Blind former Senator and presidential nominee Thomas D. Schall, Chairman of the Committee for the Preservation of the Republic.
COMMITTEE FOR PRESERVATION OF THE REPUBLIC DEMANDS IMPEACHMENT OVER ARRESTS, Howard K. Smith, The New Orleans Times-Picayune, November 17th, 1950
PHILADELPHIA–Former Senator Thomas D. Schall and U.S. Representative Henry S. Breckinridge, Chairmen of the Committee for the Preservation of the Republic, an organization striving to unite opposition to the administration for the 1952 election, issued a formal statement yesterday afternoon endorsing the proposed impeachment of President La Follette on the grounds of the “violation of citizens constitutional rights,” echoing Ben Gitlow’s prior accusation that the President has sought to build “a dictatorship of executive orders.” Centering their call on the arrests of prominent leaders of the opposition, the Committee cited:

• The April, 1949 arrest by federal agents of Congress of Industrial Organizations President John L. Lewis, who challenged the President in a narrow 1948 primary contest, and the subsequent arrest of Tony Boyle, Lewis’s erstwhile successor and formerly Fulgencio Batista’s nominee for the vice presidency of the nation. Apprehended on related charges of racketeering, both have been sentenced to 20 years in prison. Mr. Walter Reuther, having succeeded Lewis in leadership of the CIO, has sought to fundraise $500,000 to cover the organization’s legal fees.
• The arrest of Benjamin Gitlow, late Progressive nominee for the presidency, in September of that year prior to a speaking tour intended to vituperate President La Follette. Sentenced on charges of forgery for his time under an assumed name while presumed dead after the New American Revolution, Gitlow has a remaining eight years in prison with the possibility of parole.
• The arrests of Cuba Governor Fulgencio Batista, who found himself a distant second to La Follette in the presidential election, Santo Domingo Governor Rafael Trujillo, and his brother Hector on charges of racketeering and bribery. All have been sentenced to over 20 years in prison, with the arrest of Trujillo in particular notable for having sparked the alienation of William R. Hearst from the President.
• The arrest of Virginia Senator Harry F. Byrd, brother of presidential candidate Admiral Richard E. Byrd, in 1950 on charges of bribery and racketeering. Byrd has been sentenced to 20 years in prison.
• The federal investigation into New York Governor Robert Moses over the appointment of Tom Shanahan, convicted of bribery, to the New York Board of Planning, fueling the resignation of Governor Moses despite no evidence of wrongdoing on his part.
• The arrest, on charges of embezzlement, of Senator William Lemke after his promise to campaign for the presidency against La Follette and his subsequent death, after thirty-three years in the United States Senate, on the floor of a jail cell.

