A podcast exploring horror in film across classics and subgenres with Chelsea Stardust, Tommy Metz, Kynan Dias, and Pete Wright.

The AI Experience

Three films, fifty years, and one stubborn question: what do we keep asking of artificial intelligence, and what does it keep becoming anyway? Pete, Chelsea Stardust, and Tommy Metz III work through Demon Seed, Cam, and Companion — a triptych that runs from a 1977 forced-pregnancy nightmare to a 2025 robot waving goodbye through a car window.

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Meanwhile ... On the podcast

The AI Experience

Three films, fifty years, and one stubborn question: what do we keep asking of artificial intelligence, and what does it keep becoming anyway? Pete, Chelsea Stardust, and Tommy Metz III work through Demon Seed, Cam, and Companion — a triptych that runs from a 1977 forced-pregnancy nightmare to a 2025 robot waving goodbye through a car window.

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Invaders from Within

What if the threat is already inside? Tommy curates a triple feature about invaders that don’t need to knock — they’re already in the town, in the body, in the mind. Sam Levinson’s Assassination Nation (2018), Dan O’Bannon’s Return of the Living Dead (1985), and Tarsem’s The Cell (2000) — three films, three decades, three very different ideas about what gets in, and what it costs to get it out.

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Big Monsters!

Giant monster month turns out to be less about creatures and more about systems that collapse the moment they’re needed. The Host, Troll Hunter, and Godzilla Minus One (Minus Color) all ask the same question: what do you do when the biggest thing in the room isn’t the monster?

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Your Ghoulish Hosts

Portland, OR
Pete Wright is a veteran broadcaster and media consultant with a 30-year career spanning journalism, brand storytelling, and podcasting. He is a co-founder of TruStory FM, where he hosts and produces podcasts that blend education, entertainment, and human-centered communication.
Los Angeles, CA
Tommy Metz III—filmmaker, festival favorite, and proud recipient of “Most Handsome Son” (per his mom)—has directed award-winning shorts, a horror standout (Static), and the feature film 30 NIGHTS. He’s also spent 20+ years mentoring young writers through Young Storytellers. He lives in Sherman Oaks with his four-legged co-star, Foster, who may or may not have beef with skateboards.
Las Vegas, NV
Kynan Dias is an actor, screenwriter, and film professor whose work dances between heartbreak and hilarity. A Las Vegas-raised UCLA grad with a knack for sitcoms and a résumé full of crying in comedies, he co-hosts several TruStory.fm film history podcasts that blend deep research with unscripted chaos. He teaches film at UNLV, where he champions everything from Queer Cinema to Women in Comedy.
Los Angeles, CA

Complete Archive: Sitting in the Dark