#robert martin carroll

[waste-it-on-something-useful]

Sonny Boy (Robert Martin Carroll, 1989) Cinematography by Roberto D'Ettorre Piazzoli

[rainingmusic]

CHIC - Le Freak 

[badmovieihave]

Bad movie I have North by Northwest 1959

[theholmwoodfoundation]

Welcome to the Holmwood Foundation

Sanguis Vita Est

The Holmwood Foundation is a Found Footage Horror-Fiction Podcast created by Fio Trethewey @fiotrethewey (Big Finish: Gallifrey War Room, 18th Wall Productions) and Georgia Cook @georgiacooked (Big Finish: The Eleventh Doctor Chronicles, Gallifrey War Room, BBC Books, The Dracula Daily Sketch Collection). It is a modern day sequel to the gothic novel Dracula. 

What is the Holmwood Foundation about?

Our story follows Jeremy Larkin (Played by Sean Carlsen) and Maddie Townsend (Played by Rebecca Root), two co-workers at the mysterious Holmwood Foundation, as they are possessed by the ghosts of Jonathan and Mina Harker, and embark on a road trip across the country in an effort to achieve their ghost's wishes: to stop Dracula once and for all. This is a story about identity and self discovery, family loyalty and devotion, all wrapped around a nightmare of a road trip with a rejuvenating severed head, incredibly sincere Victorian ghosts, and an analogue recorder. (Content Warnings for blood, horror themes and possession)

Where can we listen to The Holmwood Foundation?

Find our pilot episode on Acast, here:

Following a successful Kickstarter campaign, we are currently working hard on season one, which we hope to drop bi-weekly in Spring/early Summer 2025. Follow along for further updates as production progresses!

We currently have late pledges open from our Kickstarter, if you would like to join our private Discord, or access ad-free episodes once season one drops!

Who are the Cast and Crew?

In our pilot episode: Across the Moors, we have:

Rebecca Root as Maddie Townsend and Mina Harker, and Sean Carlsen as Jeremy Larkin and Jonathan Harker.

Other voice talents include:

Samuel Clemens as Arthur Jones Becky Wright as Thrall & Phone Voice Jessica Carroll as Newsreader Luke Kondor as Robert Swales and featuring Attila Puskas as Dracula

Joining our crew we have Samuel Clemens as Director, Katharine Armitage as our Script Editor and Benji Clifford as our Sound Engineer and Designer

In Season one, we will also be joined by:

Basil Waite as Tom Van Helsing Michelle Kelly as Henri Martin Andrew Biss as Jonathan Harker 3rd Jackie Calistaah as Elena David Ault as Dr Timothy Lake Candace Marie as Magdalena Swift Robyn Holdaway as Cam Karim Kronfli as Dave

Extra Content:

Between now and season one's release, we will slowly be sharing small pieces of related content related to the Holmwood Foundation. These might be emails, or obituaries, maybe even interviews. Follow the links below to find all of that content together:

Extract List - Updated as of 15/11/24

Tags: Frequently Asked Questions Production Updates OOC Answered Asks Extracts Foundation Emails Holmwood Foundation Art

Social Media Links here: https://linktr.ee/theholmwoodfoundation

[hotvintagepoll]

THE TOURNAMENT IS OVER! Eartha Kitt lounges in her deck chair in the sun, dipping her toes in the pool with Toshiro Mifune and sipping a brightly colored fruity something with an umbrella in it.

Far below in the shadow realm, however, the fallen hotties dance in the dark—let's take a minute to look back at them under the cut.

PRELIM PRETTIES:

Claude Gensac, Silvia Pinal, Ewa Aulin, Rita Tushingham, Annette Funicello, Norma Bengell, Catherine Spaak, Brigitte Auber, Micheline Presle, Nanette Fabray, Libertad Lamarque, Vera Miles, Martha Raye, Catherine McLeod, Virginia Mayo, Elizabeth Allan, Belle Bennet, Virginia Cherill, Mary Brian, Ruth Chatterton, Agnes Ayres, Merna Kennedy, Marie Prevost, Corinne Griffith, May Allison, Virginia Brown Faire, Alice Brady, and Jetta Goudal

ROUND ONE WONDERS:

Angie Dickinson, Thelma Ritter, Geraldine Chaplin, Evelyn Preer, Vanessa Brown, Betty Blythe, Susan Hayward, Mae Clarke, Sally Ann Howes, Ossi Oswalda, Adrienne La Russa, Hermione Gingold, Barbara Bouchet, Melina Mercouri, Anna Karina, Edwige Fenech, Charmian Carr, Pina Pellicer, Marlène Jobert, Tsuru Aoki, Alice Roberts, Leila Hyams, Lady Tsen Mei, Geneviève Bujold, Dolores Hart, Anita Berber, Bonita Granville, Vonetta McGee, Claire Windsor, Zizi Jeanmaire, Tuesday Weld, Grace Darmond, Carol Channing, Deanna Durbin, Laraine Day, Mariette Hartey, Wendy Hiller, Candy Darling, Hermione Baddely, Valeria Creti, Ella Raines, Ann Miller, Dana Wynter, Dalida, Martine Beswick, Gale Storm, Simone Signoret, Cristina Gaioni, Mabel Normand, Stéphane Audran, Ruth Weyher, Anna Wiazemsky, Ann Sheridan, Sandhya Shantaram, Alice White, Anne Francis, Gena Rowlands, Lyda Borelli, May Whitty, Cathleen Nesbitt, Jessica Walter, Virna Lisi, Barbara Shelley, Iris Hall, Heather Angel, Anne Shirley, Joanna Pettet, Virginia O'Brien, Joan Collins, Greer Garson, Gracie Allen, Peggy Ryan, Frances Dee, Shirley Maclaine, Geraldine Farrar, Kathleen Byron, Margaret Hamilton, Eva Gabor, Francesca Bertini, Julie Adams, Olga Baclanova, Misa Uehara, Yvette Vickers, Milena Dravić, Jenny Jugo, Madeleine Carroll, Benita Hume, Olive Borden, Shirley Jones, Miyoshi Umeki, Dorothy Lamour, Gale Sondergaard, Mary Anderson, Charlotte Greenwood, Sybil Seely, Mona Barrie, Kathryn Grayson, Katharine Ross, Madge Bellamy, Rhonda Fleming, Sally Gray, Jana Brejchová, Debra Paget, Madame Sul-Te-Wan, Evelyn Brent, Zelma O'Neal, Marie Laforêt, Türkan Şoray, Beatriz Costa, Irene Zazians, Eleanor Powell, Susan Luckey, Patsy Kelly, Lil Dagover, Norma Talmadge, Dorothy Mackaill, Madge Evans, Virginia McKenna, Amália Rodrigues, Mamie Van Doren, Valerie Hobson, Isabel Jeans, Beata Tyszkiewicz, Claire Luce, Aleksandra Khokhlova, Nieves Navarro Garcia, Janet Leigh, Carmen Miranda, Jean Harlow, Aud Egedge-Nissen, Nina Foch, Jean Simmons, Piper Laurie, Katy Jurado, Jayne Mansfield, Anita Garvin, Frances Farmer, Lizabeth Scott, Joan Greenwood, Una Merkel, Arlene Francis, Ethel Merman, Doris Day, Suzanne Pleshette, Ruta Lee, Carolyn Jones, June Richmond, Eva Nil, Diana Dors, Anna Chang, Colleen Moore, Alexis Smith, Yvette Mimieux, Ruby Keeler, Viola Dana, Dolores Grey, Marie Windsor, Danielle Darieux, Jean Parker, Julie Christie, Acquanetta, Leatrice Joy, Ghita Nørby, Julie Newmar, Joanne Woodward, Sandra Dee, Eva Marie Saint, Simone Simon, Katherine Dunham, Birgitte Price, Lee Grant, Anita Page, Flora Robson, Martha Sleeper, Elsie Ames, Isabel "Coca" Sarli, Glenda Farrell, Kathleen Burke, Linden Travers, Diane Baker, Joan Davis, Joan Leslie, Sylvia Sidney, Marie Dressler, June Lockhart, Emmanuelle Riva, Libertad Leblanc, Susannah Foster, Susan Fleming, Dolores Costello, Ann Smyrner, Luise Rainer, Anna Massey, Evelyn Ankers, Ruth Gordon, Eva Dahlbeck, Ansa Ikonen, Diana Wynyard, Patricia Neal, Etta Lee, Gloria Stuart, Arletty, Dorothy McGuire, Mitzi Gaynor, Gwen Verdon, Maria Schell, Lili Damita, Ethel Moses, Gloria Holden, Kay Thompson, Jeanne Crain, Edna May Oliver, Lili Liliana, Ruth Chatterton, Giulietta Masina, Claire Bloom, Dinah Sheridan, Carroll Baker, Brenda de Banzie, Milú, Hertha Thiele, Hanka Ordonówna, Lillian Roth, Jane Powell, Carol Ohmart, Betty Garrett, Kalina Jędrusik, Edana Romney, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Kay Kendall, Ruth Hussey, Véra Clouzot, Jadwiga Smosarska, Marge Champion, Mary Astor, Ann Harding, María Casares, Maureen O'Sullivan, Mildred Natwick, Michèle Morgan, Romy Schneider, Elisabeth Bergner, Celeste Holm, Betty Hutton, Susan Peters, Mehtab, Leslie Caron, Anna Sten, Janet Munro, Nataša Gollová, Eve Arden, Ida Lupino, Regina Linnanheimo, Sonja Henie, and Terry (what a good girl)

ROUND TWO BEAUTIES:

