Archive 81 Season 1

This new Netflix show, produced by James Wan, just started streaming last week. The plot revolves around an archivist named Dan Turner (Mamoudou Athie) who takes a job restoring old VHS tapes by a mysterious man named Virgil (Martin Donovan) at an isolated building in the middle of nowhere. As Dan begins the process of restoring and watching the tapes, he becomes fascinated by the person who recorded them, a woman named Melody (Dina Shihabi). She moves into the Visser Apartment complex with her camcorder, determined to interview the residents as she's making a film about the place. She befriends a young girl who slowly introduces her to the rest of the tenants, some of which are quite eccentric. It soon becomes clear that something very odd is happening at this apartment complex, and Dan soon learns that Melody's story is connected to his past. As a child, his family home had burned down, leaving him an orphan (the Visser Apartment complex had also mysteriously burned down). Dan becomes determined to solve the mystery of what happened to Melody, in hopes that he can get answers to the family tragedy that still traumatizes him.

The series is well filmed and well acted. It's a slow burn story, but the increasing creepiness is enough to keep you watching, and things do become quite creepy. Dan eventually finds himself going down the same rabbit hole that eventually lead to Melody's disappearance. The story switches between Dan watching the tapes and piecing together what happened to Melody, and Melody piecing together the mystery of the strange goings on that are happening at the Visser Apartments. The series combines elements of occultism and cosmic horror, as well as voyeurism, when Dan realizes that the building he's staying and working at is filled with cameras that are watching his every move.

There's a lot for horror and mystery fans to enjoy. The show has the feel of Wan's earlier work (specifically the first two Conjuring films and Insidious), the story also plays like something that would have been written by Stephen King. The found footage elements of the tapes that Dan is watching are also well done. The series is only 8 episodes, and the story is tied up nicely by the time it's done, so if they don't make a second season, I'm happy with the way things ended.

Netflix's Archive 81 is an enjoyable, creepy series that will keep you engaged until the end. If you enjoyed shows like Black Mirror or Amazon Prime's Tales From The Loop, then I recommend you check this one out.

Comments

Help Me… I’m Possessed (1974) / #Missingcouple (2024)

I've watched some weird, obscure horror movies throughout my life. I can now add this lurid 1974 schlockfest to that growing list. In a castle in the desert, Dr. Arthur Blackwood runs a sanitarium filled with mentally disturbed patients (as well as staff). He claims to be working on finding a way to cure people of any violent tendencies they have, and brags about his younger sister, innocent, child-like Melanie, as evidence that his treatment works. When she was a child, their parents had to keep her locked up and chained in the basement, to control her violent fits. Now that he's cured her, Arthur has his wife Diane come to the castle to meet Melanie, so that they can be one big, happy family. Diane begins to grow suspicious that something is amiss after a Sheriff shows up investigating the murder of 2 local teens, and sets about on her own investigation, hoping to uncover the sinister secrets that she feels her husband is hiding. Help Me... I'm Possessed is an outrageous,...

Titanic Creations Yongary 1967

This figure was released in late December, and I got it about 2 days before the New Year, so I'm counting it as a 2025 release. It is the Titanic Creations version of the Korean kaiju Yongary, Monster From The Deep. The film was released in 1967 as a Godzilla ripoff, with several ideas copied from the Gamera series, such as his tusks, his ability to fire a stream of flames from his mouth, and even firing a laser beam from his horn, similar to the slicing one used by Gyaos. The film is pretty goofy, but Yongary, like most of those Asian monsters, was pretty cool (to me, at least), so I was psyched that someone finally made a figure of this lesser known kaiju. When Titanic Creations put it up for pre-order, they announced a series of tiers, where they would add accessories when a certain number of orders were met. Enough fans ordered him, so that Yongary ended up with a shit ton of stuff, making him absolutely worth the price. In addition to the kaiju, you get a flame breath effect, ...

RicSan Custom Toys Kyōrū Kaiju (Titanosaurus)

My latest kaiju figure purchase is the Titanosaurus made by Ricsan Custom Toys. I own and love the Varan & Gabara, so of course I had to preorder this one when it was available. He was delivered earlier this week. This kaiju hails from the last Godzilla film of the Showa era, 1975's Terror of Mechagodzilla. The Black Hole aliens are back, rebuilding their robot in another effort to take over the planet. They enlist the help of an ostracized Earth scientist named Mafune and his daughter Katsura, who are able to control an aquatic dinosaur named Titanosaurus. They plan to use both kaiju and mecha to attack Japan. Titano was a cool monster, with his tail that opened into a fish fin, and he would use it to create whirlpools in the sea, and high winds on land. I'm hoping that S.H. Monsterarts makes one for the 50th anniversary of the film, but when I saw this Ricsan Custom version, I couldn't pass it up. Titanosaurus (called the Kyōrū Kaiju), comes in a white box, with its n...

Musings of an Inkd Geek

Search This Blog