FRENCH AMBASSADOR ADMITS ORDER TO ASSASSINATE BUTLER FROM LINDBERGH, Walter Winchell, The New York Daily Mirror, July 16th, 1951
WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA–Gaston Henry-Haye, French Ambassador to the United States from 1935, testified yesterday to the United States Select Committee to Investigate International Crime chaired by Senator Estes Kefauver (FL-TN) after several prior refusals to appear. The Ambassador testified under oath that he was instructed in 1937 to organize the killing of General Smedley Butler by Secretary of the Treasury Hugh S. Johnson as a means of preventing General Butler from mounting a primary challenge to President Lindbergh in 1940. The Ambassador stated that he is unaware of whether President Lindbergh himself had sanctioned the assassination, but to the sensation of the impeachers, further testified that it was President La Follette who had urged him, and others from within the Administration, to defy the subpoena.
The Ambassador’s testimony has buttressed that of Envoy Porfirio Rubirosa, his primary contact in the United States government, detailing an elaborate plot organized through General Raoul Salan involving the blackmail of Butler associate Yvonne Sadoul, whose husband Jacques, imprisoned for communist associations since the beginning of the Petain Regime, was threatened with execution unless Mrs. Sadoul would provide French agents with travel details of General Butler’s tour of Madrid. The Ambassador recounted a phone call from General Salan explaining how Jean Filiol, a member of the Petainist secret police working undercover as an agent of L’Oreal cosmetics, utilized his disguise to lure Butler in for assassination on the pretext of improved makeup for his television appearances.
President La Follette has responded by the investigation as a “witch hunt,” denouncing “McCarthyism” and citing the attacks upon economic advisor Leon Keyserling as evidence of the untrustworthiness of Speaker McCarthy. Addressing the possibility of impeachment, President La Follette stated at a press conference last Thursday that “when they go low, we will continue to aim high” as he affirmed his decision to appoint former President Lindbergh to lead the newly founded National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
Senator Estes Kefauver interrogates Gaston Henry-Haye on the assassination of Smedley Butler.
United States House of Representatives Chamber, July 22nd, 1951
“Stand up, impeachers!”
The testimony of Ambassador Henry-Haye had left President La Follette in the crosshairs of Speaker McCarthy and, smelling blood in the water, McCarthy immediately struck for the kill. In typical fashion, the vitriolic Speaker would pillory moderates in a public statement claiming that "you cannot offer friendship to tyrants and murderers without advancing the cause of tyranny and murder” and label Father Charles Coughlin a “subversive” for a radio broadcast on the priest’s weekly program opposed to impeachment. Fearing the possibility of a parry from the executive branch, McCarthy would task Richard Nixon with leading the drafting of articles of impeachment immediately over the last weekend of June.
A conciliatory populist on his party’s left ever uncomfortable with Joseph McCarthy’s persona, Eduardo Chibas would ally with the Committee for the Preservation of the Republic to gather support for the impeachment, viewing La Follette as a tyrant. Speaking to the House in a broadcast covered live in Spanish in his native Caribbean, as Nixon and counsel Roy Cohn poured over treatises on constitutional law, Chibas would cite the arrest of Gitlow to declare that “the American people have been disgraced because power has won out over shame.” Three articles would be drafted within days for presentation to the House of Representatives, millions of Americans listening over the radio as the “voice of impeachment,” the voice of Nixon, presented them to Congress and the nation.
Article I: Using the powers of the office of President of the United States, Philip F. La Follette, in violation of his constitutional oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in disregard of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has repeatedly engaged in conduct violating the constitutional rights of citizens, impairing the due and proper administration of justice and the conduct of lawful inquiries, or contravening the laws governing agencies of the executive branch and the purposes of these agencies.
Article II: Without lawful cause or excuse, President La Follette directed Executive Branch agencies, offices, and officials not to comply with those subpoenas. President La Follette thus interposed the powers of the Presidency against the lawful subpoenas of the House of Representatives, and assumed to himself functions and judgments necessary to the exercise of the “sole Power of Impeachment” vested by the Constitution in the House of Representatives.
Article III: That said President La Follette, unmindful of the high duties of his office, and of his oath of office, in the year of our Lord, 1951, at Washington in the District of Columbia, unlawfully conspired with Charles A. Lindbergh, Secretary of the Air Force, to obstruct a lawful investigation by the United States Select Committee to Investigate International Crime.
Finally, echoing from the radios of the presidentially loyal Blackshirts mulling around the capitol building to millions of kitchen tables, Nixon’s voice thundered with the impeachment’s most famous line:
“Stand up, impeachers!”
A few enthusiastic young representatives like Mississippi’s Rubel Phillips, New Jersey’s Millicent Fenwick, and Massachusetts’s Henry Cabot Lodge would be the first to their feet, jumping to attention within seconds as their hands clutched railings or rose in salutes to the American flag. Within seconds, dozens more would begin to stand, socialist Norman Thomas alongside libertarian Suzanne La Follette as disabled Nebraskan Bob Dole used his good arm to carry paraplegic Michigander Harry Kelly and heed Nixon’s call. Surveying the chamber, one thing was clear: impeachment had a majority. The impeachers standing in victory, the tension of the vote would dissipate for the moment against the certainty of the result, with the most popular of the articles, the first, peaking at 291 votes for and a mere 178 against.
In an attempt to conciliate the disparate factions of the opposition, the tapestry of impeachment managers would run the gamut. Leading them, naturally, would be the “voice of impeachment,” Richard Nixon, with Progressive-Federalists also contributing aging former Judge John J. Parker of North Carolina, fiery Mississipian Rubel Phillips, irascible former prosecutor Harold Stassen of Minnesota, and Linwood Holton of Virginia, while veteran old lawyers Henry S. Breckinridge and Jouette Shouse would comprise the Liberty League contingent and McCarthyite conservative Thomas H. Werdel of California and socialist New Yorker Jacob Panken would represent the divisions within the Farmer-Labor opposition itself.
For the first time in American history, the President had been impeached.
In an advertisement purchased by the Committee for the Preservation of the Republic, Richard Nixon argues the case for impeachment in the court of public opinion.
MCCARTHY RESIGNS AS SPEAKER AFTER NEW WAVE OF OPPOSITION ARRESTS, Joseph Alsop, The Saturday Evening Post, August 14th, 1951
GRAND CHUTE, WISCONSIN–Speaker of the House Joseph McCarthy has formally resigned his office after being apprehended by state police this week at his Wisconsin home, where the nation’s most impressive demagogue was charged with sodomy in connection to his frequent attendance at the White Horse Inn, a known place of rendezvous for Milwaukee homosexuals. While initially vowing to hold onto his office and resist what he has dubbed “libel,” the loss of support from California’s young Richard Nixon signaled failure in an upcoming motion to vacate and is credited with triggering his resignation. McCarthy has accused the police investigation of having been under the influence of the La Follette family, all powerful in Wisconsin, while others cite as precedent the harassment of David I. Walsh for his homosexuality by President Luce that famously destroyed the Massachusetts’ Senator’s political career. However, like Walsh, many speculate that McCarthy may seek the presidency following his expected six month prison sentence.
In addition to McCarthy, the past two weeks has seen the arrest of several other notables who favored the President’s impeachment including, on charges of accepting kickbacks, J. Parnell Thomas (F-NJ), the irascible Chairman of the House Committee on Un-American Activities who famously called for an end to theater funding on the grounds that such constituted presidential propaganda; on charges of payroll fraud, Ernest K. Bramblett (P-CA); and Walter E. Brehm (P-OH) on charges of fraud. The arrests, however, seem to have galvanized the opposition, and this columnist’s opinion is that an outcome of removal is nearly certain.
Turncoat counsel Roy Cohn.
The Trial of the Century?
With Joseph McCarthy behind bars, President La Follette’s allies would fundraise for their leader’s defense, shocking the public by recruiting for the defense team the former counsel to the impeachers themselves: Roy Cohn. Brought in with a paycheck rumored to be over a million dollars, Cohn’s vicious persistence would be tampered by his insistence that La Follette supporters not engage in threats, arguing that doing so would alienate moderates. Cohn would be joined by another young lawyer, the son of a major Liberty League donor who had recently turned for La Follette and a friend of Vice President Musmanno’s: Robert F. Kennedy. In another attempt to appeal across the aisle, elite lawyer Clark Clifford would lead the defense, utilizing decades worth of Washington connections. Meanwhile, the President would use intermediaries such as General Trades Union President George Meany to appeal to liberal Senators such as Hubert Humphrey, arguing that, regarding the first article, the executive orders represented the nation’s best path to universal healthcare.
As Nixon and his cadre perorated eloquently on the values of democracy, Cohn, Clifford, and Kennedy would attempt to constrain the case to the bare intricacies of legal detail, avoiding grand speeches and matters of philosophy to argue narrowly for a decision to acquit. They would find sympathy in Chief Justice Hugo Black, as the former Commandant of the Blackshirts presided over the trial with a consistent willingness to defer to the requests of the defense on matters such as the rules of evidence. Their narrow arguments would target those fundamentally uncomfortable with the nation of a presidential removal as they sought to boil the decision to one of legal nuances rather than the nature of the republic.
With the President attempting to behave above the fray and portray himself as the statesman of the national revival to win the peace, his brother Bob Jr. would reluctantly join Clarence Dill in taking the lead in attempting to secure his acquittal. As journalist Herb Klein would report, the siblings’ relationship had been plagued by a growing chasm between the siblings, with Bob feeling his brother had gone too far. Yet, Bob, through private conversations as he insisted that the listener forget he was Majority Leader of the United States Senate, that a return to normalcy would be impossible if the drastic step of presidential removal was taken. Bob would seek to obtain promises from his brother that the presidency would step back if acquitted, removing Lindbergh from power and pausing the implementation of executive orders.
Central to the Wisconsin Senator’s mission of convincing would be Vice President Michael A. Musmanno. Slated for the presidency if La Follette were to be removed, Musmanno would portray himself as twice as radical. Speaking to a crowd of supporters in New York City, the Vice President would argue that Phil had “awoken in America a renaissance, a spirit to dare and accomplish that it has not known in decades,” Musmanno would claim that he heard the voice of god while praying at Mount St. Peter Church in his native Pennsylvania, instructing him to lead “the heroic work of the Blackshirts in their purification of American soil.” Musmanno would argue that “patriotic young men” required no warrants to raid the disloyal opposition, leading Bob Jr. to privately declare the Vice President “a dangerous man” who must not be let into the presidency, even momentarily, by a verdict of removal.
As Richard Nixon’s closing arguments to implored the men of the body once labeled “the most exclusive club in the world” to “follow the bloody tracks of treason,” Bob Jr. and Dill would arrange for printed copies of Musmanno’s remarks to be spread, continuing to build the argument that a continuing La Follette presidency was the safer option for democracy even as Jacob Panken dismissively reminded the legislators-turned-jurors that the Senate could remove a vice president as well. The President would appeal to Alabama’s Jim Folsom, reminding him of the federal government’s long disassociation with Alabama affairs and promising the reconciliation of Folsom on patronage affairs.
Meanwhile, letters from Progressive National Committee Chairman Osro Cobb would promise Henry Bone and Sid McMath bipartisan support in a re-election bid to counter the opposition of the President. Thus, as the day of the decision approached, the final decision would come down to wily Massachusetts’ independent J. Michael Curley, New Mexico Liberty Leaguer Henry F. Ashurst, Alabama reformer Jim Folsom, Georgia liberal Ellis Arnall, Arkansas’s Sid McMath, Nevada Landonite Walter Baring, and the Midwestern progressive Farmer-Laborite of Hubert Humphrey. Former Postmaster General Thomas Duncan would appeal on behalf of La Follette, reminding men such as Curley and Folsom of the looming ability of the administration to pursue the ever present corruption allegations surrounding both.
The radical antics of Vice President Michael A. Musmanno would turn several Senators against impeachment.
With 66 votes, the unthinkable would be put to action, and the President of the United States removed. 29 votes had been promised against removal, 63 for, as the nation’s eyes turned to the 7 in waiting. As each awaited the call of the Senate clerk to announce their votes, their thoughts on deciding the future undoubtedly raced to the past.
29 votes for acquittal. 63 votes for removal.
Walter Baring had been implored time and time again by Alf Landon to vote for impeachment, arguing that La Follette had the destruction of the Farmer-Labor right in mind. Baring had seen his ally Lister Hill driven from power as Speaker of the House for crossing the President, and he saw his chance to strike vengeance.
29 votes for acquittal. 63 votes for removal.
Henry F. Ashurst had been a friend of the La Follettes since the 1890s. He had visited Fighting Bob and spoken on his behalf as a Liberal when Aaron Burr Houston sought to destroy his support. He had watched Phil grow up, held the toddler in his arms that now sat in the White House. Michael Musmanno, to Senator Ashurst, was an ever unknown quantity. Bob had warned him of the danger of unknown quantities, and Phil, for all that Ashurst abhorred, was known. He would defeat the President at the ballot box, but he would not defy him now.
30 votes for acquittal. 63 votes for removal.
His commanding officer in the Third Pacific War, General David Shoup, visited Sid McMath the night before the vote. Shoup had pointed with abhorrence to the to the two million Japanese civilians left dead after the atomic bombings. Shoup’s words, utterances that had once been orders in their days in the Marines, echoed in McMath’s head; “All I can say is, any man that murders two million Japanese, when it might not even be their war, is not a good man. That is not the American way.”
30 votes for acquittal. 64 votes for removal.
Ellis Arnall had gotten a very different visit, a delegation of prominent state businessmen, the very men that had funded his campaign, promising desertion of not merely himself, but the state of Georgia, with a vote for acquittal. He thought of Vice President Musmanno’s words and reassured himself that democracy could be saved.
31 votes for acquittal. 64 votes for removal.
“His name is Musmanno, but we call him Curly after you.” The family’s words as they held his young namesake stuck with J. Michael Curley. The working Irish and Italians of Boston and Worcester had two heroes: Michael A. Musmanno and him. He had defied the brahmins of Boston and Harvard, worn powdered wigs to their events to mock them gaily as he rose to absolute power in the city on the back of Revolutionary era redbaiting. Curley had been in the circles of power for a half century, but even in the twilight of his life, he hated men like Phil, born with a silver spoon. His place was among the ward bosses and the machines of politics, and he distrusted the tacit offerings of favors from Thomas Duncan, the implication that the prosecutors already hot on his tail for kickbacks, fraud, and graft might reconsider with a vote for acquittal. Already in 1946 when La Follette first was elected had he served his last prison term, a matter of months then, but he knew the road was coming to an end for him. Michael Curley had never denied being corrupt, but he would take the President down with him.
31 votes for acquittal. 65 votes for removal.
Jim Folsom had never lived in a democracy. Born under the reign of Milford W. Howard, he had seen his state grow beyond his wildest dreams, never realizing that he would one day govern it. He had, after all, been rejected by the voters as the reform governor, yet his machine persisted, even as the President sought to crush it. Big Jim had never seen himself in the Governor’s chair until it happened, but Senator Jim looked across the Capitol to that glimmering White House and knew that, within the Farmer-Labor Party, he would never have a way in if he turned against their standard bearer.
32 votes for acquittal. 65 votes for removal.
Hubert Humphrey was a pharmacist, not a lawyer. He had swept into office in 1942 on the back of the Luce Administration’s antagonism towards the very Thomas Schall who now led the Committee for the Preservation of the Republic, fully holding that “the moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in shadows of life, the sick, the needy, and the handicapped.” Humphrey had followed John L. Lewis in 1948, he had stood against Phil and nearly lost his career for it in 1950. Yet, the piercing arguments of Kennedy and Cohn remained alongside the nature of the impeachment. The reforms he had spent his life fighting for were finding their baptism in fire through the President’s executive orders. Bob, who had guided him when he entered the Senate and, in that friendly manner that made Bob the consummate politician his brother never was, continually checked in on him, had begged him to vote for stability, had used the forbidden word “civil war,” had pointed to the Blackshirts mulling beyond the armed security, and told him that Musmanno would be the Augustus to his brother’s Caesar.
33 votes for acquittal, 65 votes for removal.
Shouts from the gallery, journalists rushing out to announce the story as telephone and telegraph lines competed to relay the news first.
The presidency of Philip F. La Follette would live to fight another day.
The last photo of Eduardo Chibas.
The Final Radio Broadcast of Eduardo Chibas, October 27, 1951
“My words last Sunday did not have the resonance the very serious situation demanded. America needs to wake up. But my wakeup call perhaps was not strong enough.
America has a great destiny reserved in history. The happy coincidence of natural factors so favorable for a great destiny, together with the high quality of our people, awaits only the honest and capable endeavor of a team of government ready to perform its historical task. Such a team is not the present administration, corrupted to the core and disguised with new ways to cover up its shamelessness. Neither the false opposition of Batista who encourages the return of the militias with the cunning assistance of international communism; nor the scornful group of followers of Admiral Byrd. The only group of government capable of saving America is the Committee for the Preservation of the Republic with their anti-pact platform of political independence that accepts no transactions or settlements.
Come on compañeros! For economic independence, political freedom and social justice! Let's get rid of the thieves in the government!
People of America, stand up and march! People of America, wake up!
This is the final wakeup call!”
Other voices cut into the broadcast as chaos traveled over the airwaves.
"Tiene una pistola!”
“Párenlo! Estas loco?”
Millions of Americans widened their eyes as a crash ensued over the radio.
Eduardo Chibas had breathed his last.
Has American democracy?

