The Touch

Nowhere Bad is quickly making a name for themselves in my closet. Yet another winner from them this week, which gives up a mash-up of Transformers and Michelangelo's "Creation of Man" from artist Ninjaink. As I'm always one to pimp any sort of nod to the greatest Transformers movie that will ever be, the animated 1986 classic, I had to add this one to my closet. Remember that Nowhere Bad actually gives you a week to decide about the design, not that you should need more than 2 seconds on this one, but the option is always nice.

Added bonus this week, here's the song that will be running through my head constantly every single time I put this shirt on. I have lots of epic days of wearing it in my immediate future.

Allow me a Moment Atop my Soapbox

I love blogger. The fact that I try to have something posted on a mostly daily basis should make that particular point of information abundantly clear. I don't just love blogging though, I also love to read other blogs, and if you don't believe me, you haven't been paying attention to the sidebar on your right. I've met a lot of wonderful people through blogging, and if nothing else, it's nice to know that while I may not be able to find anybody where I live that shares my enthusiasm for my particular taste in movies, music, comics, etc., all I have to do is visit my "Bat-Bloggers" section and I'm right at home amongst my fellow freaks and weirdos.

The reason for this particular rant today though, in an annoying trend that I've long noticed when it comes to members of the fairer sex. I have several female friends who use blogger, as well as twitter, facebook, and various other social networking outlets to discuss things like horror and video games. Most of them are intelligent people, who genuinely love the subject matter they're writing about and post entertaining and insightful articles that I enjoy reading. At the end, there's almost always a comment or two, or several in some cases, and while most of them are responses that at least attempt to be relevant to the subject, there are far too many "OMG a gurl who likes horror! U r so haWT!" comments. I'm ashamed to be a part of the same gender as these commentors, and at the same time I feel bad for the women who have spent the time and energy to write a thought-out post in the hopes of sparking some sort of adult conversation about a topic they clearly care about or are interested in.

Guys, really. It's 2011. Yes, there are women in this world who love horror, who love video games, who love metal music. There are women in this world who love all of the things that you love, and likely some who love it even more than you do. Let's grow up a bit. Do you really think if you leave a comment like "you're so hawt and you play Halo! We should meet!" on a post that took an hour or longer to write, any woman is going to hop the next plane out and fly across the country to bang you? It's completely asinine and juvenile, and does nothing but publicly display your ignorance. I can understand that there are females out there who like this kind of attention, but they primarily stick to things like MySpace, and I'm fairly certain it's quite illegal for you to bang them anyway.

I am well aware that I will be clicking the "publish post" button having said absolutely nothing that will have made any difference whatsoever, nor will you read anything here that you don't already know. This post is the result of my own frustration when it comes to this subject. Being a male who does a fair bit of commenting on my fellow bloggers posts, I can't help but feel like every time I press that "post comment" button, I'm going to be lumped in with the aforementioned morons, even though I've never left a comment about how "hawt" I thought a writer was....ok, except for Binky, but really, who can blame me? I have enough problems with leaving comments in the hopes that I don't come off sounding completely stupid without having to worry that some cynical bastard like myself is reading the comment thinking "oh Jesus, this guy is just trying to get laid".

So, to my fellow men out there. Put a little thought into your comments before posting them. If you truly enjoy what someone has taken the time to write, it's perfectly ok to let them know that. I think it's part of why we all do this blogging thing. But don't offer to show your dick to the writer just because she's a female. There are lots of women out there who have plenty to say that is more than worth reading, and who have things to say that I personally want to read, so let's please not scare them or run them off the internet completely. They have just as much right to be here as we do. Getting off my soapbox now, thanks for you time. 

DIY Rocketeer Rocks

Dear Disney, if you're paying attention at all, PLEASE make this pitch a reality. I will give you my hard earned monies.

The Rocketeer 20th anniversary from John Banana on Vimeo.

The Addams Family...Soska style?