Evelyn Nesbit, Thelma Todd, Tura Satana, Helen Gibson, Maureen O'Hara, Rocío Dúrcal, Mary Nolan, Lois Maxwell, Maggie Smith, Zulma Faiad, Ursula Andress, Musidora, Delphine Seyrig, Marian Marsh, Leatrice Joy, Sharon Tate, Pina Menichelli, Teresa Wright, Shelley Winters, Lee Remick, Jane Wyman, Martita Hunt, Barbara Bates, Susan Strasberg, Marie Bryant, Diana Rigg, Jane Birkin, Rosalind Russell, Vanessa Redgrave, Brigitte Helm, Gloria Grahame, Rosemary Clooney, Bebe Daniels, Constance Bennett, Lilian Bond, Ann Dvorak, Jeanette Macdonald, Pouri Banayi, Raquel Welch, Vilma Bánky, Dorothy Malone, Olive Thomas, Celia Johnson, Moira Shearer, Priscilla Lane, Dolores del Río, Ann Sothern, Françoise Rosay, June Allyson, Carole Lombard, Jeni Le Gon, Takako Irie, Barbara Steele, Claudette Colbert, Lalita Pawar, Asta Nielsen, Sandra Milo, Maria Montez, Mae West, Alma Rose Aguirre, Bibi Andersson, Joan Blondell, Anne Bancroft, Elsa Lanchester, Nita Naldi, Suchitra Sen, Dorothy Van Engle, Elisabeth Welch, Esther Williams, Loretta Young, Margueritte De La Motte, Ita Rina, Constance Talmadge, Margaret Lockwood, Barbara Bedford, Josette Day, Stefania Sandrelli, Jane Russell, Doris Dowling, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Donna Reed, Ruby Dee, Diana Sands, Billie Burke, Kyōko Kagawa, Françoise Dorléac, Hend Rostom, Monica Vitti, Lilian Harvey, Marjorie Main, Jeanne Moreau, Lola Flores, Ann Blyth, Janet Gaynor, Jennifer Jones, Margaret Sullavan, Sadhana, Ruby Myers, Lotus Long, Honor Blackman, Marsha Hunt, Debbie Reynolds, Michèle Mercier, Irene Dunne, Jean Arthur, Judy Holliday, Tippi Hedren, Susse Wold, Vera-Ellen, Carmelita González, Nargis Dutt, Purnima, Harriet Andersson, Yvonne De Carlo, Miroslava Stern, Sheila Guyse, Helen, Margaret Dumont, Betty Grable, Joan Bennett, Jane Greer, Judith Anderson, Liv Ullman, Vera Zorina, Joan Fontaine, Silvana Mangano, and Lee Ya-Ching

ROUND THREE ELECTRIFIERS:

Jean Hagen, Sumiko Mizukubo, Mary Philbin, Ann-Margret, Margaret Rutherford, Claudia Cardinale, Eleanor Parker, Jessie Matthews, Theresa Harris, Brigitte Bardot, Alla Nazimova, Faye Dunaway, Marion Davies, Anna Magnani, Theda Bara, Myrna Loy, Kay Francis, Fay Wray, Barbra Streisand, Bette Davis, Hideko Takamine, France Nuyen, Claudine Auger, Miriam Hopkins, Maylia Fong, Samia Gamal, Maude Fealy, Machiko Kyō, Sharmila Tagore, Lucille Ball, Ginger Rogers, Juanita Moore, Anna Fougez, Waheeda Rehman, Ruan Lingyu, Nina Mae McKinney, Ethel Waters, Nadira, Olivia de Havilland, Abbey Lincoln, Louise Beavers, Agnes Moorehead, Lana Turner, Norma Shearer, Maria Falconetti, Reiko Sato, Marie Doro, Clara Bow, Margaret Lindsay, Catherine Denueve, Madhabi Mukherjee, Rosaura Revueltas, Hu Die, Mary Pickford, Fredi Washington, Louise Brooks, Leonor Maia, Merle Oberon, Paulette Goddard, Vivien Leigh, Francine Everett, Savitri, Tita Merello, and Meena Kumari

ROUND FOUR STUNNERS:

Judy Garland, Dorothy Dandridge, Yoshiko Yamaguchi, Marilyn Monroe, Irene Papas, Lupe Vélez, Pola Negri, Gene Tierney, Barbara Stanwyck, Gina Lollobrigida, Lena Horne, Nutan, Jean Seberg, Kim Novak, Gladys Cooper, Tallulah Bankhead, Linda Darnell, Julie Andrews, Carmen Sevilla, Gloria Swanson, Glynis Johns, Anne Baxter, Angela Lansbury, Anita Ekberg, Toshia Mori, Deborah Kerr, Hazel Scott, Chelo Alonso, Cyd Charisse, Nancy Kwan, Devika Rani, Shima Iwashita, and Anouk Aimée

ROUND FIVE SMOKESHOWS:

Setsuko Hara, Pearl Bailey, Joan Crawford, Madhubala, Marpessa Dawn, Keiko Awaji, Rita Hayworth, Veronica Lake, Ava Gardner, Greta Garbo, Grace Kelly, Xia Meng, Suraiya, Natalie Wood, María Félix, and Mbissine Thérèse Diop

ROUND SIX SEXY LADIES:

Marilyn Monroe, Sophia Loren, Vyjyanthimala, Jane Fonda, Katharine Hepburn, Josephine Baker, Elizabeth Taylor, and Ingrid Bergman

QUARTER FINALIST GLAMAZONS:

Audrey Hepburn, Marlene Dietrich, Anna May Wong, and Lauren Bacall

SEMIFINALIST ICONS:

Rita Moreno, Diahann Carroll

FINALIST FABULOSITY:

Hedy Lamarr

ULTIMATE CHAMPION OF THE HOT & VINTAGE MOVIE WOMAN TOURNAMENT:

Eartha Kitt

[themerelypersonal]

Books I’ve consumed so far in 2024:

The Order of Time by Carlo Rovelli

I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life by Ed Yong

Something Deeply Hidden by Sean Carroll

How to Read Nature: An Expert’s Guide to Discovering the Outdoors You Never Noticed by Qarie Marshall

Helgoland: Making Sense of the Quantum Revolution by Carlo Rovelli

The World According to Physics by Jim Al-Khalili

How Not To Kill Yourself: A Portrait of the Suicidal Mind by Clancy Martin

How Far the Light Reaches: A Life in Ten Sea Creatures by Sabrina Imbler

A Series of Fortunate Events: Chance and the Making of the Planet by Sean B. Carroll

Listen: On Music, Sound and Us by Michel Faber

The Art of Communicating by Thich Nhat Hanh

I am a Strange Loop by Douglas R. Hofstadter

Transgender Warriors: Making History from Joan of Arc to Dennis Rodman by Leslie Feinberg

Spectrums: Autistic Transgender People in Their Own Words by Maxfield Sparrow

All the Flowers Kneeling by Paul Tran

Supporting Transgender Autistic Youth and Adults by Finn V. Gratton, LMFT, LPCC

Nisa by Marjorie Shostak

Determined: A Science of Life Without Free Will by Robert M. Sapolsky

21 Lessons for the 21st History by Yuval Harrari

The Book Of Secrets by Deepak Chopra

The Joy of Science by Jim Al-Khalili

The Rock Warriors Way by Arno IIgner

The Pursuit of Endurance by Jennifer Pharr Davis

Quantum Mechanics, Technology, Consciousness and the Multiverse by Martin Ettington

Born to Run by Christopher McDougall

Connecting with the Autism Spectrum by Casey “Remrov” Vormer

Light Falls: Space, Time, and an Obsession with Einstein by Brian Greene

A Walk In the Woods by Bill Bryson

10 Days in Physics that Shook the World by Brian Clegg

On Being a Therapist by Jeffrey Kottler

Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the language of the human experience by Brene Brown

What do you really want? By Cayla Craft

The Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman

How to Write an Autobiographical Novel by Alexander Chee

Chemistry for Breakfast by Dr. Mai Thi Nguyen-Kim

The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin

A Molecule Away from Madness by Sara Manning Peskin

Quantum Wonder: How the Tiny Drives Our Immense Reality by Carl AL-Khalili

Building a Life Worth Living by Marsha Linehan

How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply by David Brooks

Speed Reading by Kam Knight

Being You: A New Science of Consciousness by Anil Seth

You Are Not an Imposter by Coline Monsarrat

You are the Placebo by Dr. Joe Dispenza

Welcome to the O.C.: The Oral History by Alan Sepinwall

Heartbreak: A Personal and Scientific Journey by Florence Williams

DBT Made Simple: A Step-by-Step Guide to Dialectical Behavior Therapy by Sheri Van Dijk MSW

Move on Motherf*cker: Live, Laugh, and Let Sh*t Go by Jodie Eckleberry-Hunt, Emma Bryne PhD

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: Real and proven strategies for managing anxiety by Charlie Norman

CBT Workbook: 7 Strategies to Overcome Anxiety, Depression, Anger, Panic, Worry, Intrusive Thoughts by Mind Change Academy

Dialectical Behavior Therapy: A comprehensive guide to DBT and using Behavior Therapy to Manage Borderline Personality Disorder by Christopher Rance

Somatic Psychotherapy: A Comprehensive Guide to Theoretical and Practical Considerations by Hale Boyd

Dialectical Behavior Therapy: Regulate Emotions, Panic, Anger. Guide for BPD by Dustin Drig

How Confidence Works: The new science of self belief by Ian Robertson

Fear: Essential Wisdom for Getting Through the Storm by Thich Nhat Hanh

The God Equation by Michio Kaku

Dialectical Behavior Therapy by Cindy Crosby

Brief Answers to the Big Questions by Stephen Hawking

Quantum: A Guide for the Perplexed by Jim Al-Khalili

Zen and the Art of Saving the Planet by Thich Nhat Hanh

Einstein in Time and Space: A Life in 99 Particles by Samuel Graydon

Reality is Not What It Seems by Carlo Rovelli

Resurrecting the Body, Reinventing the Soul by Deepak Chopra

A Brief History of Intelligence by Max Bennett

What the Future Looks like by Jim Al-Khalil

Retirement 101: From 401(k) Plans to Social Security Benefits to Asset Management by Michele Cagan