https://preview.redd.it/5jhcjegtjuzc1.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=71a26f361e87730152e07e12f1bc76322db0b023
Here's a new edition of "Directors at the Box Office", which seeks to explore the directors' trajectory at the box office and analyze their hits and bombs. I already talked about a few, and as I promised, it's Wes Craven's turn.
Craven earned a master's degree in philosophy and writing from Johns Hopkins University. He subsequently bought a 16mm film camera and began making short movies. His friend Steve Chapin informed him of a messenger position at a New York City film production co, where his brother, future folk-rock star Harry Chapin worked. He started in the industry as a sound editor, before transitioning as a porn director. He said he made "many hardcore X-rated films" under pseudonyms. And then he transitioned into directing for the big screen.
From a box office perspective, how reliable was he to deliver a box office hit?
That's the point of this post. To analyze his career.

It should be noted that as he started his career in the 1970s, some of the domestic grosses here will be adjusted by inflation. The table with his highest grossing films, however, will be left in its unadjusted form, as the worldwide grosses are more difficult to adjust.

The Last House on the Left (1972)

"Mari, seventeen, is dying. Even for her, the worst is yet to come."
His directorial debut. The film stars Sandra Peabody, Lucy Grantham, David Hess, Fred J. Lincoln, Jeramie Rain, and Marc Sheffler. The plot follows Mari Collingwood, a teenager who is abducted, raped, and tortured by a family of violent fugitives led by Krug Stillo on her seventeenth birthday. When her parents discover what happened to her, they seek vengeance against the family, who have taken shelter at their home.
Craven, who had no money at the time, was put on the job of synchronizing dailies for Sean S. Cunningham's Together. They became friends, and Hallmark Releasing gave them $90,000 to make another film. Craven considered a hardcore film, but decided to tone it down a bit. The idea for this film came from Ingmar Bergman's The Virgin Spring, and Craven wanted to make a film in which the violence would be shown in detail onscreen, as he felt that many popular films of the era, such as Westerns, glamorized violence and the "vigilante hero", and gave the public a misleading representation of death in the wake of the Vietnam War.
The film attracted negative media attention for its heavy graphic content, and there were calls for some theaters to drop the film. But you know, bad buzz is still buzz and that translated to a pretty good run in theaters, earning up to $3 million in its initial run. Even to this day, the film is polarizing due to its violence and themes. But Craven just made his name well known.

• Budget: $90,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $3,100,000. ($23.1 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $3,100,000.
  

The Hills Have Eyes (1977)

"A nice American family. They didn't want to kill. But they didn't want to die."
His second film. The film stars Susan Lanier, Michael Berryman and Dee Wallace. The film follows the Carters, a suburban family targeted by a family of cannibal savages after becoming stranded in the Nevada desert.
Craven wanted to make a non-horror, but he found that his investors only wanted films with graphic content. At the New York Public Library, Craven checked the library's forensics department, and learned of the legend of Sawney Bean - the alleged head of a 48-person Scottish clan responsible for the murder and cannibalization of more than one thousand people. He drew influences from this, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Grapes of Wrath. Craven also had to cut a lot of scenes to avoid getting an X rating.
The film once again drew negative attention for its violence. But it made over $25 million at the box office, which was an even bigger success than House. It subsequently earned a cult following.

• Budget: $700,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $25,000,000. ($128.8 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $25,000,000.
  

Deadly Blessing (1981)

"Pray you're not blessed."
His third film. It stars Ernest Borgnine, Maren Jensen, Susan Buckner, and Sharon Stone, and tells the story of a strange figure committing murder in a contemporary community that is not far from another community that believes in ancient evil and curses.
It received negative reviews, but it was another box office success for Craven.

• Budget: $3,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $8,279,042. ($28.4 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $8,279,042.
  

Swamp Thing (1982)

"Science transformed him into a monster. Love changed him even more!"
His fourth film. Based on the DC Comics character created by Len Wein and Bernie Wrightson, it stars Louis Jourdan and Adrienne Barbeau. It tells the story of scientist Alec Holland who is transformed into the monster known as Swamp Thing through laboratory sabotage orchestrated by the evil Anton Arcane. Later, he helps a woman named Alice Cable and battles the man responsible for it all, the ruthless Arcane.
The film made $2.5 million domestically, despite mixed reviews.

• Budget: N/A.
  
• Domestic gross: $2,500,000. ($8 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $2,500,000.
  

