On those days when you want to beat the summer heat and just stay in and enjoy the AC, it’s a good time to catch up on the most popular streaming services – sometimes, they even intersect with the franchises we feature!
We want to give you a round-up regularly of some of the best you can stream to compliment your loot before it arrives, and these titles, featured across Loot Crate, Loot Crate DX and Loot Wear for June’s COLOSSAL theme should get you in the mood!:
Jurassic Park
So, the bummer with all things Jurassic this month is that no one is streaming any of the franchise feature films for free. Dino-poops. If you have Netflix, you do have the option of checking out the Lego Jurassic Park: Indominus Escape animated feature, but that’s about your only gratis option (with a subscription) at the present time. (If you’re a little patient, FYI, the original trilogy is coming to Netflix in July!) That said, if you don’t already own the films in the Jurassic canon, all four to date can be rented for a small fee through Amazon Prime – and we do encourage a re-watch of the frankly nutso but unfairly maligned The Lost World. It stars GOLDBLUM, so of course it’s got that in its favor, but did you recall that it also features a scene of him effortlessly pulling a door off its hinges to block a Raptor? Neither did we!
Ghostbusters
If you’re a fan of bustin’ ghosts, then you are covered best out of all of these franchises this month: It’s pretty much all available somewhere or another! With Netflix, you not only get the original 1984 film and its sequel, but also the 80’s cartoon classic The Real Ghostbusters. (Which, depending on the precise year of your birth, I’ve come to realize might be someone’s number one touchpoint for the franchise over the films, so beloved is it. Unexplained-ly blonde Egon and all!) Meanwhile, Hulu has the late 90’s animated update Extreme Ghostbusters, while if you have a STARZ subscription, you can stream the 2016 Ghostbusters feature film via the STARZ app or Amazon Prime.
Godzilla
While a little hunting will turn up a lot of the original Toho Godzilla flicks in places far flung across the interwebs (crazy rights issues!), for more recent installments the pickings are slim but fair. The excellent 2014 Godzilla is no longer available to stream on premium services but rent-able; meanwhile, if you want a dazzling visual treat that harkens to Gojira’s national origins, Netflix has the rather wonderful anime opus Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters now available to stick into your eyeballs. If you absolutely must get more King of the Monsters in the near future, you do have the option to head over to Hulu and stream the 1998 Godzilla movie starring Matthew Broderick. We’ll just preface that option with: Do not get your hopes up.
Marvel / The Hulk
So you have a need, a need for GREEN. Well, to get your Hulk on for the streaming choices at the moment, there’s probably no better choice than Thor: Ragnarok which just hit Netflix and in which both Mark Ruffalo’s Bruce Banner and the big guy are front and center of the action. (At last, he really speaks!) Of course, there’s also every episode of the original run of the ever-wonderful The Incredible Hulk series starring Bill Bixby and Lou Ferrigno on Hulu, which also has the terrific Planet Hulk animated feature if that’s more your speed. (Check out the clip above!)
King Kong
So if you want to smash and roar with the mighty Kong at the moment, having an HBO Go/Now subscription will definitely offer the best option as Kong: Skull Island is still available to stream and it’s a truly excellent monster mash. (Including, besides the big guy, some top-notch heroics from both Tom Hiddleston and Brie Larson.) Outside of the premium option, Netflix currently has Peter Jackson’s King Kong – your mileage may vary, but the scenes with between Naomi Watts’ Ann Darrow and Kong are pretty darn special – as well as, for the younger set, the animated series Kong, King of the Apes.
Planet of the Apes
Our DX item in COLOSSAL is actually an amazing Kong/Planet of the Apes mashup, so to deliver on that awesome Apes action your first stop should be Hulu, which has the classic and unsurpassed Planet of the Apes from 1968 on tap. It also has a really fun side trip in the form of Return to the Planet of the Apes, the short-lived 1970s animated series from Filmation which took more inspiration directly from Pierre Boulle’s original novel. (i.e. the apes’ society is not entirely primitive; so much modern technology!) Meanwhile, HBO Go/Now has last year’s War for the Planet of the Apes, while if you have a STARZ account you can stream all five of the original Planet of the Apes feature films. (Hot tip: Watch Conquest of the Planet of the Apes. It’s heavy, man.)
Jaws
Well, it is almost officially summer after all… which means prime time for a SHARK ATTACK. The unfortunate truth, though, is that the Jaws series is not super well-represented in any of the streaming channels at the moment. Bad timing, guys. That said, if you don’t own any of them you can rent them via VOD or Amazon Prime – and we’re just going to throw this out there, but while the one unmistakable classic in this series is the original Jaws, if you are into laugh-out-loud badness then Jaws 3-D is worth a revisit. It’s just so… so obviously shot in that way that something shoots out toward the camera every five minutes to say LOOK, A SHARK, IN 3-D! Hilarious. See the clip above for proof. (While you’re at it, skip Jaws: The Revenge, as it’s just bad and not in a laugh-out-loud way. Poor Michael Caine.)