I was never much of an Addams Family guy, I always preferred The Munsters. I've seen some of the episodes, and the movies though, and I liked them well enough. Yesterday I got an email from the Soska sisters that actually got me excited about the possibility of a new Addams Family movie. Turns out they're trying to convince Paramount, who owns the rights to all things Addams to give them a chance to write and direct a new entry in the franchise. They're also adamant that this will not be a remake or reimagining, just "a fresh new story with a Twisted Twins twist in the life and times of the Addams Family". Sounds good to me. You can read more details and find out what you can do to help by visiting and liking the official page on facebook here. 

Mister Bones' Friday Night Drive-In

You've seen the remake, shame on you if you haven't seen the original. It's Vincent Price at his creepiest! The original 1959 classic, The House on Haunted Hill....

Michael Strahan...

...just stole Black Manta's Cold Cut Trio! Guess this lockout thing's more serious than we all thought.

Green Lantern

I am a huge Green Lantern fan, and as such I wasn't going to do this because to be honest, unless this turned out to be the next Batman and Robin, or *shudder* Ghost Rider, there really was no way I wasn't going to like it. And I was right, I did like it, but I'm apparently the only one. My God the negativity directed toward this movie is off the charts, and I really have no idea why. It seems like it started way back when Ryan Reynolds was announced as the lead. Then things died down, and the first few images of the suit hit the net and it started back up. Same with the trailer, and now finally with the release of the movie. I never expected it to be the next Dark Knight, and it wasn't, but it's a perfectly fun summer movie about a regular guy getting inducted into a group of space cops who wear green, and have fancy rings that can make anything they can imagine. They use said rings to fight evil and stuff.

The movie is probably second only to panel by panel recreations like Sin City and 300 in terms of sticking to the source material. That is to say, this movie is great for those of us who actually read or have read Green Lantern comics. That alone makes it worth watching for those of us who love these characters. I loved seeing Kilowog, Tomar Re, and Sinestro come to life on screen, and immediately began thinking about how awesome Green Lantern 2 was going to be when even more of the Corps would be showing up. G'nort bitches! Could there have been more action, or even more screen time for the GL Corps? Sure, but this is an origin movie, and there were things that had to be established before Hal was off to OA to learn how to use the ring. I feel like the inevitable sequel will be a better movie, following the Iron Man movie formula: first one was good, but a whole lot of origin stuff, second one was great because it jumped right in.

Confession time again, I'm a Ryan Reynolds fan. I think dude is funny, and even like him in the serious roles he occasionally plays. This isn't his first go round in the comic book movie thing either, in Blade Trinity he was a Nightstalker, and consequently the ONLY reason to watch that movie other than Jessica Biel in skin-tight leather pants, and he played a perfect Wade Wilson, and eventually a HORRIBLE Deadpool in X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Would he have been my first pick for Hal Jordan, no probably not, but I didn't think he was terrible. I think he might've been a better Kyle Rayner, but still, didn't hate him. The whole point is, this is a young, cocky, reckless test-pilot Hal Jordan. Aside from "test-pilot" I think most of those do apply to Mr. Reynolds anyway.

The rest of the cast does a fine job, especially Mark Strong who will make you believe that Sinestro is a real guy. He was spot-on in my opinion, and I can't wait to watch him turn into Hal Jordan's greatest nemesis. Peter Sarsgaard is also great as Hector Hammond, I wish they had just stuck with him as the villain for this movie and held the Parallax stuff back for a sequel. In fact that is my one main nitpick, wish more time would've been spent on OA training, and more time would'be been spent on the Hal Jordan/ Hector Hammond/ Carol Ferris relationships. Guess that wouldn't have been impressive enough in 3D though.

I urge anyone with any interest in this movie to not be swayed by all the negativity, give it a watch and make up your own mind. This is nowhere near as bad of a movie as it's being made out to be. It's the very definition of a no-brainer for Green Lantern fans, you should have had your ass in a seat on opening night. For a lesser-known member of the Justice League of America, this is a fine big screen debut, and at the very least it's better than the Thor movie. What a piece of horse shit that was.

