Ah, the 1950s, when every scientist looked like they were auditioning for a cigarette commercial. It soothes the T-zone. #monsterdon

Awww, woodpaneled car!

#monsterdon

#TheMonolithMonsters starts with a spinning black and white globe as a voiceover explains how meteors work and that sometimes they make craters, over pictures of rocky landscapes. We then get a Disproportionately Grandiose Orchestral Music and then, goodness gracious, a Great Ball of Fire slams into the earth!

We then get a credit sequence where all the words are written in a goofy Halloween font, so i say that this movie is off to a good start so far.

#Monsterdon

#monsterdon CRATERS

OF ALL SHAPES AND SIZES

AND METEORS

These narrated intros are terrific and this score is punching way above its weight already. BRING ON THE MONSTER ROCKS

dropping my #monsterdon thread for #TheMonolithMonsters, in which I assume imposing architecture menaces the 1950s. Or maybe like walking statue monsters, i dunno.

Anyway, Monsterdon is the thing where we watch old timey monster movies and provide rareified intellectual commentary. Mute the hash tag if you don't want to see 9999+ posts about monster movies spawn in the next hour.

GOGOGOGOGOGOGOGOGOGOGOGOGO

#Monsterdon

I just realised this is the first #monsterdon in ages that had ZERO guns. Nobody ever shot anything. I don’t think anyone even had a gun.

I like how Dave and Miss Barrett became an item in there somewhere, but it mostly just jumped straight to lots of squeezing and smooches in the last scene.

#monsterdon

I also note that this is our second #monsterdon movie with Dick Cutting in the cast

@Bluedepth #Monsterdon How will they get their rocks off now?

The puns tonight were a beryl of laughs. #monsterdon

I am 100% here for the #monsterdon rock jokes

#TheMOnolithMonsters

- I enjoy the silly amounts of science gibberish.
- The miniature monolith's and composite shots were fun!
- Mini carnage was had ❤‍🔥
- no evil plot, just space rocks making more space rocks where it's inconvenient for some people to have space rocks
- explosions! :kaboom:
- and the moral of the story is...

#monsterdon #TheMOnolithMonsters

@diazona the real monster was the friendships we made along the way #Monsterdon

oh my god the Tiberium command and conquer games are literally sequels to this movie

https://cnc.fandom.com/wiki/Tiberium

#monsterdon

The best parts of this week’s #monsterdon were the miniatures effects and the abundant rock puns in the hashtag. Goodnight y’all, and thanks to @Taweret for organizing this!

#Monsterdon well that was good fun. the monster was an inanimate sciency thing, like when we had 'the magnetic monster' threatening to fuck up the magnetosphere, but i think this was a better film than that :D

@bookandswordblog "It stars John Wayne as the Mongol conqueror Genghis Khan"

Kids would not believe the shit that went on back then with casting.....

#monsterdon

Also, nobody in town mourned the loss of Ben or of Ginny's parents, because it's best just to move on #monsterdon

Contemporary with this film is the real geology tragedy of "The Conqueror," filmed in the desert downwind of an atomic bomb test. Cancer rates were high in the cast even for 1950s hard-smoking, hard-drinking Hollywood stars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conqueror_(1956_film) #Monsterdon

Oh wait, I need to list probably #Papergirls roles in the longed for crossover with #TheMonolithMonsters

Tiff - does science and determines that salt will kill the evil rocks
KJ and Mac - start by hitting cops with sticks, then end up hitting the rocks with sticks
Erin - actually delivers papers out of an ingrained sense of moral duty.

#Monsterdon

@Taweret very George Dubya Mission Accomplished vibes at the end of #Monsterdon tonight for sure

@Crazypedia I'm starting to think it wasn't as realistic as I had originally assumed!

#monsterdon

#Monsterdon I never thought I'd see people rejoice at the sight of crystals getting destroyed, let alone a whole movie about it.

#Monsterdon so salt water stops them

but human blood is basically an ocean salt water simalucrum

@Taweret They did seem a little quick to declare total victory. #Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

was there any message at all in that or was it just like "holy crap there were some rocks that were turning people into rocks but salt stops them the end"

i got like the tiniest whiffs of criticisms of environmental exploitation with the salt mines but they didn't do anything with it at all and everyone including the governor was fine with blowing up the dam #monsterdon

@raindrops_and_roses

There's several story beats that touch on property vs lives, profiteering, underfunding government programs, economics, etc.

#monsterdon #monolithmonsters

Another #Monsterdon is in the can!

Thanks to @Taweret for hosting!

Tonight's feature, #TheMonolithMonsters, from 1957, was all about stony invaders that really .... rocked a small town. We also had:

Lol, the little scamp

The End

#monsterdon

Hope?? Your plan is... HOPE????

#Monsterdon

I don't understand how those spikey things are floating up through the ground? What is happening?

#Monsterdon

Why do I think this would be too much science for a modern audience @Taweret@octodon.social ?

Just me?

#Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

#monsterdon (still can't believe they hit that dynamite detonator without one of the characters staring straight into the camera and proclaiming "fankly, I don't give a dam")

a monster movie isn't really a monster movie unless it's secretly about real estate #monsterdon

#monsterdon THAR SHE BLOWS

Okay, let's fill the next half hour with just crystal pillar toppling scenes.

#monsterdon

the rock falling sound effects are very satisfying

#monsterdon

This used to be a country where people would get together to blow stuff up at a moment's notice. We need to bring that back.

#monsterdon

This is the true origin of the Salton Sea.

#Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

Ty <Dynamite> brand dynamite today!

