¶ Intro / Opening
Way wait a sad.
Welcome back to Midnight Viewing, the Horror anthology podcast. With this season, we're taking a look at George A. Romero's nineteen eighties series Tales from the Dark Side. Sharing the Midnight view with me are the Culture Casts, Chris Statue, Hey Grace and the projection booths Mike White.
Goodbye Audience, Goodbye, Goodbye Audience.
Season three's opening on a bear.
Night, we are taking a look at two episodes from season three, the very first two episodes from season three. Those are the Circus and I can't help saying goodbye before we get going. In the last episode, I misspoke about William Tyler leaving the series season three and going to Amazing Stories. William Tyler joined the series here, I
¶ The Circus
meant Mitchell Galen. He was the original, one of the original story editors for seasons one and two, and now he's over there to make stories. How many of those stories were amazing?
I seem to remember a fair bit, but then again, it could be Twilight. So eighty five cents three and the rest are Dogship.
Pretty sure it's only now this season. This is definitely in the wake of Romero and Rubinstein kind of splitting, so they're both still involved in the series. But let's say Rubenstein just a little bit more than Romero, even though Romero provides the script here right up front. And oh, I was just talking off air with Mike about this, and I'd mentioned on another podcast pet Cemetery. When Stephen King sold pet Cemetery, he sold it, he sold it
to George Romero so George Romero could make it. And then Laurel Entertainment, the company that Rubinstein and Romero shared, went off and made it without Romero, but didn't help their relationship at all. But speak yeah, speaking of Romero. Episode one of season three, The Circus. This originally aired on September the eighth, nineteen eighty six. Written by George A. Romero from a story my Sydney Jay Bounds, and directed by Romero stalwart Michael Garnick. This one stars William Hickey,
Kevin O'Connor, David Thornton, and Ed French. It's a story of Brag, a old weary investigative journalists who gets his kicks by exposing frauds, and Charlatan's who happens upon a circus that might be everything. It's advertising, even if it isn't for kids. What do you think of this one? Chris O?
Man, what did you have to ask me? What it's like? We're watching a different show all of a sudden, and I'm so sad. I don't understand what happened to your father, Milie. This used to be a show that I held in rather high regard, and all of a sudden, the show has taken a little bit of a turd.
Say, it's taken a little bit of a turd.
A turn, not a turn? You are or William Hickey's fine, Kevin O'Connor is fine. I think stories since they're literally a Tales from the Crypt episode just like.
This on the end of the night Gallery and it's twilight, and there's always somebody exposing the thing, and then the thing turns out to be a real shore right.
Yeah, but I'm talking more specifically at a circus. Look, William Pickey Tales from the Crypt directed by Arnold Schwarzenegger.
That was at Venice Beach, not the circus, I know, no, but just you guys had me watch the one we made you watch.
Yes, that's one of several little did you know you'd be hosting your own horror anthology show much late. I thought it was me personally, and I think that the set design is probably part and Parcelize. The set design is pretty pretty pretty. What about you, Mike?
So this is how are you going to start off your third Yeah? This is it right here. A bunch of dime store costumes and William Hickey just chewing up the scenery and Kevin O'Connor doing the same. I'm surprised they didn't get into fights over. I love William Hickey absolutely, and that was the saving grace of that episode of Tales from the Crypt that you got me watch. Uh, he can't save in my pinion, things like wasn't he in too Evil Eyes?
No, he was in Tales from the Dark Side the movie?
Oh okay, which did they have Buster Poindexter as well?
Absolutely? The can't Folk from the Stephen King shirt star Oh okay.
So that's different than two Evil Eyes?
Yeah? Man, that's the black Cat with Harvey Kaike tail based on the Edgar Allen Poe shirtst.
Okay, But isn't there a second to that where something like the cat come out of Buster.
Yes, that's the cat from Hell from Tails from the Dark Side Spot holy shit.
Okay, wow man, Yeah that was bad too. Uh.
Yeah, this You're suggesting so many great things to.
This, all of them.
Do this set design everything. We're gonna use light to do lightning, just yeah, dollar store type of things. And then it's I hate to say it, it's it feels like a blackout skip from Night Gallery. I mean that you've got like the people keep saying, oh, I must have downloaded the wrong version of Asfaratu, and that's what this one felt like. Like you see the vampire and I'm just like, Okay, boy, he looks really bad. But wait, there's more. There's the Wolfman and the Mummy and Frankenstein.
