‘Terror Tuesday: Extreme’ Netflix Series Review - This Anthology is Mostly Unsatisfying

Due to the constraints related to length, short films carry the burden of delivering as much information as possible within a short runtime. Some fail to connect with us on a personal level but manage to convey the director's artistry. Some have a promising story, which gets diluted due to a lack of creativity. Still, some short films display ambition matched by the filmmaker's vigor and delight in telling his/her story. Terror Tuesday: Extreme (aka, Angkhan Khlumpong: Extreme), a collection of haunting stories inspired by the "Angkhan Khlumpong (Terror Tuesday)" radio program, doesn't contain a single episode that can be slotted into this third category. There are segments that initially look promising. In fact, certain shots and sequences made me feel so giddy that I was disappointed by the path the directors took eventually. If only the filmmakers had freed themselves from the obligation to fulfill the demands of a horror story, this collection of ghost stories could have been hauntingly mesmerizing.

The first episode, Our Little Sister, is the weakest link in this anthology. We follow a girl, Aye (Cherprang Areekul), who is suffering from PTSD. She lost her sister, Elle (Praewa Suthamphong), in a car accident, and since then, her mother (Dhanyabhorn Sondhikandha) has been acting strangely. Mommy dear misses her daughter so badly that she orders a doll and calls it Elle. The delivery boy offers them some instructions. He tells Aye and Mother to follow these three rules: (a) Feed the doll three times a day, (b) put her in the box before midnight, and (c) keep her within the boundary marked by a sacred string. Naturally, we wait for someone to break these rules so the demon can unleash his terror on the family. Sondhikandha is the most enjoyable thing about Our Little Sister. Her performance as a mad mummy is delicious. The movie, though, ends up becoming ridiculous. It tries to pull the rug from beneath your feet but trips over itself. It should have remained creepy instead of desperately going for cleverness.

Wedding Dress is about, um, a wedding dress. If those three rules in Our Little Sister remind you of Gremlins, this story about a deadly dress brings back memories of In Fabric. There is an impressive moment early in the film where an apparition is seen behind Milk (Panisara Rikulsurakan) while she is talking to her mom about her demand for a dowry. And I was taken aback by the casual manner in which Milk calls a customer "fat pig." One way to behold Wedding Dress is to consider it a statement against unrealistic beauty standards. All those thin, glamorous models can fill you with doubts regarding your own physical appearance. This can lead to dangerous incidents. Both Wedding Dress and Our Little Sister share the same problem: They start on a very strong note but fail to sustain their spooky atmosphere. You leave Wedding Dress thinking, "Ghosts are horny too. They also look for sex."

In Ode to My Family, Win (Poon Mitpakdee) and his family relocate to a new house after a scandal. There, they find a sealed room with a mysterious sticker. Soon, Win starts noticing unnatural occurrences in the house. For instance, he accidentally drops a noodle on the floor, and when he bends to pick it up, he realizes that the noodle has "disappeared." Linda (Narupornkamol Chaisang), Win's sister, initially believes he is playing pranks on her. She accuses him of locking her bedroom door. Ode to My Family is injected with an intense feeling of discord. You can almost touch the tension between the family members. Unfortunately, once the blood begins to spill, this sensation defuses. The ending could have landed better with a longer runtime. Here, it appears smart but feels feeble.

I think The Vow is the only film in this anthology that has a happy ending (sort of). Nat (Sutthirak Subvijitra) and his girlfriend Dao (Parada Titawasira) pray to the Black Hills Goddess to strengthen their relationship. Their bond grows strong all right, but not before they are forced to reveal certain things. Nat has been offered a job in Sweden, and Dao might be too attached to him. The Vow says that secrets can be destructive. Honesty is the best policy for a successful relationship. All that's fine, but the movie has an unsteady momentum. Everything about it feels loose and unengaging. The goddess is creepy, though, and I liked how the rain injured the characters' skin (I wish the sight had been more visually dramatic).

Spectral Class is the only short film that I really enjoyed. The colors are dark and bright, and the tone is amusingly unhinged. The whole movie, like the characters, is high on a hallucinogenic drug. Its sensual tone mixes smoothly with the horror comedy. The story deals with a government school teacher, Oil (Chayanit Chansangavej), who gets entangled in the familial nightmare of one of her "missing" students named Nik. Oil doesn't really like her job. She uses her phone while a colleague gives her some instructions, which, due to her inattentiveness, becomes background noise. I loved Spectral Class's humor. I laughed when Oil pushed a ghost by saying that he should buzz off and become a civil servant and when a mother assured her son that she would find him a new dick. It's all bizarre in a good way. The subtext, too, is very appealing: Religion can be a harmful drug. Be careful how you use it.

Drugs are found again in Girl Next Door, and no, they don't carry any religious currents with them in this story. It's about a man named Bird (Nat Kitcharit) who grapples with drug addiction while experiencing a series of mysterious events. From spotting a deceased woman to observing a captivating figure entering the apartment next to his, the film blurs the lines between hallucination and reality. Bird's struggles prompt viewers to ponder whether the narrative is rooted in the supernatural or merely a manifestation of drug-induced paranoia. Did he actually spy on a woman having sex with a man on the bed, or was he dreaming? Did Bird write those rules on a paper, which, among many things, ask him to not go outside after midnight? Is this a ghost story or a drug story? Should Bird be scared of spirits or of shooting too much white powder up his nostrils? Despite its interesting premise, the film falls short in terms of visual energy. The images are literal, not dreamy. The editing somewhat saves the film. The other elements, unfortunately, lack a suspenseful...spirit.

Like Spectral Class, Dear Granny inserts jokes in the middle of macabre proceedings. A girl screams at a demon that she has skipped eight (and later eighteen) while counting. But this line doesn't elicit chuckles; it makes the movie jarring. That girl is Nulek (Supicha Sangkhachinda), and that demon is her grandmother or, more accurately, looks like her grandmother. She is counting because she is playing hide-and-seek with Nulek. This game has different rules because the two characters are not children. The first time Nulek gets caught, she loses her left ear. Her right ear will be sliced the second time. Nulek's organs will be targeted by Granny until she dies. What a sadist. There is also a psycho neighbor who creeps out Nulek. Let's not forget Montha (Namthip 'Bee' Jongrachatawiboon), Nulek's mother. The spooky granny is absolutely frightening. You want to hide under your bedsheets when you see her running towards Nulek with a knife. But Spectral Class takes such a sharp turn before the end credits that you end up whispering, "What the fuck just happened?" Everything was working fine. Why spoil the mood with an unnecessary twist?

In Viral Curse, the supernatural entity is placed out of your and the characters' sight. Except for some dreamlike images, nothing here looks ghostly. The horror, for a while, seems to come from real life, like late rent and expensive school fees. Ple (Yarinda Bunnag) runs a laundry business and has a Master's degree. Since she has a daughter to care for, she doesn't apply for a full-time job in a company. Can't she look for a work-from-home opportunity? Many companies offer it. But that would put a dent in Viral Curse's calculated script, which wants Ple to remain in the laundry business to execute its preordained ending. Ple listens to a story on the Terror Tuesday program, and it quickly becomes evident to us that it sounds similar to the character's ongoing life. Who is behind this mischief? Viral Curse must have felt exciting on paper. It has all the ingredients required for a tense horror drama narrative. On the screen, however, the elements don't click together satisfyingly. You admire the intentions but come out feeling unperturbed and impassive. Viral Curse is not as chilling as it should have been.

Final Score- [4.5/10]
Reviewed by - Vikas Yadav
Follow @vikasonorous on Twitter
Publisher at Midgard Times