Cody tunes in for the second episode of Shudder's Creepshow series.
George A. Romero passed away before the Shudder streaming service embarked on making a series that continues the franchise Romero and Stephen King started with the films Creepshow and Creepshow 2 back in the '80s, but the show's creative supervisor Greg Nicotero made sure that the first episode of the show felt like a natural continuation of the films. Each episode is split into two segments, and the first segment of the first episode was based on a Stephen King story. Nicotero, who worked in the FX department on Creepshow 2 and had visited the set of the first film, directed that segment himself, then had John Harrison, who composed the score for the original Creepshow, direct the second segment, which was written by Josh Malerman.
The first segment of the second episode is the first story in this series that doesn't have a tie to King or the preceding films. Titled Bad Wolf Down, this one is an original that was written and directed by Rob Schrab, who is primarily known for his work on comedy shows like Community and The Sarah Silverman Program. The story Schrab crafted is absolutely Creepshow material, though. It's about a clash between Nazis and werewolves during World War II.
Bad Wolf Down begins with a battle between American soldiers and Nazis in a forest in France that's known for having a wolf problem. The Americans - including a character who was named Quist in reference to the werewolf classic The Howling - seek shelter in a building that turns out to be the local jail, inhabited only by mangled corpses and a woman who has locked herself in a cell because she is a werewolf and doesn't want to cause any more harm. Now the Americans are stuck in this place with a werewolf, while Nazi forces, led by a vengeful character played by genre icon Jeffrey Combs (Re-Animator and From Beyond, among other things), gather outside.
This is a serviceable segment, quick and simple. It doesn't even take up half of the episode's 44 minute running time. It builds up to a nice bloodbath, but the best thing about it is the fact that it works Combs into the world of Creepshow. It was awesome to see him on this show. My other favorite thing about Bad Wolf Down is how the werewolf transformations were handled.
The Creepshow series is made on a rather small budget, so they probably couldn't have pulled off impressive transformations like we've seen in The Howling and An American Werewolf in London. The solution to that problem was found in the show's style, which carries on the style Romero established with the original film: each episode is presented as if it's a comic book and we're seeing what's on the pages as they flip open. So for the werewolf transformations, the scene switches from live action to the art in the panels of the comic book, and like a flipbook the panels go by quickly so we can watch the progression from human to wolf through drawings. That's a classic Creepshow moment.
Since the first segment wasn't written or directed by someone who was connected to the films, Nicotero made sure the second segment of the episodes did have that legacy element. By directing the segment himself. The second story in this episode is The Finger, written by David J. Schow, whose previous genre credits include Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III, Critters 3 and 4, and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning.
DJ Qualls stars in The Finger as Clark Wilson, a down-on-his-luck fellow who likes to pick up random junk when he takes walks around his neighborhood. During one of his strolls, he happens to find a severed finger that had belonged to some kind of creature, but Clark can't find a match for it when he does an image search online. It wasn't an opossum or a raccoon... As it turns out, it's something we've never seen before, because the finger gradually grows a whole new body to be attached to, and this weird little monster instantly bonds with Clark. Clark names it Bob.
Bob is hideous, and yet cute, and was convincingly brought to the screen with some cool special effects. Bob likes popcorn and soap operas, sleeps in the freezer, and is so dedicated to Clark that he'll go out and kill anyone who irritates him, whether that person be Clark's ex-wife, a debt collector who calls on the phone, or any random person who shows disrespect. Bob has become one of the most popular things about this show, and it's easy to understand why when watching The Finger. Bob is pretty awesome. Qualls is pretty awesome in this segment himself, he gives a great performance as Clark Wilson. Together, Qualls and Bob made The Finger a really entertaining segment to watch.
Just like the first episode, I would say the second episode of Creepshow started off with a decent segment, then had an even better second segment. And overall, it was definitely worthy of having the Creepshow name.
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