Podcasts
WWI Horrors in ‘Amnesia: The Bunker’ [Safe Room Podcast]
Frictional Games might be the most impressive modern horror developer out there. I am continually impressed by their ability to evolve their games narratively and mechanically while crafting equally enthralling worlds around them. From the dog days of Penumbra to the more refined Amnesia series and SOMA, Frictional has shown they aren’t a one-trick pony. And I’d consider Amnesia: The Bunker their most impressive feat yet.
In this week’s episode, Neil and I unpack how Frictional applies an immersive sim focus to their unique brand of horror, share a few anecdotes, and discuss what makes Amnesia: The Bunker’s environment such a standout.
Meanwhile, in our Horror Bytes episode this week, we cover two short indie horror games set in 1997. Eerie Enigma channels the cheesy charms of the original Resident Evil whilst Incident at Grove Lake drags us into the world of alien abduction.
Safe Room is a weekly horror video game discussion podcast with new episodes every Monday on
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After kicking off July with discussions of Joe Dante’s seminal werewolf film The Howling (listen) and Ken Russell’s controversial erotic thriller Crimes of Passion (listen), we’re heading to Maine to dissect one of Stephen King‘s most misguided adaptations in Lawrence Kasdan‘s 2003 misfire Dreamcatcher!
Dreamcatcher sees friends Henry (Thomas Jane), Jonesy (Damian Lewis), Pete (Timothy Olyphant) and Beaver (Jason Lee) reunite for their annual hunting trip in Maine. Their reunion is cut short when they find themselves caught in the middle of a war between a hostile race of farty-farty aliens and an elite US military unit led by Colonel Abraham Curtis (Morgan Freeman), who has been driven mad after spending decades tracking the extraterrestrials. When Jonesy is possessed by one of the aliens, the remaining friends seek out their disabled childhood friend Duddits (Donnie Wahlberg), who they believe has powers that can save Jonesy…and the world.
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Episode 396: Dreamcatcher (2003)
Watch out for “ister gay” (oof), take some Gas-X and bite our bags because we’re talking Lawrence Kasdan’s baffling 2003 adaptation of Stephen King’s equally baffling novel Dreamcatcher.
Join us as we go all in on the farty-farty aliens populating this hilarious misfire that often feels like a bad Kevin Smith script. It’s a film filled with characters who get a single defining trait (if they’re lucky), played by respectable actors who are here for the paycheck (looking at you, Morgan Freeman).
Plus: blown-out assholes, using guns as telephones, pitying poor Donnie Wahlberg, and wondering why the hell this movie is called Dreamcatcher.
Cross out Dreamcatcher!
Coming Up Next: We’re going to be lounging around a posh Greenwich Village apartment as we check in on Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly in Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window (1954).
P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for over 513 hours of Patreon content including this month’s new episodes on Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Forbidden Fruits, Saccharine, Evil Dead Burn, an audio commentary on Howling II: Your Sister is a Werewolf (aka Howling II: Stirba – Werewolf Bitch), and the conclusion of our coverage of AMC’s The Vampire Lestat on the Requel Tier.