Collinwood Cocktails: SANGUINE MOON MAI TAI

By JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN

Ingredients:
2 oz Lime juice  
1 oz. Solermo blood orange liqueur
1 oz. orgeat,
½ oz. simple syrup
2 oz. Myers Dark rum
2 oz. Appleton Special Amber rum

Shake with plenty of crushed ice and pour unstrained into your vessel.  Spank a mint sprig for garnish.

What a horrible night to have a curse, but what a great time to have a drink!  With the bad moon newly risen, pour yourself this delicious variation on a classic Trader Vic's Mai Tai.  (Rumor has it, the Trader himself was hipped to this ghoulish variant while staying the night at the Cranshaw House and exploring the grounds beneath a blood moon...I wonder who...or what...he encountered).

While we all seemed to have survived the tetrad called for by the Blood Moon Prophecy, why not keep the fixings for this cocktail around all the time... I'm sure there will be another Doomeday event predicted any time now.

"The sun will turn into darkness, and the moon into blood before the great and terrible day."

Cheers!

Jonathan M. Chaffin is an Atlanta-based graphic designer and art director and a lifetime fan of horror stories and film. His current project is www.HorrorInClay.com where he uses artifacts and ephemera to tell stories...he also produces horror-themed tiki mugs and barware like the Horror In Clay Cthulhu Tiki Mug. In addition, Jonathan occasionally does voice-over and podcasting work and appears on panels at sci-fi fantasy and pop culture conventions on a variety of topics. You can follow him@CthulhuMug on twitter or by friending HorrorInClay on Facebook and G+

HORROR IN CLAY opens a cask of whoopass

(UPDATE: The campaign hit its funding goal during the first day!)

I'm rapidly running out of shelf space in my cabinets, thanks to HORROR IN CLAY.

The company is the work of CHS contributor Jonathan M. Chaffin. While his first two mugs showcased his love for H.P. Lovecraft, his latest will expand the brand to include a little Edgar Allan Poe.

Inspired by Poe's 1846 story, "The Cask of Amontillado," the mug features appropriately Poe-etic imagery. You can see it in the video above, so I won't waste any space here describing it ... but it's ridiculously cool.

Chaffin is planning two versions of the mug. The production edition funded by the Kickstarter campaign is expected to be a 7.5 inch, 22oz mug, and will come in a matte, wiped brown glaze. A limited-edition version (available at the higher donor levels) will be the same size, but will be hand glazed in multi-step, multi-tone process.

If you want to score one of these mugs via the Kickstarter campaign (which ends in early May) you can do so by clicking HERE.

SATURDAY MORNING CARTOONS: The Addams Family

By JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN

I didn’t have cable growing up. My Dad didn’t believe it in. It was alpha-bet soup for me; ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS and eventually Fox.  That was it in my house; fortunately, Dad had a VCR for business, so once Blockbuster invented the concept of the PVT (Previously Viewed Tape) that you could buy and watch, we were able to watch more than just what washed up on the airwaves.  Now that we’ve established that I lived in a whole ‘nother epoch of television viewership, [1] I’m going to talk to you about visiting my Granny, who DID have cable, and didn’t care what we watched as long as it wasn’t published after 1975 [2]. Part of that viewing included Nick At Nite and all those old rerun shows like; Bewitched, I Dream of Jeanie, The Addams Family, Gilligan’s Island, and I Love Lucy. 

From the Gold Key comic series.

What the hell does that have to do with Saturday Morning Cartoons?  Well, it means that at Granny’s house I watched, and loved, a lot of The Addams Family.  I was particularly pleased when they crossed over with Scooby Doo [4].  Did you know there was a 1973 CARTOON version of the Addam’s Family, based on the original Chas. Addams illustrations?  Because there totally was. 

Long before there was a TV show, Charles Addams was beavering away drawing thousands of ghoulishly little fun cartoons for the New Yorker and other publications.  After the TV show was successful in the mid 60’s, Hanna-Barbara capitalized on the success of the show by creating an animated property. At first it was a one-shot gimmick on Scooby Do, but was wildly popular and quickly grew into 13 oft-replayed episodes.

And this wasn’t the total chop-shop semi-animation of later Hanna-Barbara Cartoons…this was at least as good [SIC] as the animation of the Flintstones.  In all seriousness, it doesn’t offend the way some cheap jack animated cartoons of the era do (I’m looking at YOU Godzilla).  Not only is the show reasonably animated, they got some of the voice actors from the TV show to reprise their roles.  Fester is still Jackie Coogan, Lurch is still Lurch (Ted Cassidy).  Sadly for people expecting a familiar Gomez, John Astin wasn’t available and Gomez is voiced in an entirely different manner from any other depiction; less latin lover or Peter Lorre wanna be and more good-natured weasel.   Another fun thing about this show is playing “Spot the other Hanna Barbara voice actors”.  For example, Papa Smurf [6] takes a turn as a film flam man.

Get it on AMAZON!

To give the series a little movement and more freely reflect the tone of the comics Addams did (which were rooted in bizarrely humorous circumstances that could be found anywhere) and to throw in a little nod to kustom kar kulture, the Addam’s Family gore-geous [5] Second Victorian style home was converted to the carriage of a hot rod jalopy cum RV.  Like the Tardis, the Addam’s mobile is way way WAY bigger on the inside (hell, the moat digging machinery alone would take up more space than the entire vehicle…oh yeah, the car has an automatic moat digger). 

