Holy Habitual Viewing, Batman, He'll Have Square Eyes!

With this morning's screening of Minerva, Mayhem and Millionaires, I have now watched every episode of the classic Batman serial from '60s in the order they were originally transmitted.

Thanks to the great Talking Pictures TV channel here in the UK, this has been my Saturday morning ritual for the last 28 months or so.

While the idea was to simply ensure I saw all the episodes of this magnificently camp crimefighting show, I can't help but pass comment on the third - and last - season, when the show's makers swapped out Aunt Harriet (Madge Blake) for Batgirl/Barbara Gordon (Yvonne Craig).

Clearly, they felt a '60s audience of (mainly) young boys couldn't cope with two lead female characters at once. It's a pity because as much as I welcome Craig's take on Batgirl, I did miss Aunt Harriet's obliviousness to the Bat-centric shenanigans going on under her nose in stately Wayne Manor.

It was also a bit sad - but emblematic of episodic TV at the time - that Dick Grayson/Robin's  (Burt Ward) aunt wasn't even mentioned this season.

Then again, perhaps she left Gotham at just the right time as the storytelling took a massive nosedive, thanks to attempts to mix things up.

The show largely abandoned its winning two-part story formula (thus eliminating the highly entertaining cliffhangers at the end of part one of every tale) as well as bringing in a host of bland new villains instead of relying on the iconic comic book antagonists (Joker, Riddler, Penguin, Catwoman etc).

The many, wildly popular, comic book continuations of the show have shown that with the right writers and characters, Batman '66 could have run and run.

Batman '66 #1 from 2013

This isn't to say, however, that the TV show was ever less than perfect Saturday morning entertainment.

No matter what silliness was unfolding onscreen, you could always guarantee that Adam West's Batman would take their circumstances seriously... and always have exactly the right Bat-doohickey in his utility belt to help him, Robin, Batgirl, and Alfred (Alan Napier) out of any sticky situation.

But Batman isn't the only vintage show I've watched from start-to-finish in the last couple of years.

I started with all the available episodes of Dad's Army, being shown on U&Gold.

This has always been a very special show to me (and warranted its own article here), because of its connections to my dad.

Then, thanks to Legend, showing four episodes each weekend, I saw every episode of the original Twilight Zone.

Most recently, thanks to the BBC, I watched the entirely of the sublime I, Claudius from the 1970s. I remember watching some of the episodes when I was a child and some, much later, when I was in hospital recovering from my aneurysm. But I'd never seen the entire show from start-to-finish before.

The thing is I have Blu-Rays of the complete runs of both Batman and the Twilight Zone, but it felt somehow more 'authentic' to watch them weekly as new episodes were released on standard definition channels.

I'm also a great believer in the concept of "appointment television". I've a ton of shows on Netflix (where all the episodes drop at once) that I've started, but then felt no incentive to push on with.

However, knowing I'll have to wait a week for a new episode keeps the flame of enthusiasm lit.

Of course, I do binge shows. I'm not a luddite. But weekly shows are still my preferred form of delivery. Because I'm that old.

It did strike me that there was possibly something a tad morbid about this particular project of mine: ensuring I'd seen every episode of select great shows before I pop my clogs.

But I can assure you my motives are a lot more positive. There's so much great television being made all the time that it's easy to overlook the classics of old in the rush to embrace the new.

This is especially true for shows that - over the years - I've dipped in and out of, rather than watching religiously.

With my increasingly unreliable memory, I want to make sure I'm not missing great television from earlier decades while consuming the current crop of high calibre entertainment.

I'm now contemplating what show I might tackle next.

The original run of Star Trek is definitely a contender, although that will be a binge rather than appointment viewing as it's on Paramount Plus these days.

It's actually being shown on Legend as well, but that channel is in the middle of the second season and I don't want to have to wait for them to get round to the start of season one again if I'm going to go "where no man has gone before" as soon as possible.

Will I be boldly going from start to finish on the Final Frontier next?

Hokum (2026)

Stuck on the final chapter of his bestselling Conquistador trilogy, American writer Ohm Bauman (Adam Scott) decides now is the time to head to Ireland to the hotel where his late parents spent their honeymoon.

The idea being that once there he can find the tree that was particularly special to his beloved mother and scatter their ashes amongst its roots.

Arriving at the isolated and instantly creepy Bilberry Woods Hotel, Ohm learns that the honeymoon suite has been locked and barred for years as local legend has it that a witch is trapped in there.

