Chris Scullion is a Scottish video games journalist who's been covering video games professionally for 16 years. For the first six years of his career he worked at the Official Nintendo Magazine in the UK, then became the Games Editor of CVG before its untimely end. After setting up his own site, Tired Old Hack, Chris then joined Video Games Chronicle (VGC) where he is currently Features Editor. He has a passion for retro games and cataloguing their history, hence his ongoing series of console encyclopedia books (search his name on Amazon).
It’s that festive time of the year where giving is more important than receiving… or at least that’s what I try to tell my loved ones when I’m trying to get more Blu-rays from them for Christmas.
That’s why I’m giving you a Christmas present.
Last week I hit a delightful wee milestone, in that my ebook That Was A Bit Mental Volume 1 hit 600 downloads. For a wee book that has had zero publicity other than a few tweets, I’m delighted with this.
To celebrate, and to get you in the Christmas spirit, I’m giving you my follow-up ebook, That Was A Bit Mental Volume 2.
It’s December, and that can only mean one thing. Yes, it’s Slovenian Independence Day on the 26th.
As a warm-up to that big occasion, there’s also a smaller event on the previous day called Christmas, where families come together and give each other presents and eat food and get fat and get miserable for the next eleven months until they lose the fat then they decide to lose more weight because they know they’re probably going to get fat again next Christmas. It’s good fun.
With that in mind, I’ve put together a list of the 25 Christmas horror films you should watch to get in the festive mood. Ladies, gentlemen, children with irresponsible parents who let you watch films you’re too young for, I give you the That Was A Bit Mental Shoddily Photoshopped Advent Calendar Of Christmas Horror Films And That. Continue reading “The TWABM Advent Calendar (AKA the 25 best Christmas horror movies)”→
Starring: Richard Rankin, Louise Stewart, Kirsty Strain, Hope Florence, Amy E Watson
“I’m so stupid. I’m so stupid. I mean, Sophie and I, we could see the windows were boarded up from the outside… and we still went in with him. So stupid. Everything was wrong, and we still went inside with him.” (Anna, The House Of Him)
At the time of writing this review, my day job is being heavily scrutinised by a bunch of scrotes who claim to be trying to expose a lack of ‘ethics’ in video game journalism.
In reality it’s a front for something much more sinister, much darker and misogynist in nature. While this is actually fairly apt when talking about The House Of Him, it’s not why I bring it up.
Instead, it’s just a wanky way for me to bring up this full disclosure: I know Robert Florence, the lovely Glaswegian chap who wrote, directed and edited this film. I consider him a friend and I’d like to think the feeling is mutual.
Despite this friendship, and the fact I love most of the stuff he does, that doesn’t mean I’m incapable of criticising him. He wanted Scottish independence, I didn’t. He loves Dynasty Warriors games, I think they’re pish.
So I approached The House Of Him with a mixture of excitement and fear. Excitement because I love the vast majority of stuff Rab does – his sketch shows, his games writing, his vintage video game webshow Consolevania, which was fucking nailing it many years before the era of annoying YouTubers began.
The Changing Rooms reboot was deemed a little too dark for daytime ITV audiences
But also fear, because should it turn out to be shite, I would be placed in the awkward position of reviewing a mate’s work and slapping a pishy wee single-star rating on it then hoping he didn’t notice.
After all, comedy writing and video games writing are one thing, but I would imagine making a horror film requires a completely different skillset.
Starring: Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Carrie Coon, Kim Dickens, Patrick Fugit, Neil Patrick Harris, Tyler Perry
“What are you thinking? What are you feeling? What have we done to each other? What will we do?” (Nick, Gone Girl)
If man-crushes are indeed a real thing, then my man-crush is Ben Affleck.
I don’t give shit haters, bring it. Never mind the fact he was amazing in Argo and glorious in Good Will Hunting, those are a given.
He was also charming in Chasing Amy, delightful in Dogma and yes, despite what popular opinion (and Team America) would have you believe, peerless in Pearl Harbour.
Starring: Pedro García Oliva, Óscar Gisbert, Nereida López
Also known as: Carnívoros
OSCAR – “Before we have sex, I need to know your name.”
YOLANDA – “They call me… Spain’s bitch.”
OSCAR – “Oh! Yeah! That’s right. Ole to your father. Not Maria, or Theresa, but Spain’s bitch. Direct and patriotic, I like it.”
In my view, it’s all well and good making a gore movie as long as there’s a half-decent plot to back it up. The Spanish Chainsaw Massacre sticks two fingers up to this notion, before presumably chopping them off.
When the story’s so basic that the entire film can be summed up with a single sentence that speaks volumes, so here goes:
A band called The Metal Dicks have problems with their van while on the road, so they head to the nearest village, which is populated by cannibals who set about eating them.