#monsterdon

Can we just keep this guy and jettison the rest of the yoyos in this town? #Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters https://mastodon.social/@SesameSquirrel/113461959499505419

PUBLIC INTEREST!? THAT"S COMMUNISM!

#monsterdon

The Bureau of Land Management and/or Department of Reclamation will kill you for blowing up that dam. Probably.

#monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

Blow it up! Blow it up! Blow it up!

#monsterdon

Do the actors not know that 'saline' is pronounced 'say-leen'?

#monsterdon

BORED NOW

#monsterdon

Ummm... I'm pretty sure glucose doesn't resemble tar but hey, who needs accuracy. Chemicals! Ingredients! Formula! Science.

#Monsterdon

Kind of like a Dairy Queen "bomb"

#monsterdon

What if you don't like unsolicited mail?

#monsterdon

"...we're caught between the rocks and a hard place!"

#Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

"I'd like to share the ingredients we used to save Jenny, but I've already sold it to a silicon valley corporation, and we're only willing to license it for a limited time."

#monsterdon

Who needs a siren when you have a screamer like that?

#Monsterdon

That's the most idiotic idea I have ever heard

#monsterdon

Damn! They saved Ginny.

At the end, Dave, Cathy and Ginny will be together. Dave and Cathy will get married and adopt Ginny.

#monsterdon

@moira lol, it does sound like a music genre that's out there right now #monsterdon #Spooncore

Every doctor is dressed like an old school dentist #monsterdon

50s sci-fi continues to not realize how optimistic it is. Spreading rumors and calling the cops is actually going to help. So does the experimental medical treatment.

#monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

Car 42, where are you? #monsterdon

@paco Thankfully, a lot of 50s sci-fi is optimistic

#monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

Just imagine walking out of the theater after this...constantly looking over your shoulder, jumping at the shadows, knowing a rock could be lurking just about...anywhere... #Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

Oh my, a human being who works the telephone exchange, told to call everybody.....bless

#monsterdon

Extreme cyclogenesis

#monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

The weather is coming in from Canada - well there's your problem.

#monsterdon

#Monsterdon So doing our science, we learn that the evil rock can only reproduce when it gets wet, like gremlins. Unfortunately, it just started raining, which means that the giant meteor is getting wet, which means it will grow and we have problems.

Going to investigate, we find that the rock has turned into a giant Crystal Spire! Oh no! #theMonolithMonsters

Wow. I almost wish the world had ended when it rained on the space rock. All things considered.

#monsterdon

Lets all lean in and investigate the lethal growing rocks everyone!

#monsterdon

When your biggest problem is that your pet rocks are outgrowing their terrarium. #monsterdon

you know, we have a joke en la isla that greasy gringos are afraid of water and soap. this movie is totally proving our point of gringos not thinking of water.

#Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

After determining that contact with the rock kills people, they continue to touch it with their bare hands.

#monsterdon

Now I won't be satisfied until they fight a Gollum

#monsterdon

like specs of black meteors white sand, so too are the incognegro days of our lives

#Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

#monsterdon "...Yeah, she said it was about twelve miles up the canyon"

I do wish these movies came with subtitles or voiceovers from Americanese, they can be so hard to follow without

@nhgeek I think the writers snorted some dirt

#monsterdon

Let me guess... this script was written by a geologist

#monsterdon

"I didn't know there was silica in a person"

I mean, same mostly

#monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

This movie hasn't got a hope in hell of passing the Bechdel test.

#monsterdon

it's BLACK ALIEN rock spreading WHITE gravely dirt… uh-oh… it's icognegro sand

#Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

oh that's how you say 'siliceous rock'

#TIL

#monsterdon

Is that a rock in your pocket or are you...oh, it IS a rock, ok... #Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

welp… she called him special

#Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

#monsterdon "She's different from the others, Dave. She's special."

She's half rock at last count, I'll grant that is definitely an oddity

@berniethewordsmith *sad tears of laughter #monsterdon

Oh my gods an iron lung. My mom was friends with a person in the 80s who lived in an iron lung, due to post-polio issues.

Vaccines are punk as funk, get vaxxed if you can kiddos!

#Monsterdon

"The child dying will break the Woman's heart but I will be stoic"

ugg

#monsterdon

Wait .. this 40 yo man is the "young specialist"?

#monsterdon

They could just put her in a rock tumbler and make her all shiny. #Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

CUT OFF THE ARM TO SAVE THE CHILD!

#monsterdon

"Hmm, this rock kills people" as he handles it with his bare hand.

#monsterdon

Radiohead's 'Iron Lung' comes on ...

#monsterdon

Ginny? Jenny? Unsure, but she's been basilisk'd

#monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

Calm your tits, people. Cleavage is a geology term:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleavage_(geology)

#Monsterdon

You'd think he would ask questions, being a reporter and all

#monsterdon

#Monsterdon This used to be Ginny, but we hollowed her out and now she’s a little white Mocajete! Room for so much guacamole! Good job Ginny!

oops, dangit. it's TELESCOPE that's in the bingo card. dangit.

#Monsterdon #TheMonolithMonsters

Stick to the newspaper business, dumbass. The nerds have this. #monsterdon

@jonny I don't understand how Cleavage could ever be a villain nor would I want to live in that universe

#monsterdon

#Monsterdon looks like obsidian orphanages day out. Little Rock children arrayed all over. Just as they were told, to explode!

Here's a rock for the road. Cuz if there's anything we've learned here, it is always take a rock with you.

#monsterdon

Next time Jenny sees a rock: “Them!” #monsterdon