The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

Hulu has the series starting with Barnabas. Watch this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fhk61jmY3lI and you're caught up to where it begins. They only have a couple hundred episodes but they stop at a decent enough point, the story of how Barnabas became a vampire.

The only thing missing from the show was a mummy. That is, unless you don't count the two bodies in the basement that hadn't decayed at all. Other than that, they had everything, including a Lovecraft type monster.

shadokitty

Thanks for the tip. I'll look it up.

rbrown498

House of Dark Shadows is probably my favorite vampire film. Maybe it's because I saw it at a young, impressionable age, or maybe it seems to me to be a near-perfect melding of American and British vampire film styles, or maybe it's because it's got one of the hottest vampire chicks EVER, or maybe it's because Whatever the reason, I love it dearly.

You don't have to be familiar with the series to enjoy it.

And as far as plunking down $500 for the entire series, I've been buying the DVDs a collection at a time. It doesn't break the bank, and I watch the episodes so slowly that there are pretty big time spans between purchases.

GoldenWheels

I tried one year just to follow the theme nights...that alone made it seem too much like work to me.

OTOH, I have to challenge myself to watch some new stuff and the optional things do make you do that...every year can't be Hammer/Paul Naschy/Barbara Steele I guess.

orlmac

It's not crazy at all to just want to watch what you want when you want. For me personally, I like the checklist and nightly subset movies but I ignore the theme days. I enjoy the checklist and subset because it forces me to try new things that I normally wouldn't watch and to me that's what it's all about, finding new things to enjoy.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

FYI, there's a post credit scene.

It's closer to $300. $500 might have been around the time the first run, which was a limited edition went out of print pretty within a month.

I know I did it at least a couple years but only so far as to watch the subset on those days. Now I try to do what I can of the subsets since I always try to volunteer to do a pick.

I spent more years doing the checklist and the last few times trying to do it as fast as possible with what movies I had on hand. I remember Waxworks was one of the first I'd end up watching because it knocked a lot off the list. I also remember trying to scrounge up a few movies for the end and would end up with Peter Lorre in Mad Love for some reason. Maybe for the decade check and maybe as an actor check?

I might be in a strike for the start of the challenge, so we'll see how that goes.

Trevor

I haven't posted in this thread yet?! I must have been dead.

I think there was only one year where I really tried to completely stick to the theme nights. It was kind of fun. On days where you plan to watch several films it can be interesting to expand on one subject like that. Most years I just watch the subset choice so I can check off two lists at once, then watch whatever I want the rest of the day.

The expanded checklist is usually an obsession of mine, although I think I did completely skip it at least once. I'd much rather ignore it and just watch want I want, but this sort of checklist just syncs perfectly with my OCD. Pretty sure this year will be a completely skip it year.

The daily subset choices are among my favorite parts of the Challenge. A community needs things like this to be a community; otherwise it's just strangers posting random lists in a vacuum. I think I've followed these every year we've had them; sometimes having to resort to nefarious means to find the titles.

I'm undecided on what my main plan is this year. I'm so far behind in more important matters that I'm half tempted to skip it entirely. The other half wants to ignore life and do my once a year ritual of actually using my TV; maybe even 9 hours a day like last year.

PCBreakdown

This. It is a beautiful thing to behold.

Crazy, no. It really is a lot of work - the checklist, the theme days, and the subset picks.

Planning and list making are my mini-obsessions, so I love that whole part of it. Plus, it gets me watching things I would never have watched otherwise.

Undeadcow

Well said; I was just about to chime in about how great I consider the subset films, theme nights, and checklist to be - they help unify discussion and provide me with some structure. In a genre as expensive as horror is and planning to watch 100+ movies it's hard for me to entirely operate on impulse (maybe I'm too indecisive) but being encouraged to watch say 'werewolf' movies one night has resulted in some epic marathons that I might have otherwise passed on and also the discovery of some gems in subgenres I might tend to avoid (applies to subset films also).

