Sixteenth Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #10 The Lost Boys

 Here I was, thinking that this was going to be a throwaway post.  I re-watched The Lost Boys (in my head, it's just Lost Boys) last night because a coworker and I were talking about appropriate horror movies for his fourteen year old daughter.  He's been slowly introducing her to things like Poltergeist and Alien and she is NOT impressed when he squirms and jumps at these iconic movies - that TERRIFIED ALL OF US back in the day.  I suggested The Lost Boys and he was like, ooh good one, and I wondered if she'd balk at the 80s of it all, and he said that she loves Stranger Things, and I said well, I have it on DVD if you have something still to play DVDs on, and he's like, OF COURSE I DO.  But then that night, at home, I thought I should rewatch it to see if it really is appropriate for a fourteen year old because it's rated R and what the hell do I know about what a fourteen year old should watch.

And here's why I thought it would be a throwaway post because I LOVE The Lost Boys and I rewatch it a lot and I was sure that I had done a post here about it within the last couple of years.  But I can't find a post.  And I think maybe I've never included it in a Scarelicious post?

ANYWAY The Lost Boys is AWESOME and you should watch it, or watch it again.  It came out in 1987 and it is soooooooooo 80s - but like real 80s.  It was largely filmed in Santa Cruz (California), on its boardwalk, and you can tell - especially in the opening bits - that these are real folks, not actors: punks, New Wavers, dudes in Speedos, street kids.  The soundtrack is amazing and I'm pretty sure I bought it on cassette when the movie came out.

It's a vampire flick - nearly a horror-comedy with some serious 80s music video style (Joel Schumacher was the director, if that tells you anything).  And it has some surprisingly brutal violence in one or two scenes, something that I always forget in the face of all that hair and shoulder pads and Kiefer Sutherland's bleached-blond snarling and the beauty that is that era's Jason Patric.  The cast is amazing: Kiefer and Jason, plus the Coreys (Haim and Feldman), and Jamie Gertz, and Dianne Weist, and Alex Winter (of Bill and Ted fame), and Edward Herrmann (of Gilmore Girls fame).  Basically, a divorced mom and her two boys move in with her father, in a seaside town that is overrun with vampires.  That's all you need to know about the plot.  Seriously, I adore this movie.

April reads

 I'm late!  Which is hilarious, given how rarely I post on this little blog anymore.  But we were on vacation in the desert for ten days at the end of April/beginning of May and I read a bunch of books in between outdoors things and drinking (also sometimes outdoors), and then we came home and I got overwhelmed by laundry and real life and here we are, way late in sharing what I read in April.  Pluswhich, it's been so long I don't know how much I remember any of them.

• A Sorceress Comes to Call by T. Kingfisher.  I keep trying to read her older stuff but this is the newest one.  When your mom's an evil sorceress, it makes things difficult for everyone.  All the reviews say this is a "dark retelling of the Brothers Grimms' Goose Girl, but I don't really remember that one either.
• Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay.  Told by a somewhat unreliable narrator, this riff on a cursed movie tells the story of the making of an ultralow budget 1990s cult horror movie among a group of friends.  Unsettling for sure.
• Holly by Stephen King.  Holly Gibney returns to solve more murders in this mystery-horror mashup.  She's a great character and I like how King has kept her story going after her partner (and the main protagonist of the first few books in the series) has left the scene.  Good stuff.  Kind of icky.
• Sharp Ends by Joe Abercrombie.  This is a collection of short stories set in the First Law (etc.) universe, telling back stories and side stories that didn't quite have a place in those books.  Lots of fun (and rather a lot of knives).
• Carmilla by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu.  An 1872 lesbianish vampire novella, this is a precursor to - and perhaps inspiration for - Bram Stoker's Dracula.  I loved it, although I thought the ending sort of fizzled out.  I was DELIGHTED to subsequently discover a 2015 Carmilla webseries on YouTube - recommend you read it first and then watch it.
• Home Before Morning - by Lynda Van Devanter.  This memoir, recalling the author's stint as an Army nurse in Vietnam, is basically a blueprint for the subsequent novel The Women that I read in March.  It leaves no question that war is hell, and so is the homecoming sometimes.
• All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Crosby.  Changing gears, this one - which I quite liked - is about a black sheriff in a small southern town, fighting racism and the tattered remains of the Confederacy, while also trying to hunt down a serial killer.
• The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward.  Stolen children, serial killers, recluses and charismatic cats are woven together in this one.  I was entralled all the way through and there are multiple twists as you go along.  So fun.
• What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher.  A retelling (huh, another one) of The Fall of the House of Usher, this time with more mushrooms.

Fifteenth Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #12 The Vampire Lovers and #13 Vampire Circus

 It's Hammer [Films] time!  I'm combining both Hammer films into one post because.  Well, because I want to.  It's certainly not because I watched Vampire Circus weeks ago, wrote notes for a review and then lost the notes and forgot to post the review.  Certainly not that.

1970's The Vampire Lovers has Hammer Films' beloved, Peter Cushing, in it.  He gets top billing but he's not on screen all that often.  In any event, in the late 1700s, somewhere in Europe (Bavaria, maybe?), there are vampires in the village.  They've got a neat set-up, orchestrated by the main vamp, a tall, pale dude in a top hat, who lurks around and laughs, but not much else: a familiar, "the Countess," installs her vampire "daughter," who goes by Carmilla, Marcela, and other names, into local gentry's homes.  Carmilla seduces and drains any nubile daughter, killing or turning them, and then flounces on to the next home.  There's quite a lot of screaming and nekkid 70s breasts, but it's pretty slow.  Cushing and a small gang of townsmen end up staking Carmilla to end the vampiric menace.

1972's Vampire Circus uses the same castle backdrop as TVL does, which is funny.  In this one, set earlier than TVL, a village is isolated from its surroundings since there's a bit of plague floating around and none of then neighboring towns wants their germs.  A roving circus arrives, giving the village some entertainment.  But the circus folk are vampires and their familiars, in town to attempt to resurrect the main vamp who was defeated by the villagers years and years ago.  These vampires have HUGE fangs (no a euphemism).  This flick is terrifically campy (the attack by the black panther is obviously crew members tossing a big stuffed animal at the actors) but with some decent special effects.  It's also kind of lowkey 70s sexy, which is, I guess, a Hammer hallmark.

Fourteenth Annual FMS Scarilicious October Movie Series: #5 John Carpenter's Vampires

 In this 1998 flick, directed and scored by John Carpenter, James Woods leads a very organized and well-funded (by the Vatican, no less) squad of vampire slayers (no, not chosen teenaged girls).  They rout a big nest - and these vamps do not die easily, by the way, as you have to literally hammer the stakes into their hearts and then drag them into sunlight to burn.  And then, whilst celebrating their success with boozer and s3x workers, the master vampire descends upon them.  He pretty much literally shreds the squad and h00kers (fifteen or so bodies in his wake), leaving only James Woods, Daniel Baldwin and Sheryl Lee alive.  The master vamp has bitten Sheryl, however, so JW and DB use her psychic connection with him to track him, at least until she turns.

Along the way they are joined by a young priest who informs them that this master vampire is the O.G. vampire, like the first one, accidentally created in the 1300s by the Catholic Church during a botched exorcism.  Now, the O.G. vamp is searching for a relic that will allow him to day-walk.  He finds the relic.  James Woods et als. find him.  Carnage ensues.

Question from my notes: Has James Woods ever been considered a good actor?

Look, this is a basic, boring, not at all scary vampire movie.  Although the bloody (extremely bloody) bits are fun, I expected a lot more from John Carpenter.

