#Combined classic vampire tropes with modern setting so well actually

[siriuslyobsessedwithfiction]

If I had a nickel for every time my favourite character from a vampire show was a centuries old vampire with issues and toxic relationships who became a rockstar, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it has happened twice.

[darkmarkets]

DM's Field Guide to Dark Fiction - Supernatural Horror

genus: supersticiae ad infinitum orders: Tales of Terror, Horror, Gross-out

Common traits – Supernatural Horror most often involves a protagonist battling against some force that is above or greater than nature, and that force can be anything from spiritual to occultic, religious to mythological. This force must inspire revulsion and fear in the protagonist (because prancing around happily with a sexy supernatural centaur does not Supernatural horror make). For the right horrifying effect, ghosts and demons are popular, sometimes joined by vampires, ghouls, succubi, poltergeists, werewolves,

While the supernatural elements in the story can combine to aid the hero or heroine in their war with forces beyond their understanding (such as helpful gypsies with spells to close the gates of hell or priests who know how to shut that malignant ghost up), for the most part the protagonist is at odds with the supernatural, wishing to kill/escape/stop it. The supernatural can almost always be killed, escaped from, or stopped because the spirit world is just as regulated as the boring old mundane one, and that is what sets Supernatural Horror apart from the Weird Tale or Psychological Horror: the threat is a faith, myth, or superstition-based menace that can be defeated by the rules set forth by whatever occult know-it-all happens to be hanging around.

Historical sightings – The supernatural has been used in fiction since the first storytellers crawled out of the primordial sea; it's been used even more heavily in life throughout history. There have been decades of life on this earth where people actually believed that an improperly-blessed sneeze could let demons in, so the use of such ghastly ghost mongering in stories is hardly something that can be tracked.

However, the use of the supernatural in order to terrify is a relatively recent phenomenon. In Western publishing, Supernatural Horror has its roots in the Gothic traditions of the 18th and 19th centuries, with notable occurrences like Henry James' story "The Turn of the Screw" and W. W. Jacob's "The Monkey's Paw", not to mention the stories of occult-obsessed Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.  Bram Stoker's immortal classic Dracula also hails from this camp, as the well-informed Professor Von Helsing battles against the shape-shifting ancient evil bent on draining the blood out of ol' Harker's honey boo.

The tactic of using the supernatural to give readers the willies has been taken up by tons of writers throughout the 20th century: Richard Matheson, Shirley Jackson, Ramsay Campbell, Anne Rice, Ray Bradbury, Clive Barker and a slew of others. It was during this horror-happy decade that The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty and Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin emerged as stunning classics of occult fiction (the former actually leading to a spike in exorcisms requested by the general public).

While the frenzied bloodthirst for Horror fiction has tapered off in the beginnings of the 21rst century, many horror writers still put in hard time in the grand Supernatural tradition. Writers like Caitlyn R. Keirnan and Laird Barron are serving up serious literary fare with a supernatural taste, and more mainstream writers like Bentley Little and Edward Lee dip their pens in the inkwell of the occult. And of course, many other cultures around the globe have fantastic traditions of terrifying with the supernatural, on every continent from Latin America to Africa to Asia, each following their own completely different sets of rules and gory regulations, but to survey them all would take a lifetime of arcane study.

Modern habitats – The old tropes of supernatural horror—possession by Judeo-Christian-style demons, wrathful souls of the dead speaking through Ouija boards, anything with gypsy curses—are not taken well in modern Western Horror publishing. (In Western Horror films, of course, they live mercilessly unchallenged, and anyone who says the Paranormal Activity series isn't wet-your-pants scary is probably not wearing pants. But Paranormal Horror is a different species.) Still, that doesn't mean the supernatural itself is shunned. Big Guns like Clarksworld Magazine still is happy to look at an offical Supernatural Horror story, and Reputable Guns like Psuedopod and Three Lobed Burning Eye won't shake a mojo stick at them either. But, if a writer is interested in a market that doesn't specifically say supernatural accepted here, then it's a simple trick to rely more on another subgenre like Psychological or Weird, and then dole out a helping of supernatural on the side.

