Month: December 2016

Well, that’s 2016 over and done with. A lot has been written about this fateful year, and I have little of significance to add to the pile. But I do have a few things to say about how the year treated me personally.

Continue reading “So Long, 2016”

I went to see Rogue One: A Star Wars Story yesterday. I enjoyed it; it was a solid outing in the newly-rejuvenated franchise, and one that shifted focus somewhat.

Continue reading “Vietnam, S-s-s-Star Wars: Thoughts on Rogue One“

We of the Ho-Ho-Horror Honeys (the rest of whom will probably flay me for typing that) know how to celebrate Christmastime with taste and decorum. So, the December issue of Belladonna, available now at Magcloud and Magzter, has the special theme of cannibalism!

Featured this month are such legendary devourors of human flesh as Hannibal Lecter, Alfred Packer, Sweeney Todd and Eli Roth. My own contribution to this sumptuous helping of longpig is an article about WildStorm’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre comics – which are, for my money, the best things to come out of the franchise since the original film.

Away from the cannibal theme, I also review Chris Koehler and Sam Sattin’s graphic novel Legend, while the rest of the team discuss their favourite Christmas-oriented horror films. What more could you ask for?

 

A while back I made a post about how the Sad and Rabid Puppies campaigns have treated horror fiction. I pointed out that when the pro-Puppy authors write something within the horror spectrum, they generally end up with the kind of work that editor and horror expert Stephen Jones associates with the term “horror-lite”:

These days our bloodsuckers are more likely to show their romantic nature, werewolves work for covert government organisations, phantoms are private investigators and the walking dead can be found sipping tea amongst the polite society of a Jane Austen novel. […] Today we are living in a world that is ‘horror-lite’. This appalling appellation was coined by publishers to describe the type of fiction that is currently enjoying massive success under such genre categories as ‘paranormal romance’, ‘urban fantasy’, ‘literary mash-up’ or even ‘steampunk’. […] The audience for this type of fiction has no interest in being deliciously scared by what they read, or left thinking about a particularly disturbing tale long after they have finished a story and closed the book.

This description fits Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter, Declan Finn’s Honor at Stake, and arguably Brian Niemeier’s Souldancer.

Continue reading “Horror Puppies Redux: Is Souldancer Really Horror Fandom’s New Favourite Novel?”

Candy Guard is the second animator I’ve had the pleasure of profiling in my Women in British Animation series. Head over to WWAC to read the post!

The year is 2002. GeoCities websites are playing midi versions of anime themes. Sparkly gif-dolls in bell-bottom jeans are adorning Neopets pages. Teenagers are uploading their bishies to Elfwood. And Hinph Gaming is hard at work on a video game where the final boss is Jesus.

The topic for my latest WWAC article is The Last Resurrection, almost certainly the most sacrilegious Zelda clone to ever be released onto Windows. I also take a look at the game’s official novelisation (which is longer than To Kill a Mockingbird) and discuss the phenomenon of fluffbunny Wicca. It’s a long post, but I figured that – as likely the only person who will ever write an article about this obscurity – I may as well go all out.

Funny story: while I was working on the post, I had a dream that I changed the title to “Jesus Christ Supervillain”. Upon waking, I thought “hey, that’s actually a pretty good pun my subconscious mind came up with” and considered using it for the article. After my shower, I realised that the pun wasn’t really that good, and so left the title alone.