This afternoon B-D writer Tex sent in his latest review of NBC's Fear Itself (all reviews), which continues every Thursday at 10/9C. Inside you'll find a review of "Skin & Bones", which was written by Drew McWeeny & Scott Swan ("Masters of Horror") and directed by Larry Fessenden. When a cattle herder returns home to his family after being lost in the woods for days, he just doesn't seem the same. Soon, a terrible mortal struggle ensues against the terrifying monster possessing him.
Fear Itself Review: Episode 1.8 ‘Skin and Bones’
Director Larry Fessenden can’t seem to escape the supernatural grasp of the Wendigo. In 2001, Fessenden turned a feature film about the mythic cannibalistic creature. Now working from a script by Scott Swan and Drew McWeeny (CIGARETTE BURNS, PRO-LIFE), Fessenden returns to his favorite Native American beastie and lets him loose on a rural family farm.
Doug Jones (HELLBOY II) takes sabbatical from his usual prostheticly camouflaged characters to play Grady, a man—more or less—who after disappearing in the mountains near his horse ranch for 10-days returns emaciated and looking a little bit like one of the Gentlemen from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode Hush. What Grady brings back with him is a kind of infection, but not the normal kind. His soul is infected by the Wendigo and it won’t be long before his wife, kids and ranch hands all appear to be food for the frenzied beast.
Jones is the star—front and center—of this episode and he looks terrible! The normally gaunt and angled actor is still virtually unrecognizable under blacked out eyes and rotten teeth. He’s so thin; he looks like he could kill you with his collarbone. It’s horrifying and yet, Jones is such a presence that even when he’s sleeping you can’t take your eyes off of him.
It’s too bad that Doug Jones in all his ragged glory can’t save SKIN AND BONES from becoming nothing but another uninteresting entry in FEAR ITSELF—but for one side note…and not a positive one.
You see, this episode is the first one I felt completely gypped the audience on an action sequence. The film’s final shotgun blast to the face takes place off-screen and unfortunately, this time, shooting around the exploit felt out of place and incorrect. I’m sure had it been filmed as expected that the network would have been forced to cut what should have been a violent dénouement or suffer the FCC wrath and sponsor walkouts. I completely understand and accept that a MANIAC-styled brain blast is not what Proctor and Gamble wants running right before they try to sell you some Pampers! But, damnit, it’s what I want to see and what I think genre fans expected to see if we forgot for a moment that “The Peacock “was running the game.
Still, one shot (ahem) does not kill an entire episode. No, SKIN AND BONES fails mostly because it’s boring. Jones scenes are great acting exercises but in the end they service a script that has no sense of foreboding and no new elements to titillate viewers imaginations. In the end, I’m glad Jones hit a home run with his performance, but he really just wound up taking one for a team that failed him at every other opportunity.
I really hate this series. I went in with fairly low expectations (I mean, come on... a horror series on NBC? Really?) but still came out disappointed. I've noticed a trend of terrible acting, obnoxious direction and incredibly dull writing. Is this the best they can do?
I thought this episode was pretty good.
And PromNight2008, just by your sn, I think we can assume you liked that movie. Therefore, I find it funny that you call THIS crap. You wanna talk about terrible acting, obnoxious directing, and incredibly dull writing? Watch the movie of your sn again. Watch it closely.
Actually, I wasn't a huge fan of Prom Night. I made this SN before I even saw the film, because I expected it to be better... which it wasn't. I do think that it's not as bad as EVERYONE says, and I do rate it higher than I normally would based on the fact that I enjoyed it more than When A Stranger Calls, One Missed Call, etc. Other PG-13 horror. Aside from that, it wasn't spectacular, or even above-average.
And also, I just should say that I don't appreciate the whole 'Prom Night' thing being pulled out whenever someone disagrees with me. People's taste in movies are different, and I'm sick of people not respecting that.
It was one cliche pummeled with another! They used the same mirror gag like 3 times! But I will agree, One Missed Call was one of the worst pieces of trash ever created, yet they had such good source material...
I wish some people would take the sticks out of their asses and actually try to enjoy this series, it's not that bad.
Skin and Bones is my favorite episode so far.
@ MovieGeek: i agree. this was the best episode so far. It was creepy, the acting was great (except for a few cheesy lines towards the very end between the young brothers) and had some genuinly disturbing moments
there have been some SHIT episodes of Fear Itself, but many people seem to write this series off no matter what
Yeah I've seen two episodes and did not find them very good. This series will not be going beyond it's first season. I'd rather watch 30 days of night on Fearnet.
And can we do something about the banner for Mirrors??? I'm getting tired of watching the blonde chic rip her face open. way to spoil a good death
scene.
I agree with the Mirrors banner, it incredibly annoying and now have no intention of seeing the movie. Too bad only the 'Family Man' episode of Fear Itself has been good so far. This episode in particular was astoundingly bad, essentially just Doug Jones stumbling around with Paleman prosthetics on his hands doing a Wishmaster voice. It felt more like satire than horror, the dialogue was awful, the direction made the experience terribly unscary and the writer took what could've been a great premise and turned it into a joke. Horrible, horrible episode. Maybe the worst episode yet.
i thought the writing for this episode was some of the tightest of the season. yes, there are cliches and less than desirable shots but the story and character development was easily the strongest of the season. this episode didn't feel as rushed as most of the others (which is a good thing).
This was one of the best. I still liked family man best, but this one was incredible. I loved the characters and I was actually thinking that this could be a pretty amazing horror movie if they would have written it for the theatres. It appears that it's either hit or miss of most though. And just because you dont like one episode, dont give up on the series. Each episode is written and direct by someone new, so they are all going to be incredibly different.
I, too, really wanted to like this series. Unfortunately, It's REALLY bad. For me, "Skin and Bones" was the best of the worst. I really don't see this series getting better. I completely agree with some of the posts that point out that these story lines hold promise, but an hour is not long enough to flesh things out.
I've been pretty impressed so far, I missed this episode but have seen all the others. Some were great (Family Man, Eater), some were average (most of them) and one was incredibly bad (New Years Day)
Time for new writers....they keep hiring the same sorry bunch of writers and they need new blood. Pro-life and Cigarette Burns sucked. Get rid of these chumps and hire someone that can tell a scary story.
This show needs some balls!!!
I thought this episode had great potential. The gruesome character of the "family man" who is not quite right. What the heck happened? I mean they had it all set up for success! It's almost like some corporate diddy came in and edited out the entire episode, LoL. You could have done so much with this episode. End with a "family" buffet or anything besides the random shot to the head....... Ok come on now, you can be more creative, right? I hope!
Comments Page 1 of 1 | You have to be logged in to comment! If you don't have an account register now for free! Your account allows you to post comments and reviews, upload videos and images, access or our forums, write personal blogs, and maintain your profile.
Director Larry Fessenden can’t seem to escape the supernatural grasp of the Wendigo. In 2001, Fessenden turned a feature film about the mythic cannibalistic creature. Now working from a script by Scott Swan and Drew McWeeny (CIGARETTE BURNS, PRO-LIFE), Fessenden returns to his favorite Native American beastie and lets him loose on a rural family farm.
Print Story
Send to a Friend