Related: Ghost Story, Creature Horror, Werewolf, Vampire, Demon, Dark Fantasy

See also: Introduction 

LD Keach

[watching-pictures-move]

Put On Your Raincoats #20 | Squalid Motels and Desperate Gals, courtesy of Kim Christy

This review contains mild spoilers.

When I first heard of Kim Christy, I knew I had to delve into her work. Here is someone who was involved in the drag scene in the '60s and went on to direct and produce pornography from the '80s onward. She's also a trans woman director (and occasional actress), which is not just unusual in golden age pornography but even mainstream cinema today. Unfortunately, figuring out where to start was a challenge. There's a very good interview with her on the Advocate but which doesn't really delve into her directing work. So I did the highly risky and ill-advised move of scanning through the titles in her filmography and trying to pick out ones with interesting sounding premises. Even this was a challenge, as a lot of her movies sounded like they didn't have a terrible amount of story. (A good many of them also had certain slurs in the title, which are unfortunately common in trans pornography.) So out of the crapshoot of movies I picked, I can't say I really got to the bottom of what makes her work interesting or even gelled to most of them, but hopefully I can convey what makes the ones I did take to interesting.

To start with the most slight, the two Divine Atrocities movies are basically a collection of sex scenes. There's a theme of dominant women running through them, but otherwise there isn't much tying together in terms of staging, aesthetics and the like. The segments have titles like "The Leather Lass Tamer", "Rubber Rampage" and "Ms. Degradation", but truth be told, nothing here is terribly shocking. So there isn't a lot to either of these movies, but if you're watching it for those reasons, they're enjoyable enough. A few of the segments feature trans performers, and I did find that Sulka had a nicely imposing screen presence in her scene, and while Sugar Nicole briefly threatens her partner with her "big black cock", I did like that for the most part the movies don't discern between these scenes and the ones with cisgender performers. In the eyes of Kim Christy, there's room for everyone in this great sexual melange. Also notable is the threesome scene with Janey Robbins, who (after likely reading Dan Savage's column) tells one of her partners, "If you don't find a different way to fuck me, you can forget it, I'll have to find somebody else", and in the first time in the history of civilization, gets mad at her male partner for not climaxing quickly enough. "You always say it'll only take a few minutes. Time is the only thing I can't replace, and it always takes too long."

A bit more substantive narratively but less interesting is Momma's Boy, with a premise that you can guess based on the title. Tantala Ray presides over a brothel set during an indeterminate period, where she presides over her girls and also her son, who mysteriously became a deaf-mute at a certain point of time. Why did her son become a deaf-mute? Will we ever find out? Spoiler: it's incest. Tantala Ray does have a weird enough screen presence to make her parts watchable, but this has none of the charge that, say, Taboo brings to the same material. (It's worth noting that Ray in this movie, looking like a debauched queen of Mardi Gras in one scene, is a camp villain while Kay Parker plays her role straight in the other movie.) As it's shot on video, the movie is not very nice to look at, and the dirt cheap production values make it unclear whether this is supposed to be a period piece. Some of the dialogue is amusing ("Oxford?" "Guess again." "Princeton?" "Try Biloxi Tech, my sweetie."), and there is some old timey music and one of the clients wears an ascot at one point, so it's not a totally squalid affair. (It's classy, see? He's wearing an ascot.) As the son, Jerry Butler does a cringe-inducing lisp, but I did chuckle at his last line.

A bit easier to recommend is True Crimes of Passion, where Janey Robbins plays a private detective (cheekily named B.J. Fondel) who invariably bungles her investigations and winds up in sex scenes with the people she's supposed to be investigating. "Out of the fog and into the smog" begins the overwrought voiceover, which truth be told doesn't compare to the likes of Chandler but I guess the effort is nice. The first case involves her investigating the wife of a minister whom her client suspects of infidelity. Surprise, surprise, it turns out the wife has a girlfriend with whom she has dominant sex. Thanks to Robbins' investigative prowess, she gets found out and forced to join the proceedings and ends up getting her client, a Dan Quayle looking motherfucker in a cowboy hat, captured as well, which leads to an incredible burn.

