So if you were one of the legions of drive-in mutants who follow the critic from Grapevine, Texas, then you were probably glued to your TV, Smart Device or PC/Mac. Everyone had been waiting in anticipation for this event since JBB first hinted at its existence last winter. Shudder was the champion who wanted to bring back JBB after the almost 18 year hiatus imposed by the Time-Warner stooges that invaded Turner Network Television. JBB did many interviews over the two weeks leading up to the so-called "Last Drive-In." Many people were saddened to learn that this was, in actuality, the swan song of JBB's hosting duties. Nonetheless, it was going to be a fitting send off. He was going to do what he wanted, on the Shudder platform (which had all sorts of horror movies at his disposal) and it was going to be epic. I was already sold on the site long before this.
Then came Friday, July 13th, 2018, at 9:00PM Eastern/6:00PM Pacific . . .
All hell broke loose. Many people (including myself) had a doosy of a time getting on. The head honchos at Shudder (which is a service provided by the AMC Network) had vastly underestimated the turnout for the event. The Shudder people, JBB, and his staff were caught completely off-guard. Some people shrugged it off. Some people were angry, because they thought the livestream was a one-and-done (I suspected all along this wasn't the case and I was correct). Comments flooded Twitter and the FB event page. Following the end of the marathon, fans banded together and started discussion pages again. Ultimately, it ended up demonstrating that cable television was foolish to have snubbed JBB since July 2000.
So with the large outpouring of fans for this event, the question again is raised. Will JBB will end up with a regular hosting gig on Shudder? I have it gut feeling that he's serious about this being the last go-round. Even with the fan support, JBB is 65-years-old and I think there's a grand possibility he will soon announce his retirement from his columns as well. There could also be many other factors at play as well, though I'd like to not dwell on those thoughts. However, I do hope the fan reaction to this event will change his mind in some way. Maybe to the extent of a once a month set of host segments? The one thing that confuses this situation is that he recently revamped his website. I'm certain Shudder is open to it at this juncture. JBB hasn't directly addressed this yet, so only time will tell.
Because I still haven't seen the bulk of the marathon, I'm going to watch and review the host segments over the coming days. I will post screen shots to accompany each review. Since I've seen most of the movies in the marathon, I'm just going to be covering the host segments. I wish there was some way to embed the segments, but I don't see that happening for some time.
I only saw bits and pieces due to the servers crashing, but I watched the emotional ending. Since I will be describing those segments in detail for the final review, consider this a regretful spoiler warning. Keep checking for each day for the reviews, starting with Tourist Trap.
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