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It’s a prehistoric bird! (House II)

Saw House II: The Second Story (1987) last night. I'm a fan of the original film, but the sequel...my God, what an unexpected treasure this was. Rated PG-13 as opposed to the original's R and played mostly for laughs, I'm unbelievably amazed that a movie starring everything from mummies to zombie cowboys to caterpillar/dog mutants and beyond managed to be so rife with subtlety. It's not laugh-out-loud funny or anything -- it's way deeper. I think the writers and producers knew what they were going for -- something truly oddball -- but instead of banging it over your head in that "LOOK HOW WEIRD WE'RE BEING" way (see: Basket Case 2), they act as if this element of the film doesn't exist. I know I'm not explaining it correctly, but put it this way -- there's a scene where the lead hero wrestles a baby pterodactyl for a crystal skull, and they didn't use zany music. No zany music! I appreciate films like that, and I think you'll love House II. Currently being sold on the cheap on DVD in a two-pack with the original, I'm writing "recommended" on my cat's ass and making it moon you. I've read a bunch of reviews this afternoon, and most buffs seem to consider it one of the worst horror sequels ever. If you can't appreciate Royal Dano playing a resurrected cowboy from the old west trying to drive a corvette, you just suck, man.

Speaking of which, there's a scene where Dano Cowboy Ghost Mummy is flipping through channels on the television, because whenever someone from the past is brought to the present in any movie ever made, they MUST BE AMAZED BY TV. As he's scouring, keep an eye out for an old Toys 'R Us commercial, and better yet, the commercial for Big Stuf Oreo cookies. Hells yeah.

EDIT: Oops, it's Saturday. Time for another Bored Saturday Night Convo Thread. Chat away.

Posted by Matt on 07/09/2005. E-mail me!



Discussion Thread: 55 comments

Yes it’s about the famous Moonlite Bunny Ranch brothel in Nevada…HBO doesn’t even link it from their main webpage, but here’s the http://www.hbo.com/docs/programs/cathouse2/index.html">synopsis. It’s not for everybody, what with the filthiness of it all. I’m sad to learn there’s only 7 eps…My favorite aspect of watching is trying to figure out the tabs these people are racking up.
Traj, have you read about the Carnivale scandal? There was a write-up in the LA Times a few weeks back…
Initially I thought it was a corny idea, but I’m completely sold on Rome and it won’t even be airing for months. I’d still rather have new Sopranos or (ha ha) new Carnivale this fall though. I missed early seasons of both Deadwood and SFU so I’m dying to get my hands on DVDs.

Chestnuts roasted by squee4242 @ 07/10/2005 1:07 AM

Mars: I appreciate the offer, but for better or worse, I’ve decided to do the site solo. It’s been so long since X-E had other writers that it’d feel…well, wrong. :)

WHAT Carnivale scandal???!

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 07/10/2005 1:09 AM

It is a solo effort, but you have to admit that the blog comments add something to the site. Read comments as faithfully as i read the articles.

Chestnuts roasted by RAS @ 07/10/2005 1:15 AM

Oh definitely, RAS. I’m really happy with how the blog’s turned out. Nice group of folks.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 07/10/2005 1:18 AM

I know it’s not horror, but does anyone remember the kid’s movie from the 80′s "Purple People Eater" w/ Doogie Howser? Thinking of those songs from that time the other day reminded me of that movie. I had it on VHS and watched it non-stop. That would make a great review.

Chestnuts roasted by kb @ 07/10/2005 1:28 AM

Matt, you really should check out Dead Like Me sometime. It was truly one of the best shows on television till they gave it the axe. What’s really sad is that Showtime got rid of DLM so they could have a spot for crap like Barbershop: The Series.

Chestnuts roasted by Punisher Bass @ 07/10/2005 1:37 AM

I had a long day at work today, so I’m just relaxing and enjoying my latest round of Revenge of the Sith figures.

At TRU, they’re selling these two packs of figures for 9 bucks, so I was finally able to get my hands on an elusive AT-TE Gunner figure, although I had to buy a Bail Organa figure, which I hadn’t otherwise planned to buy. Oh well. Yay!