Infinite Playlist - Special "Leveler" Edition!

New August Burns Red TODAY people! Check out the first song released from Leveler here, and look below for the others. When you're done with that, go get the whole album! DO IT!

Portal Kombat

Gotta love this mash-up of Mortak Kombat and Portal, featured this week only at Nowhere Bad! Lotta Portal shirts are making the rounds lately on daily tee sites, but so far I think this is my favorite. Side note, I mentoned last week that I hadn't gotten around to play Portal 2 yet because I was waiting for a price drop, well over the weekend Toys R Us ran a two for $50 sale on some recent stuff, and Portal 2 and LA Noire are on their way to the Batcave! Thanks Toys R Us! Anyway, dig this tee and worry not if you're undecided on it, as Nowhere Bad gives you a whole week to make up your mind.

Happy Father's Day!

Best $8 I've Spent All Year

Mister Bones' Friday Night Drive-In

Rolling out a new weekly post here in the Batcave! I've recently discovered that Youtube has become a treasure-trove of public domain classic horror and sci-fi movies. It was actually my father, who is a Youtube junkie himself, that brought it to my attention and inspired the Friday Night Drive-In. The title says it all, every Friday night at 7pm I will post a full length public domain horror or sci-fi movie for your viewing pleasure. Just from my browsing what was available, it looks like this could run for a while. The movies themselves are mostly of the "B" variety, but that's perfectly ok with me, as they're sometimes the most fun to watch. Especially when they come from the 50's and 60's.

That being said, the best of the bunch is anything but a b-movie and should be considered a classic by horror and non-horror movie fans alike. Pop some popcorn and get ready for George Romero's zombie masterpiece, the original Night of the Living Dead...

Movie Night - Texas Jealousy Night

If you're into the horror scene on Twitter at all, you may have heard about a kick-ass double feature shown in a theater in Texas last month, indie powerhouses Dead Hooker in a Trunk and Hobo With a Shotgun were shown in a double feature full of all kinds of badassery. Sadly, I don't live in Texas, and therefore my jealousy of those that do was immeasurable.

Fast forward to today, I'm headed to the Plaza Theater in Atlanta for a screening of one half of the tag team of awesome that Texas got, Hobo With a Shotgun is invading the Atl. I've never been to the Plaza before, but I've read good things about it. I'm hoping I enjoy myself enough to make it something of a regular outing. Don't get much horror on the big screen, and the Plaza apparently makes a habit of showing some of the classics. For instance, the insanity that is The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 played earlier this week, and those of you astute enough may pick up on how ironic that is, and will undoubtedly appreciate how I tied it in with this post.

Before I head to Atlanta though, I plan on once again popping in my screener of the other half of the aforementioned tag team, Dead Hooker in a Trunk. I've seen it a few times now, and I'm still not tired of it. With the recent UK and Australian dvd release, the Twisted Twins have hinted that a major announcement was coming soon for those of us on this side of the pond. Personally, I think the announcement will be that a sequel is in the works, and I'm going to be cast as the titular Dead Hooker this time around. Until then, I guess I'll just have to continue to watch my screener of the first one, and you'll just have to continue to be insanely jealous.


HAH! See that Texas? I'm getting a double-feature too, so SUCK IT! Yes, there will be a two hour intermission between the two movies, which I will spend driving, but still! A double-feature! Woo Hoo!

Random Screen Grab

Mister Bones' Top 5

I haven't done one of these in a while, and was inspired by a conversation at work this morning to do another top 5 list. As I've mentioned countless times before, I have to be a little bit picky when it comes to which games I can afford to pay full price for. Believe me, there's not many, and for me to put down $60 I have to want something pretty bad. I came up with 5 or 6 games for the remainder of 2011 that I will absolutely have to have on release day...