A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

"If Nancy doesn't wake up screaming, she won't wake up at all."
His fifth film. It stars Heather Langenkamp, John Saxon, Ronee Blakley, Johnny Depp, and Robert Englund. The film's plot concerns a group of teenagers who are targeted by Freddy Krueger, an undead child killer who can murder people through their dreams, as retribution against their parents who burned him alive.
The film was inspired by several newspaper articles printed in the Los Angeles Times in the 1970s about Hmong refugees, who, after fleeing to the United States because of war and genocide in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam, suffered disturbing nightmares and refused to sleep. Some of the men died in their sleep soon after. This, along with the song "Dream Weaver" by Gary Wright, motivated Craven to craft a horror film focused on people dying through their sleep.
The film's villain, Freddy Krueger, is drawn from Craven's early life. One night, a young Craven saw an elderly man walking on the sidepath outside the window of his home. The man stopped to glance at a startled Craven and walked off. This served as the inspiration for Krueger. Initially, Fred Krueger was intended to be a child molester, but Craven eventually characterized him as a child murderer to avoid being accused of exploiting a spate of highly publicized child molestation cases that occurred in California around the time of the film's production. He settled on the name Freddy Krueger, which was based on a childhood bully of his.
The process of writing the film went smoothly, the real problem was finding a studio. Craven sent it to most studios, and all rejected it. The first studio to show interest was Disney, but Craven declined their offer as they wanted a more toned-down kid-friendly PG-13 flick. When Paramount and Universal also turned it down, Craven decided to go to the independent studio New Line Cinema. The studio only distributed films, but they agreed in financing the film. As they lacked the financial resources for the production, New Line had to turn to external financiers.
Despite opening in just 165 theaters, the film earned $1.2 million in its opening weekend, making it clear that it would be an immediate box office success. It eventually closed with $25 million domestically, and $57 million worldwide. It received critical acclaim, and has been referred as one of the best and most influential slashers ever made. Freddy Krueger would soon be hailed as one of the most emblematic figures of horror, and Craven quickly earned a reputation as a horror legend. But most importantly, it was the beginning of New Line Cinema as a studio, which is why it's referred as "the house that Freddy built."
The film would later spawn a franchise, although Craven wouldn't direct any of the "sequels." Why the quotation marks? We'll get to that later on.

• Budget: $1,100,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $25,624,448. ($77 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $57,185,134.
  

The Hills Have Eyes Part II (1985)

"So you think you're lucky to be alive."
His sixth film. The sequel to The Hills Have Eyes, it stars Tamara Stafford, Kevin Spirtas, John Bloom, Michael Berryman, Penny Johnson, Janus Blythe, John Laughlin, Willard E. Pugh, Peter Frechette and Robert Houston. It follows a group of bikers who become stranded in the desert and find themselves fighting off a family of inbred cannibals who live off the land.
The film was shot on a very low budget, and it simply ended prematurely because they ran out of funds. There are no box office numbers available, but it received awful reviews.

Deadly Friend (1986)

"There's no one alive who'll play with the girl next door."
His seventh film. Based on the novel Friend by Diana Henstell, it stars Matthew Laborteaux, Kristy Swanson, Michael Sharrett, Anne Twomey, Richard Marcus, and Anne Ramsey. Its plot follows a teenage computer prodigy who implants a robot's processor into the brain of his teenage neighbor after she is pronounced brain dead; the experiment proves successful, but she swiftly begins a killing spree in their neighborhood.
Craven wanted to make a PG-rated science fiction film, with a similar tone to Starman, hoping to prove that he could make something that wasn't horror-themed. An unfinished version of the film was screened to a test audience of Craven's fanbase, and it was poorly received for its lack of violence and gore like his previous films. So WB decided to rewrite the film, adding more scenes with tons of gore. This made the final film appear tonally jumbled, and it went from easy PG to struggling to not get an X rating.
The film was poorly received for its story and inconsistent tone. It also marked a huge flop at the box office, not even hitting $10 million. Craven lost interest in the film after WB inserted their own version, and he has since disowned the film.

• Budget: $11,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $8,988,731. ($25.6 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $8,988,731.
  

The Serpent and the Rainbow (1988)

"Don't bury me, I'm not dead!"
His eighth film. It stars Bill Pullman, and is loosely based on the life of ethnobotanist Wade Davis, recounting his experiences in Haiti investigating the story of Clairvius Narcisse, who was allegedly poisoned, buried alive, and revived with a herbal brew which produced what was called a zombie.
The film received mixed reactions, but it was a much needed box office success for Craven.

• Budget: $7,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $19,595,031. ($51.7 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $19,595,031.
  

Shocker (1989)

"No more Mr. Nice Guy."
His ninth film. It stars Michael Murphy, Peter Berg, Cami Cooper, and Mitch Pileggi, and follows a serial killer who uses electricity to come back from the dead and carry out his vengeance on the football player who turned him in to the police.
Another mixed bag for Craven, but it was still profitable.

• Budget: N/A.
  
• Domestic gross: $16,554,699. ($41.6 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $16,554,699.
  

The People Under the Stairs (1991)

"In every neighborhood, there's one house that adults whisper about and children cross the street to avoid."
His tenth film. It stars Brandon Adams, Everett McGill, Wendy Robie, and A. J. Langer. The plot follows a young boy and two adult robbers who become trapped in a house belonging to a neighborhood's crooked landlords after breaking in to steal their collection of gold coins as the boy learns a dark secret about them and what also lurks in their house.
After a slate of mixed performers, the film received Craven's best reviews since Elm Street. To the surprise of Universal, it was also a box office success.

• Budget: $6,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $24,204,154. ($55.5 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $31,347,154.
  

Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994)

"This time, the terror doesn't stop at the screen."
His 11th film. The installment in the A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise, it stars Robert Englund, Heather Langenkamp, Miko Hughes and John Saxon. The film is not part of the same continuity as previous films, and it portrays Freddy Krueger as a fictional movie villain who invades the real world and haunts the cast and crew involved in the making of the films about him.
While Craven co-wrote the franchise's third installment, Dream Warriors, he wasn't that involved with the rest of the franchise. He wanted to make a deliberately more cerebral film than recent entries to the franchise, as he considered them as being cartoonish, and not faithful to his original themes. Specifically, he wanted Freddy to resemble his original vision: far darker and less comical. To reinforce this, the character's make-up and outfit were enhanced, with one of the most prominent differences being that he now wears a long blue/black trenchcoat. In addition, the signature glove was redesigned for a more organic look, with the fingers resembling bones and having muscle textures in between.
The film received high praise, and was considered as the best film in the franchise since the original (it was Englund's favorite). But the franchise has been bleeding interest at the box office, and New Nightmare unfortunately had to suffer. It was profitable, but it became the lowest grossing film in the franchise.

• Budget: $8,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $18,090,181. ($38.1 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $19,721,741.
  

Vampire in Brooklyn (1995)

"A comic tale of horror and seduction."
His 12th film. It stars Eddie Murphy, Angela Bassett, Allen Payne, Kadeem Hardison, John Witherspoon, Zakes Mokae, and Joanna Cassidy. It follows a Caribbean vampire who seduces a Brooklyn police officer who has no idea that she is half-vampire.
The film had awful reviews, and despite the presence of a huge star like Eddie Murphy, it disappointed at the box office. Craven really needed a hit.

• Budget: $8,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $19,751,736. ($40.4 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $34,951,736.
  

