July to September, always anemic pre-Halloween hump for horror to get over.  Two thousand and eight twas no different.

Part 1: January to March.
Part 2: April to June.
Part 3: July to September.
Part 4: October to December.
Part 5: Events. (coming)
Part 6: Awards. (coming)

Last Week in Horror we finally started to see some marketing material for studio backed films and I couldn’t be more saddened?  Why?  Well, of the four studio clips, three are for remakes and the other is a PG-13 teen shocker that I’m going to guess will most heavily be advertised on MTV and MySpace.

Oh well, some cool news.  FearNET will be showing MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN for free on its service all through October.  That said, it has yet to show up on my local FearNET OnDemand menu, but then again Comcast is a fucking abysmal corporation and my OnDemand (and internet) is rarely functioning.

Last Week in Horror was some kind of post-ComicCon orgy of news.  Either this was all left over from the con and took a week to rise to the top or PR folk knew their news wasn’t big enough to rock a convention and thus waited a week.  Whatever the case, I feel like this post took longer to gather than most.

Xingu Films announced AMERICAN REAPER, which is a sci-fi film whose concept I love.  John Carpenter got a non-horror directing gig, which is the best thing for him these days, if you ask me.  Which you did.  Some GHOSTBUSTERS rumors.  Two people who yet to impress me may muck up my beloved Alexandre Aja remake of PIRANHA.  Lionsgate is fielding all kinds of heat in the fallout of their guided MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN release debacle.

But most importantly.  THE THING!  Remade!  As a music video!

The PR folk at Lionsgate must be having a tough week.  First AICN makes it big that director Lexi Alexander has been booted off of PUNISHER: WAR ZONE, buried in an NDA and that the changes set in motion are less than ideal.  Then Scott Weinberg at Cinematical writes a plea to Lionsgate’s adressing their (mis)handling of DANCE OF THE DEAD.  And now Bloody-Disgusting has a war waged in its comments section regarding the news that MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN has not only been dumped in limited release, but is only being released in dollar theaters scattered with unicorn logic around the nation.

Now why are they doing all of this?  Lionsgate used to be the go to outfit for genre championship.  Now they’re dumping well received films with unprecedented disrespect.  What gives?  Shareholders give.

Lionsgate are, despite a few huge theatrical hits from time to time, apparently, not very good at business.  In 2007 LGF was like a drunk at a race track that picked all the winning horses (most of the time), but then blew all its earnings at the bar.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Lionsgate’s accountants are behind the eight ball with these recent decisions.  Their stock is up slightly for the year, but is still down nearly 13% from its high a year ago.  In FY08, LGF’s net income was -$70 million.  Not because their movies didn’t do well, but because the company made shitty investements along the way, operating at a -33% return on its equity.  Even I’m not that bad at the stock market.