"The lord will punish you for this."

"The lord already has, he gave me you for a husband."

Also, when Robbins is forced into cunnilingus, she says over narration, "Oh Christ, I'm not even sure I've seen one of these things up close", and yeah, okay, Janey.

The second scene is probably the most notable as it features Christy as a performer. Robbins visits her friend to investigate a death threat against her friend's brother (also Robbins' ex), and the twist can be deduced when you start wondering why a seemingly minor character gets an unusually large amount of screentime. The scene features a trope that likely isn't terribly sensitive by modern standards, but I get the sense from that Advocate interview that Christy isn't too hung up about such things and one must concede that the film is a product of its time and genre (and within that context, there's a lot worse out there). The last scene has Robbins spying on her neighbour in hotel to get some industry secrets, which leads to some really awkward dialogue about champagne and then a threesome involving her client and mark. Like the work of Yasojiru Ozu, this scene breaks the 180-rule, but I guess if this is your thing, you might enjoy it. At the very end, the mark just gives up his secrets to the client. The secrets of male bonding sometimes elude me.

Easily the most accomplished and enjoyable film from Christy that I watched was Squalor Motel. It combines the sexual variety of the other films with a sense of camp and grounds it in a distinct, memorable location. There isn't much more "plot" than the other movies, as it's basically about a motel concierge doing her job over the course of a day, but as it follows her bumping into a variety of (usually horny) guests and finding herself in amusing (and unfailingly sexual) situations, there's enough of a narrative through line that it feels like a "real" movie where the other movies strained for similar effect, and the movie uses a soundtrack of icy synths and jazz that sounds like imitation Angelo Badalamenti to give it all an alluring vibe. I'm gonna make a wager that David Lynch would have liked this movie. Look, I have no idea what his viewing habits are or what sends his motor running, and the thought of him jacking it furiously to this or any movie is not something that brings me pleasure. But this shares some of the campy tone and surface qualities of his works, and I also wanted to leave you all with that image.

Why does the motel have its own house band (to whom people try to listen to while they engage in all kinds of sexual congress)? Why is Jamie Gillis made up like a vampire and trying to sell marital aids? Why does the one guest's blow-up doll turn into a real person (and prove, uh, extremely vocal during their scene)? Why is the owner wearing a pig mask and a tutu while he spies on his guests? Why is everyone laughing at the newlywed? Why is the one scientist with a Hitler mustache and his shrill-voiced assistant conducting experiments (read: having a threesome) with Tantala Ray? And how are most of these things taking place in the mysterious Reptile Room in the middle of the motel? With an extremely winning Colleen Brennan in the lead role (sporting a pair of thick glasses, a Lucille Ball updo, and a big, toothy smile), we'll have a pretty good time finding out. Like a lot of hardcore movies, this is pretty episodic in structure, but its distinct atmosphere gives it a nice sense of momentum as it drifts from scene to scene.

With its nice production design (and the fact that it seems to have actual sets, rather than being shot in what I assume are people's homes like in the other movies), Squalor Motel feels a bit more upscale and lavish than the average porno. While I don't have any budgetary information handy, I do know that the production had an assistant director, Ned Morehead. To what extent he contributed to the movie's DNA I can't say for certain, but the directorial effort of his I watched, also produced by Christy, had many of the same qualities. Desperate Women starts off feeling pretty stylish with its spraypaint style opening credits (although it loses a bit of style when it misspells star Taija Rae's name as "Taja Rea"). Taija Rae plays a reporter who ends up wrongfully convicted for a murder and thrown in brutal women's prison presided over by the sadistic Tantala Ray, who seems to get her jollies from spying on her prisoners as they get it on or abusing them with the help of her dimwitted guard. During such incidents, the guard frequently ends up ejaculating on her uniform as a source of comic relief. (One such scene ends with a shot of a photo of Ronald Reagan.) I must however disclose, without revealing too much about the shameful inner workings of my hopelessly degenerate mind, that the denouement of scene involving Ray, her guard and Sharon Mitchell did not leave me unmoved. Mitchell plays a prisoner who befriends Taija Rae, and it's worth noting that despite being one of the best actresses in classic porn, she's saddled here with an atrocious Hispanic accent and at one point sings a bit of "America" from West Side Story.