And when Frankenstein shows up, I'm just like, really, really we're doing this? Is all those other things are creatures that have been around forever. And then when you get to Frankenstein, I'm like, Okay, yeah, we're just gonna have all of the knockoff universal monster type thing. That's what we're doing. And yeah, I was really reminded of so
many better things. I was reminded of Nightmare Alley original adaptation, not the Del Toro, but the whole thing of the guy hearing the geek and then becoming the geek or the ending of Freaks. That is wonderful. I just kept thinking of better things to be. William Hickey, try as he might, could not say this, but I'm hoping to hear you redeemed by.
The Oh I love this one. No, I'm good, I.
Come on. Maybe he saw something in this that I could.
I saw William Hickey in a spangly shirt, and that could save the episode. Maybe the initial episode, the initial outfifties and is pretty rocking. I don't know that it's the set design necessarily. I think the problem with the episode overall is well too. It's twofold. Michael Gorny is one of the best cinematographers out there and one of the worst directors out there. How this is lit by a cinematographer who lit an entire mall is beyond me.
Everything is over lit. It's particularly when we get to the vampire, which I like the design of the vampire, and that's Ed French, who is the makeup designer on the show, performing as the vampire, who's doing a really bizarre performance. It's like it's genuinely frightening and you wouldn't want to be near that thing, but it's so overlt that you just see that it's all makeup. It's a drag, it's it's Rob Boteen running around on the thing set saying no, when you light it and we get some
gelatin on it, it's gonna look great. Yes, light it, put some gelatin on it. Do something, man. I noticed now this is the second Romero penned episode. I love George Ramiro, I love his screenplays. I don't like his short fiction because he falls immediately into the Ron Serling purple prose trap, the let me I don't know what subtext is. I'm just gonna get the text. This reporter who's like, I've had it with you, Charlatan's and I get my kicks by exposing U's the only thing the think, Okay,
we get it, we get it. We don't need much, we don't need anything. Honestly, he could just come to a performance and then snuck in after hours and then dunt dunt duho. But okay, here's another positive. I liked seeing the actual barrel on the platform with the wheels on it that you'd see in cartoons that sweep up behind it. At one point, William McKey rolls one of those out and I was like, I've never actually seen one of those.
What do you know that poor little guy that used to clean up after the whole circus Bullwinkle episodes.
Yeah, exactly, that guy that was made flesh or steel or something wrong. It is a bit nail in the head. But I did like the effect at the very end that they Frankenstein the reporter's head onto the Frankenstein body. Just the way it was floating, it was very off putting, and I thought that was very effective, and I liked that.
I also like the I mentioned the vampire that the vampire feasting scene is really grotesque and just made me think, like this is on it like Sunday night at seven pm, like Bravo everybody, like you're twisting everyone's mind in some small but overall there's no real story here. It's as we said, the guy who exposes things goes to the wrong thing. We've seen it thousands of times at this point. There isn't gonna be an anthology series that won't do
this story half a dozen times. Let me look at my nose if I have anything positive?
Can we talk about Nanush for a little while, Go for itnush isn't okay, I'm done.
Oh yeah, all right. I don't really have anything else to defend it. I am a little bit disappointed that it was Romero doing this writing and that one of Romero's main guys was doing the directing. But the performances are fine.
I don't know.
It's kind of creepy for a little bit. It's not the worst thing in the world. It is a bit of a blackout skitch. It really feels like a night Gallery. It feels like a modern night galler.
We were complaining about how Night Gallery kept you classic monsters, and they would have those Frankenstein skits all that. I was curious if there are William Hickey's in this episode, because there's when he's wearing that beautiful spangling shirt you're talking about, but then he comes out dressed as the ring master and his hair is gone from that bleached white brown. So I'm like, is there a second William Hickey? But I don't know.
I think he's like a Highlander, yeah, and I think that he's just he's one of the mystical circus people that we all know out there, like mister Dark, mister Niss.
In this case, right, you really couldn't get but especially just being a he can play creep.
So well and eb amused. I love abused villain who knows more but doesn't care that you're hanging off and it's just enjoying the ride. That part of it's really good. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna say don't watch this episode, just gonna say don't seek it out.
Yeah, remember Entails from the Crypt of the season, they had a circus episode.
With Jet He's real gone with Joey Pants.
I'm not sure sure I ever needed another's.
Because it was so perfect.
Hey, it was pretty good.
What about Lower Birth where we learned the origin of the Cryptkeeper?
Why would you eat? Would you even add that episode is bad and we both know it?
Oh yeah, no, I remember it being terrible, So I.
Was like, what about it?
It's not good?
Who thought they needed a Yeah, it was the origin story of the crypt Keep and then they'll dissolve cut it into the Cryptkeeper's face from the baby's face, and you're like, oh my god, it was the Cryptkeeper's origin. Still great? Wow, Yeah, that's a real thing. You can watch and Tales from the Crypt.
