Hypnogoria

The mid 1930s brings madness and mysteries galore! Universal explore the Secret of the Blue Room and The Secret of the Chateau, and introduce us to The Invisible Man and The Man Who Reclaimed His Head! Plus Karloff and Lugosi team up for the first time in another Poe adaption The Black Cat!

This year saw Universal release three new fright flicks - searching for a third horror hit to join their blockbusters Dracula and Frankenstein. Murders in the Rue Morgue had Bela Lugosi bringing Poe's classic tale to the screen. In The Old Dark director James Whale brought us a blackly comic gothic tale. While The Mummy saw the birth of a new movie monster and another ionic role for Boris Karloff!

In this chapter we look at the great flowering of Universal Horror in 1931, the year that saw the release of firstly Dracula starring Bela Lugosi and then Frankenstein starring Boris Karloff. We also discuss the little seen but rather excellent Spanish language version of Dracula too!

In this episode we begin another podcast series, this time charting the history of Universal Horror! In this opening chapter we learn how Universal began and examine the evolution of its horror films, discussing silent hits such as The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Phantom of the Opera and The Cat and the Canary.

Beginning a new occasional series on assorted tiny terrors, Mr Jim summons up the Ghoulies and traces the exploits of these diminutive demons through four movies! They'll get you in the end!

In this episode we pay a visit to the 'Orrible 'Ouse of Terrible Old Tat to investigate some very rare and rather weird items of science fiction merchandise! First we ask what exactly was a TARDIS Tuner? And why had it never actually appeared in Doctor Who? Then we investigate the Zone Box, a piece of tie-in tat for The Twilight Zone that is as bizarre as it is obscure!

A visit to the Inner Sanctum unearths a vintage chiller for Valentine's Day! A tale of love... well, love, obsession, madness, and murder!

In this episode we look at the 1962 movie version of Jack the Giant Killer, a film that bizarrely exists in to two parallel versions - one a much loved fantasy film feature creature FX magic from Jim Danforth, while the other is one of the strangest musicals ever made!

In this episode we look at various screen versions of the Jack the Giant Killer stories, examining various animated shorts, included an early cartoon from Walt Disney, before comparing Bryan Singer's big budget Jack the Giant Slayer with its mockbuster little brother from The Asylum, Jack the Giant Killer, which went head-to-head in 2013!

In the second episode of our series on Jack the Giant Killer we discover the various legends and old stories than underpin the saga, a journey in which we will encounter the likes of King Arthur, Bluebeard, and Perseus.