Weekly Briefing from the North Texas Apocalypse Bunker, 10/31/22
Silver Shamrock Edition
The Birthday of the Administrator was noted in several media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter and a great many of you piled on to wish me a happy oneāover 350 of you, in fact. This number is staggering and continues to boggle my mind, especially with some of the really nice things you said about me both publicly and privately. Sincerely, thank you all very much.
What does 53 Feel Like?
Weird, mostly. I donāt perceive my own age, not when I look at other people. I know for certain that I donāt act my ageānot a lot of people over 50 would drive north for fifteen hours just to play games for a few days. Insofar as my interests go, Iāve not moved very far past my seventeen year old self. In the rare instance where I got a new obsession or picked up a new interest, it was never at the expense of the baseline (movies, comics, horror, super heroes, sword and sorcery, creative writing, etc.) Rather, I just piled on the new thing and kept right on truckinā.
I do have a few things now that I didnāt have last year; for instance, I have legs again. This is huge. I also have the pelvic strength of a teenager. I have a fiancĆ©e. I have more friends. I even have a couple of new enemies. But Iām not letting that deter me.
Here are a few pictures from the Birthday Road trip to Wisconsin. You can read about the con here, at the blog: Field Report: GameHole Con, Madison WI.
Finnās Top 5 Lists
The redo and updating of these lists ground to a halt last week with everything else going on, and wonāt kick back up again for a while. But before that happened, these were the lists that got a spit-and-polish:
Finnās Top 5 Horror Movie Lists: Introduction
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 1930s
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 1940s
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 1950s
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 1960s
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 1970s
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 1980s
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 1990s
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 2000s
Top 5 Horror Movies of the 2010s
Top 5 Creatures on the Loose Movies
Top 5 Science Runs Amok Movies
85 capsule reviews in all. Not a bad start! I have several new lists on deck, including Bela Lugosi movies, Boris Karloff movies, Christopher Lee movies, When Animals Attack, When Insects Swarm, and updated entries for Lovecraftian Horror, Demons and Devils, TV Horror Anthologies, and Creepy Kids. These take longer to write than you might think because I really watch all of the movies, usually more than once, and I weigh my options carefully before committing them to a Top 5 list.
For example, it would do you no good to read about five consecutive Christopher Lee Dracula movies. If youāre in for a penny with The Horror of Dracula, then youāre in for a pound. But one other really good Dracula movie? Thatās worth talking about on a Top 5 Christopher Lee movies list where the goal is to provide you maximum Christopher Lee horror that stops just short of stumbling into The Howling 2. Iām just trying to be helpful here, folks.
Weekly Report from the N.T.A.B. Division of Media Review
Yours Cruelly, Elvira: Memoirs of the Mistress of the Dark/Guillermo del Toroās Cabinet of Curiosities
In a rare burst of synergy, the Division of Media Review has decided to combine forces with the weekly update and provide us with the following tidbits, just in time for Halloween. They write:
Despite the completely unprofessional posting schedule this October, we would be remiss if we didnāt remark on the updating of the Top 5 movies list and state that the rewrites have been competently handled, and a few of them have been very good. In this spirit of treating, rather than tricking, we have withheld some of our seasonal choices until Halloween Day for you to enjoy.
Yours Cruelly, Elvira: Memoirs of the Mistress of the Dark by Cassandra Peterson (Hachette Books) This is another book that delivers the goods in audio, as it is read by the author herself, and there is no one more qualified to tell her story. If you were around in the 1980s, you might have thought that Elvira sprang from seemingly nowhere, fully formed and also everywhere all at once. In fact, the road Peterson takes to get to Elvira is a jaw-dropping odyssey that reads, at times, rather like Pamela des Barresā Iām With the Band. Going from rock groupie to Vegas showgirl to Macabre Pitch Mistress doesnāt seem like a viable trajectory, but Peterson explains her journey with warmth, good humor, and a touch of wonderment, almost as if she canāt quite believe her luckāsometimes the good kind, and sometimes of the dumb variety. Itās a rock and roll horror show that is funny, heartbreaking, and uniquely her own story. Recommended.
Guillermo del Toroās Cabinet of Curiosities (Netflix)
Hereās a real rare holiday treat for all of you lovers of Night Gallery, Tales from the Darkside, and the late, lamented Masters of Horror series: a brand-new anthology series curated by none other than Guillermo del Toro, one of the most knowledgeable horror directors of our day and age. Heās paired some amazing short fiction by lesser-known luminaries like Henry Kuttner and Michael Shea, as well as a couple of well-known classics by H.P. Lovecraft, and gave them a budget, good actors, and great directors. The result is Guillermo del Toroās Cabinet of Curiosities, and itās the best horror series of its kind Iāve seen in many years.
This is not because I have a glancing and friendly relationship with Guillermo, who used to shop at Austin Books back when he was trying to get the first Hellboy movie made (we had some great conversations about the studio executives, as well as a lot of good talks about horror authors and comics), and itās not because back in the early 21st century when I was the creative director for the Violet Crown Radio Players, I wrote a horror show called āDr. Geistās Cabinet of Curiositiesā which exploited this very same conceit to great effect. Granted, I love that anyone watching the Netflix series who came to our shows in Austin is going to scoff and say, āPfft, Iāve seen this live, as a radio play!ā
These adaptations are wonderful little gems that any horror fan is bound to like, if not outright love. Hereās what weāre working with in season one:
āLot 36,ā based on the short story by Guillermo del Toro, directed by Guillermo Navarro
āGraveyard Ratsā based on the short story by Henry Kuttner, directed by Vincenzo Natali
āThe Autopsyā based on the short story by Michael Shea, directed by David Prior
āThe Outsideā based on the short story by Emily Carroll, directed by Ana Lily Amirpour
āPickmanās Modelā based on the short story by H.P. Lovecraft, directed by Keith Thomas
āDreams in the Witch Houseā based on the short story by H.P. Lovecraft, directed by Catherine HardwickeĀ
āThe Viewingā written by Panos Cosmatos & Aaron Stewart-Ahn, directed by Panos Cosmatos
āThe Murmuringā based on the short story by Guillermo del Toro, directed by Jennifer Kent
Del Toro himself introduces each episode, as one does in these kinds of shows, and his usual excited and jovial self is replaced with a somber, almost scholarly demeanor. He also tells you the name of each director, tooāa nice touch, as these storytellers are frequently downplayed in horror and genre film unless they are a personality or an auteur of some renown.
The stories run the gamut from merely macabre to madly funny and they are all pretty creepy, with a few of them generating genuine scares and chills. Are some better than others? Of course, but the worst of the bunch is still better than most recent attempts to do short form horror in the streaming wars.
OhPlease OhPlease OhPlease OhPleeeeeeease let there be a season two. The timing was perfect.
Happy belated birthday! I'm glad you had a fun time up here in Badgerland! Would've been great to meet & maybe have lunch. Next time!
Related: Next time maybe I'll also figure out how to send an email correctly. I think direct replies to these sometimes get hurled into the ether.
Happy Birthday!! Heading for the big 50 myself and your recent blog certainly struck a cord! We share all the same core interests and I'm enjoying your updates. Here's to another 53 years!! Well we can dream can't we ;) that and progress in stem cell research...