The writer dismisses this as "hokum" and is generally a complete arsehole to most of the staff, arrogant, self-centred and patronising.

However, it turns out this is masking a deep depression; luckily the sensitive barmaid Fiona (Florence Ordesh) realises something is wrong when she goes to his room to return personal items he'd left in the bar after an evening of heavy drinking.

She rescues him from an attempted suicide and the troubled writer is sent to the local hospital to recuperate.

Weeks later, Ohm returns to the hotel to collect his possessions and thank his saviour - only to discover that Fiona has gone missing. He is told, candidly, that the police believe she was kidnapped and killed by the local rough sleeper, Jerry (David Wilmot).

Because she saved his life, Ohm - who is now, almost, a changed man - becomes determined to get involved in the hunt for Fiona, despite the protestations of the hotel manager, Mal (Peter Coonan).

After his stellar performances in the great horror Krampus and, of course, the mind-bending Apple TV tentpole show Severance, I was excited to see Parks and Recreation star Adam Scott - another of my favourite actors -  in a new horror flick.

The incredibly well-crafted script, written by the film's director Damian McCarthy, does a splendid job of manoeuvring Scott's character believably to where he needs to be, in just the right circumstances, but my issue with Hokum is less technical and more mundane.

It very quickly becomes clear that while Ohm is 'haunted' by ghosts of his own, especially concerning the traumatic death of his mother, the central mystery he becomes entangled in is an almost stereotypically sordid, very human, whodunnit.

The supernatural elements of Hokum are thus largely incidental - although often on the dramatic side - barriers to slow down his amateur investigation. 

So, despite Adam Scott's strong performance, and the superb supporting cast, the story was very disappointing for me as I'd come for the ghosts and ghoulies. Sure, they were there, but they almost felt like an afterthought. To be fair, there's several decent "spooky things going on in the background" shots of the kind I always appreciate.

However, a final scene, with Ohm back in the hospital, suggests that - maybe - all the weird stuff Ohm witnessed could have been in his head anyway.

At around 107 minutes, Hokum is too long for the story it has to tell - even with all the character-building sub-plots - and there's definitely a sense of repetition as the tale unfolds. 

Honestly, it could probably have been trimmed down to an hour-long episode of the Twilight Zone or even a half-hour Inside No. 9 and told the same story with more concentrated impact.

Night of the Eagle (1962)

Night of The Eagle will air in the UK on Talking Pictures TV, on July 25 at 9.05pm and July 28 at 9pm

The other year, one of my oldest online friends, John, announced he was having a clear-out and wanted to dispose of some of his old horror-themed Blu-Rays.

Never one to turn down a free movie, I offered to take a few off his hands and soon a package arrived with four discs in.

Among them was one I confess I'd never heard of: Night Of The Eagle (aka Burn Witch Burn).

So, naturally, that was the first to be taken for a spin in the Blu-Ray player.

Charming and charismatic psychology professor Norman Taylor (Peter Wyngarde aka Jason King of Department S) has it all: a great house, a career on the fast-track to success, and a beautiful wife, Tansy (Janet Blair).

Therefore, Norman is shocked to discover that his wife has been secretly practising witchcraft, she says to protect him from dangerous and jealous forces that would otherwise seek to derail his career or even harm him.

Angrily, he makes her destroy all her charms, fetishes, and witchy paraphernalia.

However, no sooner does she do this than their lives take a dramatic turn for the worse.

First, Norman is accused of sexually assaulting Margaret Abbott (Judith Stott), one of his students, at Hempnell Medical College, then some 'force' seemingly attacks his home.

The rational professor tries to deal with all these things logically, but Tansy starts to take increasingly wild, and potentially dangerous, steps to thwart this with - what she believes is - magic.

Night Of The Eagle is a fantastic, little, horror film, in a similar vein to 1957's Night Of The Demon and 1963's The Haunting.

It's oozing with atmosphere, relying on limited special effects and a strong amount of suggestion, so, like Norman, we're never 100 per cent sure if what's happening is co-incidence, feverish hallucinations, hypnosis or genuine black magic.

The ending is a bit sudden, given all the furore that has just unfurled, and certainly comes from the "karma is a bitch" playbook.

But, then, that was the style of films back in the day - they knew not to hang around and outstay their welcome. They had a story to tell, got in, told it, and got out. A trait seemingly lost on some filmmakers and their more recent overlong snorefests.

Based on Fritz Leiber's Conjure Wife (which first appeared in 1943 in Unknown magazine and then as novel in 1953), Night Of The Eagle's original New England setting was changed for 'old' England, instead.

