Deep Fakes always existed in 2019

Has anybody seen the viddie where they put Jim Carrey into The Shining? It's incredible how far technology has come, and it's also incredibly scary. This stuff can and will compromise the integrity of surveillance footage. It's only a matter of time before a grand conspiracy occurs involving this stuff, but is it new? Haven't we all been faked out for decades?

Shortly after the Shining video, we went back to the 90s for a T2 redux with Stallone's face on Arnold's body. I read that this was actually the idea for Face/Off with Travolta and Cage, and it's much more believable to two beefcakes who have a similar body type than it was for Cage/Travolta, but that movie wasn't bad either way.

So photoshop is definitely a thing, and it's much more easy to believe that someone doctored an image rather than a video, but we can go back a few years further... Back to the future... and with Arnold again... in... The Running Man!


Made in 1987 (one of the greatest years of cinematic history), The Running Man was set in the distant future of 2019, just like Blade Runner, only much more believable. We didn't have flying cars and replicants in this dystopian future. Just a few interactive game shows and bad fashions.

So there's a bit in the later half of the movie where Arnold's face is digitally put onto a double's body for a fight with Jesse Ventura. This deep fake is a bit more advanced than our current tech, because they were able to capture and impose his Austrian accent, and they pulled no punches with their body double when Ventura impales him into a spiked wall.



So much talk about deep fakes lately, but they're nothing new! After all, this is the future!

Wicked World (1991) - Could this be the next THINGS?

"A Barry J. Gillis Film" is already selling me.



You got to love how his trailers feature titties in them. You also got to love how it takes nearly 30 years to get this piece of shit on video. I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for this turkey.

What movies did you buy or watch this week? (7-21)

The Gingerbread Man (Blu-ray)
Con Air (Blu-ray)
Lust for a Vampire (Blu-ray)

Also about to preorder Who Saw her Die? and Alice Sweet Alice, both on Blu-ray.

Marvel can suck my nuts

They announced their phase 4 plans, and it all has me rolling my eyes.

Doctor Strange: In the Multiverse of Madness is being called the first MCU horror film. As if! PG-13 horror is not horror. Provided the director has done a few horror films, you know they're gonna puss out and make it into a regular fantasy extravaganza. Honestly, the first Doctor Strange movie was pretty damn cool, but call a spade a spade. Don't lie to us and tell us you're making a horror movie out of a kid-friendly property. They tried this with X-Men: New Mutants, but what happened to that movie? Despite getting great reviews from early screenings, they pussed right the fuck out and decided to reshoot the entire movie, and that was almost 3 years ago! And there's still no sign of this movie ever coming out, because Marvel and Horror don't want to co-exist, because then all the little kiddies can't see it.

Speaking of horror-related stuff, we're supposed to get a new Blade movie. Now, Wesley Snipes has been begging them for nearly 10 years to let him do another Blade movie, and they've been talking and teasing him that whole time, only to say no and give it to another actor who was already in the MCU. Well, I guess the netflix stuff, originally proposed to be in the MCU, isn't in the MCU because they're trying to pretend that shit doesn't exist anymore, even though it was hardcore and awesome.

Next, we got some "diversity" bullshit, since Natalie Portman is going to be the new Thor, and The Eternals is going to have some LGBTQ shit. Plus, it'll have Angelina Jolie, so count me out. That lady creeps me out.

And even with their anxious effort to buy FOX, they still don't have any plans for X-Men. They pressured the X-Men series to end with that shitty Dark Phoenix movie, and they aren't even doing anything with that property? They can go fuck themselves.

Marvel should have quit after Endgame. Instead, they're making shows about their lame characters like Hawkeye, Falcon & Bucky, and Scarlet Witch? Who cares about those turkeys. Who cares about any of this shit!

Halloween Kills (2020) and Halloween Ends (2021)

I told myself I only had to stay alive long enough to see Halloween 2018 as well as the upcoming Terminator movie, but those bastards at Blumhouse gave me another two somethings to look forward to. The same team from the last movie is coming back for some back-to-back horror in Haddonfield, so does anybody have any speculations?

