On Oct. 8, 2020, The Nerdosphere podcast released a new episode featuring an appearance by Isaac. Given the season, the topic for the evening was horror movie remakes: keep ’em or toss ’em.
“I’ve been following Nerdosphere for a while now,” Isaac says. “I love the breadth of topics they cover. One episode might be about movies. Another might be about comics or music. They’re nerd without being too niche.”
Although the past couple of decades have been replete with hand-wringing over the volume of horror movie remakes (and remakes of remakes) that have dominated mainstream horror cinema, Isaac and the regular Nerdosphere hosts started the hour by discussing the horror movie remakes they thought were well done.
“I actually prefer the remake of Wes Craven’s Last House on the Left to what many fans consider a ground-breaking original,” Isaac explains. “Just because a film is remade or a franchise is rebooted does not necessarily mean it’s bad or unoriginal. In fact, there’s a ton of new, original horror out there right now in addition to the wealth of remakes. There’s Haunting of Bly Manor and Lovecraft Country, just to name a couple of new originals. You also can’t forget about new groundbreakers like Host on Shudder.”
Naturally, one point of contention came when the discussion turned to the original 1985 Fright Night when compared to 2011’s remake.
“It turns out, that Corbin dislikes the 1985 original movie, which he didn’t see until after he watched the 2011 remake,” Isaac says. “I prefer the original, which I saw when I was 14 or 15. However, each of us likes our respective version for the same reason: it brought back the vampire as a monster.
“If you read Dracula, you’ll notice that the vampire remains a monster throughout the novel,” Isaac continues. “He’s never a god, never a tragic hero. Up until Fright Night became a cable/rental hit in the 80s, horror was suffering from slasher fatigue. Everything had to be a Halloween or Friday the 13th clone. When Fright Night arrived, we could finally be afraid of monsters again.”
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