#i just watched the new vhs it was pretty good if you like anthologies and you don't mind some gore

[picodart]

Digiweek 2021 - day 1: Beginnings

So I decided to do the Digiweek 2021 event this week. The first prompt is beginnings, whith one of the examples being “how you first got into Digimon”

(btw, i usually prefer the original japanese names, but since I’m talking about my first experiences with the english dub, I will be using the english names, just for this post)

For me it was in 3rd grade. I don’t remember which was the exact first episode I saw. I know I watched assorted episodes of the Devimon and Etemon arcs out of order (I also never happened to catch the Frigimon ep during the original run, first seeing it when I stumbled upon a VHS when I was in middle school) and despite some other kids saying it was a Pokemon ripoff, I thought it was pretty good.

However, I remember it was the Myotismon/real world arc that really got me hooked. If I had to pick a single episode that got me invested it would be “Out on the Town”, the Pumpkinmon and Gotsumon ep. First of all, my favorire holiday is halloween and as a kid I always loved goofy incompitant henchmen, so despite dying at the end of the episode, Pumpkinmon instantly become a favorite of mine (I think he may actually be my second favorite perfect level digimon after LadyDevimon) 

Second of all, like I said, up until then I had mostly seen various Devimon and Etemon eps out of order  (I think I’d seen all of the Etemon arc, and like half the Devimon arc) and though I may or may not of seen some of the early eps where DemiDevimon was messing with the kids (not totally sure) but I know I had somehow completely missed Myotismon’s introduction and the Digidestined traveling back to the real world. (I think I may have previously been watching reruns during a different timeslot or something)

So needless to say, I was pretty confused when I first saw Matt and TK running around in Japan, as well as when a Vampire villain I’d never seen before showed up, but everyone recognized him. Obviously I’d missed a lot, but the whole premise of them being in the real world (as well as a much more ruthless villain) must of captured my interest, since from then on I continued to tune into every episode of the Digimon Adventure anime, in order, all the way through Wizardmon / Gatomon eps, the Dark Masters arc, and the final showdown with Apocalymon. 

In fact, I’m fairly certain Digimon Adventure was the first series with an ongoing story that I ever got into. Up until then I’d mostly watched nicktoons, episodic cartoon network shows, kids horror anthologies like Goosebumps, and the first season of Pokemon (I know Pokemon kind of had an ongoing story, but really, for the most part the show was pretty episodic and you could watch the episodes out of order, and the only big change is some of the characters had new pokemon)

 So I think it says something to the writing quality of Digimon Adventure that it got little 8 to 9-year old me so invested as to follow along a serialized plot for the first time ever.

#digimon #digiweek2021 #day 1 #digimon adventure #pumpkinmon #gotsumon #myotismon #vamdemon #pumpmon #digiweek 2021 #digiweek #digisafe

[nileqt87]

More thoughts on how to resurrect the Indiana Jones franchise post-Harrison Ford

Perhaps a proper, modern television show would be a good way to bring back a younger, but adult Indy (with perhaps flashbacks littered throughout). You can also get away with a lot more content (definitely aim for TV-14) and characters who are allowed to be flawed. Relationship dramas are serialized storytelling's forte in a way that is disappearing more and more from blockbuster films. Complicated characters are better left to television, as the audience expects and allows for it because of the nuance and depth the serialization affords. The complicated, messy story of Abner and Marion is a story best left to being explored only after the characters have some real complexity and development. It also wouldn't be forced to play to the mass audience of under-13s that makes modern PG-13 often meaningless. In comparison, TV-14 actually pushes up harder against its limits regularly--not just violence, but also with innuendo and sexuality minus nudity. The amount of historical-style, pulpy violence, not to mention potentially comically gruesome deaths, in Indy would also necessitate the rating. Indiana Jones might be niche enough at this point with an audience veering towards adults who grew up with it (Gen-X and the older end of Gen-Y), while Gen-Z has little awareness of it, that Disney wouldn't be forced to make it a total kiddie property. It's not the same situation as back in the early '90s with Young Indy being aimed at older kids who had recently seen Last Crusade in the theater. They could reboot it for television with a young adult Indy who potentially could grow into a fully adult version. And I wouldn't try too hard to not step on the trilogy's toes with the timeline. Just let it live in its own developing continuity.

Use of long-running supporting cast (parents, Remy and returning guest stars aside) would also be a big difference from Young Indy. Characters like Belloq (could potentially go from friend to antagonist, akin to how Smallville handled Lex), Sallah, Henry, Brody, Abner, Marion, etc... could actually be around a lot more than just for an adventure here or there. These are all characters Indy had clearly known for years. Actually put the show into a seasonal, serialized format that isn't a new cast every episode. You could also stick around in locations a lot longer this way, which would help with budget.

Another thought I've had since watching an absolute ton of fantasy/sci-fi dramas in the last few years is that the influence of Indiana Jones is actually pretty apparent in a number of pretty famous characters, sometimes overtly and sometimes a bit more subtly. Harrison, Indy or Raiders in general are outright name-checked in quite a few places, often by scrappy action hero types who tend to take hard beatings (the kinds of characters who should've died a hundred times over) while in situations they're way over their heads in or literally impossible odds they can't win. Like Indy, the intended prize isn't won at the end and, outside of a few gruesome baddie deaths, the shady, corrupt or evil barely get a dent. Fox Mulder and Dean Winchester are two characters who name-check the comparison overtly and you can see the writers and actors both having the influence in mind. It's obviously a male fantasy, too. The influence on The X-Files and Supernatural is definitely there. Supernatural is chock full of biblical MacGuffins (not to mention having angels and demons as most of its recurring supporting cast), so it would be a hard comparison to avoid. Raiders came up in the WWII Nazi submarine episode with a piece of the Ark onboard (it's subsequently a show to raid for Indy ideas, because they pretty much mined everything biblical), for example. The X-Files likewise was dealing with shady government officials and pretty blatantly copied the huge warehouse of government secrets loaded with alien relics (and then repeated the Cigarette Smoking Man's warehouse reveal with the tunnel of filing cabinets stretching on forever). Mulder was also very much a one-man army a lot of the time when it came to the alien conspiracy (no offense to Scully). Moments like him climbing/riding the tops of sky rides, trains and escaping the spaceship were total Indy-esque moments. Sam and Dean had literal God-tier levels of plot armor keeping them alive (repeated resurrections included). Angel is another one that, unlike Mulder and the Winchesters being very human, is a supernatural character (subsequently his level of pain tolerance and durability is at the level of regular impalement, defenestration out of skyscrapers and being set on fire), but the comparison still holds because of how often he's getting decimated and fighting forces way beyond his pay grade. Wolfram & Hart, the Shanshu and seeking redemption with the Powers that Be, like the mytharc conspiracy/alien takeover and literal God a.k.a. Chuck, is another endless, unwinnable fight that is so far beyond all the protagonists that there's no win/happily ever after and they'd be lucky just walking away from it with nothing. Angel also name-checks Indy with a blatantly Indy-inspired fantasy dream episode (Awakening in season 4) with Angelus making a crack about the Raiders fantasy. George Lucas actually visited the Angel set back in 2000 and was interested in how they were making mini movies every week and doing some pretty huge stunts on television. David Boreanaz had lunch with Lucas and has talked about it a few times over the many years. I mean, these are all shows starring action-oriented leading men and writing staffs of relatively similar age. Mostly Gen-X males with a few Baby Boomers (more so on the writing staff) with an audience that's primarily Gen-Y but appealing to a pretty broad age range (and probably a lot more female than originally intended!). Star Wars, Indiana Jones and Harrison Ford films in general were very formative to that generation. Harrison Ford is the ultimate leading man action star to a certain generation. Gen-Y got their familiarity with all of that by being the original home video/VHS generation and subsequently a lot more familiar with retro media (including things that were made before they were born or around that time) than Gen-Z. '80s movies have a lot of currency and familiarity still with Gen-Y, even if Baby Boomers were the stars of them and Gen-X were the ones who saw them in theaters. Gen-Y fangirls absolutely dominate the fandoms of many iconic television supernatural/sci-fi franchises (many are admittedly aging franchises). The WB/CW have catered to this group of fans for the last two and a half decades. If you're going to be reviving the character as a mid-20s-to-30s version (if the show lasts long enough, it probably will be stepping on the trilogy's toes timeline-wise by the end), I'd absolutely be aiming for this same audience and their tastes. They're also the audience who would be most receptive to and familiar with the character, IMO. If I were going to reinvent Indiana Jones for the television landscape, I would definitely be looking at those sorts of shows that have influence from the character already in their DNA. I think for the target audience, they'd definitely need to be aiming it at the same fanbases. Young Indy mostly tried to avoid stepping on Raiders' toes (despite Temple of Doom and Mask of Evil already making it ludicrous) by limiting the amount of supernatural elements, but I think a show would have to go all in on it. Indy would have to be transformed a bit in regards to trying to line him up with a character who would still be skeptical after all he's seen. Young Indy ended up forced into being a straight period drama with educational elements, which is very counter to what the audience wanted. There are things to keep from that approach (meeting historical persons, being a WWI veteran and witnessing history could absolutely be mined as backdrops to the stories), but the supernatural elements would have to exist in a revival now to get the audience who I think would be most receptive to it. While I would aim for a serialized drama format that would mean the globetrotting wouldn't have to completely change locations every episode (have it instead in arcs with some bigger MacGuffins and baddies perhaps crossing entire seasons), it's true that there would probably have to be more location filming than good, ol' Vancouver, but Disney is one of the few who could afford it (though Covid certainly would throw a wrench in it and political situations could potentially kill off certain locations). There's only so much green screen that Indy could get away with, though I imagine that a fair amount of it would have to be used for period piece reasons alone. There are a lot of modern intrusions even in historically-intact cities (Eastern Europe comes to mind as having a lot of its architecture intact and is affordable to film in) and around iconic landscapes to paint out. But at its core, it probably would need to bulk up its focus on the relationship dramas. Indy tends to have a girl at every port and to a degree you would introduce some of these love interests, but there's still a lot of relationships of every kind that could be developed and serialized. Certainly throw in a few femme fatales and tragic losses, given the Smallville-esque situation of there being an inevitable Indy/Marion endgame that should be kept--it thus becomes about the journey when it's a set conclusion. Absolutely have a strong recurring cast of Henry and friends new and old. The films actually have a lot of characters that Indy didn't just meet yesterday and could be developed to a huge extent. For a show to work now, there'd have to be a lot more connectivity to how often the recurring cast appear. Young Indy had a lot more of an anthology format with little chance of us getting attached to most of the revolving cast outside of a very tiny few. That's the biggest thing I'd change. You need characters to become regulars beyond just Indy if it were revived for modern cinematic television (the true successor to the film serials of the '30s!) in a way that isn't necessary for film installments.