Top 5 Most Anticipated Games for the Second Half of 2011

5. Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 - I think the last Call of Duty game I bought on day one was the first Modern Warfare. I normally don't get into the multiplayer on CoD because I don't know about you, but for me, running around with a pellet gun, when the rest of the world has been playing non-stop for months and unlocking all the perks and better weapons, just doesn't appeal to me. However, I do love the Call of Duty single player campaigns, and the trailers for Modern Warfare 3 have me salivating.

4. Gears of War 3 - For some, Gears is beginning to show it's age and suffer a bit from sequelitis. I can see that a little bit, and I think Gears 4 may end up being a totally different experience. In the meantime, Gears of War 3 looks jaw-droppingly awesome. From what I've seen, the enemies look bigger and there are more on-screen at any given moment than ever before. Personally, I can't wait to put Marcus, the Cole Train, and the rest of the Cogs through their final confrontation with the Locust Queen. 

3. Silent Hill Downpour - I've made no secret for my love of this series. It's my absolute favorite survival horror franchise, and I love it to death. Downpour doesn't look like it's going to stray too far from the proven Silent Hill formula, although it will introduce optional side quests for the first time in the series.Best believe I'll be doing everything there is to do in this one, as I must devour as many details of Silent Hill as humanly possible.

2. Battlefield 3 - Oh my damn, this game looks fucking AMAZING. Again, as I've mentioned time and time again here, I am a huge Battlefield fan. Modern Combat, 1943, Bad Company, it doesn't matter, I love them all. I love Battlefield so much in fact that I'll even play multiplayer with the general public. Every trailer I've seen for Battlefield 3 so far has just added to my excitement. I think this is going to be the best-looking game we've seen on consoles to date, it is gorgeous. Dice never disappoints, and my expectations for the third true Battlefield game are through the roof.

1. Batman Arkham City - I know I don't need to explain why I'm so excited for this one. Anybody who played Rocksteady's last Batman game, Arkham Asylum, should be excited for this sequel. Me? I am literally counting the days, and currently reading the comic series from Paul Dini that bridges the first game to the second. The premise for Arkham City is a little far-fetched, even for Gotham City, but I have all the faith in the world in Rocksteady to produce the greatest super-hero video game of all time. I mean, they've already done that once, right?

There you have it, where a good bit of my extra spending money for the remainder of 2011 will be going. One more honorable mention goes to Insomniac's Resistance 3 which I will also likely be buying on day one. First one was ok, but damn I loved Resistance 2. Anyway, there's of course a handful of other things I'm interested in playing but will be waiting for price drops, and as per usual I have plenty to play and some interesting looking XBLA titles on the horizon to keep me busy while I wait for these.

The remainder of 2011 looks pretty good for gamers, and 2012 looks to be a great year too. Bioshock Infinite, Mass Effect 3, Halo 4 and the list goes on. I really should probably look into getting some sort of second job. Anybody out there hiring?

In case of zombies, use Portal.

I've still yet to play Portal 2 but I did love the first one. One of these days I'll get around to picking up the sequel. Anyway, Ript printed this shirt yesterday and I loved it, so of course it will be on it's way to my closet.

Batman Deliverance

It's Batman vs Wolverine, noir style! A very cool little fan film, with a nonsensical ending. Wolverine wins? Bah, not a chance. Clearly this isn't the REAL Batman here. Still worth a watch though.

BATMAN DELIVRANCE from Atomic Production on Vimeo.

Super 8

Lots of secrecy surrounding this one, and far be it from me to spoil anything here, especially on opening weekend for the movie, so this will be short and sweet. Besides, I'm sure you all have your minds made up as to whether or not you're going to see it anyway, and all I would really be doing is adding to the already very present love-fest for it. I will say that if you look at the creative minds behind it, you will know exactly what kind of treat you're in for. JJ Abrams is the master of giving you just enough to pique interest but keeping you guessing, and Steven Spielberg is the master of making movies that make you feel like a kid again.

