Tom and Crow would have a field day with this...

For the past several years, the Sci-Fi channel (stupidly renamed "SyFy" in 2009) has devoted it's Saturday night lineup to a series of movies, many of which they produced themselves. A vast majority of these films are B-movies; low-budget movies with horrid acting, tacky computer effects, and nonsensical plots. They're the kinds of movies you'd see on "Mystery Science Theater 3000". A lot of these movies fall under the category "so bad, it's good".

Most of these movies seem to involve giant or mutated animals, or concepts which were stolen from better, more profitable movies. Movies they've aired in the past include "Ice Spiders", "SS Doomtrooper", and their magnum opus, "Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus". In one of this movie's most notorious scenes, the title shark leaps out of the water and snatches a jumbo jet from the sky. No, really, it needs to be seen to be believed.

A lot of these movies are produced by a studio called "The Asylum". They're infamous for making cheap knock-offs of popular blockbusters, including "Snakes On A Train" and "Transmorphers". Not surprisingly,  20th Century Fox has a pending lawsuit against them. Apparently, The Asylum's movie "The Day The Earth Stopped" was too similar to their movie, "The Day The Earth Stood Still".

Their newest film, which sounds like a rip-off of one of their own movies, airs this Saturday on SyFy. It's called "Mega Python Vs. Gatoroid". In this gem, a team of scientists create a giant alligator in order to defeat a giant python created by a crazed animal rights activist. Both creatures go berserk and wreak havoc upon the state of Florida.

Maybe it's better than it sounds.

You can watch a scene from the movie here.

Coach Gary and the Daleks

I instantly fell in love with the BBC TV series Doctor Who when I first saw it a few years ago. Despite being introduced to the show in the new millennium, I saw the classic series (which ran from 1963-89) before seeing the modern series (which started in 2005). I like both of them for different reasons, but I have a slight preference towards the classic series. I could go into further detail, but that's not what I want to tell you about.

A few weeks ago, my younger brother, Jim, was at a team dinner for his high school swimming team, which I used to be a member of. Apparently, he mentioned to the team coach, Gary, that I was a die hard Whovian. At practice the next day, Coach Gary gave Jim a box. It was heavy, and had been formerly used to store bulk underwear. He asked Jim to give it to me.

I was reluctant to open the box at first. I knew my former coach had a twisted sense of humor, and was befuddled as to why he was giving me an old box of women's undergarments. Nevertheless, I opened it. Inside were about a hundred Doctor Who novels.

These books were mostly novelizations of classic DW television stories. A lot of them were based on episodes from the '60s which no longer existed. This was back in the day when it was cheaper to record over used tapes instead of buying new ones.

While the windfall was quite large, it wasn't a complete collection. There are still about 30 or 40 books still out there. Apparently the books are very hard to find outside of Britain, but can be found on eBay from time to time.

I just finished reading "Invasion Of The Dinosaurs", the 45th book in my new collection. This book is about exactly what you think it's about. Next up is "Death To The Daleks", featuring the Doctor's most infamous enemy (pictured above). I'll have to write more about them in a later post.

Greetings, earthlings!

Welcome to Chameleon Circuit!

This blog will consist of news, reviews, opinions, and other anecdotes about science and fantasy fiction. You can expect me to cover movies, TV programs, literature, comic books, video games, and all other media.

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