Still the Mind by Alan Watts

Anchor System Thinking by A.I. Shoukry

Finance Basics by Harvard Business Review

The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle

A Brief History of Earth by Andrew Knoll

The Physics Book by DK

Investing for Beginners by David Cohne

The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene

Drink? The New Science of Alcohol and your Health by Professor David Nutt

Unique: The New Science of Human Individuality by David Linden

Psychedelics by Professor David Nutt

What do you need? By Lauren Wesley Wilson

Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins

Endure by Cameron Hanes

Being Peace by Thich Nhat Hanh

Die with Zero: Getting all you can with your money and your life by Bill Perkins

How Humans Evolved by Robert Boyd and Joan Silk

No Bad Parts by Richard C. Schwartz,PHD

The Matter of Everything: How Curiosity, Physics, and Improbable Experiments Changed the World by Suzie Sheehy

The Radium Girls by Kate Moore

Bumpin: A Modern Guide to Pregnancy by Leslie Schrock

Choose Strong by Sally McRae

Outgrowing God by Richard Dawkins

Can We Talk about Israel? By Daniel Sokatch

Black Holes and Baby Universes and Other Essays by Stephen Hawking

Hal Koerner’s Field Guide to Ultra Running by Hal Koerner

The Science and Art of Running by Cooper Barton

Eat and Run: My Unlikely Journey to Ultramarathon Greatness by Scott Jurek

North: Finding my Way While Running the Appalachian Trail by Scott Jurek & Jenny Jurek

7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey

Securities Industries Essentials by Kaplan

Above the Clouds by Kilian Jornet

What is Life? by Paul Nurse

What I Know For Sure by Oprah Winfrey

A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle

Mastering Logical Fallacies by Michael Withey

This is why you Dream by Rahul Jandial,MD,PHD

The Tao of Running by Gary Dudney

Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil DeGrasse Tyson

The Magic of Reality by Richard Dawkins

Parallel Worlds: A Journey through Creation, Higher Dimensions and the Future of the Cosmos by Michio Kaku

Dance of the Photons by Anton Zelinger

Quantum Body by Deepak Chopra

The Heart of Understanding by Thich Nhat Hanh

Annuity 360 Learn All You Need to Know About Annuities by Ford Strokes

Quantum Entanglement by Jed Brody

Relationships by Ram Dass

The Way of Zen by Alan Watts

Ultimate Confidence by Ralf Aabot

101 Essays that will Change the Way You Think by Brianna Wiest

The Science of Happiness by Brendan Kelly

Fighting for our Friendships by Danielle Bayard Jackson

One Day My Soul Just Opened Up by Iyanla Vanzant

K2: Life and Death on the World’s Most Dangerous Mountain by Ed Viesturs and David Roberts

Know that I Am by Eckhart Tolle

Girls Like Us by Sheila Weller

Love Sense: The Revolutionary New Science of Romantic Relationships by Dr. Sue Johnson

Girls that Invest by Simran Kaur

Slow Productivity by Cal Newport

Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey

Stillness Speaks by Eckhart Tolle

Retroactive Jealousy by Vincenzo Venezia

Right Thing, Right Now by Ryan Holiday

The Best American Essays 2022 by Alexander Chee & Robert Atwan

Talking to Strangers by Malcolm Gladwell

Insecure in love by Leslie Becker-Phelps PHD

Codependent No More by Melody Beattie

Be Here Now by Ram Dass

Reality, Art, and Illusion by Alan Watts

Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman

We Will be Jaguars by Nemonte Nenquimo

The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron

Rising Strong: How the Ability to Reset Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead by Brene Brown

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott

The War of Art by Steven Pressfield

Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Shunryu Suzuki

The Secret Lives of Booksellers and Librarians by James Patterson and Matt Everymann

Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe

Series 7 by Kaplan

List of Books I Consumed in 2023:

The Last climb by David Breashears, Audrey Selkeld, and Audry Salkend

What is Life by Schrodinger

A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking

Beyond Feeling: A Guide to Critical Thinking by Vincent Ryan Ruggiero

Furniture by Kevin Sheetz

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson

Relativity by Albert Einstein

Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu

An Immense World by Ed Yong

Quantum Supremacy by Michio Kaku

White Holes by Carlo Rovelli

A Separate Reality by Carlos Castaneda

Outlive by Peter Attia

Until the End of Time by Brian Greene

Tribe by Sebastian Junger

Ghosts of Everest by Jochen Hemmleb

Attached by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller

Mind and Matter by Schrodinger

Wired for Love by Stan Tatkin

Grit by Angela Duckworth

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a fuck by Mark Manson

Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

The Ethical Slut by Janet Hardy and Dossie Easton

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell

The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene

The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Van Der Kolk

Committed by Elizabeth Gilbert

Homo Deus Summary a Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Harari

Alone on the Wall by Alex Honnold

Why we Believe in God (s): A Concise Guide to the Science of Faith by J. Anderson Thomson

Physics and Philosophy: The Revolution of Modern Science by Werner Heisenberg

The Tao of Physics by Fritjof Chopra

Sacred Woman by Queen Afja

Everest: The West Ridge by Thomas Hornbein

Tracks by Robyn Davidson

The Ink Dark Moon by Ono no Komachi and Izumi Shikoku

Einstein by Walter Isaacson

Learned Optimism by Martin Seligman

[jbaileyfansite]

The Bridge Theatre has announced the full cast for Richard II, opening on 10 February 2025 and running until 10 May.

Directed by Nicholas Hytner, the production will star Jonathan Bailey in the title role, supported by a cast that includes Royce Pierreson as Henry Bolingbroke, Christopher Osikanlu Colquhoun as the Earl of Northumberland, and Olivia Popica as Queen Isabel.

Additional cast members include Amanda Root as Green and the Duchess of York, Phoenix Di Sebastiani as Thomas Mowbray and Groom, and Clive Wood as John of Gaunt. Returning to the Bridge Theatre is Michael Simkins, who will play the Duke of York.

The ensemble is rounded out by Adam Best as Sir John Bagot, Seamus Dillane as Lord Surrey, Vinnie Heaven as Aumerle, Jordan Kouamé as Sir John Bushy and Harry Percy, Gerard Monaco as Sir Stephen Scroop and Keeper, George Taylor as Fitzwater, and Badria Timimi as the Abbess of Carlisle. The understudy cast includes Emma Bown, Martin Carroll, and Stephan Boyce.

Richard II sees Shakespeare delve into themes of political power and authority, foregrounding on the contrast between the impulsive Richard and the practical Bolingbroke.

The production will feature design by Bob Crowley, lighting by Bruno Poet, sound by Carolyn Downing, and an original score by Grant Olding. Robert Sterne is the casting director, with Lily Dyble as associate director.

The creative team includes Jaimie Todd as associate designer, Charlie Smith as associate sound designer, Eleanor Dolan as costume supervisor, and Lily Mollgaard as props supervisor.

You can still buy tickets here and here.

[dweemeister]

Whenever you feel alone, just remember that those kings will always be there to guide you. And so will I.

Born to a turbulent family on a Mississippi farm, James Earl Jones passed away today. He was ninety-three years old. Abandoned by his parents as a child and raised by a racist grandmother (although he later reconciled with his actor father and performed alongside him as an adult), the trauma of his childhood developed into a stutter that followed him through his primary school years – sometimes, his stutter was so debilitating, he could not speak at all. In high school, Jones found in an English teacher someone who found in him a talent for written expression, and encouraged him to write and recite poetry in class. He overcame his stutter by graduation, although the effects of it carried over for the remainder of his life.

Jones' most accomplished roles may have been on the Broadway stage, where he won three Tonys (twice winning Best Actor in a Play for originating the lead roles in 1969's The Great White Hope by Howard Sackler and 1987's Fences by August Wilson) and was considered one of the best Shakespearean actors of his time.

But his contributions to cinema left an impact on audiences, too. Jones received an Honorary Academy Award alongside makeup artist Dick Smith (1972's The Godfather, 1984's Amadeus) in 2011. From the end of Hollywood's Golden Age to the dawn of the summer Hollywood blockbuster in the 1970s to the present, Jones' presence – and his basso profundo voice – could scarcely be ignored. Though he could not sing like Paul Robeson nor had the looks of Sidney Poitier, his presence and command put him in league of both of his acting predecessors.

Ten of the films James Earl Jones appeared in, whether in-person or voice acting, follow (left-right, descending):

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) – directed by Stanley Kubrick; also starring Peter Sellers, George C. Scott, Sterling Hayden, Keenan Wynn, and Slim Pickens

The Great White Hope (1970) – directed by Martin Ritt; also starring Jane Alexander, Chester Morris, Hal Holbrook Beah Richards, and Moses Gunn

Star Wars saga (1977-2019; A New Hope pictured) – multiple directors, as the voice of Darth Vader, also starring Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alec Guinness, Billy Dee Williams, Anthony Daniels, David Prowse, Kenny Baker, Peter Mayhew, and Frank Oz

Claudine (1974) – directed by John Berry; also starring Diahann Carroll, Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs, and Tamu Blackwell

Conan the Barbarian (1982) – directed by John Milius; also starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sandahl Bergman, Ben Davidson, Cassandra Gaviola, Gerry Lopez, Mako, Valerie Quennessen, William Smith, and Max von Sydow

Coming to America series (1988 and 2021; original pictured) – multiple directors; also starring Eddie Murphy, Arsenio Hall, John Amos, Madge Sinclair, Shari Headley, Jermaine Fowler, Leslie Jones, Tracy Morgan, and KiKi Layne

The Hunt for Red October (1990) – directed by John McTiernan; also starring Sean Connery, Alec Baldwin, Scott Glenn, and Sam Neill

The Sandlot (1993) – directed by David Mickey Evans; also staring Tom Guiry, Mike Vitar, Patrick Renna, Chauncey Leopardi, Marty York, Brandon Adams, Grant Gelt, Shane Obedzinski, Victor DiMattia, Denis Leary, and Karen Allen

The Lion King (1994) – directed by Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff, as the voice of Mufasa; also starring Jonathan Taylor Thomas, Matthew Broderick, Jeremy Irons, Moira Kelly, Niketa Calame, Ernie Sabella, Nathan Lane, and Robert Guillaume, Rowan Atkinson, Whoopi Goldberg, Cheech Marin, Jim Cummings, and Madge Sinclair

Field of Dreams (1989) – directed by Phil Alden Robinson; also starring Kevin Costner, Amy Madigan, Ray Liotta, and Burt Lancaster

[bracketsoffear]

Other Leitner Reading List

The full list of submissions for the Unaffiliated Leitner bracket. Bold titles are ones which were accepted to appear in the bracket. Synopses and propaganda can be found below the cut. Be warned, however, that these may contain spoilers!

