Author: John Daniel Tangalin

The Amazing Digital Circus character with colorful background and logo.
FeaturesReviewsSeries & Specials ReviewsStellar Picks

‘The Amazing Digital Circus: The Last Act’ Review: A Fitting Finale For Fervent Fans

John Daniel Tangalin ,  ,  5 min read

Gooseworx‘s The Amazing Digital Circus follows young people trapped in a virtual realm. Characters embark on various quests, similar to Pendleton Ward‘s Adventure Time or Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy‘s Westworld. Jester-like protagonist Pomni (voiced by Lizzie Freeman) befriends other “avatars” stuck in the circus. Together, they face non-playable characters (NPCs), explore a haunted manor, run a fast food joint, and

Read More
saccharine-movie-review
FeaturesMovie ReviewsReviews

‘Saccharine’ Makes Attempts at Exercising and Exorcising

John Daniel Tangalin ,  6 min read

Following her filmmaking on Paramount Pictures’ Rosemary’s Baby prequel, Apartment 7A, with Christian White and Skylar James, writer-director Natalie Erika James returns with a new horror project. Independent Film Company and Shudder’s science fiction supernatural horror drama film, Saccharine, follows a young woman in medical school. She becomes terrorized by an apparition after experimenting with an unapproved weight-loss procedure—pill supplements apparently

Read More
Happy Feet Movie Review
FeaturesMovie ReviewsReviewsStellar Picks

Happy Feet: Revisiting the Beloved Animated Classic

John Daniel Tangalin ,  ,  4 min read

Producer George Miller, co-producers Judy Morris and Warren Coleman, and John Collee’s musical comedy adventure animated film, Happy Feet, briefly returned to Regal Theaters this past weekend. This is due to their “And the Award Goes to…” daily re-release of award-winning films for the month of March, from the classics to this year’s Academy Awards nominees. Revisiting Happy Feet I remember

Read More
V/H/S/Halloween movie-review
FeaturesMovie ReviewsReviewsStellar Picks

‘V/H/S/Halloween’ Is A Cruel Addition To The Shudder Film Franchise

John Daniel Tangalin ,  15 min read

Many people do not realize how much anthologies are a group effort within the film industry, whether it’s Rod Serling‘s The Twilight Zone, Charlie Brooker‘s Black Mirror, Tim Miller‘s Love, Death + Robots, Marvel’s What If…?, Star Wars: Visions, and so on. Every piece of a film or a season of television requires input from an individual storyteller through screenwriting and

Read More
the-long-walk-movie-review-banner
FeaturesMovie ReviewsReviewsStellar Picks

‘The Long Walk’: A Standard Stephen King Adaptation

John Daniel Tangalin ,  ,  ,  ,  9 min read

Producer Francis Lawrence and J.T. Mollner’s coming-of-age dystopian survival horror-thriller, The Long Walk, has finally strode into theaters. Based on executive producer Stephen King’s 1979 novel of the same name under King’s pseudonym, Richard Bachman, the adaptation follows a selection of fifty teenage boys chosen to walk endlessly down a road at three miles per hour. In a year that includes

Read More
creature-commandos-dc- animated-series-review-banner
FeaturesReviewsSeries & Specials ReviewsStellar Picks

‘Creature Commandos’: James Gunn’s Impressive Feat in the DC Universe

John Daniel Tangalin ,  ,  ,  ,  ,  12 min read

Since his contributions to the DC Extended Universe at the start of the decade (first with The Suicide Squad followed by Peacemaker season 1) filmmaker James Gunn’s soft reboot of the DC Universe has been an impressive feat, now with his seven-episode miniseries, Creature Commandos. Taking its title from J.M. DeMatteis, Robert Kanigher, and Fred Carrillo’s 1980-83 comic book stories of

Read More
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes Review Banner
FeaturesMovie ReviewsReviewsStellar Picks

Review: ‘Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes’

John Daniel Tangalin ,  ,  8 min read

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is the tenth entry in the Planet of the Apes film franchise and the fourth entry in the reboot series, following the release of War for the Planet of the Apes in 2017. This summer sees Wes Ball (producer and director of the Maze Runner film adaptations) sitting in the director’s chair and Josh

Read More