Podcasts
A Celebration of the Classic and Modern Versions of ‘Resident Evil 2’ [Safe Room Podcast]
Before diving into our Resident Evil 2 Safe Room episode, be sure to listen to this month’s edition of the indie horror showcase Horror Bytes!
Without an ounce of hyperbole, playing Resident Evil 2 was a life-changing experience for me.
Despite coming to Capcom’s revered sequel far too late, Resident Evil 2 gave me my first taste of what M-rated games had in store for me. By this point in my adolescents, I had been covertly watching horror films (secretly gifted by my grandparents) in my living room until the wee hours of the morning.
Night of the Living Dead, The Fly, and The Thing were trauma-inducing but formative films that I became fascinated by, much to my parent’s dismay. But as far as games went at this time, my horror gaming experiences were relatively tame. I ravenously consumed classics such as Zombies Ate My Neighbors and Doom, and despite their timelessness, these games never captured the level of dread I felt during those harrowing midnight viewings.
All of that changed with Resident Evil 2. A rare occurrence of my parents throwing caution to the wind and gifting me a Playstation with a Greatest Hits edition of Resi 2. From the opening moments, the game presents itself in a way that previously only films had.
A fiery introduction to a city besieged by a zombie apocalypse immediately reminded me of my countless viewings of Romero’s trilogy. But it wasn’t just Resident Evil 2′s bombastic opening but its blending of resource management, hellish monster design, and the corporate conspiracy encapsulating it all that made Resident Evil 2 feel distinctly unique.
Dare I say special?
Among these things, I wouldn’t be able to appreciate the game’s approach to a “bigger and better” sequel mentality until a few years later, when I’d go back and play the original.
Naturally, when Neil and I began the podcast, Resident Evil 2 was at the top of our collective wishlist of games to discuss at some point (Resident Evil 2, Safe Room? Had to be didn’t it?). And given the inaccessibility of the original game, Capcom’s 2019 Resident Evil 2 remake was the natural version for us to discuss.
So for this week’s episode, Neil and I recruited fellow Bloody FM member Rob Coakley of Hometown Ghost Stories to unpack what makes the Resident Evil 2 remake the blueprint for remakes and how it manages to retain the stoic legacy of one of survival horrors’ greats sequels. –Jay Krieger
Safe Room is a weekly horror video game discussion podcast with new episodes every Monday on
iTunes/Apple, Sticher, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and Linktree for additional streaming services.
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Podcasts
‘The Boston Strangler’ Adaptations Share One Major Blind Spot [Murder Made Fiction Podcast]
Amanda and I have spent the month of July examining the various cinematic depictions of The Boston Strangler over on Murder Made Fiction, and we’ve come to an odd realization: despite the case claiming thirteen lives, none of its filmed adaptations seem to care at all about the victims.
After walking Amanda through a Primer on the case, which seems like an open and shut indictment of Albert DeSalvo (until it gets muddied by conspiracy and possible corruption by the Boston PD), we tackled three very different films:
- 1964’s The Strangler: Burt Topper directs Whatever Happened to Baby Jane actor Victor Buono in a slice of 60s pop psychology that tries to inject a weird doll fetish into the proceedings. The real life details of the case mostly fall by the wayside, in large part because DeSalvo wasn’t implicated in the murders until after this film’s release. Still, Buono’s performance is pretty astounding!
- 1968’s The Boston Strangler: The best of this month’s three films, though it is less for Tony Curtis‘ take on the killer than its use of split screens by cinematographer Richard H. Kline and editor Marion Rothman. It’s magnificently entertaining, though the back half slows down too much when it comes time to let Curtis do his thing.
- 2023’s Boston Strangler: This is the film that finally prioritizes women…although not the victims. The straight-to-Hulu film (which I reviewed for Bloody back in the day) stars Keira Knightley and Carrie Coon as Record American reporters, but writer/director Matt Ruskin’s thesis, which boils down to “it’s hard for women in the workforce,” feels overly simplistic. In hindsight, this one is mostly just a boring misfire.
The Boston Strangler 1968
Next month: For August, we’re turning our attention to John List, the family annihilator who went on to inspire 1987’s The Stepfather. We’ll partner that up with the 2009 remake, starring YOU‘s Penn Badgley (!), as well as the 2026 Tubi version starring Taye Diggs (!!)
Want even more true crime adaptations and Murder Made Fiction? Support the show on Patreon to listen to our coverage of Elle Fanning in The Girl From Plainville and Ryan Murphy’s The Watcher Netflix series, as well as full-length primers and 160+ hours of bonus content.
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