Lisa Marie’s Week In Television: 10/13/24 — 10/19/24


I watched a lot of  horror movies this week but I didn’t watch much television.  Starting on November 1st, I’m going to have a lot of shows to get caught up on.

I caught the latest installment of American Sports Story: Aaron Hernandez.  Like a lot of Ryan Murphy’s recent miniseries, American Sports Story started out strong but the last few episodes have felt like padding.  It’s not that the episodes aren’t contributing to the story.  This week, we watched as Aaron committed what was apparently his first murder and as he started to show signs of CTE.  But it’s still hard not to feel as if each episode is basically 20 minutes worth of story stretched out to 50 minutes.  We’re halfway through this series and it has yet to really give us a reason why we should care about Aaron Hernandez.  He just comes across as being an idiot, regardless of his athletic skills, his terrible childhood, or his status as a self-hating gay man trying to survive in a homophobic culture.  He doesn’t seem to be worth all of this trouble.

I watched Hell’s Kitchen.  The chefs continue to compete at a high level and they continue to have disastrous dinner services.  Hell’s Kitchen is one of the few reality shows not to have massively changed its format over the past four years.  The producers know there’s no need to fix something that’s already working.  If only the producers of Big Brother and Survivor understood that!

I watched an old episode of Night Flight on Friday.  It featured Elvis snarling at the camera.

I watched the episode of Dr. Phil in which Phil and cult expert Rick Ross confronted a guy who said he wasn’t a cult leader despite the fact that he clearly was.  There’s a lot negative things that can be said about Dr. Phil’s show but the episodes where he exposed cults and their leaders were always entertaining and worth watching.

I watched and reviewed Homicide, Miami Vice, and The Love Boat!  I also watched and shared several episodes of One Step Beyond.

And that’s it!

Horror on TV: One Step Beyond 3.3 “The Death Waltz” (dir by John Newland)


Tonight’s episode of One Step Beyond is called The Death Waltz.  It’s about what happens when, in 1860, two calvary officers fall in love with the same young woman, Lillie (Elizabeth Montgomery).  Lillie has a great time playing the two men against each other but, when one of them is killed by Apaches, she rather heartlessly goes to a dance with the surviving suitor.

Unfortunately, for her, the dead man’s ghost decides to go to the dance as well….

The episode originally aired on October 4th, 1960.

Enjoy!

Retro Television Review: Welcome Back, Kotter 4.4 “Once Upon A Ledge”


Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Saturdays, I will be reviewing Welcome Back Kotter, which ran on ABC  from 1975 to 1979.  The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

This week, Arnold Horshack gets to be a hero!

Episode 4.4 “Once Upon A Ledge”

(Dir by Norman Abbott, originally aired on October 2nd, 1978)

Seriously, what is going on at Buchanan High?

Gabe is vice principal but he’s away at a teacher’s conference.  Horshack and Washington are once again running the student store.  Epstien is once again working for the audio visual department.  Barbarino is nowhere to be seen.  This new Sweathog, Beau, is apparently the most popular guy in school, even though this is only his second episode.  Perhaps the strangest development is that Julie is now working as Mr. Woodman’s administrative assistant.  When did this happen?  I can’t even remember what Julie’s previous profession was but I don’t think it had anything to do with education in general or Buchanan High in specific.

Mary Johnson (Irene Arranga) is a shy student who feels that she doesn’t have any sort of identity in the school.  She’s one of three Mary Johnsons at Buchanan High.  She’s not Mary Johnson the Jock.  She’s not Mary Johnson the Cheerleader.  She’s Mary Johnson, the one with the perfect teeth.  When she tells Woodman that she wants to transfer into the remedial classes so that she can be a Sweathog, Woodman tells her that her C-average makes her ineligible.  She can’t even succeed at being a bad student.

Feeling lost, Mary climbs out on a ledge and threatens to jump.  Woodman, Julie, and each of the Sweathogs tries to talk her in but it’s only Horshack who is able to get through to her.  Horshack actually walks out onto the ledge himself so that he can talk to Mary about what’s it’s like to feel like an outsider.  Horshack gets Mary to come in, though he nearly falls off the ledge himself.

While binging and reviewing this show, it’s occasionally been easy to criticize Ron Pallilo’s performance as Arnold Horshack, though I think the real culprits were the show’s writers, who tended to make Horshack into such a strange character that I don’t think anyone could play him without being annoying.  But, to give credit where credit is due, Pallilo gives a really good performance in this episode.  Indeed, in some ways, this episode feels like a throw back to season one, when the Sweathogs still had a bit of grit and angst to them.

