Horror On TV: The Cloning of Clifford Swimmer (dir by Lela Swift)

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Tonight’s televised horror is The Cloning of Clifford Swimmer. Peter Haskell stars as Clifford Swimmer, an angry jerk who is unhappy with his marriage. He’s come up with a plan, though. He’s going to have himself cloned and then, after leaving his clone with his family, he’ll be free to live his life. However, Swimmer discovers that things never work that simply when it comes to creating a clone. This is a clever story with a great twist at the end.

It originally aired on November 1st, 1974 as a part of ABC’s The Wide World of Mystery.

The TSL’s Horror Grindhouse: Amityville 3-D (dir by Richard Fleischer)

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 1983’s Amityville 3-D, Tony Roberts plays John Baxter, a journalist who is a professional skeptic. He made his fame by exposing con artists who pretend to have had supernatural experiences. He doesn’t buy that the famous house in Amityville is haunted. In fact, he’s so confident that there are no such things as evil spirits that he buys the house and moves in with his teenage daughter, Susan (Lori Loughlin). Soon, Susan and her best friend Lisa (Meg Ryan)—HEY! THAT’S MY NAME!—are fooling around with a Ouija board and people close to John are dying.

Now, I wish I could tell you that this Amityville film featured either Lori Loughlin or Meg Ryan getting possessed by the Amityville demon, because that probably would have made for a cool movie and it would also give me a chance to make some jokes about why Loughlin was later cursed to appear on Full House. (No, I would not have made any jokes about the college acceptance scandal because, as far as I’m concerned, Loughlin did nothing wrong.) Playing a teenager possessed by a demon would have also been quite a way for Meg Ryan to make her film debut. Unfortunately, neither one of them gets possessed. Instead, the evil in the Amityville house all has to do with a haunted well in the basement. A lot of people do die in this film. The deaths, though, tend to be a bit random. None of them are as disturbing as the deaths from the second film. That’s probably a good thing, as Amityville II is one of the few horror films that I really have a hard time watching.

When Amityville III went into production, Orion Pictures was being sued by George and Kathy Lutz, the two people who lied about the house being possessed in the first place. The Lutzes claimed they owned the term “Amityville.” Eventually, a court ruled that you can’t own the name of a town, especially one that you fled because the Devil was after you. Still, because of the lawsuit, Amityville III was specifically written to avoid mentioning anything specific that happened in the previous films. I guess the studio did this so that the film could be sold as just another haunted house film if the court ruled in favor of the Lutzes. As a result, Amityville III feels rather generic. There’s really only one scene that works, in which the ghost of a character who has just died makes a sudden appearance and smiles sadly before going on their way. Otherwise, things are pretty dull. Not even the presence of Robert Joy can liven things up.

Realizing that they would need a gimmick to get audiences to sit through another Amityville film, Orion decided to shoot this film in 3-D! Just imagine that Amityville Realty sign swinging back and forth and nearly taking off someone’s head in the audience. Scary! This movie came out around the same time as Friday the 13th 3-D and Jaws 3-D. Wow! I hope everyone kept those cardboard glasses that they used back in the day. It’s good to have a souvenir.

The third Amityville film was panned by critics and, while it made money, it didn’t make that much money. Still, the Amityville franchise continued. There are now probably over a hundred Amityville films out there and, God help me, I’m going to watch every one of them.

Previous TSL Amityville Reviews:

Brad revisits ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS – S1, E20: “And So Died Riabouchinska,” starring Claude Rains & Charles Bronson!

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Bradley Crain

I love Alfred Hitchcock. And I really love Charles Bronson. When you consider that Bronson was featured three times in ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS, you know I’m all in. Bronson first appeared in the season 1 episode, “And So Died Riabouchinska” which starred the Invisible Man himself, Claude Rains! Now seemed like a good time for a rewatch!

When a juggler named Ockman is found dead in the basement of a vaudeville theater, Detective Krovitch (Charles Bronson), is on the case. The prime suspect is John Fabian (Claude Rains), a ventriloquist whose act revolves around his beautiful female dummy, Riabouchinska, who we find out is modeled after a long, lost love. As Krovitch interrogates Fabian and many others, including his embittered wife Alyce (Wynne Miller), and her lover, the shady manager Douglas, it becomes clear that the ventriloquist has a dark past. We discover a Fabian who is lost in a world of obsession, self delusion and perversion, a world that the victim was threatening to expose. Without giving too much away, this episode blends psychological horror with police procedural and spits out quite the freaky story.

