Black Gate

Sofia Boutella as the Mummy of Cleopatra, perhaps?

This is the sort of news that should actually make me smile… a bit.

Instead, I’m pouring myself an adult beverage and doodling the word “why” all over the back of my 2015 Edward Gory calendar.

Before I explain cause of all the sadness, let’s peer into the black depths of Hollywood history…

As a fledgling movie studio in the early 1920’s Universal began to gain real public attention with its first two horror films The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and Phantom of the Opera (1925).

But it wasn’t until 1928, when studio founder Carl Laemmle made his son, Carl Jr. head of Universal Pictures as a 21st birthday present, that the studio found what became its most popular genre. Carl Jr. took his childhood taste for the “penny dreadfuls,” mixed it with Daddy’s money and created a niche for the studio, beginning a series of horror films which extended into the 1950s, affectionately dubbed Universal Horror.

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Normally, I have a personal rule against covering the same topic twice in so many weeks. Primarily this is because I have an extremely short attention span and I assume you do as well.

But I just couldn’t let this go.

Last week we joined together to lament the assumed loss of a true Aliens sequel directed by Neill Blomkamp and ignoring the mediocre efforts that were Alien 3 and Alien 4. We also shook our collective fists as the mercurial Ridley Scott who, after foisting Prometheus upon us, originally threatened to continue the torture with Prometheus 2, but instead took a hard left turn and commandeered the Aliens sequel by turning it into connective tissue between the Prometheus and Alien storylines.

We knew this from reading cryptic Ridley Scott quotes during which he referenced if not clarified his new project entitled Alien: Paradise Lost.

However, no sooner had we begun to get our brains around this when last Friday the newswire was abuzz with fresh Scott quotations, stemming from his Thursday evening appearance and the AFI Festival (American Film Institute).

According to IndieWire, Scott remarked that the project formerly known as Alien: Paradise Lost will now be called Alien: Covenant.

But buckle up, because there’s more.

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Thankfully this all happened when I was deeply immersed in “the season,” so the enormous sadness was delayed in favor of scaring the snot out of the neighborhood youngsters.

But now the news has finally had a chance to sink in, and I am forced to seek comfort in well-blended adult beverages and berating the interns.

On October 29^th, writer / director Neill Blomkamp took to Twitter to shatter our hearts:

In the two weeks since, word is that the Alien sequel is even less than “holding” and more like entirely nuked.

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Talk about throwing in everything but the kitchen sink…

This little gem caught my attention just like anything else with a “red band trailer” – which is probably the point. But unlike most of the gore-fests that are NSFW, this just might be the most brilliant bit of film making I’ve come across in recent memory.

First off, a big studio is dropping it. Not to be outdone by Columbia (which had Zombieland) or Universal (which had Shawn of the Dead), Sony is now apparently stepping up to bat with its own not-sure-if-I-should-laugh-or-gag offering, Freaks of Nature.

Second, the cast is massive and includes Nicholas Braun, Mackenzie Davis, Josh Fadem, Joan Cusack, Bob Odenkirk, Keegan-Michael Key, Ed Westwick, Patton Oswalt, and even Vanessa Hudgens and Denis Leary for crying out loud.

I mean, these are all people who fans are actually still looking for.

Okay, maybe not Joan Cusack so much… but you know what I’m getting at.

Considering the stars involved, Freaks of Nature still managed to fly under the radar, possibly because the title was only just announced this week, even though it hits theaters next Friday. In case you’re keeping track, that’s a pretty clandestine approach for a horror movie with a Halloween release.

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