I am – Hercules!! Showtime’s “Masters of Horror” kicks off with 13 new episodes, and just in time for Halloween! Here’s who masters the horror this year: 1) “The Damned Thing,” directed by Tobe Hooper (“The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”) from a teleplay by R.C. Matheson (“Loose Cannons”). 2) “Family,” directed by John Landis (“An American Werewolf in London”) from a teleplay by Brent Hanley (“Frailty”). 3) “The V Word,” directed by Ernest Dickerson (“Bones,” “Demon Knight”) from a teleplay by Mick Garris (“Critters 2,” “Hocus Pocus”). 4) “Sounds Like,” written and directed by Brad Anderson (“The Machinist”). 5) “Pro-Life,” directed by John Carpenter (“Halloween”) from a teleplay by longtime Ain’t It Cool contributors Drew McWeeny and Scott Swan (the season-one episode “Cigarette Burns”). 6) “Pelts,” directed by Dario Argento (“Suspira”) from a teleplay by Matt Venne (“White Noise 2”). 7) “The Screwfly Solution,” directed by Joe Dante (“Gremlins”) from a teleplay by Sam Hamm (“Batman,” “Monkeybone”). 8) “Valerie on the Stairs,” written and directed by Mick Garris (“Critters 2,” “Riding The Bullet”). 9) “We Scream For Ice Cream,” directed by Tom Holland (“Child’s Play”) from a teleplay by David J. Schow (“The Crow”). 10) “The Black Cat,” directed by Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) from a teleplay by Gordon and Dennis Paoli (“Body Snatchers”). 11) “The Washingtonians,” directed by Peter Medak (“The Changeling”) from a teleplay by actor Johnathon Schaech (“That Thing You Do!”) & Richard Chizma. 12) “Right To Die,” directed by Bob Schmidt (“Wrong Turn”). 13) “Dream Cruise,” directed by Norio Tsuruta ("Ringu 0: Bâsudei," "Premonition") from a teleplay by Tsuruta and Naoya Takayama ("Ringu: Saishûshô"). Learn more about the episodes here. The New York Times says:

… for my money, the most gruesome sight in Mr. Hooper’s entry is a scene where a young man suddenly takes a hammer, haphazardly, to his own face and head. He doesn’t stop till he’s dead. The spontaneous madness that drives him to this suicide seems more horrifying, somehow, than the epicurean calculation of a full-dress villain like Hannibal Lecter. Maybe it depends on whether you like your monsters socially powerful or powerless, in control or anarchic. But the powerful self-thrashing scene is only a sidebar to the predictably muddled action in “The Damned Thing,” which bops around various houses, chronicling waves of demonic possession in a small Texas town. The creature doing the possessing is a big, bloblike thing; pop psych would tell you it’s something repressed (Waco?) making its inevitable reappearance. The soundtrack to this movie is thunder, lightning and crashes, and the lights are kept low, even before the electricity cuts off. The effect of the loud sounds and low light is too much vérité for adequately stylized horror. “The Damned Thing” might be an underwritten war movie. It all seems to happen in a fog. …

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer says:

… I served more time watching a few chapters of season two of "Masters of Horror," debuting the first -- and possibly the worst -- of 13 one-hour episodes tonight. "Masters of Horror" is an anthology series that you desperately want to be better than it is. … Season one began ably enough with "Phantasm," director Don Coscarelli's "Incident on and off a Mountain Road," which took the horror cliche of a beautiful woman terrorized by a cleaver-wielding psycho and turned it on its ear. Coscarelli's episode was an exception. Out of 13 promised hours, about half were pointless, and the one that promised to be shocking and gruesome to make it all worth it, Takashi Miike's "Imprint," was evidently too outrageous for television. Even for a premium cable channel that, let's be real, almost nobody watches. … Tobe Hooper gives us one of J.R. Ewing's fever visions. The hour is called "The Damned Thing" and is so creatively hollow that you'll almost expect Scooby-Doo, Velma and the rest of the gang to squeal by in the Mystery Machine. Ted Raimi and Sean Patrick Flanery are in it, and should be very sad that their names will be eternally linked to it on imdb.com.

The Washington Times says:

… Showtime's "Masters of Horror" anthology series purports to let horror's brightest stars scare us anew. The fact is, the horror genre has precious few stars in its galaxy. The series' second season premiere, alas, is a case in point. … Mr. Hooper's camera work is as frenzied as that of any neophyte, and the installment is a frightless way to start the new season. Next week's episode, "The Family," fares better. It begins with a jarring set piece as good as anything you'll find at the movies.

The New York Press says:

… There once was a time when premium cable was considered exactly that—premium, first class, the best. In short, it was superior to the network television that commoners watched when they couldn’t splurge for the topnotch stuff. But Showtime’s “Masters of Horror” series, which is inexplicably back for a second season with 13 new one-hour episodes, falls below par. … The episode titled “Family” aims for the eerie suburbia captured by The Stepford Wives and the deluded fantasy of Psycho, but it is outright laughable—as in, I found myself thinking that the series might be an intentional joke. … It’s hard to believe that “The Damned Thing” is directed by Tobe Hooper of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. This one is a cross between The Shining and Swamp Thing. With choice scenes—like when one dude’s insides become outsides or when a cop accidentally rips a chick in half—this episode is absolutely incoherent. …

10 p.m. Friday. Showtime.

What book about Stanley Kubrick could possibly be worth $200? How about The Stanley Kubrick Archives??