Adapted by Mel Dinelli from Ray Bradbury’s short story, “And So Died Riabouchinska” is an exceptional entry in Season 1 of the ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS TV series. Claude Rains is incredible as Fabian. It’s a thespian tour-de-force, with Rains creating a role that’s creepy, pathetic, and oddly relatable all at the same time. I haven’t seen many of Rains’ most notable works, but based on his performance here, I need to. Charles Bronson, whose strong screen presence was obvious from the beginning of his career, goes toe to toe with Rains (and Riabouchinska) and helps ground the episode in something resembling the real world. It’s not a showy role for the icon, but he conveys the toughness and authority that would go on to define his career. But what sets this episode truly apart is a storyline that explores the human psyche in a way that seems daring for 1956 television. There are parts of this episode that will definitely make you uncomfortable.

Overall, in my opinion, “And So Died Riabouchinska” is an essential episode of the ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS series. It’s a lot of fun seeing Hitchcock introduce the show at the beginning and wrap it up at the end, but the best part is the fact that the story that takes place in-between is creepy, clever, and very re-watchable.

We Watched The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part One (2011, Dir. by Bill Condon)

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Dazzling Erin

Earlier today, Lis and I watched the second-to-last Twilight film, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn: Part One.

The movie starts with Bella (Kristen Stewart) finally marrying Edward (Robert Pattinson). They get married in the woods, and almost everyone from the entire saga is there, including Bella’s mother. Bella’s father (Billy Burke) and Jacob (Taylor Lautner) don’t approve of her marrying Edward, and Jessica (Anna Kendrick) thinks Bella is pregnant—why else would she be getting married at 18? I probably would have thought the same thing if I were at the wedding, but actually, Bella and Edward are virgins when they marry. Even though Jacob warns that a human could die having sex with a vampire because of how strong vampires are, Bella and Edward still consummate their marriage without Edward turning Bella into a vampire. Edward does not want to turn Bella for some reason. Lis and I agreed that Edward probably wants Bella to get old and die so that he can find someone else. There’s also a weird scene when Edward confesses to Bella that he briefly rebelled against his father and drank the blood of men in the 1920s. Bella says that’s fine because all the men were bad. Team Jacob is looking better and better.

Bella ends up getting pregnant with a hybrid baby. The pregnancy progresses at a faster rate than Bella’s body is prepared for. Edward tries to talk Bella into having an abortion, but Bella refuses. Instead, they return to Forks and stay with Edward’s family. Bella starts to drink blood so that the fetus will stop feasting on her. Jacob, meanwhile, tries to keep the wolf pack from killing Bella to prevent her half-vampire baby from harming anyone.

I have to respect that Twilight built an entire movie around one very difficult pregnancy. That’s probably why the acting in Breaking Dawn is considerably better than in the previous Twilight movies—there’s more at stake than just Bella missing her boyfriend or trying to decide between Edward and Jacob. Though I didn’t realize it until I rewatched the movie, Taylor Lautner really poured his heart into Jacob in this film. I also remember that, when I first saw this movie, I wasn’t comfortable with the “imprinting” scene, and watching it again, I still wasn’t comfortable with it. If you’ve seen the movie or read the books, you know what I mean.

After all this time, I don’t know if it’s really a spoiler to say that this movie ends with Bella opening her eyes and revealing that she is now a vampire. She got a husband, a baby, and immortality! Way to go, Bella!

Tomorrow, we’ll be finishing things up with Breaking Dawn: Part Two.

Morbius (2022, directed by Daniel Epinosa)

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Jedadiah Leland

Michael Morbius (Jared Leto) has devoted his life to creating artificial blood, but he publicly declines to accept the Nobel Prize because he still hasn’t found a cure for the rare blood disease that is affecting not only him but also his best friend, a man he calls Milo (Matt Smith) for reasons that are too stupid to get into. Using the genes of Costa Rican bats, Morbius finally develops a cure, but there’s a side effect. Taking the cure transforms someone into a living vampire. Morbius is now strong and fast, but he also has a craving for blood. Morbius knows that the cure is even worse than the disease, but Milo doesn’t care and takes it anyway. Now, there are two living vampires wreaking havoc in New York City.

It’s not just New York that suffers due to Morbius. It’s also Sony Pictures, which released the film to terrible reviews and bad box office on April 1st, 2022. After the film was yanked out of theaters, someone at Sony noticed that a lot of people on Twitter were posting a meme that featured Morbius. Mistakenly thinking that this meant Morbius had become a so-bad-it’s-good cult phenomenon, Sony rereleased Morbius in theaters on June 3rd, and the film flopped a second time.

