Ghastly Gems: Werewolf of London (1935)
Forgive the pun, but Werewolf of London is a strange beast of a film. It preceded the much more well-known The Wolf Man by six years and established a fair amount of mythology that we...
Category: Ghastly Gems
Ghastly Gems: Phantom of the Opera (1943)
After a solid run, the Universal monster series of movies suffered its first notable dud with the 1943 remake of 1925’s The Phantom of the Opera. In case you forgot, I considered the 1925...
Top 7 Universal Monsters
Having written about at least one movie featuring each of the most famous Universal monsters, Ghastly Gems has hit something of a crossroads. Before moving onto sequels, spin-offs, and other monster-related oddities, let’s start...
Ghastly Gems: Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954)
Once again, we skip ahead to a new decade to look at one of the more unique “core” Universal monster movies: 1954’s The Creature from the Black Lagoon. In the mid ‘50s, American moviegoers...
Ghastly Gems: The Wolf Man (1941)
Even a man who is pure in heart, and says his prayers by night; May become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms and the autumn moon is bright. This iconic poem is...
Ghastly Gems: The Mummy (1932)
1932’s The Mummy is a difficult film for me to revisit, as it was the first I distinctly remember being (very) disappointed by. As a child, I was obsessed with movie monsters as well...
Ghastly Gems: Frankenstein (1931)
Released the same year as Dracula, Frankenstein marked a pivotal moment for the then-budding horror genre. In sharp contrast to Dracula’s purely malevolent vampire, the central monster in Frankenstein is almost entirely sympathetic. While...
Ghastly Gems: The Phantom of the Opera (1925)
Going backwards a bit chronologically from Dracula, 1925’s The Phantom of the Opera offered audiences a memorably horrific adaptation of the famous French novel. This particular screen version is notable for many reasons –...
Ghastly Gems: Dracula (1931)
With Universal Pictures recently launching their “Dark Universe” series of rebooted monster movies (starting with Alex Kurtzman’s The Mummy), now is as good a time as ever to look back on the classic “Universal...
Nerds on the Rocks 133: Doctor Who’s Game of Thrones
This week, we return to the wonderful world of Cable TV. Hitting on the recent Doctor Who season finale, season 3 of the Walking Dead and Game of Thrones. Some discussion on Mad Men...