Chestnuts roasted by marioshoku @ 07/10/2005 1:40 AM

Matt,

I love House 2! Also, some kid in study hall back in high school gave me some torn-up comic book he’d found in his locker.. turned out to be the official Marvel Comics movie adaption of House 2!

Chestnuts roasted by Review the World @ 07/10/2005 1:41 AM

I’m get the opposite feeling with you guys here. I LOVE Entourage but can’t stand Comeback. Am I supposed to feel sorry for Lisa Kudrow’s character because everyone around her is a jerk? I don’t. I just don’t find that show funny.

Carnivale was ok. I watched it more out of habit than actually caring about it.

Six Feet Under has been pretty good this season compared to the last two rather boring seasons. But I’m actually kind of glad this is it’s last season since they seem to be doing the same things for awhile now. I get the feeling that at least one of the Fischer’s is going to die this season (my guess, Billy goes berzerk again and kills either Claire, Nate, or Brenda in a rage). You got to end the show somehow.

Deadwood rocks even though I have no clue what is going on half the time.

Cathouse is an interesting show. I’ll leave it at that.

As for what I did tonight, I watched Teen Titans, Justice Leaue Unlimited, a doc on the hitory of punk music on IFC, and a pretty good film called SLC Punk.

Chestnuts roasted by JLAJRC @ 07/10/2005 1:42 AM

Okay, I found the text of the LA Times article http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05178/528920.stm">here.
Basically, some guy is claiming he wrote the ideas for Carnivale in his novel back in the 80′s and is suing HBO over it: "The suit describes a character in the novel named Brother Ezra, an up-and-coming radio preacher with a large tattoo on his chest of dead foliage. He dreams of building a large temple in Beulah City to attract more congregants…Likewise, the suit noted, the novel includes a dwarf named Doc Catchem, a ‘smooth-talking, articulate, fancy dresser’". There are more similarities too if you read the article.

Chestnuts roasted by squee4242 @ 07/10/2005 1:49 AM

This was buried in the musc thread, but here’s a repost to any of didn’t see it:

I don’t remember the first songs I was into, but I will tell you about the very first CD i ever bought (and still listen to):

Saturday Morning Cartoons’ Greatest Hits

it was released sometime around 1995 and that’s probably when I bought it. It has 19 different songs from classic saturday morning shows, but covered by 90′s bands

they were:

1) The Tra La La Song (The Banan Splits theme) by Liz Phair with Material Issue
2) the Speed Racer theme by Sponge
3) Sugar Sugar (from The Archie Show) by Mary Lou Lord w/ Semisonic
4) the Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? theme by Matthew Sweet
5) the Josie & The Pussycats theme by Juilana Hatfield & Tanya Donelly
6) The Bugaloos theme by Collective Soul
7) the Underdog theme by The Butthole Surfers
8 ) the Gigantor theme by Helmet
9) the classic 60′s Spiderman theme by The Ramones
10) Jonny Quest/Stop That Pigeon (the Dastardly & Muttley In Their Flying Machines theme) by Reverend Horton Heat
11) Open Up Your Heart and Let The Sun Shine In (from the Flintstones) by Frente!
12) Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah (from The Jetsons) by Violent Femmes
13) Fat Albert theme by Dig
14) I’m Popeye The Sailor Man by face to face
15) Friends/Sigmund & The Seamonsters theme by Tripping Daisy
16) Goolie Get Together (from the Groovie Goolies) by Toadies
17) the Hong Kong Phooey theme by Sublime
18 ) the H.R. Pufnstuf theme by The Murmurs
19) Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy (from Ren & Stimpy) by Wax

to me, the best songs are tracks 1, 2, 6-10, 12 and 16. The worst ones are proably tracks 13 and 19. To those, I’d prefer to the originals (preferrably Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy)

I haven’t been able to stop listenting to the album for the last year or so now.

Chestnuts roasted by Invader Norbert @ 07/10/2005 1:58 AM

Matt you’ve got to do a blog entry on Pringles Prints!

Chestnuts roasted by squee4242 @ 07/10/2005 2:23 AM

House II rules! It’s definately the best in the series. The parts with the guy from cheers as the electician/adventurer are friggin’ great.

Chestnuts roasted by D-Roc @ 07/10/2005 3:38 AM

Has anyone seen Rescue Me on F/X? It’s an awesome show. Denis Leary is a total prick in it, but somehow he still comes across likable.