I know that I groaned when I first read that Sony was developing a Morbius film to be a part of their “extended Spider-Man universe.” That’s because Morbius was always one of my favorite Marvel characters, and I knew Sony would probably never be able to do the character justice. I was right. Morbius is mostly interesting as a throwback to what comic book films were like before the MCU and Zack Snyder came along. There’s no real affection for the characters and none of the type of big moments that usually made even the least inspired of the MCU films worth watching. It looks cheap, it feels cheap, and the whole thing is totally by the numbers. Matt Smith is given little to do as the villain, and, for all of his reputation for eccentricity, Jared Leto gives an anemic performance. He lets his beard and his hair do most of the acting. The worst thing about it is that it’s just boring. In the comic books, Morbius mixed his brilliance with a feral bloodlust. That’s what made him such a memorable character. In the movie, he’s just Jared Leto.

Morbius the Living Vampire deserved better.

Leprechaun In The Hood (2000, directed by Rob Spera)

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Jedadiah Leland

After they’re dropped by record producer Mack Daddy O’Nasses (Ice-T), three aspiring rappers get their revenge by breaking into Mack Daddy’s office. When Mack Daddy shows up unexpectedly, Postmaster P (Antony Montgomery) panics and shoots him. Thinking that Mack Daddy is dead, Postmaster P steals the small golden flute that he always carries with him. One of Postmaster P’s partners removes a medallion from a statue of the Leprechaun, bringing the Leprechaun back to life. Now, Postmaster P and his friends find themselves being pursued by both the Leprechaun and Mack Daddy (who, it turns out, was not dead).

To give some credit where it is due, Leprechaun in the Hood gets off to a good start with a flashback to a young Mack Daddy, complete with platform shoes and a giant afro, first finding the statue and the golden flute. The opening had the right amount of humor and style, and it also had Ice-T and Warwick Davis acting opposite each other. If the movie had stayed in the 70s and if Ice-T had been the star instead of just a supporting character, Leprechaun in the Hood could have been a classic mix of blaxploitation style and campy horror. But then the movie jumps into the present with Postmaster P and his boring friends, and an uneasy mix of gore and mean-spirited humor.

Given the Leprechaun’s love for rhymes, an eventual hip-hop Leprechaun movie was probably the next logical step in the franchise, and it does make slightly more sense to find him here than in outer space. I have to wonder how, if the Leprechaun spent nearly twenty years as a statue in Ice-T’s office, he was also able to be in North Dakota and Las Vegas at the same time. I guess you don’t need continuity when you’ve got a pot of gold.

Retro Television Review: Saved By The Bell: The New Class 2.22 “To Cheat Or Not To Cheat”

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Saved By The Bell: The New Class, which ran on NBC from 1993 to 2o00. The show is currently on Prime.

This week, the Gang learns a pointless lesson about cheating.

Episode 2.22 “To Cheat Or Not To Cheat”

(Dir by Don Barnhart, originally aired on December 3rd, 1994)

When I was in high school, my best subjects were always things like History, English, Drama, and Creative Writing. I excelled at classes that involved creativity, writing, and research. I absolutely sucked at any class the involved numbers.

In fact, during my senior year, I nearly flunked Algebra II. It just wasn’t my thing. I could usually get the right answer. Indeed, a lot of the time, I would look at a equation and solve it in my head within seconds. The problem was that I had to “show my work” and my work was always sloppy. Whenever I had to actually write out the numbers and the steps, I would end up either making a careless mistake or I would double guess myself.

Fortunately, Erin has taken Algebra II the year before me and she had saved all of her tests. An exam day, I would just wear a short skirt and write all the answers on my inner thigh before going to class. That was how I passed Algebra II. If I hadn’t done that, I would have flunked Algebra II and I would have graduated with a normal diploma instead of my neat advanced diploma.

In short, I cheated and I’ve never really regretted or felt bad about it. I did what I had to do so that I could enjoy the classes that I liked as opposed to spending all year stressing about the one that I struggled with.

This episode of Saved By The Bell: The New Class also deals with cheating though I’m not sure that what happens in the episode actually counts. A school dance is approaching and Brian wants to take Rachel. But unless Rachel gets a B on her History midterm, she’s not going to be allowed to go. When Brian happens to come across a copy of the midterm, he tells Rachel what she should study. Rachel does so and scores an A.

The show calls this cheating but is it? Brain doesn’t tell Rachel the answers. Instead, he simply tells her what to study. Rachel studies and she passes the exam. To me, the important thing is that Rachel studied. To be honest, I don’t see what the big deal is.

