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Posted on May 31, 2019

Monstrous Relationalities in Alan Moore and Stephen Bissette’s Swamp Thing

Guest Post

In anticipation of the upcoming web television series Swamp Thing (set to premiere on May 31, 2019 on the DC Universe streaming service), we have been asked to offer a “teaser” of our chapter about the comic series published in the 2016 anthology collection, Plant Horror: Approaches to the Monstrous Vegetal in Fiction and Film, co-edited by Dawn Keetly and Angela Tenga. While the television series may draw from any of the various versions of the Swamp Thing character put forth since its initial creation by Len Wein and Bernie Wrightson in a 1971 issue of House of Secrets, our essay looks specifically to Alan Moore and Stephen Bissette’s version, which saw a complete overhaul of the Swamp Thing canon and included a small but significant twist in the titular character’s origin story. Read more

Posted on May 29, 2019

Stephen King’s Radical Rewriting of Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”

Dawn Keetley

Shirley Jackson’s 1948 short story “The Lottery” is a well-known cautionary tale about the dangers of blindly following tradition, about conformity, and about an innate human violence that needs to be appeased. (The Purge franchise clearly picked up on Jackson’s vision of the efficacy of regular cathartic releases of violence.)

In Jackson’s “The Lottery,” and its film adaptations, however much tradition, conformity, or violence may be pressuring individuals to act, it is clear that it is indeed humans who are acting. At the end of the story, after the sacrificial victim has picked her paper with the black dot, we see characters deliberately pick up stones from the pile gathered in the town center. “Mrs. Delacroix selected a stone so large she had to pick it up with both hands.” The town’s children had already taken their stones, and “someone gave little Davy Hutchinson,” the victim’s son, “a few pebbles.” The infamous last line of the story, “and then they were upon her,” makes it clear that the characters act –with purpose and intention. Jackson’s story is a humanist story: it doesn’t necessarily elaborate the more attractive parts of human nature, but we see human free will and human choice in action.

Posted on May 26, 2019

The Perfection is Amazing – and Never What You Think

Dawn Keetley

As I am sure many people have done, I saw the preview for Richard Shepard’s The Perfection (2018) and started watching it with a certain set of expectations; I think I was imagining something along the lines of Single White Female (1992). I was wrong. Things took a turn—actually many turns—and I became completely unmoored, disoriented. The film twists violently several times, and there are at least two moments when what you think has just happened is literally overturned.

I’m not going to give anything away in this review. Everyone should just experience this crazy and disturbing film. And for those of you who, like me, may have thought The Perfection was not a “horror” film, rest assured that it unambiguously is. The fact that it is labeled “Drama, Mystery, Suspense” on the Rotten Tomatoes website is misleading. I was literally retching by around thirty minutes in and was transfixed and appalled when I was another thirty minutes in. And then was left gaping and deeply disturbed at the final scene—though it wasn’t like what came before wasn’t already plenty disturbing. Yes, The Perfection is a horror film. It’s got gore; it’s transgressive; it’s deeply unsettling; and it definitely has some social commentary, though the latter is subservient to complex storytelling, brilliant cinematography, and powerful performances.

Posted on May 24, 2019

Black Summer and Zombie Minimalism: Leaving the Horde Behind

Guest Post

Black Summer (2019) has polarized critics and undead fans. Some have called the show a rejuvenation of the zombie genre and others have balked at the story’s zombies and its ending. Wherever the critics and undead-lovers land on the series, there is no mistaking that Black Summer brings a new take on old lore. However, in a landscape of continually evolving interpretations of the walking flesh eater–Train to Busan (2016), Cargo (2017), The Dead Don’t Die (2019), etc.–Black Summer innovates by opposing the massive hordes and the deadeye heroes of current zombie films and television. In doing so, Black Summer masters a minimalistic horror that reignites the fear of the living dead. Read more

Posted on May 21, 2019

Eat ‘Em All: Talking the Piranha Franchise

Elizabeth Erwin

Think Jaws is the scariest reason to stay out of the water? Well, think again! In today’s episode, we’re deep diving into the Piranha franchise. A glorious mixture of exploitation and, at times, shockingly relevant social critique, Piranha is often dismissed as an uninspired parody but does it deserve that label? We’re breaking it all down on today’s episode so stay tuned!

You will find that we were in some serious disagreement over our favorite Piranha film, with some arguing that the first, directed by Joe Dante and written by John Sayles, is by far the best. You can stream that 1978 original here: Read more