Super 8 is good. It's very good. The first hour or so is fantastic in fact, for those of us old enough to remember what being a kid was like in the late 70's to mid 80's, it's a welcome throwback to then. It reminded me of being 5 years old and watching Close Encounters for the fist time. I hate to use the word "magic" but I can't think of any better word to use either. I honestly wish I could have this much fun watching every movie that I sat down to see.

I should mention here, that prior to going in, I had no clue as to the runtime of this movie. I normally check things like that so I have an idea as to where I am in the movie at any given time, but I was so adamant about knowing as little as possible that I never even looked. I assumed at least two hours, and I was wrong. Surprisingly, Super 8 only runs about an hour and 43 minutes, which wouldn't be a big deal except that so much time is spent with the first two acts, that just when things start to go down, the movie is over. I literally sat there and said "that's it?". I feel like the final act could've used another 20 or 30 minutes to develop.

Still, I highly recommend everyone checking out Super 8. Especially for those of us who grew up on movies like The Monster Squad, Goonies, and Stand By Me. The first 2/3 of the movie will make you feel like a kid again, and the last 1/3 isn't bad at all, it just felt a bit rushed to me. It's still one of the best movies I've seen in a while, and is an experience I think almost anyone will enjoy. Just know that if you're primarily going into it hoping for a great creature feature, you will probably be a little disappointed.

Monster Brawl Teaser

Despite there being several more appealing monsters on the card, my money is on Witch Bitch!

Batman

If you tell him you're really the Flash, you better be prepared to back it up.

Infinite Playlist - Tech N9ne edition

In honor of a brand new Tech N9ne album dropping yesterday, today I will be inducting a few of my personal favorite of his songs into the Infinite Playlist. Enjoy!

X-Men First Class

Like every other good little comic book nerd, this past weekend I went out and saw X-Men First Class. This is another one of those that I've literally read so many impressions and reviews of that I have absolutely nothing to say or add that you haven't read elsewhere, written much, much better. Still, it's a comic book film, and you just know I'm going to at least talk a little about it.

I'm among a minority of comic book fans who doesn't absolutely love the "X" movie franchise. Yes, the first two were good, and X2 was damn good, but I don't think they're particularly great. I hated X3 and X-Men Origins Wolverine. I understand there are limitations as to what they can do when bringing a comic like X-Men to the screen, it's the things that are changed or the way things are mishandled for no apparent reason that bother me. For example, Sabretooth from the first film, Juggernaut from X3, and Magneto from all three films. For everything Bryan Singer did right, he did something else that I didn't like. I will NEVER forgive whoever it was that wrote Storm's line about what happens to a Toad when it gets hit by lightning from the first one. Every time I hear it I literally get physically angry because of how stupid it is. I won't even begin to start on my Juggernaut rant, the less said about the abortion from X3 that they called "Juggernaut" the better.

I went in to First Class with high expectations, the trailers looked fantastic, and I'm particularly fond of Michael Fassbender and was looking forward to his Magneto. I never liked Ian McKellan as Magneto, dude was just too damn old and his helmet looked goofy. I also liked James McAvoy in Wanted, so I knew Professor X was in capable hands as well. Both were great here, and played off of each other very well. It was easy to imagine that this was really how the relationship between Charles and Eric started out. Kevin Bacon was the other stand-out, and again I expected as much, but he managed to make a character that I never really cared much about, Sebastian Shaw of the Hellfire Club, fucking awesome. I'm a Kevin Bacon fan, and I especially love it when he plays the bad guy. I'm guessing there may actually be one or two people who haven't had the cameo spoiled for them, so I'll keep my mouth shut about it, other than to say that I loved it and it made me laugh out loud.