I think season five oh, I think it's earlier than I think it's season three, and I think it's it was in the it was in one of the comics. That's an adaptation.
Oh wow, yeah, yeah.
No.
The Frankenstein's Monster for me, I think is the step too far here because everything else is just like monsters. Then it's like, this is a literary monster. Guys, come up, you didn't love this.
You didn't love his fake arm just flinging around wildly as pretending that it's not going to be ripped off. That was great.
The singular saving grace is that this fat that's the singular saving Kristen. Yeah, the William Hekey of it all can't do it not.
Well, then we're moving on. This is season two, episode two. It's a season three episode two. I can't help saying goodbye ared Originally on October the fifth, nineteen eighty six. This one was written by Julie Selbo and directed by John Stizzick, starring Brian ben Ben.
This thank you You were gonna laugh when you.
Oh no, yeah, you can't not laugh at Brian ben Ben. It's name Brian Benben, of course from Radio Land Murders and Be Wonderful. HBO early television series what was it called move On or something? Dream On, dream On, Oh my God, developed by John landis the first schizophrenic television series. This one is about a little girl who knows the fate of those around her before it happens. But is she just psychic or is it something more sinister? Tell me, Mike,
¶ I Can't Help Saying Goodbye
it's not something more sinist.
Can tell that people are gonna die. She can't cause people to die by goodbye. She just knows when they're going, even when her doll is going to be broken. That was such a gids to say goodbye to her. They really took a simple wretch did the hell out And boy, oh boy, I'm feeling those traps when it comes to this, And I almost wish I was watching the Terrestrial tele could see what those commercials were at the time, because I think I'd be more interested than this. This is
perfectly serviceable. I found the acting to be pretty darn good. The Brian ben Ben does go over the top pretty quickly in it. As soon as he started sniffling and coughing and stuff, I was like, Oh, well he's gonna do and yeah, you can see all those twists and turns coming after the first goodbye that she gives to her grandmother, it's like, what the fuck is going on? Once you figure that out, it's like, oh, all right, And they try to throw a little bit of mystery
as far as can she control can she not? Of course, I got a little bit of them that she wish somebody into Cornfield if they're mean to her, But they quickly dissolve that, and they don't even make that a thing. After that, she confesses to her doll. Luckily we're there to know that she can't do that, and then she confesses to her sister right after. We're like all right. They kind of take the mystery on it. But overall
I found it to be enjoyable. I just wish it was about half of how about you, Chris, what'd you think?
I am so I'm so disappointed that the ending of this episode is not as earned as it wishes it was, because the ending of this episode the fucking I laughed at the end of the episode more than anything else, because like, God, she's gonna kill her own sister. I guess right, yeah, right, it's gonna murder her younger sister. She's gonna drown her to death is the implication. I liked the ending. I think everything that came before the ending was pretty bad. It was I don't know what
they were getting at. Yeah, when ben Ben has the inhaler, I was like, Oh, there's no way till more five minutes from the end. And then I wish that at the end of the episode they hadn't had the ominous music playing. The moment she handed her the dress, I was like, or the swim suit. Give it a moment. Give the audience a moment to come to their own conclusion before you show the sister filling a was she filling an inner tube with quizz creek with sand?
I didn't get that. I was like, how is that gonna make it sink?
I thought she was gonna fill up two little pails with like concrete stick her feet throw her into there. I don't know, it makes more sense than what we saw.
She was waiting it down so it looked like it was filled with air, but it was actually going to be filled with sand. And then when she was in the water, she's going to toss her that inner tube, which is going to effectively drag her to the bottom.
But she could just let go.
Yeah, of course it's probably more buoyant than that. Yeah. And they were just telegraphed as soon as the grandma turned on the stove, Oh, that pilot lights out, and then they like keep going back to the stove. And I was like, yeah, I got it.
I I'm good.
You don't have to keep telling this. You're really telegraphing this stuff to me. I'm really okay.
Yeah I was not. I was out of fanity. The episode had zero subtle subtlety. Have a fucking bull hammered.
The complaint I had about Romero's Purple Prose that he had no subtext only text is just wildly off the charts here with Julie Soelbo's script the mom they soon to be Dead Mom is an exposition machine. My god, it's so wonderful though, that this kid gets this power right about right before everyone in her life is about to die. Well, how many people there are they? Yeah, that's the thing. They could have played that a little
bit more. It's like you said, they should have. They cut their lone legs out from under themselves by having this girl confessed to the doll like she should have been maybe making some threats to people who are treating her poorly and give us a chance to wonder whether or not she's a malevolent little fucker.
Yeah. Half the episode should have, well maybe a third of the episode between two commercial should have been can this little girl this? And we better be fucking nice to her? That that whole idea of being nice to Billy move me away, that's what I was looking for this. I was like, Okay, now she's a show for.
