OYENTE

Jonathan Von

  • 13
  • opiniones
  • 0
  • votos útiles
  • 116
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Navy SEAL Human hunting Action

Total
3 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
3 out of 5 stars
Historia
3 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 08-19-24

The Kill Club does a good job of conveying the Navy SEAL lifestyle mentality in the form of a light-action slasher thriller. It's an extra dose of military, whatever that means to you. I'm not really the target audience for this. It was pretty fast-paced and had a satisfying action movie third act. It just seemed kind of poor quality overall and I didn't think the characters were very interesting. I feel bad for saying that. It killed some time. This is like a made-for-DVD, low-budget thriller from the 2000s. It could have also been a script for The Sniper Part 4. If you're in the right mood, it can be cheesy action entertainment.

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80s Horror Curiosity Gets A Bit Silly

Total
3 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
3 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 07-14-24

Bloodwind is 80% weird little alienated thriller about an almost-forty female college professor whose life is a wreck because she can’t fully process the death of her daughter a few years earlier (and 20% eighties horror monster/wizard gibberish). But the main part is the good stuff here after the story begins with the protagonist having driven home drunk with a new dent in her car, students seem to be going missing, and someone keeps coming into her house when she’s not there. Her world is unraveling as she tries not to think about her daughter’s birthday. It’s a well-written story about unresolved trauma and madness but then it’s like, werewolves, a red cloud, cultists… make the third act a monster movie, why not?

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Surprisingly Affecting Boy-And-His-Monster Comedy

Total
4 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
4 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 04-11-24

An unconventional boy-and-his-monster story in which the pet is the problem. Dweller is a consistently witty and funny comedy about an antisocial misfit who develops a friendship with a fearsome forest monster but there's an unexpected depth. Toby and his monster friend Owen are really just a pair of sad sack screwups who keep accidentally killing people, and it pushes everyone away. Surprisingly, the story isn't just confined to their youthful friendship but Toby grows into a man and we get the sense of how this toxic friendship has affected his life. It soon becomes clear, that Owen the monster symbolizes much more than a hairy, razor-clawed forest beast. Ultimately, this is a story about those jokey guys who are always wisecracking, but you can see in their eyes that something has gone terribly, terribly wrong. Weaves a self-destructive spell on the reader and makes you laugh while leading you into a dark little cave of friendship gone wrong.

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Surprisingly Solid Survival Slasher

Total
3 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
3 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 04-11-24

3.5 The trouble with Friday the 13th rip-offs is they always feel the need to add some kind of elaborate metaphor when people want an old-school, violent action movie. So the fact that Pursuit is an old-school "Jason meets The Terminator" slasher is refreshing. This one kind of reminds me of Cameron Roubique’s Kill River series in that it's unpretentious and focused on action and character. A supernatural zombie biker becomes fixated on a pair of newlyweds and makes their life a living hell with a high body count. The biker details were interesting, the police station scene was memorable, and just good fun.

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Simple, But Effective, Aquatic Scotland Horror

Total
4 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
3 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 03-23-24

This compelling cheapo horror novel is set in Scotland about a journalist mother who must take her two children to live with an estranged relative while she investigates a pattern of missing persons surrounding the local river. Feminist conspiracies and fish monster mayhem ensue. It’s pretty short, VERY Scottish, and despite not really having a third act, ties up the themes reasonably well. It’s a solid paranoid-mother, pulp-fish-monster book that can be read in just a few hours and has an interesting message.

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Mixed Bag Wendigo Horror

Total
3 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
3 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 03-13-24

2.5 I feel bad kicking on this one because it has good qualities but the plot is just all over the place. The first half is about the story of three businessmen who get rooked into an ill-advised hunting expedition in a cursed Canadian wilderness. It turns out their boss, a rich asshole, is about to have a nervous breakdown and lead them onto the land of an evil Native American spirit. It's slow going for about a hundred pages and abruptly shifts and changes locations, and does it twice again until there's a showdown against the demon. Our hero is joined by his Native Canadian guide and pretty magazine illustrator wife. It's silly pulp stuff that I would call good if it were a hundred pages shorter. I did, however, like the Native portrayals and the book still feels relatively modern. If Wendigo books are something you're interested in, this id a pretty solid take. It's just a mess, introduces characters that it then drops, has long scenes that don't go anywhere, and builds up to underwhelming action. But there are some good parts too, the bit with the dead deer gave me chills.

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80s-Style Teen Witch Horror

Total
4 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
3 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 02-24-24

3.5 A modern male feminist take on an 80s-horror-style book. Those old blood-soaked paperbacks are great, but why do they have to be so sexist all the time? Here comes Sallow Bend, a well-executed mix of pulp 80s horror and modern liberal politics. It's exciting and I agree with all this!