Storylines revolve around the typical eel-out-of-water antics you’d expect, with people trying to swindle or take advantage of the Addams’ kooky and generous nature and generally failing.  One oddity about the cartoon is that for all the menagerie present in the TV show, the cartoon chooses to introduce an octopus (Ocho) and an alligator (Ali) as animal sidekicks.  Fortunately, they don’t talk or anything, and behave more like creepy versions of Lassie.

The there was a SECOND Addams’ Family animated show in the early 1990’s, which I have not watched.  Perhaps if I can track it down I’ll followup.

Despite some changes in the popular lexicon and the absence of cell phones and computers, the 1970’s edition of the show holds up really really well.  I started watching it on Amazon on demand for this review, and it has temporarily taken place of pride in the evening rituals with my daughter as a great treat if she’s been really good.  That’s right - my techno-savvy 6 year clambers for a cartoon 7 years older than I am.  And we BOTH enjoy it.  I’m given to understand that a manufacture-on-reman set can be ordered from Amazon, so consider picking that up for YOUR little monster.

As a side note, apropos of nothing, I am informed by Carrier Bat that I will be participating on a panel about the Addams Family and The Munsters at Anachrocon the last weekend in February.  If you are there, by all means stop by and say, “Hi”.

(1) seriously, what do you mean you had to tune in to watch a show?)
(2) Unless it was her “Stories”. Granny loved to watch her stories in the afternoon. And you could watch with her, as long as you didn’t talk or move.  So I’ve pretty much seen whole swathes of “General Hospital”, “The Young & The Restless”, and the “evening stories” like “Dallas”.  Also a lot of Murder, She Wrote.[3]
(3) Always loved Murder, She Wrote.  Although in my head it had more punctuation:  “Murder!”, she wrote…
(4) I liked it way better when the Addams Family guest starred than when it was The Harlem Globetrotters (although they were ok too).
(5) I see what I did there.
(6) Don Messick

SATURDAY MORNING CARTOONS: The Inhumanoids

By JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN

While we're on the subject of action cartoons that anchor a time slot, anyone else out there in TV land who loved the cartoon THE INHUMANOIDS?  It came on alongside JEM AND THE HOLOGRAMS, ROBITIX, and BIGFOOT AND THE MUSCLE MACHINES on Saturday mornings. I loved that show.  I mean, LOVED it.

Wikipedia tells me the cartoon was basically 13 twenty-two minute episodes, later released as a few movies (I think there were 4 volumes on VHS).  It was a rollicking team-up produced by Marvel and Sunbow, with some Marvel/Star comics as tie in material.  Like many cartoons of that era, Inhumanoids was really a long serialized toy commercial for Hasbro...even as kids we knew it, but no one cared, because the toys were AWESOME. I'll get more to the awesome toys in a minute. Let me tell you a little about the cartoon.

Inhumanoids had a nice linear plot, which made the fact it shared a timeslot a game of hellish russian roulette.  Ok, TV Guide says it's time for "Bigfoot Hour"...am I going to get Inhumanoids, or Jem and the Holograms? (guilty pleasure...I love Jem and the Holograms)  Will I see a shiny new episode in sequence, or the same one I always seem to see with Sandra Blackthorne getting turned into a zombie?  Or no Inhumanoids at all?

The tagline for Inhumanoids was, "The Evil the Lies Within."  Fitting, as everything (rocks, trees, statues, corpses ... everything) in this world was animated, reanimated, or mutated. Many of them were deadly, possibly horrific, monsters.  This show had literally everything a kid could want.  Giant monsters, zombies, corporate espionage, evil scientists who were also politicians, do-gooder eco-scientists who were also mechasuit wearing bad-assess, Lovecraftian beasties, and an extensive mythology.  What was not to love?

Basically, you start with the good guys, Earth Corps, versus the evil corporate leader Blackthorne.  Blackthore wants it all and is willing to bribe, steal, murder, destroy the environment, and make deals with giant evil monsters in order to get power. Earth Corps wants to stop him. Next you throw in a long-running war between ancient tree and rock people versus the aforementioned Giant Evil Monsters.  The tree and rock people don't trust the good guys, Blackthorne keeps making then breaking deals with the Big Bad (named Metlar), somewhere the bad guy get a cyclops-dragon with a transparent acid-belly....this show is just great.  I just re watched some....still great. 

Earth Corp. (pronounce Earth Core) is everything we needed from our 1980's good guy team; just imagine they are the more familiar Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles with Blackthorne's sister as April O'Neil and they are fairly well sketched in. They are assisted by some rock people and some tree people.  The real fun begins with the bad guys (doesn't it always?).  Let's meet the main Inhumaniods (plus the aforementioned cyclops dragon).

One was a giant human/T-rex hybrid lich called D-Compose.  His raspy shriek will be very familiar to fans my age; he was voiced by the incomparable Chris Latta,who also voiced Starscream (Transformers) and Cobra Commander (GI Joe).

Another Inhumanoid was a behemoth called Metlar (he kinda defies description, but I tend to conflate him with Bowser and Ganon as a big burly burning- eyed baddie).  A big focus of the show is containing Metlar; there is a character named Magnokor who basically exists to keep Metlar contained in a magnetic field. 

Tendril.

My favorite of the Inhumanoids, perhaps obviously to folks who know the show, is the monster from the Earth’s mantle named Tendril.  Tendril is a big shambling green thing bedecked with tentacles.  Inspired by Cthulhu, needless to say. Unfortunately, Tendril is Low Man on the Totem Pole, because, as his name might suggest, he is dumb as a stump. He is not bright. He is hard to kill though (see below).