#indana jones #harrison ford #lucasfilm #indy #young indy

[fromtheringapron]

WWF Royal Rumble 1988

Date: January 24, 1988.

Location: Copps Coliseum in Hamilton, Ontario. 

Attendance: 18,000.

Commentary: Vince McMahon and Jesse Ventura.

Results:

1. Ricky Steamboat defeated Rick Rude via disqualification. 

2. Two-out-of-Three Falls Match for the WWF Women’s Tag Team Championship: The Jumping Bomb Angels (Noriyo Tateno & Itzuki Yamazaki) defeated The Glamour Girls (Judy Martin & Leilani Kai) (champions) (with Jimmy Hart) to win the titles. 

3. Royal Rumble Match: Jim Duggan won the match by lastly eliminating One Man Gang. Other participants included (in order of appearance): Bret Hart, Tito Santana, Butch Reed, Jim Neidhart, Jake Roberts, Harley Race, Jim Brunzell, Sam Houston, Danny Davis, Boris Zhukov, Don Muraco, Nikolai Volkoff, Ron Bass, B. Brian Blair, Hillbilly Jim, Dino Bravo, The Ultimate Warrior, and Junkyard Dog. 

4. Two-out-of-Three Falls Match: The Islanders (Haku & Tama) defeated The Young Stallions (Paul Roma & Jim Powers). 

My Review 

The first ever Royal Rumble event is a far cry from the much-hyped first stop on the Road to WrestleMania as we know it today. While the Rumble match was the creative genius of Pat Patterson, the event itself was largely birthed out of Vince McMahon’s cutthroat political maneuvering in the late ‘80s. The story is pretty well-documented now: With rival Jim Crockett Promotions set to air its new pay-per-view Bunkhouse Stampede on January 24, 1988, McMahon decided to launch a special of his own, dubbed the Royal Rumble, on the same night in direct competition, this time on free TV. A typical dick move from McMahon, but the plan worked. Royal Rumble scored huge TV ratings while Bunkhouse Stampede was critical and commercial bust, and the rest was history.

Royal Rumble ’88 can’t help but feel like the WWF testing the waters for their next big pay-per-view event. The Rumble match alone could tell you that. As the only one to feature 20, not 30, men, it’s a comparatively paltry affair with much lower stakes. The winner, Jim Duggan, gets nothing more than bragging rights and a nifty little accomplishment to add to his resume. One thing that particularly stands out is how the “no friends” angle of the match isn’t put over at all, instead sticking to a strict heel vs. face divide. I’d say this is to the match’s detriment, but the crowd doesn’t give a damn. They’re absolutely sucked into the entire thing. It’s not hard at all to see why the WWF decided to build an annual pay-per-view around it.

But, of course, they couldn’t just treat 18,000 people in the Copps Coliseum to only one match. There was an entire show to fill out, and that explains why we’re also treated to a mixed bag of matches and segments that put the show on a weird pace. Arguably just as big a draw, if not more so, as the Rumble match is the contract signing between Hulk Hogan and Andre The Giant for their historic rematch on The Main Event. In an age where contract singings are a monthly occurrence on Raw, the segment seems like nothing special, but it was huge frickin’ deal in 1988, especially considering the rematch is still the most-watched wrestling match on cable TV. Much less of a frickin’ deal is a torturous Dino Bravo weightlifting segment, which seemingly lasts for three decennia and exists solely as a vessel for cheap heat.

There are only three other matches booked on the card, two of them being two-out-of-three falls tag matches. The first of these is the excellent WWF Women’s Tag Team Championship match, one of the few shining moments for women’s wrestling in ‘80s WWF. There’s always been this narrative that women’s wrestling wasn’t successful in the U.S. because “fans didn’t care about it” when, in reality, it was more because the bookers didn’t care about it. When given time and development, fans certainly did care, and let this match and its showcase for The Jumping Bomb Angels serves as proof. The other tag match is a completely unnecessary bout between The Islanders and The Young Stallions. Not only is it unnecessary, but it actually ends the show! This is largely due to the WWF’s practice of front-loading their TV specials at the time, but you’d be forgiven if you turned the show off after the Rumble.

While Royal Rumble 1988 isn’t exactly a must-see, it makes for interesting viewing as a blueprint. Just a year later, the show would air on pay-per-view and begin to resemble the event we recognize. There were still kinks to be ironed out following the 1989 show but if nothing else, at least they learned to never air a weightlifting segment ever again.

My Random Notes

When exactly did they start acknowledging this show as canon? I seem to remember the ’89 Rumble being acknowledged as the first Rumble for many years and then it suddenly changed. Also, since it was never released on VHS, this was something of a “lost” show for me and I didn’t get to view it in full in the DVD Anthology came out.

Vince not being able to tell the Jumping Bomb Angels apart gives me secondhand embarrassment, and then he refers to Noriyo Tateno as “Norino” for good measure.

Some noticeable absences here: Randy Savage, then-current IC champ The Honkytonk Man, and Rick Martel, which is particularly odd given his tag partner Tito Santana made it to the Copps Coliseum that night just fine.

So many guys have their one-time only appearance in the Rumble here, which makes this one more of a novelty. The names include: Sam Houston, Danny Davis, Butch Reed, Don Muraco, Hillbilly Jim, The Killer Bees, Boris Zhukov, Harley Race, and JYD (who you just know is winding down his WWF career here given how he’s dumped out unceremoniously and doesn’t have a care in the world).

Jesse still manages to put over Bret Hart on commentary. He always went out of his way to tell us that Bret is awesome and it’s something that always sticks out when I watch anything from this period.

My god, the dubbed Rick Rude theme on the WWE Network is terrible. Why can’t they get his original theme music, anyway? Does it have anything to do with the killer sax?