Allende, Isabel: Ripper

Beauregard, Aron: Playground Borges, Jorge Luis: Averroës's Search Borges, Jorge Luis: El Aleph Bosch, Pseudonymous: The Secret Series Breed-Wrisley, Kira and Scott Cawthon: Five Nights At Freddy's: The Silver Eyes Bulgakov, Mikhail: The Master and Margarita Burroughs, William S.: Naked Lunch Byng, Georgia: Molly Moon's Incredible Book of Hypnotism

Carroll, Lewis: The Hunting of the Snark

Denning, G.S.: Warlock Holmes DeTerlizzi, Tony: The Search for WondLa

El-Mohtar, Amal and Max Gladstone: This Is How You Lose the Time War

Fforde, Jasper: Thursday Next series

Gaiman, Neil & Terry Pratchett: Good Omens Grahame-Smith, Seth: How to Survive a Horror Movie: All the Skills to Dodge the Kills Grimm, Brothers: Grimm's Fairy Tales

Holt, Tom: Doughnut Hussie, Andrew: Homestuck

Johnson, Jeremy Robert: We Live Inside You

Langlois, Amelie C.: The Sister Verse Series Lewis, C.S.: The Silver Chair Lovecraft, H.P.: The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath Lubar, David: Weenies series Lyons, Steve: The Crooked World

Nash, Ogden: A Tale of the 13th Floor

Osman, Richard: The Thursday Murder Club

Pinkwater, Daniel: Alan Mendelsohn, the Boy from Mars Pirinçci, Akif: Felidae

Rix, Jamie: Grizzly Tales For Gruesome Kids

Scieszka, Jon: The Stinky Cheese Man Shannon, David: No, David! Sims, Jonathan: Thirteen Storeys Skipp, John: Don't Push the Button Stine, R.L.: Goosebumps

Theis, Jim: The Eye of Argon Tokuda-Hall, Maggie: The Mermaid The Witch and The Sea Traditional (German): Der Struwwelpeter Trumbo,  Dalton: Johnny Got His Gun

Van Allsburg, Chris: The Mysteries of Harris Burdick Vasquez, Jhonen: Squee's Wonderful Big Giant Book of Unspeakable Horrors

Allende, Isabel: Ripper

Seventeen-year-old Amanda Martin is fascinated by crime. She is currently obsessed with a game called "Ripper" which she plays online with players from around the world. With the assistance of her beloved grandfather, she guides the group (Sherlock, Esmeralda, Colonel Paddington, and Abatha) in their objective of solve crimes inspired by those of Jack the Ripper. When a series of grisly murders starts taking place in the San Francisco area where she leaves, she is fascinated by then and finds herself steering the group toward solving these real life murders.

But the game stops being fun when her mother, free-spirited Indiana Jackson, goes missing.

Beauregard, Aron: Playground

Three low-income families have been given a handsome retainer to join Geraldine Borden for a day at her cliffside estate. All the parents must do to collect the rest of their money is allow their children to test out the revolutionary playground equipment Geraldine has been working on for decades. But there’s a reason the structures in the bowels of her gothic castle have taken so long to develop—they were never meant to see the light of day.

When a band of dysfunctional children is suddenly thrust into a diabolical realm of violence, they must grow up instantly to have a chance at survival. Will they find a way to put their differences aside, or be swallowed up by the insidious architecture all around them?

Borges, Jorge Luis: Averroës's Search

The story very much reminds me of the domain in MAG183: Monument. "The story imagines the difficulty of Averroës, the famed Islamic philosopher and translator, in translating Aristotle's Poetics because he was not able to understand what a play was, owing to the absence of live theatrical performances from Averroës' cultural milieu, in contrast to that of ancient Greece. In the story, Averroës casually observes some children play-acting, then later hears a traveler ineptly describe an actual theatrical performance he once saw in a distant land, but still fails to understand that the tragedies and comedies of which Aristotle writes are a kind of performance art, rather than merely literature.

The process of writing the story is meant to parallel the events in the story itself; Borges writes in an afterword to the story that his attempt to understand Averroës was as doomed as Averroës's attempt to understand drama. "I felt that the work mocked me, foiled me, thwarted me. I felt that Averroës, trying to imagine what a play is without ever having suspected what a theater is, was no more absurd than I, trying to imagine Averroës yet with no more material than a few snatches from Renan, Lane, and Asín Palacios.""

Borges, Jorge Luis: El Aleph

I am not sure if this counts as it is a collection of short stories, so I will also submit my personal choice that best fits an unaligned Leitner in my opinion. "The title work, "The Aleph", describes a point in space that contains all other spaces at once. The work also presents the idea of infinite time. Borges writes in the original afterword, dated May 3, 1949 (Buenos Aires), that most of the stories belong to the genre of fantasy, mentioning themes such as identity and immortality."

Bosch, Pseudonymous: The Secret Series

The series is about two children who are not named Cass and Max-Ernest. Cass is a survivalist, while Max-Ernest has a condition (though no one knows quite what his condition is). One day, they are swept into the dangerous world of the Terces Society and the Midnight Sun...and the Secret.

Features alchemy, the quest for immortality, time travel, a very Lemony narrator, and the exploration of all five senses.

Breed-Wrisley, Kira and Scott Cawthon: Five Nights At Freddy's: The Silver Eyes

From the creator of the bestselling horror video game series Five Nights at Freddy's.Ten years after the horrific murders at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza that ripped their town apart, Charlie, whose father owned the restaurant, and her childhood friends reunite on the anniversary of the tragedy and find themselves at the old pizza place which had been locked up and abandoned for years. After they discover a way inside, they realize that things are not as they used to be. The four adult-sized animatronic mascots that once entertained patrons have changed. They now have a dark secret . . . and a murderous agenda.

Bulgakov, Mikhail: The Master and Margarita

One hot spring, the devil arrives in Moscow, accompanied by a retinue that includes a beautiful naked witch and an immense talking black cat with a fondness for chess and vodka. The visitors quickly wreak havoc in a city that refuses to believe in either God or Satan. But they also bring peace to two unhappy Muscovites: one is the Master, a writer pilloried for daring to write a novel about Christ and Pontius Pilate; the other is Margarita, who loves the Master so deeply that she is willing literally to go to hell for him.

Burroughs, William S.: Naked Lunch

It follows Bill Lee through Interzone: a surreal, orgiastic wasteland of drugs, depravity, political plots, paranoia, sadistic medical experiments and endless, gnawing addiction. The book is structured as a series of loosely connected vignettes, intended by Burroughs to be read in any order, and the main character takes on various aliases as he travels from the U.S. to Mexico, eventually to Tangier and the dreamlike Interzone. Burroughs wrote in his introduction that "The title means exactly what the words say: naked lunch, a frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every fork."

Could this book be considered as being aligned to the Spiral? Could it be Flesh? I don't know, but it is certainly something or other.

Byng, Georgia: Molly Moon's Incredible Book of Hypnotism

Molly Moon is a British preteen living in a terrible orphanage. Just before her only friend is adopted and moves to America without saying goodbye, she finds a rare book on hypnotism, and gains the ability to hypnotize anyone through eye contact and make them do whatever she wants. She heads off to America to find her friend, hypnotizing people all the way. Meanwhile, a sinister wanna-be hypnotist stalks her... and he is willing to do anything to get the book in his hands.

Sequels deal with further developing psychic powers, including body-hopping, weather control, and even time travel.

Carroll, Lewis: The Hunting of the Snark

An epic poem which hits quite a few different fears; the Hunt is an obvious one, and given the author, so is the Spiral. The sea voyage has elements of Vast, and various characters can be read as Flesh, Stranger, and even Web. The poem seems to end with the Lonely; " He had softly and suddenly vanished away — For the Snark was a Boojum, you see."

Denning, G.S.: Warlock Holmes

A Sherlock Holmes parody in which the titular detective is a rather abstracted mage, Watson is the brains of the outfit, and Gregson and Lestrade are an ogre and a vampire, respectively. Together, they investigate supernatural crime in Victorian England.

DeTerlizzi, Tony: The Search for WondLa

The Search for WondLa is the first book in a trilogy about a human girl, Eva Nine, in a strange and unfamiliar world.

She actually spends a lot of this book believing she is the last of her species surrounded by all sorts of strange creatures she can never quite feel close to (lonely, extinction) while being hunted by a trophy hunter who wants to give her to a mysterious queen.

On why it's Lonely: a large portion of the book is spent with someone she cannot communicate with and feels distant from, alongside the general Lonely vibes of "last human" stories.

On why it's Extinction: This is earth. A long-destroyed earth, specifically (she visits the ruins of NYC, I have proof), and these alien races have moved in now that the humans are all "gone" (complicated). It's heavily implied the earth was destroyed in some nuclear war or natural disaster, with the alien species having restored the earth from a wasteland.

On why it's hunt: she spends the entire book being hunted and being afraid because of that, what more do I need to say?

On why it belongs here: quite the fear cocktail for a children's book, isn't it?

El-Mohtar, Amal and Max Gladstone: This Is How You Lose the Time War

The novel is about two agents on rival sides of a time war, Red and Blue, who are both working to ensure that their respective futures — the highly technological Agency and the biological Garden — come to pass. Despite their opposing organizations, Red and Blue begin exchanging letters across time and space, and develop affection for each other that threatens not only them, but the entire time war.