All of the monsters call different strata of the planet home, and each has a power that help them create armies and wreck havoc; D-Compose raises corpses, Metlar animates statues (and once got it on with the Statue of Liberty). Tendril...well,...let's just say, "Cut off the head and two grow back".

It'd just be mean to tease you about the cyclops dragon with a transparent acid-belly and not give up the goods, so let me tell you about Gargoyle.  He's more like a ravening animal than the rest of the Inhumanoids, and Gargoyle was never made as a toy, which is a shame because TRANSPARENT ACID BELLY.  I can imagine filling it up with that glowing slime from He-Man's Slime Pit.  Woulda been great! Gargoyle give a younger me wicked nightmares. Why? Because A) he ate all his siblings, and B) because when Gargoyle opens his toothy maw and swallows you down, probably inflicting hideous gashes with his teeth, you land in the pool of acid that is his tummy tum and then, YOU DON'T DIE. No, you lie there, in acid, able to see out through his membranous belly, and suffer until your bones fall apart. How freaking terrible is that?

Why were the toys so awesome?  First, they were freaking huge; unlike most of the other toys at the time, the Inhumanoids toy line was to scale and the monsters TOWERED over the good guys.  Giant tentacle monster toy beloved and embedded in my brain - check.  That’s why I wanted to learn more about Cthulhu. The human scientists were bigger than most other toys lying around, and you could take the helmets off which was cool, but the real gems were the Inhumanoids. They weighed in at around 14 inches tall.  Let me tell you; the fun thing was pitting those guys against GI Joe and Cobra ... 3.75 inch figures against giant monsters? Hours of fun.

Second, the toys were also clever if not actually innovative; they used translucent red plastic in the top of the figures head to make the eyes and fangs glow.  Tendril had rubbery tentacles. D-Compose had a ribcage you could open and trap the good guys in. The packaging was also great...these guys OWNED the toy isle at Christmas.  All in all, they were really fun bits of toy.  I really wish I could buy one cheaper on ebay, because one day I WILL OWN ONE AGAIN.  (If anyone has an old Tendril figure they want to mail me, let me know.  Ditto if you have a Boglin, Mint In Box).

SO. I love the show. You should watch the show. It's worth dusting off your VCR for and tracking down a VHS if you can't find it on DVD to watch the show.

An interesting wrinkle; a few years ago, Kevin Smith expressed interest in the series and mentioned someone should really pic it up.  Marvel was vaguely involved in the old days. Open letter to the internet: Marvel Cinematic Universe, you need to make an Inhumanoids movie.  Or at least a revival toy line and re-release box set of the show.  Something.

JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN is an Atlanta-based graphic designer and art director and a lifetime fan of horror stories and film. His current project is www.HorrorInClay.com where he uses artifacts and ephemera to tell stories... he also produces horror-themed tiki mugs and barware like the Horror In Clay Cthulhu Tiki Mug. In addition, Jonathan occasionally does voice-over and podcasting work and appears on panels at sci-fi fantasy and pop culture conventions on a variety of topics. You can follow him @CthulhuMug on twitter or by friending HorrorInClay on Facebook and G+

Saturday Morning Cartoons: GODZILLA

By JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN

If you were a kid in the 70’s and 80’s, you know the Hanna Barbera logo... it was the last sign-off for multiple television shows every Saturday morning when you snuck down-stairs, grabbed a bowl of Frankenberry cereal (or Nintendo cereal), and waited for the “grownup shows” to stop and Saturday Morning Cartoons to start.  The sound of the H-B logo takes me back to snuggling in the sleeping bag (blue, with flowers and a red interior) my granny made for me.   

Hanna Barbera is famous for coining the “Four meddling _______ & a _______” format of adventure show: Scooby Doo (4 kids & a dog), Captain Caveman (four musicians & a caveman), Jabberjaw (four  kids & a shark doing a Three Stooges impression), and countless others. I watched and loved all of those shows back in the day.  

Let’s talk about their 1978 effort, four irritating scientists & Godzilla plus a horrible “Scrappy Doo” version of Godzilla. Statement of bias; I don’t much like this show.  If you liked the show, I’m glad. I have some guilty cartoon and cinematic pleasures of my own.

Why am I writing about it?  I LOVE Godzilla.  And I love my 6 year old, and SHE loves this show.  So I’m going assume it’s doing its job by entertaining kids.  If you have kids and want to introduce them to Kaiju, this is a great way.

Like their other shows, GODZILLA is fairly described as “semi-animated,” a production technique that allows a show to be animated in about half the produced frames. Only the body parts that need to be moving are animated, and there is lot of reuse of animation. Most television cartoons of this era use the technique, but it is particularly noticeable (if not egregious) in this show. 

Gadzuki, everybody.

This series is pretty much summarized by the phrase “Godzilla Ex Machina.”  The plot of each episode is “Crew of the Calico gets in trouble, calls Godzilla like a giant doberman with firebreath, and the day is saved.”  Also, Gadzuki, the Scrappy Doo to Godzilla’s…Godzilla, bumbles around, gets stuck and causes problems and generally Jar-Jars up the place.  Fie upon thee, Gadzuki.  I hate you worse than Minya.