It's a thoughtful story about a teen witch who returns as part of a curse on a town who uses her powers to kill harassing men. So the townsfolk have to ask themselves, "How can I not be a sexist piece of shit to survive?" The main characters are surprisingly queer-positive and the violent deaths are gruesome. It's a balanced mix of horror and preachiness. I liked the worldbuilding around the evil spirit and how it implanted false memories in the town's people. Mid, but interesting and easy to read. Fairly spooky too.

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Stalker Horror Comedy

Total
4 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
3 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 01-25-24

3.5 Engaging thriller that's mild on horror but strong on witty banter. Patrick and Amy are a happy couple going on vacation with a pair of kids but little do they know, they are about to cross paths with a pair of psychopath brothers intent on playing murderous mind games. The book goes back and forth between the two couples, a loving couple who act like they're in a screwball comedy, and the dark comedy sadism of the brothers. But does in a way that's scary but fun. There are some good stalker scenes and psychological horror, but on the whole, it is pretty light. It's a good mix. So when it gets to the pretty dark ending, and the characters are still making jokes, it feels like a nightmare. I wasn't a huge fan of Dark Halls but I liked this and am interested in more from the author. Maybe part of it was the audiobook as I enjoyed the narration from Gary Tiedemann. Considering that the book is nearly all banter, he does a good job of giving the chemistry of the couples and balancing the different tones. Good horror comedy!

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Bram Stoker Takes a Deadly Inspiration

Total
3 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
4 out of 5 stars
Historia
3 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 12-05-23

Sometimes historical fiction can run into a problem of verisimilitude. How accurate is the research and portrayal and how much can a reader infer about the subjects? Bram Stoker is a London business manager for a successful theater. He and his friend, Arther Conan Doyle are talking about the latest production of Dr Jeckyll and Mr Hyde (Oscar Wilde also has a few chime-ins). When the Whitechapel Jack The Ripper murders occur the police question the play's convincing lead actor.

This leads to a series of events where, by chance, Stoker comes closer to the case of the famous serial killer than he would like and begins to suspect vampirism. A great idea begins to form in his head and he needs to pursue the relationship. This book is about a writer's inspiration and that eventful time in London's history. I feel like I learned a fair bit, but I'm also not sure how accurate it is. Stoker and Doyle form a sort of Home and Watson relationship and the book seems to be referencing their styles of writing at times and a lot of it has a vague epistolary approach. It's an interesting book on Bram Stoker, and the prose is eerily explicit at times. It's kind of one of those "journalist interviews a vampire" books but not very driving. The climax is ultimately way more about a writer finding inspiration than any sort of grisly reveal so more intellectual than horror. But if you're into the Victorian London era, should be interesting I think.

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Even better than the first book!

Total
4 out of 5 stars
Ejecución
5 out of 5 stars
Historia
4 out of 5 stars

Revisado: 10-19-23

Better than the first one. Jeff Strand does his horror comedy thing and this is up there with The Odds as the right blend of black comedy action and sit-com conversation. Alex Fletcher is a very unlucky man, first his his childhood friend (more of an acquaintance) turns out to be a psychopathic mastermind who devotes his life to tormenting his old schoolmates. The first book had Alex's wife and daughter killed and Alex was forced to murder a woman to save another little girl. Darren Rust (that's the bad guy) wants to prove to Alex that he can turn Alex into a killer to say they are not so different. It turns out Alex is going to have to kill a few more people just to survive in the sequel, so maybe he was right.

Flash forward a few years and Alex is basically a hermit; reads, does nerdy stuff, works in a convenience store in the middle of nowhere, all while trying not to think about the documentary movie was made about the crimes in the first book and how he is now something of a murder celebrity. One day he meets an attractive woman who wants to have tons of amazing sex with him, and he can't imagine his good luck. Except, she's an obvious serial killer super fan and about to make his life a living hell.

Alex is contacted by the little girl he saved in the first book, now a spunky teen girl trying to get money for college. She recruits him to give a brief talk and Q&A for a private group. But, you see it turns out, these guys are in a murderous cult who worship the killer, a proper cult with dozens of people and a compound. When his ex-girlfriend shows up, they must fight for their lives.

This is an exciting action comedy filled with funny dialogue. Every horror cliche is disassembled, witty banter is non-stop. Nerdy jokes about violence and suspense horror cliches are tossed back and forth but there is also somehow a good amount of action. It's ultimately a comedy and can play a little like a TV script.

I say I like it more than the first book because I didn't like the first half when they were kids. So I prefer the structure of the second one more that moves away from all that. The best part is when Darren, himself turns up and is just kind of an asshole.

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