Scream (1996)

"Someone has taken their love of scary movies one step too far."
His 13th film. It stars David Arquette, Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, Matthew Lillard, Rose McGowan, Skeet Ulrich and Drew Barrymore. Set in the fictional town of Woodsboro, California, Scream's plot follows high school student Sidney Prescott and her friends, who, on the anniversary of her mother's murder, become the targets of a costumed serial killer known as Ghostface.
As he was trying to make it in the industry, Kevin Williamson watched a Turning Point documentary about serial killer Danny Rolling which he said left him unsettled. Williamson later noticed an open window, armed himself with a knife, and called his friend for support. The pair began discussing horror characters that had resonated with them such as Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees. This experience prompted Williamson to start developing a concept wherein a girl is haunted by a caller.
He started writing a film titled Scary Movie, and even left an outline for possible sequels. The concept was part of an era where there was debate over the influence of cinematic violence on audience, with Williamson coming up with a brilliant line "movies don't create psychos, movies make psychos more creative." It was inspired by many 1980s slashers, even though the genre was on decline by that point. His characters were intentionally designed to be knowledgeable about these horror films and their typical elements, with the intention of creating a unique killer who was not only aware of horror film clichés but also exploited them for his own advantage.
While Williamson struggled with his previous films, this script was part of a bidding war with the studios, to the point that Oliver Stone himself wanted to direct it. Miramax (through Dimension Films) bought the script, and Williamson made some rewrites to scale back the violence. Bob Weinstein also wanted to change the name, as he believed the audiences would think the film is a comedy.
The studio considered Danny Boyle, Tom McLoughlin, Sam Raimi, Robert Rodriguez, George A. Romero, Quentin Tarantino, and Anthony Waller as prime candidates to direct the film, but they all preferred to view the film as a comedy. Wes Craven was considered, but the studio believed he couldn't direct a satire. Craven also wasn't planning on directing it, as he wanted to focus on more mainstream films to salvage his career. Craven's assistant Julie Plec (who would collaborate with Williamson on The Vampire Diaries) convinced him in helming the project. By signing, Craven decided to get back some of the gore that was missing in the previous drafts.
A huge contrast to the horror films of the era was that the film had established actors as the leads, as Craven and Williamson wanted to prove that no character was safe. Drew Barrymore had already starred in a few recognizable names, Neve Campbell was on the hit show Party of Five, Rose McGowan was known for Encino Man and The Doom Generation, David Arquette, Matthew Lillard and Skeet Ulrich were recognizable supporting characters, and Courteney Cox obviously was known for Friends. Vince Vaughn and Natasha Lyonne were the preferred choices for Billy and Tatum, but external problems caused them to drop out.
After viewing the dailies raw footage, the Weinsteins criticized the quality of Craven's work as "workmanlike at best", believing it lacked tension and had an inconsistent tone. The Weinsteins also disliked the mask design, and said Barrymore lacked sex appeal because of the pageboy hairstyle she had chosen. While filming the final fight, Campbell's stuntwoman accidentally stabbed Ulrich with an umbrella tip, missing the protective vest he was wearing and hitting the site of an open heart surgery Ulrich had as a child. During post-production, Harvey Weinstein decided to name the film as Scream based on the Michael and Janet Jackson song.
In a surprising move, the Weinsteins decided to release the film during the holiday season as counter-programming, offering teenagers an alternative to more traditional holiday fare. The decision was unpopular with the cast and crew, with Williamson expecting the film to fail. The film opened with $6.4 million and finishing in fourth place, leading analysts to consider the film as a bomb.
But the film just kept growing.
Buoyed by positive word of mouth, the Weinsteins increased marketing and the film managed to increase in its second and third weekends. It closed with $103 million domestically and $173 million worldwide, becoming the highest grossing slasher film ever and Craven's highest grossing film ever. The film received critical acclaim for its characters and writing, and has since been deemed as one of the most influential horror films of all time. It rekindled interest in horror, resurrected Craven's career and launched the careers of Williamson and the cast.

• Budget: $15,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $103,046,663. ($245.4 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $173,046,663.
  

Scream 2 (1997)

"Someone has taken their love of sequels one step too far."
His 14th film. The sequel to Scream, it stars David Arquette, Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Jamie Kennedy, Laurie Metcalf, Jerry O'Connell, Elise Neal, Timothy Olyphant, Jada Pinkett, and Liev Schreiber. The film takes place two years after the first film and again follows the character of Sidney Prescott, along with other survivors of the Woodsboro massacre, at the fictional Windsor College in Ohio where they are targeted by a copycat killer using the guise of Ghostface.
As Williamson already had plans for sequels, the idea was for Sidney to attend college while being stalked by a copycat Ghostface killer. As filming began, Williamson's script had four killers: Derek, Hallie, Cotton Weary, and Nancy Loomis. But after Williamson transferred his script to the production, it was leaked onto the Internet in full, revealing the identity of the killers and a large amount of the involved plot. This resulted in the production continuing to film with only a partial script while Williamson conducted extensive rewrites, changing much of the film's finale, the identities of the film's killers and drastically altering the roles of other characters such as Randy Meeks and Joel. With a short deadline, Williamson couldn't fully compromise on the final script, forcing Craven to fill in the gaps himself. So the film was one of the very first cases where the Internet leaked major aspects of a film.
As the Weinsteins wanted the film ready for December, it was able to capitalize on the audience's word of mouth to the original. It opened with $32 million in its first weekend, almost five times as big as the original, and the biggest December debut. It didn't hold as great as the original due to the competition, such as Titanic, but it still made $172.3 million worldwide, almost matching the original's gross. It also received very positive reviews, and so a profitable franchise was already underway.

• Budget: $24,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $101,363,301. ($237.2 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $172,363,301.
  

Music of the Heart (1999)

"She gave them a gift they could never imagine. They gave the system a fight it would never forget."
His 15th film. The film stars Meryl Streep, Aidan Quinn, Angela Bassett, Gloria Estefan, Jane Leeves, Kieran Culkin and Jay O. Sanders. The film is a dramatization of the true story of Roberta Guaspari, who co-founded the Opus 118 Harlem School of Music and fought for music education funding in New York City public schools.
After seeing the documentary Small Wonders, Craven was inspired to make a full-length film about Guaspari. Madonna was originally signed to play the role of Guaspari, but left the project before filming began, citing "creative differences" with Craven. When she left, Madonna had already studied for many months to play the violin. Streep learned to play Bach's Concerto for 2 Violins for the film. The project marked a huge departure for Craven; it was his first and only film to be rated PG, and his only one to not be horror or thriller.
It received generally positive reviews, but it bombed at the box office. It received 2 Oscar nominations for Best Actress and Best Original Song, the only Craven film to get any noms.

• Budget: $27,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $14,859,394. ($27.8 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $14,936,407.
  

Scream 3 (2000)

"The most terrifying scream is always the last."
His 16th film. The third installment in the Scream franchise, it stars David Arquette, Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox Arquette, Parker Posey, Patrick Dempsey, Scott Foley, Lance Henriksen, Matt Keeslar, Jenny McCarthy, Emily Mortimer, Deon Richmond, and Patrick Warburton. The film's story takes place one year after the previous film's events and follows Sidney Prescott, who has gone into self-imposed isolation following the events of the previous two films but is drawn to Hollywood after a new Ghostface begins killing the cast of the film within a film Stab 3.
The plans for a sequel were already underway since Williamson sold the script, although Williamson still didn't write a script yet. When the Weinsteins approached him to write the film, Williamson was already busy with many projects (including his directorial debut), and was unavailable to perform his duties. He only made a 20-page outline wherein Ghostface would return just as production on a fictional film Stab 3 would be filmed. His plan was to show the killers were part of a Stab fan club (this idea would later be adapted into his show, The Following). With Williamson not available, Ehren Kruger was tasked in writing.
Shortly before production began on the film, the Columbine High School massacre took place, and many parties began looking for reasoning behind the shooters' actions and there came an increased scrutiny on the role of the media in society, including video games and film, and the influence it could have on an audience. With production of Scream 3 not yet underway, there were considerations about whether the film should be made at that time, aware of the potential for negative attention but the studio decided to press forward, albeit with changes.
The Weinsteins demanded to scale back on the gore and emphasize its satiric humor, as well as moving the setting to Hollywood. At one point in the production, the studio went as far as demanding that the film feature no blood or on-screen violence at all, a drastic departure for the series, but Craven directly intervened. One of the aspects changed was that the killer would be revealed to be Stu Macher, having survived the original film. The Weinsteins changed it after Columbine, as they didn't want to associate violence and murder with a high school setting.
The film opened with $34.7 million, a franchise record and the biggest February debut ever. But it had weak legs, although it still made a very profitable $161.8 million worldwide. While the previous films were well-received, this film received negative reviews, who lambasted the film for becoming the very own thing it satirizes.

• Budget: $40,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $89,143,175. ($178.2 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $161,834,276.
  