If you needed any further proof that Islanders vs. The Young Stallions was a complete afterthought, they actually air Ted DiBiase segment between falls while both guys have to awkwardly linger around the ring. Paul Roma could never catch a break.

So was Nikolai Volkoff running out to the ring before his number a botch or genuinely planned? It’s a hilarious bit either way.

On Dino Bravo: Why did they push this dude so much? I get that he was a huge star in Montreal, and that was a completely different world all to itself, but I just don’t see how it could’ve translated into a role as a top heel in a major national promotion. Compared to the embarrassment of riches they had in colorful heels at the time, his generic anti-American act seems dull and kinda outdated even for the time period.

One final note: I wish that fan who brought their own megaphone to the Copps Coliseum a particularly unpleasant evening, wherever they may be now.

#royal rumble #wrestling #wwe network #andre the giant

[deathrock]

Weekly Horror Watch List (Week #1)

(Originally posted in r/horror)

The Monster Club (1981) - I'm not sure how this one managed to fly under my radar. It's a brilliant anthology film starring Vincent Price. Between stories there's live music and entertainment for a punk/post-punk crowd. 9/10

Cat People (1982) - Granted, I never did see the original. But I thought this was excellent! Despite the long runtime, it was very well paced. Felt like the retelling of a classic novel. Great acting, obviously great Bowie song. Kinda fell in love with it. 9/10

Gremlins (1984) - I watched this in theaters for the promo going on last weekend. I realized while watching that I'd never actually seen more than the first half before! I absolutely loved it, great Christmas movie. My only complaint is that we don't get to see enough of the Gremlins when they're cute and fluffy. 8/10

Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990) - Obviously the Gremlins didn't look as good as they did in the original, but I thought this was an excellent follow-up. It was fun as hell. 8/10

Body Parts (1991) - A family man gets into a car accident and loses an arm, luckily they can do arm transplants. But the arm used to belong to a serial killer so it's evil! Cheesy in all the right early 90s ways. This one's underrated. 8/10

The People Under The Stairs (1991) - I recall being disappointed when I saw this for the first time 5 years ago, perhaps because I was expecting more screen time for the "people under the stairs", but upon second viewing, I fucking love this movie. It's heartwarming, yet so goddamn weird. 8/10

Species (1995) - First time seeing this since its original release on VHS and it still holds up despite the bad CGI. 8/10

Demon (2015) - Parts of this dragged on a bit too long, but I'm glad it exists. I think it brings something refreshing to the horror genre. I would have appreciated it far more if I were more familiar with Polish/Jewish history. It kinda felt like whatever the subgenre for I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House is, but definitely far more suspense/thriller elements. It was somewhat of a comedy too. This sub would appreciate it. 7/10

Minutes Past Midnight (2016) - I appreciate this anthology for what it is, but it's very similar to ABCs of Death, meaning it's hit or miss. Kind of a lot of misses. I think it's still worth checking out. 6/10

Boys In The Trees (2016) - I love that it takes place in the late 90s, I wasn't quite a teenager back then but I think they created an accurate portrayal. Great music and imagery. There's so much to love about this movie. Unfortunately, the characters fall completely flat. It's pretty bad when you don't give a shit about any of the main characters. I appreciated so much about it, but it felt soulless. 7/10

Killing Ground (2016) - A fucked up "killers in the wilderness" story. One of the victims is a baby. Several parts were difficult to watch so I don't recommend it for everybody, but I liked it. Probably wouldn't watch it again though. 7/10

Split (2016) - I finally watched this on my free HBO trial through Amazon. I loved it, especially compared to Shyamalan's found footage film that came out a few years back. I thought it was a great take on the abduction genre. Perfectly suspenseful with next-level acting. 8/10

Hounds of Love (2016) - One of the best thrillers I've seen in a long time. Just after the viewing I read an article about how the film steals particular details from a true crime case that the victim doesn't want to be broadcast. It's unfortunate the director denies that the film is based on the case and therefore responsibility, but at the very least, we did get a good horror movie inspired by this real life tragedy. Also, Joy Division at the end. 9/10

Non-horror:

The Cheshire Murders (2013) - True crime documentary on HBO about a 2007 family murder in Connecticut. Fucking heartbreaking. This was recommended on the My Favorite Murder podcast semi-recently. The small town kind of reminds me of Pawnee, IN with all its quirks. 8/10

Why Him? (2016) - Stupid comedy starring James Franco where the joke goes on way too long for it to actually stay funny. It's basically a modern take on that Pauly Shore movie Son In Law. It had some good jokes here and there, so I guess it's worth watching once. Just don't expect anything great. 6/10

#horror movies #weekly watchlist

[gusticeleague]

Morty’s Mind Blowers review

Oh thank god, it’s an easy one.

I was surprised that this turned out to the the answer to Interdimensional Cable this season. I thought Tales from the Citadel was going to be it, since it basically had the same anthology structure but more focused and less based on vignettes.  

Actually if anything, the episode Morty’s Mind Blowers most reminds me of is the parasite episode, given that it focuses on the unpleasant memories you have about your mistakes or your family that you wish you could erase but have to live with because that’s a part of your shared history, for better or worse.

I can totally buy from a character perspective that Morty would want to erase the terrible things he does and Rick would allow him because when Morty gets emotional, it interferes with Rick’s work. I especially love the idea that Rick erases any evidence that he isn’t a hyper-capable genius in Morty’s mind (and that beating him at checkers is one such slight deserving of memory erasure to him). My one gripe though is when they hit the amnesia angle halfway through. It works for what the episode is trying to do because it means we get to see more Mind Blowers, but I’ve never been a fan of amnesia plots because they don’t really tend to use that opportunity to teach us anything new about the characters and just expect the audience to laugh at the characters rediscovering who they are, which is never as funny to me as putting characters in new environments or familiar but slightly off versions of them, which is where Tales from the Citadel really succeeded.

As good as all those Mind-Blowers were (I don’t think there’s a bad one in the lot), I kind of felt the framing story could have leaned into similar thematic territory. If you’ve read my rankings of Rick and Morty episodes from the first two seasons, you’ll see a pretty big disparity between the two Interdimensional Cable episodes. To my mind, Rixty Minutes works better over Interdimensional Cable II: Tempting Fate because while they both lean into the escapist power of television to distract you from getting involved with complicated family drama, Rixty Minutes uses that conceit for one of the most life-affirming character moments ever put to television and a thesis statement for the entire show, while Interdimensional Cable II takes what could have been an interesting reason to have all the characters watching television (to distract from worrying about a mortally diseased Jerry) and proceeded to do nothing interesting with it. I can’t really blame them though. From what I’ve gleaned about that episode’s production, Interdimensional Cable ran out of steam as a concept pretty quickly, as they initially thought was going to be their answer to Treehouse of Horror but then decided against it when they realised that they couldn’t make that lightning strike twice. And so instead we have Morty’s Mind Blowers, which gives the writing team time to really hash out a solid joke rather than rely on any random thing that Justin and company want to riff on in the booth.

There’s not really a whole lot to comment on here, so I’m probably just going to bullet point the rest of this one out. A freeform anthology review, if you will.

I’ve been trying to think of what regular episodes could count as mind-blowers, but then I realised that all of them take place after Jerry left, because he isn’t in any of them other than one brief one at Morty’s 13th birthday. Which is also an interesting continuity note, because Morty is 14 by the time the show starts and Rick had already been with the family for about a year prior to that point, since the anniversary of his coming back was in the first Council of Ricks episode. I’m guessing the 13th birthday one is either due to Rick’s shitty filing system and/or Rick deciding to remove that memory from Morty’s mind sometime after Jerry left, maybe because Morty reminded him about it and then removed it out of spite.

Hey look, it’s Neil Gaiman’s Sandman. This show is full of Endless possibilities. Also, the Truth Tortoise said “I’m a Beatle, Paul is dead” backwards, because of course it did.

I love how Jerry has a crappier version of the Mind Blower helmet with VHS tapes instead of vials of memory goo. One of them’s labelled “Sleepy Gary”.

They were pretty spot on with those Men in Black II jokes. “Save it for Youtube” made me chuckle, and also a little ashamed at the fact that I do spend a good chunk of my time online watching video essays.  