This Godzilla cartoon (there have been others) was an anchor show for a rotating host of other Hanna Barbara action cartoons aired from 1978-81 in various combinations.  There are 26 half hour episodes.  Well, really, there is about one proto-episode, and they switched the monster and the lesson learned 26 times. History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of man.[1]

It IS fun to see the cartoon Kaiju battles, and that payoff is pretty clearly where the animation budget (such as it was) was spent.  (About $3 grand an episode, the internet tells me).   A super cut of the Kajui monster battles would be pretty great, although sometimes they change scale from scene to scene. And, sometimes, their powers are interestingly modified. 

Something you’ll read a lot about if you research this show is that Godzilla breathes fire instead of destructive atomic energy. I’m fascinated by this choice.  By changing Godzilla’s breath weapon from atomic furnace to fire, Big G is effectively turned into a wingless fire-breathing dragon.  The whole overtones of the original movie relating to  the terror of the destruction of the atomic bomb are changed if Godzilla isn’t an atomic monster.  Perhaps the decision was a graphic choice; red flames instead of blue glowing radiation, but it is one that is curiously prevalent in a lot of American depictions of Godzilla. 

Regardless, giving Godzilla fire breath and having him run to heel and assist like Puff the Magic Dragon is a fundamentally different message from “unstoppable atonic monster of our own creation protects his territory from the menace of mankind.”  I might be reading too much into a Saturday morning cartoon, but hey, that’s what I’m here for.  Also, Godzilla has laser beam eyes, or heat vision, or something.  For…reasons.

Worth watching a few episodes if you are a Godzilla completist, but really, there are a lot of shows that do the formula better.  

For the die hard lovers of the show, or the (probably more numerous) college kids who fell in love with Sea Lab 2021 and Venture Brothers style modern send ups of 1970’s adventure shows, Cartoon Network created a short called “Godzilla vs. the Y2K Bug" using footage from the show.  It’s a one trick pony, so I won’t spoil it for you, but it’s kinda fun. 


[1]  The first concert I ever attended on my own in a dive bar was a Blue Oyster Cult concert.  The song “Godzilla” blew my mind, and I really wanted to put it in this review. Check it out. It’s way better than this cartoon.  It should be the soundtrack for the super cut of kaiju battles I mentioned.  Internet, you should make that. 

JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN is an Atlanta-based graphic designer and art director and a lifetime fan of horror stories and film. His current project is www.HorrorInClay.com where he uses artifacts and ephemera to tell stories... he also produces horror-themed tiki mugs and barware like the Horror In Clay Cthulhu Tiki Mug. In addition, Jonathan occasionally does voice-over and podcasting work and appears on panels at sci-fi fantasy and pop culture conventions on a variety of topics. You can follow him @CthulhuMug on twitter or by friending HorrorInClay on Facebook and G+

Monster Serial: DELLAMORTE DELLAMORE (aka CEMETERY MAN)

By JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN

DELLAMORTE DELLAMORE, (“On the Death of Love” or “About Death, About Love,”) foolishly branded CEMETERY MAN in English, is a gem of many facets. It is beautifully shot, deliciously weird and, more than once, highly disturbing.

This gorgeous dark comedy is a must see.  I’m going to lose some people with the next sentence, then spend the rest of the essay winning them back. CEMETERY MAN involves loneliness, zombies, rape, impotence, murder, MORE zombies, quite a bit of sex (with “The Girl”[1] admirably played by the stunning Anna Falchi in various guises), body horror and, woven through it all, an amazingly genuine and fun performance from Rupert Everett.

The film has all the “matter-of-fact, zombies are here, let’s deal with them” aspects of films like RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD, SHAWN OF THE DEAD, or ZOMBIELAND.  Lots of nice close-up crushed skulls, blood, and vomit in the finest Italian horror movie tradition.  Wrapped in with all that is the slow unravelling of Francis Dellamorte, the eponymous Cemetery Man.  The story revolves around a gravedigger/watchman, called an “Engineer” by the townsfolk for some reason, who lives in the cemetery near an ossuary [2]. Francis is attended by his feeble-minded assistant Gnaghi who reminds me of a cross between a Stooge and an Addams.

In terms of tone, this movie always puts me in mind of EDWARD SCISSORHANDS; beautiful and sad.  CEMETERY MAN, however, has substantially more violence and nudity.

 If you’re looking for how director Michele Soavi fits in the pantheon of Italian horror, he has worked as an assistant director alongside Dario Argento on TENEBRE (1982) and PHENOMENA (1985), Terry Gilliam on THE ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN (1988), and with Lamberto Bava on DEMONI (1985.)

In broad terms, this movie is set in a graveyard where the dead return to life.  Above the gate is the word RESVRRECTVRIS, which is pretty funny. The caretaker, widely rumored to be impotent, falls in love with a widow, “The Girl,” who then dies. Then a bunch of people die and return to life.  Then Gnaghi, his dimwitted assistant, finds love with the mayor’s daughter Valentina ... projectile vomit is involved. Then Our Hero Francis falls in love with a woman who is terrified of sex (another incarnation of “The Girl”) and goes to extreme lengths to be with her. 

Francis is thwarted when this incarnation of “The Girl” falls in love with another man; in this case, the other man was her boss/rapist. Francis gets a little (more) depressed.  He kills some people (who don’t stay dead) and finally, at long last, meets a woman who is both emotionally available to him and willing and interested in having sex with him. Perhaps the third time’s the charm? Nope. Turns out this incarnation of “The Girl” is a hooker. Francis burns her house down, with her and her flat-mates inside.
Then, in a hilarious, sad, and bizarre twist reminiscent of the ending of AMERICAN PSYCHO, Francis goes on a murder spree, which is entirely unnoticed. So he packs up his bags and his assistant to leave town. More on that later.