Chestnuts roasted by Joe in OH @ 07/10/2005 8:41 AM

Being in Korea the past year has left me behind in the TV world….I have not seen even one episode of Lost, Desperate Housewives, American Idol 4, Cathouse, Comeback, OR American Dad!! Nor have I watched the Simpsons or Family Guy for 9 MONTHS…9 Months, man, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry. (think Stand By Me)

Chestnuts roasted by Muppet Baby @ 07/10/2005 11:28 AM

Muppet Baby: Unless you’re REALLY hard up for a Family Guy fix, you’re not missing much with American Dad.

It’s Family Guy with less laughs and all the political jokes they couldn’t shoehorn into that week’s episode of FG.

You know, I haven’t seen ANY of that good HBO original programming. I’ve never seen an episode of Six Feet Under or the Sopranos.

I guess at some point in the future, near or far, I’ll have a LOT to look forward to on DVD :D

Chestnuts roasted by Night_Trekker @ 07/10/2005 12:44 PM

Night_Trekker= Well, that’s a good way to look at it!! Actually, a while back I WAS so hard up for a Family Guy fix that I had my Mom mail me an old VHS tape from home because I knew it had 6 episodes of Family Guy taped on it…I had to have her mail it to Korea so I could get a quick fix. You gotta do what you gotta do.

Chestnuts roasted by Muppet Baby @ 07/10/2005 12:49 PM

American Dad, I think, found a little more footing in the later episodes. There were a few jokes worth watching the eps for, at least. I still kinda find the alien to be unnecessary — they haven’t really done much good with that character yet, and the few times they’ve tried haven’t gone so well.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 07/10/2005 12:55 PM

Matt: Yeah, I’ll watch it if it’s on generally, I’ll just finish watching and realize I could have seen an entire episode of Family Guy instead :)

The alien seems pretty useless most of the time, but he’s gotten a few laughs out of me. The goldfish, on the other hand, IS useless. That character hasn’t said one funny thing so far, and he’s hardly used at all in the course of your typical episode.

I figure they’ll make an episode devoted entirely to him at some point to offset the imbalance.

Chestnuts roasted by Night_Trekker @ 07/10/2005 1:13 PM

IHAQ

Indeed it is I who discusses Our Lady Peace ad nauseum. They’re not super huge in the states. I mean they got kinda big with ‘Somewhere Out There’, but by the time the Live album and DVD came out, well they were back to being the best kept musical secret ever.

I’ve been a fan since Clumsy and try to convert my friends constantly. I’ve been successful everytime :)

Speaking of horror movies, The Devil’s Rejects comes out on July 22nd, if I recall correctly. I know there are mixed feelings on House of a 1000 Corpses, but I adore it.

Captain Spaulding forever!!

Chestnuts roasted by Knegative @ 07/10/2005 2:03 PM

What does Captain Spaulding forever, mean?

Sorry, I just had 17 hours of sleep. Those are not ideal conditions for me.

Well for the love of Jane Russell’s big fat horse’s @$$ on toast, stop posting on that g****** blog

hehe

Chestnuts roasted by Knegative @ 07/10/2005 2:11 PM

Hooray for Capt. Spaulding, the African explorer!
Hooray Hooray Hooray!

Chestnuts roasted by kingklash @ 07/10/2005 2:46 PM

Thanks for expanding my pop culture knowledge. I’ve never seen any Marx Bros. films/etc.

But hey

Hooray for Capt. Spaulding, the foul-mouthed murderous clown
Hooray Hooray Hooray

Chestnuts roasted by Knegative @ 07/10/2005 3:27 PM

I agree with the previous American Dad comments. The pilot was pretty dissapointing but subsequent episodes got better. It’s no Family Guy, but it’s still funnier than most TV shows (the rest of Adult Swim excluded).

As far as movies go, I watched Hi-Line last night. It was a really simple story and low budget and it wasn’t really my kind of movie, but I really liked it overall. Rachael Leigh Cook was awesome.

Chestnuts roasted by Gozer @ 07/10/2005 3:32 PM

You’re starting to sound like me Gozer, and honestly, that can’t be a good thing :P j/k

Chestnuts roasted by Knegative @ 07/10/2005 6:38 PM

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