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Post by fenris on Apr 28, 2015 1:35:51 GMT
New releases from The Asylum include their Fifty Shades of Grey knock-off Bound starring Charisma Carpenter (thought that might get your attention), and the Avengers/Zenescope comic book universe/ Once Upon A Time mash-up Avengers Grimm. The latter was actually released on Region 2 DVD in the UK yesterday (27th April 2015), and although a trailer is no guarantee of a movie's quality, it looks considerably more stylish and impressive than the average offering from The Asylum.
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Post by fenris on Apr 28, 2015 2:15:16 GMT
New releases from The Asylum include the Avengers/Zenescope comic book universe/ Once Upon A Time mash-up Avengers Grimm, which was actually released on Region 2 DVD in the UK yesterday (27th April 2015). STOP PRESS: the UK release date for Avengers Grimm has been pushed back to 4th May 2015.
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Post by fenris on May 15, 2016 15:57:29 GMT
Trailer for Avengers Grimm (2015). I really like this film. Assuming that The Asylum kept to their usual formula, it was probably shot in two weeks with a budget of less than $1 million. Lower your expectations accordingly, don't expect high production values, expensive special effects and large-scale action setpieces, and in my opinion this is an entertaining and likable effort. The cast acquit themselves well, and most of the action scenes are effectively handled (the fight in the storm drain between Red and Cinderella being the highlight). I'd like to see a sequel.
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Post by fenris on Jul 9, 2016 9:31:57 GMT
And lo, it came to pass. The Asylum's new release Sinister Squad (their mockbuster take on Suicide Squad) is actually a sequel to last year's Avengers Grimm. The pitch: when Rumplestiltskin uses the broken fragments of the magic mirror (which was shattered in the previous movie) to trap Death itself, the enraged Grim Reaper swears vengeance on the entire Earth. To prevent a supernatural cult from freeing Death, a thrown-together group of other-dimensional heroes - Alice (from Wonderland), Goldilocks, the Pied Piper, Tweedledum and Tweedledee - must forceably recruit a team of storybook/folklore villains to fight Death's followers: Bluebeard, Gelda (the Queen of Hearts), the Mad Hatter, the Big Bad Wolf, cannibalistic witch Carabosse, and Rumplestlitskin himself. Here's the trailer. Hmm. I really enjoyed Avengers Grimm, but despite Sinister Squad having the same writer/director, based on that trailer it looks nowhere near as impressive. The Asylum have a formula that they stick to, because it works well for them - none of their films costs more than a million dollars and they're all shot in just two weeks. But Sinister Squad looks as though it was an even cheaper and more hurried production than usual. The Asylum normally announce their upcoming movies months in advance, but Sinister Squad caught everyone by surprise when it seemingly sprang out of nowhere and was released in America last week, probably indicating that it was a rush job. I'll still be interested to see it though.
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Post by fenris on Jul 11, 2016 13:45:33 GMT
I confess that when I first learnt about Sinister Squad, I was disappointed by the fact that while all the protagonists in previous movie Avengers Grimm were taken from classic fairy tales (Rumplestiltskin, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Rapunzel and Red Riding Hood), Sinister Squad instead just seemed crammed with a random hodge-podge of assorted fictitious characters. However, after a few moments thought, I realised that all the characters in Sinister Squad come from just two sources - traditional fairy tales and Lewis Carroll's various books set in Wonderland;
Wonderland: Alice, The Queen of Hearts, The Mad Hatter, Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Fairy tales/forklore: Rumplestiltskin, Goldilocks, The Pied Piper, Big Bad Wolf, Bluebeard and Carabosse.
I suspect The Asylum aren't just attempting to cash in on the upcoming Suicide Squad movie, but also the DVD release of Disney's live-action version of Alice Through The Looking Glass (screened in cinemas earlier this year).
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Post by fenris on Jul 21, 2016 21:28:36 GMT
Is anyone else aware of the Syfy mini-series The Witches of Oz (2011)? There was also a re-edited, extensively re-worked, one-hour-shorter version called Dorothy and the Witches of Oz that was screened in a handful of American cinemas. The Witches of Oz wasn't produced by The Asylum, but it's director/writer Leigh Scott and producer/co-writer/actress/soundtrack composer Eliza Swenson both started their careers at The Asylum, making and/or starring in several films for the company (another Asylum veteran, Sarah Lieving, also cameos in The Witches of Oz as The Wicked Witch of the East). In addition, I've seen an on-camera interview (I think it was included in the extras on the mini-series' Blu-ray) in which Leigh Scott says he originally pitched The Witches of Oz to The Asylum, but they said it was too elaborate and expensive a project for them to take on.
