Signal Watch Reads: The Midnight Assassin - The Hunt For America's First Serial Killer (2017)

Author:  Skip Hollandsworth

Narrator:  Clint Jordan

Some time around the turn of the century, I was an avid reader of Texas Monthly, a periodical covering a wide range of topics which I considered to have some of the finest writing one could come by in that era.  And in one issue appeared the odd story of a serial killer, pre-dating Jack the Ripper, who had lurked in my own backyard - killing women and girls in Austin the mid-1880's, when Austin was the capital, but still just sprouting up as a municipality.

I was stunned.  

Like a lot of young folks with too much time on their hands, I was aware of details around particularly famous serial killers, having read up on Jack the Ripper as far back as middle school.  And I recall being aware of Henry Lee Lucas, Ted Bundy, and a handful of other killers by the time I graduated high school, back when all of it was sort of an abstraction.  So to find out that Austin had it's own Victorian-era killer, and that we had our famed Moontowers because of the killer?  That was mind-boggling.  

Since that article, the general knowledge that Austin had a 19th-century serial killer has become more pronounced.  And, these days, if you want to go on one of those Ghost Tours of Austin, I believe there's some that cater to hitting up the spots where folks were killed.  

But I'd never read Skip Hollandsworth's follow up to the article, his 2017 book The Midnight Assassin: The Hunt for America's First Serial Killer.  I'd planned to read it in October as my Hallow-read, but... I get excited and jump the gun sometimes.  And here we are.   And, yes, I took the book in as an audiobook read by Clint Jordan.

Trailer: Maggie Gyllenhaal's "The Bride"

Longtime readers will know that The Bride of Frankenstein is, full stop, one of my favorite movies.  And Frankenstein is such a favorite book, I think I'm starting a re-read soon.  

I'm not really much of a purist, as these things go.  The book is 200+ years old, and folks can do as they please.  What *does* bother me is when folks either have never seen Bride of Frankenstein or gravely, somehow, against all odds, misunderstood the movie.  In either case it's believing that the movie is not 100% about the folly of believing you can make someone love you.  (in this case, make someone to love you)  And so we get all the cutesy merch with Franky and The Bride as a cute couple, and...  well, I have to remind myself it's all in good fun.

So, I could care less if someone does *an entirely new story* that doesn't just bobble the 1935 movie.  Take those basics of the Frankenstein movies and/ or book and go bananas.  And, this looks bananas.  Good on director Gyllenhaal.  I'm in.  I could care less that we already had Poor Things and Creature Commandos recently.  Keep it coming.

Your guess what this will be is as good or better than mine.  

Super Re-Watch: Superman (2025)

just some punk-rock kid from Bakerline

Watched:  09/21/2025

Format:  HBOmax

Viewing:  Fourth

Director:  James Gunn

So, before I forget...  surely James Gunn was referencing The Simpsons' Radioactive Man in the first minutes of Superman (2025) when Number 4 says he'll have Superman "up and at them", right?  

Hallmark Christmas Movie Schedule 2025 Drops

Ms. Chabert, set to grace Christmas screens this Holiday season, seen here having pulled this man's finger

Well, Hallmark has released their schedule for the Christmas movies coming in 2025.  Despite the fact it's September and in the 90's where I live, over in Hallmark HQ, it might as well be time to rock around the Christmas tree.

Hallmark isn't completely ignoring the rest of the year.  They're currently showing movies with a fall theme on the channels (although it's not officially autumn until September 22nd).  And they're even getting spooky this year as Ms. Chabert and Hallmark stalwart Wes Brown will appear in the Halloween themed third chapter in the "Haul Out the Holly" saga.  

Meanwhile, Hallmark ornaments are coming in waves for 2025, with an official Lacey Chabert ornament coming in October.  (I am well aware of the Superman ornament, thanks).  

Here's the Hallmark checklist of new content:

Happy Birthday, Cassandra Peterson

Today is the birthday of Cassandra Peterson, better known as Elvira, Mistress of the Dark.

Peterson doesn't actually get dressed up as Elvira anymore for conventions, etc...  but she's managed to just be herself, and it turns out, people really like Cassandra Peterson.  

We highly recommend her memoir, Yours Cruelly, Elvira.  

Robert Redford Merges WIth The Infinite

Robert Redford, actor, producer, director, activist and all-around okay guy, has passed.

I'll say it:  I've never seen Redford deliver anything but a great performance, and I'm not sure I've ever genuinely disliked anything he's been in.  Of course, I've only seen a fraction of his filmography, but I'll stand by the idea.

