Mums:
Tales From the Hood director Rusty Cundieff (who directed a segment last season) directs this Joe Hill adaptation. Here, a young boy experiences growing pains growing up in a mysterious small town with a deadly secret. It seems none of the adults will tell him what is really going on in his small town, leaving him to discover the awful truth of his backyard garden on his own.
I felt Gregory Nicotero & David J. Schow did a decent job capturing the creepy, nostalgic domestic feel Joe Hill is known for. Don't forget two of his stories have already been adapted (one of which was for last year's Halloween special that I didn't cover for this site and the other was for the first season finale that I did). Though the twist ending did owe a little too much to the ending of the original Little Shop of Horrors (which Shudder recently brought back into the limelight when Joe Bob Briggs aired it on his show recently), I felt the kitsch-y tone, make-up, and acting all worked together to produce an enjoyable little critique of home garden culture. Not a bad season opener.
Queen Bee:
Greg Nicotero directs this devious satire of Gen Y media culture from an original story by Erik Sandoval & Michael Rousselet (you might remember their work last season on "Dead and Breakfast"). A young woman wins concert tickets to see her favorite singer/media influencer and she is able to bring along two of her best friends to meet her backstage....where the horrible truth of this media starlet (no, she is not based on Beyonce, that I can tell, anyway) is revealed. It goes without saying their lives will never be the same.
A story like this was bound to get told on Creepshow. I enjoyed the gonzo make-up effects and creature design, but the media satire, nudges to the rumors of MK ultra, and twist ending were too on-the-nose and predictable for me. It wasn't really scary or suspenseful and ultimately felt like a stereotypical older man yelling at the youth of today, telling them things were better when they were their age (which granted, they probably were since they didn't have to deal with COVID-19 when going to concerts). Since the real life horrors of pandemic were completely ignored, I felt like this was just a missed opportunity.