So although the mini-series was produced by another company, it still contains a hefty amount of Asylum DNA. Therefore, I like to think that The Witches of Oz - in which various warring inhabitants of a magical and supposedly fictitious realm breakthrough into our world to continue their conflict - is set in the same continuity or universe as The Asylum's 2015 movie Avengers Grimm (fairy tale princesses re-imagined as superpowered heroines and transported from their home dimension to present-day Los Angeles) and it's 2016 sequel Sinister Squad (which throws characters from Lewis Carroll's Wonderland novels into the mix).
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Post by matsee on Jul 21, 2016 22:21:40 GMT
I have seen the Witches of Oz and while as you say was not made by Asylum it is definitely on par with the quality of Asylum movies.
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Post by fenris on Jul 25, 2016 14:27:04 GMT
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Post by fenris on Mar 30, 2017 15:25:44 GMT
Trailer for The Lost Girls, the third film about members of 'The Nine', a vampire-hunting organisation that first appeared in The Asylum's Dracula's Curse (2006) and returned in the non-Asylum movie Wolvesbayne (2009). The Lost Girls was completed in 2014 and unfortunately seems currently stuck in distribution limbo.
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Post by fenris on Jul 2, 2017 17:42:57 GMT
Over the last decade British adult movie producer 'Kaizen XXX' (who also writes and directs under the name 'Dick Bush') has made a large number of films and television series set in the horror, fantasy and sci-fi genres. I've recently discovered that in 2015 he wrote and directed the TV series League of Frankenstein, which has a very similar premise to The Asylum's Avengers Grimm (2015) and Sinister Squad (2016). The plot: in the 1930s, an attempt by Victor Frankenstein (descendant of the original) to invoke dark forces to resurrect his dead wife Elizabeth instead breach the dimensional wall between our world and the fantastical realm of Neverland, enabling Peter Pan, Tickerbell and Hook (daughter of Captain Hook) to cross over. Hook immediately makes plans to invade and conquer Earth, aided by the vampire Lord Ruthven. To stop her, Victor assembles an army consisting of the aforementioned Peter and Tickerbell, plus Barbara Van Helsing (daughter of the famed vampire hunter), adventurer & Lost World explorer John Roxton, Alice (from Wonderland), and Tarzan's wife Jane Porter. Here's a montage of clips from the series, and the show's trailer.
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Post by fenris on Apr 1, 2018 17:09:20 GMT
The usual reacton towards The Asylum is just to dismiss them as shameless hack ripoff merchants, but they're not doing anything that numerous other production companies and even major studios have been doing for decades (to quote just one example, in 1989 Carolco's DeepStar Six, MGM's Leviathan and the Roger Corman-produced Lords of the Deep all cashed in on the release of The Abyss). If anything, with their blatant soundalike titles The Asylum are simply being more honest and upfront about it than most. And while I won't deny that they've made their fair share of bad movies, in my humble opinion they've produced quite a few low budget gems as well (plus films that although seriously flawed, remain highly watchable). I'll happily defend the likes of Merlin and the War of the Dragons, Dracula's Curse, Grimm's Snow White, Battle of Los Angeles, 3 Musketeers, Almighty Thor, Sinister Squad, Transmorphers, Jack the Giant Killer, Death Racers, Hansel & Gretel and it's sequel Hansel vs Gretel, Nazis at the Centre of the Earth, Little Dead Rotting Hood, Mercenaries, Sherlock Holmes, and my all-time personal favourite Asylum movie, Avengers Grimm;
Ultimately, I admire The Asylum for constantly trying to punch above their weight, even if they don't always succeed. They've actually been moving away from mockbusters in recent years, concentrating more on their gonzo shark franchises (Sharknado, Mega Shark, Multiple Headed Shark Attack, etc) which I confess I'm not a fan of. But they haven't given up on the mockbusters entirely. Recent and upcoming Asylum films include Operation Dunkirk, Atlantic Rim: Resurrection, Tomb Invader, and one I'm really looking forward to - Avengers Grimm: Time Wars.
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Post by fenris on Apr 18, 2018 21:41:01 GMT
Avengers Grimm: Time Wars was shown on the Syfy UK channel twice last weekend (one screening on Saturday 14/04/18, the other on Sunday 15/04/18), but I don't have Sky. These screenings may well have been the film's world premiere, as - after a quick search - I haven't found any indication that it's been broadcast in America or anywhere else yet. In fact, due to The Asylum being routinely lax in updating their official website and YouTube channel, the trailer still hasn't been posted on-line.