This adaptation (there have been several) was penned by horror legend Richard Matheson with Twilight Zone writer Charles Beaumont, and some tweaking by George Baxt, at the behest of producer Albert Fennell.

A smart, tight, script, buoyed up by cracking performances from all concerned, Night Of The Eagle is definitely one for those who are happy to take their horror served without dollops of gore and jump scares.

I Never Set Out To Be A Funko Collector!

My most recent Pops!: Dunk and Egg

I have no recollection of when I first acquired a Funko Pop! or even which one it was, but now - like something out of the Twilight Zone they seem to be multiplying and filling every nook and cranny in the house!

Wikipedia says of the divisive little figures:

"In 2010, the Funko Pop! line was created. Funko Pop! vinyl line are figures modelled in a style similar to the Japanese chibi style. The figures have large squarish heads, disproportionately small bodies, and large, circular black eyes"

I know some people don't get the appeal, but I find them very cute (and affordable) manifestations of the various niches within my geeky hobbies.

My most recent acquisitions were Dunk and Egg from the excellent A Knight of The Seven Kingdoms and I was very excited to receive a random (one in six, I believe) chase variant of Dunk, dressed as a knight. Of course, this means, at some point I'll need to pick up the original Dunk in scruffy clothes figure.

Originally, I had a single shelf over the door into the gamesroom that was to be the home of my modest Pop! collection, but then more continued to arrive and the horde spread out. So now you can find on book shelves and on top of glass cabinets in several rooms.

Most have been removed from their boxes (one of Rachel's rules for my collecting habits), except for a handful they consider truly collectible (mainly Pops! related to the Mortal Engines movie, based on the book by Philip Reeve).

I'll get round to releasing Dunk and Egg soon, but, at the moment, they seem quite content boxed-up as they are.

A few aren't particularly well-balanced (and have a habit of jumping off shelves in the middle of the night) and so have to lean back on books, but mostly the figures are remarkably stable and remain where they're placed.

Frieren on the far left and He-Man on the right 

Clark Kent changing into Superman, and Krypto

Sue Storm and the Kerblam! Man, hiding behind Scooby-Doo action figures

Pops! have become so pervasive in our house that Rachel even got me a personalised one: me in Pop! form (see below):

That's me, that is

Superman and Lois Lane in flight

Keeping watch from on top of the new bookcase

My original shelf in the gamesroom - filled up very quickly!

THROWBACK THURSDAY: Happy Birthday to 2000AD

The latest issue of the ever-brilliant Judge Dredd Megazine

This week issue 2470 of the weekly 2000AD sci-fi comic anthology comic, along with issue 489 of the Judge Dredd Megazine - the monthly Dredd-centric spin-off - popped through my letterbox just in time for 2000AD's 49th birthday celebrations today (February 19).

I can't recall if I purchased the first issue of the Megazine when it was launched in 1990 (I suspect not), but I certainly remember picking up the very first issue (prog) of 2000AD, back in 1977, when I was 10.

One of my few remaining vivid memories from that age is of sitting in the back of my parents' car, eagerly reading this comic that was unlike anything I had seen before.

I suspect mum and dad were taking me somewhere "fun", but I was more interested in my copy of 2000AD.

Via

Early issues often came packaged with gifts, such as "biotronic" stickers with the second issue, so you could emulate John Probe (the star of the comic's Six Million Dollar Man clone M.A.C.H. 1) with the illusion of robotic parts peeking through your skin!

It's weird now to think that the big selling point of 2000AD initially was its Dan Dare strip (which, despite some striking visuals, ran for less than two years), and Judge Dredd - now a pop culture icon - didn't even appear until prog two.

2000AD was gritty and darker than my usual fare at the time, and thus felt more 'grown up'.

There are stories from those early days that have firmly cemented themselves into my psyche: such as Flesh (about time-travelling cowboys harvesting dinosaur meat), Shako (soldiers versus a man-eating polar bear in the Artic), and some of the more twisted of Tharg's Future Shocks (self-contained Twilight Zone-like stories with an inevitably bonkers surprise ending).

I read the title weekly for a long time, but, as is my wont, eventually found something else to hold my attention (probably American comics, roleplaying games... and girls).

Judge Dredd's debut in prog #2

I can't pinpoint exactly when I stopped reading 2000AD regularly.