Obviously, it comes as little surprise that Michael survives his 2018 outing. How he does this is beyond me, because SPOILERS... that damn cellar was secure. Laurie was a paranoid survivalist who undoubtedly went over every inch of that basement to make sure that her assailant wouldn't be able to escape, but those screenwriters can write themselves out of any corner.

Wouldn't it be funny if the new movie was a direct sequel to the original, again? More SPOILERS... how's Michael going to properly wield his knife if he's missing a few fingers now? The obvious answer is with his other hand, but still... Will he be badly burned again, like he was in the original Halloween II? Will his mask and outfit survive, or will he have to find another? These are the hardest obstacles in making another sequel. Once we get through this shit... the rest is gravy.


Whatever they end up doing ought to be fun either way. As long as you have a good actor behind that mask, Jamie Lee in defense mode, John Carpenter making that music, and loads of atmosphere, people will eat that shit up. I know I will.

Gore Ratings

You can now rate the gore factor of a movie on Trash Epics. This was a feature on zed's site and he told me I could use it here a long time ago, so I finally decided to implement it. I've been working on a lot of edits, so I figured I'd throw this onto the stack as well.

It's a 1-5 system of basically no gore, blood, gashes, guts, and splatter. Of course, I can't remember every instance of violence in film, so go with your best guess and it'll even itself out.

I'm sure I've overlooked a few aspects of this in the grand scheme of things here on TE, but I'll tweak it as needed. I'm also debating added zed's nudity ratings concept, but I want to make sure this added feature doesn't hurt performance before I work on that. Also, I'm still considering what icon to use for the nudity rating, so we'll see.

So if you've already rated enough shit on here, well... you can now rate everything all over again.

Great Bruces in History

I have probably posted this before, I think this thought recurrently, every few months.... I just can't get rid of it. Anyway: people named Bruce have done disproportionately well in pop culture, for several decades now. Will this exciting trend continue?.... We shall see.

Can you think of any major Bruces who have been a huge part of pop culture, including, but not restricted to, horror movie culture? There are several obvious choices, but just to start out with something people might not instantly think of, there was Bruce, the shark in Jaws. And, arguably, any movie starring any guy from Australia.

Anyone have any others?

Stranger Things 3

The new season came out a few days ago and I didn't give two shits. Season 2 left a really bad taste in my mouth. It had no charm, I really hated Billie, the arc was underwhelming, and it seemed like a season of filler.

Season 3 is a comeback. Somehow, it glued me to the screen again, and I think that's because it had a very fun story this time around. David Harbour is going full Magnum PI with his look, and he's easily the best character on the show.

This season is set in the days leading up to July 4th of 1985, and it cashes in hard on the pop culture. We've got bits about Romero's Day of the Dead and Back to the Future and all sorts of other things. There's a whole Red Dawn plot about communists and evil scientists, and that plot in itself has a Terminator knockoff that I very much enjoyed. He's a Russian soldier who's in very many ways stylized to be Arnold from T1, with the hair and gloves and attitude.

It's also like the recent "Us" in that it deals with dopplegangers and underworlds, which leads to a lot of melting bodies and all sorts of bizarre monster/portal type shit.

Of course, there's also a lot of Fast Times references, since a major setting is that totally 80s mall, in which our character Steve works as a sailor looking ice cream vendor, and he wears that suit the entire season. 😄

Very big improvement over the last season. Quite entertaining. If you watch it, look for as many pop culture references as you can. I'm sure there are a lot.

Least favorite movies

Just interested in peoples least favorite movies of all time. My would have to be Eragon. I loved the books so much and that movie was the worst thing ever. Close is Dragonball: Evolution and Avatar the Last Airbender

Shout Box problems?

Hey Box, is something wrong with the Shout Box? I guess it is also possible that I am doing something wrong. I have tried a few times in the last few hours to post something there, but it isn't working for me. What's up with that?? By the way, what I'm trying to post is a link to an article about Danielle Harris expressing interest in getting involved with any future Halloween movies.