Fforde, Jasper: Thursday Next series

Thursday Next lives in an Alternate History. In her world, Time Travel, cloning and genetic engineering are commonplace; resurrected dodos are the household pet of choice. The obscenely powerful Goliath Corporation, which nearly singlehandedly reconstructed England after World War II, now runs the country as a virtual police state. And literature, particularly classic literature, is very, very, very Serious Business. Writers are revered with nearly spiritual devotion, controversial claims about books and authors can be criminal, and an entire police squad, the LiteraTecs, exist to keep the literary scene in order. Thursday works for just such a unit in Swindon, with her friend and colleague, the exceedingly polite Bowden Cable.

In the course of rescuing her Gadgeteer Genius uncle Mycroft from international arch-criminal Acheron Hades, a gleefully evil individual with supernatural powers, Thursday discovers the Great Library, a sort of pocket dimension that exists 'behind the scenes' of all works of literature, where all literary characters live. They're self-aware, acting out their roles when a person reads a book but chilling out and living their own lives as soon as they close it. The Great Library is governed by the Council of Genres and kept in line by Jurisfiction, another police force whose task it is to make sure the plot of every book stays the same every time someone reads it. (Insofar as they can.)

Such is the universe of Jasper Fforde's meta-fictional masterpiece, the Thursday Next series. The author hangs a lampshade on everything and anything relating to classic literature, the tropes of police fiction and spy fiction, and even the relationship between a work of fiction and its audience. Heavy on wordplay and puns, the series deals with the tireless heroine's adventures balancing her work as an agent of Jurisfiction in the Great Library and LiteraTec in the outside world, to say nothing of her responsibilities as a wife and mother.

Gaiman, Neil & Terry Pratchett: Good Omens

Blank

Grahame-Smith, Seth: How to Survive a Horror Movie: All the Skills to Dodge the Kills

Every month or so, a new horror movie hits #1 at the box office no wonder there are dozens of new fright films slated for release in 2007. But if you find yourself trapped in one of these movies, there's no need to be afraid. How to Survive a Horror Movie teaches readers how to cope with every kind of horror movie obstacle, from ax-wielding psychopaths to haunted Japanese VHS tapes. Chapters include:

-How to Survive a Night of Babysitting -How to Convince the Skeptical Local Sheriff -How to Perform an Exorcism -How to Tell If You've Been Dead Since the Beginning of the Movie -How to Vanquish a Murderous Doll

Full of illustrated instructions on avoiding ghosts, serial killers, haunted cars, murderous pets, telekinetic prom queens, and countless other hazards, How to Survive a Horror Movie is essential reading for movie buffs of all ages!

Grimm, Brothers: Grimm's Fairy Tales

Can't beat the classics, especially when the original versions feature cannibalism, murder, mutilation, and torture!

Holt, Tom: Doughnut

Multiversal travel is made possible through mathematics and fried dough.

Hussie, Andrew: Homestuck

This thing is a tome of madness, chaos, and early 2000s Internet culture (oops, tautology!)

***

you know why

Johnson, Jeremy Robert: We Live Inside You

"We are within you, and we are growing. Watching. Waiting for your empires to fall. It won't be long now. We are the fear of death that drives you and the terrible hunger that reshapes you in its name. We are the vengeance born from senseless slaughter and the pulsing reptile desire that negates your consciousness. We are the lie on your lips, the collapsing star in your heart, and the still-warm gun in your shaking hands. The illusion of control is all we'll allow you, and no matter what you do... WE LIVE INSIDE YOU"

This book is one of those story collections that everybody should read. In turns fascinating, poignant, scary and all too human, Jeremy Robert Johnson taps into the nightmare psyche that threatens to eat you every moment of your life. Each story highlights another gremlin that snacks on your nerves, tells you things you don't want to hear.

Langlois, Amelie C.: The Sister Verse Series

John, an unstable detective living in an alternate future, is plagued by hallucinations of a malevolent, shapeshifting entity, known as the Lord in White, that haunted his childhood. While he struggles to maintain his grip on reality, he soon discovers that his world is a terrifying illusion designed to make him suffer. Surreal, horrifying, and unflinchingly brutal – enter a world of blood and fear. Enter the Sister Verse.

The series reads like a fever dream. The world reflects the fears of all the characters in the most bizarre way possible, and things continue to unravel the further they go, typically ending in a forest made of liquid meat that surrounds a black hole shaped like a willow with teeth. It is revealed in the first book that the whole reality John and the rest of the cast of characters live in and themselves was created by the Lord in White for his own amusement. The Lord in White is completely aware that it’s in a fictional universe, and is implied to have the power to rewrite parts of the story, being the avatar of the Sister Verse. It often refers to the reader directly, as well as real world occurrences and future in-universe events, to the point that it literally recites lines from the book. And that's just the first book in the series, with the Lovecraftian horror continuing further in the sequels as the past of the Dreadlands is revealed, along with the past of its characters.

Lewis, C.S.: The Silver Chair

"Eustace and Jill escape from the bullies at school through a strange door in the wall, which, for once, is unlocked. It leads to the open moor...or does it? Once again Aslan has a task for the children, and Narnia needs them. Through dangers untold and caverns deep and dark, they pursue the quest that brings them face to face with the evil Witch. She must be defeated if Prince Rillian is to be saved."

Lovecraft, H.P.: The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath

Uncelebrated writer and illustrious dreamer Randolph Carter dreams three times of a majestic sunset city, but each time he is abruptly snatched away before he can see it up close. When he prays to the gods of dream to reveal the whereabouts of the phantasmal city, they do not answer, and his dreams of the city stop altogether. Undaunted, Carter decides to use all his talents in the dream-world to find the legendary mountain Kadath, where the wiser Earth Gods live, in order to ask them for the location of his beloved sunset city. He initiates a quest through the depths of the Dreamlands, finding the weirdest things and meeting the strangest friends and foes.

Unknowingly to Carter, a powerful entity is bent on making him desist of his quest...

Lubar, David: Weenies series

A series of horror story collections for kids which range from the funny to the weird to the outright twisted.

Lyons, Steve: The Crooked World

Synopsis: The people of the Crooked World lead an idyllic existence.

Take Streaky Bacon, for example. This jovial farmer wants nothing more from life than a huge blunderbuss, with which he can blast away at his crop-stealing nemesis. And then there's Angel Falls, a racing driver with a string of victories to her name. Sure, her trusted guardian might occasionally put on a mask and menace her for her prize money, but that's just life, right? And for Jasper the cat, nothing could be more pleasant than a nice, long nap in his kitchen — so long as that darn mouse doesn't jam his tail into the plug socket again.

But somebody is about to shatter all those lives. Somebody is about to change everything — and it's possible that no one on the Crooked World will ever be happy again.

The Doctor's TARDIS is about to arrive. And when it does... That's all folks!

Propaganda: okay. okay okayokayokkay. I can be normal about this book (a lie). The TARDIS lands on a planet that operates on cartoon logic. The Doctor immediately gets shot in the chest and everyone is very confused when he doesn't immediately heal. The travelers have inadvertently introduced the real world into this Saturday Morning fantasyland, with concepts like death and sex and social inequality. For the first time, people can die permanently. The two-bit villains unite to nuke the heroic characters. The Scooby gang actually do discover the flayed corpse of God. In the middle of it all is the Doctor at maximum Nyarlathotep, fomenting revolution and drastic metaphysical upheaval in his strange, too-real clothes. If nothing else, vote for this book for actually making me cry over the death of Scrappy Fuckin' Doo!

Nash, Ogden: A Tale of the 13th Floor

A poem which warns against murderous retribution and illustrates the hellish fate of killers tied forever to their victims in the afterlife. Link: https://allpoetry.com/A-Tale-Of-The-Thirteenth-Floor

Osman, Richard: The Thursday Murder Club

“In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet up once a week to investigate unsolved murders. But when a brutal killing takes place on their very doorstep, the Thursday Murder Club find themselves in the middle of their first live case. Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim and Ron might be pushing eighty but they still have a few tricks up their sleeves. Can our unorthodox but brilliant gang catch the killer before it's too late?”

While it seems like a shoe-in for the Hunt with tracking down who did the crime, the book goes in areas that could consider being touched by the Lonely, the End, and the Eye. After all, this does take place in a retirement village — people die, people are lonely and these four senior citizens want to get to the bottom of this mystery.

Pinkwater, Daniel: Alan Mendelsohn, the Boy from Mars

Leonard Neeble has been unhappy since his parents moved from the big city to suburban Kangaroo Park, New Jersey. His new school, Bat Masterson Jr. High, is terrible, and he has no friends since his classmates are snobbish louts who won't be friends with him because he's portly.

Things change once a new student shows up from The Bronx: Alan Mendelsohn, a trollish student who shuts the school down by telling everyone he's from Mars. After they both get suspended for acting out, the two boys journey to Downtown Hogboro, where they start a Mind Control course that teaches them telekinesis and, eventually, how to travel between dimensions.

Pirinçci, Akif: Felidae

Francis is a cat who has moved with his owner to a city in Germany. There, he comes across a mystery involving the murders of several neighborhood cats. Think Warriors, but it is a murder mystery written for adults. It has a lot of Slaughter and Hunt going on, but the killer's motives and backstory would honestly make him a prime Avatar for the Extinction.

The serial killer, Claudandus aka Pascal, is purely motivated by a deep hatred of humans after a traumatic past as the victim of some truly sadistic animal experiments in which he and other cats were used as lab rats, which leads him to try to create a race of "genetically perfect" cats while murdering those he considers to be inferior. He dreams of a future in which humans have been replaced as the dominant species by this future breed of cats, the narration even including an imaginary scenerio of the very last human trying to hide in the ruins of civilization before being hunted down like prey.

Rix, Jamie: Grizzly Tales For Gruesome Kids

A series of cautionary tales for lovers of screams! Getting a haircut? eating spaghetti? Having a birthday party? You may think these all sound like very ordinary things to do. But read on and see just how grizzly they can be!

Scieszka, Jon: The Stinky Cheese Man

it scared the FUCK out of me as a child, I have no idea why and I don't remember what it was about, and just its art style still creeps me out and I'm in my thirties now. That's got to count for something, yeah? ...okay this prolly isn't a great one for the tournament, but if you're struggling to fill in the brackets.