Anyway, it seems like that The Ricklantis Mixup took up the majority of the time and budget and was an emotional gut-punch to boot, so Morty’s Mind Blowers is meant to serve as a breather for the fans and the writers before we get to what I assume is going to be a gut-punch Beth and Rick episode and a climax to either Rick-Shank Redemption or The Ricklantis Mixup. And structural nit-picking aside, while The Ricklantis Mixup was a better anthology this season, this one had enough good clips in it that it passes the bar. Not Rixty Minutes good, but not Interdimensional Cable II bad. Probably somewhere in the ballpark of Lawnmower Dog.

Episode MVP: Summer, for not getting paid enough for this shit.

Favourite bit character: Poor Beebo. If only it were Venzenulon Nine, then he wouldn’t have died in vain.

And instead of best joke, here’s my:

Top 5 Mind Blowers

5) Beth’s Choice

Only including this one because it got such a reaction out of me. I’ve mentioned before how I find Beth one of the more interesting characters on the show because of how the writers base her psychological profile out of Rick leaving her as a child and how that affected her ability to relate to people, including Jerry and her own children. Choosing Summer over Morty feels in line with that. It kind of the inverse of that bit in Malcolm in the Middle where Lois says if she was to choose between saving Reese or Malcolm, she’d choose Reese, because he needs all the help he can get while Malcolm is smart enough to look after himself since he’s smart and Reese is an idiot. Whereas Beth would choose Summer since she’s more capable and less of a hassle to look after than Morty, who I think she sees as a smaller Jerry and she probably made that Sophie’s Choice a long time ago in her mind.

4) Talking to Animals

RIP Erica Henderson and Ryan North’s mentions. I’m really only including this on the list for the hummingbird’s thoughts, since it reminded me of The Far Side. I find the idea of animals secretly plotting against us kind of rote because it is almost always something cute and innocuous like a squirrel or a rabbit or a dolphin, and never something more genuinely benign and out-of-left-field like...I dunno, anteaters. Also turns out Rick and Morty have hopped realities again, which at this point they could only really do as a throwaway joke, cause there’s no way in hell they’re going to be able to top the end of Rick Potion #9.

3) The Whole Enchilada

Speaking of hell, the bait-and-switch of the alien having has an actual objective afterlife was excellent, and something I’ve always wondered why that hasn’t been explored more. Especially if a species were to have a soul and what their notion of “life” would be if they know it continues to exist for them after their tangible existence. That’s been done, right? Trek’s probably done it, surely.

2) Wrong Light Switch

Great set-up, excellent punch-line. The less you explain it, the funnier it is.

1 ) “True Level”

My favourite kind of joke is to take an ordinary activity or thing and ramp it up to a ridiculous science fiction version of that thing. My favourite kind of Rick and Morty joke is to have Rick be the one to introduce the sci-fi version of a thing to Morty, only for Rick to get frustrated at Morty’s inability to wrap his head around it. My second favourite kind of Rick and Morty joke is to have a character gain a sudden cosmic revelation and having it crush their spirit so completely as to be permanently emotionally crippled, usually while woefully lamenting their own insignificance. So this is basically the perfect joke to me. My true level of jokes.

It does feel a little familiar though, mostly because I think I can tell that Dan Harmon wrote this segment. Rick’s rant about judging level with “your naked caveman eye and a bubble of fucking air” could have been taken from any first five minutes of a Harmontown episode, and the whole premise seems incredibly similar to that Community joke about the room where they get room temperature from. Be that as it may, there’s no sin in being familiar, and “REALITY IS POISON!” made me laugh my ass off, so it’s a very easy hit to my funny bone regardless.

Final Rating: 3 out of 5 grapples

#rick and morty #rick sanchez #morty smith #summer smith #beth sanchez #mortys mind blowers #dan harmon #justin roiland

[stacks-reviews]

Must Reads Special Part 4

This episode: It’s Time to get Spooky!

A look at some of Stacks favorite scary books and shows.

Please note: not everything that will be listed is necessarily scary. I scare easily. 

--Anything by Junji Ito Junji Ito is widely considered a Mastermind of Horror and for good reason. He has a very surreal art style that makes his stories all the more disturbing. So far I have read Uzumaki, Tomie, Gyo (all the deluxe editions), Fragments of Horror, and Junji Ito’s Cat Diary: Yon and Mu (this one isn’t horror, it’s a biography of him, his wife, and their two cats). 

I didn’t find every story to be scary (like Gyo) but each has disturbing imagery, Fragments of Horror might have the worst image but it’s been a year so I can’t recall what that scene was. My favorite story was Uzumaki but my favorite short story was in the end of Gyo, The Enigma of Arigara Fault. 

Uzumaki: A town is infested with spirals Tomie: There’s something about a young woman that drives men to love her and then kill her. And somehow she always comes back to life. Fragments of Horror: Various short horror stories Gyo: Dead fish with robotic limbs terrorize the world Dissolving Classroom: A series of shorts following two siblings. One who is obsessed with the devil and can melt people’s brain by repeatedly apologizing to them. And his little sister who is just plain crazy. It came out in January of this year. I haven’t read all of it yet. Shiver: Another collection of short horror stories that will be released in the US in December of this year.

--The Forest of Hands and Teeth, The Dead-Tossed Waves, and The Dark and Hollow Places by Carrie Ryan It’s basically The Village but the monsters are real and they are zombies. At least in the first book. Everyone in the first one wears puritan style clothes and it a very old-fashioned village, surrounded by a fence that they may never cross unless they are a Guardian who spends every day or night walking the fences and watching for breaches and fighting when necessary. Travel beyond the village is forbidden due to losing contact with the other villages years back (they’d travel using a fenced path). Forbidden by the Sisterhood, the governing body of woman of the village. (Forgive me for this summary. It has been a long time since I last read this series).

Our main lead is Mary who ultimately wants more out of life than just marrying and living in this fenced in world. Then one day a girl wearing unusual clothes shows up on the path which proves to Mary that the other villages are still standing and would like to see them. But the Sisterhood takes the stranger away. And Mary soon after finds her among the Unconsecrated outside the fence. An unusually fast and strong Unconsecrated. And thus they have doomed themselves.

I loved this series when I first read it. And as I reread it before each new book came out. The writing style is very beautiful. Some scenes gave me chills (the scene with the baby, the name sake of book two, the sewers of book three). It was one of the few zombie stories I was able to read and enjoy. And that list hasn’t grown much. Because I am a coward and frighten easily.

--The Girl with All the Gifts and The Boy on the Bridge by M.R. Carey “Melanie is a very special girl. Dr. Caldwell calls her “our little genius.” Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant Parks keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don’t like her. She jokes that she won’t bite, but they don’t laugh. Melanie loves school. She loves learning about spelling and sums and the world outside the classroom and the children’s cells. She tells her favorite teacher all the things she’ll do when she grows up. Melanie doesn’t know why this makes Miss Justineau look sad.”

Read this last year and really enjoyed it. And it was recently made into a movie which I hear was pretty good; from a friend who has also read the book. The Girl with all the Gifts starts with a facility housing zombie children who can function like a person. Sorta anyway. They are extremely smart and can even talk. The children are being used to find out why they are so different and to hopefully find a cure. But then contact with the last standing city in England is cut. Then the facility is attacked by a group of humans who decided to live outside the city as they lead a hoard of zombies to attack. A small group escapes the facility, including Miss Justineau, Sergeant Parks, (evil) Dr. Caldwell, and Melanie. The rest of the book follows them as they try to reach the city.

The Boy on the Bridge is a sorta prequel but can be treated as a stand alone novel within the world of The Girl with all the Gifts. It follows the group of the Rosalind Franklin, also called Rosie, that is referenced in The Girl with all the Gifts. Rosie is a massive and impressive research truck that set out from the last city in order to get samples, make tests, and hopefully find a cure for the virus. 

I would recommend reading The Girl with all the Gifts before reading The Boy on the Bridge. It made the prequel a lot more nerve wrecking to me. Because all we know about Rosie before this book is that contact with her was lost. No one knows what happened to her or her crew. So while reading it I just knew that at any moment they were going to get attacked. It made me tense. I wanted to avoid the moment at night so I wouldn’t have nightmares (once again I am a coward so you might not have the same problem).

--Kenan & Kel: Two Heads are Better Than None “The Rockmores set out on a family road trip with an uninvited Kel stashed in the trunk. While camping out in the woods, Kenan has a scary encounter with a mysterious, shadowy figure...”