In an industry full of people trying to dumb things down, Redford exploded during the 1960's and 70's where he took on challenging roles in complicated films, whether we're talking something like a clockwork political thriller like Three Days of the Condor or the exploration of the myth of the west in Jeremiah Johnson.  But his list of classic roles is as long as your arm.  Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.  The Sting.  The Great Gatsby.  The Natural.  Etc... et al.  Heck, he played one of the best villains in a Marvel film.  Who knew?

He'd go on to direct critically acclaimed films, including Quiz Show (which is still stunningly good).  

Far from just a handsome actor to slot into parts, Redford carved out his own world within Hollywood, using his box office draw to get attention for numerous causes.  He helped found Sundance as a film festival and market for independent film (when that meant something) and he supported efforts to save Barton Springs here in Austin, Texas - where he swam as a kid.

Flat out, this site thinks Redford is cool AF, and salutes the man.  He'll be missed.

Nunsploitation Watch: To The Devil A Daughter (1976)

Watched:  09/15/2025

Format:  Criterion

Viewing:  First

Director:  Peter Sykes

It's hard not to see To The Devil a Daughter (1976) as existing due to Rosemary's Baby's wild success, a dash of 1970's-style Satanic Panic, and a dollop of Hammer's latter-era horror output like The Devil Rides Out (this is a Hammer co-production).  It's based on a novel by Dennis Wheatley from the 1950's, so good on the printed word leading the way here.

For reasons that kinda make sense if what I understand about Hammer's financial state in the 70's, a German company was involved in financing and production.  

The movie stars an American, Richard Widmark, who made his name in noir - especially with Kiss of Death, with which he's still widely associated - and then went on to participate in a wide-range of movies and roles.  Widmark plays a writer who has written a sensationalistic best-seller about Satanism, who is represented by former Bond-girl Honor Blackman, his pal in London,* and her boyfriend, David.

Nunsploitation Watch: Behind Convent Walls (1978)

Watched:  09/13/2025

Format:  Criterion

Viewing;  First

Director:  Walerian Borowczyk

Uhm.

So.

Yeah.

And.

Right.

So.

Behind Convent Walls (1978) is a lot more what I had in mind when the word "Nunsploitation" entered my vocabulary a few weeks ago.  For good or ill.

Signal Watch Reads: Project Hail Mary

Author:  Andy Weir

Audiobook read by:  Ray Porter

I read The Martian by Andy Weir a bit before the movie was released, and thoroughly enjoyed the Ridley Scott/ Matt Damon film that followed.  I skipped Artemis, and somehow just sort of missed that Project Hail Mary had been released until the movie trailer dropped and saw that the film was based on a book by Andy Weir.  

Jamie, who loved the The Martian, picked up Project Hail Mary, and plowed through it in a couple of days, recommending the novel.  Also, I am now listening to audiobooks in one ear while I walk Emmylou in the mornings before work, and this seemed like a good one to listen to after The Godfather.

There's a certain sameness to Project Hail Mary that you'll feel if you read The Martian, and while that's certainly the author's voice coming in strong, it almost feels like the same character from The Martian at times.  And I suspect that was a return to form after Artemis, which had a female lead and was a bit more space-adventurey from what I heard, didn't get the same good notices as Weir's freshman effort.  

But, like a band whose first record you liked, it's not all bad to get that third album and hear that the band was just finding their way on the sophomore effort, and now they're back in their groove.  

An astronaut awakens on a craft headed to a nearby star - his memory is wiped and the other two crew members are dead.  As he stumbles about, pieces of memory come back to him.

Earth had a problem - the sun was fading.  If a solution isn't found, the planet will drop into an ice age that will kill a whole lot of life on Earth.  

SPOILERS

I really liked Project Hail Mary.  I don't know that it will be taken for great literature, but it certainly makes for an interesting page turner of a read.  Slowly revealing what happened on Earth, how middle-school science teacher Ryland Grace winds up as one of three astronauts sent to save the Sun/ our Solar System is a great engine to propel the story, pushing forward the sturdy chassis of the story of the actual work done to save the planet and teamwork needed to get there.

Horror Watch: Alucarda (1977)

Watched:  09/08/2025

Format:  Criterion

Viewing:  First

Director:  Juan Lopez Moctezuma

Now that's how you make a horror movie.

Start with a base of Carmilla, the pre-Dracula vampire story about sapphic vampires (or 1970's The Vampire Lovers), sprinkle in some Dracula, add in some The Exorcist, probably three or four movies I'm not thinking of or aware of, and then a dollop of Carrie for the finale.  

A Mexican-produced film, Alucarda (1977) is just batshit from the first scene and then cranks it up to 11.  I'm not sure it's in any way scary - any more than a Hammer film ever feels frightening - but it's a crazy spectacle - and never fails to be *interesting*.