By porn standards, this is actually quite well produced and has a relatively sturdy narrative. (I must however note that one scene has a blatant ejaculation-related continuity error.) Women in prison movies tend to be pretty squalid affairs in general, at least in terms of production values, so this doesn't feel too far off from the real thing and offers more explicit versions of the same pleasures, while its sense of humour gives it a nice campy quality. Tantala Ray especially delivers in a pleasingly over the top performance as the teeth-gnashing villain (the camera often frames her severe face in wide angle close ups), and say what you will about Sharon Mitchell's accent, I did like seeing her pop up in here. With all the flamboyance and excitement around her, Taija Rae almost becomes a supporting character in her own movie, although I must confess that I found her character's hopeless naivety pretty cute. ("I didn't wear rubbers, it's sunny out".) With a fun cast, a firm handle on the genre's pleasures and a groovy soundtrack, this is a pretty good time.

[krinsbez]

Book Recommendations: Da Big List, Fiction Edition

Well, I said I’d do more book recs, so here we go...

(note that some of the series recs are out of date, with additional installments written since I previously updated the list) 

-Devil's Cape by Rob Rogers is the single best work of superhero prose I have ever read. -The Six-Gun Tarot by R. S. Belcher, in which the unusual inhabitants of a Wild West town (a sheriff who can't die, a deputy who's the son of Coyote, a housewife who used to be an assassin, and more) fight an Eldritch Abomination. Has two sequels, The Shotgun Arcana and The Queen of Swords -"Craft Sequence" series (six books and counting, starting with either Three Parts Dead or Last First Snow, depending on whether you want to read 'em in publication or chronological order, respectively), by Max Gladstone. Set in a modern-esque fantasy world that runs on corporate necromancy and "applied theocracy", the first (in publication order) involves a junior associate in a necromancy firm having to investigate the murder of the god who powers a steampunk city. -The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison, in which the half-goblin Unfavorite son of the Elven Emperor is unexpectedly raised to the throne after his father and half-brothers die in a zeppelin crash. -Daughter of the Sword by Steve Bein, in which a Tokyo policewoman catches a case that involves a Yakuza power struggle and a trio of magic swords, with extensive flashbacks (as in, they ultimately take up about half of the book) to the history of said swords. Has a sequel, Year of the Demon, in which the heroine goes up against a cult revolving around a mask tied to the swords. Also, more flashbacks. Now has a third sequel, Disciple of the Wind; there are also a couple of eNovellas, which I haven't read. -Eifelheim by Michael Flynn, in which a Renaissance-era village in Germany interact with a group of aliens whose ship crashed nearby. -Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie, in which the last remnant of a space warship's AI seeks revenge on the ones who blew up the rest of her and...find out why they did it. Has two sequels, Ancillary Sword and Ancillary Mercy. -The Chinatown Death Cloud Peril by Paul Malmont, in which the creators of Doc Savage and The Shadow team-up with each other (and L. Ron Hubbard and someone else who is a minor spoiler) on an actual pulp adventure involving Nazi spies, a Chinese warlord, and something which is actually a BIG spoiler. Has a sequel, The Astounding, the Amazing, and the Unknown, in which Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, and L. Sprague De Camp investigate Tesla's final invention. -Bridge of Birds by Barry Hughart, in which Master Li, a sage "with a slight flaw in his character", is hired by an immensely strong peasant named Number Ten Ox to investigate a mysterious plague afflicting his village in a "China that never was". Has two sequels, The Story of the Stone and Eight Skilled Gentlemen that are greatly inferior but still enjoyable. -The Kitty Norville books by Carrie Vaughn (15 books starting with Kitty and the Midnight Hour; the count includes a short-story collection and a side-novel starring a secondary character), about the host of a midnight radio show in Denver, who is also a newly turned werewolf. One night, instead of playing random music, she starts talking about the supernatural. Then vampires and other werewolves start calling