Fourteenth Annual FMS Scarilicious October Movie Series: #2 Salem's Lot

 Before Netflix abandoned its DVD service, to which I have been a loyal subscriber for a long, long time, I managed to get a couple of older horror flicks, which are hard-to-impossible to find streaming, including this iconic television movie from 1979.  That vampire boy floating outside the second story window has traumatized all of Gen X - kids who shouldn't have been watching Salem's Lot when it was on.  The cast includes David Soul (from the OG Starsky & Hutch and miscast, if you ask me), Bonnie Bedelia and Fred Willard, plus a whole bunch of "who's that guy?!" actors.

If you aren't familiar with it, this 1979 t.v. movie is based on a 1975 Stephen King novel of the same name.  Go read the novel.  It's long but I'll wait.  It's terrific.  Writer Ben Mears returns to the Maine town he grew up in to write about an old mansion, the Marsden House.  But two newcomers, Mr. Straker and Mr. Barlow, purported antiques dealers, have bought the house.  Barlow is, of course, a vampire and Straker is his main minion.  Townspeople start getting killed for food or turned into baby vamps.  Ben amasses a small team to fight the vampires -  girlfriend Susan, an older high school teacher, a local doctor, a Catholic priest and a soon-to-be-orphaned teenaged boy, Mark.  It doesn't go well for the team and only Ben and Mark live to fight another day.

Look, I'll grant you that the vampire kid at the window holds up, and the Barlow monster design is fantastic (except why did they make him blue?), but otherwise this is a fairly underwhelming horror offering for the 70s, even keeping television standards under consideration.  It was directed by Tobe Hooper, for crying out loud!  Davis Soul is not as charming as Ben should be; Bonnie Bedelia plays Susan as a lot dumber than the book version; Barlow and Straker are very different from the book as well.  The "Maine" accents are predictably shitty.  The acting is pretty painful, to be honest, and the narrative seems disjointed and hard to follow.  Maybe if I didn't know the book so well I would have appreciated this more?

Thirteenth Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #6 Day Shift

 Day Shift is a new (2022) straight-to-Netflix horror-comedy starring Jamie Foxx as Bud, a hard-working but non-union vampire hunter in the San Fernando valley.  When his ex-wife threatens to take their kid and move to Florida, he needs to come up with enough cash - quickly - to pay for the kid's tuition and braces to entice her to stay.  He wheedles his way back into the Vampire Hunters Union, on the good word of legendary slayer Snoop Dogg, but gets saddles with Seth, a bean-counting chaperone (Dave Franco).  JF starts racking up the kills (the hunters collects vamp teeth as proof) and soon kills the wrong old lady vampire, pissing off the head vamp, Audrey.  Audrey kidnaps Bud's family, there's lots of car chases ... and this just didn't hold my attention very well.

The action is solid, with good fight choreography, and it's plenty gory.  But this is not even close to scary, or all that funny, or all that original.  I give it a meh.

Elventh Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #7 Vampires Vs the Bronx

 Netflix's brand new Vampires Vs. the Bronx is a new-ish take on an old story: a group of teenagers must do battle with the nefarious vampires who are taking over their neighborhood.  A tale as old as time.  But what's new - and quite refreshing - is that nearly the entire cast are POC, except for the bad guys who are very, very white.

Miguel/"Lil' Mayor", with the help of his BFFs Bobby and Luis, is putting together a block party fundraiser to save the neighborhood bodega that was their second home.  All throughout the neighborhood, real estate developers are coming in and paying cash money to the local people.  Most of the adults see this as easy money and a chance to get out of the Bronx.  What the kids see is the loss of their beloved neighborhood as gentrifying forces replace bodegas and nail salons with coffee bars and hipster shops.  What's worse: the gentrifying forces are actually vampires who know that the city police won't look too hard for all the missing gangbangers, etc., who have become midnight snacks.   Truly, what is scarier: gentrification or suckheads?

There's not a ton of plot.  Lil' Mayor wants to save the bodega, flirt with older girls and not get so embarrassed by his mom.  Luis ("the Puerto Rican Harry Potter") is just glad to be back in the Bronx with his friends, after being shipped off to Tampa to stay with relatives.  Bobby has the most compelling side-story as he navigates being recruited by a local gangbanger.  And they have to learn how to kill vampires.

Vampire-wise, there is no new ground being broken.  This is a lightweight horror-comedy.  There are specific references to Blade, Buffy and 'Salem's Lot.  This is a PG-13 offering and nothing is scarier than your average BtVS episode.  But the cast is fantastic and charming as hell.  Representation matters and I for one welcome more diversity into the horror genre. 

Eleventh Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #2 Fright Night (2011)

 'Twas a dark and stormy night in the suburbs of Las Vegas.  Kids are missing and Charlie, former nerd now with cool friends and a hot girlfriend, suspects his new neighbor, Jerry.  The story is relatively faithful to the 1985 original, with modern updates, of course.  Charlie's friend Ed gets seduced/turned by Jerry; Jerry menaces Charlie and no one believes him; Charlie turns to Peter Vincent, a Vegas goth magician who claims to be a vampire killer for help; Vincent scoffs and turns him away; when girlfriend Amy gets kidnapped, Charlie - and eventually Vincent - mount an attack on the vampire.

Parts of this update are strong.  The cast is terrific: Anton Yelchin (RIP) as Charlie, Colin Farrell as Jerry, David Tennant as Peter Vincent, McLovin' as Ed, Imogene Poots as Amy, and Toni Collette in a thankless role as Charlie's mom.  There are some very creepy scenes, especially in the hallway of Jerry's hidden dungeon.  David Tennant is a friggin' HOOT, swanning around in leather pants and fake facial hair, chugging Midori liqueur.  Colin Farrell is also superb when he is slouching around being menacing and sexy - but all that goes right out the window when the CGI kicks in.

The biggest problem is, of course, the CGI.  All the effects are CGI which is not particularly good and totally took me out of the scene each time it reared its ugly head.  The practical effects in the original were vastly superior, I thought.  This movie also might have been shot for 3D (?) which seems pointless.  

Probably the most sinister part of this new Fright Night are the scenes of those Vegas suburbs, islands of cookie-cutter neighborhoods, half-deserted in the desert.  What a bleak, horrible place to live.

Eleventh Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #1 Fright Night (1985)

 Welcome, everyone, to the Eleventh Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series - really the only reason for this blog's existence anymore!  Without further ado ...

The original Fright Night: when a vampire moves in next door, it's up to a couple of teenagers and a washed-up late night television host to save the day.  Charlie and Amy have been dating for over a year and are ready to take it to the next level.  But when suave Jerry Dandridge moves in next door, and murdered bodies start popping up around town, Charlie gets first distracted, and then obsessed with thinking his neighbor is a vampire.  With only his horror movie aficionado buddy's folkloric advice to aid him, Charlie is over his head and turns to the one "vampire killer" he knows: Peter Vincent, who hosts the local channel's overnight fright flicks.  Of course, Vincent is just an actor and doesn't want to be involved at all.  When Jerry (lol who names a vampire "Jerry"?) abducts, seduces and turns virginal Amy, however, Charlie and Vincent rise to the occasion, stakes in hand.

Why have I not watched this movie before?  A 1980s horror/comedy with a strong cast - Chris Sarandon (is HOT) as vampire Jerry, William Ragsdale as Charlie, Amanda Bearse (later in Married with Children) as Amy, Roddy McDowell as Peter Vincent - even with the bad acting, I just loved it.  The permed and feathered hair, the awful music, the big cars, the sweaters!  And the best part was the truly excellent (and no sarcasm there at all) practical effects.  For a flick that seemed to be unintentionally funny half the time, it really kicks into gear for the last thirty minutes with some outstanding and very gory effects: the bat creature, the melting henchman and the reverse werewolf to vampire transition.  Just awesome.

