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Hola amigos, buenas vibras para todos.
**Hello friends, good vibes to all.
Netflix continues to squeeze content to horror and this time it was the turn of a miniseries of the master of cinema Guillermo del Toro. At first I confess that I had no idea what this was about because we are taking into account what was said a few days ago, I saw absolutely nothing before sitting down to watch the first chapter, which again worked a little because if there has been something that has surprised me lately was this series with all its curiosities that are there. The interesting thing here is that yes, it is horror, but being a series of chapters, eight to be exact, in each of them we see a different version of the genre so those of us who like these things may enjoy it a little.
Other very present things is the very marked presence of Del Toro's style, if you have seen some of his films, Hellboy, The Shape of Water or Pan's Labyrinth you will know what I mean. He is a guy with a brilliant mind for me when creating his worlds because each film is one and in this cabinet we will see how each episode is a different universe full of creatures, Dantesque situations, fear, in short, a terror taken to the greatest of eccentricities but another from the most genuine and pure suspense. It's very strange friends but it's still worth a look and it's worth a watch. Having said that, let's talk a little more profanely about what Guillermo del Toro's vision of horror is all about.
The first thing to know is that this series does not follow a pattern, that is to say, there is no plot or story to follow, here the only relevant thing that is repeated in all the chapters is horror, as I made clear before. The reality is that it is a journey where Guillermo del Toro seeks to redefine this genre, to be seen in a way that had not been done before and for that he will need the help of eight great directors and screenwriters, among which are some who were in The Shape of Water or his most recent work Pinocchio. This journey will touch on fear in many ways, from the magical to the most grotesque you can imagine, from the most macabre to the purely paranormal, all with the aim of understanding that terror has many faces and not just the conventional ones we are used to seeing.
At the beginning of each episode you will find Del Toro giving a little preamble of what will be the next story and he does it using a nice cabinet from which he will take out certain objects that allude to what comes next. Personally I can't say that I liked all the episodes, in fact out of the eight I only really liked four because they were very well done stories, well acted and with a super interesting background. The rest for me seemed inconsequential, there are a couple that are very grotesque that if you are a weak stomached person it might be a little hard to watch the whole thing.
Graveyard Rats, Pickman's Model, Dreams in the Witch House and The Murmuring are the names of the episodes that caught my attention the most. They are very well told and set stories with very good visual effects. I like this format because each time it's something totally new, you always go in blind, you don't know what surprises there are in each chapter, because there are, and I think that's the great attraction of this work. Talking about whether you can get bored or not enjoy this series is a bit pointless because it all depends on your tastes and your own fears, being a very diverse stories you can say that there is something for everyone. Do you like paranormal horror? - There is, you like the absurd and at the same time gloomy? - You have it, you like psychedelic and macabre? - it's there too. As you can see, it is an anthological series that gathers all the edges of a genre.
There is something that I realized and is that much of the terror in each story will depend on the personalities of their protagonists, they are things that go hand in hand. Greed, avarice, envy, selfishness, vanity, are some of the traits of the people who give life to the different plots and based on these characteristics their destiny will be marked or sentenced. I see it as a lesson they take with them, where the path is quite tortuous, weird and creepy, depending on the case. And once again, the protagonists are the center of everything and for that they found a pretty good cast of actors and actresses, known and not so well known, who did an incredible job.
Some of the actors you will find here are Kate Micucci, Andrew Lincoln, Rupert Grint, Crispin Glover, Eric André, among others. Like the stories themselves the actors are also very diverse. In my opinion one of the best was Rupert Grint, his story in itself was one of the ones I liked the most and his acting in it is really good, basically and without going into spoilers is a person who is not able to overcome a loved one and will do whatever it takes to be with that person. I think it's one of the stories you'll enjoy the most because in the end they are just that, pretty weird and peculiar horror stories. Andrew Lincoln, Rick in The Walking Dead, is another one whose story is very top notch as well. A very sad plot and with a good drama but without leaving aside the high degree of suspense that is lived. There he shows off his acting skills and together with his co-star Essie Davis, who is another well-known horror actress, they recreate a very heartfelt and dark story.
The thing is that this series of horror stories is made for all tastes, in general terms it is not a bad work, I liked it a lot, I am a big fan of Guillermo del Toro and everything he does but it is true that not all these stories managed to captivate me completely, it is very difficult to please everyone I guess and more with a genre that always causes people's opinions to be so diverse. I applaud the risk, I think it was a success and it would be good to continue seeing things like this. I don't know if you remember "Tales from the crypt", well, it's something very similar; in its time it was a real boom and here I think that was the intention.
It gets a 7.5/10 because in the end I ended up connecting with only half of the stories. The horror is not bad but for me in the other four it wasn't enough, maybe it's all a matter of taste and perspective. I think it's worth watching because it's something different and new, I haven't seen something like this for a while and I repeat, there is something for everyone. It is on Netflix and each chapter lasts about an hour. Here's the trailer so you can take a look at it.
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Bueno amigos por hoy es todo, espero que les haya gustado. ¡Un abrazo a todos, nos vemos en la próxima!
***Well friends that's all for today, I hope you liked it. ¡A hug to everyone, see you next time!
