TheRetroCritic

Gothamized  is a completely unofficial guide to new series  Gotham  and a debate arena for all things Batman. DOWNLOAD THE EPISODE HERE In this 26th episode, I discuss episodes 7 and 8 of  Gotham  Season 2 and I continue to explore Roddy McDowall's  Batman  audiobook. (for my written review of the Gotham Pilot,  click here! ) Hope you enjoy it! You can also find us on podcast  The Big Rewind  (available on Soundcloud, iTunes, Stitcher and Player FM) and send us emails with your Bat-questions, Six Degrees challenges and riddles here:  gothamized@gmail.com (for the pilot episode  CLICK HERE )

Gothamized  is a completely unofficial guide to new series  Gotham  and a debate arena for all things Batman. DOWNLOAD THE EPISODE HERE In this 25th episode, I discuss episodes 4, 5 and 6 of  Gotham  Season 2 and I check out Roddy McDowall's Batman audiobook. (for my written review of the Gotham Pilot,  click here! ) Hope you enjoy it! You can also find us on podcast  The Big Rewind  (available on Soundcloud, iTunes, Stitcher and Player FM) and send us emails with your Bat-questions, Six Degrees challenges and riddles here:  gothamized@gmail.com (for the pilot episode  CLICK HERE )

What a strange franchise. Really, when you think about it, that was five movies about talking apes they made back in the day, along with a TV series, of course, and now two more films! After going beneath the Planet Of The Apes , escaping it, conquering it, now, finally, we get to see the epic Battle For The Planet Of The Apes and, after such a massive build up, it's sure to be something special and unforgettable. Or a dud, whatever. As it turns out, the Apes franchise ended with more of a whimper than an all-out "battle". With the ever growing plot-holes added on between each movie from the first sequel onwards, reaching near-incomprehensible levels, the logic of this whole story finally comes crumbling down in a messy effort featuring yet another fine performance by Roddy McDowall and a couple of promising ideas but mostly unremarkable developments. For one thing, it's weird that Caesar is still alive and that the world crumbled this easily off-camera. B

Going back to this one post- Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes (and Rise) was certainly a bizarre experiment seeing as Conquest Of The Planet Of The Apes is essentially the basis for these reboots even if it has a pretty different vibe and plot to it. As with every Planet Of The Apes sequel, the film starts with some hugely unconvincing expositional dialog only there to explain what happened between movies and justify stuff that was foreseen in Escape From The Planet Of The Apes . Roddy McDowall is back, not as Cornelius mind you but as that very ape's son Caesar, who was being kept hidden by circus ringmaster Armando (Ricardo Montalban reprising his role) as the humans started freaking out about the future and, following a disease affecting cats and dogs, using apes as slaves performing all kinds of mindless manual tasks for them. Ludicrous? Definitely, but no more than time-travelling apes. The thing is, this whole pet scenario makes very little sense and the fact that all the

So, ok, you know how the end of Beneath The Planet Of The Apes was pretty, without spoiling anything, final? I mean, an ending like that definitely doesn't lend itself to any follow-ups so the fact that this sequel, Escape From The Planet Of The Apes , exists is something of a miracle. Or maybe just a desperate attempt at breathing life into a franchise that pretty much said its last word already. Alright, so expect some spoilers. Get this: as it turns out, the planet did explode like we saw in Beneath BUT Cornelius, Zira and some other ape doctor happened to be in Charlton Heston's spaceship and the bomb happened to trigger some kind of temporal "whoosh" thereby propelling the spaceship back in time over a thousand years with its crew completely unharmed. So already you've got a plot which sounds about as ludicrous as that fourth Star Trek movie plus Jerry Goldsmith's score sounds like something out of a goofy Roger Moore 007 outing and the tone

Yes the Fright Night remake was surprisingly decent. But what of the original? Released a couple of years before The Lost Boys , it already took a more tongue-in-cheek, nostalgic approach to vampire films and put a geeky character in the middle of a full-blown nightmare. "Fright Night" refers to a TV show within the film in which an ageing actor playing a vampire hunter (a perfect Roddy McDowall) introduces classic horror films Vampira-style. McDowall's Peter Vincent is an obvious homage to iconic actor Peter Cushing, known for playing vampire hunter Van Helsing in countless Hammer films. His character is dragged kicking and screaming into a real life vampire problem and his disbelief at the events unfolding before him is tons of fun throughout. The film sees a vampire amusingly called Jerry (Chris Sarandon) move in next door to some high school kid (William Ragsdale) who soon becomes aware of what his neighbour really is and, of course, becomes his primary targe