Mini book review: We Are Where the Nightmares Go and other stories by C. Robert Cargill

It's not even September yet so it's far too soon for horror movies.  I have, however, been in the mood for some horror books, inspired by NPR's recent article.  I am particularly fond of horror short stories (Stephen King, Joe Hill, Neil Gaiman when he's feeling especially macabre) and thus first pounced upon C. Robert Cargill's We Are Where the Nightmares Go and other stories when it became available at the library.  To be honest, I didn't love it.  I thought the stories were pretty uneven and the prose didn't readily pull me in (as does the prose of Messrs. King, Hill and Gaiman).  I did enjoy several individual stories:  the title story, "We Are Where the Nightmares Go," which has doors to other worlds, bad clowns and lost children; "The Town That Wasn't Anymore," about an Appalachian town that is dying away, not just because the mining is tapped out but because the town's dead just won't stay dead; and, most wonderfully, "Hell Creek" which is about ZOMBIE DINOSAURS.  I mean, who doesn't love zombie dinosaurs?  Bad people, that's who.

A couple of itty-bitty book reviews

Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman.  I usually LOVE Neil Gaiman.  I love his world-building and the intelligence of the language he uses.  I also love mythology.  When I was a kid, I would take out all the mythology books in my grade school library; I especially liked Greek, Egyptian and Norse, reading the myths and stories over and over again.  Perhaps that's why I didn't love Gaiman's 2017 Norse Mythology: I already knew all the stories he told, so none of it was new.  I also didn't feel like his voice came through at all, which would have freshened the myths up a bit.  For people who don't know the old stories about Thor, Loki, Odin, Baldur, Freya and the rest, this is a nice, accessible introduction.  But for me, it was a bit of a waste of time.

Vampires in the Lemon Grove  by Karen Russell.  This one, a short story collection by the author of Swamplandia (which I know I've read but apparently didn't review here), was not a waste of time.  Each story is touched with a bit of fantasy - vampires, human silkworms, American presidents reincarnated as horses - and each is very different from the other.  Some agreed with me more than others but all were very original, building specific, interesting worlds in just a few pages.  Lots of fun, that one.

Eighth Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #5 Lifeforce

Tobe Hooper's 1985 Lifeforce.  With a portentous voiceover to start, I was in love before the opening credits finished: with both naked space vampires and PATRICK STEWART, how could this movie not be amazing?  Lifeforce is ridiculous and waaaaaaaaaaaaay too long, but it takes itself seriously and is all kinds of mid-80s awesome.  For a horror movie about space vampires.

A joint British/American space mission on board the shuttle Churchill are exploring Halley's Comet.  They find a huge (150 miles long) alien craft that is possibly organic and of course think it's smart to send people inside to check it out.  They find a bunch of dried up space bat corpses and three beautiful naked humanoids encased in crystal boxes.  The mission commander Carlsen decides to bring the box set and one desiccated space bat back to the Churchill.  When the shuttle Columbia rendezvouses with the Churchill, there has been a fire: all the crew are dead, the escape pod is missing but the box set and the dead space bat are okay.  So the crew brings them back to London.  As it turns out, the three naked humanoids are not dead.  They wake up and go on a rampage (if one can call disappearing from the screen for long periods of time a "rampage") wherein the gorgeous Space Girl (who has really great boobs) sucks the lifeforce out of all the humans she meets.  In short time, London has devolved into a madhouse as the space vampires' victims become zombies (?).  Carlsen - who escaped the Churchill in the escape pod, did I forget to mention that? - and another dude chase the space vampires across London, including to a mental hospital where PATRICK STEWART is the head doctor.  There is a lot of fuzzy space/horror "science," vampiric victims exploding into dust, a corpse made entirely out of blood pulled from PATRICK STEWART's head and an ambiguous ending with a lot of blue lightning.

Lifeforce is much too long (PATRICK STEWART doesn't even show up until 1 hour 5 minutes and 22 seconds in (I wrote it down)) and is completely nutso.  But the animatronic desiccated victim effects are outstanding - I love that stuff.  And, really, if you can't embrace a 1980s movie about naked space vampires, you should probably just go watch Beaches again, because that's probably more your thing.

Eighth Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series: #1 Cronos

Welcome back to the Eighth Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series!  We're going start things off all sophisticated-like with a Spanish/English-subtitled vampire movie by none other than the fantastic Guillermo del Toro.

Cronos was Guillermo del Toro's first feature film and while it doesn't pack the punch of some of his later works, many of his hallmarks are there: clockworks, insect imagery, preternaturally calm children and practical special effects.  In this elegant but not particularly scary vampire movie, an elderly antiquities dealer, Senor Jesus Gris (played by frequent del Toro collaborator Federico Luppi), discovers a strange gadget - the "Cronos device" - hidden in the base of a sculpture.  The Cronos gadget pierces his skin, filtering his blood, and although it is very painful, it rejuvenates him, de-aging and putting some spring back into his step - to the delight of his previously bored wife.  Unfortunately, a dying millionaire has sent his thuggish nephew (played by frequent collaborator Ron Perlman, looking so young here) to find this gadget.  The millionaire has the manuscript explaining how to use the Cronos device and is convinced that it will save his life.  Senor Gris and the nephew clash; the millionaire explains to Gris that he needs to drink human blood to replenish his own so the Cronos device doesn't kill him; Senor Gris is unwilling to go full-monster and dies a noble death, surrounded by his beloved granddaughter and wife.

The pace of this movie is, to say the least, languid and I will confess that I dozed off briefly at one point - and then woke up wondering why Senor Gris was wearing his suit backwards after he escaped from the morgue.  (Still don't know.)  And it isn't scary at all, with just a little blood and practical ick effects.  But the characters are engaging and anyone who has seen del Toro's later works can see his themes developing here.  Fun stuff.

Preacher recap S2E13 "The End of the Road" 9/11/17

Flashback.  Jesse Custer as a teenager, collecting money (and picking pockets) at the gate of Angelville, his family home, which does seances, Tarot card readings, divining and fortune telling, 'gator tours, finding lost pets, "gift shop closes at 5."  Around lunchtime, a truck comes out from the main house to give him his lunch and collect the morning's takings; when Jesse tries to hold out, one of the guys ("TC" and "Jody") grabs him and wrenches his arm.  After the truck returns to the main house, Jesse is so upset that he kills a friendly chicken that has been scratching around in the dirt.  He feels so badly about this that he runs back to the house and tearfully begs a woman - his grandmother, I presume - to make it right.  The woman reminds him that there is always a price for such a thing.  Jesse seems willing to pay it, whatever it is, as he gently lay the little carcass on the table in front of her.

Now.  Herr Starr has a plan in place to market Jesse as the new Messiah.  While Jesse isn't interested in wearing a fancy 11th century cloak, he is willing to give speeches in front of carefully selected groups.  In this case, a group of Catholic schoolkids.  When his speech is interrupted by "the Armenians" brandishing guns and knives, Jesse takes them all on.  First, he tries to use the Genesis Voice to get the men to drop their guns.  The Voice doesn't work - which takes him aback, and makes Starr raise an eyebrow - so he then resorts to fisticuffs.  Now, even though all the kids and nuns (and press, once notified) think he's a hero, the "Armenians'" guns were loaded with blanks and it was all arranged by Starr.  Jesse is displeased at being used but Starr is all, it went viral and now we're booked on Kimmel so this is how we get the word out about you.