The show argues that, since Rachel didn’t know that Brian had seen the exam and didn’t realize that she had “cheated” (instead, she just assumed that Brian had good instincts), Rachel will now think that all she has to do is cram the night before a test and she’ll do well. But again, so what? That’s what most people do. That’s what I did and I had a great time in college. Seriously, when you’re in school, you shouldn’t be worried about grades. You should be worried about having the fun that you’re no longer going to be allowed to have after you graduate.

In the end, a guilt-stricken Brian confesses to Mr. Belding and he gets suspended for two days. As for Rachel, she’s told that she can take a makeup exam. But why should Rachel be punished when she actually did study the first time and she didn’t know that Brian had seen the test?

This is a dumb episode. I haven’t even talked about Screech asking Tommy, Bobby, and Lindsay to fake school emergencies so that Screech can “solve” them and hopefully get a good evaluation from Mr. Belding. (Screech is cheating too! But the show seems to think it’s only bad when Rachel gets an A.) If you’re in high school and you’re reading this, go ahead and cheat. Your teachers are too burned out to care and won’t even remember you were in their class after the school year ends. Enjoy your life.

October True Crime: Menendez: Blood Brothers (dir by Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato)

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Hollywood is stunned when entertainment executive Jose Menendez (Benito Martinez) and his wife Kitty (Courtney Love) are brutally gunned down in their Beverly Hills home. Hollywood is shocked a second time when Jose and Kitty’s two sons, Erik (Myko Oliver) and Lyle (Nico Tortorella), are arrested and charged with the crime. A third shock comes when Erik and Lyle admit to killing their parents but claim that it was done in self-defense. They tell a harrowing story of being physically and sexually abused by their father, and they portray their mother as being his enabler. High-powered defense attorney Leslie Abramson (Meredith Scott Lynn) is hired to defend Erik in his trial. A final shock comes when it’s discovered that 20-something Lyle is bald and has been wearing a wig since he was a teenager.

Menendez: Blood Brothers aired on Lifetime in 2017, several years before the better-known Menendez brothers miniseries aired on Netflix. However, both Blood Brothers and Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story suffer from the same problem. On the one hand, the Menendez brothers are obviously guilty and, while everyone seems to agree that Jose could be a harsh taskmaster when it comes to his sons, not everyone agrees that he was abusive. (And indeed, it’s interesting to note that, while both parents were shot at close range, Kitty was the one that the brothers really seemed to be obsessed with punishing.) On the other hand, no one wants to admit that someone could lie about being abused and, as a result, many people feel like they have almost an obligation to believe the claims of the Menendez brothers. Monsters handled this issue by refusing to take a definite side. The first half of the series was devoted to the brothers telling their story while the second half dealt with the lives of Jose and Kitty. Blood Brothers deals with this issue by focusing on Erik as the more sympathetic of the two brothers and essentially suggesting that anything bad that happened was totally the fault of Lyle. Erik just wants to be a good son, a good defendant, and ultimately a good prisoner. But dangit, arrogant old Lyle with his bald head and his smug smirk just keeps getting in the way!

That said, Blood Brothers is definitely on the side of Lyle and Erik. Jose is portrayed as a tyrant and the brothers are portrayed as being two somewhat spoiled rich kids who were ultimately pushed to murder by the abuse that they suffered. The ghost of Kitty shows up throughout the film and, for the most part, she seems to be sympathetic to her sons. At the very least, she doesn’t give them a hard time about killing her. (If I were her, I would never stop making them feel guilty about it.) Love gives a fairly good performance in the role and keeps you guessing as to whether or not she’s really a ghost or just a figment of the brothers’ imagination. It’s a well-made film, even if its biases are pretty clear from the start. I’d recommend it over Monsters if only because Blood Brothers gets the job done in 90 minutes and there’s something to be said for not wasting time.

Lifetime In October: The Couple Across The Street (dir by Anjali Nayar)

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The Lawsons—Amy (Jenny Raven), Brett (Nate Lawson), and their teenage daughter Lily (Presley Allard)—have just moved into a new home in the country. It’s a nice house and, for Amy, it’s a chance to get away from the city and her former life as a high-priced lawyer. Amy spends a lot of time repeating to herself that she’s strong and she can survive. Of course, all the self-help mantras in the world don’t change the fact that Brett is kind of goofy and Lily is at that age where she really doesn’t want to spend too much time hanging out with her mother.

Living across the street are Rachel (Ellen David) and Tom Sullivan (William MacDonald). Rachel and Tom are an older couple. Tom used to work in military intelligence, which leads to a bit of awkwardness when he admits that he ran a background check on Amy and Brett before they even moved into their new house. Rachel and Tom are also doomsday preppers, complete with an underground bunker and bear traps on their property. Amy takes an almost instant dislike to Tom and Rachel, but Brett seems to enjoy their company. “They’re fun,” Brett puts it.