Into that mix of psycho drama you add a busload of dead Boy Scouts, arson, voyeuristic will o’ th’ wisps, Death, and all manner of gorgeously billowing diaphanous material [3]. (Really, the visual styling of this movie is beautiful, and it includes one of the most beautifully creepy shots of the female superior/cowgirl sexual positions ever filmed in a graveyard.

OK, buckle your seat belts — here’s where we go off the rails: what follows is some seriously wild speculation involving psychological terms far more complex than I’ll relate in a 1,300-word review. Also, I only know what a few general sociology and psychology classes and Wikipedia entries tell me about some of these topics, but I’m convinced they have a very real and entertaining relationship in this film. Also, spoilers follow, so take this next bit as you will.

Sigmund Freud posited that the “death drive,” or Thanatos, leads an individual on certain occasions to seek to reduce or eliminate tension through repetition of behavior.  Specifically, and I quote, Thanatos can manifest “an urge in organic life to restore an earlier state of things” through repetition (which is why we all make the same self-destructive decisions sometimes.)  The aforementioned urge is played out through the film’s structure. Francis’ repeated assignations with “The Girl” in her various incarnations service this drive.
 
The film begins with Francis living a placid existence as a cog in society. The man doesn’t even fill out paperwork to deal with a zombie outbreak; choosing instead to shoot them and rebury them.  He is a pretty good example of a functioning Superego (society’s grown-up instincts) well-modulated by his Ego. His retarded or “simple” assistant Gnaghi is a benign example of a childish, Id-ridden man-child.  Through the tension between Thanatos and Eros present in the movie (in this context mostly sexual love and survival), Francis moves further and further out of his original orbit (my favorite part is when the Grim Reaper appears to him and tell him to stop killing the dead and kill the living for a change.)

From the impotent “engineer” who kills zombies and lusts after beauty, Francis is driven (through repeat encounters with The Girl) into an active state unregulated by the SuperEgo or Ego, with sex and murder the result.  

Francis’ Ego and SuperEgo are eventually so battered through the repetition of losing “The Girl” that by the film’s conclusion he tries to flee, then finally trades roles and characteristics with Gnaghi (this movie’s representative of the Id.)

The movie concludes with a gorgeously shot and truly circular reveal that hearkens back to the very beginning of the movie.

In addition to that journey from Ego to Id, we have the striking comparison between the Eros embodied by Francis and The Girl and the Platonically idyllic love between Gnaghi and Valentina [4] (which may even be considered to be Ludus, playful friendly love as between children.)

Libido is typically seen as diverting the destructive instinct; in Cemetery Man the relationship evolves, and as the destructive instinct becomes ascendant Francis becomes confused, possibly as unable to affect the world as the dead names he has crossed out in the phone book[5].

To recap: go for the snappy writing, the zombie bikers, and awesome hottie Anna Falchi, stay for the existential struggle between sex and death. 
  
[1] Anna plays 3 different characters, but they seem to be facets of the same woman, or lookalikes, or reincarnations existing in the same temporal space. Pick your poison. She’s gorgeous.

[2]An ossuary is a communal bone pit/catacomb. It was also real, in this film, so the sex scene set there is…extra creepy.  Particularly given its overtones of necrophilia.

[3] More than the music video for “Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler.

 [4] Because she is an undead severed head, I’m going to go with completely un-consumatable, “let’s watch TV together with no ulterior motives” love. If your mind wanders elsewhere, shame on you. Also, ewww.

 [5]. (Fun Fact: the Necronomicon is also known as the “Liber Ex Mortis” or “Book of Dead Names: - Thus Francis could be figuratively conjuring zombies by writing in the Necronomicon. While a large stretch, this idea amuses me greatly.
 
JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN is an Atlanta-based graphic designer and art director and a lifetime fan of horror stories and film. His current project is www.HorrorInClay.com where he uses artifacts and ephemera to tell stories... he also produces horror-themed tiki mugs and barware like the Horror In Clay Cthulhu Tiki Mug. In addition, Jonathan occasionally does voice-over and podcasting work and appears on panels at sci-fi fantasy and pop culture conventions on a variety of topics. You can follow him @CthulhuMug on twitter or by friending HorrorInClay on Facebook and G+

Collinwood Cocktails: TOM COLLINSPORT

By JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN

¾ oz. Lemon juice
1 oz. Rock candy Syrup
2 oz. Plymouth Gin
1 dropper Fiendishly Tropical Bitters
Shake, add 1oz lemon flavoured or plain seltzer, strain into Collins glass with fresh ice.
Garnish with large lemon peel.

Like much of the beloved DARK SHADOWS cast, the "Tom Collins" is an oldie but a goodie ... a cocktail for the ages.

A drink known as a "John Collins" has existed since the 1860s at the very least and is believed to have originated with a head waiter of that name who worked at Limmer's Old House in Conduit Street in Mayfair.  Limmer's Old House was a popular London hotel and coffee house around 1790-1817.  This "Mr. Collins" popped up again and again ... and was immortalized around 1876 "Bartender's Guide" under the name of Tom.

Seems only fitting to update this classic with a bit of a twist made possible by the growing craft bitters trend.  Warning: This "adult lemonade" is VERY drinkable.

Cheers!

