Friends, it was just a few days ago that we saw the conclusion of the all too brief second season of Shudder’s Creepshow. Although it has to be said that over the nine stories or segments that made up Season 2, the love for classic monsters and horror films was most assuredly front and center. This season started off strong with the absolutely fantastic segments “Monster Kid” and “Public Television of the Dead”, with the latter basically being a continuation of the Evil Dead franchise. Having said that however is the staggering amount of horror alumni that Creepshow landed for this second go around, just a few notable actors include Barbara Crampton (Re-Animator), Kevin Dillon (The Blob), Ted Raimi (Evil Dead II), Ali Larter (Final Destination), Keith David (The Thing), Ryan Kwanten (Dead Silence), as well as Justin Long (Jeepers Creepers).
The iconic Greg Nicotero (Day of the Dead, The Walking Dead) wears many hats on Creepshow, being the showrunner, in addition to a writer, and director. In fact he directed the Season 2 finale entitled “Night of the Living Late Show”, from a script by Dana Gould (The Simpsons) – who just so happened to have starred in the Season 1 segment “Skinwalkers”. While the Season 2 finale benefits from having such actors as Long, D’Arcy Carden (The Good Place), and Hannah Fierman (V/H/S) in it’s ranks, it is the fact that it revolves around 1972’s Horror Express that is the really incredible part!
I will not be going into full spoilers as this article is not exactly a review of “Night of the Living Late Show”. But the basic gist of the story though is that Simon (Long) is an inventor who has created something revolutionary that he calls the immersopod, a virtual reality device that possesses hundreds of cameras that aid in inserting a user into any film they might desire. In the case of Simon, that means he can enjoy being an extra in Horror Express, interacting with the characters played by the late and great Christopher Lee as well as Peter Cushing. The advanced technological marvel that Simon has created though allows for total sensory input, meaning you can be an active participant in whichever movie you might choose.
As was touched on in both the original novel by Ernest Cline and the 2018 Ready Player One film adaptation, that type of virtual escape if it existed in the real world could be extremely addictive. At least that appears to be the case with Simon who quickly begins to ignore his wife, Renee (Carden), in favor of the affections of Countess Irina Petrovska, who was played by Silvia Tortosa in 1972’s Horror Express but is doubled by Fierman in this segment. Throughout the story though it is revealed that perhaps Simon hasn’t been honest with Renee for quite some time… and the poor woman might have had enough of it.
“Night of the Living Late Show” really does pull off some impressive merging of Long’s character of Simon and Renee into Horror Express, while it might not always come off without a hitch, considering the low budget of the Creepshow series it is an impressive feat nonetheless.
In closing out this article, I want to say that this second season of Creepshow has proved entertaining and I hope that we will have many more seasons of the series to look forward to in the years to come. Of course with any anthology series there were some stories that were better than others, but I wouldn’t say that any segment was outright a failure when all is said and done. And for what it is worth, Shudder has already given the green light to a third season of Creepshow – one can’t hope that come this October that we might be getting a treat instead of a trick, right?
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