Other than a few little continuity issues and retcons, I really don't have anything bad to say about First Class. Those of you going into it looking for non-stop action will come away disappointed, as there's only a couple of action sequences. They're really good ones, but still there's only two or three. Personally, I liked the fact that this movie was more story-driven. It did move a bit slowly in the beginning, which forced a little hurry-up in the third act, I enjoyed the training sequences, would like to have seen more of that. A lot of characters were introduced, but unlike X3, this time almost all of them actually served some purpose in the movie. Still some could've used a little more attention. Still all these are minor nitpicks when you put First Class up against the unforgivable problems I have with X3 and X-Men Origins Wolverine.

If I'm ranking the franchise, I'd put First Class second only to X2, and it's not lagging very far behind it. I'm not sure if I saw the same movie as all of these people claiming it will give The Dark Knight a run for it's money as the best superhero film of all time, but as good as it is, it's definitely no Dark Knight. If nothing else though, it got me excited about the X-Men on the big screen again. The ending of course left things wide open for the inevitable sequels, and I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't looking forward to them, provided director Matthew Vaughn and the cast plan to return.

Random Screen Grab

Love that Jock-er

A while back on Twitter, #myfavoriteartist was trending and of course I once again let it be known that Jock is the end-all, be-all of comic book artists in my opinion. Jock is currently doing the best work of his career over in Detective Comics, and this week he posted the following upcoming cover on Twitter:

I honestly don't think it's healthy for one man to be so in love with one image. I want this hanging on every wall in my house, I want it on a t-shirt, I want it on a lunch box, keychain, boxers, socks, fuck I don't care, EVERYTHING. This is a prime example of why I love his artwork so much, so I thought I'd share.

Batman

If he asks you to load his iPod while he's out cracking criminal skulls, do NOT put Paramore on it...

Gotham After Midnight by Spooky Sean

Back today with the second half of the blog swap between Spooky Sean of Sinful Bloggery fame, and myself. Some of you who have been with me for a while might remember my going on and on....and on about Gotham After Midnight by personal favorites Steven Niles and Kelley Jones. Seriously, I talked about the series a LOT. But when Sean approached me about the blog swap idea, and he told me he wanted to write a review of the series, I jumped at the idea. You all know I'm going to be biased due to my love of the Dark Knight, so the idea of someone else who is reading strictly because of an interest in the story and the creators appealed to me. Enough of my rambling though, read on for Spooky Sean's review.....

Batman Gotham After Midnight review

By: Spooky Sean

"Batman comic books get no better than this."-John Carpenter

First, a very special thanks to Mister Bones for letting me into his

Batcave. Surprisingly small amount of guano in here.

Howdy, and welcome to my review of Batman Gotham After Midnight. It is

written by one of my favorite comic book writers, Steve Niles, whom

you may know from 30 Days of Night, or from his character Cal

McDonald, from the Criminal Macabre series. The art is by Kelley

Jones, who has collaborated with Niles before to write Criminal

Macabre: Last Train to Deadsville. By the by, if you haven't read any

of the Criminal Macabre collections, and you like noir style

detectives and monsters, get on tracking it down. I know I'm hooked on

Steve Niles. He has an extremely engaging style, and wastes no time in

getting the action going.

I listed the Carpenter quote at the top of this article, because what

better proof do you need of a good story, than for it to be personally

endorsed by John Carpenter. I'm here to tell you, this is one epic

graphic novel.

I hate giving a synopsis for my reviews (mostly because I'm a lazy

bastard) because, among other reasons, I really hate to spoil a story

for people. So, I won't talk about the plot specifically. I can tell

you that I haven't read a tremendous amount of Batman. I only read a

TPB every once and a while. I have no idea what the ongoing story arcs

are. So, I'm reviewing this, as a casual Batman fan, I guess. And as a

casual fan, you won't have any trouble hopping in and chugging away.

However, there are enough references to baddies in Gotham that even

the most devoted of Batman fans should be pleased. There is a villain

that looks just like the cliché version of Jack the Ripper you so

often see in Hollywood portrayals of the serial killer.

