Podcast: Morbius (2022)

Leading up to our appearance at Comicpalooza, we finally gave in to the hype and reviewed one of the most notorious and meme-worthy comic book movies of all time: 2022's Morbius!

Dr. Michael Morbius (Jared Leto) has a blood disease that makes his blood not good and he has to walk with crutches. He travels to Costa Rica’s Cerro de la Muerte to capture a tube full of vampire bats in the hopes he can study them and reverse his bad blood disease.

The cure works, but as a result he turns into a cool vampire. His childhood friend Milo (Matt Smith) finds out he’s a cool vampire and wants to be a cool vampire too and he steals the vampire goo and turns into a cool bad vampire. They have a vampire fight and one of them wins (guess which one). Michael Keaton shows up at the end for some reason.

Comicpalooza Update: We're on the schedule! Your Stupid Minds will be at the Main Podcast Stage on the Exhibit Floor on Friday, May 26 at 4:30! Come by and watch us talk about Catwoman LIVE! You might also get a special Catwoman prize.

Podcast: Dracula Untold (2014)

Your Stupid Minds covers one of the many movies leaving HBO Max at the end of the month in the platform’s effort pre-merger to make their streaming service really bad! This one isn't a huge loss though. It’s 2014’s Dracula Untold!

Vlad Drăculea (Luke Evans) is Prince of Wallachia and Transylvania and mostly a good dad and leader, despite some light impaling he’s done in the past. Sultan Mehmed II is leader of the Ottoman Empire and eyeing his territory, and also wants to take his son Ingeras (Art Parkinson) as a Janissary, so Vlad meets up with a disgusting vampire he met in a cave (Charles Dance) and strikes a deal with him to borrow his vampire powers for three days so he can kill the entire Turkish army and turn back into a human so long as he doesn’t feed.

Vlad’s wife Mierna (Sarah Gadon) is a little peeved he didn’t talk to her first, but eventually is okay with it and he tears through the Turkish army with his bat powers. Can he resist temptation and return to human form, or will he become a vampire forever? Obviously the latter, since Dracula is, like, a thing. So no mystery there.

Podcast: The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003)

We finally cover the much maligned, needlessly complex, and American-ified The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen starring Sean Connery in his last big-screen role. Sloppily adapted from an Alan Moore comic, LXG as Moore would not want to call it is about a group of British literary characters who form the first super team at the end of the 19th century.

Allan Quatermain, Mina Harker, Dorian Gray, the Invisible Man, Mr. Hyde, Captain Nemo and (sigh) Tom Sawyer team up to stop the Fantom, who seeks to… blow up some things and… steal some powers. Chris and Nick discuss plans for a B-Team League, as well as a super team featuring real characters of history. A poor impersonation of Ira Glass appears to plead for your support.

Some Notes:

• B-Team League: Varney the Vampire, Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, Jane Eyre, Dr. Frankenstein, Ishmael
• History League: Nicola Tesla, Alfred Nobel, Annie Oakley, Teddy Roosevelt, Andrew Carnegie (in a steel suit), Queen Liliuokalani, Ishmael
• Alan Moore and Todd MacFarlane, if you could confirm that you listen to the podcast that'd be great thanks.
• Listen to Ira Glass at the end of the episode, folks! We. Need. Your. Support! Like us on Facebook, rate and review us on iTunes. We might give you a neat YSM tote-bag (but probably not).

Direct download

Podcast: Vampirella (1996)

You WILL get fooled again… with another vampire episode before we finish out October. It's the exploitation direct-to-Showtime comic book adaptation, 1996's Vampirella!


On the planet Drakulon, featuring a race of alien vampires that drinks rivers of blood, Vampirella (Talisa Soto, a.k.a. Kitana from Mortal Kombat) travels to earth to avenge her father's murder by the puffy-shirted Vlad (Roger Daltrey of The Who/YEEEAAAAAAHHHHHH). The sexily dressed vamp retains none of the weaknesses of Vlad's dumb vampire clan, and she works with the secret MIB-style organization PURGE and its hotshot agent Adam Van Helsing (Richard Joseph Paul) to bring Vlad down and teach the earth a thing or who about bloodsucking, cleavage, and child murder.

Some notes:

• We apologize for the somewhat disparaging and relevant comments regarding Cal Ripkin Jr.
• Directed by the Joyce Carol Oates of exploitation schlock: Jim Wynorski, who also brought us Chopping Mall, as well as some amazingly named softcore pornos such as The Witches of Breastwick, The Bare Wench Project, and Cleavagefield.
• Ultimately, the 4:3 aspect ratio and VHS quality DVD transfer, this feels like a very cheap double episode of The X-Files.

Direct download

Podcast: Dracula 3D (2012)

Dario Argento returns with his unique take on the well-traversed Dracula story... but this time in 3D! Daughter Asia Argento and Rutger Hauer get in on the fun as we explore the wonders of CGI wolves, horrible French accents, poorly-designed jails, nudity, partially rendered computer animation, and giant killer praying mantises. Everything you remember from Bram Stoker's seminal work! The always hilarious Adam Pecht guest stars in this episode.

Some notes:

• If you're wondering if the 3D will ruin this movie, we're not entirely sure this is possible.
• Everyone in town is dead, including the innkeeper's wife, who we assume died of grief.
• Once again Dario Argento directs his daughter in a film where she's naked. Fool me once, Dario, shame on me. Fool me seven times, definitely shame on you.
• See some of our many other written reviews of Dario Argento films.

Direct download.

BloodRayne (2005)

For those who somehow aren't familiar with him, Uwe Boll makes bad movies about video games. By 2005, Boll had already made Alone in the Dark and House of the Dead, two horrendously bad films based on incredibly irrelevant video game franchises.

So it should come as no surprise that BloodRayne, a video-game adaptation about a half-vampire in leather who fights Nazis, is significantly worse than it sounds. Boll changed the setting to 17th Century Romania so he could shoot scenes in Dracula's castle, thus annoying both fans of the franchise and fans of Nazis getting messed up by super-powered beings. Then he assembled what must have seemed an A-List cast to Boll: the Terminatrix, Bud from Kill Bill, the angry chick from The Fast and the Furious... how could he go wrong?!

Sadly, nothing remotely this cool happens in the movie.

Vampire's Kiss (1988)

Nicolas Cage is a conundrum. Similar to Gary Busey's manic psychosis, Cage has a love hate relationship with acting. He never adequately strikes a balance between extremes; either mumbily sleepwalking through a performance (The Weather Man, Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Matchstick Men) or going so bombastically overboard (Face/Off, The Wicker Man, Bad Lieutenant) as to render the entire project comical, regardless of direction, writing, intent or supporting roles.

1988's Vampire's Kiss falls into the latter category. Cage plays New York literary agent Peter Loew, a Sherman McCoy-like Manhattan asshole unfulfilled by constant clubbing and anonymous hookups with beautiful women. During one of these hookups a bat flies into Loew's luxurious high-rise apartment. From this moment on Loew undergoes a drastic transformation. He is sensitive to sunlight, becomes increasingly erratic, and fashions a makeshift coffin by flipping his leather couch upside down. Loew says it best when he runs down the street screaming "I'M A VAMPIRE" at the top of his lungs.

HOW'D IT GET BIT? HOW'D IT GET BIT?

THREE FEET TALL! TWO INCH FANGS!

Still looks better than Twilight.