Starring: Morgan Fairchild, Brian Bremer, Christopher Wolf, Sara Suzanne Brown, Michele Matheson, Don Dowe
Also known as: Virgin Hunters
“We come from your future. Our mission here is to prevent a corporate takeover of the planet, and the banning of sex between consenting adults.” (Naldo, Test Tube Teens From The Year 2000)
Let’s face it, even if you don’t know anything about this film you already know why I decided to watch and review it.
Yes, I’m a sucker for a great film title, and if my rating at the end of each review was based on titles alone this little beauty would find itself in the Hall Of Fame with gusto.
Sadly however, the film itself doesn’t quite live up to the heady expectations set by its name – how could it ever expect to? – and as such the number of Trevor Moorhouse heads you see at the bottom is lower than one would have hoped.
Starring: Dee Wallace Stone, M Emmet Walsh, Billy Green Bush, Scott Grimes, Billy Zane
CRITTER 1 – “They have weapons.” CRITTER 2 – “So what?” <Critter 2 is blown up> CRITTER 2 – “Fuck!”
As I’ve explored in numerous reviews in the past, such as Bride Of Chucky and Puppet Master III, there comes a point in some horror films where it becomes clear that the killer isn’t very intimidating.
There are ways to deal with this. The Puppet Master solution was to turn its killers – the titular puppets – into the heroes and make the audience root for them.
The Bride Of Chucky solution, meanwhile, was to acknowledge that the concept of a killer doll was a daft one and therefore the best thing to do was not only make Chucky the hero but also play the film entirely for laughs.
Critters instead takes the Gremlins approach (the first one, not its sequel), which also aims for comedy but at the same time steadfastly refuses to accept that its killer creatures are anything other than nasty little bastards. And it works. Continue reading “Critters (1986) review”→
Full Moon, the studio behind the Puppet Master series, realised it sooner than this. By the end of Puppet Master II, in which the killer puppets are double-crossed by their evil owner, the audience is expected to start feeling sympathy for them.
Puppet Master III, then, takes things one step further and makes the puppets outright good guys. A horror film in which the killer dolls are the heroes? Who could the villains possibly be, other than Nazis or something? Continue reading “Puppet Master III: Toulon’s Revenge (1991) review”→
Starring: Charlie Sheen, Tom Berenger, Corbin Bernsen, Wesley Snipes, Rene Russo, Dennis Haysbert, James Gammon
CERRANO – “Bats, they are sick. I cannot hit curveball. Straight ball, I hit it very much. Curveball, bats are afraid. I ask Jobu to come, take fear from bats. I offer him cigar, rum. He will come.”
HARRIS – “You know, you might wanna think about taking Jesus Christ as your saviour instead of fooling around with all this stuff.”
CERRANO – “Ah, Jesus. I like him very much. But he no help with curveball.”
HARRIS – “Are you trying to say Jesus Christ can’t hit a curveball?”
Let me cut to the chase: if you’re from the UK, chances are you don’t care about baseball and haven’t heard of Major League. And yet – spoilers – I’ve given it five stars. Lol wut etc.
The truth is, I’m slightly biased here. I have family who lived in Cleveland, Ohio and as a result I grew up following the Cleveland-based sports teams, most notably the Cleveland Browns of the NFL and the Cleveland Indians of the MLB.
Major League, a comedy movie about the Indians, has therefore featured in my life for more than two decades. Over the years I’ve watched my worn-out VHS copy, DVD copy and Blu-ray copy so many times I could probably act the whole thing out from start to finish. Continue reading “Major League (1989) review”→
Starring: Robin Williams, Connie Nielsen, Michael Vartan, Dylan Smith
“Family photos depict smiling faces: births, weddings, holidays, children’s birthday parties. People take pictures of the happy moments in their lives. Someone looking through our photo album would conclude that we had led a joyous, leisurely existence free of tragedy. No one ever takes a photograph of something they want to forget.” (Sy, One Hour Photo)
The tragic death of Robin Williams has led to the inevitable business of fans sharing their favourite movies on their social networks of choice.
Given that he was obviously best known for his comedy work, it’s therefore no surprise that the vast majority of the films and TV shows nominated as his best are humorous in nature.
Mrs Doubtfire, Mork & Mindy, Aladdin, his live stand-up shows… there can be no denying that Williams made us laugh countless times throughout the years. Continue reading “One Hour Photo (2002) review”→
It’s that festive time of the year where giving is more important than receiving… or at least that’s what I try to tell my loved ones when I’m trying to get more Blu-rays from them for Christmas.
That Was A Bit Mental 