Cursed (2005)

"What doesn't kill you makes you stronger."
His 17th film. It stars Christina Ricci, Joshua Jackson, Jesse Eisenberg, Judy Greer, Scott Baio, Milo Ventimiglia, Shannon Elizabeth and Mýa, and follows two orphaned siblings attacked by a werewolf loose in Los Angeles.
Kevin Williamson started working on a script that followed the exploits of a New York City serial killer who discovers that his lethal tendencies are due to his lycanthrope nature. When one of his projects was scrapped, Craven decided to direct, teaming them up again for another Scream reunion. But it wasn't planned like that. Craven was making a film, Pulse, when Bob Weinstein abruptly pulled the movie from the schedule ten days before shooting and cut through all the slow lanes, wanting Craven to get to Cursed as soon as possible. Craven was reportedly not pleased so Weinstein doubled his pay in order for him to direct the film. The director deemed the script too tonally similar to his film Vampire in Brooklyn, but felt pressured by the studio, leading him to ultimately sign on.
The film started filming in January 2003, hoping to get the film released in August. In June, they only had six days left for filming. Suddenly, Dimension Films decided to put the movie on hold because top executives at the company weren't happy with the film's ending or how the special effects were progressing, specifically the look of the film's lead lupine. Rick Baker was preparing the final transformation effects when production stopped and asked Weinstein to let his team finish the work in order for it to be ready for the reshoot, but he refused. Patrick Lussier was brought in for massive rewrites, and the film didn't return to production until November. Baker was fired, and the prosthetic make-up was replaced with CGI. Skeet Ulrich filmed his scene as one of the leads, but chose to drop out following the reshoots as he disliked the new direction. It was also heavily edited to get the R rating down to PG-13. The budget was originally $35 million, yet some reports suggest it ballooned all the way to $100 million, making it one of the most expensive horror films ever.
With that budget, it was clear it was not going to be a box office success. It flopped with just $29 million worldwide, and was panned by critics. Craven himself dislikes the final product, and a director's cut was never an option because his original ending was never filmed.

• Budget: $100,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $19,297,522. ($30.8 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $29,621,722.
  

Red Eye (2005)

"Fear takes flight."
His 18th film. It stars Rachel McAdams, Cillian Murphy, and Brian Cox. The story follows a hotel manager ensnared in an assassination plot by a terrorist while aboard a red-eye flight to Miami.
The film received Craven's best reviews in years, and was a box office success, earning almost $100 million. While he is fine with people loving it, Cillian Murphy is not really fond of the film, "I love Rachel McAdams and we had fun making it but I don’t think it's a good movie. It’s a good B movie."

• Budget: $26,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $57,891,803. ($92.5 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $96,258,201.
  

My Soul to Take (2010)

"Only one has the power to save their souls."
His 19th film. It stars Max Thieriot, Denzel Whitaker, Raul Esparza, and Shareeka Epps. It follows Adam "Bug" Hellerman, who is one of seven teenagers chosen to die following the anniversary of a serial killer's death.
This was Craven's first film in almost two decades where he would be directing, producing and writing. But that didn't pan out to a success: it was a critical and commercial dud.

• Budget: $25,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $14,744,435. ($21.1 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $21,500,813.
  

Scream 4 (2011)

"New decade. New rules."
His 20th and final film. The fourth installment in the Scream franchise, it stars David Arquette, Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, Emma Roberts, Hayden Panettiere, Anthony Anderson, Alison Brie, Adam Brody, Rory Culkin, Marielle Jaffe, Erik Knudsen, Mary McDonnell, Marley Shelton, Nico Tortorella, and Roger L. Jackson. The film takes place on the fifteenth anniversary of the original Woodsboro murders from Scream and involves Sidney Prescott returning to the town after ten years, where Ghostface once again begins killing students from Woodsboro High.
In 2010, Williamson and Craven confirmed their plans for a new film. Craven said that endless sequels, the modern spew of remakes, film studios, and directors are the butts of parodies in the film. The main characters have to figure out where the horror genre is in current days to figure out the modern events happening to and around them. This was the first film in the franchise to use CGI, with the knife's blade added in post-production.
Even though the franchise was profitable, it seemed like its glory days were long behind it by the time it hit theaters. The film disappointed in its opening weekend with just $18 million, and closed with a weak $97 million worlwide, far less than the previous films. It also received mixed reviews, particularly for its writing and new characters. It was the last film directed by Craven before his death in 2015.

• Budget: $40,000,000.
  
• Domestic gross: $38,180,928. ($53 million adjusted)
  
• Worldwide gross: $97,231,420.
  

MOVIES (FROM HIGHEST GROSSING TO LEAST GROSSING)

No.	Movie	Year	Studio	Domestic Total	Overseas Total	Worldwide Total	Budget
1	Scream	1996	Dimension Films	$103,046,663	$70,000,000	$173,046,663	$15M
2	Scream 2	1997	Dimension Films	$101,363,301	$71,000,000	$172,363,301	$24M
3	Scream 3	2000	Dimension Films	$89,143,175	$72,691,101	$161,834,276	$40M
4	Scream 4	2011	Dimension Films	$38,180,928	$59,050,492	$97,231,420	$40M
5	Red Eye	2005	DreamWorks	$57,891,803	$38,366,398	$96,258,201	$26M
6	A Nightmare on Elm Street	1984	New Line Cinema	$25,624,448	$31,560,686	$57,185,134	$1.1M
7	Vampires in Brooklyn	1995	Paramount	$19,751,736	$15,200,000	$34,951,736	$14M
8	The People Under the Stairs	1991	Universal	$24,204,154	$7,143,000	$31,347,154	$6M
9	Cursed	2005	Miramax	$19,297,522	$10,324,200	$29,621,722	$100M
10	The Hills Have Eyes	1977	Vanguard	$25,000,000	$0	$25,000,000	$700K
11	My Soul to Take	2010	Universal	$14,744,435	$6,756,378	$21,500,813	$25M
12	Wes Craven's New Nightmare	1994	New Line Cinema	$18,090,181	$1,631,560	$19,721,741	$8M
13	The Serpent and the Shadow	1988	Universal	$19,595,031	$0	$19,595,031	$7M
14	Shocker	1989	Universal	$16,554,699	$0	$16,554,699	N/A
15	Music of the Heart	1999	Miramax	$14,859,394	$77,013	$14,936,407	$27M
16	Deadly Friend	1986	Warner Bros.	$8,988,731	$0	$8,988,731	$11M
17	Deadly Blessing	1981	United Artists	$8,279,042	$0	$8,279,042	$3M
18	The Last House on the Left	1972	Hallmark Releasing	$3,100,000	$0	$3,100,000	$90K
19	Swamp Thing	1982	Embassy	$2,500,000	$0	$2,500,000	N/A

He made 20 films, but only 19 have reported box office numbers. Across those 19 films, he made $994,016,071 worldwide. That's $52,316,635 per film.

The Verdict

Quite inconsistent, but a very iconic figure in the horror genre. You know you made it big when your creations include Elm Street and Scream. Craven often struggled with difficult productions (you can blame the Weinsteins for that), but he still managed to make competent and scary films, even if some are better than others. Some even see critical re-appraisal as time passes; even Scream 3 and Scream 4 have their fans. We don't know what he would've done with the franchise after the fourth film, but he made it clear he was exhausted by having to film without finished scripts. Rest in Peace to a horror legend.
Hope you liked this edition. You can find this and more in the wiki for this section.
The next director will be Clint Eastwood. I think I'll have to make two posts, given that he directed 42 films.
I asked you to choose who else should be in the run and the comment with the most upvotes would be chosen. Well, we'll later talk about... Ang Lee. A legendary Asian director.
This is the schedule for the following four:

Week	Director	Reasoning
May 13-19	Clint Eastwood	Great actor. Great director.
May 20-26	Robert Zemeckis	Can we get old Zemeckis back?
May 27-June 2	Richard Donner	An influential figure of the 70s and 80s.
June 3-9	Ang Lee	What happened to Lee?

Who should be next after Lee? That's up to you. And there's a theme.
And that theme is: controversial directors. I'm talking directors who have attained a polarizing response to their films (like Zack Snyder), or the directors themselves are also controversial figures in real life (like Oliver Stone). Basically, a director that has as many fans as haters.

