30 Years Of ROCKET LAWNCHAIR, Kombat In The Street and The Shark Summer Parter

SNK released an official video celebrating the Metal Slug’s 30th anniversary a few days ago.

The video itself it’s nothing too special, just a thank you using footage from all mainline Metal Slug games (and Metal Slug Defense-Attack too), but it ends with a message displayed on a NEO GEO cabinet: “MISSION REBOOT”.

Obviously a teaser for a potential new mailine game in the future, i’d argue about damn time since the new Saudi prince-owned SNK had been pushing out a plethora of F2P gacha titles using the Metal Slug license, ranging from crap to ok, MS Awakening was actually ok as in it was as close as you could get to a proper MS title…. for a F2P thing, so getting an actual, proper Metal Slug game would be nice.

I mean, given the current nostalgia-driven market and how it has been almost 2 decades since the last mainline MS game, Metal Slug 7, released for the DS in 2008, then ported-expanded on PSP, Metal Slug XX came out in 2009, and that version was rereleased on modern consoles back in 2018, almost a decade ago already.

So the fans have been starved enough, and this comes alongside PlayOn rereleasing a new version of the home console version of the Neo Geo hardware, the NEO GEO AES +, which will have newly made carts for the console but also will be compatible with the old ones.

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[EXPRESSO] Lee Cronin’s The Mummy (2026) | Sacrifice Unto Sebek

As the title implies, this isn’t really a remake of the classic 1932 Universal film, nor a reboot of the 1999 Frasier starring film (which is actually coming in a couple years, because we live in the past permanently in the future), but more of a new retelling of the mummy and its mythology.

Set in modern days, we have a family that – while briefly living in Cairo – suffers the disappearance of the youngest daughter, Katie, by a mysterious woman.

8 years later, the family is still heartbroken but had to somewhat moved on, until they receive the news from Egyptian authorities of Katie being found in a 3000 years old sarcophagus, which itself somehow survived a deadly plane crash.

Even stranger, Katie is found, heavily scarred, wounded, in a catatonic state but alive, so she is brought back into the family, but soon her behaviour becomes even more worrying and strange events afflict the family…

Lee Cronin’s take on the classic monster has some nice ideas to make it distinct and not just a rehash of the old mummy myth, modernizing with a touch of folk horror and some creepy ambience, but it’s not fully realized as it relies a bit too much on other horror cliches, to the point it basically pivots to be just another exorcism film with an Egyptian flavor topping.

Props for it actually taking place a lot in Egypt and involve actively egyptian characters (instead of just having scenes in Cairo at the beginning), plus there is some good gore, but it never becomes properly scary, nor it manages to escape some overdone trapping with exorcism/possession films, the good acting helps as the characters ain’t much more than functional, and the script could have used some trimming, as the runtime feels bloated.

The Mummy Resurrection (2022) [REVIEW] | Budget Mummies

Since we’re getting a new Mummy movie meant as a stand-alone thing unrelated to the old, forsaken Dark Universe, i’ve figured instead of reviewing again 2017’s The Mummy and boring myself to tears, i might be more interesting to review a random mummy themed horror film i found new on Amazon for 4 bucks and bought sight unseen.

No prior research, just unwrapped the thing from my library and saw it, for a change.

The result of this dice throw is both not good, but also kinda interesting and not as bad as i would have assumed.

Still bad, but the more interesting kind of “bad”.

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[EXPRESSO] Ready Or Not 2: Here They Come (2026) | Competitive Shemhamforash-ing

The first Ready Or Not was a refreshing modern twist on the classic formula first pioneered by The Most Dangerous Game, as in, fiv-i mean seven years ago the modern “eat the rich” subgenre of horror wasn’t yet saturated to exhaustion, and of crap like HIM (not the band) or Blink Twice.

So making a sequel isn’t necessarily a good idea, especially since the approach is quite simple, as it double downs with more of everything, taking place immediatly after the ending of the first one, with Grace’s survival setting in motion a bigger ritual that involves the other elite families reunited to take part in a manhunt to obtain a seal of ultimate power, again against Grace, and her estranged sister that gets forcedly roped into this satanic mess.