In New Orleans, Featherstone and Hoover are packing up their apartment - they are no longer required to stake out the apartment since Jesse is on board.  Meanwhile, Cassidy is doing laundry (getting distracted by a thong of Tulip's in amongst his t-shirts).  When he puts away some of Dennis's clothes, he checks out a website on his son's laptop: it's a vampire site of sorts, with videos of screaming people.  He is transfixed for a moment before snapping out of it - it seems as though being good and not feeding on people is more difficult than he might have let on.  When Tulip comes back from shopping for their road trip to Bimini (lots of SPF100 and a value-sized jug of vodka), she sits beside him on the bed and talks to him about what's to come with the two of them.  It isn't clear that it's a fantasy until they start gettin' busy and Cassidy latches onto her neck, ripping out her throat with a big spurt of blood.  Seems as though Dennis's worse proclivities are getting into his father's head.  When Tulip REALLY comes back from shopping, she checks in on him and then goes to pack as he stares numbly out the window.  Something's gonna have to give here.

On the outskirts of Hell.  Eugene and Hitler run and run and run until they find themselves on the shore of a river.  Hitler tells Eugene to ask the ferryman (Charon) for passage out since he doesn't belong here, then get on the boat and cross over.  Eugene asks Hitler to come with him but the other man demurs.  A nervous Eugene approaches Charon who summons the boat and who generally seems like a nice guy.  So it's surprising when the Hell Administrator comes up to drag Eugene back to the cells and shoots Charon in the head with a (?) crossbow quarrel.  Then Hitler comes up behind her, knocks her out and clambers onto the boat with Eugene.  Blah blah blah  they get back to the world and when Eugene invites Hitler to come home with him and meet his dad, Hitler runs off and darts down an alleyway.  Because what this world needs now is Hitler on the loose.  Also, I am really not that interested in Eugene and Hitler's adventures.  I'm having a really hard time figuring out how this storyline connects with Jesse, Tulip, Cassidy et als.

New Orleans.  Tulip finishes packing (she packs pretty light) but on her way out to load the car, she notices one of the little spy cameras that the Grail installed in their apartment.  She shows it to Cassidy.  He wonders if they should tell Jesse but she's all, what difference would it make?  Tulip goes out to the car.  Cassidy grabs up the dog to leave but stops when Dennis finds Tulip's underwear in his room.  Dennis taunts him some and Cassidy is forced to admit that he doesn't think he can control himself with Dennis around.  So he pushes Dennis out the window, into the sunlight, and cowers inside as his vampire son dies a pretty horrible, burning death.  I'm not going to miss Dennis at all but that whole storyline just seemed a little pointless.

Cassidy and the dog join Tulip in the car, but then she gets out again and goes back inside to say goodbye to "Jenny," her only friend.  (After she goes, Cassidy lets the dog go.)  Jenny/Featherstone takes a few moments to get to the door and while she waiting, Tulip finds a trace of the same sticky gum that had been on that little spy camera.  When Jenny/Featherstone finally comes out, she's holding her revolver behind her back.  Tulip is also armed - but only with a screwdriver - and when the shit hits the fan, it's pretty obvious who's going down.

Jesse is about to board the Grail jet (to go to L.A., or wherever Kimmel is) when he gets a panicked call from Cassidy.  He rushes off - and Starr immediately gets on the phone to Featherstone and Hoover, calling them idiots and telling them to cancel the ambulance Cassidy has called.  Jesse gets back to the apartment to find Tulip bleeding out on the kitchen floor and Cassidy trying to save her.  The bullet went right through her and there is blood everywhere.  They can't stop the bleeding.  Cassidy begs Jesse to use the Voice and Jesse tries it, but it still isn't working.  A frantic Cassidy decides that the only way to save her is to turn her into a vampire but Jesse pulls him off her.  They fight, Cassidy nearly feral, as Tulip convulses and struggles to breathe.  Jesse holds Cassidy back and Tulip breathes her last as they watch.  Cassidy is all why? I could have saved her and she might not have been like Dennis.  Jesse, reluctantly, is all, there really is another way.

So then they are in Tulip's car, her lifeless body in the backseat, driving to Angelville.  The fear and sadness on Jesse's face is palpable.  Cassidy can't believe that Jesse let her die and says, "There's something I want to say.  Something I been meaning to tell you for a long time.  I hate you."  Jesse all but rolls his eyes: "You hate me now?  Just you wait."  And as they turn down the L'Angell driveway, that damn chicken runs across the road.

The tag: God is still alive, in a hotel room somewhere, jazz on the radio, dog costume hanging up, beer cans and pill bottles strewn across the rumpled bed.  We don't get to see Him, but when the toilet flushes and the bathroom door opens, the room is flooded with glory and light.

Previously on Preacher / next time on Preacher

Preacher recap S2E12 "On Your Knees" 9/4/17

We start off back in Hell, where Eugene and Hitler have landed in the Hole.  As they go into another running of Eugene's personal hell, Hitler reminds him that he has to work his way out of it so they can get out the back door.  They run through a couple of iterations - Eugene kissing Tracy and her shooting herself; Eugene turning her down and her shooting herself; the two of them agreeing to just be friends, Tracy asking to see his penis and then her shooting herself - before Eugene figures it out and gets through a scenario that doesn't end with her shooting herself.  Hitler tries to open the bedroom window but it's still stuck, so Eugene hasn't worked through everything yet.  Next: Eugene's scout leader in a furry mascot suit (who apparently abused Eugene on a camping trip (unnecessary) so Eugene shoots him); and then Eugene's dad (with a ass-face from shooting himself).  When Eugene and his dad work through their shit and tell each other "I love you," Hitler finally can get the window open and he and Eugene scarper.  I'm just really not sure how all this Eugene in Hell with Hitler stuff fits in with the larger Preacher story.

Back in Louisiana, we spend a couple of weeks with the Saint of Killers as he's stuck in that truck at the bottom of the Angelville swamp.  In flashback, we get to see him happy with his wife and child, then their deaths that sent him over the edge, etc. etc.  In the now, eventually, the Grail hauls the truck out of the swamp - replacing it with an empty one which Jesse and Tulip found last episode - and takes it to an empty warehouse.  Hoover is in charge and he leaves the Saint in there for another week, until the killer is willing to listen.  The Grail says they can't get him what he wants (entry to Heaven for eternity with his wife and daughter) but he agrees to work with them anyway.

In the New Orleans apartment, Cassidy finds Dennis poking around in his bedroom, looking for something.  The older vampire kicks his son out, then opens the wardrobe, where he has hidden the chihuahua puppy.  He gives the puppy an ear rub and tells him he'll be safe there.  I knew Dennis would want to eat that dog!  Cassidy wanders out to the kitchen where (1) Tulip is moping about Jesse and (2) Featherstone and Hoover are watching them - bored - over the CCTV.  Cassidy and Tulip are developing a nice rapport, giving each other massive amounts of shit, although Cassidy does get a little distracted by the pulse of blood coursing through the vein in her neck.  Jesse finally comes back.  He doesn't want to talk about the search for God but he's looking for a drink.  Luckily, Cassidy has a homemade "potash" in his room.

The boys head to Cassidy's room while Tulip takes out the trash.  On her way back down the hall, the Saint shows up.  She quakes for a moment then regains her mojo and launches herself at him.  Unfazed, he swats her away, knocking her into the wall and knocking her out.  The Saint stalks through the apartment (you can hear Cassidy and Jesse talking from a couple rooms away), pausing to pick a knife out of a kitchen cabinet.  He takes a smaller one than you might expect.  He pulls down a blind, then stands in the shadows, observing his quarry.  Music is coming from Dennis's room, however, and he goes to investigate.