The art pops right off the page, bright colors, and whole page panels

(is that a splash page, need to research comic terminology...) yet

it's still is dark as midnight. It's extremely creepy looking, but

would you want something called Gotham After Midnight to by anything

but?

If you like Batman and horror comics, definitely pick this bad boy up.

Oh, did I mention Batman fights in a big ass robot? How could you not

read this, it has Batman in a robot?!

That's good stuff, eh? Thanks again to the Spookster for stepping in on this one. I gotta say this was one hell of a successful blog swap in my opinion. Hope you guys enjoyed it!

War of the Undead

Want to read about a comic book series which features Frankenstein, the Wolfman, and Dracula against Nazi zombies, a mummy, and a nefarious plot to resurrect Hitler? Of COURSE you do. Allow me to direct your attention to Spooky Sean's Sinful Bloggery where you can do just that, as the Spookster graciously handed the reigns over to me temporarily. In return, he will be doing a guest-blog here in the Batcave about a personal favorite Batman story written by Steve Niles!

Stake Land

I waited for what seemed like an eternity to see this movie! I don't even remember how long ago it was that I first saw the trailer, but it was then that I fell in love with Stake Land. It looked like what I wanted Zombieland to be, only with vampires instead of zombies. Imagine how much more awesome Zombieland could've been had it been played straight up horror and skipped all that forced comedy bullshit. So did Stake Land live up to the expectations the trailers gave me for it? For the most part, but there were a couple minor nitpicks that I'd be remiss if I didn't at least make mention of.

Stake Land is the story of a world overrun by a vampire epidemic. Most of humanity is either dead or in hiding in small, scattered strongholds. A veteran vampire hunter known only as "Mister" is traveling across the country destroying as many bloodsuckers as he can when he comes across a family under attack. He only manages to save one of them, a young boy named Martin. Mister takes the young boy in, and teaches him how to hunt while fighting to keep him safe from the vamps and a cannibalistic religious cult. Along the way they pick up more survivors and attempt to make it to Canada, where humanity has built a safe haven known as "New Eden".

First off, let me say this, Stake Land is the best vampire movie I've seen since Let the Right One In. It's nowhere near on the same level as it, but for the sad state of vampire movies today, Stake Land is a much needed breath of OLD air. No tweens, no love stories, no angst, NO sparkling. Just stakes to the heart, knives to the head, and jugular's being torn open by evil, snarling creatures of the night. You know, the way it's supposed to be. Most of the cast does a decent job, with the standout being Danielle Harris of course, but I might be a bit biased as I'm in love with her. The vampires are of the "monster" variety, as in From Dusk till Dawn, and the make-up is very well done. The gore is plentiful though not over-done at all, and everything I noticed effects-wise appeared to be practical. If there is any cg in Stake Land either I didn't notice it, or I just don't remember it.

But I mentioned nitpicks before, and minor as they may be, they're worth bringing up. First, and maybe this is just me, but if I lived in a world where I had to fight for my life every single day to survive against vampires, and I knew that said vampires would in fact die if exposed to sunlight, and I knew any time I spent resting, or trying to sleep could potentially get me killed, I think maybe I might, oh, I don't know, try and sleep during the DAY. These people get attacked every single time they stop at night to set up camp and get some sleep. And guess what they're doing tomorrow night? Yep, the same fucking thing. I realize it's easier to hide at night from all the potential threats to their safety, but if there was something I could do that would completely eliminate at least one of those threats, arguably the biggest threat, you can bet your ass I'd do it. My other nitpick would be a huge spoiler if I gave too many details, so I'll just say that the third act of the movie had probably the most interesting twist to it, but everything really felt rushed because they waited so long to put things into motion. For my fellow video game enthusiasts, let's just say the final "boss fight" was pretty damn anti-climactic.

Neither of those things detracts too much from the proceedings though, Stake Land is a fine entry into a vampire genre that has all but lost it's..."teeth" with the horror community. The tweens and Twi-tards have taken our vampires and it's going to take more movies like Stake Land to get them back.