Fantastic Fest 2022 may have flown into the cinematic night, taking the Oscar-ready big titles like Triangle of Sadness and The Banshees of Inisherin with it. But Fantastic Fest is not over, merely morphing into FF@Home, the shadow twin streaming into your home via the Drafthouse’s Alamo on Demand platform. Buckle up, because this is where the fest gets really strange, a selection of faves from the in-person fest and new additions – some under the Burnt Ends flag of truly transgressive and experimental indies.

FF@Home, Thu.-Tue., Sept. 29-Oct. 4, fantasticfest.com/ff@home

Mike Mignola: Drawing Monsters

After Marvel and DC, the biggest comic universe is the Mignolaverse, the gothic tales created by minimalist gothic artist Mike Mignola. In their Kickstarter-funded documentary, filmmakers Jim Demonakos and Kevin Konrad Hanna explore the mind of the man that created Hellboy.

Quantum Cowboys

Austin animation innovator Geoff Marslett deconstructs the current cinematic fascination with multiverses for something closer to the scientific theories and yet even wilder. Horse opera meets superstring theory in a stylistic patchwork that features David Arquette, filmmaking anarchist Alex Cox, and Neko Case in her first acting role. (Read our interview with Marslett, “Moseying Out Into the Multiverse With the Quantum Cowboys,” Sept. 23.)

Shin Ultraman

Director Shinji Higuchi already dragged Godzilla into the 21st century with Shin Gojira. Now he takes another of Japan’s most beloved cultural icons, the giant superhero Ultraman. But just as he made the whale-lizard truly terrifying again, now the alien savior of the world becomes more human than ever.

Country Gold

Mickey Reece’s idiosyncratic, thoughtful, and microbudgeted tales of strangeness in the profoundly normal are always deceptively fascinating. This time the Oklahoma native sends fictional version of country legend George “No Show” Jones on a one-night bender with a thinly disguised Garth Brooks before the “He Stopped Loving Her Today” musician gets his head frozen, Walt Disney-style.

Birdemic 3: Sea Eagle

Yeah, the Sharknado movies, y’know, jumped the shark, and The Room always seemed like weirdly calculated hipster bait, but James Nguyen’s deranged riff on Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds remains the height of “what did I just watch?” negative-budget home movies.

This article appears in September 30 • 2022.

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The Chronicle's first Culture Desk editor, Richard has reported on Austin's growing film production and appreciation scene for over a decade. A graduate of the universities of York, Stirling, and UT-Austin, a Rotten Tomatoes certified critic, and eight-time Best of Austin winner, he's currently at work on two books and a play.