Shannon, David: No, David!

When David Shannon was five years old, he wrote and illustrated his first book. On every page were these words: NO, DAVID! . . . and a picture of David doing things he was not supposed to do.Now David is all grown up. But some things never change. . . .Twenty years after its initial publication, No, David! remains a perennial household favorite, delighting children, parents, and teachers alike. David is a beloved character, whose unabashed good humor, mischievous smile, and laughter-inducing antics underline the love parents have for their children -- even when they misbehave.

Sims, Jonathan: Thirteen Storeys

"You're cordially invited to dinner. Penthouse access is available via the broken freight elevator. Black tie optional.

A dinner party is held in the penthouse of a multimillion-pound development. All the guests are strangers - even to their host, the billionaire owner of the building. None of them know why they were selected to receive his invitation. Whether privileged or deprived, besides a postcode, they share only one thing in common - they've all experienced a shocking disturbance within the building's walls.

By the end of the night, their host is dead, and none of the guests ever said what happened. His death remains one of the biggest unsolved mysteries - until now.

But are you ready for their stories?"

Skipp, John: Don't Push the Button

We all know horror. It's in our face every day. You can try to negotiate the nightmare but total chaos and destruction is just one button-push away.

In this intensely personal collection of short stories, screenplays, and essays, the author walks you through the light and the dark with an unflinching eye. Revealing both the best and worst of us, one laugh and scream at a time.

It ain't pretty. But it's beautiful. Once you go all the way.

Stine, R.L.: Goosebumps

It is a series of horror novels written for very young audiences. The protagonists in these stories are teens or pre-teens who find themselves in frightening circumstances, often involving the supernatural, the paranormal or the occult. The best way to describe these books is that they are The Twilight Zone for pre-adolescents, with a twist at the end of every book (sometimes cruel, sometimes not, sometimes non-existent, which is a twist in and of itself given the series). It has spawned a pair of television series, a video games series, a comic series and merchandise, as well as a pair of feature films.

While the books are written for children and so they might not be that scary, they can still get quite creepy, and you might find one book for every Entity if you search hard enough. The book covers can also get really creepy to look at, too.

Theis, Jim: The Eye of Argon

Described as "the worst fantasy novella ever", The Eye of Argon is a story by then 16 year-old Jim Theis. It's the tale of Grignr, a foul-mouthed barbarian warrior who is trying to escape the dungeons of Evil Overlord Agaphim and rescue a young woman named Carthena from a pagan cult who want to sacrifice her to their idol — a statue with one eye called "The Eye of Argon". (A "scarlet emerald", complete with some interesting plumbing.)

Published in the fanzine OSFAN 7 in 1970, the story is well known for its abundant cliches, shoddy spelling, flat characters, wooden dialogue and overly colourful writing. Every woman is a "wench", eyes are "emerald orbs". Almost nothing is ever "said" — instead it is "queried" or "ejaculated" or "husked" or "stated whimsicoracally". There's an extended scene involving elderly cult priests groping Carthena, and she is described earlier as a "half-naked harlot… with a lithe, opaque nose".

The most widely-known and circulated copy of the story comes to an abrupt and unsatisfactory halt, and for many years it was believed that the ending was lost forever (or even, in some quarters, that the story was never completed). Recent years have seen the separate discoveries of two intact copies of the fanzine in which The Eye of Argon debuted, so it is now known how the tale ends. (With multiple exclamation marks, it turns out.)

At science fiction conventions, The Eye of Argon is now a sort of parlor game. All participants sit in a circle with a hard copy of the story, and the first one starts reading aloud — pronouncing every word as it's misspelled, and including every adjective. When they finally burst into laughter, the copy is passed to the next person. If a person manages to make it through more than a page, the copy is sometimes passed anyway, on the grounds that the reader must have special training as a news anchor.

Tokuda-Hall, Maggie: The Mermaid The Witch and The Sea

Follows mainly two characters – Evelyn, the daughter of a wealthy family, sent off on a ship to an arranged marriage, and Flora, known by the alias Florian, a pirate on said ship. This ship is a conship, as it takes people on long travels only to sell them as slaves. Themes of the vast, stranger, the end, the slaughter, and the desolation are commonly present throughout the book

Traditional (German): Der Struwwelpeter

1845 German children's book filled with cautionary tales. These cautionary tales are more grim than others, however — they often end in death or dismemberment for the child. They are a source of plenty of nightmare fuel, too.

Notable examples: The Dreadful Story of Harriet/Pauline and the Matches - Desolation, she plays with matches and burns to death. The Story of the Wild Huntsman - Hunt, a hare steals a hunter's rifle and eyeglasses and hunts him. The Story of Little Suck-a-Thumb - Flesh(?), Conrad is warned by his mother not to suck his thumbs, but he does anyway. So a tailor appears and snips them off. The Story of Flying Robert - Vast, Robert goes outside during a storm and the wind picks up his umbrella, carrying him off never to be seen again.

Trumbo,  Dalton: Johnny Got His Gun

It follows a young man named Joe Bonham, who, after becoming grievously injured during World War I, is left deaf, blind, dumb, and without any limbs. Throughout the novel, Joe reminisces about the life that he's lost, waxes philosophical about war and conscription, and tries desperately to communicate with the doctors keeping him alive.

The novel is heavily about the horrors of war, which would make it Slaughter, but in Joe's plight there's also another sort of horror: He can't move, he can't see, he can't speak. He is effectively trapped in his own body, a torment that could be but it's not quite Buried. There's also some argument for the Spiral to be there as well, as his condition makes it hard for him and the reader to know when he's awake or when he's dreaming, to say nothing on how the horrible situation he's in affects his sanity.

"I don't know whether I'm alive and dreaming or dead and remembering."

Van Allsburg, Chris: The Mysteries of Harris Burdick

Downloadable PDF: https://mrsgraveswebsite.weebly.com/uploads/1/2/6/8/12686140/the_mysteries_of_harris_burdick.pdf

The Mysteries of Harris Burdick consists of a series of images, ostensibly created by Harris Burdick, a man who has mysteriously disappeared. Each image is accompanied by a title and a single line of text, which encourage readers to create their own stories.

Vasquez, Jhonen: Squee's Wonderful Big Giant Book of Unspeakable Horrors

Squee (named after the sound he makes when he's afraid) is a little boy whose short life is an unending parade of horrors. His parents outwardly detest him to the point where his father watches footage of his birth played in reverse for amusement, and the only kid in school who likes him is the Antichrist, who Squee is terrified of. He has never, ever, ever, had a good dream. Through the course of the book, he is visited by aliens, ghosts, zombies, time travelers and the serial killer next door.

Though Squee is as frightened by all this as anyone else might be, he takes it in his stride with a passive resilience that only a child could possess and the help of Shmee, his teddy bear and 'trauma-sponge.' He gets through the horrors just by being a simple-minded kid. Adults dwell on the past and the future. Kids live squarely in the present, daydream about flying and drink Tang until they forget it all. He takes for granted that the world is scary and just goes to school each day, provided he hasn't been abducted by aliens.

[thewarmestplacetohide]

Dread by the Decade: The Monster Maker

👻 You can support me on Ko-fi! ❤️

0 Stars

Plot: Desperate to blackmail a woman into marrying him, a man gives her father a rare condition.

Review: With an incoherent plot, undeveloped characters, and rampant ableism, this film commits the ultimate B movie sin: it isn't even fun to mock.

Year: 1944 Genre: Sci-Fi Horror, Bio Horror Country: United States Language: English Runtime: 1 hour 2 minutes

Director: Sam Newfield Writers: Lawrence Williams, Pierre Gendron, Martin Mooney Cinematographer: Same Newfield Editor: Robert E. Cline Composer: Albert Glasser Cast: J. Carrol Naish, Ralph Morgan, Tala Birell, Wanda McKay, Terry Frost

-----

Story: 0/5 - Appalling. A jumbled mess of empty characters and cliche concepts, most of which appear to be forgotten as soon as they're introduced.

Performances: 2/5 - Not awful, though Naish is a knock-off Lugosi.

Cinematography: 2.5/5 - The strongest element, with some decent lighting and shadow use.

Editing: 1.5/5 - Certainly doesn't help the story's poor pacing.

Music: 2/5

Effects & Props: 2/5 - The gorilla suit is fairly well articulated considering the year and budget.

Sets: 1.5/5 - Limited. Set pieces are obviously reused.

Costumes, Hair, & Make-Up: 2/5 - Morgan's makeup is passable (though ableist and inaccurate), working best when obscured by shadows.

Trigger Warnings:

Very mild violence

Sexual harassment (mild; criticized by film)

Ableism (uncritical)

Xenophobia (uncritical)

Medical abuse

Mild animal abuse

[wanderingmind867]

I made a Fancast for a Batman TV series in the 80s a while ago, but I only revisited it yesterday. It's almost fully complete (at least, I've filled nearly all the roles I added). Let me list them:

Batman: Pierce Brosnan

Robin I (Dick Grayson): maybe Matthew Broderick?