And they are fun… until a police helicopter flies overhead and Rachel and Tom learn that there’s a killer on the loose. They take Lily, Brett, and Amy into their underground bunker. Rachel and Tom claim that they’re just trying to keep them safe, but Amy has her doubts. Why are Tom and Rachel always whispering to each other? Why do they seem so interested in Amy’s marriage to Brett and whether or not the two of them ever fight? When Amy hears Brett talking to someone and saying that he doesn’t have enough information, what is he talking about? Brett keeps saying that Amy is being paranoid, but Amy comes to suspect that there’s something Tom and Rachel aren’t telling her…

This turned out to be one of the best Lifetime films that I’ve recently seen. When the film started, I didn’t think I was going to like it. It seemed like Rachel and Tom were a heavy-handed representation of every delusion that blue staters have about red staters. Amy seemed so suspicious and so instantly judgmental that I wondered if the film’s director realized that she was kind of unlikable. It seemed as if she was going to spend the whole film complaining about the fact that people enjoyed hanging out with Brett more than they did with her.

Luckily, the film turned out to be a lot smarter and far more self-aware than I gave it credit for. There’s a twist that occurs during the final fourth of the film that totally changes the entire film and forces you to reexamine everything that you originally assumed about the characters. This film is actually a pretty clever look at how we allow our own prejudices to affect our thinking without even realizing it. Both the film’s characters and the audience are forced to reconsider how they originally reacted to each other.

This was a good Lifetime film. The bunker was a fascinating location and all five members of the main cast gave excellent performances. There were a few solid jump scares as well, making this a good pick if you’re looking to watch a Lifetime film for October

Guilty Pleasure No. 134: Teen Witch (dir by Dorian Walker)

Posted on October 13, 2026 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 1989’s Teen Witch, Robyn Lively plays Louise Miller, a 15-year-old who is not particularly popular in high school. While all of the popular girls sing a song called “I Like Boys” and perform an impromptu dance number in the locker room, Louise can only watch and wish she had the courage to ask her crush, Brad Powell (Dan Gauthier), to prom. Later, after Brad nearly runs over Louise in his car, Louise stumbles into the home of palm reader Madame Serena (Zelda Rubinstein). Serena reveals that Louise is a witch who will be gaining her powers as soon as she turns sixteen. Hey, Louise’s birthday is only a few days away!

Suddenly, Louise has the power to make her wishes come true! She turns her brother (Joshua Miller) into a dog! She gets Brad to break up with his girlfriend! She gets the locker room girls to argue! She helps her friend Polly (Mandy Ingber) win a rap battle against Rhet (Noah Blake). “Look how funky he is!” Polly says about Rhet. Well, Rhet may be funky, but soon Louise is the most popular girl at school. She’s so popular that Polly starts to feel left out. Why didn’t Louise wish for Polly to be popular? I mean, the solution was right there.

It’s difficult to put into words just how weird and tonally mixed-up Teen Witch is. There’s the “Top That” rap battle between Polly and Rhet. There’s the “I Like Boys” production number. There’s Zelda Rubinstein sitting on Robyn Lively’s lap and both of them laughing at how awkward it all is. There’s Joshua Miller, playing Louise’s younger brother in much the same way that he played the vampire kid in Near Dark. There’s Dick Sargent and Caren Kaye as Louise’s parents, Marcia Wallace as her teacher, and there’s also the fact that Brad turns out to be a nice guy even though he nearly ran over Louise. There’s the scene where Louise tells the star of the school play to “break a leg” and you can guess what happens. Louise spends the movie worrying about accidentally hurting someone with her powers and then uses a voodoo doll to torment a teacher. Reportedly, the film’s producer added some scenes after production initially wrapped. That explains why Louise abruptly goes from being innocent and naive to being a music video vixen and back again.

It’s a silly mix of tones and style that makes no sense and that’s why it’s the perfect film about being a teenager. There’s a sweetness in the center of Teen Witch’s chaos and it makes for an enjoyably weird film to which almost everyone can relate. Who hasn’t wanted to have magical powers? Who hasn’t looked at three guys dancing in the middle of the street and said, “I will never be hip.” And, in the end, what’s important is that Louise ultimately learns that she doesn’t need the magic to get the cute boy and to star in the school play. She just has to be herself.

Seriously, I’ll take Teen Witch over this new version of Carrie any day.

Previous Guilty Pleasures