Forgotten is such a sad word, isn’t it? Reminds people of times they’ve been left
behind at the grocery store by an unattendant parent, or of long-lost lovers one might never
see again. Maybe we’ll eschew that terminology in favour
of some that feels more positively regarded. Like CULT.
Yeah, that’s the stuff. And there’s no genres that earn “cult”
status quite like sci-fi and horror. So it makes sense that when combining the
two, you’d find a few more lesser-known gems.
But for the sake of title continuity, we’ll keep referring to them for a moment as forgotten.
Hello horror heads, and welcome back to the scariest channel on YouTube: Top5ScaryVideos.
I’m your horror host, Keegan Hughes, and today we’ll be counting down the Top 5 Scary
Forgotten Sci Fi Horror Movies - Part 2. Before we get going, make sure to give this
video a big thumbs up, and subscribe for more galactic gore.
Perfect, let’s begin. NUMBER FIVE: NIGHT OF THE COMET
If you enjoy Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you have Night of the Comet to thank.
Apparently it was a big influence on the creation of the titular character.
Wicked. Night of the Comet is a valley-girl goofball
comedy complete with space-dust zombie invasion. It kicks off as Earth passes through the tail
of a comet, with unforeseen circumstances. See, it’s implied that this is the same
comet that killed the dinosaurs, and people have decided to celebrate like it’s the
Fourth of July. The morning after, anyone who wasn’t safely
contained in a steel box of some sort has become a dust zombie.
Don’t worry about it too much. Two sisters, who were very much inside steel
containers for reasons that are better seen than explained, survive the intial transformation,
and decide to see what the world has to offer now that everyone is essentially dead.
They meet a lovely truck driver, and the trio begins their post-apocalyptic lives together.
But surviving zombies isn’t enough, no. To make this a true sci-fi horror, we’re
also introduced to some mad scientists. Strictly speaking, they’re looking for a
cure to this space disease. However, this ends up looking like draining
healthy people of all their blood and leaving them to die.
Yeesh. Night of the Comet is a classic, cheesy B-movie
romp. It’s packed to the brim with cliches and
nonsense situations, but it’s done with love and a sense of levity.
We get a shopping mall montage a la Dawn of the Dead, but this time it’s more about
actually shopping than survival. We’ve got a smattering of callbacks to classics
through the clever and on-the-nose addition of a movie theatre setpiece.
We get, as previously mentioned, a lovely mad scientist or two.
It’s just a lot of fun, okay? NUMBER FOUR: VIRUS
Hey man, the trendy thing to do right now is watch virus movies, right?
See what writers and directors predicted correctly, what they got wrong, maybe see the happy ending
at the other end of the tunnel? Personally, I prefer to watch movies that
don’t make me think of a virus at all, but hey! Different strokes for different folks,
right? This post-apocalyptic Japanese sci fi flick
was the most expensive Japanese film ever made upon release.
It was a Japan-America co-production, and for whatever reason the Western release got
about 40 minutes snipped, so look for the original if you can.
Beautiful, poignant, and often heart-wrenching, it’s not as goofy as some make it out to
be. After a “mimic” virus is accidentally
released by Americans trying to prevent just that, it rapidly spreads through Italy.
Whatever virus this one attaches to gets amplified, and scientists quickly realize that this means
the end for humanity. Starting as an outbreak movie, it transitions
seamlessly into a disaster flick, and a political thriller.
World leaders do their best to prevent the spread, as it becomes apparent that soon the
global population will plummet. Eventually, most of the world has died off,
and survivors from submarines and artic bases come together to repopulate the planet.
This seems like a great solution, until earthquakes threaten to set off nuclear warheads.
It’s just one disaster after another, eh? I mean, at least we can look at this and say
“thank goodness that isn’t us,” right? Huge in scope, Virus is tragic and beautiful.
There are plenty of gory and corpse-filled scenes for all of the hardcore folks out there
too. NUMBER THREE: SPLINTER
Did someone say low-budget fungus infection movie?
No? I mean, that makes sense. Why would somebody
say that out of the blue? Well, now that we’re on the topic, might
as well address it in full! Splinter is a tense, enjoyable B-movie that
doesn’t get nearly enough attention. It kicks off with a couple of young folks
getting kidnapped by some drug-fuelled rednecks. After stopping at a gas station in the middle
of nowhere (always a bad move), they realize that something is amiss.
And by something I mean an infectious splinter monster.
And by amiss I mean killing and devouring all sorts of people.
It infects people by poking into their skin with it’s sharp, pointy bits, sort of working
by zombie rules. If it breaks skin, or enters you in some other
way, you’re probably gonna turn. To add to this already difficult situation,
dismembered infected parts can move around autonomously, and they’re heat seeking,
too. And the splinter things look cool as hell,
too. Low-budget ain’t such a big deal when it’s
done as well as this. Splinter is largely well written and acted,
too. You’d expect a group of survivors in a situation
like this to act as useless cannon fodder, but they’re actually all useful and likeable
in their own special ways. They overcome personality flaws, and maximize
their strengths in the name of survival. Big ups to the folks behind those choices.