On the balcony outside Cassidy's room, the boys are sipping at a bright green concoction in a mason jar.  Jesse chokes down a mouthful, spluttering.  Cassidy: "What? Too much Neosporin?"  Heh.  They decide to switch to beer and go back into the apartment.  Jesse notices the adjusted blind.  Behind him, Cassidy squeals as he gets tossed down the hallway.  The Saint comes in and confronts Jesse but when Jesse tries to use the Genesis Voice on him, it doesn't work for some reason.  Cassidy attacks the Saint from behind and the killer nonchalantly throws him headfirst into the built-in bookcase.  Jesse holds his own for a while with some fisticuffs, then a reawakened Tulip goes after him with a fireplace poker.  He tosses her aside again, grabs Jesse and forces him to his knees.  The Saint is just about to scalp Jesse - yikes! - when the cavalry arrives.  It's the administrators from Hell, called in by Herr Starr, and here to take the Saint back to his Hell cell.  He doesn't put up a fight because they tell him his cell is empty and must be filled - if not by him, then perhaps by his wife or daughter.  "You can't do that," he growls but the administrator shrugs: "God is gone.  Who's gonna stop me?"

As the Hell wagon drives off with the Saint, Tulip and Cassidy go off to the hospital in an ambulance.  But the logo on the ambulance reads A DIVISION OF GRAIL INDUSTRIES and it takes them to Starr's office instead.  Starr tells him the situation: Jesse is in position to become the Messiah and they're just holding him back.  "Given that the fate of the universe is at stake, how shall we proceed?" he wants to know.

On t.v., the Pope tells the faithful that God is gone, really gone.  But the Messiah, or a reasonable facsimile thereof, is poised to step up.  Jesse shuts off the television and when Tulip and Cassidy get back, with WTF looks on their faces, asks them if they want to go get breakfast.

They go to a diner and after Cassidy spins some yarn about seeing a unicorn, they get down to asking Jesse WTF.  The problem is, Jesse thinks he can do it, thinks he can be the Messiah.  And Cassidy is all, I'm not really down with this - following you around and being all glory to Lord Jesse and all does not sound that fun.  Tulip is biting her tongue but can't stop rolling her eyes.  She looks at him sadly.  "I love you, Jesse, 'til the end of the world.  But you gotta be honest with me.  What do you need us for?"  And he can't answer her.

As the Saint walks into his Hell cell, he tells the administrator, "Tell Satan I want a word."  She replies, "He'll want a word with you as well."  So that could be fun!

Jesse leaves the diner - Tulip and Cassidy already long gone - and goes to Starr's office.  He asks Starr what happens next.  Starr gets up from behind his desk and kneels at Jesse's feet, placing the preacher's hand on his bald head in benediction.  Oh, that's just going to feed Jesse's ego big time.

Previously on Preacher / next time on Preacher

Preacher recap "Holes" S2E8 8/7/17

In which Cassidy becomes the most interesting character on this show.

Hell.  Eugene is determined to prove that he is not a nice guy because, as y'all might remember, nice guys finish last (and get punished) in Hell.  He's still in that holding cell with the rest of them.  Other interesting tidbits from Hell:  all the candy bars in vending machines are Zagnuts and toilet paper is duct tape.  Fun!  As it turns out, the reason the individual cell mechanisms are glitching is because the system is overloading due to someone being in Hell who isn't meant to be there.  The commandant is determined to find out who it is.  Because he still feels so guilty for what happened to Tracy, Eugene doesn't admit that it's him.  Hitler isn't buying his act, though, and after Eugene gets tossed in the Pit  for a while (where his personal hell is exacerbated to include Tracy, alive, but giving Jesse Custer a handjob while Eugene watches), Hitler tells him that he wants to help Eugene escape.

1946.  Daylight.  A not-yet vampiric Cassidy croons an Irish lullaby to his newborn son Dennis.

Now.  Dennis's insides appear to be liquefying.  Cassidy tries to help his dying son but all Dennis wants is for his father to turn him into a vampire, thus saving him.  Cassidy won't do it.  He goes into the kitchen and finds Tulip there, trying to stay awake so she won't have nightmares about the Saint of Killers.  She tries to get him to go out with her but he thinks he should stay with Dennis.  And Jesse is asleep, needing rest since he's full-on searching for God in the morning.  Tulip shrugs and then sneaks out, ostensibly back to the Hurt Locker.

In the morning, as Jesse dresses for his day, we see that Dennis's apartment has been bugged: the fake lounge singer lady and her pudgy partner - Grail operatives - have set up down the hall, doing surveillance until Herr Starr joins them.  Back in Dennis's apartment, just before Jesse heads out, Cassidy asks him if he might be willing to use the Genesis Voice on Dennis.  Jesse is taken aback and says no, he doesn't think that would work, plus he doesn't think that's what it's for.  To his credit, Cassidy just nods - and doesn't retort that maybe taking down a whole household of New Orleans gangsters because he's jealous over his girlfriend's husband isn't really what Genesis is for either.  (I'm not sure I would have had such restraint.)  Jesse runs into Tulip coming in as he is going out.  She is in rough shape, a shadow of her former self, but the two of them just can't seem to communicate with each other.  Jesse tells her that he's off to a Best Buy knockoff, taking the shooting fake God video with him to see if the techs can zoom in on the gun's serial numbers.  Tulip thinks for a moment and then goes with him.

At the "Dork Docs" counter, the guys take the DVD and start to see what they can do.  Tulip has wandered off and Jesse finds her purchasing a new fridge - to replace the one in Dennis's apartment that was plugged by the Saint's bullet.  While Jesse stays to wait for his video, she returns to the apartment to accept for the fridge delivery.  Cassidy is tending to Dennis, who is getting worse and worse.  He asks Tulip what she thinks about his being a vampire, the living forever bit.  She shrugs, saying that the whole not-dying thing is pretty handy.  Cassidy runs through the counterarguments: no more sunlight, boredom, outliving everyone you ever cared for.  Tulip: "Yep. That sucks."  Later, as Cassidy cleans Dennis up, his son pleads, in English, "Papa.  Papa, please."  Cassidy hangs his head.

Back at the tech counter, the dork docs confirm that there's no way the serial numbers can be read: they think Jesse is the shooter and doesn't want to be identified.  He explains that he does, in fact, want to identify the shooter so they try some other techniques.  But no, there's nothing.  Jesse gets angry and shouts that he's just trying to find God!  And the dorks are all, whoa, dude, chill out.  Frustrated, Jesse stomps off and the dorks put the DVD in the shredder.  As the disk goes down, we see "PROPERTY OF GRAIL INDUSTRIES" stamped into the plastic.  Too bad Jesse didn't notice that.

In the apartment, Tulip pushes the new refrigerator to one side and looks through the bullet hole in the wall.  Bothered by the hole, she patches it and plasters over the patch.  Then she goes into the next apartment and patches those holes.  When she goes to the apartment at the end of the hall, she is surprised to find the door locked.  That's the Grail operatives' apartment, you see, and they have to scurry to hide their equipment before "Jenny," a new tenant who is on the run from her abusive ex, opens the door.  "Jenny" lets Tulip in.  Tulip patches the bullet hole.  They talk a little and then, just as she's leaving, Tulip asks if she's ever strapped on a bullet-proof vest and gotten shot in the chest.  "Jenny" is all, "I can't say that I have ... it sounds fun."  Tulip:  "It is! We should go sometime."

Meanwhile, Cassidy is on the phone with "Seamus."  Seems like this Seamus is another vampire but it's never said.  Cassidy tells Seamus that he has a son who is dying.  Seamus asks what he's like, what his prevailing temperament is.  When Cassidy isn't that forthcoming (because he doesn't know), Seamus says, "Don't do it.  Let him die."  Cassidy hangs up the phone and goes into Dennis's bedroom.  He walks slowly towards the bed, singing that lullaby.  Dennis opens his eyes, gasping for breath.  Cassidy stares at his dying son, serious, intense, more than a little sinister.  Is he going to save Dennis or is he going to put him out of his misery?  That appears to be the question.