I mean, to make my point, this released the same month as They Will Kill You, which is also an action horror comedy about a devil worshipping cult made of powerful rich assholes and the protagonist is in this mess because of her sister, though the context isn’t the same, the style is far more grindhouse, even the usage of the supernatural element is for slightly different purposes.

Even so, the question is inevitable, and i would say this is the better film, as the approach of more of the same actually works for this sequel, there’s simply more to the plot, to the characters, bigger stakes, a proper sense of escalation, less repetition and a better handling of its themes (even as they have become overly familiary by now) making for a fun and funny action horror romp.

Comparisons asides (i’d say just watch them both if you can), it’s a good sequel and i gotta admit, it’s still funny to see people explode like rubberbanded human watermelons.

The Post-Easter Food Coma Rehab Post

So, if you survive Easter, congrats, and to better digest the lamb and chocolate induced coma, i’ll soapbox about some things about upcoming reviews and the blog as a whole.

First, i would like to spend some time and then review in EXPRESSO form Arknights Endfield, i have it installed on PS5 but i wasn’t sure, despite me quite liking the original Arknights… as long as i could since i’m a F2P player that doesn’t spend money in microtransactions, period, so eventually i reach the “bottleneck” where they expect you to pay to actually get some progress done before you expire, i get bored and move on.

Still, i have been curious about it, so we’ll see.

Despite earlier planning to do Melee May in a redux fashion, it will happen, though i compromised with a rewrite.

This as i planned to slow down output in order to do some maintenance, organize the reviews proper in categories, that stuff, which i still plan to do during the usual mid-August hiatus, but i would like to do some during May, so if there are less reviews than usual, that will be the reason.

As you might have notices since we’re almost at the two digits mark, i’m committed to keep Platformation Time Again going and hopefully be somewhat costant of a featured rubric, and eventually i will expand the rubric with a specific tier/type about collections, since these are becoming more and more common, as the industry and publishers are scraping up anything that might have nostalgia value to it, heck, they even did remaster-port the Zool games.

On a closing note, One Piece Month will still happen but most likely in a redux fashion, due to how some other returning rubrics will happen, as i will explain later down the line.

[EXPRESSO] Don Chisciotte (2026) | Romance Dusk

A new, Italian adaptation of the famous Don Quixote by Cervantes, also based off an old theathre adaptation of the same classic story by an often unsung master of italian cinema and theathre (among others thing, he co-wrote Bycicle Thieves) Gerardo Guerrieri.

While i’m not familiar with Guerrieri treatment-version of the story, i think this aspect it’s worth noting because some there’s a theathrical flair and approach to some scenes, for better or worse, not that i think this is a proper, major flaw.

That said, this is a straightforward adaptation of the classic novel, taking place in its proper time period and locations, but aside the beginning and end framing this as Cervantes himself envisioning his book while being treated at a hospital after partecipating in the Battle Of Lepanto (and a couple of events are cut to avoid the film go over the 2 hours runtime) it is indeed Don Quixote, and ironically the fact it’s not a modernized take gives it more impactful.

Sure, while i did like Gilliam’s take on the tale (for example), i also understand that in a way there’s no need to modernize the story, as it’s themes do keep on resonating as strong as they do today, and reconfirm this as a modern classic not just because they tell you it is and make you read it in school.

I won’t lie, at times its committment to being faithful makes it a bit too didactic, some of the acting isn’t amazing, but the main performances of Alessio Boni (Don Quixote) and Fiorenzo Mattu (Sancho) are great, photography is quite good, and the committment to have the world feel extra concrete extends to avoid any digital effects, as in, they actually built real windmills and windmill props, which is extra laudable especially now.

Steel Ball Run anime debut [FIRST IMPRESSIONS]

I wasn’t planning to, i have a JoJo themed review coming next month, but i’m doing a quickie first impression piece now because despite the incredible success of the first episode of Steel Ball Run, that launched on the 19th on Netflix… there’s no simply no telling when the second one will drop, if it’s gonna have a weekly release or if they’re gonna drop it in batches like for Stone Ocean.

Hopefully an event meant tied to SBR taking place on the 28th should reveal that and these speculations will quickly become outdated, but i wouldn’t put it past Netflix to be idiots on this subject…. again.