Sure the camera can get a little TOO shaky sometimes, but it does a good job of selling
and maybe hiding some of the other low-budget restrictions.
Where did they come from? Where did they go? Why are these splinters causing blood to flow?
NUMBER TWO: ALTERED STATES A drug-fuelled existential trip that brings
a man to the origin of all life. Damn.
Based on the novel by Paddy Chayefsky, Altered States takes a look at a psychopathologist
who wants insight into the mind. Sensory deprivation tanks, psychedelics, the
whole nine yards. His marriage is failing, so what better time
to head out to Mexico and give ayahuasca a try?
After taking the journey, Edward brings some tincture home with him to keep experimenting.
By using some inside of a sensory deprivation tank, he’s able to experience more intense
visions. And these visions soon become physical reality.
He actually, literally becomes earlier versions of man, which naturally lead to caveman rampages
through the city streets. This freaks out his colleagues, wife, pedestrians,
you name it. But he keeps going, in the name of science.
Now I don’t want to spoil too much, so I’ll pose a question instead: Given the ability
to regress into literally nothing, would you let your consciousness rejoin the universe,
or fight it and come back to reality knowing that there is more out there?
Altered States is constantly wrestling with the origin of life by way of Dr. Jekyll and
Mr. Hyde. Our scientist protagonist knows better, but
he keeps coming back to the titular Altered States in order to experience the rush once
again. It’s a fascinating exercise in pseudoscience,
with surprisingly crazy special effects. If you’ve ever wanted to see William Hurt
run around as a weirdly beige caveman, this is your opportunity.
NUMBER ONE: THE HIDDEN Full disclosure: this flick got a sequel.
I know, how could I possibly say The Hidden is forgotten if TWO of them exist?
Well, even with a cult following, I can’t say too many people bring this one up these
days. Which is a travesty! But hopefully some more
views will come through after we discuss it. It’s a fricken slug-alien-intergalactic-buddy-cop-movie!
What’s not to love? Somehow, a malicious extraterrestrial body-snatcher
has made it to earth, and wants to cause a whole lot of trouble.
For an alien, it’s got expensive taste, and decides to rob a bank, snag a Ferrari,
spend time at a strip club, and more. After infecting a few civilians via mouth-transfer,
the local police get involved. Obviously in over their heads, the FBI sends
some dudes too. But our main dude, the ever-excellent Dale
Cooper, well, he doesn’t seem totally human. And human he is not!
Teaming up with the people police, our alien law-enforcer begins a quest to track down
the luxuriously living larvae from outer space. Although it sounds sort of silly when I put
it that way, The Hidden is able to hit all sorts of marks.
We get sci-fi thriller moments, action-packed sequences, and of course, plenty of dark humour.
What’s not to love? It even presents us with a plot to invade
the government, which results in a presidential candidate firefight right in front of the
press! Imagine what would happen if we saw something
like this in real life. Damn.
OUTRO What a list!
Man, I wish I could just sit around all day watching these movies, but I’ve got scripts
to write. Make sure you all do your duty and watch these
in my stead. How many of these selections have you seen?
Are there any other sci-fi horrors that need to be reintroduced to the world?
What’s better? Soft pretzels or crunchy ones?
Make sure you let me know down in the comments. Speaking of comments, let’s take a look
at some of your more minty ones from the last Scary Forgotten Sci Fi Horror list:
The Mimsicles asks “Anybody remember the movie VIRUS with Donald Sutherland, Jamie
Lee Curtis, and William Baldwin? That one fell under the radar. It’s pretty good!”
Another Virus flick! A classic too. Maybe it’ll make it for part 3.
Victor Valdez says “Here’s a scary premise for a film from a while back that I was telling
my friend about earlier today. The film is about a little girl who lives with her sister
after her parents died in a car wreck. She finds an alien bio-weapon, and is hunted by
a ruthless alien bounty hunter trying to get it back. It stars Daveigh Chase who was in
The Ring, Donnie Darko, and S. Darko. If you think about it, Lilo and Stitch had a VERY
dark premise.” You had me there for a second! I love this
kind of thought exercise. Mario Angel Medina says “The Arrival is
one of the inspirations for Half-Life 1 (mostly Gordon Freeman’s iconic glasses and goatee
combo, but the scene in which Charlie Sheen explores the alien base in Mexico has a very
Half-Life vibe.)” I love the idea that Charlie Sheen has been
immortalized as a classic video game protagonist. AJ Klassen says “heck! Why doesn’t this
channel have a section for people’s script concepts based on thoughts spawned by your
rantings?” Get it going! Start a blog! Or a messageboard!
John Predaking says “You haven’t touched on fan films yet… You’re welcome”
Ouuu, good idea. Seems like fan films are an endless source of content, eh? If the studio
won’t make it, you better do it yourself! And that’s all the time we have for today!
Before I sign up for the vacation package at Camp Crystal Lake, make sure to give this
video a big thumbs up, and subscribe for more lesser-known larks!
Thanks for watching, and I’ll see you next time.