That's what this show is known for for Fox at least these kinds of yeah.
And then Kevin O'Connor comes in and be like.
Oh, she's a fake.
She's a horn area as Frank it's nine right, Yeah, there's fucking arms and everything. I will tell you that you're vague Gonzo he is.
You know, you keep referencing the Cornfield episode of the Twilight Zone, And that's really appropriate because this feels like a Twilight Zone eighty five episode with a doll up of dark Side at the very end.
Yeah, the last two really have man Like, if we're gonna say this skews in the direction of what bad show we've watched its twilights on, because it's not night Gallery. This is this feels like Peak Twilights out of Nowhere like an RKO.
They don't seem to have their footing when it comes to something that isn't straight up horror. Yeah, anything that's fantasy or comedy related, they're just gonna stumble. But this one at least veer directly into the horror. At the I was writing the episode off entirely until she said let's go swimming. Ohly, what okay? Does it redeem the
whole thing? Probably not. I didn't like the exposition machines that every character seemed to be in the first act, and then, like you said that the telegraphing was absolutely absurd. They might as well have just had Brian Benden like cough into a handkerchief and oh it's bloodstained. Oh a touch of that couch. Yeah, I mean they may as
well have. The other thing that was shocking about this you mentioned in the last one, like I was shocked to watch The Vampire or Eat the the Lamb at seven o'clock on a Sunday night and this.
Is what kids watch this, This is a family show. Sorry.
Yeah, like they were making fun of it. I think Romero was making doing that. The critics of that but here we got a little girl who like falls downstairs and died. Like they just can't sadie it and dump it on the couch.
Oh that's the Yeah, that's Can we talk about that for a second. A small child walks outside, They go, don't be careful, it's slippery. The child goes up, crunch, crunch. You hear the neck break for bucks sake, show like a small less than ten year old child, and the episode just like, and she's dead. Is that how this works? God? I guess so. I guess you could theoretically fall and snap your neck on icy steps.
Oh yeah, of course.
Episode yes, so, but good god, episode like, I didn't need to see it and I didn't need to hear it. But it's it goes for it, and it's again it feels a little unearned because the episode just never gets back to that level of kind of shock.
Well it does right at the fucking end. It does.
Yeah, but that's but that's it, and it's not enough.
I disagree with you. I think those shocks are perfectly in line with the dark Side tradition. I just think whatever is what the rest of that's hung around it is not great. If they had hung up more Night Gallery. Unless Twilight Zone on this we would have had a fucking corker of an episode.
I do like that shot at the water rising.
Oh that's good. Yeah, I didn't mention that that was interesting and fun.
Yeah, got her got her own ass.
Her sister is going to drown her and she is resigned to that fate. Yeah, speak everybody, Yeah, hey, pretty much anything else on this one? All right? Then on the next episode of Midnight Viewing, we'll be taking a look at the next two episodes of season three. Those are The Bitterest Pill and Florence. Bravo Midnight Viewing. The Horror Anthology Podcast is a proud member of weirding Way Media Group and our theme song was composed by HP with an assist by Donald Rubinstein. Until next time? What
are you working on? Where can people find it? Mike White?
Everything I do is available at widowamedia dot com. How about you, Chris same?
Everything I do is found over a Weirdingwaymedia dot com. But like, rate and review anything you get wherever you get it, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, x, whatever the fuck it's called. Just interact with the content and content creators because it helps them out a lot more than it takes out of your daily schedules.
Yeah.
As for me, Patreon dot com slash culture casts, where you can find the only thing that's not available Weirdingwaymedia dot com, which is ranking on Bond, which Mike, you and I do with our friend Father Malone sometimes. Have you been on it once? You're going to be on it again? I think here pretty soon and Richard is there all the time, and we talk about James Bond once on Father Malone was on for Living Let Die. I think you're gonna be on for Gold and I'm swiftly approaching it'd on.
I thought I was getting a Timothy Dalton ow Man.
It's even closer than that. You're like, we're knocking at the door.
I thought it was a license to kill.
Okay, then we're like two away at this point. Yeah, And that's where you can find that. So what about you father Alone?
Well? As for me, head over to Patreon dot com slash Father Alone. You're gonna get episodes early and commercial free and bonus content you can only get there. And like Cable Box Theater, the show I do with Noise Junkies host HP where we talk about early cable television and their use of Broadway shows that were shot on videotape. My god, if money's tight, you can do us a solid by giving us a five star review. Just like Chris said, subscribe, like share, tell someone I don't know.
Thank you all for listening here at midnight. Viewing it until next time, try to enjoy the daylight.