Saturday, November 27, 2010

What to Watch Weekend: Scarier TV

Y'all know I am tepid about The Walking Dead, and now that Entertainment Weekly is all up the show's butt, I am even more turned off.  Not that I don't enjoy EW.  Any magazine that manages a way to insert Buffy into every list they create is alright by me.  But I just can't jump on the Walking Dead bandwagon yet.  So I thought for this week's edition of What to Watch Weekend, I would suggest the best scary television program of ALL TIME: Tales from the Crypt [note that The Twilight Zone is not considered horror in my brain, even though it may be in some of yours.  Meaning, I adore that show, but it's apples and oranges.].  Tales from the Crypt sparked my interest in horror comics when I was a kid, and there are so many memorable episodes I don't know where to start.  Who am I kidding?  Of course I do!  Here is a list of my favorite episodes of TFTC:

1.  "Dig That Cat...He's Real Gone" (Season 1)- Do NOT go to Wikipedia for descriptions of these episodes.  TOTAL SPOILERS!  Bastards!  That's the beauty of TFTC and The Twilight Zone-- the twisted endings!  For shame!  Anyway, I love any episode that takes place at an old time circus (and there are many), but this one it too brilliant.  The entire story is told from the perspective of a man who was buried alive as part of a circus act after he was given some gland from a cat that supposedly gave him nine lives.  Watch as he recounts each show-stopping death, and hear how he plans to spend the rest of his final life once they dig him up.  I turned this one into a scary story I tell my students.

2.  "Collection Completed" (Season 1) - This is a doozy about a wife whose taxidermy-loving husband won't pay her enough attention.  Perhaps predictable, except for how it looks.  Nasty!

3.  "For Cryin' Out Loud" (Season 2) - An obnoxious guy in the music industry does something bad, and as a result hears voices.  Loud voices.  We're talking so loud you want to jab a pencil in your ears.

4.  "Four-Sided Triangle" (Season 2) - Patricia Arquette and sex with a scarecrow.  That's all I'm saying.

5.  "The Ventriloquist's Dummy" (Season 2) - Do I need to tell you anything else but the title?  If you don't know what I'm talking about, then you don't know what I'm talking about.

6.  "Lower Berth" (Season 2) - The origin of The Cryptkeeper!  At an old time circus!  Holy crap this one's weird.

Alas, I am out of time.  You can see this list might go on forever, if I already have six episodes from only the first two seasons.  If anyone shows interest, I can continue my list another week.  For now, hahahahahahahah! (That's supposed to be the Cryptkeeper's show-ending cackle.  Not as scary in type).

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