Jonathan M. Chaffin is an Atlanta-based graphic designer and art director and a lifetime fan of horror stories and film. His current project is www.HorrorInClay.com where he uses artifacts and ephemera to tell stories...he also produces horror-themed tiki mugs and barware like the Horror In Clay Cthulhu Tiki Mug. In addition, Jonathan occasionally does voice-over and podcasting work and appears on panels at sci-fi fantasy and pop culture conventions on a variety of topics. You can follow him @CthulhuMug on twitter or by friending HorrorInClay on Facebook and G+

Horror in Clay returns with the INNSMOUTH FOGCUTTER TIKI MUG

In 2012, Jonathan A. Chaffin conjured up a successful Kickstarter campaign with HORROR IN CLAY, which gave the world the Cthulhu Tiki Mug. Somehow, the world survived the return of this elder god, possibly because Chaffin was wise enough to summon Great Cthulhu in a portable 30 oz. size.

Not having learned his lesson the first time, Chaffin is once more tampering with eldritch horror, threatening us all with the tyranny of the INNSMOUTH FOGCUTTER TIKI MUG. Here's what he has to say about the latest project:

"The backstory for the mug is supported by artifacts and ephemera I designed around an outline for a romantic tragedy set in Innsmouth. This romantic tragedy flows from fan theory; if you and your beloved were both raised knowing you were special and really would be together forever, what would happen if you couldn't be?"

The project has numerous pledge levels, which include such unspeakable oddities as The Gilman House Hand Towel, Esoteric Order of Dagon Fez, a screen-printed Evolution of a Deep One shirt and more! You can read more about the project by watching the video above, or contribute by visiting the INNSMOUTH FOGCUTTER TIKI MUG's official Kickstarter page HERE.

Find HORROR IN CLAY at Facebook at www.facebook.com/horrorinclay, or follow them at Twitter at @CthulhuMug.

The campaign ends Monday, March 10, at 5 p.m. EST.

Monster Serial: HALLOWEEN H20, 1998

Hello, boils and ghouls! October is upon us and that means one thing: HALLOWEEN! While most holidays get a measly day or two of formal recognition, orthodox Monster Kids prefer to celebrate it in the tradition of our people: By watching tons of horror movies. This month at THE COLLINSPORT HISTORICAL SOCIETY, we're going to be discussing some of our favorites every day until Halloween. So, put on your 3-D spex, pop some popcorn and turn out the lights .... because we're going to the movies!

By JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN

In 1998 when a projectionist called me after midnight on a Tuesday and said, "I'm building the print for H20 tonight and have to test it ... wanna come watch?" I damn well got back out of bed, got dressed, and ran every red light on the way to the theater. That's how I came to watch "HALLOWEEN H20: TWENTY YEARS LATER" a week before release in an empty theater in the wee hours of the morning with the sound cranked to max.  Hearing that signature theme boom and echo in the dark for the first time was a highlight of my life [1]. The movie did not disappoint then, and still doesn't.

A quick note before we dive in: The HALLOWEEN series LOVES its long titles, numbers, and subtitles.  I will refer to this film in text as H20 or HALLOWEEN 7, and rarely by HALLOWEEN H20: TWENTY YEARS LATER.  Also; this film deals with the character Laurie Strode who is living under the assumed name Keri Tate - I will primarily refer to her as Laurie.

I'm not going to talk overmuch about the psycho killer (or agent of Thorn if you prefer [2] ) aspect of the film; it's fun, it's got a good beat, and you can dance to it. "Who will survive and what will be left of them" is as relevant a question for this 1998 release as it was for the TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE in 1974. Halloween 7 is a post-SCREAM slasher film; a little self-aware, a little clever, and  a little unpredictable [3].

What I LOVE about this movie, and what has made it my second favorite of the franchise after the first, is that like SCREAM, H20 deconstructs horror movie tropes and explores their logical consequences: fan theory as opposed to fan fiction.  This film pays the most attention to the evolution of Laurie Strode (in this film called Tate) from victim to heroine. Several young cast members and a talented rapper round out the cast as mostly forgettable cannon fodder for Michael's bloodlust.

It's easy to imagine H20 starting out as a thought experiment. If Michael Myers' sister wasn't actually killed in the prior movies, where would she be and what would she be like?  As originally conceived, H20 was intended to dovetail with Halloween 4, 5, & 6, and as such does not directly contradict anything except the originally shot ending of HALLOWEEN 6: THE CURSE OF MICHAEL MYERS.

Like you'd expect from any combat veteran/tragedy survivor, Laurie suffers from post-traumatic stress and unspecified anxiety disorders.  She medicates herself with both proscribed meds and booze. The bookish girl from HALLOWEEN and HALLOWEEN II who has a caregiver role as a babysitter is now headmaster in a private school near a small town (which also conveniently isolates her from the wider world and, she hopes, from her murderous brother).

At the same time, Laurie has lived her life expecting and preparing for Michael to return and attempt to finish the job of slaughtering his entire family. This movie has fun with the audience's expectations in several places.  Other heroines in other movies wander around asking the darkness "Is anyone really there?"; when the phone goes dead Laurie goes straight for her hidden revolver. When I watched this movie a second time in the theater, there was a cheer when she pulled the weapon out.  Laurie has no intention of squaring off with her brother in a knife fight. When Michael is presumed dead she doesn't take it for granted that he's dead. Ever. 

