I’m in the process of completing two new long-form horror movie reviews, and if I’m lucky, I’ll get some more written during the week.
I have a great love of most forms of media and multiple genres. I consume so much music. I watch so much genre film and TV (granted, usually years behind everyone else). I’ve been a voracious reader all my life. But I’ve only ever felt qualified to write about horror movies. That’s a niche where I feel comfortable, where I have enough of a foundation to explain what works and what doesn’t, and I’ve read and written enough horror that I like trying to figure out what fixes could have improved a weaker script. I feel comfortable having opinions that might differ from the rest of the critics, and I’m usually pretty good at explaining why.
I think the fact that I can find the good even in the mediocre speaks to a real love of horror, and I sometimes feel like you have to love something to properly criticize it, because then you know any negative criticism isn’t an indictment or dismissal of the entire genre, or even of the movie itself.
Outside of horror movies, though, I like to joke that I have no taste. I just like what I like, and there’s no shame in that.
And I almost always add that my brother has far better taste than I do. He consumes even more media than me and has many more thoughts on the matter, with a greater critical understanding of a broader variety of entertainment. I do horror, and I love talking with him about horror movies, because it’s one of the few things where I feel I come from a place of authority. When he was younger, he used to be terrified of horror, but I slowly helped introduce him back to it when he grew up and our relationship was changing from that between two children to two adults. So we kind of built a new relationship around that.
But he does everything, and I love to read his takes on the rest of popular culture and critical response. We grew up on geek culture, and we’re both unapologetic nerds. We just went in slightly different directions with it.
Do check him out, and start with his ranking of the movies of Stephen Spielberg HERE.