Previously on Preacher / next time on Preacher

Preacher recap "Sokosha" S2E6 7/24/17

A polite business man ("Ando," from Heroes) negotiates with a middle-aged couple: the price is per unit, but if you go above 10%, you double your money.  He says that the procedure doesn't hurt but some people do experience some side effects.  "Trust me," he says, "You won't even miss it."  The man lies down on the couch; Ando gets out his machine and feeds a syringe into the man's leg.  Using an arthroscopic (?) camera, he feeds the tube up into the man's body and then extracts - something.  When the counter hits 15%, the extraction stops and a tiny bit of pale liquid halfway filled a small test tube.  After giving the man a sedative, Ando gives the wife a check for $150,000, packs up in a high-tech armored van and drives away with two armed guards watching over him.  Their next stop is a New Orleans mansion [the one that featured in American Horror Story: Coven, I believe.] An older man meets Ando at the door, fretting, having second thoughts.  But his wife is walking around the house pantsless with a vacant look on face.  Those second thoughts are vanished.  Ando uses a personal item of the wife's to determine a match, then uses a centrifuge to turn a vial of that pale liquid into a little pill.  The wife takes the pill and immediately comes back to herself.  The husband hands over his credit card - $2,700,000 - and the deal is done.  Ando goes back to the armored van - which is full, floor to ceiling, with those tiny vials, and the guards drive away.

Jesse steps out of the shower and smiles at himself in the foggy mirror.  It's a new day.  Time to go find God.  As Tulip puts together a horrifically sweet breakfast (pancakes with hot fudge, whipped cream, marshmallows and candies and syrup), Cassidy hears Dennis coughing and tries to help him get dressed.  The old man shouts at him in French and storms out.  As Jesse and Cassidy sit down at the kitchen table, Cassidy apologizes for being a bastard yesterday.  But when he asks Jesse if Jesse has anything to say to him, the preacher is all just, "You're forgiven," which is not exactly what the vampire was hoping to hear.  But they all tuck into breakfast, laughing and giving each other a hard time and discussing how best to find God.

Out in the hall, however, Viktor's daughter has brought the Saint of Killers to Dennis's apartment building.  She can't remember exactly which apartment is was, however, so when the Saint starts in on the far end of the hall, she skedaddles.  The Saint works his way through the apartments, firing one shot - which goes through the victim's head and all the interior walls of all the apartments - and then using his saber for the other tenants.

While Cassidy and Tulip riff off each other, Jesse hears a little thump come from the fridge.  He gets up and notices a bullet hole in the back of the fridge; a yogurt cup is leaking and he fishes a burning hot bullet out.  He looks up (outside, the Saint is approaching their door) and says, "Hey, guys - "  Just a moment later, the Saint bursts in. Jesse, Tulip and Cassidy have all escaped out the window but the Saint notices JESS spelled out in M&Ms on the remainder of Jesse's pancakes.  He knows he's found the right place.

Jesse, Tulip and Cassidy hunker down in an alley.  Jesse calls the casino and confirms that Fiore is dead, shot by "a cowboy."  Cassidy suggests that they run; Tulip suggests that Jesse stop using the Word so that the Saint can't track them.  Jesse's all, we can't run forever and I need the Word to find God.  Surely the Saint has a weakness, something that Fiore promised him to take the deal to kill the preacher.  So they go to the library.  In a funny, clever scene, Cassidy reads comic books, Jesse pores through history books and Tulip listens to a book on tape, whose narrator explains the Saint's backstory: with the loss of his soul, what with being such a horrible Confederate killer, even Satan is rumored to be afraid of him.  They learn about the death of his family and Jesse figures that is what Fiore offered the Saint: getting out of Hell and going to Heaven to reunite with his wife and daughter.   Just then, Cassidy jumps up: "Holy mother of bleedin' shite - I forgot about Dennis!"  He calls Dennis to warn him not to go into the apartment but it's too late: Dennis goes into his apartment and just has enough time for one shot on his inhaler before the Saint grabs him.  Jesse gets on the phone and uses the Word: "I'M HERE.  DON'T HURT HIM.  I'M COMING."

Jesse goes to the apartment and confronts the Saint, saying that (1) he should let Dennis go and (2) since Fiore is dead and God is missing, if the Saint kills him, the deal is off and the Saint will never get to Heaven.  He says that he can get the Saint what he wants.  The Saint says, you know what I need? and Jesse says yes.  So the Saint says he has one hour but Tulip, Cassidy and Dennis have to stay in the apartment as hostages.  Tulip is rightfully anxious about this but there doesn't seem to be any way around it.  This is their one shot.

Jesse goes straight to Papa Bebe's House of Voodoo and tells the proprietor that he needs to buy a soul right now.  The man dissembles but Jesse cuts through the bullshit, knowing a whole lot about the procedure of extracting and selling souls.  The man is all, who are you?  And Jesse, reluctantly, says, "I'm Jesse L'Angell."  The man recognizes the name and is willing to help, except that the Japanese have pushed out all the local soul-sellers (except Angelville (the name of the town that gave Jesse the willies an episode or so back) which is just hanging on by a thread).  As luck would have it, however, that armored car - Soul Happy Go Go is the name of the company - pulls up out front.  Jesse's all, there are souls on that truck?  He dashes out but can't get into the truck, which is soundproofed so he can't use the Genesis voice.

Tulip calls him to tell him to hurry because Dennis is sick (the Saint crushed his inhaler).  Jesse's all, okay but how do I break into an armored truck?  She walks him through it, using the resources of a handy local hardware store, but when he sets it off, it doesn't even leave a mark.  

When Tulip hangs up, Cassidy walks in, sad, regretting that after all this time he never bothered to learn French.  Tulip: "He's your dad or uncle, isn't he?"  Cassidy:  "He's my son.  Hard luck, eh, havin' me for a da'."  He strokes Dennis's face.  Tulip gets a determined look and marches into the kitchen where the Saint is sitting.  She tries to talk him into letting Dennis go and he doesn't respond at all, but when she makes the mistake of mentioning his dead family, he lunges at her, grabbing her by the throat and then tossing her across the room.  She pulls herself together and goes back into the other room.  Cassidy looks at her, concerned, and asks if she's all right.  Tulip: "Uh.  He touched me."  She does not seem all right.

Meanwhile, a cop pulls up and arrests Jesse.  Jesse uses the Voice to get the cop to make the armed guards open up the Soul Happy Go Go truck.  A punch in the nose and some judicious use of the Word later, Jesse is sitting down with Ando, trying to find a match to the Saint's bullet as the guards drive like mad men through the streets to New Orleans towards Dennis's apartment.  There isn't any, not in all the thousands of souls on the truck.  They have to find a close enough match - like organ donation - or the body will reject the soul.  Jesse reluctantly pulls out some of his own hair and they test it against the bullet.  It's close enough.  Jesse flinches and asks what is the smallest amount he can give.  It's 1% - "You won't even miss it," says Ando - and that's what he does.

He just barely makes it back to the apartment in time: the Saint has Tulip on the floor and Cassidy is clinging to his saber, trying to keep him from killing her.  All of the vampire's fingers get sliced off, just as Jesse bursts in with the soul pill.  Cassidy tapes up his mutilated hands and Tulip takes him and Dennis to a hospital.  Before she goes, however, she asks Jesse how he knows about these souls.  Jesse: "Family business."  