Robin II (Jason Todd): Not Sure Yet

Batgirl: Molly Ringwald

Alfred: Jon Pertwee

Commissioner Gordon: John Astin

Harvey Bullock: John Candy

Renee Montoya: Rachel Ticotin

Lucius Fox: Not Sure Yet

Leslie Thompkins: Betty White

Jack Ryder: Richard Belzer

Vicki Vale: Dana Delany

Jason Bard: Andrew McCarthy

Aunt Harriet: Doris Roberts or Rue McClanahan

Thomas & Martha Wayne: Adam West & Julie Newmar

The Joker: Willem Dafoe

The Penguin: Danny DeVito

The Riddler: Robin Williams

Catwoman: Mary Steenburgen

Two-Face: Not Sure Yet

Poison Ivy: Kathleen Turner

The Scarecrow: Christopher Lee

The Mad Hatter: Martin Short

Mr. Freeze: Patrick Stewart

Killer Croc: Not Sure Yet

Black Mask: Not Sure Yet

Rupert Thorne: Carroll O'Connor

Ra's Al Ghul: Ricardo Montalban

Talia Al Ghul: Demi Moore

I missed a few here, because the list was getting too long to put on one thing. But you get the picture. For all those I can't yet figure out, suggestions are currently open. I do desperately need help putting the rest of this together. I mean, I've only got 3-4 left. It'd be nice to say I'd completed a cast list (I usually never do). Here's the link if you want to help:

[waste-it-on-something-useful]

Sonny Boy (Robert Martin Carroll, 1989) Cinematography by Roberto D'Ettorre Piazzoli

[dannyreviews]

Veteran British born/based film/TV actors born before and including 1936 still alive:

With the recent death of Dame Maggie Smith, I thought I'd detail the legendary actors of UK cinema and television that are still living as of the date of this post:

Eileen Bennett (b. 1919)

Arnold Yarrow (b. 1920)

Beulah Garrick (b. 1921)

Elizabeth Kelly (b. 1921)

Elisabeth Kirkby (b. 1921)

Sara Luzita (b. 1922)

Annabel Maule (b. 1922)

Paul Harding (b. 1923)

Vincent Ball (b. 1923)

David Lawton (b. 1923)

Anne Vernon (b. 1924)

Donald Pelmear (b. 1924)

Thelma Ruby (b. 1925)

Pete Murray (b. 1925)

Michael Beint (b. 1925)

Shelia Mitchell (b. 1925)

Kerima (b. 1925)

David Attenborough (b. 1926)

Elizabeth Benson (b. 1926)

Margaret Barton (b. 1926)

Terry Kilburn (b. 1926)

Stanley Baxter (b. 1926)

David Frankham (b. 1926)

William Glover (b. 1926)

Josephine Stuart (b. 1926)

Patricia Davidson (b. 1926)

Barbara Clegg (b. 1926)

Glen Michael (b. 1926)

Araby Lockhart (b. 1926)

Eileen Page (b. 1926)

Rosemary Harris (b. 1927)

Cleo Laine (b. 1927)

Lee Montague (b. 1927)

Genevieve Page (b. 1927)

Neville Phillips (b. 1927)

Jean Lodge (b. 1927)

Barbara Ashcroft (b. 1927)

Jill Freud (b. 1927)

Jean Southern (b. 1927)

Antonia Pemberton (b. 1927)

Peter Cellier (b. 1928)

Jeanette Landis (b. 1928)

Sheila Ballantine (b. 1928)

Dorothea Phillips (b. 1928)

Jeannie Carson (b. 1928)

Hazel Ascot (b. 1928)

Brenda Hogan (b. 1928)

Philip Guard (b. 1928)

Raymond Llewelyn (b. 1928)

Pauline Brailsford (b. 1928)

Leonard Weir (b. 1928)

Kevin Scott (b. 1928)

Tony Hughes (b. 1928)

Joan Plowright (b. 1929)

Patricia Routledge (b. 1929)

Colin Jeavons (b. 1929)

Michael Craig (b. 1929)

Thelma Barlow (b. 1929)

Peter Myers (b. 1929)

Paul Williamson (b. 1929)

Kevin Miles (b. 1929)

John Gale (b. 1929)

Phillip Ross (b. 1929)

Jimmy Fagg (b. 1929)

Hazel Phillips (b. 1929)

Mignon Elkins (b. 1929)

Margaret Stallard (b. 1929)

Maya Koumani (b. 1929)

Clive Revill (b. 1930)

Charles Kay (b. 1930)

Roy Evans (b. 1930)

Una McLean (b. 1930)

Roddy Maude-Roxby (b. 1930)

Ruth Trouncer (b. 1930)

Cyril Appleton (b. 1930)

Vera Frances (b. 1930)

Gary Watson (b. 1930)

Keith Alexander (b. 1930)

Libby Morris (b. 1930)

Pauline Jefferson (b. 1930)

Claire Bloom (b. 1931)

Leslie Caron (b. 1931)

Carroll Baker (b. 1931)

Virginia McKenna (b. 1931)

Vivian Pickles (b. 1931)

Stanley Meadows (b. 1931)

Gerald Harper (b. 1931)

Patricia Greene (b. 1931)

Ellen McIntosh (b. 1931)

Elvi Hale (b. 1931)

Maureen Connell (b. 1931)

June Laverick (b. 1931)

James Martin (b. 1931)

Denyse Alexander (b. 1931)

Arthur Nightingale (b. 1931)

Eileen Derbyshire (b. 1931)

Carl Held (b. 1931)

Shelia Bernette (b. 1931)

George Eugeniou (b. 1931)

Corinne Skinner-Carter (b. 1931)

Tusse Silberg (b. 1931)

Petula Clark (b. 1932)

Prunella Scales (b. 1932)

Phyllida Law (b. 1932)

Ray Cooney (b. 1932)

Brian Murphy (b. 1932)

Edward De Souza (b. 1932)

Alan Dobie (b. 1932)

John Turner (b. 1932)

Roland Curram (b. 1932)

Gabriel Woolf (b. 1932)

Johnnie Wade (b. 1932)

Eileen Moore (b. 1932)

Laurie Leigh (b. 1932)

William Roache (b. 1932)

Athol Fugard (b. 1932)

Carmen Munroe (b. 1932)

Norman Bowler (b. 1932)

Marcia Ashton (b. 1932)

Thelma Holt (b. 1932)

Antony Carrick (b. 1932)

Sally Bazely (b. 1932)

Michael Caine (b. 1933)

Joan Collins (b. 1933)

Sian Phillips (b. 1933)

Sheila Hancock (b. 1933)

Elizabeth Seal (b. 1933)

Shani Willis (b. 1933)

Patrick Godfrey (b. 1933)

Caroline Blakiston (b. 1933)

Donald Douglas (b. 1933)

Ann Firbank (b. 1933)

Vera Day (b. 1933)

Tsai Chin (b. 1933)

Geoffrey Frederick (b. 1933)

Marla Landi (b. 1933)

Monte Landis (b. 1933)

Mary Germaine (b. 1933)

Ruth Posner (b. 1933)

Barbara Archer (b. 1933)

W.B. Brydon (b. 1933)

Robert Gillespie (b. 1933)

Brian Patton (b. 1933)

Arthur White (b. 1933)

Barbara Archer (b. 1933)

Sally Bazley (b. 1933)

Madhur Jaffrey (b. 1933)

Jeanette Sterke (b. 1933)

Ann Rogers (b. 1933)

Barbara Knox (b. 1933)

John Boorman (b. 1933)

Derek Martin (b. 1933)

Michael Aspel (b. 1933)

Bill Edwards (b. 1933)

Judi Dench (b. 1934)

Eileen Atkins (b. 1934)

Tom Baker (b. 1934)

Alan Bennett (b. 1934)

Jean Marsh (b. 1934)

Annette Crosbie (b. 1934)

Wendy Craig (b. 1934)

Richard Chamberlain (b. 1934)

Millicent Martin (b. 1934)

John Standing (b. 1934)

Vernon Dobtcheff (b. 1934)

Nanette Newman (b. 1934)

David Burke (b. 1934)

Christopher Benjamin (b. 1934)

Mary Peach (b. 1934)

Geraldine Newman (b. 1934)

Renny Lister (b. 1934)

Priscilla Morgan (b. 1934)

Audrey Dalton (b. 1934)

Leila Hoffman (b. 1934)

Simone Lovell (b. 1934)

Magda Miller (b. 1934)

Robert Aldous (b. 1934)

Ram John Holder (b. 1934)

Jamila Massey (b. 1934)

Margaretta D’Arcy (b. 1934)

Leslie Saeward (b. 1934)

Maurice Podbrey (b. 1934)

Steve Emerson (b. 1934)

Peter Bland (b. 1934)

Michael Darlow (b. 1934)

Barbara Archer (b. 1934)

Joy Webster (b. 1934)

Jacqueline Ellis (b. 1934)

Jacqueline Jones (b. 1934)

Julie Andrews (b. 1935)

Julian Glover (b. 1935)

Jim Dale (b. 1935)

Anne Reid (b. 1935)

James Bolam (b. 1935)

Christina Pickles (b. 1935) 

Judy Parfitt (b. 1935)

Wanda Ventham (b. 1935)

Amanda Barrie (b. 1935)

Derren Nesbitt (b. 1935)

Nadim Swalha (b. 1935)

Gary Raymond (b. 1935)

Janet Henfrey (b. 1935)

Melvyn Hayes (b. 1935)

Susan Engel (b. 1935)

Amanda Walker (b. 1935)

Delena Kidd (b. 1935)

Derek Partridge (b. 1935)

Allister Bain (b. 1935)

Derry Power (b. 1935)

Phyllis MacMahon (b. 1935)

Rowena Cooper (b. 1935)

Derek Partridge (b. 1935)

Jill Dixon (b. 1935)

Des Keough (b. 1935)

Barbara Angell (b. 1935)

Lucille Soong (b. 1935)

Anita West (b. 1935)

June Watson (b. 1935)

David Daker (b. 1935)

Shirley Cain (b. 1935)

Bobby Pattinson (b. 1935)

George Roubicek (b. 1935)

Brian Blessed (b. 1936)

Richard Wilson (b. 1936)

Tommy Steele (b. 1936)

Edward Petherbridge (b. 1936) 

Ursula Andress (b. 1936)

John Leyton (b. 1936)

Jess Conrad (b. 1936)

Elizabeth Shepherd (b. 1936)

Sandra Voe (b. 1936)

Doug Sheldon (b. 1936)

John Golightly (b. 1936)

Peter Ellis (b. 1936)

Andria Lawrence (b. 1936)

Jon Laurimore (b. 1936)

Tony Scoggo (b. 1936)

Barry MacGregor (b. 1936)

Frank Barrie (b. 1936)

Kenneth Farrington (b. 1936)

Eileen McCallum (b. 1936)

Frederick Pyne (b. 1936)

Philip Lowrie (b. 1936)

Marian Diamond (b. 1936)

Anthony Higginson (b. 1936)

Elsie Kelly (b. 1936)

Ann Taylor (b. 1936)

Heidi Erich (b. 1936)

Keith Faulkner (b. 1936)

Ruth Meyers (b. 1936)

Julia Blake (b. 1936)

[popentertainment-moviereviews]

JOKER: FOLIE Á DEUX (2024)

Starring Joaquin Phoenix, Lady Gaga, Brendan Gleeson, Catherine Keener, Zazie Beetz, Harry Lawtey, Steve Coogan, Ken Leung, Bill Smitrovich, Jacob Lofland, Leigh Gill, Sharon Washington, Gattlin Griffith, Mac Brandt, Tim Dillon, George Carroll, Mike Houston, John Lacy, Sam Wren Vincent, Troy Metcalf, Jimmy Walker Jr., G.L. McQueary and Brian Donahue.