However, I do remember devouring several of the early, important, Judge Dredd story arcs, such as The Judge Child, Judge Death Lives, and the Apocalypse War, which would have taken me to at least prog 270.

Sláine, Pat Mills' mythical Celtic berserker, first appeared in prog 330, and I know I followed his early adventures in the magazine, as I immediately grokked the fact that the ideas presented there could be ported over into a redefining of the "berserker/barbarian" character class in Dungeons & Dragons.

So that's six or seven years of loyal reading.

There was one aspect of the magazine that I never really bought into: the fact that it was supposedly edited by an alien called Tharg (a pseudonym adopted by all the actual editors), who arrived on Earth with his arsenal of "cool" alien slang.

He was an extraterrestrial Stan Lee, but gregarious Stan was always 'The Man', whereas, for me, Tharg was a pale imitation.

I've mellowed rather now and the cringe I felt as a teenager about this whole idea now simply makes me smirk a bit.

In subsequent decades, it was primarily Sláine and Judge Dredd that brought me back into the 2000AD fold, picking up either single issues from newsagents or graphic novel collections of stories from bookshops (or later, Amazon).

Although, for many years, there wasn't the same frisson of excitement picking up and reading the odd prog here and there compared to when I was 10.

It felt as though so much geeky media - and society in general - had shifted in that similar ("don't talk down to young readers") direction, even though 2000AD was the trailblazer.

However, in the last year I have resumed my subscription to 2000AD, paired with my longer-running one to the Megazine, as I'm now finding the various stories - on the whole - in the anthology title are gelling more with my tastes.

I also love the fact that 2000AD's still going strong, and that new readers are discovering the joys of its gritty, British adventures every week.

Can't wait to see what the publishers, Rebellion, have lined up for 2000AD's 50th anniversary next year.

This week's 2000AD "prog"

2000AD, prog one, cover date: February 26,1977

Unearthly Stranger (1963)

Several scientists around the world, including Britain's Professor Geoffrey Munro (Warren Mitchell), have died of mysterious, explosive, brain haemorrhages - just as they were about to make major breakthroughs.

All were working on trying to crack the scientific formula that would allow individuals to "project themselves through thought" to alien worlds... what we might call today "astral projection".

Following Munro's sudden demise, newly-married theoretical physicist, Dr Mark Davidson (John Neville, probably best known for his portrayal of Hieronymus Karl Frederick, Baron von Munchausen in Terry Gilliam's 1988 The Adventures of Baron Munchausen) is promoted to take his place in the project.

However, state security - in the form of the secret service's wonderfully mannered Major Clarke (Patrick Newell, who would go on to play 'Mother' in The Avengers, from 1965 to 1969) - is suspicious of Davidson's whirlwind holiday romance and his new Swiss bride, Julie (Gabriella Licudi), about whom no records can be found.

There's also the fact that Julie sleeps with her eyes open, never blinks, has no pulse, cries acidic tears, is immune to extremes of heat, and scares children.

The clues are there that there's "something" about Julie, but love-struck Mark refuses to accept it, despite proclamations from both Major Clarke and Mark's colleague, Prof. John Lancaster (Philip Stone).

Nevertheless, regardless of his blind spot in regards to his new bride, Mark does reach the conclusion that if scientists on Earth are trying to reach other planets psychically, perhaps alien races have already come to Earth using the same method.

And perhaps they want to stop Earthlings gaining this ability to travel the cosmos.

But it's not Julie, right?

A tight, low-budget, black-and-white sci-fi thriller, 1963's Unearthly Stranger shares themes and ideas with both Invasion of The Body Snatchers and HP Lovecraft's story The Shadow Out Of Time.

Events kick off in media res, as a sweaty Mark races back to his office to document all he has learned via a reel-to-reel recorder.

This then allows the film to flashback to the main story - which, itself, contains a secondary flashback to Mark's first encounter with Julie (which bears many of the hallmarks of a classic UFO encounter).

The whole shindig is so compact that it feels like a 76-minute Twilight Zone episode rather than a movie, unburdened by spurious sub-plots and the need to slowly establish character and motivation.

This brevity is something often lacking in modern filmmaking.

ADVENTURE HOOK: A Town Called Abracadabra

Working my way chronologically through the original Twilight Zone episodes, courtesy of the Legend channel, this week I came upon a fourth season story, Valley of Shadow, that - superficially - reminded me of another old - but not so old - show, A Town Called Eureka (aka Eureka).

Both concerned hidden communities where "weird science" held sway as a result of their particular backstories.