in... -The Inspector Chen novels by Liz Williams (6 books starting with Snake Agent), about a police detective in a near future Singapore who investigates mysteries that require him to liaise with the Chinese versions of Hell and Heaven. -"Barsoom" series by Edgar Rice Burroughs (11 books, starting with A Princess of Mars): The ur-text of the Planetary Romance sub-genre, one of the definitional texts of soft SF. Rollicking adventures with epic characters in a marvelously imagined world. Long story short; a Civil War vet on the verge of death is astrally projected to not-yet-dead Mars, befriends a group of warlike natives, falls in love with the Princess of another, and turns the whole planet upside down in the name of love. Then he has kids... -"Lensman" series by E. E. "Doc" Smith (6 books; starting with either Triplanetary or Galactic Patrol, depending on your preferences): The granddaddy of all Space Operas, a triumphant example of power creep. The forces of Order and Chaos war for the fate of the universe, using the ultimate police force and an army of space pirates as proxies. -Last and First Men by Olaf Stapledon: An exploration of the future evolution of mankind. Starting in the '30s with the then-current state of the "First Men" (that is to say, Homo sapiens sapiens) until the extinction of the "Last Men" millions of years hence. Redefines epic scope. -Star-Maker by Olaf Stapledon: A companion of sorts to Last and First Men, except with with the scope turned up to eleven, covering billions of years and the entire universe. -Slan by A. E. Van Vogt: Jommy Cross is a Slan, an evolved human possessed of superior physical and mental abilities. Years ago, the Slans took over the world, but their regime was overthrown and now the Slans are hunted. When Jommy's parents are killed, he must learn to survive in a world that hates and fears him...or does it? Jampacked with twists and turns, not to mention being the archetypical "mutant hunt" novel. -Voyage of the Space Beagle by A. E. Van Vogt: The best and brightest of man's scientific minds have been sent into space to explore strange new worlds, and then figure out how to keep the life-forms they encounter from killing them. A rip-roaring tale of of space exploration, alien monsters, and an omnicompetent protagonist. Not only was it a major influence on Star Trek, one episode is the basis for Alien. -"Demon Princes" series by Jack Vance (5 books starting with The Star King): Years ago, the five most dangerous criminals in the known universe joined together to murder or enslave the inhabitants of a small colony. Now the sole survivor is hunting them down one-by-one across the galaxy... The narrative is a great combination of action and mystery, and the setting is full of all manner of interesting worlds and civilizations. -"Planet of Adventure" series by Jack Vance (4 books, starting with City of the Chasch): An Earthman crash-lands on a planet inhabited by four alien species, and the humans they've enslaved, travels the world to find a way home. A marvelous exploration of the concept of Blue-And-Orange Morality. -"Sector General" series by James White (12 books, starting with Hospital Station): Life aboard a massive, multi-species hospital space station in a deeply idealistic 'verse with one of the most diverse bunch of aliens ever devised. The first six books are mostly collections of short stories featuring medical mysteries solved by Dr. Conway (the primary exception is the second book, which is mostly a novella set against the backdrop of an interstellar war and brilliantly inverts the "Hard Man Making Hard Decisions" trope), as he goes from being a trainee to one of the hospital's elite, while the latter six are novels featuring an assortment of characters. -"Cobra" series by Timothy Zahn (9 books and counting, starting with Cobra): A multi-generational tale of super-soldiers in war and peace, with a healthy helping of interstellar diplomacy. A really interesting take on MilSF, where out-of-the-box thinking takes center stage. -"Quadrail" series by Timothy Zahn (5 books, starting with Night Train To Rigel): Frank Compton, former agent of the human government, finds himself working for the mysterious aliens who run the local 'verse's sole form of interstellar travel; a train in space called the Quadrail. Intrigue, action, and plot twists abound, including one of the best Heel Face Turns I have ever encountered. -"Stainless Steel Rat" series by Harry Harrison (11 books, starting with The Stainless Steel Rat, and