Tag: Cowabunga

We recently started carrying a whole mess of VHS tapes of newly released movies from Lunchmeat VHS. One of these is an 80s scifi throwback called Galaxy Warriors. I took the time to watch it today, and I wanted to share some thoughts.

Galaxy Warriors looks, at first glance, like it’s going to be a Roger Corman-y sleaze fest. It’s a movie about a group of lady bounty hunters who end up on a prison planet where they’re forced to fight the other female prisoners to the death. It sounds like it should be an uncomfortably sleazy affair. Instead, it’s no more risque than an episode of Xena: Warrior Princess (and about as well produced.)

The film is full of costumes of varying quality, and sets of varying quality, and special effects that would have elevated a bunch of the kinds of movies this is seeking to emulate. (Seriously, the practical effects for the spaceships and the stop motion monsters would have improved most direct to video scifi.)

As I said, I watched the movie on VHS. I specifically watched it on the 28″ Sylvania CRT TV we recently installed in the Cowabunga Video display at Hemlock Bazaar. A VHS on a large CRT TV is 100% the way I would recommend watching this film.

It’s a 16:10 presentation (SD TVs were 4:3 or 16:12. Modern TVs are 16:9. a film in 16:10 gets minor letter-boxing at the top on bottom on SD TVs and minor pillar-boxing on the left and right (or minor cropping on the top and bottom) on modern widescreen TVs. It’s a compromise in both cases, but it looks pretty good in both cases.

If VHS tapes aren’t your thing, the movie is also occasionally available on various streaming services.

The movie was a delight, I really loved it, and I think you will too. And to really drive home that old school charm, Lunchmeat has even released an official novelization of the film!

If you haven’t been paying attention to modern technology trends, you may have missed the news, but VHS is the future of home entertainment. This revolutionary format brings analog video in to your home, but in a convenient cassette based format. What’s more, VHS is a read/write format. That means that anyone can make their own tapes. Truly a modern miracle.

And since we’re living in the future, you can order your VHS Tapes with a computer! I know, it’s hard to believe, but it’s true! Check out some of the VHS Tapes we have for sale:

Specifically, we’ve just added a HUGE selection of titles from Lunchmeat, a new VHS manufacturer. They partner with indie filmmakers to release genre films that just feel right on VHS. You can browse the whole collection, but I wanted to highlight a couple of specific titles and share some trailers.

Lunchmeat VHS

Trailers:

In all seriousness, physical media is neat. VHS tapes don’t look especially good compared to bluray or streaming or even a DVD, and a lot of people don’t even have a VCR anymore, but this lo-fi way to connect audiences with films has a kind of charm that extends well beyond it’s fuzzy scanlines.

Some films feel very different when they’re watched like this. If you still have a VCR kicking around, give it a shot. (And if you don’t, come check our shop. We usually have one or two on the floor in Ellijay, they’re just too heavy to justify shipping.)

Imagine for a moment Kung Fu legend Ip Man fighting corrupt politicians, Japanese soldiers, and the Axe Gang as a masked vigilante during an invasion by the Japanese army in pre-revolution China. Sounds about perfect, right?

Enter Ip Man: Kung Fu Master. It was released in late 2019, and was released directly to streaming platform Youku.

Lots of reviewers compared the film negatively to the more popular trilogy of films about legendary martial artist Ip Man, but I think that’s entirely the wrong way to think about this movie. Think about this as a direct to video release from a small studio that is exploiting the popularity of a real person in order to tell a story that has very little to do with that real person.

Taken in that light, this film is a world better than you might expect.

Compared to other “Ip-sploitation” films, this one sits near the top of the pile. I think Ip Man: The Final Fight might best it, but it’s significantly better than most of the other films looking to cash in on Ip’s name.

(And I’m going to be honest, when he showed up wearing a leather mask reminiscent of Kato’s from The Green Hornet, I got Hype.)

So, if in this era of video streaming, you’ve found yourself missing the kind of direct to video martial arts films that littered video store shelves in the 1980s, you’d be hard pressed to find a more worthy successor than this direct-to-Chinese-streaming release about a highly fictionalized Vigilante Ip Man.

Of course, you may be more interested in our other Kung Fu titles, including a number of films that were originally part of those drive-in and direct to video releases. Check out the kung fu films and novels we currently have in stock:

(View All Kung Fu Titles)

Are you a fan of kung fu movies with leaping swordsmen and mystical forces? You might like Wuxia. (Pronounced Woo-Sha or Woo-She-ah.)

What?

Wuxia is, in many ways, the Chinese equivalent of English Sword and Sorcery novels. Translated literally, Wuxia means martial arts and chivalry. In practice, it means historical fantasy, usually with martial arts and mystical forces. Think Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon.

Until recently, very few vintage Wuxia novels were translated into English, and even fewer modern ones. In recent years, with the rise of self publishing and a renewed American interest in these stories, they’ve become more widely available.

Modern Wuxia novels are frequently found along side Manga, and tend to draw on things like Dragon Ball and other Manga influences. Some authors have started mixing in romance elements as well. These can be a lot of fun! Classic Wuxia novels, on the other hand, tend to be a little more somber and serious. Things like The Legend of the Condor Heroes or The Three Kingdoms have more in common with Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon than Dragon Ball.

Either way, Wuxia is a fun genre that has been under represented in the US for too long.

Check out the Wuxia novels we have in stock:

Welcome to another Hemlock Bazaar product spotlight. This is a semi-regular series of posts where we highlight interesting or noteworthy items from our collection and showcase things worth talking about. Today we’re talking about Cartoons! Specifically, Thundarr the Barbarian and The Herculoids.

The Herculoids was produced by Hanna-Barbera in the late 60s, with a brief revival in the 1980s. It is about a family living on an alien planet, and their monster pets/friends. It is, in a word, beautiful; in two words, buck wild. There’s a dragon, there’s a rock monster, there’s a dinosaur that fires projectiles, and there’s a family of goo creatures.

The Herculoids was the first cartoon to really explore the Sword and Planet style of science fantasy, and it’s real wacky.

Thundarr the Barbarian was produced in 1980 by Ruby Spears. Until recently, I thought Thundarr was another Hanna-Barbera production. This isn’t especially surprising, as I later learned that Ruby and Spears were former Hanna-Barbera employees, and that both had written for, you guessed it, The Herculoids.

Thundarr is set in a post apocalyptic wasteland, in the far future year of 3994, following a catastrophic event in the less far future year of 1994. It’s another Sword and Planet style science fantasy series, with lightsabers and wookies and magic. It has a lot of DNA in common with The Herculoids, but it’s darker, less goofy, and even weirder.

If you’re a child of the 1990s, it’s likely you encountered each of these shows in infrequent re-runs on Cartoon Network or Boomerang. It’s equally likely that you were baffled by them. But you didn’t hallucinate, they were not a dream, The Herculoids and Thundarr the Barbarian were real, and they’re available now on Blu-Ray.

Of course, if that’s not your thing, we have lots of other cartoons: