#despite the graphic content and horror qualities

[sockysucks]

HI TUMBLR!!

ive come to create a incredibly lengthy post about the new mascot horror game called Indigo Park

I need to ramble ( haha rambley ) about it as i have just quit twitter for an indefinite time for my own mental health as an autistic cannot last on there at all

anyway, im going to talk about all the reason why indigo park is so good and what i hope from it!! and any criticisms i have for it, i honestly dont have many even though its so early to talk about.

how i found out about indigo park:

UNIQUEGEESE!! naturally, i was watching one of masons past streams on his youtube playing FNF after having rejoined the FNF community after its update and finding out about the mod HIT SINGLE; the mod masons was playing( people know it mostly for the silly billy song ) and he had mentioned about him making a mascot horror game which i shrugged off naturally because i am not a fan of modern mascot horror as most of it seems to be low effort and genuinely unappealing, i knew he had made something that was definitely made with love but i didnt have the will to check it out until a announcement trailer dropped which i then saw snippets of the game and the characters and environment, which i was definitely intrigued so I played the game myself.

My thoughts playing the game:

and found it surpisingly good compared to any other mascot horror game, it was unique, genuinely had awesome character designs and very high quality’s graphics and beautiful models and lighting were stunning, again really surprised having endured the hideousness of other low quality mascot horror games, to then find a game with fucking great models ( unlike banban, 2 billion polygon remote or whatever lmfao ).

I started the game and to be real as a extremely gay furry who loves little silly furry boys i felt like i was gonna explode during every single rambley voice line and animation played and fell so in love with him, now a massive comfort character and ive draw. him like 12 times prior to the games first chapter being released like 2 days ago lol, ive never gotten so attached so quicky in my life which definitely makes rambley and indigo park a really special game.

I really love this game, the pacing is really well done, the horror isnt low quality, the like actual character models for lloyd and molly are really gorgeous, i just think the hair and some of the texturing is over done slightly, but definitely made me shit myself multiple times despite this, all while i was laughing with my new silly raccoon boyfriend 💜💜💜💜

hugeeeeww shoutout to team neutron for the the absolute gorgeous expressive rambley screen animations and the credits theme that left me almost tbe same way portal 2’s credits effected me the first time i ever played and definitely huge huge props to otterboyva for the super adorable voice of rambley.

what do I hope for the future of Indigo Park

I hope for the future of this game that content farms and bootleggers disregard it, but this doesnt give me hope seeing that one rambley plush that a company made before the first chapter even released that was completely unlicensed. I will be avoiding social media in efforts to not see people start shitting on this game if it becomes on the same level and milked by content farms like what happened to the amazing digital circus ( i watched this on the day the pilot released, and was equally devastated as many others to see it being used as low effort bait in shitty kids cartoons on youtube shorts )

in case you didnt see i did a little animation at the top of this!! very rough but yeah

I love tgis game PLEASEEEE i cannot wait to see more high quality content from this really passionate creative team uniquegeese/mason has formed

in case you wanted to play it for yourself, heres a link to the steam page!! the first chapter is free and a kickstarter started a couple days ago has been completed funded so…. CHAPTER 2 IS CONFIRMED!!

[anhed-nia]

BLOGTOBER 10/6-7/2023: X, PEARL

Ti West is so frustrating. His more successful movies have earned him enough good will that I've been willing to wait for him like some war bride while he turns out things I find unforgivable, assuming that someone with his demonstrated talent will right himself eventually. For this reason I wish I liked X more. I find it very watchable and I don't hate the premise, but I also really object to parts of it. Some of it is just half-baked; like I kind of enjoy the movie's conversation about how pornography inflates or injures people's vanity and shines a light on inner moral conflicts, but it's all kind of gestural, I don't know if any real conclusions are reached. And I really don't appreciate the take on hagsploitation here, with sexy Mia Goth under a hundred pounds of foam rubber reminding us all of how scary aging is--which connects to this questionable tradition in horror where the monster is a human who is alienated due to their looks, and we'd better learn to fear such people because being sexually undesirable is a punishment so cruel that it could make you dangerously insane. I'm really interested in this trope, where the corrupting force is just physical ugliness (and/or the inability to get laid), but in the case of X I would have found it more compelling if the villains were played by actual old people.

The movies we think of when we hear the terms "hagsploitation" or "psycho biddie" generally star actual older actresses who bring a certain kind of thoughtful, energetic presence to their roles, and that's why they're so effective; when it's just a young person pretending to be old, it requires the viewer to really be afraid of and repulsed by the basic concept of an old person. I've heard some arguments that X is "sex positive" because of its graphic scene of the fake old people doing it, and although I'd agree that some amount of pity is elicited by that (with the husband explicitly pitying his horny, ugly wife), I think it's a big reach to suggest that that content is celebratory or elevating in any way. Again, I might change my tune if it were real old people, but in the meantime the whole production is just young people telling this story about how old people are gross and you might become a crazed killer if you stopped getting laid, and that's just not good enough for me. Maybe if the old people were more like anti-heroes and less like general monstrosities slobbering in the dark, I would have gotten more out of it.

Meanwhile, the prequel PEARL tells a compelling story about a real monster who is complex and charismatic enough to make you sympathize with her, even though she is unambiguously villainous. I do think this movie is somewhat overhyped, but I'm not mad about it; I'm happy that this happened for Ti West, who I definitely want to make more good movies, and PEARL has a lot of cool qualities. It stretches its $1mil budget a surprising distance to make a period piece (usually inadvisable for a cheap movie) with a lot of style and class. Ti West has a talent for genre pastiche--the present movie is somehow a cross between THE WIZARD OF OZ and HUSH...HUSH, SWEET CHARLOTTE--but it doesn't feel like an empty fashion statement, which is the problem I usually have with modern horror productions that do a forced impression of older genre films. Despite whatever is familiar about it, PEARL feels really fresh and original. Tellingly, I don't even feel like enumerating this movie's flaws. It's a charmer and it deserves its success.

[anonymousad]

Re: your post about the Among the Stacks crowdfund, thank you for taking the time to write such a comprehensive and balanced breakdown of the issues with it. You're definitely not the only one who has noticed issues with the project overall, and I think they're very pertinent to a lot of the concerns you raised.

Things like the show casting while having little to no content written, the show's genre changing apparently at random (Nigel has definitively called it both "weird horror" and "fantasy mystery" on their Twitter), glaring proofreading errors in cast announcements (including things like attributing a different character to an actor in the tweet versus the graphic, misspelling a big-name actor's name in his cast announcement tweet, and huge formatting issues in text alignment on several actors' bios), Nigel's occasional use of the show Twitter rather than her personal Twitter to engage with other shows in pursuit of getting cast in roles (a choice that cannot have been accidental, given that the offending tweets end with "-N", despite no one else on the team seeming to have access to the Twitter), the way the show is marketed as massively collaborative but all communications and a lot of the content features Nigel front and center... the list goes on and on.

A couple of specific relevant points:

In regards to the traced art, as well as the show's logo and all of their non-episode graphics, those aren't credited because Nigel makes them. I had the same question when I saw the difference in style between the listed artist for Among the Stacks and the stuff being posted, and if you compare it to the style of the episode art for Nigel's other show (Hyperfixations) it becomes very obvious who's making them... which is just another way in which 90% of the content on the Twitter seems to come from Nigel and no one else.

Very little effort seems to have been made to promote the show's actual artist, which is weird both because she seems pretty talented and because it's pretty hard to sell people on wanting a design on a t-shirt if not enough people are seeing it to get excited about it. (I have my own thoughts about this and the aggressive watermarking on the crowdfund, but they're petty and baseless and mostly boil down to a suspicion that Nigel hates not being the center of attention.)

(You can find the full design that's on the shirt on the artist's Twitter, by the way. Not that you should have to go looking for it.)

Another thing is that at least one of Nigel's old shows (Archive Admirers) stopped updating without warning. If you search the show's handle (AdmirersArchive) on Twitter, one of the most recent tweets is from July 6th, 2022, responding to a February 1st episode announcement with:

"...is the podcast dead? You guys said episode 30 would be up May 23, and it's July... :("

Nobody from the show responded, the show has not been updated, and Nigel has actively tweeted about the show since. Note: the last time the show updated was a bonus episode on May 9th, but the show Twitter stopped being updated February 1st. No updates, no notice of hiatus, no explanation. Nada.

Huge red flags for show abandonment and overall attitude towards audience. (How hard would it have been to respond to one disappointed fan?)

Also, in regards to the annotated scripts promised on the crowdfund, the actual transcripts for half of the episodes of the prologue season not only aren't available, there's nothing on the website to indicate or explain which transcripts are and are not available, why certain transcripts are not available, why only the first three and last two are available, and when transcripts are meant to become available.

All episodes feature a "Download Transcript" button, but the buttons for "Prelude: You know they're playing it somewhere, but you have to find it." and Tales 1 through 3 redirect you to the website's homepage without explanation.

It doesn't exactly fill me with confidence about the quality of what people should expect from annotated scripts. The standard of care here seems to be inconsistent at best.

This is all publicly confirmable information. You can find 99% of this stuff by looking on Twitter.

And that's without even getting into the rumors that are circulating behind the scenes: rumors about Nigel taking everything personally and refusing to take anyone's advice, rumors about collaborators being so checked out of the project that at least one has told friends they don't think it'll see any actual movement for months, rumors that certain actors were guaranteed a baseline of pay regardless of the results of the crowdfunding, and rumors of early collaborators having been removed from the project without warning or explanation.

yeah there is a lot in here that I have also heard/seen going on.

I didn't really want to stray too far from the crowdfund specific stuff in my post, but this feels like the kind of project that will have a "post-mortem" investigation done by someone when it fully falls down.

as I tried to make clear, I am not trying to just hate on the project or fuck over someone, but I think that a lot of people are being taken advantage of to some extent here and that's not an okay thing that I want to see happening in our community.

I'm sure some of the fans are younger and more impressionable and so in love with the idea of this show, especially with how much it is marketed solely on the basis of being "queer". I don't want those people to be disillusioned with the medium or feel betrayed or lose their money.

I've been around long enough to have backed crowdfunds that went nowhere, things for which I wasn't able to see the obvious red flags in. there's an entire micro-genre of youtube content devoted to failed or scam campaigns and ALWAYS new projects to cover.

I don't want to see that here, in a community that is so accessible and trusting and loving.

my distrust of this project as a whole is based in love for the art form and the community we've built. I just want us to preserve that.

[onlyasimp4-2dbitches]

Okay so here's my favourite Resident Evil games that are, (imo) fun and would recommend!

RE8 - THIS GAME IS AMAZING!! I replay it constantly it's SO GOOD. The horror is phenomenal, the visuals just gorgeous as they are horrifying. All the bosses have deep interesting lore and personalities, even the mini-bosses! You also get to play as Chris near the end and just go ape-shit. (I JUST LOVE THE CULT HORROR!!)

RE: Umbrella Chronicles - It's extremely cheesy, with goofy horror but delivers it's purpose of providing new context to the pre-existing stories. Also the Willsker bible. The fourth chapter is a new story (not a retelling) so there is original content included in the game as well.

RE: Survivor - It's short and fun. Also first person so if you're more familiar with first person shooters & old gaming mechanics this would be an easy and fun play. CREEPY in the best way possible. (Graphics are dogshit though, and again it's an old and short game, not for everyone.)

RE4: Original - Despite being an older game it's still playable for people not used to old gaming mechanics, so that's a big plus. The enemies like the plaga infected dogs continue to be some of my favourite in the entire franchise. RE4OG got its fame for a reason. (Also my first Resi game so I am biased LMFAO.)

RE4R - There is close to no (bad) changes from the original to this remake, so I would recommend it the same as RE4OG. I personally preferred Original, but again they are basically the same. RE4R does have better graphics, quality and easier game-play than the OG though for people who prefer modern games.

Please take this list with a huge, massive grain of salt LMFAO. It's entirely subjective and just my personal favourites I liked and thought were fun, but you might have different taste. Sorry!

[maximuswolf]

Hellblade 2 | Ultimate Analysis - This is easily the most graphically impressive title of 2024

Hellblade 2 | Ultimate Analysis - This is easily the most graphically impressive title of 2024 It's been about a week since Senua's Saga: Hellblade II dropped. Here is the in-depth analysis of all aspects of the game after scouring through most of the reviews online, Story: 84/100 (This is the average of story scores across reviews)The story receives high praise for its deep, emotionally impactful, and rich narrative, blending psychological horror, mythological intrigue, and themes of mental illness and trauma. Critics laud the character development and immersive storytelling. However, some note issues with pacing, direction, and a less personal feel compared to the first game. The positives significantly outweigh the negatives though, making it a highly engaging narrative experience.Gameplay: 69/100 (This is the average of gameplay scores across reviews)Critics are split on the gameplay. Positive feedback highlights engaging combat, improved visuals, varied enemies, and seamless transitions, with particular praise for the fast-paced combat and intriguing puzzles. However, detractors point out overly simple puzzles, repetitive combat, and filler content. The game excels in certain areas but has room for improvement to enhance the overall player experience.Graphics: 97/100 (This is the average of graphics scores across reviews)Hellblade 2 is hailed as a visual masterpiece, with critics praising its stunning graphics, realistic environments, and meticulous detail. Despite minor issues like dynamic resolution and overly dark scenes, the game sets a new standard for next-gen visuals, utilizing Unreal Engine 5 to create breathtaking landscapes and seamless gameplay transitions. Overall, it's considered one of the best-looking games ever, making it a must-play for fans of visually striking gamesSound: 90/100 (This is the average of sound and music scores across reviews)The sound design and music received widespread acclaim for their exceptional quality and immersive elements. Critics praised the haunting melodies, ambient sounds, and binaural 3D audio technology, which created a chilling and atmospheric experience. Highlights include the impactful voice acting and auditory hallucinations, though some noted minor issues with dialogue clarity. The audio design is a standout feature, making the game a must-experience with headphones for maximum immersion.Technical Performance: 76/100 (This is the average of performance scores across reviews)Hellblade 2 impresses with its technical performance on Xbox Series X, running at 4K and 30fps, with smooth gameplay - despite minor issues like dynamic resolution and letterboxing. On PC, the experience varies: some face technical glitches, while others enjoy flawless performance on high-end systems. Overall, the game is praised for its stunning visuals and high production values across both platforms, cementing its status as a technical showcase.Overall: 81.25/100Critik.ai: 81/100Metacritic: 81/100Opencritic: 83/100IMDB: 8/10Hellblade 2 dazzles with its stunning visuals, immersive audio, and compelling storytelling, offering a cinematic experience that grips players from start to finish. However, its repetitive gameplay, pacing issues, and lack of narrative depth leave much to be desired. Despite these flaws, the game's artistic achievements make it a must-try for fans of single-player story games, even if it doesn't quite match the brilliance of its predecessor.Do you agree with the consensus? What's your take on it? I personally think it's graphically impressive as hell and has a good story. But man, the gameplay gets repetitive and the pacing drags like crazy at times. It's worth a play for sure if you liked the first game though. Submitted May 27, 2024 at 03:57AM by wtfcommittee https://ift.tt/6NBoQPG via /r/gaming

[priyeshmeenasourceandsign]

BLOG-6

VR Immersive Experiences in Games

Being a game buff, VR as having the ability of providing an immersive experience has always excited me. The virtual reality (VR) technology has gone through a lot, leading to a wide application in such diverse areas as education and training, simulations, healthcare, among others. This blog post entails my views about how VR affects gaming by presenting a few examples of immersive VR games.

VR is a powerful tool for gaming.

The novelty of VR gaming lies in the fact that it cuts the player away from his/her external reality and involves the body into the gaming process. It surpasses traditional gaming by making players live it up through their involvement in the game world. Furthermore, the adoption of VR to different cultural heritage settings like museums and exhibitions as well as virtual reality games continues to grow.

Examples of Immersive VR Games

Half-Life: Half-life: Alyx is considered to be one the best and most captivating VR game, with the highest storytelling and visual immersion standards. The game is very well built with mechanics and physics that captures you.

Lone Echo: It has a very interesting story, amazing visuals and physics features that make this one of the best VR engagements.

The Gallery: A pioneer despite being an older one, The Gallery and its sequel had immersive storytelling and gameplay embedded in a VR.

Resident Evil 7: This biohazard horror game utilizes the tension-filled quality attributed with VRs to present a scary experience for players.

Echo VR: Echo VR, is a virtual reality competition game mixing sport with FPS under gravity less conditions.

Challenges and Future Potential

The potential benefits associated with virtual reality gaming notwithstanding, the journey is not without hiccups. One of the major problems lies in the price of VR equipment that might be too high for many clients. Other important structural problems to virtual reality gaming are high content development costs and market fragmentation.

Nevertheless, VR technology keeps advancing, and so are more interactive encounters tomorrow. In turn, using a device like the Meta’s Quest 3 VR headset in conjunction with VR and AR expands creative possibility in gaming. Besides, with time VR technology will be used in making more new and intriguing games whose parameters exceed those allowed for ordinary virtual reality.

Personal Perspective

Being a gamer, I look forward to what lies ahead in VR gaming as more of such enhanced gaming options become available. The presented cases in this post illustrate how effective VR can be for creating intriguing game environments which are very immersive. With increased development of technology and the designer’s exploration of new ways of employing VR, a larger number of sensational and intense games should be expected later on.

References

Hamad, A. and Jia, B. (2022). How Virtual Reality Technology Has Changed Our Lives: An Overview of the Current and Potential Applications and Limitations. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, [online] 19(18), p.11278. doi: https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph191811278 .

Theodoropoulos , A. and Antoniou2, A. (2022). Virtual Reality Games in Cultural Heritage. [online] Scholarly Community Encyclopedia. Available at: https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/33196  [Accessed 25 Dec. 2023].

Kraynov, M. (2023). VR Gaming: Navigating Challenges for Mainstream Success. [online] Spiceworks. Available at: https://www.spiceworks.com/tech/innovation/guest-article/vr-gaming-key-challenges/amp/  [Accessed 25 Dec. 2023].

ReflectingThePast (2023). What’s the best VR game you played in terms of overall immersion in storytelling and graphic fidelity? [online] Reddit. Available at: https://www.reddit.com/r/virtualreality/comments/14dged2/whats_the_best_vr_game_you_played_in_terms_of/  [Accessed 25 Dec. 2023].

Moore, E. (n.d.). Designing VR Games and Experiences Worth Playing | Toptal®. [online] Designers. Available at: https://www.toptal.com/designers/virtual-reality/designing-vr-games  [Accessed 25 Dec. 2023].

Bojarski, M. (2022). 10 Totally Immersive VR Games And Experiences. [online] ScreenRant. Available at: https://screenrant.com/immersive-vr-games-experiences/  [Accessed 26 Dec. 2023].

Porokh, A. (2023). Best PC VR Games: Immersive Experiences Beyond Reality. [online] Kevuru Games. Available at: https://kevurugames.com/blog/best-pc-vr-games-immersive-experience/  [Accessed 26 Dec. 2023].

[skaeptical]

RULES BELOW FOR NEW FOLLOWERS . / *

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ABOUT THE MUN:

Hi, I’m Quinn. 24 years old, est, they/them. EST. Busy.

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001. GENERAL DISCLAIMERS This blog is OC, FANDOMLESS OC, AU, CROSSOVER, ETC. WELCOMING.

ADDITIONALLY, YOU DO NOT NEED ICONS, PSDS, GRAPHICS, GOOGLE DOCS, A CARRD, ETC. TO WRITE WITH ME. ALL YOU NEED IS A RULES LIST &, IF YOU’RE A MULTI-MUSE/Original Character, PREFERABLY A MUSE LIST OR BIOGRAPHY ! ( If neither of those exist, that’s okay too! We can always private message to figure it out!)

GENERAL DISCLAIMER: Due to the contents of the x-files & Dana Scully’s work as a medical doctor, there may be mentions of GORE, BLOOD, DEATH, THE SUPERNATURAL, CULT CONTENT, HORROR THEMES, HOSPITALS, NEEDLES, ETC. present on this blog. I will work to actively tag sensitive topics. I typically tag ‘ cw ____ ’ .

MEMES ARE OPEN TO ALL INDIVIDUALS FOLLOWING SKAEPTICAL.

However, please respect that I am primarily mutuals only & selective ! I am a quality over quantity blog. My posting rate may be slow but I feel I produce better writing with time.

IF I FOLLOW YOU , I WANT TO INTERACT .

discord available upon request . ⁣　

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003. MAINS & EXCLUSIVES

I am happy to discuss MAINS & EXCLUSIVITY !! Though, this is a rarity. We need a pre-established interaction and some form of discussion out of character. I want to world build with my MAINS & EXCLUSIVES !

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004. FORMATTING , WRITING STYLE , AND INTERACTIONS.

My formatting is typically small font w/ icon. However, I know small font may be hard to read. I will typically conform to my partner’s preferred style of writing. I AM OKAY USING REGULAR FONT AND GOING ICONLESS !!!

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005. MY VERSION OF SCULLY

I typically write a heavily canon influenced Scully. Though, due to the show, I am also headcanon based. This may make my Scully a bit canon divergent. Though, I try to explain information omitted or information not consistently held up through the seasons. Regardless, I am always accepting questions to Scully !!

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006. INTERACTIONS

I do not/will not interact with two specific users; blue. I do not have their URLs or current accounts. however, if i do see them on my dash, i may unfollow. we can still write! though, due to black listing not always working and despite blocking, i need to do what is best for me and for my viewing pleasures on the dash. (i am not saying to stop writing with either of them. i am entirely indifferent. i just have a heavy preference as to not seeing them on my dash.) 

no drama. i can't keep up with it nor do i have the motivation.

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[hargrove-mayfields]

Getting real tired of the duffers and their split-second coincidences.

If Murray hadn’t gotten the code wrong, and Suzie hadn’t made Dustin sing with her to get the right code, thus forcing that ridiculously long montage, they could’ve closed the gate before the Russians arrived, so Billy wouldn’t have died and Hopper wouldn’t have been captured. If that random guy hadn’t walked past the Creel house and seen Erica, if Jason hadn’t responded to that tip and crushed the Walkman during the fight, if Mike's speech had taken just a few seconds less, Max wouldn’t have died. If Murray hadn’t been in the right spot at the right time with his flamethrower then Joyce and Hop would’ve died. Actually all of Russia was just one massive predictable chain of events, starting from the moment Joyce got the package, to Enzo conveniently being at the phone when they call back, to Yuri's betrayal conveniently happening in enough time to get them in the prison right before the demogorgon fight, to them finding a grate in the floor that lead to the middle of nowhere but was still close to Yuris hideout, etc. Also the California crew finding the Nina Project at the same exact time it’s being busted so they can take El away before the government realizes she wasn’t killed. The timing of every single moment is way too practiced and forced.

They’ve been doing this shit since season 1, the earliest I can think of being Jonathan taking an extra shift so he conveniently wasn’t home to notice Will went missing overnight or to give him a ride home from the Wheelers. One (usually) implausible thing after another building and building until it’s just over in the end and you feel empty because nothing really happened. It’s honestly getting boring. You can’t make a good show out of pure tension with no big pay-off. They drag out these sequences just for the outcome to be exactly the same. Hopper was in Russia for all nine episodes, and then he gets like five minutes to reunite with his family. Talk about rushed. We all knew he was going to survive, so putting him in these situations that were never going to end badly for them just made the Russia sequences feel long and unnecessary. And later, if Mike hadn’t said anything and El gave up, Max still would’ve died because the Walkman was broken. So what did the love confession add? They already created the setup, we could’ve skipped the middle entirely because it didn’t actually change anything in the long run. This is how they end up with details that they forget completely and it’s honestly just a frustrating way to write a story.

But they keep doing this over and over, crafting these extremely high stakes situations that they think are plot twists, where the predicted outcome still happens in the end, and there’s loose ends left over. That’s why I think the ending of the Piggyback felt so flat. Because it was the first moment in the season pretty much that wasn’t pinballing off of another. It felt like the start of the next season instead of a meaningful conclusion to everything that had happened in this season. Because after killing off two characters, their tension was used up, and they had to find a way to start over and fill in all the gaps they’d left in the storytelling while they were chasing those high-strung, coincidental plots. At some point, they realized they’d written themselves into a dead spot by beating this tactic to death and just went with a spongebob time card to fix all their narrative problems for them while they dumped all of the plot exposition into a half hour block of dramatic shots, which very much just felt out of place as a conclusion to this massive season with multiple episodes the length of films.

[hostess-of-horror]

⚠️WARNING: BLOOD AND GORE ⚠️

[Content Includes: Graphic Violence, Impalement, Blood, Body Horror, and a Chainsaw]

Episode 9: Sam and Max + The Texas Chainsaw Massacre

It's been so long... far too long...

At long last, I have finally finished the 9th episode of Sam and Max's Horror Show. Fun Fact about Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the original 70's film actually had no blood or gore whatsoever, despite it being really brutal and gritty. However, that was changed when the sequels, reboots, and remakes came out. I tried to get as much blood in this piece as possible, but also not so much that it's completely unbelievable. Though, this is a cartoon that I'm making fan art for, so maybe stuff like that can pass. I actually had fun making this episode and I got amazing inspiration when my Dad and I recently took a trip to Arkansas last month. We went to a Halloween event called "Horror in the Hollow", which involved three separate haunted mazes and a zombie paintball game. One of those mazes was called "Bubba's Butcher Barn" and it scared the hell out of me (lol). But that was a good thing - I experienced first hand what it would be like in such a horror movie! My favorite piece is the faceless corpse of Superball on the table, although the quality of the photo doesn't really do it justice.

[ambassadorquark]

here’s a long post about a bunch of webcomics i love and recommend. i’ve certainly read & liked other ones and have just lost track of them somehow but these are like, mostly classics that basically anyone who reads newer webcomics will recommend to you and a couple i’ve found more recently that i loved. tried to limit it to FAVES that update pretty regularly or are already completed so you can get quality stories out of it but it still ended up mammoth so uh, it’s goin’ under a readmore

namesake - super long-running comic with beautiful art, consistent and frighteningly frequent updates, made by Webcomics Pros. it’s about people who have the ability to enter the worlds of essentially any fairy tales in which the protagonists happen to share their name, and the lore only gets more intricate from there. this one is a very engaging archive binge as it’s been running for about a million years

gunnerkrigg court - honestly if you’re not already reading gunnerkrigg court i'd be very surprised since this is another one that’s been going easily since the invention of webcomics (not really, but THAT ARCHIVE!). i don’t know how to summarize it beyond saying it STARTS as a story about a girl attending a quirky boarding school and is now kind of a sweeping epic about the intersection of technology, nature, and divinity. there’s time travel or something in there now?! you will love renardine. i love renardine

paranatural - another one i’m sure you’re already reading and if not, WHY? it’s a fun li’l action-comedy about middle schoolers fighting ghosts with the help of other ghosts. has been running for a good while and gone through some weird changes but is also probably one of the funniest serial comics i’ve ever read

he is a good boy - a super weird, cerebral, since-finished comic by online comics vet KC Green, about a little acorn finally leaving the tree he grew on after it dies. this one has more “adult” content than any of the previous ones, but if you can handle some cartoony gore and obscenity it’s really funny, strange, and worth checking out

anything by evan dahm tbh - these come recommended by absolutely anyone with taste because evan dahm makes beautiful fantasy comics. rice boy and order of tales are both completed and have a bizarre, super-unique setting and bittersweet approach to these delicate, human stories (despite having no actual human characters). vattu is still currently running and is a slightly more grounded fantasy comic about a little girl from a nomadic hunter-gatherer culture getting caught up in the machinery of the empire that’s moving in on the land where she was born. cannot recommend these enough TBH

also anything on johnny wander - this site contains a bunch of comics by a couple of married comics pros; a big backlog of their really funny, charming autobio comics, the entirety of their graphic novel lucky penny, a whole bunch of shorter comics you might have seen around, and also their new, longer-form webcomic barbarous, which is about a wizard school dropout who’s appointed as a super at an apartment building full of weird magical folks. recommended because there’s a lot of quality stuff in there for you

the sword interval - on webtoon, completed. legit my favorite thing i’ve read in a hot minute. modern fantasy about a young woman who tracks down a legendary, but retired monster hunter for help on her quest to find and kill the lich-like being who killed her parents. gorgeous art, super awesome monster designs, twists on twists, characters you will never want anything bad to happen to ever. reggie the golem.

widdershins - a pretty well established comic i only just read recently. a series of connected stories following different characters from a big ensemble cast and their various adventures in a magical town in victorian west yorkshire. full of fun old-timey shit and wizards. i read it obsessively in like a day. super funny, super long archive. extremely endearing characters who you also will never want anything bad to happen to.

the last halloween - abby howard is a godly horror artist who’s been doing this comic since her style and sense of humor were almost completely different, but the story really does grow as it goes and is both very spooky and very funny. book one is about a little girl facing the potential extinction of humanity after the spontaneous appearance of billions of monsters. it’s currently in book 2, which is a direct sequel about different characters that actually updates sporadically at the moment because the artist is making other cool stuff. definitely still worth it though. gets intense as hell

string theory - this one got back into regular updates pretty recently! i’m linking the about page, not the homepage, because this one is about nasty people doing nasty things and there’s a few CWs that the author mentions right in the summary. it’s an alternate history sci-fi set in a near future where the USA was devastated by nuclear weapons after the cuban missile crisis but is mostly a character driven story about a jerkhole scientist having a terrible couple years. i can’t explain this one at all. if you like terrible men as much as i do you’ll probably enjoy it

tiger, tiger - a beautifully drawn maritime fantasy about a young noblewoman who impersonates her sea captain brother in order to launch an expedition to study sea sponges. there is a sexy nonbinary sea monster character if that sweetens the pot for you any. awesome, subtly integrated worldbuilding. super funny and charming. i love this one a whole bunch

bybloemen - i’m not just recommending this because i’m vague internet acquaintances with the author, it’s ALSO an extremely one-of-a-kind comic about the dutch tulip mania, and also demons. the art is gorgeous and the character designs are some of my favorites out there in newer webcomics. just kind of an extremely good concept that i think everyone should check out. and it’s funny, duh

mare internum - completed. an extremely affecting sci-fi set on Mars. you really just have to read this one, honestly. i’m also linking to the about page on this one because it contains CWs to keep in mind; it’s an incredibly well-constructed character study of some flawed, complicated people and also awesome if you like space aliens.

ozzie the vampire - another supernatural action-comedy because i know what i like, about a recently turned vampire girl and her best friend defending their small new jersey town from demons. super funny, super exciting, and really grounded and realistic for a story that’s about a vampire punching demons. the artist is also a superhuman wizard who draws a whole other comic, a shounen inspired action story called station square that you should check out if you end up liking ozzie.

[calamity-bean]

16 new horror films i’ve watched at random lately just cause i’ve been in the mood for horror

Been thinking about horror today, and fun fact, I’ve actually been fairly DEVOURING horror films of late! Sixteen new ones in the past couple weeks, in fact, according to the little list I’ve been keeping! New to me, that is, though they do all happen to be very recent releases (2016 at earliest). Horror is a genre with which I often like to pull up Netflix or Hulu and just pick at random some film I’ve never heard of and don’t know the first thing about; I feel like it’s a genre that depends so much on personal taste and that encompasses such a wide variety of tropes and approaches that I never entirely know whether I’ll like a particular film until I try it. It’s a gamble, sure, and sometimes it’s a dull or infuriating couple hours... But I love horror in general, and I feel like it’s a genre in which even terrible films often stir my imagination with the potential of their premise if not the brilliance of their execution. And you do find those hidden gems.

Anyway, since I love to hear myself talk, I thought I’d share my quick impressions of the ones I’ve watched lately, in case any of you are also in the mood to stream something new! These are (almost) all currently on Netflix or Hulu, so have at it. No specific spoilers; mostly just whether I liked it or not and why. I added a few content warnings where I remembered any elements that, to me, went beyond genre-standard levels of content or involved specific common triggers, but, I mean, they’re all horror films, so do your due diligence if necessary and do expect some level of violent or disturbing content in all of them. 

The sixteen films in question are: Sweetheart (2019); The Lodge (2019); Mercy Black (2019); What Keeps You Alive (2018); Cold Skin (2017); The Golem (2018); Rattlesnake (2019); We Summon the Darkness (2019); The Wretched (2019); They Come Knocking (2019); Pyewacket (2017); The Other Lamb (2019); The Silence (2019); Body at Brighton Rock (2019); Under the Shadow (2016); and Seven in Heaven (2018).

Brief descriptions and impressions and such under the cut!

Sweetheart: Survival/monster horror about a young woman who, after the boat she and her friends were on goes down in a storm, washes up alone on an uninhabited island… and then realizes she’s not entirely alone. Quite liked this one! Like almost any horror movie, it suffers from the fact that monsters are almost ALWAYS far scarier (and far less cheesy) before you actually see their CGI rendering chasing the protag, but that’s typical, we’re used to that. The protagonist is smart and capable, and the actress (Kiersey Clemons) has to carry so much of the film solo and often with very sparse dialogue. Warning for mutilated and decomposing corpses.

The Lodge: A woman who as a child was the only survivor of a cult winds up stranded with her new fiance’s two children in a remote, snowbound lodge. This one was pretty dark! I love themes of cold, isolation, and losing connection with reality, and I think the whole cast does a great job; the acting and production are overall high quality. Not sure it captured my imagination enough for a rewatch, but I did enjoy watching it. My fellow Barkskins fans will notice a few glimpses of our own Renardette. Warnings for onscreen suicide, pet death, and psychiatric/medical manipulation. 

Mercy Black: A young woman returns home fifteen years after, in her childhood, being involved in a disturbing act of violence inspired by an urban legend called Mercy Black. I like the concept behind this one, in terms of the urban legend, the protagonist’s relationship with it; I liked the overall film okay, but I found certain aspects a bit cliche or thinly sketched. Standard supernatural horror levels of violence and spookiness, imo.

What Keeps You Alive: For their one-year anniversary, a young couple vacation to a remote house in the woods, where the protagonist begins to learn some strange things about her wife. I really enjoyed this one. It might be my favorite on this list, and certainly one of the ones I’m more likely to watch again. It’s well structured, well made, with a strong, compact cast, and it’s gotten the song “Bloodlet” stuck in my head for weeks. However, you will probably not enjoy this one if, as I know is the case for some people, you would rather not consume content that depicts LGBT relationships that are unhealthy or LGBT characters who are villainous. I get where you’re coming from, but it means this one probably isn’t for you. It also isn’t for you if you would rather not see some quite brutal injuries.

Cold Skin: Okay, this is the only one that wasn’t actually on streaming, I checked this out from my local library. Set in 1914, a young man takes a post as a meteorologist on a remote island in the South Atlantic, inhabited only by the unfriendly lighthouse keeper… and the creatures that crawl onto shore at night. Gosh… How do I feel about this one? There are aspects that are cheesy, effects that don’t entirely hold up. But I liked it. I like the idea of it, and I like the themes of isolation and connection, and I like the protagonist and overall I think it’s a solid and interesting narrative. Sort of… The Terror meets Lovecraft. Warning for offscreen (but audible, and almost visible) sexual assault.

The Golem: Set in the late 17th century in a rural Lithuanian shtetl, a woman creates a golem to protect her community from the threats of Christians who blame her people for the plague. Thematically, this one centers largely around motherhood, which I think makes sense with how it’s done here, and I always like the supernatural elements of a horror film to have a very strong, personal thematic link with the protagonist’s emotional character arc. Stars Maman Brigitte from American Gods! Warning for mentions of miscarriage and themes of child death.

Rattlesnake: After a mishap on a remote highway, a woman unknowingly makes a deal with the devil in order to save her young daughter’s life. I liked this one as well; I found the protagonist enjoyable, the overall concept straightforward but engaging, and the hot, arid, rural setting — I think it’s supposed to be around Palo Duro? — an effective backdrop. Not spooky-scary, but nice tension throughout. 

We Summon the Darkness: Set in the 80s, three girls travel to a heavy metal concert despite the string of recent killings apparently committed by a Satanic cult. This one is basically a slasher flick — with a twist, yeah, but essentially the slasher model of teens plus extensive violence — and I think it’s a pretty decent one. And I liked the hair and costumes, ahaha. 

The Wretched: A teenage boy becomes convinced that his new neighbor has been possessed by something evil. I like the narrative and the characters in this one okay, but where I really have to give it props is in the overall visual presentation of the supernatural threats; it’s able to lean into uncanniness and human body horror that work well on film rather than presenting a creature created wholecloth (which, as I mentioned earlier, often doesn’t work super well).

They Come Knocking: On a drive into the middle of nowhere, a father and his two daughters hear something knocking on their caravan at night, asking to be let in. Okay, so… this one is a black-eyed children story (with a setup reminiscent of ye olde Anansi’s Goatman, too, in a way), and I have to admit that black-eyed children are one of those tropes that doesn’t work for me even as a creepypasta, it just strikes me as lame and dumb. And I did find the actual children in this film to be, well, cheesy and dumb-looking. But the human side of the narrative — the characters and their relationships and emotional aspects — is actually pretty well done! So I found it engaging enough in that regard.

Pyewacket: A teenage girl who has a difficult relationship with her mother lashes out by trying to summon a demon to kill her, only to regret the ritual right away. I think this one was well done, too, pretty dark, with a spooky forest setting and some genuinely creepy glimpses of the supernatural threat. I am also delighted to discover that Pyewacket is actually the name of a familiar spirit according to the confession of an accused witch in the 17th century. (Not delighted by the fact that this poor 17th century woman was tortured for being an alleged witch, but delighted that there’s a little historical inspo here.) Warning for a fairly graphic death by burning.

The Other Lamb: This one is not horror as in “scary” but horror as in thematically disturbing and a little eerie. A young girl who’s been raised in a cult — all female except for their leader, to whom all the members are either wives or daughters — begins to question her faith. Slow, quiet, and a bit surreal, with some slightly feral-woman themes that are up my alley; I think I enjoyed it? The cast is quite good, especially the protagonist (Raffey Cassidy) and cult leader (Michiel Huisman with, I gotta say, some truly lovely hair). Warning for onscreen but nongraphic (as in, clothed and not showing anything below the neck) sexual assault of a minor.

The Silence: A deaf teenager and her family struggle to survive amidst an apocalypse of deadly monsters that attack based on sound. No, I’m not talking about A Quiet Place. I do feel a bit sorry for this film, because I know that it was conceived of and began production well before A Quiet Place came out, only to essentially be doomed by its striking similarity to such a successful film… And honestly, it’s not as good as A Quiet Place; it’s cheesier, there are more plot and character holes, the ultimate main threat feels disconnected from the premise, and the core theme/character arcs aren’t as cohesive. But it’s not TERRIBLE. It’s more of a B-movie-esque monster/disaster flick, is all. And I like Stanley Tucci, so at least he’s always fun to watch.

Body at Brighton Rock: An inexperienced parks employee gets lost in the backcountry and has to spend the night watching over a (possibly murdered) body she stumbles across while awaiting rescue. This one… hm. It’s like, I didn’t hate it? But it was frustrating. It reused the same scares / fake-outs multiple times, and even by horror movie standards the protagonist was maddeningly careless. I think it was all the more disappointing because I do like the setting and premise but felt it could’ve been better. 

Under the Shadow: In 1980s Tehran, during the air raids and missile strikes of the War of the Cities, a woman begins to fear something evil is stalking her young daughter through their emptying apartment building. This is another top fave, and I think overall the most well constructed film on this list in an objective sense. Strong narrative, strong characters and acting, a really great atmosphere of claustrophobia and tension and dread, and an interesting and effective setting. Would absolutely watch again.

Seven in Heaven: At a house party, two teenagers enter a closet as part of a kissing game, and they exit into a parallel universe that is similar but different in striking ways. This one was, hm… okay? I felt like it could’ve gone so much farther with the potential of alternate universes, in terms of really making them weird and interesting, and although I don’t expect a film to spell out everything for me, I just thought that the whole underlying mechanism of what was happening was left too unexplained. Also, the background characters looked like they were played by actual high school-age teens while the main characters looked like your standard Hollywood 20-something “teens,” which created kind of a weird dissonance lmao. But it was okay.

Overall, I didn’t HAAATE any of these; most were fine, some I found less engaging or more frustrating than others, and some I really enjoyed. I did start and then not finish a few more as well... I watched about 20 minutes of Black Rock (2012) before deciding I wasn’t in the mood for where it was going, and I just barely started We Are What We Are (2010) but realized I was too tired and distracted by other things to pay enough attention to subtitles at the moment. On a not strictly horror note, but it’s still thriller so we’ll toss it in, I got a ways into The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017) because that’s a helluva title and I wanted to see Barry Keoghan’s work outside Dunkirk (the only film I’d seen him in), but man, that’s a weird one huh, very slow, very odd style of dialogue. I’ll still likely finish some or all of those at some point, but I just wasn’t in the right headspace when I first tried. 

Anyway, this has been me telling you what movies I’ve been watching! I’m sure you’re enthralled. And please always feel free to talk horror movies to me or send me recs!

[quibliography]

The Sandman series by Neil Gaimon

Synopsis: This graphic novel is about one of the eternals, the master of the dreamworld, the sandman. In an attempt to capture Death, an occultist accidentally captures Morpheus (aka Dream) instead. During his imprisonment, Morpheus’s possessions are lost and scattered through the ages and the world is thrown into dreamless anguish. This is just the beginning as the infamous sandman must seek release, revenge, and master over his dominion once again.

My Quibs: I want to preface that I started this series (graphic novels and audible adaptation) with a deadline, not knowing how huge an endeavor this would be. Audible had only put out 8 chapters, which seemed do-able. Now I know, not only is this only Act I, which precedes a highly anticipated Act II and Act III, but it only covered Books 1-3, of which there are 11. And Gaiman is not a breezy read. So, my review thus far is strictly about Books 1-3/Act I.

My love for Gaiman and his writing is so inherent and obvious that more words praising him is unnecessary. Despite that, I avoided reading The Sandman because I’m very picky when it comes to the style of a graphic novel. Classic American comic book art is like classic Hollywood horror to me: there’s too much detail that unfortunately leaves little to the wrong side of imagination. But with the expectation of the audio adaptation and the news of a TV series, I felt the time had come. Strangely, the graphic novels are exactly what I would expect. It’s your standard high-quality Gaiman story telling and he uses every visual tool of a graphic novel to give it every nuance. The story itself is curiouser and curiouser and I’m invested in all the characters. It also helps when you have actors like James McAvoy and Kat Dennings giving them life. The audio adaptation, despite the steller voice casting, plays second fiddle to the graphic novels. I always give the benefit of the doubt though because it’s hard to translate anything. All Gaiman’s visual artistry is literally translated into descriptive narration (by Gaiman), but there’s a reason I read books instead of listen to them. Audio books lull me and I lose track of the story. You also get supportive information from background art that background audio usually makes more confusing than clearer. Maybe if the original content had leaned more heavily on dialogue than graphics, it would’ve been an easier transition to audio. But also maybe if they had invested a looooot more in foleys. I’ve noticed that the best audio stories have creative and distinct foleys; it’s basically sound art. A highly underappreciated art.

Should you read it? Always always read Gaiman.

Similar reads? Audio-wise, I loved the audio adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere which also has James McAvoy as lead protagonist.

(Spoiler Alert!) The narrative is a bit windy and confusing at times. Some books/issues are contained side stories and some participate in a larger story. I did enjoy the lone-immortal-human-because-Dream-is-lonely-and-wants-a-friend story but while listening to the audio adaptation, I was thrown way out of the loop. I also didn’t appreciate the extended serial/cereal (killer) convention storyline. It seemed gratuitous, how much detail went in to each killer and their seemingly prosaic but disturbing conversations. Other than that, the narrative unwinds at a pace and path that doesn’t lend itself to conclusion jumping. He creates a world that is just on the other side of unpredictable so I don’t even try to anticipate or expect anything. Thus, I have nothing to say about spoilers. Just enjoy the weird and twisted wonderland kind of ride.

What did you think of The Sandman series?

[aion-rsa]

Old Review: M. Night Shyamalan’s Makes Another Happening

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Filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan has left his unmistakable stamp on some of our culture’s most primal fears: ghosts, beings from another world, and even unnamed monsters in the woods. Yet in his latest effort, the cryptically titled Old, the storyteller attempts to wrap his arms around the greatest terror of all: time itself.

Like the ticking clock inside Peter Pan’s crocodile, time has stalked every creature on this planet to their inevitable doom. It can often be ignored or compartmentalized, but it finds you in the end. Which is why, on paper, Old should be terrifying. By adapting a graphic novel called Sandcastle by Pierre-Oscar Lévy and Frederick Peeters, Shyamalan is attempting to prevent us from looking away. This is a film where once you step foot on a mythical beach, you will live a lifetime in a day. Who has time to distract themselves from the ravages of decay when it’ll be here by dinner?

And yet, that is not the movie Shyamalan made. Despite being a film supposedly preoccupied with the future that awaits us all, Old feels like a relic of its director’s past. For here is another half-baked and clumsily constructed series of clichés strung together by sequences which vary wildly from quality to kitsch, and from horrifying to hilarious. His characters might be rapidly aging, but the filmmaker’s undeniable talent feels as if it’s regressed back to its awkward and gangly The Happening days.

Also like that Mark Wahlberg misfire, Old is a story that mistakenly believes it’s obligated to overthink and explain its fairy tale logic. Which is a shame since the actual setup of the film is simple enough: Two sets of families, plus two other childless couples, are offered a once in a lifetime opportunity by their isolated island resort. They will be driven to the far side of the island where there’s a secluded beach surrounded by a cove with special minerals. Alone on white sandy shores and in the bluest waters, they can get to know each other and sample the good life.

There are more characters than are worth listing, but suffice to say the important ones are Guy, an actuary accountant played by Gael García Bernal, and his museum curator wife Prisca (Vicky Krieps). Despite being of separate international origins, they’ve raised the all-American nuclear family with daughter Maddox and son Trent (Alexa Swinton and Nolan River… at first), and are determined to give their children a happy childhood, even as their marriage appears to have long rested at the water’s edge. However, once they reach this magical beach populated by many other underdeveloped characters, it becomes an open question how happy a life can be had when their children rapidly age into teenagers and then young adults in the span of a morning… and that rich doctor down the way (Rufus Sewell) begins showing signs of late stage Alzheimer’s after only a few more hours.

Old is a genuinely creepy premise, which in the right hands could unnerve as the ultimate body horror. What instills more existential dread than seeing your youth turn to wrinkles, and golden halcyon days go gray inside of 90 minutes? But inexplicably that is not the movie Shyamalan chose to make. To be sure, there is some basic use of humans’ natural transmutations, but it’s mostly through the perspective of parents watching their children age like bananas. And credit should be given to the hair and makeup folks, as well as the younger actors, who convincingly pull off the continuity of Maddox and Trent’s accelerated lifespans.

But for each effective moment, such as when teenaged Maddox and Trent approach their parents confused and horrified at why their voices are different, there are five more of Guy, Prisca, and an ensemble of wildly inconsistent adult performances standing around trying to justify their film’s lunacy with laughable pseudo-science. Rather than delve into the ripe existential phobias that are growing around its cast like coconuts, Old is content with mostly coasting on being a Fantasy Island episode that adapts And Then There Were None—complete with a surprise killer running around. The movie thus plays less like an artist grappling with mortality than it does one slumming in B-movie trashiness.

And if The Happening should’ve taught Shyamalan and his audience anything, it’s that intentional trash has never been his forte. As with the revelation of why folks were killing themselves in The Happening, Old spends far too much time setting up a rationalization and an inevitable third act twist, which plays a bit like if at the end of The Birds, Alfred Hitchcock revealed the title creatures had been trained by a mad scientist down the shoreline. It’s unnecessary and, like so much else of the film, focused on the wrong questions. But then even the ideas that Old does concern itself with are haphazardly explored and articulated.

After proving he still has a gift for quirky and clever dialogue with films like Split, the perfunctory and ham-fisted nature of nearly every adult character interaction is baffling here. From on-the-nose lectures wherein parents tell their children in the first scene they’re too young for this and not old enough for that, to the robotic way in which Guy and Prisca unconvincingly talk about their marriage, the banality of the screenplay is as ceaseless as the sea. Framing and blocking for the camera is similarly roughshod throughout the movie. Sequences meant to evoke genuine horror—including a surprise pregnancy teased in the trailer—become outright giggle-inducing in their final execution. It’s in fact hard to think of any theatrical screening this summer with more laughs drifting through an auditorium.

By the time of its hokey and melodramatic finale, Old has collapsed on every level as a horror movie, but may have cemented its status as a cult midnight movie classic.

I take no joy in writing this. As someone who’s seen virtues in most Shyamalan movies, even damnable ones, it was a real pleasure to witness the “Shyamalanaissance” emerge in the wake of The Visit and Split. I even enjoy the autobiographical subtext the filmmaker inserted into Glass. But if those movies were a validation of his cinematic powers, then Old is the puddle waiting for him in the parking lot.

Old opens in theaters on Friday, July 23.

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[grandhotelabyss]

Though my online course is over, I still feel obligated to provide audiovisual content on Mondays. Above is a movie I watched recently, White of the Eye (1987). I hadn’t even heard of it before I ran across it in Bezos’s archive, and I now believe it’s criminally unheralded in the semi-arty horror-thriller pantheon (do not, please, speak to me of Ari Aster). 

Being a philistine, I like White of the Eye better, for instance, than the connoisseur’s go-to ’80s cult object, Żuławski’s Possession, which I find unendurably over-stylized despite its other merits. Fun fact: Possession was co-written by novelists’ novelist Frederic Tuten, who once received the most extravagant blurb from my beloved Cynthia Ozick, as friend-of-the-blog @danskjavlarna pointed out: “What an amazing, glittering, glowing, Proustian, Conradian, Borgesian, diamond-faceted, language-studded, myth-drowned dream!” exclaimed our greatest living Republican-voting novelist (remember that Cormac McCarthy doesn’t vote). Tuten, by the way, is not to be blamed for what I call Possession’s over-stylization, which is a matter of performance not script. But I don’t want to get into a hipper-than-thou spiral, “My cult movie’s better than your cult movie,” to be trapped in a crisis of Girard’s mimetic desire or Bourdieu’s cultural capital—merde, but the French are depressing, “too human, too historical,” as Deleuze complained in acclaiming “the superiority of Anglo-American literature.” The work of art has formal, affective, conceptual intrinsic qualities, not just extrinsic social determinants, and White of the Eye is, I argue, intrinsically spectacular.

Speaking of performance: White of the Eye was directed by Donald Cammell, the co-director with Nicolas Roeg of the classic 1970 film Performance. Again a philistine, I could never get into Performance—never even watched it all the way through—even though it sits at the nexus of two of my early influences. First, in a Comics Journal interview in the mid-’90s, English artist Bryan Talbot credited Performance’s jump-cut montage techniques for inspiring the storytelling innovations in his graphic novel The Adventures of Luther Arkwright. The underread Arkwright is the lost key to comics’s British Invasion—without it we wouldn’t have had V for Vendetta, Watchmen, Sandman, or The Invisibles. (It’s also a key to this movement’s cryptic politics, as Talbot stages a Jacobite uprising as anti-fascist revolution, precursor to Moore’s much more famous but still baffling ancom in Guy Fawkes garb. Is all anarchism Tory anarchism?) Second, Performance was a particular interest of Professor Colin MacCabe’s, whose class on James Joyce, with its mind-altering 12 weeks on Ulysses, helped to make me the reader and writer I am today back in that explosive landmark year, 2001. Protagonist of an epochal affaire in poststructuralism’s history and erstwhile director of the British Film Institute, MacCabe later wrote a book on Performance, which, alas, unlike his books on Joyce and Godard, I haven’t read. 

I like White of the Eye better than Performance as I like it better than Possession, though. Mysterious symbolism, desert desolation, languorous eroticism, and, yes, some montage. The scorching, doomed marriage between a fanatic Western audiophile—he looks like the young W. Bush—and his breathy, no-nonsense New York wife; a Paglia-esque misogynist rampage (“that fuckin’ black hole...if that’s not female, I don’t know what is”) in an arid outpost of the Reagan-era bourgeoisie and its multicultural fringe: it all evokes the inherent evil of the American landscape that Burroughs observes in Naked Lunch. It has that ’80s quality of emotional amplitude not just between but within scenes. At every moment you might ask, “Is this sad, funny, or horrifying?” and answer, “Yes.” I do see filmmakers today working in the same vein and aspiring to the same compass. Witness the already famous Jacques Derrida High School in David Prior’s ultimately disappointing Empty Man or the scarcely resistible vaporwave dreamscape of Anthony Scott Burns’s also ultimately disappointing Come True (can’t anybody end a movie anymore?). But White of the Eye does it without effort or self-consciousness, as the very essence of its being an artwork at all—an artifact from a lost civilization.

[marueonmain]

WINDFLOWER

part four ~ it was them like that ~ 

(part one) (part two) (part three) (part four)

A/N: I rewrote this part twice wanting it to be perfect readable. I am grateful for every like/retweet: to quote our boy himself “I wish I could shake all your little hands.” Messages/asks are always highly appreciated. Strive to have a good quarantine, and take care of yourself!

Summary: Alex goes to find Sammy at his apartment and is met with an odd reception from Y/N.

Pairing: imallexx x reader

Warning: Language. Minor (Non-Graphic) Injury.

Word Count: 2.6k

Alex woke to the feeling of incessant buzzing in his hand. It was not a bright morning. With a groan, he opened his eyes – feeling the crust in the corners of them – and looked to his phone in his right hand. It buzzed with silenced notifications, and the screen lit up with banners and alerts. He tried to fight through his exhaustion. There was an odd taste in his mouth; he swirled his tongue around, attempting to produce saliva to little avail.

Propping himself on his elbows, he pulled his phone to his chest and read the lock screen. Nothing it said made sense. When he activated the touch ID, his phone opened to instagram and the last thing he watched before passing out (in his street clothes on top of his bedding). He had been watching an instagram story he was tagged in – even worse – it was George's instagram story.

To his horror, George had posted a solid three minutes of him dancing. Despite the overall low quality of the videos and darkness of the club, it was clear that it was indeed Alex who was throwing his limbs and jumping around erratically.  

George had also managed, even in his inebriated state, to post the worst of the videos on twitter. And his followers were going mad. Three hundred retweets, five hundred comments, and at least a thousand laughing-crying emojis in all. 

Alex groaned and tossed his phone to the end of the bed.

Getting up was a slow process. He had to stop to ground himself every few steps. While grasping a weak hand on his side table, he picked a pair of black joggers off the floor and replaced his white jeans with them. He moved steadily, grazing his fingertips along the wall as he went to his cupboard, and ripped a shirt from its hanger in an almost aggressive manner. He changed into it.

Eventually, he made it to his bathroom. After splashing water on his face and sticking his head under the faucet for a good minute, slurping the water like he would if he were drinking from a garden hose, he felt better. Alex tossed his hair around with his hand, pulling it forward and down, smoothing the cowlicks. Its slight greasiness was not too noticeable. He huffed, gathered his essentials (wallet, keys, phone) from his desk/bed, and left.

"You up already?" George called from where he sat on the sofa eating cereal. "It's before noon."

"Shut up. I saw your instagram story." Alex stood in the kitchen with a blank gaze debating whether to eat then or later. "You made me look like a complete bellend; I don't appreciate it."

"You wanted to dance! Who am I to deny the imallexx stans their behind-the-scenes exclusive?"

Rolling his eyes, Alex left the kitchen. At the front door, he slipped on the most available shoes there: which happened to be George's crocs (he swears he bought as a laugh but wore all the time).

"I'm going to go pick-up Sammy.” 

George snorted and said, "You mean pick-up off the floor, probably."

"Just be ready to film when we get back."

Standing out in the hall, breathing in the fixed smell of wet dog in the carpet, Alex thanked himself for being young enough to be able to near blackout and be just a touch ill in the morning.

It was not a full two minutes between Alex leaving George and him stepping out of the lift onto the floor above. Coming up on Sammy and Y/N's apartment, there was a fleeting regret that he wished he had thought in his morning haze to brush his teeth before showing up unannounced. But it was too late as his hand was raised and rapping on their door.

KNOCK. KNOCK.

Alex watched the door handle jump as it was twisted and pulled on the tiniest amount possible. Just enough for the latch bolt to disengage and reengage so that it rested – holding the door open – against the doorframe. There was no proper greeting. He felt like an intruder having to push on the almost closed door and let himself into the apartment: though invited not necessarily welcome.

Inside it was bright with all available light fixtures on including a scattering of floor and table lamps. There was the sound of a running shower.

To his left was Y/N ducked into her refrigerator. She pushed things around on the top shelf before landing her hand on a carton of eggs. Taking them out, she sat them on the counter next to a mixing bowl. She turned her back to Alex but not before flashing him a tense near straight-line smile.

"Hi." Y/N counted out three eggs from the carton. "Sam's in the shower."

Alex grabbed a bar seat. He rested slouched against the backrest but kept his shoulders square and arms open. Hair fell from his fringe, and he jerked his head out of instinct, flipping the hair out of his face. A bit bedraggled. The chain still around his neck from his night-out. Lithe arms stuck out from armholes three times their size as he drowned in the large yellow crewneck.

It was the same yellow as the one Y/N complimented him on earlier. Not that he recognized it when he was throwing on clothes. Not that he would admit he recognized it.

Y/N cracked three eggs into the mixing bowl with one hand and tossed the shells into the kitchen bin. She stood, her feet set like an arrow, with her toes touching. Next to the mixing bowl was a waffle iron with a red light on top and a baking mix box. She held it up; her mouth moved as she read off the ingredients on the recipe on the back of the box to herself.

Alex forced a light chuckle. "I'm surprised he's up. He was out of it when we dropped him off."

"You all were," mumbled Y/N into her collar. She placed the box down and stirred the contents of the mixing bowl with a fork and a quick hand. Her head was down focused on what she was doing; a little wrinkle formed between her eyebrows.

"You got me there." Alex shifted in his seat, scooching up so he might rest his forearms on the counter. He proceeded to crack his knuckles to occupy his nervous hands. "How is Sammy?"

"Fine."

"He's helping me film a video." Like a smiling dog promised and expecting a treat, Alex straightened up in his seat. He searched Y/N's side profile for a read on her but came up blank.

"Hmm," hummed Y/N letting up on her battering of the waffle batter.

It was evident in how his spine slumped and how he returned to resting on his arms that it was not the reaction Alex expected. The reaction he hoped for was a reaction at all but no such luck.

"I guess he would have told you. I'm a youtuber." Alex added in a stronger voice (as if her not hearing him was the issue), "So is George."

"Uh-huh." Polite in tone but nonetheless dismissive.

"I was hoping you'd text me, then I'd have your number as well."

Y/N gave no response. Her eyes were clouded and distant. Leaving the batter to sit, she crossed the kitchen and pulled open a drawer of miscellaneous utensils. While she searched for what she wanted, the fingers of her non-dominate hand drummed a rhythm against her hip.

"Did I do something wrong?" asked Alex.

"What?"

"Was it last night? Did I do something to offend you? I was trashed." He spoke plain, hiding the hint of hurt in his voice. His open palm-up hands moved in a series of give and take type gestures.

His bit of babbling grabbed Y/N's full attention. She pulled her focus up, from her search in the utensil drawer to Alex's face. Her hesitant gaze stopped at his mouth and nose before going further up.

Their eyes met. Alex felt a surge of warmth rushing upon him: a warmth he could lie in forever. Die in. So even his bones might one afternoon be exposed to it. It was clear at that moment (as if it was not before) that being around Y/N was not something Alex knew how to handle or react to.

There was an undeniable switch in her gaze – a moment of real recognition – and if eyes could talk, hers would have sighed and happily said, oh, it's you.

Alex reiterated, "I promise I don't remember a thing."

"Sorry, Al." (a pause like she did intend the nickname but then thought it inappropriate) "Sorry, Alex. It's not you. I just have a lot I'm thinking about."

"You don’t have to apologize; I was just a little worried is all." He relaxed, dropping his hands, letting them fall to his lap.

"You're sweet. Thank you." Her hand settled in the utensil drawer; she pulled out an ice cream scoop and held it at an odd angle. Fiddling with the lever as if checking it worked. It did. Y/N turned her back to him once more to place the ice cream scoop on the counter with the mixing bowl. She picked out the fork from the bowl and continued stirring the batter.

Sore from slouching and general aching muscles, Alex stood from the bar seat and stretched.

"You make a lot of breakfast foods, huh?" he asked as he stood with solid feet and twisted at the middle as far to his left as he could; he twisted to the other side as his spine screamed at him. "Is that your favourite then?"

"Why? Got something against breakfast?"

"I like buttered toast as much as the next—" Alex was distracted mid-thought when he lifted his foot and put it down again to the sound of a quiet crunch. Light speckles of paint dotted the floor, and when he lifted his foot, under it was a small chip of plasterboard.

"Toast, you said? How extravagant!"

A framed picture was stuck on the wall nearest Alex: one he did not recognize as being there before, but half the apartment was not yet unpacked when he last was there. How bad could you screw up your wall hanging something? He pulled on a bottom corner of the frame and peered behind it.

It was a fine hanging job. There was just a fist-sized hole in the plasterboard wall. And the framed picture was covering it.

Y/N glanced over to him. "That's nothing – just a little accident from last night. Could thank George for that if you like."

"George did that?"  He exclaimed, reeling as if he were about to faint. Alex made a fist and compared it to the hole. George and him about matched in height – matched hand sizes. While the hole in the plasterboard could eat Alex's hand.

Y/N's face dropped as she rushed to correct herself, "No! Not at all."

"You scared me," the words rode out on his bated breath. He put the framed picture back in place, moving to retake the bar seat.

"Sorry, I shouldn't have said it like that." Y/N gave a shallow shake of the head.

"What did happen?"

"Oh," she sounded exhausted, "Sam got angry because George was teasing him about something."

"What was it about?"

"I couldn't understand it. None of you lot were making sense," she said unconvincingly

"Come on, Red."

And there at his words or in reaction to the strange atmosphere Y/N rolled her left shoulder back and, when it returned to its natural resting position, she twitched. Her head turned forty-five degrees to the left, and her chin lifted so that her cheek was parallel to the ground for about half a second until her muscles relaxed, and she stood regular. Y/N spoke soft, "I don't know."

"Well, Sammy must have said something. Or George."

"Stop." Y/N spoke clear and stern, throwing her voice despite not facing him. "You were all giggling like idiots and piss drunk. Ok? It was bound to happen."

Atop the waffle iron, the red light switched to green. Y/N tilted the mixing bowl toward herself and grabbed the ice cream scoop. She stirred it around the bowl. Her elbow lifted from her side in the motion. It was shaking. She was shaking. Trembling – even if just a small amount.

"Ok," Alex said without thinking. 

The ice cream scoop gathered the golden batter. It would have looked delicious if his stomach was not so knotted.

Lifting the waffle iron lid, Y/N poured the batter in a circle from the outside-in, when the lid dropped, snapping shut on two of her fingers. "Ow! Shit."

She raced to the sink: turning it on to its coldest setting: she kept her hurt hand at a distance. Her free hand grasped her inner elbow supporting the extended arm. As the water bathed her burnt fingers, Y/N stood bent over with her head tucked under her arms and muttered a string of curses.

"Fuck. Are you alright?" Alex rushed around the counter. "Did you break them?"

"N-no. No." She was stuttering through distressed gasps.

"Red, it's not great." Alex laid a hand on her shoulder and another over her free hand on her arm. He felt her continuing to struggle for breath and start a self-soothing type rocking on her feet – not about to give in to the panic. "It’s not great, but you got to calm down. Follow me."

He pulled his lips in and inhaled a slow breath as if through a straw, exhaling it just the same. It took ten seconds of him doing the exercise on his own before Y/N began to follow. And it was them like that. And it was nice – given the circumstances.

Both their shirts were damp from the splashback of the running sink.

Half a minute passed. Y/N had not gained her complete composure, but her breathing evened out, and her muscles relaxed enough that Alex had to reposition himself to support her as she leaned into him slightly.

"Thank you." It was audible though her chin was still tucked to her chest.

"It's alright...I can't cook either."

She laughed a short laugh. "You were lying earlier?"

"I know, pretty believable."

Sammy walked in from the master bedroom: shirtless with his wet hair dripping water onto the floor: and his eyebrows knit together in immediate confusion and concern. Set in action, he rushed over to the kitchen and pulled Alex off Y/N (sending him stumbling over himself to regain balance). At Y/N's side, he turned off the sink and took hold of her hands, avoiding the burned fingers.

"Red. What did you do?" he asked.

"It's alright," she assured, and it was, as most minor burns are after a few seconds under cold water.

Alex was frozen in place – watching them – reconciling his protective instincts with his disorientation. And despite where his eyes landed in physical space, he was far off in another place in his mind.

Staring at him with a skewed frown, Sammy asked, "What are you doing here?"

"I'm– I was going to pick you up to film."

"Right." He straightened Y/N and himself up to be standing. "I'll be up in a bit."

It took a moment for the command from Alex's brain (move) to reach his legs. In that time, he stole a glance at Y/N whose face canvased a flustered blush. She smiled. A metaphorical dart whizzed around his head, striking a metaphorical bullseye, and producing a singular thought.™

He wished he could go back to about twenty-three lines ago. To when she was leaning on him.

Alex smiled a reassuring smile in return and shuffled out of the apartment. Two steps from the closed door, he heard Sammy say to Y/N in a hushed voice, "I’m here for you, Red, but you should have known better."

[bigprettygothgf]

Why would u id as a commie when places North Korea exists lol. Are u that dumb or are u just being performative on tumblr to be relatable

Rabies is the fifth studio album by Skinny Puppy. It was released on November 21, 1989 through Nettwerk. The album notably features Ministry frontman Al Jourgensen (credited as Alien Jourgensen) who performed electric guitar and vocals on several songs. The album spawned two singles, "Tin Omen" and "Worlock", the latter of which becoming one of the band's most recognizable songs. The cover art was made by longtime Skinny Puppy collaborator Steven R. Gilmore. In 1993 the CD edition was reissued by Nettwerk to correct mastering errors in the original release.[1]

Rabies was a commercial success for the band, but received mixed reviews from critics upon release, several of whom drew parallels between the record and Ministry's style, both favorably and unfavorably. A joint tour with Ministry, KMFDM, and My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult, dubbed The Mutants of Rock Tour, was planned but ultimately cancelled when Skinny Puppy ended its commitment to the project.

Recording and production[edit]

Most of the band's previous albums had been mixed and produced by the group's "fourth member" Dave "Rave" Ogilvie. For Rabies, lead singer/songwriter Nivek Ogre brought in friend and Ministry frontman, Al Jourgensen. Ogre had met Jourgensen during the recording of the PTP song "Show Me Your Spine" in 1987. Ogre later toured with Ministry (Ogre can be seen and heard on the In Case You Didn't Feel Like Showing Up video and CD) and would also go on to provide vocals for Jourgensen's side project Revolting Cocks.[2][3] The other two members of Skinny Puppy, cEvin Key (drummer) and Dwayne Goettel (keyboardist/synthesist), did not approve of Jourgensen's takeover, creating a "glacial coldness" between the band members.[4][5] A couple years following the release of Rabies, Key mentioned to Alternative Press that he believed Jourgensen's motive for assisting in the album's production was to try and break up Skinny Puppy.[5]

Much of the album had been written before Jourgensen was officially involved, though Key has mentioned that the process was influenced by the notion that Jourgensen might join them in the studio to "jam." The group took into consideration what type of music Jourgensen would be interested in making, thus writing guitar heavy material such as "Tin Omen,"[5] a song which makes reference to the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989.[6] "Fascist Jock Itch," also written with Jourgensen in mind,[5] was inspired by an incident between Ogre and a few skinheads. Ogre states that he had been approached by the skinheads who then proceeded to question him regarding his "loyalty towards communism" (prompted by a small Red star on his pants). Feeling threatened, Ogre pushed one of them away and a short scuffle ensued.[3] Other songs on the album, such as "Worlock" and "Choralone," have been described as being more "pure" to previous Skinny Puppy material.[5] The song "Hexonxonx," a song which criticizes the use of oil (written in the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989),[7] has been described as being an exemplary mixture of "twisted humor and Throbbing Gristle-like experimentation", while other entries from the album have been noted for their novel use of sampling.[8]

The song "Worlock" has been played on every tour after its conception. A Roland Harmonizer was used to create the vocoder-effect during the chorus. Samples of the song "Helter Skelter" by the Beatles are mixed with an excerpt of Charles Manson singing the song;[9] the excerpt comes from the 1973 documentary Manson.[10]

Release and promotion[edit]

The original CD release on Nettwerk (and the licensed version on Capitol) was mistakenly mastered with Dolby B noise reduction, which resulted in a muffled sound. In 1993, the album was digitally remastered and re-released on Nettwerk.[1]

Only one promotional video was produced for Rabies. The "Worlock" video was primarily a rhythmically edited string of horror movie clips featuring outtakes and clips from the band's earlier video, "Stairs and Flowers" (from the album Mind: The Perpetual Intercourse). The video, which opens with a "Rated X" graphic, was intended to be a critique of the concept of censorship in America.[3] Many of the movie clips featured in the video were from films made by controversial Italian filmmaker Dario Argento, whose work has a reputation for being heavily censored by US distributors in order to gain "R-Ratings" from the MPAA.[11] For the "Worlock" video Skinny Puppy included footage deleted from the US versions of such Argento films as Deep Red, Suspiria, Tenebrae, Phenomena, and Opera. Other films included in the music video include, The Beyond, Hellbound: Hellraiser II, Bad Taste, Dead and Buried, Luther The Geek, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, From Beyond, Death Warmed Up, Eraserhead and Altered States.

Due to the graphic violence of the horror film clips used in the video, and also copyright violations, "Worlock" was subsequently banned by MTV, and did not receive any television airplay.[12] In 1992, Skinny Puppy released a compilation of their music videos, but "Worlock" was noticeably absent. According to Nettwerk, the video was omitted partially due to copyright problems and also because of concern the video would be banned by other countries which might find the video's content obscene.[citation needed] However, in recent years the video has been widely bootlegged among fans on the Internet. "Backing" videos for "Tin Omen" and "Choralone" were produced for the Too Dark Park tour in 1990, and have also been spread on the Internet.

A limited run of promotional mechanical pencils were made and sent to college (and possibly other) radio stations along with the album. Shaped like a syringe the pencils were white with black lettering "SKINNY [PUPPY]" and white on black lettering "RABIES". They were approximately 4 inches in length.

The Mutants of Rock Tour, which was to include a quadruple bill including Skinny Puppy, Ministry, KMFDM, and My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult, was to begin on December 27, 1989. However, according to Key, the tour was called off when Skinny Puppy collectively decided to pull out, citing concerns regarding the band's then uncertain situation. Key suggested a potential line of shows for the summer of 1990, but expressed little faith in any tour supporting Rabies ever happening.[13] Ogre ultimately joined Ministry's tour for The Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Taste.[14]

Critical reception

Since the album's release, reception from both critics and fans has been mixed. Alternative Press said Rabies was more of a Skinny Puppy/Ministry hybrid and was not representative of the group's best work.[5]

Tim DiGravina from Allmusic stated that Rabies was a solid release, even though he felt the band was not performing "at their peak". He goes on to praise the album's implementation of movie dialogue, particularly commending its use in the songs "Worlock", "Tin Omen", and "Rivers". DiGravina was, however, less impressed by Jourgensen's contributions, asserting that the same qualities which made The Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Taste a good album were not suitable for Rabies.[8] Trey Spencer from Sputnikmusic was less favorable, calling the record one of the group's "low points". He was critical of the album's use of simple (and sometimes "formless") song structures and claimed that the sampling brought nothing meaningful to the table. Spencer was more receptive to the song "Worlock", calling it the band's "defining moment", but concludes by saying that "the rest of the album consists of two good Industrial Metal songs, three average songs, and five songs that aren’t worth wasting your time on".[18]

Beth Fertig of The Boston Globe panned the album as "just another festering collection of noise", but pointed out the use of humor on songs such as "Fascist Jock Itch" as a positive element of the band's music.[15] Daniel Lukes of Kerrang! said that despite a "handful of undeniably classic tracks", the album comes across more as a collection of "Ministry B-sides" than a typical Skinny Puppy record.[16]

In a positive review from the Los Angeles Times, writers Jonathan Gold and David Kendrick list Rabies as an essential industrial album, calling it a "slightly atypical" offering that "also rocks a little harder".[17] This sentiment was echoed by CMJ's Brad Filicky, who called the album "a masterpiece of the industrial genre".[21] Jean Carey of the Tampa Bay Times praised the album, calling attention to the use of sampling, the song "Worlock", and Ogre's vocal work, which was compared to a "crazed Jimmy Durante". Carey concluded by saying that "Skinny Puppy's willingness to experiment and change makes [Rabies] well worth a listen".[19] Mark Jenkins of the Washington Post thought the album was less theatrical than their previous efforts, but concluded that the album's "groove is as solid as any the Puppy has ever fetched".[20]

Personnel[edit]

Nivek Ogre (vocals)

cEvin Key (production, engineering, mixing, various instruments)

Dwayne Goettel (production, engineering, mixing, various instruments)

Dave Ogilvie (production, engineering, mixing, backing vocals)

Al Jourgensen (production, engineering, mixing, guitar, additional vocals)

Greg Reely (additional engineering, special thanks)

Marc Ramaer (additional engineering, mixing)

Ken Marshall (additional engineering)

Cyan Meeks (vocals and lyrics on "Rain")

Keith Auerbach (mixing on "Fascist Jock Itch")

Jeff Newell (mixing on "Fascist Jock Itch")