Gas Station Carnivals: a lesson in uncertainty

She awakens from the nightmare screaming. She thinks it's over. Only to find a zombie- or any variation of a monster- sleeping next to her. She awakes again. "Holy shit" she says. The scene ends. Perhaps the first example of the 'double nightmare' scare is from An American Werewolf In London. In which David dreams of horribly disfigured zombie Gestapo officers massacring his entire family and slitting his throat. He awakes to the nurse. She goes over to the window to open the curtains and behind them is one of zombie troopers from his nightmare, stabbing her repeatedly. He awakens for real this time. "Holy shit." This has been used again and again in horror films and television shows since then. The nightmare within a nightmare.  

Dreams contain disconnected memory fragments. Pieces of nostalgia from our childhoods that remain intact. This is where Freud departs and Ligotti takes over. He's much more interested in the memory itself. 

Before I go further, I implore you to listen to the full story.

The setting of the story is the Crimson Cabaret. The unnamed narrator is seated at a table and is joined by art critic Stuart Quissler, who tells of his childhood memories of gas station carnivals. The rides are peculiarly small and all are out of order. The 'performers' at these carnivals are usually the gas station attendants dressed in an unconvincing get-up. There is one exception: The Showman. Quissler tells of how him and his parents would go to see The Showman perform. His back turned to the audience. Instead of having this piece of the story take over the story itself, starting with Quissler as a child and building a climactic confrontation with The Showman, it is presented as a secondhand anecdote. 

The narrator dismisses the story. Only to replace it with an equally bizarre explanation. He relates it to art magic. A theme Ligotti would use in several of his stories. 

Everything in the story thus far has a sense of vagueness. The unreality of the characters are implied by withholding their names. The name of the club this takes place in is The Crimson Cabaret and the owner is The Crimson Woman. The sideshow performer is The Showman. Then there is the matter of the title of the story. Gas stations are only meant to be places you travel through. The carnival by contrast, has no function except being itself. "Let's go to the carnival except it isn't a carnival, just a gas station with some extras." 

At some point, the art critics leaves. The next day they meet and the narrator asks Quissler about the meeting they had last night. Only Quissler says he was home that night and never went out. Quissler mentions that the last time the narrator was at the Crimson Cabaret, hr insulted the Crimson Woman by telling her to take down her paintings. The narrator goes back to the Cabaret and asks the Crimson Woman about this. The Crimson Woman tells him he did not insult her. It was the waitress who convinced her to take down her paintings so she could get her paintings on the walls. 

Weird fiction author Michael Cisco writes on this story: "The narrator presses on, and no we might believe we are uncovering the real plot of the story, the revenge of the crimson woman. The narrator does not seem to notice or care that his plot is also pretty hackneyed, but, by linking magic to art, Ligotti is roping us into the curse, since we are currently reading a work of art. The artist makes you believe things that aren't true, but- as Lovecraft wrote in "The Silver Key", since all we know of reality is just pictures in the brain anyway, there's no reason to prefer one set of pictures over another. The terrifying possibility of the story is that line between dreams or delusions and reality is something that can only be lost, it can never be found." 

People are lost in their own delusions throughout this story. Every character has a theory about who is doing what but nobody is certain. That creates this pool of doubt they all springboard into. What if what I see is not real? Every wake up from a dream where you were certain what you saw in that dream was real? In Ligotti's world, there is no reprieve. No breath of relief where the nightmare is over. There is only uncertainty of the waking world. 

You've got to pick up every stitch, must be The Season Of The Witch

  Halloween III has been beloved for so long that it's no longer 'underappreciated' - time has been kind so now it's a fan favorite; people love an underdog. 

  Halloween Ends isn't an Anthology film like Season Of The Witch but it does have that let's-switch-it-up spirit. 

  From its great opening needle drop and slanted blue font leading us into its cold open, Ends instantly carries itself differently. Much like Part III, it's unshackled itself from the cultural weight of Michael Myers as an Icon and focused more on him as peripheral Myth. Kills was a massively messy clunker so my expectations were fucking nil for Ends and that yielded some intense surprise for me.

-major spoilers ahead-

    Despite how I feel about Kills and Halloween (2018), what I mostly took away from those movies was Carpenter's score. The trailer for Ends didn't make me feel much of anything beyond this feeling that Carpenter had yet another banger of an album on the way and this rollout to promote it includes another movie tie-in (same with that Firestarter remake). But Ends blew me away in terms of having actual resounding synthesis with Carpenter's score. For the first time in the whole Blumhouse Trilogy the composers aren't overqualified; every track is nocturnal and eerie but there's a spacious melancholy to them too, which fits Haddonfield's whole atmosphere now.

  Also, for the first time since the '78 original, Michael Myers is spooky again. Every new movie in the franchise's many timelines ratcheted up his relentless barbarity but here he's presented as more haunting, a lurking spectre we rarely see - Green making good on the original's ending. When we finally do see him in his sewer hideout his mask is rotting and caked in mud, surrounded by sewer rats and spider webs. My favorite part of this dwelling, that still gives me the creeps, is how the facial features of his mask are molded into the Earth. It's never explained and we only see it once but with roots twining out around it, it drives home this feeling that he's part of Haddonfield (and not in a limp metaphorical way; this shit is grossly literal).

  More than that, The Shape is more interesting here than he's been in...ever. His 'team-up' with Corey after 'infecting' him is as fascinating to watch as it is invigorating to this Halloween fan. Their whole dynamic erects new 'lore' without any hard-and-fast exposition; it's all implied and vague, in the best possible way (Thorn-free). It makes every single action by Michael interesting and engaging (especially when he lets Corey wrestle him in the sewer, a jawdropping scene because of how bold it is).

  Taking an idea set up at the end of Part 4, that was ultimately abandoned in Part 5, this is my favorite kind of 'remake,' one that doesn't set out to honor the original, but improve upon it. At the end of Part 4, Jamie Lloyd, 'infected' with Michael Myers' 'evil' after touching his hand, stabs her foster Mom and stands menacingly atop the stairs as Dr. Loomis screams "No!" until the credits roll. It's an exciting ending to an otherwise boring movie. Even Danielle Harris got excited to play The Boogeyman's Sidekick! ...but in Part 5 she's no longer evil, just cursed with the ability to see what Michael does (and is also inexplicably mute[?]). It failed to deliver.

  Ends takes that half-baked idea, hones the recipe, and simmers it until meat is falling off the bone.

  I had to watch it multiple times to confirm I wasn't just drunk on giddiness and low expectations or high on the audacity of Green and his writers, or some unholy in-between. Nah, dude, can confirm: this movie rules.

  Any and all criticisms people have of it, especially those bemoaning it as "the worst of the franchise!," I point to every single movie that preceded it and ask you to reflect. The dialog is bad? Okay, tell me you love the dialog between Annie and Linda in the original - or, fuck, any of the sequels (especially 6 and Resurrection). We barely see Michael? Okay, he has less screentime in the original than he does here - ever seen Jaws? It's not a good ending to this trilogy? Thematically, it ties everything up.

  The biggest criticism I see is: Michael Myers is 'weak' and gets his ass kicked by Corey? Well, he's in a body that's over 60 years old. He was beaten, stabbed, and shot multiple times in 2018 and, four years later, hasn't had as many victims to 'reinvigorate' him. I buy that Corey, a strapping dude in his 20s who's now imbued with The Shape's 'power,' is able to overpower Michael. And you also have to consider: no matter how many times Corey knocks him down, he comes right back up. Not to mention, in the original, he was stabbed and knocked down by Laurie multiple times. You can't say Michael never stopped enduring.

  But, snark aside, if you expected one kind of movie and got this, your feelings are valid since the marketing is misleading: Corey isn't highlighted but Michael and Laurie are. David Gordon Green said that he and the other writers had "no interest in a Laurie vs. Michael showdown" but the trailers and posters paint a different story. The marketing is most likely not Green's fault, it's either Universal's and/or Blumhouse's deception. It's not fair, I get that you feel duped.

  But underneath that, doesn't it thrill you? Plus, like...what's the alternative? ANOTHER movie where Laurie and Michael get into a cat-and-mouse game while he slaughters random people until one or both of them die at the end? That's the 2018 movie. You want Michael to be a badass and rack up bodies for a Kill Count video? That's Halloween Kills (the Fire Department massacre, alone, is him at his most barbarically cool and that's right at the start of the movie. He goes on to turn Haddonfield into a slaughterhouse). And even if you hate Corey wearing the mask, he has two of the most ghoulish kills of this or any franchise.
 