one short story, which can be found in the collection Stainless Steel Visions). In a far future where mankind has spread across the stars, crime has been eliminated. Well, that's what the authorities would like you to believe; in truth there are still a small handful of individuals maladjusted enough to commit crimes and smart enough to get away with them. James Bolivar "Slippery Jim" Digriz, the Stainless Steel Rat, may be the smartest of them all, a white collar thief and con artist who's almost pathological disregard for law and authority is balanced by a surprisingly strong moral code. Which is why when he is finally caught, the authorities put him to work catching criminals who lack those morals. This is classic SF comedy, with a surprising amount of pathos at points. -"The Parasol Protectorate" series by Gail Carriger (five books, starting with Soulless). A humorous and exciting tale of love, intrigue, mad scientists, and fashion in an alternate Victorian era where the British Empire's power derives from steampunk technology, werewolf soldiers, and vampire politicians. Has a sequel series, "The Custard Protocol" (3 books and counting, starting with Prudence) revolving around the daughter of the original protagonist. Has a YA prequel spinoff, "Finishing School" (4 books, starting with Ettiquette and Espionage) revolving around a teenager who is recruited by a boarding school that trains spies. There are, in addition, a manga adaptation of the first couple books. -Ports of Call by Jack Vance. Myron Tany has always dreamed of traveling the Gaean Reach. When his eccentric aunt acquires a spaceship, it seems his dream has come true...until she ends up marooning him on random planet. Fortunately, Myron is able to obtain a position as supercargo aboard the merchant ship Glicca. The story does not really have a plot per se, consisting primarily of a series of marvelous picaresque vignettes as Myron and his crew-mates travel to different worlds delivering cargo, trying to acquire additional cargo, and periodically running afoul of bizarre local customs. The book just kinda stops at one point, and resumes in a second book, entitled Lurulu. I'm not really describing this well, but they're both very fun, beautifully written books. -The Green and the Gray by Timothy Zahn. A night on the town for a young New York couple takes a turn for the weird when they are forced, at gunpoint, to take custody of a 12-year old girl. They soon find themselves enmeshed in a secret Cold War between two alien races that have secretly been living in the city for generations...a Cold War that is threatening to turn hot. -The Rook by Daniel O'Malley. A young woman awakens surrounded by corpses with no memory of who she is. In her pocket is a letter from her pre-amnesia self, one Myfanwy Thomas. It seems that Myfanwy was a senior bureaucrat for the covert organization in charge of controlling magic and other such weirdness in Britain, and that her amnesiac state is something that was done to her. Myfanwy must therefore investigate the mystery of precisely who that is, while simultaneously do a job about which she knows nothing, without letting anyone realize what's happened to her. Ha a sequel, Stiletto, though I cannot explain the plot without spoiling the previous book. -Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed. A tale in which an elderly demon-hunting cleric and his paladin assistant team-up with a shape-shifting barbarian girl and husband and wife alchemists to prevent an undead villain unleash an ancient evil, while trying not get involved between the conflict between the tyrannical ruler of their city and a gentleman thief-turned-revolutionary. Did I mention that the cleric's spells invoke the name of Allah, the paladin is a dervish, the barbarian is a Bedouin, and the whole setting draws it's cues not from Tolkien but the Arabian Nights? -"White Trash Zombie" by Diana Rowland (6 books and counting, starting with My Life As a White Trash Zombie). Angel Crawford is an unemployed high school dropout in rural Louisiana with a deadbeat dad, an asshole boyfriend, a drug habit, and no future. After one particularly wild night of drinking and drugging, she gets into a devastating car accident...and wakes up in the hospital without a scratch on her to find that an unknown benefactor has arranged for her to have a job at the Coroner's Office. Which is good because she now has a hankering for brains... -Under the Moons of Mars: New Adventures on Barsoom edited by John Joseph