The Halloween movie of the TV show Kenan & Kel. I adore this movie. So does my whole family. We still have a recording of it on a VHS, which was later burned onto a DVD thanks to one of my aunts. Though now that I have The Splat I can just watch it off the DVR. 

It’s a really fun movie. We quote it a lot.

--Tales from the Crypt When I was younger my family watched this show all the time. My cousins and I would lay down and sit up in time with the Crypt Keeper. A while back I slowly bought each season and I try to watch some episodes every year. It’s a great little anthology horror series. 

A reboot had been planned for this series but it is still in hiatus. If not already canceled.

#time to get spooky #halloween #junji ito #uzumaki #tomie #gyo #fragments of horror #dissolving classroom #shiver #the enigma of amigara fault #junji ito's cat diary #the forest of hands and teeth #the dead tossed waves #the dark and hollow places #carrie ryan #the village #the girl with all the gifts #the boy on the bridge #m.r. carey #kenan & kel #two heads are better than none #tales from the crypt #books #Book Recommendations #tv series #movies #the splat #nickelodeon

[the-hellbound-heart]

V/H/S (2012)

What better way to kick things off than with one of the first horror films I ever saw on Netflix, VHS.

I watched this for the first time a couple years ago when I was just starting to get into horror films, after finding it on a list of “alternative horror movies to watch on Halloween.” At the time, it absolutely terrified me. I distinctly remember walking my friend to her dorm and then having to run back alone down her building’s staircase, eerily similar to a staircase that acts as a set piece near the beginning of the movie.

As much as it scared me, I did really like this film, even if it has its cheesy moments. Recently I had the opportunity to revisit it, and after seeing so many horror films since I first watched VHS, I was interested to see if it still holds up. And it does, mostly.

VHS is a found footage anthology made up of five different short films inside of a frame narrative. I’ve seen plenty of bad found footage films, but I’ll also defend the genre as one that can be effective when used well. VHS is kind of a mixed bag in regard to how the found footage is used, but I’ll go into the specifics of this later on.

As for anthology films, these tend to be more hit or miss for me, usually with one or two shorts that stand out among a bunch of mediocre ones, but this has come to be expected in a genre focused on experimentation.

Since VHS is a series of shorts, I’ll review each one individually as opposed to the movie as a whole, because, again, they are very hit or miss.

“Tape 56″ (Frame Narrative)

“Tape 56″ is the main storyline that the film cuts back to in between shorts. It focuses on a group of criminals who make money filming videos of themselves sexually assaulting women and committing other various crimes. They are hired to break into a house and steal a VHS tape, where they find the owner of the house dead in front of his television. They begin to watch the VHS tapes, kicking off our other stories.

There’s not really much to say about this one. It serves its purpose by tying the narrative together, but it is pretty bland and the characters are extremely unlikable. Much of the dialogue is just needless exposition about the criminals explaining how they make their money. It’s boring, and the opening montage leaves an especially bad taste.

“Amateur Night”

Luckily, the first short we are treated to makes up for the bad opening. “Amateur Night” follows three young men who spend a night hopping from club to club, hoping to pick up girls. However, one of the girls is not what she seems, and many delightfully gruesome events ensue.

This segment is probably my favorite (apparently others felt the same as it ended up with its own spin off film, SiREN). It holds little back as far as content goes (this segment is one of the few movie scenes I have ever seen that features full on male nudity, in addition to being wonderfully violent) but manages to maintain an air of mystery. We are told what we need to know about the characters and their situation but are spared from clunky and pointless exposition dialogue like that in the “Tape 56″ segment.

I also found the characters in this segment to be some of the best in a film that is not exactly stellar with character development. The main character isn’t a total dick, unlike most of the characters in this movie, and seeing his dickish friends meet bloody ends is very satisfying. The monster, which I won’t spoil, is also an intriguing character, if more than a bit terrifying.

Overall, “Amateur Night” makes for a solid and effectively scary short.

“Second Honeymoon”

This segment follows a young married couple traveling through the southwest on their “second honeymoon.” They are stalked by a mysterious stranger, who breaks into their hotel room while they are sleeping.

There’s not much to say about this one. It’s slowly paced, the characters didn't interest me much, and I didn’t find it that scary. The ending twist was lame. The best thing I can say about it is that at least it was short.

“Tuesday the 17th”

This short is about a group of high school aged kids who accompany their new friend on a hiking trip in the woods to the spot where several of her other friends were murdered a year before. The kids are followed by a strange creature known as “The Glitch,” whose face is kept obscured by a glitch in the video.

The effect used on the glitch monster is really interesting, even if the segment itself borrows from familiar narratives (it has a lot in common with Slenderman-type stories). The characters are standard, and the story is predictable, but the effects and the mysterious nature of the creature still make it interesting enough to watch.

“The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily When She Was Younger”

This one utilizes found footage in a creative way, taking the form of video chats between Emily and her boyfriend. Emily has been encountering what appear to be ghost children in her apartment at night. At the same time, she begins to notice a strange bump on her arm, which draws her suspicions.

Emily and her boyfriend are well-enough defined characters, and it ends up being more unique than just another ghost kid story. The big drawback for me is that it’s really fucking confusing. It wasn’t until I read the film’s imdb page that I learned what the twist at the end was supposed to be. It’s not a bad short, but I do wish there could have been more to clarify what exactly was going on.

“10/31/98″

It’s typical for anthology films to end on their strongest short, and that certainly is the case here (though personally I would consider this one on par with “Amateur Night,” this seems to be the general audience favorite).

This segment follows a group of friends on Halloween as they get lost on their way to a party and stumble upon some sort of ritual, where they rescue a young woman. As they attempt to escape with her, paranormal phenomena seem to follow them.

This is a good old fashioned ghost/demon story, and boy is it effective. This is easily the scariest segment of the film, with the tension escalating perfectly as things get more and more dire, before ending on a horrifying and gruesome note.

As a whole, I probably enjoy VHS a little more than most people do. While much of it does drift into generic jump scare territory, great shorts such as “Amateur Night” and “10/31/98″ more than make up for the lesser segments.

Though the found footage is used relatively well in many parts of the film, it also has its drawbacks. In some segments it doesn’t make sense for the characters to be filming the events (”Second Honeymoon”, for example), and one does have to question the use of a VHS format in a movie that presumably takes place in 2012.

For as many scenes that use found footage poorly, however, there are plenty that use it smartly. “Tuesday the 17th” and “The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily” give enough variety to keep it interesting, and even shorts like “Amateur Night” give an explanation for why the characters are filming, even when any sane person would drop the camera and start running.

It’s worth mentioning that there is a weird bit of sexism to this film as a whole, which delights maybe a little too much in seeing women assaulted and objectified. It walks a thin line between subverting sexist tropes (“Amateur Night”) and embracing them (”Tape 56″), but the misogynistic undertones should definitely be noted and is the major drawback of the film.

As far as effects go, this film stays pretty minimalist, but there are some really good gore scenes, which range from realistic to cheesy and fake, but never feel out of place. If that kind of thing bothers you, though, I would not recommend this film. Just about every segment has some pretty graphic gore.

Overall, I give VHS a tentative thumbs up. It’s hit or miss, but the parts that work really work and it makes for some great scares. I’d recommend VHS to anyone who likes found footage and exploring different genres.

(It’s also worth noting that this film has two sequels, VHS 2 and VHS: Viral. I have seen the second one and will post my review soon, but I have not seen the third one yet.)

#sorry this review is so long! #i swear they won't be this long in the future #i just had a lot to say about this film #reviews #vhs #my reviews #kyla speaks #found footage #horror films #horror reviews #netflix #horror films on netflix #vhs (2012) #vhs movie #vhs 2012

[faygosmayhem]

Story Time #2- Final Fantasy & Me:Part 2

The Reason People Should Be Afraid of Clowns: 

I was gifted the PlayStation Final Fantasy Anthology at the end of the ‘04/’05 school year to celebrate my moving up in the world. On it was ported versions of Final Fantasy V and Final Fantasy VI, which had originally been released in the US for the Super Nintendo as Final Fantasy III.

 I started out playing V a few days later. For some reason, it never grabbed me at all. I got through a good chunk of the game, then hit a troublesome boss and just stopped playing it. I still can’t remember anything about the game no matter how hard I think on it. Probably because it was overshadowed by what came next.