  I didn't want what the marketing promised so I got something refreshing and weird that made me shift my weight in the theater seat. I was leaning forward intrigued, perplexed, confused, exuberant, and engrossed in a tale of learned helplessness.
 

Corey's tale is a look at forgiveness, redemption, misinformation, cancel culture, true crime spectacle, co-opting tragedy, and nature vs. nurture

  It's a flawed movie, for sure, but its strengths elevate it so much. I could write a whole post about how dynamic a character Corey Cunningham is, his parallels with Michael and Laurie, Allyson's arc, Rohan Campbell's performance, the dense thematic layering and tightly woven narrative. There are even unexpectedly poignant scenes where Laurie acts like a teenager again, crushing on Frank Hawkins, which is such a welcome contrast to her absolute misery the past three movies. And that romance comes full-circle for a satisfying ending that's not entirely sweet so much as finally content.

 
  Since this is the final part of a trilogy that totally whiffed it in the second movie, it feels like a thoughtful rebuild after reckless destruction. And what it builds is an ending that's confidently character-driven and reflective - how do you not appreciate that? This movie is special because it's risky, fun, and thoughtful.

  And, just like with Part III, time is gonna be kind to it. Right now it's underappreciated but ...people do love an underdog.

Album Covers: Where Horror Meets Metal

The fine folks at Bennett Media are throwing a Heavy Metal Halloween. So, in the spirit of the season, I thought I'd toss in some stuff into the candy bag.

Let's face it: metal bands have the best album art. Anytime I go into a record store I tend to gravitate toward the metal section. Not just to go to a specific band or album I'm looking for, but to just gaze at these precious works of art. These covers deserve as much wall space as a horror movie poster. Sometimes they can be overwrought. Sometimes though, they strike that perfect balance. 

I'll let the art speak for itself. 

Runner up: Spiritual Healing

Runner up: Live After Death, Somewhere In Time

 

What I've been reading

It's no secret HP Lovecraft harbored xenophobic and racist views. His story The Horror At Red Hook is infamous for depicting Red Hook's immigrant population as 'sub human mongrel hordes'. What author Victor LaValle was able to take his conflicted feelings on Lovecraft and reclaim the story. The two main characters from Lovecraft's story are kept along with some of his ideas. Everything else is given a new sheen. The 'subhuman immigrants' are now victims of a wealthy, privileged white man's manipulations. 

It's a perfectly structured novella that never overstays it's welcome. 

Messed with me on a level I was not expecting. Demonic possession narratives, when done right, tend to genuinely scare me. A Head Full of Ghosts is a good example of one done right. This is another. What makes it so effective is the subjectivity of it. It is told from the possessed character's perspective as the possession gradually unfolds. 

Like Black Tom, Come Closer is a short novella that packs a punch stronger than several full length novels.

What happens when good people do nothing? 

Small town horror is a subgenre I continue to come back to. Stephen King mastered the form in Salem's Lot and It. Joan Samson does it with her only novel. A slow burn that doesn't take on any supernatural aura until it's final pages. 

A small slice of queer cannibalism. Sara Tantlinger mostly does poetry, so the melding of descriptive prose with extreme horror is as vivid as you can get. Not for the squeamish. 

"His fear was whetted to such a fine edge that he could actually feel it now: a disembodied ball of baby fingers inside his stomach, tickling him from the inside. That's what mortal terror felt like, he realized. Tiny fingers tickling you from the inside."

Every camper in this book is fully fleshed out. Their flaws are put under a microscope and magnified when dealing with the horrors of the island: tapeworms. Not just any tapeworms, genetically modified hydatids that spread faster and consume faster. If that's not enough, one of the boys is a full on sociopath. 

The structure reminded me of Carrie. We are treated to accounts of the island, Q & A's with biological scientists, journal entries. There are scenes in this book that will stay with me. Lingering. 

The true crime obsession has been at an all time high with the release of the Netflix series Dahmer. Triana's book takes on the true crime obsession and pushes it to new, frightening heights with the protagonist being infatuated with a serial killer. This book is a journey of grime and muck, where the rivers you are traversing run with blood. All leading to an unforgettable final line. 

Cosmic Visions