This got me to thinking about how to employ such a locale in a fantasy RPG setting.

How much of a headache would it be for a Games Master if the player-characters stumbled across a secret community of eccentric magicians all working on developing new spells and potions... and even trying to create magical items?

I'm not talking about an Unseen University, Aretuza, or Brakebills College for Magical Pedagogy "school" for magic, but a hothouse environment where geniuses of the sorcerous arts strive to take their science to the next level and push the boundaries of what is possible.

Would that concentration of magical energy in one space warp the fabric of reality?

Throw in some kind of "magical mishaps"  rule - either official or homegrown, depending on your system of choice - and you have a recipe for joyous chaos.

Vivarium (2019)

Given the weakness of the the most recent series of the Twilight Zone (I must confess I've only managed about half the episodes), I'm reticent to make the comparison, but Vivarium is a classic Twilight Zone-style story.

Young couple Gemma (Imogen Poots) and Tom (Jesse Eisenberg) are looking to buy a starter home and are taken by a strange estate agent, Martin (Jonathan Aris), to an out-of-town development of identical homes on identical streets.

Martin leaves while the couple are looking around Number Nine... and suddenly they discover there's no way out of the, otherwise unpopulated, estate.

Wherever they go, they end up back at Number Nine.

Then a parcel is left for them: containing a baby, with a note telling them to raise the child and they will be set free.

Time passes; bland, tasteless food is left for them and their rubbish is taken away by unseen hands.

The couple are trapped there for days, weeks, months, and the baby blossoms into a creepy young boy (Senan Jennings), with an oddly deep voice and a habit of screaming like a banshee if he doesn't get what he wants.

If the static clouds in the perfect sky don't give it away, the clue is in the title, as they say.

Segueing swiftly from a dream-like idyll to nightmare fuel, Vivarium follows Tom and Gemma's life as they try to figure out what is going on, while coping with the demands of a freakish cuckoo in their familial nest.

With all the hints that are dropped along the way, there is only really one explanation for the goings-on that makes sense, but the script takes the bold step - given that it is so clear to anyone versed in this kind of weird storytelling - of not actually spelling it out.

Which is probably quite frustrating for the casual viewer.

But, in all honesty, Vivarium isn't a film I could imagine many casual viewers opting for.

However, for those of us that love this style of obtuse, almost surreal, art house, paranormal mystery and psychological horror, it is magnificent.

Twisting the conceit of nightmarish, suburban conformity way past its logical ends, Vivarium is a British spin on '50s American sci-fi horror mixed in with an almost live-action Rick and Morty level of stark brutality about the unfolding events (I was reminded of one episode in particular from the first season, but I can say no more as it would give away a bit too much!)

The performances, across the board, are mightily impressive - as we would have expected from Poots and Eisenberg - with Senan Jennings' turn as the strange child being memorably unnerving and peculiar.

After a single viewing, I have to say I have already become rather a champion for this little gem, written by Garret Shanley who shares credit for the story with director Lorcan Finnegan.

I know Vivarium will only appeal to a small percentage of the movie-watching audience, but for me I was hanging on every clue that our protagonists acquired about their "captors", trying to piece together my own ideas of who was "on the other side of the glass".

The Substance (2024)

How does writer/director Coralie Fargeat make a half-hour Twilight Zone/Tales of The Unexpected plot last a painful two hours and 20 minutes? By having everything in The Substance unfold at a glacial pace.

Past-her-prime actress Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) is given a second shot at celebrity by a mysterious medical procedure - involving The Substance - that births a new, younger version of herself (Margaret Qualley).

The rules are, though, that each versions can only exist for one week at a time.

However, the younger iteration, calling herself Sue, soon starts to abuse the privilege with a predictably gruesome results for all concerned.

What could have been a solid David Cronenberg/William Burroughs/HP Lovecraft sci-fi body horror instead slowly slouches its predictable way towards an unearned Grand Guignol climax that's more a Troma parody than the clever arthouse genre subversion it seems to think it is.

I know it's supposed to be a parable about the inability to fight fate, but that doesn't excuse the multiple plot holes and inconsistencies in the story.

A pretentious horror flick for people who don't watch horror films, The Substance is one of the worst movies I've seen in recent years, pretty much on a par with that other example of Emperor's New Clothes that was the hugely overrated and oversold Poor Things.

Both of these movies seem to think the best way to subvert the male gaze is to give it exactly what it wants and have its lead actresses parade around in the nude for lengthy periods of time.

Really socking it to The Man!