Just a quick retraction before we start this week's article. I said last week that we were now seeing sales worse than anything the Legion had seen before or would see after. That was somewhat hyperbolic and, in fact, the Legion will see worse sales in the future.
Man, every time I look into Legion sales figures I get a little more depressed. If only they could've taken the huge sales boost they got from being a back-up in Action Comics and kept a least half that readership with their own book... Or if maybe DC actually hired someone who could bring readers to a book...
Instead, let's go back to the dog days of the PZH Legion. Once more, into the detritus...
LSH #114
LSH #115
Can anyone explain why you would keep with the numbering on the cover when these books no longer tie into each other? Does anyone think about these things at all, or is this yet another attempt to improve sales by not having interconnected titles? Which, of course, would make no sense, but what do I know?
It's the two-part Bizarro Legion story. To bring everyone up to speed, Brainiac 5.1 brought the Bizarro technology to the 30th Century, started experimenting, and turned the Outpost and the Legionnaires onboard into Bizarro versions of the ship and the heroes.
Invisible Kid, Lightning Lad, Ferro, and Karate Kid return from a mission to discover the chaos and try to figure out what's going on.
Now for my Bizarro review:

• What an amazingly well-written comic. Nothing about this feels derivative at all and me love the creativity.
• What an amazingly well-drawn comic. The pictures are beautiful and artist Scott Kolins makes every character look stunning. His facial expressions, however, are pretty lackluster.
• Me always love when Koko saves the day. There's nothing better than watching a monkey solve problems quicker than Invisible Kid, who's cursed with being a super spy and an incredibly smart scientist.
• Having Live Wire act like a complete jerk in almost every scene was another brilliant choice. Why show any character development, or create a character that readers would care about, when you can just make him lash out at his teammates for absolutely no reason?
• Me also loved that we finally got to see a well-written Kinetix here. After months of her written as if she has taken every downer in the galaxy, and knowing that the writers hate using her, seeing her reduced to such a joke was the perfect way to make her relevant again.
• And is there any better surprise ending than having the Bizarro Legionnaires attack R.J. Brande? This has never been done before and the creative team has never forced Brande into a story for absolutely no reason. So refreshing!
• Speaking of R.J. Brande, Me am so happy they placed him, naked, in a mudbath.
• In fact, me am so happy we're moving to the second issue of this story that me am celebrating getting to read 44 pages of this Watchmen-level comic.
• For those of you who were amazed that Invisible Kid used to be the only character who could speak Durlan, you can be even more impressed that he can speak with Koko. The monkey. Me loved those old Lassie episodes as much as everyone else, so when this happened, me was smiling from ear-to-ear:

Lyle: If I don't figure out a way to reverse the process within 24 hours, they'll be Bizarros forever!
Koko: Okok! Okok! Okok! Okok!
Lyle: What? Separate the D.N.A. strands? But how do we--

• Me have no words for how brilliant that was. Not as brilliant as Koko, who figures out how to cure them, but brilliant enough. Me love that Bizarro-Koko is smarter than the person who has been established to be the second smartest Legionnaires. Awesome for monkeys!
• Lyle sends a light blast through everyone's Mini-Omnicoms in their belts and suddenly we have the regular Legionnaires beside the Bizarro Legionnaires. So it's a battle against each other. Me love when nothing they write makes any sense and they just keep throwing spaghetti at the wall in their stories.
• Another thing me love in these stories is when the writers just ignore what's going on in the story and magically transport characters from one place to another. After all, when Bizarro Brainy blows up (or does he, because Brainiac 5.1 wonders if they got away), they just leave Mars and ignore that there may be Bizarros running around and head right back to the Outpost with no explanation how or why.
• Even better, me reached the point where me am convinced they're missing some pages. Me love when the story makes so little sense that me wonder if me got a defective copy... nope... it's just this perfectly confusing...
• These two issues were so good, me wishes it would just keep going and going and going so me can enjoy more insanely stupid ideas and scenes... cause that's what me love the best about the Legion.

One Brainiac 5.1 point here - at what point does the constant damage and destruction that he causes outweigh any possible good? I mean, how many labs can he blow up, how many times can he risk the lives of his teammates, before the Legion figures that having Lyle handle the science is better? I guess it would be okay if they actually showed Brainy deliver something really, genuinely useful...
LSH #116
I'm gonna stick with the Legion since Legionnaires has a three-part story. Or just to get this over with.
We continue getting Thunder, and her long-running subplot of collecting pieces of her planet to bring them together and make it whole again (which makes so little sense that it's insane) shoved down our throats so I guess it's not a surprise that we get more of this nonsense.
Before I start this review, I want to personally apologize to any artist I've criticized during my time writing these rereads on reddit. Let's take a look at this first page and talk about just how horrible it is. Keron Grant is the guest artist and wow... this is shockingly bad! Like, I honestly can't think of a book that looks worse. Ever. I honestly can't think of a worse looking comic book. I'm sure there's one out there. But I even want to apologize to Rob Liefeld...
https://preview.redd.it/d4i7mgsg6gyc1.png?width=599&format=png&auto=webp&s=d464752fd149c571daffb0da59c45c6ba4853bc7
Let's talk about this first page. First, anatomy:

• Thunder's torso cannot be connected to her legs
• Speaking of her legs, I'm fairly certain she's been skipping leg day for a while
• Green guy in the background doesn't actually have legs, just stumps
• Green guy in the foreground has legs, and a bum, that aren't actually connected to his waist... it's like that belt is holding onto two separate things

Second, the roll call:

• Thunder looks cross-eyed and drunk
• Brainiac 5.1 now has a receding hairline
• Did someone tell the artist to draw up most of their noses?
• Did the artist not know that Spark and Live Wire are twins and should have at least one similar feature?
• Did Invisible Kid lose his skull?