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Post by fenris on May 2, 2018 21:22:01 GMT
Avengers Grimm: Time Wars was shown on the Syfy UK channel twice last weekend (one screening on Saturday 14/04/18, the other on Sunday 15/04/18), but I don't have Sky. These screenings may well have been the film's world premiere, as - after a quick search - I haven't found any indication that it's been broadcast in America or anywhere else yet. In fact, due to The Asylum being routinely lax in updating their official website and YouTube channel, the trailer still hasn't been posted on-line. Over two weeks after Avengers Grimm: Time Wars was shown on the Syfy UK channel and made available via various streaming services, the trailer has (finally!) been posted on-line;
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Post by fenris on May 13, 2018 22:13:22 GMT
Have seen Avengers Grimm: Time Wars and really enjoyed it, though if you're not already a fan or admirer of The Asylum's output, I doubt Time Wars will convert you. While the original Avengers Grimm and spin-off film Sinister Squad were both written and directed by Jeremy Inman, with Time Wars Inman only provides the script and directing duties are handled by longtime Asylum staffer Max Elfeldt. Inman's screenplay impressively expands upon the world-building he conducted in the previous two films. In Avengers Grimm, the Magic Mirror - a portal between worlds - was shattered, and Sinister Squad dealt with the aftermath, as the walls separating various dimensions broke down and realms started to overlap and bleed into one another. Alice (herself a seasoned mirror traveller) established Looking Glass, a holding facility for troublesome individuals from other worlds who had been unleashed upon 'our' Earth, staffed by various characters from Wonderland and the Grimm-world. In Time Wars, the surface world comes under attack from the forces of Queen Magda of Atlantis (played by Katherine Maya) - visually inspired by Aquaman and Mera from the Justice League movie, and presumably supposed to be Hans Christian Andersen's Little Mermaid, Gone Bad (in case you're wondering why she's not called Ariel, Andersen never named her in his original story - it was Disney who came up with the Ariel moniker, and if The Asylum had identified her as such, they no doubt would have received a swift phone call from the House of Mouse's legal department). Magda is pursuing Prince Charming (Michael Marcel), Snow White's ex who vanished on the eve of their wedding several years earlier, having been lured into a trap by Magda and subsequently held prisoner until his recent escape. Charming has the film's McGuffin, a magical ring that will bestow upon who'sever finger he willingly places it on complete & absolute power over... well, basically everything.
Inman clearly knows that continuity is important to movie and comic book fans, and takes time to explain why some characters from the previous films are absent (when actor availability and/or a restricted budget were no doubt the real reasons), though some of his explanations are pleasingly cheeky: "Trust the rest of the Squad to be on holiday when we're facing an invasion" mutters Alice.
Having upgraded Looking Glass from it's initial warehouse location to a high-tech skyscraper, Alice and her faithful second-in-command Hatter (Christina Licciardi and Randall Yarbrough respiring their roles from Sinister Squad) awaken Snow White, whose body instinctively froze itself to recover from the injuries sustained at the conclusion of Avengers Grimm, reunite her with Sleeping Beauty and Red Riding Hood, and set them to work locating Charming and foiling Magda's schemes. Also getting involved is Rumpelstiltskin, the Big Bad in Avengers Grimm who was pressganged into assisting Alice in Sinister Squad. Portrayed by Eric Feltes (the third actor to play the role in this series), he continues - as he did in Squad - to take advantage of the situation & play both sides against one another, successfully conspiring to activate fragments of the Mirror and trap Snow, Beauty and Red by bouncing them around between different worlds and timestreams.
Lauren Parkinson as Snow White and Marah Fairclough as Sleeping Beauty both return from the first Avengers Grimm. Parkinson gets an effective action sequence as Snow is confronted at the burial site of her closest friends by a hulking Merman assassin who'd been specifically tasked with killing her, and makes impromptu use of grave markers to defend herself. Fairclough's Sleeping Beauty was memorably prissy and snide in the previous movie, and although she's mellowed considerably, her banter with Red Riding Hood still contains a pleasing degree of snark. Elizabeth Eileen plays Red, but looks so identical to Elizabeth Peterson who played the role in the earlier Grimm that I believe she must be the same actress, though the IMDB currently lists them as two separate performers. Regardless, Eileen is clearly enjoying herself enormously as the team's resident combat specialist and weapons expert, dispatching Magda's minions with knives, swords, her trusty bow & arrows, and - proving how well Red has adapted to our world - producing hand grenades and twin revolvers from under her cloak. Hatter was portrayed as a permanently spaced out acid casualty in Sinister Squad, but seems slightly more grounded this time round - most of the time, anyway. Displaying an impeccable English accent, Christina Licciardi's Alice was the best thing about Squad, and she's equally good here. Having initially been a Nick Fury/Amanda Waller figure, Alice is now revealed to have her own superpower, and it's perfectly in keeping with Lewis Carroll's original stories. And as Prince Charming, Marcel gives a nicely judged and winningly tongue-in-cheek performance of a handsome, brave, deep-voiced, utterly sincere, impossibly perfect and sickeningly noble fairytale hero.
At the time of writing, superhero movies remain in vogue and highly popular. As a result, I hope we haven't seen the last of The Asylum's Avengers Grimmverse. I would certainly welcome further adventures.
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Post by fenris on May 28, 2018 13:49:28 GMT
Better late than never. Four years after it was released in America and other countries to coincide with the Robocop remake, The Asylum's Android Cop is getting an official DVD release in the UK. According to Amazon, it will be available from 30th October.
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