s famous antihero is determined to help make the ocean a safer place one adventure at a time in Jason Henderson's Young Captain Nemo, first in a new middle-grade series."