 After rage quitting FFV, I moved on to VI and never looked back. Similar to IX, I was automatically captured by the game’s easy charm and emotional resonance. The characters in that game are so multifaceted and I found each of them to be wonderful in their unique way. 

The one thing VI has that IX, unfortunately, does not is a fantastic villain. Kefka, the demented little fashion-challenged asshole, easily set the standard for things that make up the perfect villain to me. This guy had absolutely no motivation other than just wanting to watch the world burn, and is a key citation of personality traits you never, ever, want to encounter. 

Comical as he was, Kefka scared the ever loving crap out of me, much more than any horror game or movie I’ve experienced since then (with the exception of Silent Hill 2), and I freaking loved it. Of all the memorable aspects of FFVI, that maniacal laugh is always the first thing to come to mind. 

Me In The Spotlight, Losing My Religion

( readers with sensitive views on religion might want to avoid this part)

People always look at me like I’ve grown a second head when I tell them that a video game is the reason I became an Atheist. I agree that sounds a little extreme, but back in ‘05/’06 when I finally caught up to the rest of the world and got my hands on Final Fantasy X, it made perfect sense. 

For the first time, I wasn’t the one in my circle of three close friends to acquire the game first. That honor went to my friend Mikey (that is not her real name), who had just been gifted the game and a Ps2 of her own. The problem was that she didn’t have a memory card and couldn’t afford one (they were anywhere from 25-40$ dollars at the time), and called me up one day desperately begging to borrow mine after having had to play through the intro of the game all the way to leaving Besaid island for the third time because her mom kept shutting off the system.

 Of course I wanted to help her out, but this created a bit of a problem; I couldn’t lend her my memory card indefinitely because it would prevent me from enjoying my own games. The solution was for us to play through the game the first time completely in each others company. By that point we were used to getting through sections of games together, but this was the first (and last) attempt for us to play the entire game under the stipulation that the game could not continue unless both of us were there. So, naturally, I practically moved into her house for the summer. 

Things started out fun enough. We ruthlessly made fun of the game for hours on end. We shared laughs and frustrations with the game’s mechanics, had fun recording amusing cut-scenes and lines of dialog (we made a YouTube poop VHS before YouTube was even a thing), and were just generally loving life at that point. 

Then we get to fucking operation Mi’ihen. 

That section of the game floored us both. We had just finished learning about Constantine and Crusades the year previous in school and had commented earlier about noticing the reference, though I never thought the game would ever try to give such a direct example. 

For those in need of a quick refresher, Operation Mi’ihen was the part of the game where the Crusaders and Al’Bhed team up and try to use a new type of machina to defeat Sin. The operation fails, most of the people who take part are slaughtered by Sinspawn, and the Crusaders who survive are excommunicated by the church for going against the teachings, even though two of Yevon’s most prominent figures were on site to ‘Bless the Operation’. Operation Mi’ihen was the point in the game where the religious allegory really got heavy, and just kept getting worse from there. 

After that section was over we both needed a break. I finally went home for the first time in about two weeks, and spent the next few days recharging my batteries until I was comfortable picking the game up again. We went back to joking about the game pretty easily, though the tone didn’t exactly improve from there. The next time the game broke me was during the revelation of Yevon and the Final Summoning. 

The knowledge that the entire journey up to that point had been a lie, a pointless quest of willing Martyrs that were being deceived themselves hit me the hardest. During that part of the game I adapted traits of characters I hated the most. I was dumbfounded, whiny, frustrated, and unwilling to believe what was going on even though the evidence was being clearly presented. I was Tidus and Wakka combined, and at that point I hated myself for it. I came to really loathe Yevon and its real world basis. 

When the game finally ended, I spent a few weeks in quiet contemplation. My friend wasn’t religious, and never had been, and couldn’t understand the extreme negative reaction. I was young, and at the time unable to formulate and articulate enough explanation while my feelings were still so turbulent. I distanced myself from her for a time while I tried to work it out. 

All these years later I can finally put words to the metaphor I saw when I witnessed the end of the game. To save her world from Sin, Yuna sacrifices her fayth (the Aeons) and kills the dream (the Zanarkand utopia). The lie of Yevon is disbanded and the world enters an Eternal Calm. 

I couldn’t explain it at the time, but I felt it. After coming to terms with everything, I renounced my faith in the church. Playing Final Fantasy X wasn’t the only catalyst, there were plenty of real world instances and influences that had me questioning even before the game, but FFX was definitely the boiling point. 

X is the only FF game I’ve never been able to play all the way through more than once. I went back again after my friend let me borrow the game for myself in order to get through all the sidequests, but never progressed past getting inside of Sin. When the re-masters came out, I tried again and couldn’t make it past the Mi’ihen Highroad. 

Final Fantasy X was a very good game, but it is still probably my least favorite of the ones I’ve played. 

Horrible Feeling Redux- This Time With Fun Costumes!

I honestly don’t know why I bothered with Final Fantasy X-2 this time around. I guess there was a part of me that wanted to see if the fake world was dealing with the loss of Fayth better than I was. My first playthrough of the game took me about six hours, and I was left so angry I almost broke a controller. 

Once again, it took a chance encounter and consult of a guide for me to realize I played the game wrong, and that by only following the game’s main story points I had missed about 9/10ths of the content and that was the reason the game felt incomplete and pointless. With frequent trips to the EB Games across the street to re-check the guide I eventually was able to 100% the game and get the actual ending. 

I honestly don’t remember much of the plot, too much got drowned out in the endless repetitive mini-games and AP farming. I do remember liking the new characters, and that overall I was pleased with the re-visit to the world and how well the game handled the familiar while still being new enough to not feel like the same thing over again. I also must have watched that fmv of ‘1000 Words’ about a hundred times in that sphere dome (I had a file saved at the location so I could just watch it whenever). The take on the classic job system was interesting, but at the time I was a huge tomboy, and felt pretty offended that the game seemed to be trying to appeal to a female market by making the entire plot revolve around clothes. 

All in all, X-2 gave me peace with X. As much as I complain about it, I did end up liking it, though it was a game I could have done without. 

Ok readers, I know I promised XII with this part, but re-living the feelings of X took more out of me than I was expecting, so now it shall be lumped in with XIII, XIII-2 and XV. I do hope it’s as much of an experience reading it as it is writing. I’d like to hear some memories other people have with the series, if you have the time to share. 

Also, the header for X is a line from the song ‘Losing My Religion’ by REM. 

#final fantasy #dafetcha'sdumptruck

[aion-rsa]

Colleen Coover Revisits ‘Girly Porno’ Comic Small Favors with New Collection

Today, Colleen Coover is the Eisner Award-winning creator best known for comics including “X-Men: First Class,” “Gingerbread Girl” and the ongoing series “Bandette,” written by Paul Tobin and drawn by Coover, which saw its third print collection published by Dark Horse Comics late last year. Coover’s first comics project, though, was a little different. “Small Favors” was an adult comic originally published by Fantagraphics’ Eros Press imprint from 2000-2003, and is now coming back to print in a deluxe hardcover edition — titled “Small Favors: The Definitive Girly Porno Collection” — from Oni Press’ Limerence Press imprint, the publisher’s erotica and sex education line.

“Small Favors” tells the story of Annie and a spite named Nibbil, who’s assigned to watch Annie by her conscience. Nibbil does not keep Annie’s libido in check, and over the course of the series the book manages to maintain a tone that is fun, sex positive and playful — and by the end, also surprisingly moving and romantic.

In a new interview with CBR, Coover makes it clear that was the goal from the beginning. In our conversation she talks about the challenges of making a comic without drama, why she ended “Small Favors” and why she views the book as her “grad school dissertation.”

CBR: I had heard of “Small Favors” before this, but I never had a chance to read the series until this new edition. Was this your first comic?

Colleen Coover: It was my first major project. I had some stuff with Paul [Tobin] earlier. He was doing an independent comic for a small press called “Attitude Land” and that came out first through Caliber Press and then Slave Labor in the ’90s. It was a kind of punk rock anthology book. Paul was writing everything and there were a couple artists that drew shorts for that, and I drew a few.

“Small Favors” was the first thing that I sat down and said, “I’m going to make a series and I’m going to work on it until there’s something that can be published as a series of comics.” I worked on it for a couple of years before I sent it to Fantagraphics. I had 100 pages of completed comics — which I copied and sent in a package through the snail mail to Eros and Fantagraphics to see if they would take it — and they did.

What was your initial goal?

I was working at a comics shop at the time in Iowa. I noticed that a lot of the adult comics were not very much fun to read. There was sex in them but they weren’t very sexy — a lot of times they would be very dark or humorless or just vulgar. I noticed that a lot of the women who came into the store, who weren’t regulars after their pull boxes of “X-Men” and what have you, were coming in looking specifically for adult comics. Stuff that was more mature or grown up. There wasn’t really anything there for a lady who just wants to read a sexy comic book and have fun reading something sexy, so I decided to create that comic.

I read very few Eros Comics, but I always had the impression that the line was heavily influenced by underground comics.

Exactly. It was more about counterculture or drug culture than it was about being sexy entertainment. And so “adult” in those comics seemed to be more about being stuff that’s not for kids. It would include sex but it would also include violence and ultra-violence and drugs or whatever. A lot of them, frankly, were specifically for dudes. I wouldn’t want to paint too broad a brush, but it was definitely heavy in that way.

So was the goal for you in part to make a book that you found sexy?

Yeah. As part of that, I made it a rule that everybody was going to have a good time. I figured that if everybody in the comic book was having a good time, then anybody reading the comic book was having a good time. I made a conscious decision that the most conflict anybody ever had was: “Are we going to have sex?” “I don’t know… OK.” [Laughs] That kept things fun.

On some level, making it fun doesn’t seem like a very high bar and yet so few comics or other media do that.

If you set yourself a restriction like that then you have to find something to keep the readers’ interest. That was the challenge. That’s part of where the fantastical element comes in — Nibel being a sprite, the size change, the queen of the conscience. Having a setup outside of the bedroom was important to give it some sort of context other than hey there’s these people having sex. Otherwise why even make a comic? Why not just make sexy illustrations?

You managed to get that tone right and you took this idea very seriously.

I did. That was important to me because another thing that I sometimes would see in adult comics was people just saying, well, we’ve got sex in here, so I guess my job is done. This was my first big comic and I wasn’t setting out to be a porno comics artist, I was setting out to be a professional comics artist. I was taking my craft really seriously. Another reason that I was doing an adult comic was it was my way of learning the discipline of creating a comic book over time. One of the hardest things you learn as a creator is starting a thing and not stopping. I figured that this wouldn’t get boring. [Laughs] That worked out nicely. I churned out eight issues over the course of the series and that was a time when it was like, OK, I’ve done all the positions I can think of. [Laughs] I’ve achieved a mature romantic relationship with the main characters and now it’s time to move on and do something else. That’s when we started to do an all-ages comic, “Banana Sunday.”

I think one of the tests of an artist as you said is creating a book, setting a schedule, working on the project over time.

That’s why I finished 100 pages before I approached publishers. That’s almost four issues worth of comics, and by the time the first issue was actually in shops I had even more pages done. That was a real conscious effort. I’ve always tried to be very up front about what my speed is. I’ve always felt that an important part of being a professional creator is being mindful of that. When something is going to print you have to make that deadline because there’s other people involved — printers and distributors and truck drivers — who have to make a deadline, so you have to make your deadline.

And I would imagine that was part of the learning experience, that this is how fast you work, this is what you need as an artist.

Definitely. It’s a hard job. [Laughs] Especially when you’re working on your own and you’re figuring out how to work on your own. I didn’t go to school for this. I had to figure it out on my own. I had to figure out what worked for me. I didn’t have computers at the time even so I was hand lettering and it was a real learning process. It was basically my grad school dissertation. It was the project where I learned how when bodies are interacting with each other, where do the legs go? [Laughs] A lot of the lessons that I learned in “Small Favors” about how arms and legs intertwine I applied later on when I was working at Marvel and drawing fights. It’s a different context, but it’s all the same stuff.

Looking over the comic again to prepare this new collection, what did you think?

Well, I thought some of the art was pretty old. [Laughs] Which is a problem that I think every comic artist runs across when they look at their older work. I also thought it was pretty good. I’m really pleased with the place where I started and where it wound up. I actually drew a new story that I wrote years ago and never drew it, but I dug it out and edited it and drew it for this collection. It was very odd revisiting some of these characters with my more mature art. It was interesting to see how they were still totally recognizable to me and totally familiar, but drawn in my current state of being.

Reading “Small Favors,” it’s possible to see your evolution as an artist.

When I talk about grad school dissertations, I think that was a pretty big leap from the very earliest stuff to the eighth issue. I learned how to refine and scale down and cartoon and act and not always refer to photo reference. I just learned a lot about storytelling and everything you need to tell a comic book story. I hope I still continue to learn. I’ve always felt that a comics artist should never feel complacent, that their work has reached its peak. Once you’ve reached your peak, that’s when you start going downhill. I never want to do that.

One decision you made in the book was that you didn’t have any guys appear in the book, not even in street scenes. Why?

That was inspired by an adult video that I saw in a store. There was a VHS tape of like “Hotel Lesbos Volume 2” — something like that. Right on the cover it said, “The only man in the room… is you!” I was like, wait, me? [Laughs] I thought about how that really puts the reader or the viewer into a box that they don’t necessarily fit into. If a lesbian woman wants to read “Small Favors,” I don’t want to make the assumption that the person reading is a dude. I feel like a lot of the adult comics at the time made the assumption that everybody who read these comics was a dude. I knew that wasn’t true. By removing men from the comic I felt like I was removing the contextual male voyeurism of reading an adult comic book. I mean voyeurism is part of porn. If nobody’s looking at your porn, then why are you doing it? [Laughs] I didn’t want to make an assumption of who the voyeur was. I didn’t want to exclude men. I don’t think I ever did. I wanted to make it inclusive to all.

You made the point before that you didn’t want to draw porn comics, you wanted to draw comics. Was that one reason why you ended the series?

It is somewhat. I talked to another adult comics artist years ago back in the early 2000s when I was most of the way through the series. He had been doing some adult comics under an assumed name and he said, after a while you just run out of stuff for them to do. [Laughs] I was like, well, I haven’t got there yet, but I can see your point. I didn’t want it to get stale. I didn’t want to introduce drama to prevent it from getting stale. Also I wanted to work on stories that did have some conflict in them. The first short story that I did after “Small Favors” was for an all women anthology that Diana Schutz put together called “Sexy Chix.” The story I did was called “The Boogeyman” about a woman who is basically in trauma after the death of her husband in a car crash that she survived. It was the saddest thing I could think of. It was about six pages long and I was bummed out by the end of it. At the same time, I thought, this is a really good palate chaser after all the sugar that I had with “Small Favors.” A little bitter salt to chase that sweet flavor out of my mouth and be ready to do something else. I wanted to continue to challenge myself and I just didn’t want to be in a pigeon hole.

You followed “Small Favors” by making “Banana Sunday” with Paul, and I would guess that making an all-ages book was a very deliberate decision.

Absolutely. We had been working on that for a few months before we showed it to Oni and got it approved. That was definitely something that we wanted for my career and also for his. That was the direction that I wanted to go. I like kids and I want them to read comics.

Reading “Small Favors” and then reading “Banana Sunday” and “Gingerbread Girl,” it’s very much of a piece with where your style was at the end of the series.

Once a reporter about the different styles that I use, but I always use the same style. It’s just me. Sometimes I’ll change the technique but it’s the same style.

You’ve always had this cartoony style, though I dislike using that term, because of how people tend to use it.

Yeah, cartoony as a derogatory term has always been confusing to me. Cartoon just means that you’re drawing not from life. If you’re drawing you’re usually looking at a model or a photograph and recreating what you see. With cartooning you’re building a character. I generally prefer cartooning to drawing.

Have you always preferred cartooning to drawing?

I don’t think so. In my comic book work I have, but in the early “Small Favors” I was still referring to photo reference to figure out how the body was put together. I think my big breakthrough was getting a copy of “Cartooning the Head and Figure” by Jack Hamm. It’s one of these perennial art books and it’s just got pages of how to cartoon feet or how to cartoon a fat guy or a lady. Referring to that taught me a lot more about how to build a figure than a lot of the life drawing that I had done before. They’re both valuable, it’s just that I rely on one more than the other.

Right now you’re working on “Bandette” and is that it for the moment?

Right now my main comic work is “Bandette.” This is artisanal comics so it comes out on the occasion that it comes out. I think we’re making a graphic novel each year and a half? That’s how often it comes out in print after it’s serialized digitally on comixology. That’s my full time gig and I occasionally take some commercial work on the side to pay some bills. That’s really it. The art is all me, which takes time. I’ve always been sort of a control freak when it comes to lettering and coloring, so it’s a very very inefficient production line of one.

Do you want to write more comics?

I enjoy writing short pieces. Which is one of the reasons why most of the “Small Favors” stories were short. It’s not my main passion. Occasionally I’ll think up a story. It usually springs fully formed out of my skull and then I’m compelled to make that story.

Right now I really like working with other writers. Particularly Paul. We occasionally co-write, which is nice. We prop each other up when we’re co-writing, but writing for myself for the long term, I don’t think I would do that. That would be a frustration rather than fun.

“Small Favors: The Definitive Girly Porno Collection” is scheduled for release on April 26 from Oni Press.

The post Colleen Coover Revisits ‘Girly Porno’ Comic Small Favors with New Collection appeared first on CBR.

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[horror-movie-blog]

HMB: VHS 1 & 2

Original Publishing Date: March 27th, 2015 

So I decided to do both VHS movies for today Thursday Horror Movie Blog because you can't really talk about one without talking about the other. Basically both movie are just okay in my eyes, they're not good but they weren't bad either... okay, they're a little bad, but that's the price you pay for a horror anthology series, some bits are good while others are bad. The VHS franchise is a collection of 10 to twenty minute short horror movies done in a found footage style of film making, and no, I'm not going to takes points off for not explaining who is editing these videos, I feel like that's more of a nitpick than an actual criticism.  Like I said, it's a bag of mixed nuts, so let's go over the short films of the first movie. The framing device in VHS1 is a group of teenagers who go around and harass women and vandalize homes. They stumble upon a dead body in front a bunch of television screens, and discover a series of VHS's. Basically the transition into each short comes from one of the teens sitting down and watching the video, and while that's going on, something is lurking in the house, and when the short ends, the person who was watching it has suddenly vanished. I think that was a cleaver framing device, although the bits are my favorite in the film. The first short, titled "Amateur Night", is about three college kids who want to film themselves having sex with two girls that they picked up at a bar. One of these girls acts very strange, and by the end of the movie we learn why. In a strange way I kind of like this one, I don't know, maybe it has to do with the twist at the end but I feel like this one was okay, it's certainly the most memorable one of the five shorts. The second short is called, "Second Honeymoon", and boy is it boring. It's about two people on a honeymoon, and someone sneaks into their hotel room and steals their stuff. At the end this person kills the boyfriend and we discover why the intruder did that. There's nothing new about this, and the twist isn't as satisfying as the last short's. The third short is "Tuesday the 17th" (ha-ha, get it? It's four days after Friday the 13th), and it's just about four teens going to a dirty little pond in the middle of the woods to do drugs. One of the girls tells them her friends were killed there last summer, but they shake it off as a joke. Well, without giving away the twist, it's not a joke. This one is boring too, it's really predictable and doesn't have a good payoff. The forth short, "The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily When She Was Younger" (yes, that is the title), is about a woman who thinks her house is haunted and with the help of her long distance boyfriend/doctor/ they confront the spirits. Just like the last three, there is a twist. I'm having trouble with this one, I don't know if it's good or not. I like the idea, having someone who can only see the hauntings through Skype interact this the ghosts, but the twist is a bit far fetched. And finally, the fifth short "10/31/98", a group of friends venture out looking for a kick ass Halloween party only to stumble upon a pagan sacrifice in an old abandoned house, that I swear to God is the same house from House of the Devil. Which is weird, because the director of House of the Devil also directed Second Honeymoon, did he have anything to do with this short too? I don't know. For a finale, it's pretty weak. I like the idea of a group of dumb college kids stumbling upon something they can't handle, but it just ends with a chase out of the house, though granted, it's suspenseful. And to follow the theme of the movie, it has a twist ending... kind of, I don't know, it's pretty dam confusing. To rate the shorts in VHS 1: 1. Amateur Night, the most memorable one of the group, which I can't say for the others. 2. Tuesday the 13th, has a interesting villain in it. 3. 10/31/98, for decent suspense but weak ending. 4. The Sick Thing 5. Second Honeymoon Overall, VHS is okay, if you want to bing watch a couple of horror shorts, than VHS is alright for you, just don't expect anything life changing in it. Now let's move on to VHS 2. Honestly, this movie is a lot better then it's predecessor. Yeah, a horror movie sequel that's actually better than the original, that's so rare. The two major changes is that there are four shorts instead of five and the production is a lot better-for most of the shorts. The framing device is like the first film, someone stumbles upon a den of television screens and watch VHS. The only thing the first movie did better than this one was how they handled the framing device. In this movie, the people watching the VHS seem unaffected by what they see, despite seeing some fucked up shit. In the original, we don't see the character's reaction to the VHS, because they all died. So this is one down side to the movie. Okay, let's get into the shorts, first off we have "Phase 1 Clinical Trails". This one is probably the worst of the four shorts. A man gets an robotic eye, with the catch being the eye is recording everything he's doing. The doctor tells him the eye is glitchy so he should beware. Now, at first, this seems like an amazing set up. The glitches can mess with his head, make him question what's real or fake, this set up can lead to some interesting things. But no... we have ghosts. Oh... Okay... You know what, this idea is great too, maybe artificial eyes can see ghosts unlike human eyes and they guy has to live with this haunting reality... oh, no, he sees ghosts just as much as normal people do... you know, in horror movies. Sadly this is just an excuse for the characters to walk around without holding a camera. It's weak, it's unoriginal, it's boring, and a waste of a perfectly good idea. The second short is called "A Ride in the Park", and believe it or not, this one was directed by the minds behind the Blair Witch Project. The idea is so simple and yet it's so original, it's a Go Pro camera on a zombie. A biker gets attacked by a zombie, becomes one, and we see him interact with other zombies and attack a child's birthday party. This alone can be it's own movie, it's such a fascinating idea. The end is also very touching, but I won't give it away. This was a simple film, but it worked really well. The third short is "Safe Haven", the longest but the most bizarre of the shorts. A documentary crew interviews a cult leader in Indonesia, and as soon as they enter the compound, all sorts of crazy shit happens. At first it's so calm and well paced, but as soon as the shit hits the fan, chaos emerges. It's so hard to talk about this short without giving away the ending, but if saw this short, you'd totally agree, it's fuck up, but hey, at least the production is good. The final short is a bit of a weak note to end on, but it's much better than the last movie's ending, it's "Slumber Party Alien Abduction". Yeah, no point of covering this one up (no pun intended), it's about people getting adopted by aliens, teens and children to be exact. It starts off with your typical older sister-younger brother conflict where the sister and her friends are jerks to the kids and the kids throws water balloons at them, yadda-yadda-yadda. Then aliens come out of nowhere and start adapting them. It's a sudden shift in mood, in just a second they went from yelling at each other to fighting off aliens. What really bothers me is how little the beginning and end connect, you have this build up of tension between the little brother and older sister and her friends, and it's suddenly gone once the aliens are introduced. I'd like to see some of this tension carry over to the climax, like the boyfriend does try to protect the little brother at first because of all the shit he's done to them, but he suddenly has a change of heart and then decides to protect the kid. I don't know, it's okay, it's just not something to end the movie on. Also a dogs dies, just to warn you all, a dog dies. So, to rate these shorts: 1. A Ride in the Park, was originally going to put Safe Haven at number 1, but after thinking about it, I defiantly see Ride in the Park as the best of the four shorts. 2. Safe Haven 3. Slumber Party Alien Abduction 4. Phase 1 Clinical Trails So I liked VHS 2 more than VHS 1, it had better stories and much large budget. I think you'd have a better chance finding a short you like in this movie than in the first movie. Also, it's kind if interesting that the theme of the first movie seems to be twist endings, and the theme of the second movie is mobs of monsters attacking someone. Whatever, go check it out if you're interested. 

#vhs #vhs 2 #horror movie blog