Regardless, at least we have the first episode out, and they basically went for a big double sized episode to start things off, as most likely David Production didn’t knew what the hell the release schedule was gonna be like, and decided to at least deliver a sizeable debut episode to the fans as this did have a release date announced for certain.

In case you don’t know, this is Part 7 of the long running, beloved Jo Jo Bizarre Adventure series, though i can also be a perfect entry point if you are not caught up or completely new to Jo Jo, as – to put it spoiler free- Steel Ball Run is basically a fresh new start, with new characters and a new storyline unrelated to the previous 6 parts, so you don’t really need to know those to just follow the plot… and i will leave it at that, again, to avoid any spoilers.

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Attack Of The 50 Foot Woman (1958) [REVIEW] | #giantmonstermarch

One thing that might surprise younger people is that despite its popularity, Attack Of The 50 Foot Woman ain’t a precursor on the trend of giant/miniaturized people, quite the opposite.

It’s also funny how is such a movie obviously conceived for the drive-in circuits, since it’s so short than of course it had to be shown as a double feature, that being Corman’s War Of The Satellites.

So short than to expand the runtime from 66 minutes to 75 for the TV version they had to basically reuse sequences, add a long crawl at the beginning and even fuck around with frames manipulation to artificially lenghten the thing. Jesus Christ, the desperation indeed.

In hindsight, one does learn to appreciate the efficiency of these cheap movies from the era, for better or worse they ended up not wasting your time as much as some crap movies now do, even if they clearly wanted to reach the standard 90 minutes, but in the “age of content”, these films being to the point are quite welcome in their brevity.

Even though often they are so more due to budget than anything else.

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[EXPRESSO] The Bride! (2026) | Mary Shelley’s Frankenmess

This was a film i did look forward to see, obviously, being a peculiar take on Bride Of Frankenstein, with the trailers showing off The Creature (the Frankenstein monster) and The Bride in a Bonny & Clyde, Syd & Nancy style dynamic as they travel a 30’s America of gangsters and trenched detectives.

The premise sees the ghost/spirit of Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein herself, meta narrate about her “sequel” about the “Bride” of Frankenstein, in this case the corpse of a prostitute working undercover to gather info about a particularly violent mob boss, which is dug up after the Creature travels to America and seeks the help of Dr. Ephronious to make him a companion in order to soothe his unique loneliness.

The experiment is successful and so the Bride is borne, but it becomes difficult for the two monsters to go unnoticed, not only due to the police and the mob befuddled by a presumed dead woman showing up on the newspapers’ headlines, but also because Mary Shelley herself occasionally possesses the Bride’s body…..

the idea of a feminist take on Bride Of Frankenstein makes perfect sense, i do believe so, even if discordant by design, as it’s not only a horror-crime duet of deranged protagonists complementing each other’s delirium, but it’s also a gothic romance that often dips into comedy and even musical sequence that seems to tribute-spoof Frankenstein Junior.

It’s ambitious and – again- by design tries to combine together pieces that don’t really naturally fit, which is indeed “very Frankenstein”, but the execution honestly feels like a really hot mess of intentions, even more stitched together and messier than intended, downright clunky.

I do respect its ambition, even if the final result is indeed quite flawed, but also proper interesting and never quite boring.

The Black Scorpion 1957 [REVIEW] | #giantmonstermarch

There are many giant monster bugs themed films from the ’50s, and if you made one back then, there’s a good chance that legendary fx maestro Willis O’Brien worked on most of them, curating the creature effects made in stop motion animation, and The Black Scorpion is indeed one of the less discussed 50s giant monster flicks, alongside the often forgotten-ignored piece of Eugenie Larie’s “dinosaur trilogy”, The Giant Behemoth, also with effects by O’Brien.

Yes, before you point it out, yes, a scorpion is not a bug per sé (and we’re gonna split hair, ants aren’t bugs either), is an arachnid, but it’s not like audiences cared about this back in ’50s, nor do they now.

Doesn’t really matter because if we can make it big, we can make a movie about it, thems the rules, and a scorpion is a really intimidating crawly for most, so why the fuck not?

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