This weekend, my cousin Bess came to Dallas to visit me.  We spent her first night here watching all three Jurassic Park films in anticipation of Jurassic World‘s release.  I chose to view our immediate fixation on movies in a positive light:  our family is very media- and story-oriented, so really, we were honoring our ancestry.  After all, this was not the first time movies were central to my memories of Bess.

When I was very little, I loved the Ernest movies starring Jim Varney.  So did my brother Roy and my cousins Andrew and Bess.  One night when we were visiting them in Atlanta, we rented Ernest Scared Stupid, in which Ernest must destroy a bunch of trolls on Halloween.  It is the most absurd film to ever exist, culminating in Ernest dancing and kissing said evil troll.  The four of us peered over blankets, laughing as though we weren’t actually terrified.  I vowed never to watch a scary movie again.  Continue reading →