All of these characterizations feel genuine for someone who has survived a horror movie. Laurie is believable. The mature Jamie Lee Curtis (now the Lady Haden-Guest, by the way) knocks this role out of the park with a touching blend of authoritarian instructor/overbearing parent and vulnerable survivor. Her transition into a tempered-steel Ripley-in-ALIENS heroine during the course of the movie is foreshadowed by a classroom discussion about fate. Regarding FRANKENSTEIN, a student says, "Victor should have confronted the monster sooner. He's completely responsible for Elizabeth's death. He was so paralyzed by fear that he never did anything." It is clear when Laurie chooses to get her son safely off the school grounds and then opts to return for a showdown with Michael Myers that she is working to choose her own fate. I particularly enjoyed the cat-and-mouse sequence as Jamie Lee stalks through the abandoned school wielding a fire-ax and shouting for her homicidal brother. Laurie Strode is essentially yelling, "Come on if you think you're hard enough!"

In two nicely-shot sequences that bookend the climax of the movie Laurie ends up eyeball to black eyeball with her brother. The first time her sense of panic and shock causes Laurie to fumble for her handgun and allows Michael time to disappear again.  The final time Laurie confronts her brother in this movie she seems to consider compassion…then opts to murder her brother, just to be safe. I'd love to hear some lawyers argue over whether Laurie's coup-de-gras at the finale of this film is manslaughter, self-defense, first degree murder, or what. We get to watch as she considers giving her brother a chance of redemption and discards it. The thoughts are clear on her face as she decides to snuff the light in "the blackest eyes ... the devils eyes."

To circle back to the classroom scene from the original HALLOWEEN: "fate caught up with several lives here. No matter what course of action Rollins took, he was destined to his own fate, his own day of reckoning with himself. The idea is that destiny is a very real, concrete thing that every person has to deal with."  With its' conclusion, HALLOWEEN: H20, TWENTY YEARS LATER was intended to bring closure to the tale of the Myers family and wrap it up in a tidy bow [6]. I think the film is a worthy revisitation of the themes of fate and free will as presented in the original movie. I really enjoyed the added bonus evolution of a scream queen into a fully-actualized hero. Watch it.

Happy Halloween!

1. (Star Wars fans probably know the feeling from the 1990s theatrical releases of those films).  No matter how good your home sound system is, I still believe there is a place for the epic sweep of a theater sound system.  Support your local art theater.

2. See HALLOWEEN 4, 5, & 6. Watch them as if they are a single movie, and get the producers cut of 6 if you want to think about Michael Myers in a dramatically different way. 6 also does a good job, in my opinion, of tying in the events of HALLOWEEN 3: SEASON OF THE WITCH.

3. In a fun nod to the earliest days of the slasher genre, the theme from Alfred Hitchcock's PSYCHO is briefly used during the scene (at 42:00) where Laurie Strode spoke with Norma Watson.  Norma, Laurie's secretary in this film, is a cameo role played by Janet Leigh, Jamie Lee Curtis' real life actress mother. Janet played Marion Crane in PSYCHO and is seen here in front of a 1957 Ford Sedan, license plate NFB 418 [4], reputedly the same car she drove in PSYCHO [5].

4. NFB = Norman Francis Bates. Clever.

5. Her boyfriend in the movie was named Sam Loomis…why does that sound familiar? Oh yeah…Michael Myer's doctor from the entire Halloween franchise.

6. Before those bastards went back to the trough one last time before the reboots and in so doing entirely squandered Laurie's hero journey and potential.  Jerks. 

Jonathan M. Chaffin is an Atlanta-based graphic designer and art director and a lifetime fan of horror stories and film. His current project is www.HorrorInClay.com where he uses artifacts and ephemera to tell stories...he also produces horror-themed tiki mugs and barware like the Horror In Clay Cthulhu Tiki Mug. In addition, Jonathan occasionally does voice-over and podcasting work and appears on panels at sci-fi fantasy and pop culture conventions on a variety of topics. You can follow him @CthulhuMug on twitter or by friending HorrorInClay on Facebook and G+

Monster Serial: IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS, 1994

Hello, boils and ghouls! October is upon us and that means one thing: HALLOWEEN! While most holidays get a measly day or two of formal recognition, orthodox Monster Kids prefer to celebrate it in the tradition of our people: By watching tons of horror movies. This month at THE COLLINSPORT HISTORICAL SOCIETY, we're going to be discussing some of our favorites every day until Halloween. So, put on your 3-D spex, pop some popcorn and turn out the lights .... because we're going to the movies!  

By JONATHAN M. CHAFFIN

When asked by an old friend to write a review of a favorite horror movie, my immediate response was “I’ll write about HALLOWEEN! That is my all time favorite horror movie!" Ah, but which Halloween to write about? The original? The bizarre but beloved by me “HALLOWEEN 3: SEASON OF THE WITCH?" The 4th, 5th, and 6th installment considered as a single film using the alternate director’s footage wherein Dr. Loomis replaces Michael Meyers as the avatar of Thorn? (Look it up...I love it). Or perhaps the ultra stylish Rob Zombie remakes?

At the end of the day, several false starts, and a lot of cursing, I decided to shift focus ... I love those movies, but there I may actually be too familiar with them. Looking at the rest of Carpenter’s filmography, though, reminded me A) I love his work and B) there is one film that has shown up in my own design work in strange ways. That film, dear readers, is IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS, the third installment in John Carpenter’s Apocalypse trilogy (THE THING and PRINCE OF DARKNESS being the prior two).

IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS, at its core, is a story about belief and madness. About the transitions from one state to another, and about the lines between fiction and reality blurring until they break. Part of what I love about art and fandom and movies and storytelling at this point in history is the ever-increasing likelihood of running across real artifacts and products from movies in the real world. My own HORROR IN CLAY projects specifically create fictions and backstories and artifacts for places that never existed, and part of my fascination for that traces back to this movie.

Not to give it all away in the opening paragraphs, but a cynical insurance investigator uses clues published across an author’s body of work to locate a town that isn’t supposed to exist. Then finds out it was a staged publicity stunt. THEN finds out that the publicity stunt has gone horribly wrong and the monsters are real. Catnip for a horror junkie! At one point the movie breaks the 4th wall OF the 4th wall frame story! Breaks it like a lunatic with a fireax.

IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS tells the story of John Trent (gleefully played by Sam Neill), a freelance insurance investigator with a two-cigarette a scene habit, as he attempts to discover the truth behind a famous author’s disappearance. Neill plays it straight and dry, and the effect when he is faced with mindblowing weirdness is marvelous.

After being retained by publisher Arcane House to track down Sutter Cane (definitely not Stephen King at all ... mostly), Trent finds clues in Cane’s books which lead him to the author. Paired with Cane’s editor Linda he finds himself either trapped inside of or influenced by Cane’s books. He may in fact be a character. Hijinks ensue (but not the funny kind of hijinks...as befits a film from John Carpenter, there is some good visceral body horror and great shocks littered throughout the movie). Also, some of it is just weird and disturbing - parts put me in mind of ERASERHEAD, and parts reminiscent of JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS (well, of some Harryhausen effect vehicle, anyway).

In all its grandiose recursion, the film is about the subjective nature of reality and the power of belief to warp and change boundaries. I think there a nice implied indictment of capitalism; of its power to skew observable reality, but that might be going a little far. Nevertheless, the idea that churning out pulp novels (or political tracts, or public health pamphlets) can gradually make the environment more conducive to monsters or ideas once considered implausible and evil or malevolent forces has interesting connotations. The sleep of reason breeds monsters after all.

IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS is perhaps the most Lovecraftian movie I’ve ever seen. The monsters from beyond space and time are indeed squamous (and in fact are described using actual bits of Lovecraft's writing.) The monsters are alien, unconcerned with humanity on a personal level. Everything will be destroyed, but it’s nothing personal. The investigator is hard-bitten and completely screwed. We know he’s screwed from the beginning shots of the ambulance heading to the asylum...the only question in how he got there.

Trent is a neo-noir character; cynical, rational, and fairly unprepared for the sharp left turn the movie has in store for him. He’s always looking for the angle to the fraud he’s sure lurks just behind everyone else. As an aside; the film has some great noir-ish camera work as well with lots of angular shadows, even what I will choose to believe was a conscious nod towards German Expressionist films such as the CABINET OF DR CALIGARI in the set design of Trent’s asylum cell. Some of the shots were in fact filmed by Sam Neil himself.

Julie Carmen’s character, Linda Styles, is pretty bad. So bad, in fact, that I actively started trying to tune her out. Her best moment, by far, is when she turns into a monster and punches Sam Neil through a door. Mediocre acting and a labored character didn’t detract too much from the general fun of the movie, it just introduced a strange note of shadenfreude. I was happy when bad things happened to Linda Styles.

Short appearances by Charlton Heston and Jürgen Prochnow (as the enigmatic Sutter Cane) were dynamic and fun additions. Don’t ask me about the thing growing from the back of Prochnow’s head…that was just odd.

Structurally, the movie is ambitious; it contains a frame story, dream sequences, narrative asides, recursive filming...true to Lovecraftian form, the audience knows Trent is doomed from the very beginning. Some of the scenes are lot of grisly, weird fun; for example a change of focus or foreground or background detail creates dramatic irony as Trent and Styles unknowingly wander through a small town straight out of CHILDREN OF THE CORN. “It came for the children first…” bemoans one creepy townsman before he does something...irrevocable. Cane’s small town, Hobb’s End, could just as easily be Stephen King’s Castle Rock or HP Lovecraft’s Dunwich.

In general, the film hasn’t aged that well (lost in New England? Where’s my GPS). Watching the movie again for this review after a number of years revealed some glorious hallmarks of 80’s film that were entertaining in and of themselves (OH those shoulder pads).

The elephant in the room is that the recursive storytelling gets grating; as many times as I’ve seen this movie there is always someone who hates it, or gets bored or hopelessly lost towards the end. All that said, I think if you accept the film’s flaws and celebrate the parts it gets right, it’s really worth seeing. The cinematography is solid, and the Lovecraft and other horror references in the movie are fun to spot. There is a faint but entertaining thread of humor throughout the movie. It has some great shocks, some great body horror, some creepy-weird bits, and some fascinating points to make about the power of belief and about consumer culture influencing belief and vice versa. Also, the movie has truly kickass '80’s music during the opening and closing credits.

Jonathan M. Chaffin is an Atlanta-based graphic designer and art director and a lifetime fan of horror stories and film. His current project is www.HorrorInClay.com where he uses artifacts and ephemera to tell stories...he also produces horror-themed tiki mugs and barware like the Horror In Clay Cthulhu Tiki Mug. In addition, Jonathan occasionally does voice-over and podcasting work and appears on panels at sci-fi fantasy and pop culture conventions on a variety of topics.