Adams. Exactly what is says on the tin, a collection of original stories set on Barsoom by an assortment of writers. As with any anthology, quality is a bit uneven; some of the stories are excellent Original Flavor pastiches, some are deconstructions or parodies, one or two are just bad. But all in all a great collection. -Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs edited by Mike Resnick and Robert T. Garcia. Same basic idea, but for the entire Burroughs oevure, including some of his non-SFnal work. -"Winter of the World" series by Michael Scott Rohan (two trilogies, the first starting with The Anvil of Ice, the second place taking place before the first and in another part of the world, and which I haven't been able to get my hands on ), an epic fantasy taking place against the backdrop of an Ice Age, in which a young man rises from slavery to become the most powerful smith-cum-magician the world has ever known, and together with some companions fights to defeat the sinister primal forces that wish to cover the world in glaciers forever. Much less generic than it sounds, even without going into the appendixes which reveal the real(ish) science behind quite a bit of the magic. -"Spiral Arm" series by Michael Flynn (4 books, starting with The January Dancer). Moderately Irish-flavored space opera, the first book tells the tale of of how a random space captain found a pre-human artifact, of the various hands said artifact passed into, and the conflicts that sprung up in it's wake. The second book turns the first's framing sequence into an epic of it's own, as a young bard hunts down the truth of her parentage. The series notably involves massive retcons with each volume, revealing that what we thought was going on was actually something else, but does so in a way that's compelling rather than irritating. -Dr. Jay Hosler is an entomologist who has written four edutational graphic novels for children (Clan Apis, The Sandwalk Adventures, Optical Allusions, and Last of the Sandwalkers). I've read three and they are amazing. In Clan Apis, a young honeybee desperately searches for her place in the hive, and ultimately finds an unorthodox solution. In The Sandwalk Adventures, an elderly Charles Darwin tries to convince a follicle mite living in his eyebrow that he's not God, by teaching him about evolution. In Last of the Sandwalkers (no relation)...honestly, the story contains so much epic awesomeness, I just want to list it, but it's all spoilers; suffice to say that the title character is A: a beetle, B: could give Sam Carter and Agatha Heterodyne a run for their money in the mad science department, and C: leads an expedition to explore the unknown and along the way discovers truths about her family and the nature of her people's civilization that some people really don't want her to (also you learn stuff about beetles). -Nightwise by R. S. Belcher. Years ago, Laytham Ballard was the Golden Boy of the occult underworld sub-culture. That was a LONG time ago, and no one would ever mistake Laytham for golden. But he's not so much of a bastard that he'll refuse the last request of one of his few remaining friends. What was supposed to be a simple revenge killing, however, turns out to be a lot more complicated and a lot more dangerous than Laytham ever imagined. Has a sequel, The Night Dahlia, which I have yet to read. -Brotherhood of the Wheel by R. S. Belcher. Jimmy Aussapile is an independent trucker, hauling cargo cross-country to support his pregnant wife and teenage daughter; he is also a member of a secret order descended from the Knights Templar that protects the highways of America from monsters both human and not. An encounter with a hitchhiking ghost finds him heading off on a quest, in which he joins forces with the heir apparent of monster-fighting outlaw biker gang who's military service unleashed some serious inner demons, and a State Trooper who's determination to solve a series of child abductions leads her to go rogue. Together, they must battle an ancient evil involving serial killers, human sacrifice, and Black-Eyed Kids. Note that it's loosely tied to Nightwise, in which Jimmy shows up in one scene as a minor side character; meanwhile, an off-hand reference to Laytham is made at one point in Brotherhood, and a minor plot thread in the later novel relates to a major plot thread in the earlier. They aren't even the same genre, with Nightwise being urban fantasy noir instead of horror. All in all, one doesn't have to have read one to enjoy the other,

