Andy and Philip end this year’s couple’s counseling by trying to help a couple whose primary hurdle is the potential downfall of civilization at the hands of green-eyed capitalists and green-faced fascists. Billy and Kate are just doing their best trying to make it in the big city with their dead-end jobs, toxic bosses, and slimy creatures hell-bent on creating chaos (also, gremlins). So, let’s see if we can help them get through these rough, monster-infested times with Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990).

This week in couple’s counseling, Andy and Philip travel across the pond to help a couple (or throuple?) who may have too many skeletons (and ghosts) in the closet to be fixed. We’re talking incest, codependency, daddy issues and how some of us should really just listen to our mothers more when we fail to beware Crimson Peak (2015).

Last session, our counseling got a little rage-y with The Brood, so this time Philip and Andy are lightening it up by accompanying two comedy legend lovebirds on a trip to an old dark house for a spooky wedding weekend of murder, werewolves, and musical numbers with Gene Wilder and Gilda Radner in the frighteningly under-appreciated horror comedy Haunted Honeymoon (1986).

It’s time once again for Philip and Andy to reopen their Horror Couples Counseling practice, and this year we’re starting by acknowledging that relationships are informed by both nature and nurture and you don’t need to gestate rage babies to find out that some are just not built to last (and that some therapists can be the opposite of helpful…not us, of course). So, let’s talk through some generational trauma, weaponized therapy-speak, and good old fashioned body horror to get to the heart of the problems between Frank and Nola in David Cronenberg’s divorce song, The Brood (1979).

2024 was a packed year filled with infections, infestations, mutations, mutilations, slashers, sharks, aliens, werewolves, vampires, drag queens (battling vampires), prequels and sequels that were actually good, and not one but two mysteriously pregnant nun movies. It truly was a great year…for horror. So, Andy and Philip have their work cut out for them sorting through this treasure trove and finding the best of the best (and, of course, killing the few bad apples), but no matter what, we are definitely not spitting this time.

As you look over your X-mas haul today, take a moment with us to focus on those horror movies who might not be getting the love they deserve. In the spirit of the holiday, Andy and Philip want to unwrap some very strange and interesting presents: the low-budget Christmas slashers Christmassacre - AKA Secret Santa (2015) and Nutcracker Massacre (2022).

Art is back for the holidays and he’s brought us a whole new portfolio of work to critique. So, put on your Santa suit and grab an axe, chainsaw, or maybe a tube and some rats to help us examine the messy tableau that is Terrifier 3.

Sometimes families of choice are just as challenging as families of origin…especially if said family involves a bossy vampire, a flatulent frankenstein, a gay werewolf, a problematically sexual hunchback, and a mummy with an abusive parasite. So, Andy and Philip are closing their 2024 family therapy sessions with a unique chosen family of monsters in the regional, low budget horror comedy Franky and His Pals (1991).