This was a simple but effective episode, even if the absences of both Gabe Kaplan and John Travolta were definitely felt.  (Nothing against Stephen Shortridge — who I’ve seen give good performances on The Love Boat and Fantasy island — but Beau was no substitute for Vinnie Barbarino.)  Still, it was nice to see Pallilo get a chance to once again play Horshack as a human being as opposed to a walking punchline.  And, for once, Woodman got to show his nice side, as he tried to help Mary feel better about her place in the school.  This was a surprisingly well-done episode.

Bonus Horror Song of the Day: Do It To Me by Riz Ortolani


Since I earlier shared the theme song from The New York Ripper, it only seems appropriate to share another 70s-style Italian horror theme song.  From the infamous House On The Edge of the Park, here is Riz Ortolani’s Do It To Me.

Seriously, this is a song that gets stuck in my head every time that I hear it.

Horror Scenes That I Love: “You left the bodies!” from Poltergeist


Admittedly, this is a pretty short scene.  It’s only 16 seconds, taking from the much longer climax of 1982’s Poltergeist.

That said, this is one of the greatest over-the-top moments in cinematic history.  I defy anyone to watch Poltergiest without shouting “YOU LEFT THE BODIES!” afterwards.  As an actor, Craig T. Nelson has never been one to worry about subtlety so, when you give him an excuse to yell about headstones and bodies….

(Also, give some praise to the great James Karen, heroically matching Nelson’s intensity throughout the scene.)

4 Shots From 4 Horror Films: Special Tobe Hooper Edition


4 (or more) Shots From 4 (or more) Films is just what it says it is, 4 (or more) shots from 4 (or more) of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 (or more) Shots From 4 (or more) Films lets the visuals do the talking.

Today, I am proud to pay homage to a director from my home state, a man who changed the face of horror and the movies but who was treated terribly by a jealous film industry.  I am talking, of course, about Texas’s own Tobe Hooper.  Hooper redefined horror with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.  Though his later films were never quite as critically or financially successful as that classic, many of them have since been rediscovered by audiences who now better appreciate Hooper’s quirky sensibility.  Hollywood may not have known how to handle Tobe Hooper but horror fans like me will always appreciate him.

It’s time for….

4 Shots From 4 Tobe Hooper Films

Live Tweet Alert: Join #ScarySocial for Wrong Turn!


As some of our regular readers undoubtedly know, I am involved in a few weekly live tweets on twitter.  I host #FridayNightFlix every Friday, I co-host #ScarySocial on Saturday, and I am one of the five hosts of #MondayActionMovie!  Every week, we get together.  We watch a movie.  We tweet our way through it.

Tonight, at 9 pm et, Deanna Dawn will be hosting #ScarySocial!  The movie?  2003’s Wrong Turn!

If you want to join us this Friday, just hop onto twitter, start the movie at 9 pm et, and use the #ScarySocial hashtag!  I’ll be there tweeting and I imagine some other members of the TSL Crew will be there as well.  It’s a friendly group and welcoming of newcomers so don’t be shy.

Wrong Turn is available on Prime!

See you there!

Horror on the Lens: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (dir by John S. Robertson)


394px-Dr_Jekyll_and_Mr_Hyde_1920_poster

Ever since the birth of film, Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde has been a popular subject for adaptation.  Not only does the classic story of a good doctor who unleashes his evil instinct via potion serve as a potent metaphor for everything from sexual repression to drug addiction, but the dual role of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde has provides an excellent opportunity for an actor to show off.

The first film adaptation of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is believed to have been made in 1908.  Two more version followed in 1912 and 1913 and then, suddenly, 1920 saw three different film versions.

The best known of the 1920 version is our film for today.  This version is best remembered for John Barrymore’s powerful performance in the title role but it also holds up remarkably well as a work of cinematic horror.

Horror Song Of The Day: New York One More Day by Francesco De Masi


Tonight’s horror song of the day is perhaps not as well-known as some of the other songs that I’ve shared.  It appeared in Lucio Fulci’s controversial (to put it mildly) giallo, The New York Ripper.   That film is so infamous for its violence, nihilism, and killer who quacks like a duck that it is something overlooked that it features a great score from Francesco De Masi.

This is the main theme from The New York Ripper and it captures the movie’s mix of horror and police procedural.  It’s the 70s cop show theme from Hell.