[rhetorical-ink]

Rhetorical Ink Reviews: What We Do in the Shadows

**SPOILERS BELOW**

I’ve wanted to watch this film for a while and was so happy to see it’s on Amazon Prime for free! So, now I can write down....

My Top Ten Thoughts on What We Do in the Shadows:

10. The “Mockumentary” style of filming: I have always loved shows like Parks and Recreation and The Office, that try to mimic a documentary. It works perfectly for this movie, which follows around four vampires from various time periods. It’s a great style of filming for this funny concept. Even the inclusion of classic “vampire” imagery works well here.

9. The Tropes of Vampires throughout Literature and Pop Cultured are Satirized and Explored: I love how they take stereotypes of vampires and apply them to a modern context and explore how each would react. For example, the “master and slave” situation between humans and vampires, how vampires would get “invited” into the club, or even  how vampires “lure” their meals in...the concepts they explore work well and were creative and funny!

8. Peter is scary: The eldest of the group, an 8,000 year old vampire named Peter, is definitely a tribute to Nosferatu, and is probably the scariest thing about the movie. That’s not saying much, as the movie isn’t particularly “horrific,” even with the gore, but he has some moments to definitely put one on edge.

7. Nick is a “dick:” Nick, a newly made vampire, is the obvious antagonist throughout the first half of the film. His “transformation,” or rather the lead up to it, is actually almost scary. Nick’s character is that of a “new vampire,” and he can’t keep his mouth shut about that, with hilarious and frustrating results. Deacon, his vampire “brother,” is particularly frustrated with him, and for good reason. Nick causes a lot of conflict in the film, which we’ll touch base on more below. But, for the most part, he’s my least favorite part about the film...a character you just “love to hate.”

6. Handling Reflections: Probably one of my favorite gimmicks they play with in the film is that of reflections and how since they can’t see themselves in the mirror, they rely on themselves to make sure their fashion sense is alright. It results in some really funny scenarios throughout the movie.

5. New Zealand as the Setting: The movie takes place in Wellington, New Zealand, but you would only notice by the characters’ accents. The activities that go on, the locations, etc. all are pretty universal in nature, which is nice; especially if you’re not sure about any “in jokes” because of the filming location.

4. Stu and the Werewolves: Stu, Nick’s friend, ends up befriending the group and for a while, you see them all get along with their human friend...of course, by the end of the film, they encounter a pack of werewolves, who maul poor Stu. The good news? Stu luckily doesn’t die, but comes back as a werewolf and everyone gets along. Stu’s character was so comedic-ally fun because of his clearly “boring IT tech assistant” persona; I was glad he didn’t pass away. Also, the special effects on the werewolves were actually pretty good!

3. Jermaine Clement as Vladislav: If you’ve not watched the comedy band Flight of the Conchords, you may not know who Jermaine Clement is, but I love him as an actor and comedian. His humor is unique and dry and his performance is a highlight of the film.  He is fantastic in this, combining the faux “Fabio” suaveness he naturally carries and the dry humor he brings from his other projects. His friends on the Flight of the Conchords television series also make welcomed appearances.

2. The “Ball”: Towards the climax of the film, they all attend a ball filled with Vampires, Werewolves, Witches, and Zombies. Each have their own stereotypes played upon, to some very funny results, especially the Zombies. It was cool seeing them play around with this concept, and if they ever made another of these films, it would be cool for them to return back to these groups to explore more.

1. Taika Waititi as Viago: Viago is the vampire that is the “middle child,” and the one that narrates most of the story. Waititi’s performance is very good in this, as he taps into the charm and innocence in as much as a vampire can have. He also has a plot thread that plays out through the film with a very fun ending, which I won’t ruin here.

The Verdict?

If you like “mockumentaries” like The Office, and if you like Vampires, this will be a fun movie to watch. At times, the humor lulls, or maybe doesn’t hit as strong as it could, but I laughed out loud several times and found myself entertained. Definitely go rent it!