When they are gone, Jesse gives the Saint the soul-pill.  The Saint's eyes brighten immediately.  Jesse snarls at him, using Genesis:  GET ON YOUR KNEES.  The Saint crashes to the floor, shocked, and Jesse expositions that the only reason why the Word didn't work on him before is because he didn't have a soul.  Now that he has a little bit of one, Jesse is in control.  He also tells the Saint that there's no way a killer like him is going to Heaven.  The Saint is all, okay, then send me back to Hell - but I'll take your soul with me.  Jesse hadn't considered that and apparently that is not something he is willing to risk.  So he Voices the Saint into the back of the abandoned Soul Happy Go Go truck and drives him out to the swamps of Angelville.  With the Saint locked in the back, the preacher sends the truck down into the swamps, the killer screaming with rage as the truck sinks.  I'm guessing that this is not the end of the Saint but it should hold him for a little while.  Jesse turns and walks back to town when the truck has disappeared.

That evening, after Dennis is back from the hospital (and Cassidy's fingers have started to grow back), the gang settles in for some time at home.  Tulip is staring blankly into space in what must be the aftermath of having the Saint's hands on her.  Jesse, meanwhile, is hiding the Saint's guns and saber under the tiles of the bathroom floor.  When he's done, he looks at himself in the mirror again.  There's no smile this time.  Guess he does actually miss that little piece of his soul after all.

Previously on Preacher / next time on Preacher

Preacher recap "Viktor" S2E4 7/10/17

After relieving Tulip of her gun, Viktor's goons take her to his mansion.  They leave her to wait in Viktor's.  From behind closed doors come three men's voices: two talking, one screaming.  Viktor comes out of the screaming room (he was NOT the one screaming) and just stares at Tulip: "So, what are we going to do with you?"  She can't meet his eyes and is struggling not to burst into tears.  Meanwhile, Jesse has made his way to Dennis's place where he catches Cassidy up on his first night's search for God adventures, and Cassidy too-subtly tries to get Jesse worried that Tulip is gone.  Jesse's all, eh, we're in a fight, it's not unlike her to disappear.  He goes to take a nap while Cassidy frets.

Also meanwhile, down in Hell, the cellblock software running the inmates' individual hell scenarios is glitching.  Everyone comes out of their cells and mills about in the corridor.  [I feel like I should be able to pick out various denizens: there's Tyler, an 80s frat boy, a gypsy woman (whom Eugene defends when the fratboy harasses her), a woman in cat-eye glasses and pearls, a flapper ... and Hitler, of course.  Hitler is quite pleasant, actually, sticking up for Eugene when the fratboy comes for him, and then inviting the boy into his cell when Eugene gets locked out of his own.  Curious to see what Hitler's worst memory might be, Eugene goes in: Munich 1919, Hitler is having lunch with a pretty lady friend in a genteel cafe, where she encourages him to show his paintings to a potential patron and, when a yarmulke-wearing man bumps Hitler's chair, the future Fuhrer apologizes first, saying it must have been his fault.  The software glitch shuts the memory scenario down before things progress, leaving Eugene all, WTF?  That's your worst memory?  You're awfully nice for fucking Hitler!

Viktor's house.  Now Tulip is actually in tears.  Viktor hands her a tissue and tells her to stop crying because that isn't going to fix things.  He says, "I brought you in, trusted you, made you a part of my family.  And in return you made a fool out of me."  He tells her that she better think of an explanation better than "I'm sorry" because that won't fix things either, suggesting that she walk around the house and get a grip on how things stand.  (Meanwhile, Cassidy is incessantly texting her: RU OK?)

Jesse and Cassidy.  After watching a post-Hurricane Katrina infomercial, Jesse and Cassidy recognize one of the actors as the guy who played Fake God back in the church at Annville.  They decide their best/only lead is to track him down.  Also, Cassidy again tries to get Jesse interested in where Tulip might be but Jesse again shrugs it off, saying that since they're in a fight, she's off bein' mad at him - shoppin', shopliftin', cheatin' at cards.

Hell.  The Hell cellblock administrator calls in a tech who says the repair will take a while, maybe a full reset.  She orders Eugene out of his cell (and the tech gives him a funny look when he goes, like maybe this glitch is happening for a reason) and takes him to her office.  She gets a phone call, which on second viewing I realize is about the Saint of Killers: "[her side of the call] What do you mean he's gone?  How could that happen?  Who let him out?  Well, someone better find him or we'll have to answer to You-Know-Who."  After she hangs up, she tells Eugene that she has reviewed his hell scenario and says that he seems like a nice, sweet, kind, loyal boy - and that Hell has no place for that sort of behavior:  "This is Hell.  Act accordingly.  We will be watching."  If he keeps it up, she'll put him in the Hole; the enormous guard pries up a manhole cover in the floor - entrance to the Hole - and Eugene cringes at the screams and wails and growls wafting up out of it.  In the meantime, she'll put him in Holding with the rest of his cellblock.

Viktor's house.  Tulip walks around, trying to talk with goons playing poker, goons and cooks in the kitchen, Viktor's young daughter even, and they all give her the cold shoulder.  The little girl even spits at her and says she hopes her father kills her.  Tulip seems stricken.  But she is still resourceful, trying to break into a gun safe.  One of Viktor's goons catches her, smirking that they changed the combination after she left, so it just takes her three or four punches to knock him out and grab his gun instead.  Thus armed, Tulip heads upstairs.  She finds Viktor in his bedroom and gets the drop on him.  But before she can do whatever she's intending to do, the torturer from downstairs sneaks up behind her and knocks her down.  The torturer offers to take care of things but Viktor waves him off, saying he'll handle Tulip.  Lying on the floor, she can just shake her head, nose streaming blood.

Jesse and Cassidy.  The boys track down the Fake God actor to his agent and, when Cassidy says that they're casting for a Game of Thrones recurring part (possibly series regular), the guy plays right into their hands.  Of course, the agent doesn't actually know where the actor is - he disappeared several weeks ago after the last gig he booked, "an out-of-town understudy part," you know, GOD - but he does give them a copy of the guy's audition tape.  When they watch it, the most notable part about it is that at the end, after the off-camera people tell him he is hired, they shoot him dead.  Cassidy's a little shocked but Jesse's all, well, guess he had to die for them to get him to Heaven.  There's a glimpse of the shooter's hand in the frame and Jesse homes right in on that, trying to figure out how to identify the shooter from just that shot.

Hell.  In Holding, Hitler continues to be friendly and nice to Eugene, baffling the boy.  But then the fratboy gets in Hitler's face and knocks him down, beating him.  Eugene watches in horror as the rest of the group joins him, stomping Hitler bloody as he cowers on the floor.  Eugene stands up and shouts at everyone to stop.  Then he takes a quick look at the closed-circuit camera in the corner of the room, and remembers that the administrator said she was watching, and then Eugene joins him, stomping and kicking and beating the one person who has been kind to him in Hell.

Jesse and Cassidy.  Cassidy finally gets through to Jesse that Tulip might be in trouble.  The vampire is all, but she made me promise not to tell.  Jesse grabs him by the shirt: where is she?!?

Viktor's house.  Jesse wastes no time using the Voice, gaining entrance to the mansion easily.  The torturer catches him unawares but when Jesse regains consciousness, a pretty epic smackdown between the two of them gets underway.  Jesse can't use the Voice on the torturer because the guy is wearing earbuds (blasting "Uptown Girl" by Billy Joel of all ridiculous songs).  Their fight goes on much longer than one might think - particularly since one might think it would be fairly easy for those earbuds to be dislodged or yanked out - but Jesse finally prevails, impaling the other guy.  Just before he croaks, the torturer gasps out that Tulip is in the bedroom.

