The punk I named Waldo was passed out. Edwige, my kangaroo companion from my misadventures in North America, had punched him in the sweet spot. I took a can of Mellow Yellow I retrieved from the Cold Drinks machine on the second floor of the Museum of Schlock. I shook the can vigorously, popped the tab, and sprayed the sticky soda in Waldo’s face. The punk woke up and looked at me blankly. 

“Where is the Revenging Manta?” I asked. 

“I don’t know anything,” the punk said, but I wasn’t buying his answer. I signaled to Edwige and she slapped his face with her tail. Waldo wept.

— To be continued.

Merry Christmas from the Museum of Schlock to you and yours. I hunted down another found footage documentary. This is 2022’s The Christmas Tapes. I can’t believe someone put this trash out to make a quick buck off of these victims! These are Christmas victims of horrific events, some of a paranormal nature. 

The movie begins with some home movie footage of a middle American family’s Christmas celebration. A man named Geoff shows up at the door, saying that his car broke down and if he could use their phone since his cell is also out of juice. The dorky dad lets him inside and tells him they were planning to watch a Christmas movie. It’s not long before a gun comes out, the family is tied up with Christmas lights, and Geoff has a captive audience for a bunch of VHS tapes he brought with him.

The first tape features a husband and wife making a Christmas travel video for their YouTube channel. They run into a scarecrow during their travels and recite some German incantation that will bring the scarecrow to life to punish the wicked during Christmas time. It’s done for a lark, but the scarecrow comes to life in the middle of the night while they are camping and, well, you know. The creature brutally murders them as the camera rolls.

The next VHS tape we get involves a father trying to give his kids a surprising present. A man dressed in a Santa Claus outfit comes to the father’s place of work and claims to be the real Santa Claus. He’s there to pack the father up in a box and drop him off at his house so the kids can open up the package. Instead, the father ends up getting tied up in the basement of this Santa Claus’s house and tortured. It seems that this Santa Claus isn’t the real Santa Claus, but an employee the father had fired. I hope you like scenes of ears getting cut off. I am looking at you Tarantino and David Lynch fans.

This whole affair reminds me of that Faces of Death movie the elementary school kids used to ramble about on the school bus back in the 80s. You know, the tape of horrible real life deaths like the guy who parachutes into the alligator pit and gets eaten alive. Maybe you could put the video camera down and help the guy. It’s a sad commentary on these United States.

Happy Holidays!

Jeff Shuster (episode 47, episode 102, episode 124, episode 131, episode 284, episode 441, episode 442, episode 443, episode 444, episode 450, episode 477, episode 491, episode 492, episode 493, episode 495, episode 496, episode 545, episode 546, episode 547, episode 548, episode 549, episode 575, episode 596, episode 597, episode 598, and episode 599) is an MFA graduate from the University of Central Florida.