Halloween may be over, but for true lovers of all things scary, creepy, and just downright weird, the spookiest season of the year never truly ends, does it? If you don’t believe us, just ask Al Omega. The Original Creature Features Still Here After All These Years.
For the past 13 years, James Currie — better known by his on-screen moniker Al Omega (the name being stylized as the Alpha and Omega of all things horror and science fiction) — has served as the host of the longtime fan-favorite science fiction and horror TV series, Creature Features, having hosted more than 600 episodes during his tenure as the show’s host.
Spawning from the initial cult success of the original series by the same name that aired throughout the 1970s and into the 1980s, the revitalized Creature Features broadcast under Al’s role as the show’s host follows the same vision as the original series started by hit television personality Bob Wilkins.
Under Wilkins’ vision to help normalize themes of horror and science fiction in film, the original series was able to obtain a cult following through airing over 6,000 broadcasts of classic horror and science fiction films from the silver era of Universal Studios such as “Dracula,” “Frankenstein,” and “King Kong”. The show also helped introduce a broader audience of Western viewers to Japanese “kaiju”-themed films of the 1950s and 60s like “Godzilla” as well as lesser-known B-movies such as Roger Corman’s “The Raven” and “The Terror,” spurring generations of viewers to gain an interest in all things weird and obscure in classic (and sometimes, not so classic) cinema.
Now, the show is being produced through a revived studio under the name of Creature Feature Productions based out of the San Francisco Bay area in California. With Currie starring as Al Omega at the show’s forefront, Creature Features aims to bring the same chills, thrills, and scares to a new generation of viewers that its predecessor was able to instill 50 years prior.
“Creature Feature Productions started back in 2008,” says Currie, “when Tom Wrysch asked my associate and me to bring back the Bob Wilkins Creature Feature show from the 70s’.”
As Currie mentions, Wrysch’s asking him to revitalize Wilkins’s original show is what helped spur him into founding Creature Feature Productions as a vehicle through which he could host and release its latest iteration. Under Currie’s guidance, Creature Features is also the only horror-themed television series filmed entirely in 6K, 60 fps format to ensure its sharpness—no matter what size or kind of screen viewers are tuning in from.
After over a decade and hundreds of episodes, Currie hopes that Creature Features will not only bring back past generations of viewers of Wilkins’s original beloved cult horror show, but also spark younger viewers to follow their interests and passions tied to the macabre.
Creature Features is available for viewing and streaming online and on ROKU-enabled devices.