Screenplay by Scott Silver & Todd Phillips.

Directed by Todd Phillips.

Distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. 138 minutes. Rated R.

I know I’m kind of in the minority on this point, but I can’t even start to tell you how much I hated Todd Phillips’ 2019 movie Joker.

Five years later, here comes the follow-up, and it’s like Phillips said to himself: Hmm… how can we make this story even more annoying? I know! Let’s make it a musical. Better yet, let’s not even completely commit fully to the genre and make it sort of a stealth musical. The cast will start singing inappropriately, but mostly in a relatively subdued manner. None of the other trappings of the style – the dancing, the frenetic movement, the wild visuals, the boisterous chorus lines – need to be used. And we won’t even write our own music, we’ll just dust off some 60s and 70s pop songs and overly familiar standards from the Great American Songbook.

On the plus side, this time around, I don’t think I’ll be all that lonely in hating Joker: Folie à Deux. Because I really, really did hate it. If possible, this sequel is even more unbearable than the original. Imagine that.

I can’t imagine anyone actually liking Joker: Folie à Deux – then again, I felt that way about the first one, too, so maybe I’m not the best judge. Nonetheless, early buzz on the sequel seems pretty negative, so hopefully it’s not just me.

I take no joy in saying that. I actually was rather looking forward to the original Joker movie until I saw it. Because the truth is, Batman is a relatively dull superhero, but the one thing he always did have going for himself were the best villains. And a movie about arguably the most interesting of Batman’s villains could be amazing.

It’s just not this series.

At least the first Joker had something of a storyline. Granted, it was a pretty blatant rip-off of Martin Scorsese’s 1983 cult favorite The King of Comedy – they even cast that film’s star Robert De Niro in a major supporting role to make the connection even more obvious – but it was something of a plot.

Joker: Folie à Deux, on the other hand, is nearly two and a half hours (!!!) of Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix) being psychoanalyzed and mistreated in an insane asylum. (Like we didn’t know he was mentally deranged from the first time he appeared on screen in the first film.) Then it switches to being a courtroom drama about Arthur’s criminal trial for the mayhem he committed in the first film, although it plays out like an episode of Law & Order: Super Villains Unit.

While in the asylum, he meets his one true love, Lee Quinzel, who becomes Harley Quinn. (Of course, in the first Joker movie, Arthur imagined Zazie Beetz’ character – who reappears here as a witness for the prosecution – was his one true love, so Arthur isn’t too reliable in matters of the heart.) Lady Gaga is okay, if way too subdued, as the future Harley. She certainly won’t make anyone forget Margot Robbie’s powerhouse performances in the same role.

My biggest problem with Joker: Folie à Deux is the same as my problem with the first film. In both of these films, the Joker is played as a sad, pathetic, miserable loser who has life take a massive dump on him throughout the entire running time. Is this really supposed to be the guy who is going to be Batman’s greatest nemesis?

At least in the original film, Arthur eventually snapped and went on a violent killing spree, which was not a great, moral or relatable storyline, but at least he did something. In Folie à Deux, any violence or mayhem which he commits is mostly done in fantasy sequences, which just makes him seem even sadder and more impotent in real life.

After it was over, someone who apparently enjoyed the movie much more than I did tried to convince me that Folie à Deux is a movie that shows the depths a man will go to for love. However, his relationship with Lee is so dysfunctional, so toxic, so driven by mania, that it’s hard to root for a happy ever after for these two crazy kids. They – and the world – are probably better off with them separate. We know that is not the case from the comics, although the ending does put that in doubt.

As I said in the original review five years ago, Joker has been known to inspire many complicated emotional reactions. Pity has never really been one of them.

However, even more than I pitied the Joker in these two movies, I mostly pity myself because I have now wasted about four and a half hours of my life watching this sad saga.

Jay S. Jacobs

Copyright ©2024 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: October 3, 2024.

[flameswallower]

Hey I loooove your stuff! What are some other artists, visual, audio, and text based, who inspire you? I hope to be able to create something as evocative as your work one day myself <3

Thank you!! There are so many! In terms of really direct and really significant, enduring influences on my writing style, or approach to subject matter & narrative, or overall "aesthetic" what springs to mind is:

The short stories of Kelly Link, Clive Barker, M. Rickert, Elizabeth Hand, Joyce Carol Oates, Tanith Lee, Steve Rasnic Tem, Melanie Tem, Karen Russell, and Ray Bradbury

The early 1990s horror novels of Kathe Koja and Poppy Z. Brite/Billy Martin

Shirley Jackson's entire body of literary work

Porpentine's 2010s twine games & fiction from the same time

Junji Ito's comics

Emily Carroll's comics

Lynda Barry's fiction and comics

John Darnielle's music/songwriting with the Mountain Goats

Sarah Manguso's poetry

The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle

In terms of artists/works I only encountered within the past few years, but am already feeling as "big influences" on my work in a similar way to the above:

Sayaka Murata's fiction, particularly her novel Earthlings

Samuel R. Delany's short fiction (I hope to tackle Dhalgren sometime in the next year!)

Max Graves' comic What Happens Next

Hal Schrieve's fiction and comics

Leo Fox's comics and art

Never Angeline North's fiction

Robert Aickman's short stories

Freshwater, by Akwaeke Emezi

I listen to a lot of music while writing. Recent favorites include Uyarakq, Guided By Voices, Nascent by Alexander Panos, Big Thief, Owen Pallet, and my sister Louise.

[a-man-for-hire-and-his-archives]

‘Scrublands’ Season 2: Luke Carroll, Debra Lawrance & More To Join Returning Luke Arnold & Bella Heathcote In Stan Mystery Drama; First Look Here

EXCLUSIVE: Luke Carroll (The Artful Dodger), Debra Lawrance (Please Like Me) and David Roberts (Please Like Me) are among the new stars of Australian drama Scrublands, which is gearing up for its second season on Stan and 9 Network.

Also starring alongside returning leads Luke Arnold and Bella Heathcote in Scrublands: Silver are Tasma Walton (The Twelve), Luke Pegler (Hacksaw Ridge), Caroline Brazier (Year Of), Joel Jackson (Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door), Toby Truslove (La Brea), Sarah Roberts (Home and Away), Hamish Michael (The Twelve), Radek Jonak (The Surfer) and Damian De Montemas (Hounds of Love).

Above you can see an exclusive first-look image of season 2, with filming now underway in Augusta, Western Australia.

The season is being adapted from author Chris Hammer’s novel ‘Silver’, and here are some new plot details: A year after the life changing events of season 1, investigative journalist Martin Scarsden (Arnold) has returned to his coastal hometown, Port Silver, to set up a new life with partner Mandy Bond (Heathcote). When he arrives to find his childhood friend Jasper brutally murdered and Mandy the prime suspect, Martin struggles with doubts – about Mandy and about his own ability to recognise the truth. As he pushes forward to find the real murderer and absolve Mandy, Martin confronts secrets about Port Silver and his long-buried past.

The series comes from Easy Tiger and Third Act Stories as a co-production for Stan and 8 Network. Martha Coleman, Ian Collie, Rob Gibson and Felicity Packard are the producers. Ben Young is the director, and the writers are Felicity Packard, Fiona Kelly and Jock Serong, with Michael Healy and Andy Ryan from the 9 Network and Cailah Scobie and Alicia Brown for Stan the executive producers. Major production investment came from Screenwest, Lotterywest and the WA Regional Screen Fund, and the season was developed with the assistance of Screenwest and Lotterywest. Abacus Media Rights is the international distributor.

We revealed the official confirmation of season 2 in March when we had news of Stan’s 2024 slate. The reorder had been widely expected with sources within the streamer talking glowingly about its performance.

“Following the immense success of Scrublands, we look forward to working with Easy Tiger and Third Act Stories, alongside lead cast Luke and Bella, as we bring audiences another thrilling season,” said Stan Chief Content Officer Cailah Scobie.

9 Network Head of Drama Andy Ryan added: “Set in the stark coastal beauty of Western Australia, Scrublands: Silver will wow audiences with a gripping crime mystery in a unique environment. With the outstanding Luke Arnold and Bella Heathcote returning along with the creative maestros at Easy Tiger and Third Act Stories, viewers should strap in for another emotional rollercoaster of world class premium drama.”

Easy Tiger co-chief Ian Collie said it was “great to step back into the world of Mandy and Martin, played perfectly by Luke Arnold and Bella Heathcote. Like the first season, we are witness from the get-go to a violent tragedy that implicates both our heroes.”

The series is the latest to film in Western Australia, which is being with other states such as Victoria and New South Wales to attract local and international projects, with production credit schemes and other soft money readily available in most. “This is Stan’s fourth project in Western Australia in the last twelve months, and shows our commitment to collaborating with local cast and creatives so that we can deliver fresh and exceptional Originals for Australian and global audiences,” said Scobie.

“We are pleased to welcome Stan and Easy Tiger back to WA and are excited to see Luke Arnold and Bella Heathcote reprise their roles, this time in our stunning South West,” said Screenwest CEO Rikki Lea Bestall. “Augusta is abuzz with activity with WA producer Martha Coleman and WA director Ben Young heading up a fantastic Western Australian crew.”

Source: Deadline