Trevor

Each year I'm tempted to do heavy research and find a way to satisfy the checklist in the fewest numbers of films. I raced one year and did it in about 3 days, but probably could do better. But I always seem to be busy in the few days between our finalizing of the checklist and the Challenge going live.

Sounds like the plan is to be all set a bit earlier this year, so maybe.....
This whole thing really is quite beautiful. The 'extras' have definitely opened my eyes to films I'd never have watched otherwise, and generated some fun discussions over the years.

Marathon theme or franchise nights can be a blast.

Have we ever tried an online group movie watching experience? We can 'roast' a film together via Skpe or something?

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

I setup a dvdtalkhorror xbox account years ago because friends of that account can connect with each other and watch stuff through netflix. I got a decent number of friend requests but as far as I know, not a single person has ever used it to watch something with someone else.

shadokitty

Too bad there is nothing like that on PSN.

Spiderbite

I don't really pay attention to the checklists and genres and stuff. I just watch what I want to watch.

Though my favorite part of this challenge is the 31 different movie suggestions and then discussion of those in the review forum. I have found a lot of gems I might not otherwise known about (and some stinkers too). But I always enjoy seeing what detailed info people say about them during the month. They posts seem to go a lot deeper than the random, "it's sucks, it's awesome" comments.

shadokitty

This. Just because I don't feel like watching them myself, doesn't mean I don't enjoy the discussions.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

Skype just seems easier. Plus you aren't limited to just Netflix. You have hulu, dvds, blu-rays, youtube, etc. I think the only downside is possibly hearing everyone else's time in the movie just a second or two off from each other and getting a weird echo going on.

I think I tried doing it one Saturday night a few challenges back but I'm on the west coast and anyone interested was on the east coast and so the times weren't working out.

PCBreakdown

There's a site - TogetherTube.com, that everyone in the same chatroom can watch the same movie at the same time. It just has to be on YouTube, Soundcloud, Vimeo or Dailymotion.

Dick Laurent

All this shopping talk has me itching to get out on the hunt. Big Lots... Ollies... Dollar General... Mmmmmmm

Darkgod

Sounds pretty good

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

Here's some youtube playlists of horror movies I've come across

Full Horror Movies https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...6AEB679F373332

1980s HORROR movies https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...07FF9FE37ECBEF

Horror Slasher Full Movies https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...0507F0726B64D7

clckworang

I'm so excited about the challenge getting closer. One of my best friends who is also a fellow horror junkie recently moved back down near me. She is so excited to be here for October. I anticipate a lot of movies being watched with her. Plus, I have a new group of movie watching friends who will probably get in the spirit. It's great to have friends who really get excited about going through this challenge with me.

There is one thing that I'm already dreading about October. I have to go to a work conference and will be out of town for 4 or 5 days. Ugh. That's not going to help my numbers. I know I'm going to have to do some planning and take some discs with me.

Darth Maher

Does TCM or AMC have their own chat rooms? If anyone was planning to watch stuff when it airs on those channels, that might be a way to keep in touch.
I like the Skype idea too. Too bad DVDTalk doesn't have a chat room. Just a place to pop in and say "hey I'm watching 'xx'". I;m glad so and so recommend it. Or "hey we're all watching "xx" at 7pm CST Join in the chat. I don't know. Did we ever try OHMC Twitter or Facebook hashtags?

Just brainstorming.

Darth Maher

I'm in the same boat. I try to load up my iPad with horror but it's only 16g so even with lower encode rate, I can't fit a whole lot. And I'm usually exhausted the whole time I'm working that I don't get to any movies.

Last year, at the same conference, I did catch PSYCHO on the big screen at an ArcLight theater in Pasadena, CA. I was so exhausted that I dozed off for a scene or two. I hope I didn't start snoring...

shadokitty

Chiller does a thing where they host a Twitter party on their Saturday at 9 PM movie, but that's all I know of.

The Man with the Golden Doujinshi

http://kreepykastle.com/tv-livestream/ has a chat thing next to their video window. They stream 24/7

shadokitty

Kind of on topic as it's horror related, but tonight I bought 2 survival horror games for PS3, Dino Crisis 1 and 2.