Jesse marches upstairs and kicks in Viktor's bedroom door.  Viktor and Tulip are sitting (innocently, all clothed) on the bed but Jesse grabs Viktor around the neck, dragging him to the floor and choking him.  Tulip's all, Jesse, stop! Stop!  Nothing is getting through, however, so she steels herself and admits, "Jesse, you can't kill him.  He's my husband."  And Jesse, not loosening his grip much at all, gives her some SERIOUS side-eye at that.

Road into New Orleans.  All that Voice-shouting has caught someone's attention.  The Saint of Killers is closing in.

Previously on Preacher / next time on Preacher

Preacher recap "On the Road" S2E1 6/26/17

Hey there, y'all - welcome back to the Preacher recaps!  If you've forgotten what happened last time (since it's been nearly eleven months), there's a link down bottom to prior posts.  Let us begin!

THE SEARCH FOR GOD

DAY ONE

Our heroes - Jesse, Tulip and Cassidy - are on the road in Tulip's car, shooting the shit and talking about nothing the way you always do on a road trip.  They now know that God is missing and they're off to find him.  Around the time that "Come On Eileen" comes on the radio, Tulip has blown by a cop doing 97.  The cop gives chase, a few others join him and Jesse suggests that maybe she outrun them, just for fun.  Tulip notes that they're low on gas ... but okay.  The show switches over to a grindhouse-film look - grainy, with scratches and skips in the frames - as Tulip easily ditches the cops.  And just as they've gotten clear, her car runs out of gas.

The cops surround them and drag them out of the car.  Cassidy insists that he needs his umbrella or he'll burst into flame.  The cops are not inclined to believe him, of course, so he dashes across the tarmac and dives into one of their cars, smoking slightly and singed around the edges.  As the cops menace them, Jesse asks Tulip if it's okay if he uses the Genesis voice.  She doesn't like it but it's clear they aren't going to talk their way out of it.  So Jesse uses the VOICE, telling the head cop to mace his own nuts, another one to recite "Yellow Rose of Texas," another couple to hold hands, etc.  He's just getting into it when, from out of nowhere, massive bullets start flying, splattering cop bodies and heads into red slush and generally being terrifying.  It's startling and gory and awesome.  As Jesse fetches Cassidy, who has been hiding from the sun and/or shooter under a car, Tulip manages to siphon gas from one of the cop cars ... using a length of someone's intestine.  Seems gratuitous, especially with the intestine flopping around behind the car as they drive off.  Jesse and Cassidy peer out the back window as Tulip drives away, trying to make out who's been shooting at them.  It's the Cowboy, obviously.

Some ways down the road, the kids stop at a convenience store.  Cassidy instructs Tulip on how to get the taste of blood/intestine out of her mouth:  hot sauce, followed by Yoohoo.  Jesse uses the Genesis voice to tell the convenience store owner to just pretend they weren't there.  They try to figure out why they were being shot at and finally deem it to just be an unlucky start.  Cassidy:  "Smooth-ish sailing from here on out."  A little later, after they've left, Jesse's Genesis instruction works out poorly for the convenience store owner: the Cowboy walks up and inquires after "Preacher."  The man is literally unable to give him any information and so the Cowboy reaches in and rips out the poor guy's tongue.  Eeeuw.

Jesse has decided that they need to consult a religious scholar/family friend he knows, figuring that if anyone knows where God might have gone, it would be a man who studies such things.  Tulip and Cassidy (mostly Tulip) are skeptical, then, when they drive to a rundown rural ranch.  While Jesse goes to meet up with his friend alone - the man is apparently a little skittish around strangers - A still-smitten Cassidy tries to convince Tulip that they should tell Jesse about their hook-up.  Tulip:  "I'm going to try not to exaggerate here but out of all the stupid things you've ever said, that is the stupidest."  Cassidy: "I don't think that's true."  They are distracted from this conversation when they discover a girl locked in a cage in the garage.  Before they can get her out, Jesse shows up with his scholar-friend, Mike.  Mike gruffly explains that the cage is part of the service he offers his parishioners: cold-turkey cage cure for drinking, drugs, Internet (the current girl in there is an Instagram addict or some such).

They go into Mike's house and Jesse explains what's been going on.  Mike is not surprised to hear that God has gone walkabout; he hasn't heard Him when he prays of late.  He doesn't have any hard answers for them - and scoffs when Jesse wonders if there's anything in any of his books - but does say that one of his parishioners (Tammy) recently seems to have been scared straight when she saw God.  Jesse's all, God is here?  Mike gives him Tammy's business card and, after an uncomfortable night with all three of Cassidy, Jesse and Tulip in Mike's guest room, the kids head off to talk to this woman.  It isn't long before the Cowboy is at Mike's doorstep.  But Mike recognizes him (we have a name: the SAINT OF KILLERS) and is ready for him.  Before the Saint of Killers can make him talk, Mike stabs himself in the heart with a small knife.

The kids go to a strip club that Tammy runs.  An excellent jazz trio - not what you would expect in this kind of joint - is playing on stage.  While Cassidy goes off to find himself a lap dance, Jesse and Tulip meet with Tammy in her office.  She is not inclined to talk to them but eventually admits that yes, God was there.  Behind Jesse and Tulip, on the video monitors, Cassidy is tangling with the club's security for having put hands on the stripper.  Tammy doesn't want to tell Jesse and Tulip why God was there (they think it was for one of the girls) and so they discuss, in front of her, if he should use Genesis on her.  She gets more and more fidgety; on the video monitors, the security guy and Cassidy are wrestling over the security guy's gun.  A nervous Tammy stands up, pulling a knife.  And then, through the wall, the security guy's gun goes off, striking Tammy in the chest.  As she dies, Jesse uses Genesis to ask what girl God had come to see.  She scoffs, calling him an idiot and telling him that God came to the club for the jazz.

That night, they go to a motel, Jesse and Tulip in one room, Cassidy in the adjoining one.  To blow off steam, Tulip locks herself in the bathroom.  It's a thing they do: Jesse knocks the door down and then they have surprisingly sweet, cathartic sex.  Later, Jesse goes outside for a cigarette.  He looks down the street and there, walking in and out of the patches of light from the streetlights, comes the Saint of Killers, implacable.  Jesse shouts STOP at the approaching man, several times, using Genesis.  The Saint of Killers does not, in fact, stop.  Uh-oh.

Previously on Preacher / next time on Preacher

Seventh Annual FMS Scarelicious October Movie Series #7: Bloodsucking Bastards

Shaun of the Dead plus Office Space plus BtVS = Bloodsucking Bastards.  You could do much, much worse - and I have.

Evan Sanders (Fran Kranz, Dollhouse, Cabin in the Woods) is having a rough time of it.  He is the acting sales manager at a telesales company, with an apathetic sales team comprised of bros and weirdos.  His girlfriend just dumped him and she works in the same office so he sees her all the time.  Just when he thinks he's going to be promoted to sales manager, his boss hires someone from outside: Max (Pedro Pascal, the Viper from Game of Thrones), Evan's douchey nemesis from college.  And just to rub salt in the wounds: Max is a vampire and he's on a recruitment tear.

Bloodsucking Bastards is a lightweight horror comedy.  It's pretty funny and has buckets of blood but is never actually scary.  It's clearly lower budget than Shaun of the Dead or Slither, and yet has its own charms.  The characters are actually well-developed and the way they act makes sense for who they are and the universe they inhabit.  I'm not sure it's ever found much of an audience but I'm glad I found it: its cheerfully bloody tone has encouraged me to press on with scary (or, "scary") movies for the second half of October.