This is a bad book from start to finish and the art makes it painful to read. Quick recap - some bad guy from Rimbor wants all of the rock Thunder's trying to find. He captures her and Sensor and takes them back to his base. She escapes by saying her magic words "Captain Marvel" and ends up back home in the future. But she knows she has to save Sensor and get back. Sensor, meanwhile, is going to be vivisected by scientists there. Oh, and the Legion come to help but don't do much. And this garbage is continued next issue... time to pray Grant's not back...
Legionnaires #71
Legionnaires #72
Legionnaires #73
With all that excitement in space, let's head to Earth (and other places) for more chaos.
We start in Japan, where Cosmic Boy isn't really having the best of reunions with his family. He's obsessed with figuring out where his former manager, Alux Cuspin, is. Last issue, he tried to get revenge by hiring Domain, a contract killer, to take out the Legionnaire. We know he's working as a dishwasher in Rio, but Rokk doesn't.
On that note, I guess Star Trek has kinda ruined me for my view of the future, but I really have a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that people would be employed as dishwashers in the 30th Century. I mean, don't they have robots for that? Or self-cleaning utensils? Or hologram plates that disappear after you've finished eating? I know that I've harped on this before but this book just doesn't feel like it's in the future. Fantastic Four comics have more impressive tech. And the writers don't seem to have spent even one moment thinking about what the future would look like. Just bigger machines and aliens. That's it.
We then get introduced to four characters who are going to become important once Dragonmage screws up. We meet different aliens (and a Sun Boy), who have different elemental connections (fire, water, earth, air) and are struggling with their current lives.
We also go to Dryad, which, I gotta be honest, just fills me with dread. Blok was always one of my favorites and I really don't want to see either creative team wreck him this close to their cancellation.
So, surprise surprise, Dragonmage, in a quest for power (he's taken the Kinetix role), blasts these rocks that contain mystical, elemental energy. Four bolts take off through the cosmos, looking for hosts of their power. They fly off searching for the four beings we met earlier for absolutely no reason. They don't even try to connect them, or show why the elemental magic would want them. It's so completely random that if you think about it for even a moment, everything falls apart... which is a great way to describe most Legion stories these days.
We wrap up the Cuspin subplot in four pages as Chameleon arrests him and hands him over the Shvaughn Erin.
Then all technology stops working as the magic hits Earth.. and Dryad... and Gil'dan... and four beings are possessed with the power. Poor Dirk Morgna - I swear all he does in the PZH Legion is stand around and then get blasted. Could he actually accomplish anything for himself?
We get another Cosmic Boy saves the day moment (they're really going overboard on this) and then Lady Mysa shows up at Legion HQ to explain what Dragonmage did and to ask for help.
Everything keeps escalating and Dirk's sun powers are going out of control in Japan - and only Cosmic Boy, Umbra, and Kid Quantum are there to help.
To the second part we go and, because we have pages to waste, we spend the first issue recapping Dirk Morgna's life... why?? By 1999, the only people reading this book are longtime fans. They really don't need to keep writing these books like it's 1982 Marvel.
Oh, and to make things slightly cringey, they name the fire elemental that's possessed Dirk: Phy'r. Ugh...
Element Lad and Monstress have joined the fight as the five Legionnaires try to stop Dirk from destroying more of Tokyo. Saturn Girl, Gates, and Lady Mysa arrive as well and the magician realizes that teamwork will solve the problem.
Wow - so glad that a team of super-heroes, literally built on teamwork, got that suggestion. Why is Mysa here?
To planet Swizzar we go, where a butterfly-looking being named Flutter is possessed by the wind elemental named A'rie. I swear they're not even trying with these names.
On Dryad, Brika is possessed by RRox, the earth elemental. And she starts attacking the colonizers who want to take over her world. So she's good, right?
And on Gil'dan, Ebb is taken over by the unnamed water elemental (did the random bad name generator not work here or did no one notice?).
All three start killing everyone around them, suck all the air and water off their planets or, in Rrox's case, they destroy the entire planet of Dryad. I knew this wasn't going to be good.
Back to Earth, where Dirk's powers are getting stronger and stronger and he ends up sucking lava up from the core. He, like the other three, blasts off into space and heads somewhere.
Everywhere the four fly by, they steal the energy of the planet and wreak havoc, whether it's Colu or Takron-Galtos.
And where are they headed? The planet where Mordru was defeated and imprisoned. This isn't good, is it?
To the third part of this kinda well done and actually interesting story... such a dramatic shift from the other book.
We start off with the elementals arriving at the planet and killing random guards. Oh, and they didn't even bother giving Ebb an elemental name. So sad for him.
The Legionnaires are rushing after them, trying to get there in their ship as quickly as possible. If I was a jerk, I'd mention how traveling through space is slow when they need it to be and fast when they don't want to think about it, but I'll let that go.
We get a nice little subplot as Star Boy realizes that his gravity-controlling powers are working again. He's also laying into Dragonmage, which is well-deserved. By the way, would Dragonmage be punished by the U.P. for causing all this death and destruction? I mean, it could be argued that it's akin to manslaughter, right? He's directly responsible for the deaths of three planets.
As the elementals wait for Rrox, the Legion has called in the rest of the troops who aren't Bizarro versions of themselves so Ultra Boy, Apparition, and Chameleon are heading to the planet too.
Gates and Monstress lead the attack, hitting A'rie before Mysa can encase her in the same crystal prison Mordru is in. Then they take out Ebb as well. Saturn Girl tries to get through to Dirk mentally, and it looks like he's getting back into control, when Rrox shows up and sends the Legion for a loop.
So they didn't see her coming? A big mountain flying through space?
They start attacking Rrox, who breaks Ultra Boy's arm because he, once again, doesn't know how to use his powers at all. I mean, they're not even trying to make him competent, are they? Element Lad converts the stargate around Rrox's waist (don't ask) into a bomb and blows her up.
I guess the Legion is no longer against killing, are they?
The battles continue and Mordru starts stirring. Dragonmage and Star Boy show up through what I'm guessing is a mystic portal and join the fight.
Star Boy and Mysa work together as he anchors himself to the ground and she starts separating the elemental from the being possessed. I have absolutely no idea why she needed Star Boy for this, but the writers stopped caring about anything making sense a long, long time ago, so why should I? In the "what a dumb subplot" category, this whole moment was referenced by Dreamer, who claimed that Star Boy would save his team. But all he did was stand there. Once again, is no one actually paying attention to anything?
The beings start remembering who they were before the elementals and Brika isn't dead, but horribly sad and tormented at the fact that she destroyed her entire planet. So that's better...?? It's enough for her to join with the Legion and fight the other beings, who don't want to give up their powers.
Dragonmage swears that he'll stop them and he starts a spell to capture them all in a big bubble. Mysa helps, which makes sense. Kid Quantum and Star Boy help too, which makes no sense.
The bubble collapses upon itself, trapping the elementals inside... and Dragonmage... so I guess he's dead. Or trapped. Or just gone. But Mordru's still asleep, so that's good.
No, he's still alive, but badly hurt. As are the host bodies of the four possessed by the elementals. Find out next issue who lives and who dies... of course, do we really care about any of them? I mean, honestly?
The scary thing is that as much as part of this story made no sense and things were jumping around, this Legionnaires tale was so much better than anything in the Legion book that it's unfair I'm doing these reviews together. It almost feels like I'm getting whiplash by the drastic change in quality.
Also, I'm probably overly positive about the Legionnaires because it's a competent, adequately done comic. It's not great. There have been far, far better stories by this creative team. But it's not the crap the other book is publishing right now.
Our next Legionnaire in the spotlight... Lar Gand / Mon-El / Valor / M'Onel!!!
You get a cookie if you remember these comics strips that appeared in DC comics.
https://preview.redd.it/1epxa4ax5gyc1.jpg?width=409&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=bffa618fbb68ad932a935aa0d65211ae8c630649
https://preview.redd.it/yuvyzoaj5gyc1.jpg?width=400&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b5673eca447c315b673b530494b38707a16bc85b
https://preview.redd.it/3ma2zxft5gyc1.jpg?width=400&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d26dffa7ace96094b9be7b9abf8519f57169d6fd
https://preview.redd.it/h735vbxl5gyc1.jpg?width=1326&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b8264d0b2f091cc350360dc297a207ed7301e035
This is a tough one to write, not because I don't like this character (which I do), but because I don't want this to sound like an old man yelling at clouds about how the good old days were so much better than anything else.
Mon-El could've been the most boring, redundant super-hero in the Legion. He was certainly set up that way. An almost clone of Superboy, with the exact same powers and a costume that is fairly monotonous, Lar Gand could've been a character ignored by most because, let's be honest, everything he brought to the table had already been seen and done before. And this is even truer with both Superboy and Supergirl on the team. When you give a character the name Bob Cobb, you know you're not even trying to make them interesting.
Instead, the writers leaned into four things that really established him as a character:

• Lead poisoning
• Relationship with Tasmia / friendships with Tinya and Jo
• Fear of the Phantom Zone / the torment of 1,000 years of solitude
• Love for exploration

Now we had fertile ground to cover and ways to weaken/strengthen Mon-El that made him very, very different from the other Els. Some of the best Legion stories revolve around these four ideas and turned Mon-El into one of the most popular characters in the Legion.
So, of course, every time there was a reboot or rethinking of the character, they pretty much tossed everything out except for him being an explorer. Lead was never a problem, Tasmia just wanted to date him but they never got further than that, and he had no other friends.
Also, it seems like every time he shows up in DC continuity, it's just as a Superman fill in and not really his own person. Heck, he even adopted a costume that was similar to Superman's. Why can't they try to make him even slightly different?
Such a waste.
It's funny that I actually consider the Tasmia/Lar relationship more important than almost any other and one that should be a keystone for the series. It allowed the writers to grow and develop both characters in such an epic way that they just feel 'right' when they're together, if that makes any sense.
The other thing that always amazes me is that Mon-El (sorry, Valor) has the longest lasting solo series of any Legionnaire. The competition isn't that strong, and the book didn't even last two years, but it's still better than Karate Kid's series... which, admittedly, isn't saying that much, is it?
What do you think of Mon-El?
On a housekeeping note, next week's column is probably going to arrive a day earlier than usual so I can enjoy a weekend trip. Fingers crossed I get through the next set of 6 comics without putting my head through a wall.

Context: my other budgie died a few days ago. The two were together since I got them (they were from the same pet store). Today I have noticed a drastic change in my budgie’s behavior. He’s constantly opening and closing his mouth, puffed up, little energy or appetite, lots of head bobbing (likely grief because head bobbing is a mating ritual), and hasn’t done much all day. I looked up the symptoms and it seems that some of them are related to grief but others could be related to sickness. I may be reading too far into this but I worry he may have a respiratory infection because of the mouth-thing he’s been doing, his puffed up feathers, and how his tail has bobbing excessively. I’m really worried about him because this is the only budgie I have left and I really can’t lose him so soon after losing my other budgie. PS: I know he’s a girl, I just refer to him as a boy because I always have.