Perversions of Science!
Guess it’s anthology week on Dino Drac After Dark!
I recently gushed about some of my fave episodes from Tales from the Darkside and The Outer Limits, which got me to thinking about other anthology series episodes that used to rule my world.
The well ran deeper than I’d remembered! For instance, did any of you watch Perversions of Science? It ran on HBO in the late ‘90s, and though I don’t remember this part, Wikipedia says that it was directly spun from Tales from the Crypt. (Course, for this show, we traded the Crypt Keeper for a foxy robot.)
I literally only remember one episode, which I happened upon accidentally back in ‘97. Fortunately for me, it appears to be the only Perversions of Science episode that people seriously liked!
I don’t want to spoil what happens in The Exile, though you’ll probably be able to guess the ending from a mile away. I will tell you that it’s set in the future, where criminals are dumped in the past.
(Also note that the episode stars Jeffrey Combs of Re-Animator fame, and David Warner of “guy who mutated Tokka and Rahzar” fame. Ron Perlman, too!)
Enjoy! Cheesy as hell, but there’s a reason I’ve remembered it for 20 years.
The Outer Limits: Sandkings!
The ‘90s reboot of The Outer Limits is another one of those shows that really captures the spirit of Dino Drac After Dark.
As I recall, it aired on weekends in an odd time slot. If you were home to see it, you were desperate for entertainment. A lot of those old syndicated weekend shows were like that. We didn’t necessarily count them among our favorites, but when we were bored to tears and totally without prospects, even a show we kinda sorta liked meant the world to us.
I could count on one hand the number of times someone’s mentioned this series to me in recent years, which is a shame, because so many of the episodes were creative, weird, spooky and surprising. Course, the show did kind of peak in its first episode:
The Sandkings kicked off the series in March of ‘95. Based on George R. R. Martin’s same-named novelette, it stars Beau Bridges as a guy who raises little martian creatures in a big glass tank, and becomes so obsessed with his research that he refuses to call it quits even after his cute little martian bugs — the “Sandkings” — display a certain bloodlust.
(Cute? I think so.)
I LOVE THIS EPISODE. (Well, it’s technically two episodes, but the point holds.) The effects were pretty good by mid ‘90s TV standards, and the adaptation is gripping. Someday I gotta read Martin’s original story to see how it compares.
The video is a bit fuzzy but still watchable. Try this one out, guys. It’s been a fave of mine for decades.
More Tales from the Darkside Eps!
Here’s a pair of Tales from the Darkside episodes, because I can never get enough of this show. (…which should be obvious, since this is the third time I’ve posted about it on Dino Drac After Dark!)
Trick or Treat was the first episode in the series, and remains one of the most beloved. I’ve never been as big on it as others are, I guess because it lacks the sort of corny/creepy subtlety of the later eps. Still, this one tops many fans’ lists of favorites, and it has one hell of an ending!
Answer Me is also from the first season, and it’s much more my speed. It’s about a woman tormented by a ringing phone, and I’ll say no more than that.
Episodes like Answer Me are a tough sell by today’s standards, but if you can picture being a kid and watching this on a crummy hand-me-down television in a dark bedroom late at night, I think you’ll get the appeal.
In Dino Drac news, I’ll be darting in and out of Funpack duties this week, but I have a couple of cool articles on deck, too. Also think we’re gonna try to record the next Purple Stuff episode. Should be fun!
What do you collect?
Survey night!
(We haven’t done one on Dino Drac After Dark in ages, after all.)
In the comments, talk about WHAT YOU COLLECT.
The impetus for this one: Next week I plan to do a minor purge to ditch a whole bunch of stuff that I really don’t need.
(My “toy room” back in ’98. I own almost none of this stuff now.)
I’m not talking about things with any real sentimental/nostalgia value, or honestly any value at all. I mean stuff like half-complete board games, DVDs that I’ll never watch and that don’t even fall within my preferred genres, and other things that I’ll plainly never miss.
Reason? I want the items I actually do collect to have a better chance to shine. For instance, I have a pretty decent collection of old horror videos, but good luck spotting them when there’s so much other junk on their shelves.
I’ve done these purges before, and the biggest of them were because I was feeling weighed down by the sheer amount of garbage in my life. I’ve gotten much better about that, but there’s always room to prune.
Suffice to say, most of what I’ll be tossing is stuff I wouldn’t even take for free from someone’s yard sale, so yeah, the goal here is just to give my actual good stuff a better podium. I expect the process to be both cathartic and full of sneezes.
To answer my own question, what do I still consider myself a true collector of? Besides the horror videos, old food items are high on the list. I’m still pretty wild for vintage Kool-Aid, for instance.
(It may surprise you to learn that I don’t consider myself a toy collector, these days. Still have tons of ‘em and love tons of ‘em, but I’m super casual in that arena.)
Your turn! In the comments, talk about what YOU collect.
