Sitting in the Dark

Gather round the flickering candlelight, boils and ghouls! In this special episode of Sitting in the Dark, Ray DeLancey welcomes two macabre mavens to the morbid merriment: Pete Wright and Tommy Metz III. Together, these horror hounds aim to dig up the decaying details on two Vincent Price classics given modern makeovers—the 1999 and 2005 remakes of House on Haunted Hill and House of Wax.

Hunkering into the cobweb-covered crypt, the ghastly trio finds plenty to praise in the remakes’ attempts to recreate the vintage thrills of the originals. From entire towns gruesomely molded from wax to clever winks to William Castle’s famous theater gimmicks, the filmmakers conjure the macabre spirit of the classics. Yet Ray, Pete, and Tommy agree that capturing the unique charisma of Vincent Price or conjuring new horror icons is no easy feat.

Throughout their late-night analysis, they look at these films as “playgrounds” for horror, where anything goes, and the screams come easy. But they conclude that without rules that make sense and characters you care about, the scares just aren’t the same.

Film Sundries
  • (00:00) - Welcome to Sitting in the Dark
  • (02:23) - A Little Price Backgrounder
  • (10:53) - The Remakes
  • (11:49) - House on Haunted Hill
  • (35:51) - House of Wax
  • (52:16) - Coming Attractions

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What is Sitting in the Dark?

Sitting in the Dark is a podcast about horror, but not the kind that hides in a single shadow. Each month, hosts Tommy Metz III, Kynan Dias, and Pete Wright pick a theme — an idea, a trope, a nightmare that keeps winding back — and explore it through three films that share its DNA. Sometimes the connections are obvious, sometimes they’re unexpected, and sometimes they lead you deeper into the maze than you expected to go.

One month might bring The Drac Pack, three wildly different takes on cinema’s most famous vampire. Another, a journey through The Bride, the Boy, and the Firetruck, unpacking coded queer horror across decades. We’ve explored maternal terror in Mommy Acts This Way Because She Loves You, broken into the home-invasion subgenre, tiptoed through haunted houses, and stared down both classic monsters and blockbuster franchises.

What ties it all together is a love of horror as a labyrinth — a twisting path where every turn reveals something new about our fears, desires, and cultural obsessions. With smart conversation, dark humor, and a willingness to look behind the curtain (or under the bed), Sitting in the Dark invites you to settle in, turn down the lights, and find out what connects the nightmares.