What do you guys think of the series? I was pretty happy with it, though oddly enough, the 'highly praised' episodes were among my least favorite. I thought 'Incident' was total, derivative crap. By the time the plot twist came I didn't care. Carpenter's Cigarette Burns was good, but not nearly as good as many fans made it out to be. I really found Larry Cohen's Pick Me Up to the most enjoyable. Moriarty and his foe give excellent performances.
Thoughts on the series?

"Pick me up" was the only one I didn't get to see (Besides Miike's of course) but the other 2 you mentioned were my most favorites. *Shrug*

Cigarette Burns and Chocolate were my two favorites. I don't know why I liked Chocolate, but there was just something about it...

I have the first four volumes, and of the four I like three of them real well, and Chocolate wasn't that bad (it felt more like a Tales from the Crypt episode).

Cigarette Burns was the best by far. So far I don't think this show is as bad as some others mentioned.

Cigarette Burns was the only one that I have liked so far... I have only been able to see the one out on DVD...

I've only seen the ones released on DVD thus far and I have to say I've been pleasantly surprised. I really like all of them so far with Cigarette Burns being my favorite and Incident On and Off a Mountain Road being my least favorite. I also really like the extras that they've produced for each episode. I don't understand why horror fans don't like this series. It has the requisite things to keep me interested:

1)original story
2)boobies
3)gore

How can a horror fan go wrong with those?

ACK! http://www.mastersofhorror.net/ is a Flash-only website. Terrible. I keep hitting back and it has to reload everything again.

OK... with that out of the way...

My rankings, from best to worst:

Deer Woman - this was really fun, a bit like X-Files that didn't take itself too seriously
Haeckel's Tale - another good one, nice change of pace having a period piece
Dreams in the Witch-House - cool story, the set wasn't quite as frightening as it could've been
Incident On and Off a Mountain Road - clever, but a bit one-note
Dance of the Dead - very hackneyed, could barely watch it

The hitchhiker one and Cigarette Burns I saw, but not enough to really form an opinion. Neither seemed very exciting though.

I really liked the series, despite what people have said. I've only sen the ones they released so far on DVD, so here's my rankings:

Cigarette Burns: Some great parts, but too talky (B-)
Incident On and Off a Mnt Road: some great parts here too but Scrimm didn't work for me either, neither did the b/f's whole surivivalist angle-why did she love him anyway? (B)
Dreams in the Witch House: really controlled and well executed. (B)
Sick Girl: had a weird vibe that was fun and likable; Bettis' vioce did get a bit annoying though (B+)
Deer Woman: really an unofficial sequel of sort to American Werewolf-enjoyed it a lot (B+)

Nothing has been a grand slam here, but all have been highly watchable, some more than others. I skipped out on Chocolate though, Garris doesn't interest me.

Upcoming: Homecoming has my interest a lot. Jenifer looks amazing and crazy. Imprint has my curiousity. Dance of the Dead looks horrible. Haven't seen the trailers for the other either.

Will definately pick up Imprint and Jenifer, will wait on reviews for all others.

my fave was 'Sick Girl'

question: I thought I had heard that Argento's Jenifer's gore quotent actually got a bit too extreme and that it got clipped of some it's more graphic violence, can anyone support this claim.

Affirmative.

Greg Nicotero confirms that this sequence was indeed shot.
Something tells me even if this doesn't make it to the DVD-cut of the episode, at least hide it as an easter egg!


And I agree with the "Sick Girl" love. I didn't mind it upon first veiwing when it originally aired. But after re-watching it via DVD, I sure do like it a lot more now.

'Incident On and Off a Mountain Road' - Entertaining enough, cool atmospheric visuals, with a hot chick. B+
'Dreams in the Witch House' - Derivative and uninspired. C-
'Dance of the Dead' - Idiotic and boring. D
'Jenifer' - Fucked up. Really, really, fucked up. B
'Homecoming' - A joke. Only value is if you agree with its heavy-handed politics, and even then, most can still recognize it sucks. F
'Deer Woman' - Funny, creative. B
'Cigarette Burns' - Really, the only interesting one from the series. A-
'Fair Haired Child' - Meh. OK, but predictable. C+
'Sick Girl' - Weird, wild stuff. Strangely engrossing. B-
'Pick Me Up' - Somewhat fun but lost its momentum by the end. B-
'Haeckel's Tale' - More disturbing shit, but not that interesting. C

das

Anyone know why the release schedule got screwed up? Originally the schedule was for July 18th and it was Joe Dante's Homecoming and Larry Cohen's Pick Me Up. Cohen's epsiode has been dumped to what looks like October 17. Also they changed the artwork midstream. They got rid of the portraits of the director's on the cover (at least for Dante's episode).


--Ian

Ian, i read a while back that Mick Garris (creator, "Chocolate") didn't like the art of the director's, so maybe that's why it was changed. The new art seems to focus more on the individual film instead of the director. The spine's are the same as are the wealth of extras, which are most important, but it is wierd to change the style of the season mid-way.

Eazy E would have liked this girl me thinks.

Cigarette Burns and Incident on and off a Mountain Road were the only ones I've liked so far. Chocolate was really kind of dumb. Hopefully, the rest of them that I see will get better.

I think you're dead on with these two! Homecoming was absolute garbage, definitely the worst of the series. Sick Girl surprised me. I've never seen 'May' and read a lot of comments about that film that it's only for certain tastes. Bettis is weird, as is the film, but you're right. It is strangely engrossing. Definitely an enjoyable watch.

I've only seen three so far and enjoyed them: Cigarette Burns, Incident On and Off a Mountain Road, and Dreams in the Witch House.

Well, I saw Homecoming for the first time last night and it's the first one I've seen that I haven't cared for. I thought maybe it was going to have a subtle political message behind it, but there was nothing subtle about it at all. For the first time in this series, I was not entertained. Oh well, 6 out of 7 is pretty damn good. I'll still continue to pick these up as they're released, but I'm disappointed in the artwork change midway through the season too. That's just lame.

has a street date for the video release been annouced for the unaired Miike episode?

I heard September.

As for Homecoming, I watched it and liked it, but not a slam dunk like DVD Savant's review made it seem. I agree with the political message, but can we have a little more horror?

Grade: B-

I'm answering my own question (heehee):

Miike's 'Imprint' is up for pre-order at TLA:
Masters of Horror: Takashi Miike (Imprint)

After watching all the episodes as they originally aired, I would change the show title to "Masters Of Nothing". If this series was to showcase true Masters of Horror, it failed miserably.

The entire series was poor as a whole with only a few episodes worth watching. I was disappointed and it was one of the reasons I canceled my Showtime sub (also b/c Bullshit! has gone downhill and there was nothing else original on the channel worth watching).

What you should have done was after the 4th episode, you should've told yourself to re-name the series, "Low-budget tales from Teh Canada" and you would've been fine. Worked for me!

I saw the teaser for season 2 the other night. Hopefully it'll be an improvement over season 1.