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Jack Parsons, The Rocket Magician

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Back in 2000 Alan Moore, one of the most celebrated comic authors of all time, was writing an anthology book for DC comics called Tomorrow Tales. Tomorrow Tales was homage to the old pulp comics. One of the characters in the book was Cobweb, a femme fatal who fought crime in as sexy a way as possible. One of Moore’s stories for Cobweb was blocked by DC due to subject matter, adding to Moore’s dissatisfaction with DC and ultimate departure from mainstream publishers all together.The subject matter of the story is what fascinated me when I learned of it. It was based on real events and had Cobweb meeting L. Ron Hubbard and Jack Parsons. Now I of course had heard of Hubbard before, but Parsons was new to me. It turns out that his was a fascinating story, and I can see why Moore wanted to tell it.

John Whiteside “Jack” Parsons, was born Marvel Whiteside Parsons in 1914, and I think we can guess why he may have wanted to change his name when he got the chance.

There are two very compelling and yet very different aspects to Jack Parsons life that make him worth learning about. To our sensibilities they would even seem at odds, though the fact that they weren’t to him adds to his mystique.

Parsons was born rich, but was abandoned by his father as a teenager. He attended college but did not get a degree. However I suspect that he gave up on college because it bored him. You see Parsons was a scientific genius. Despite having no degree he still managed to join the Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory of the California Institute of Technology.  The man was literally a self-made rocket scientist.  He conducted some of the earliest rocket research in the U.S. and pioneered solid fuel which led directly to the invention of JATO.  In 1936 he was one of the co-founders of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and his research is credited with making modern rocketry possible.  There are many who feel that Parsons should be credited as the father of modern rocketry.

But that was and still is unlikely due to the other interesting side of Parsons. Not only was he one of the leading scientists of his time, he was also one of America’s leading occultists.

Parsons had become involved in the Ordo Templi Orienties or OTO and thus a follower of Thelema, the religion founded by Aleister Crowley.  Parsons eventually rose to lead the major American Branch of the O.T.O. known as the Agape Lodge. Parsons saw no difference between his work as a scientist and his practices as a ceremonial magician. In fact he was known to invoke the god Pan prior to rocket tests.

Parsons was also interested in science fiction, so would seek out writers as well as other artist. He ran a boarding house nicknamed “The Parsonage” that had artists, writers, and scientists as lodgers.

One of these writers was L. Ron Hubbard.

And here is where things get very interesting.

But first just a little more background.

Parsons had been married to Helen Northrup. Helen’s half-sister Sarah Northrup came to live with them which led to her having an affair with Parsons.  This did not go over well with Helen and she eventually left Parsons. While they never married Parsons and Sara continued their relationship.

Now back to Hubbard.

Hubbard and Parsons got on well and began practicing magic together. They agreed to attempt a major magical ritual, known as the Babalon Working. Now while I am familiar with some practices of the OTO I certainly do not know any of the specifics of this working and I honestly do not trust accounts I have found as I suspect there is a lot of sensationalism in them. What I do know is that the purpose of the Babalon Working was to produce a Moonchild, a being that will usher in a new age for mankind. Part of the working was intended to find a third member of the working, known as the Scarlet Woman. They eventually found Marjorie Cameron, who did join them in the ritual. Not much is known of what happened of course, but Parsons declared it a success.

This event is what Alan Moore was interested in depicting. Knowing Moore he either wanted to cast Cobweb as the Scarlet Woman, or I suspect more likely claim she was the Moonchild. Either way it was the fact that the story involved Hubbard that made DC get cold feet and pull the story.

After the Babalon Working Parson, Hubbard, and Sarah Northrup formed a business partnership to run a boat company, with Parsons putting up the majority of the money to get it started. This of course is where things went south.  Earlier Aleister Crowley had warned Parsons that he considered Hubbard a con man and that he would find a way to make off with Parsons’ money and Sarah. This is basically what happened. Hubbard and Sarah went off to buy the first boat, but instead of bringing it back, made off with it and the rest of the company’s funds.

Parsons, borrowing a page from the Tempest, claims to have summoned a storm that forced them back to port. Then he went the more mundane route of suing to get his money back. He recovered much of the money, but Hubbard got to keep the boat.

Hubbard ended up marrying Northrup and Parsons married Cameron.

Parsons did manage to bounce back from all this. He continued working as both a scientist and magician. He also wrote several essays on magical practices and philosophy. His writings were collected in a book called Freedom is a Two-Edged sword.

In 1952 Parsons died in an explosion in his home laboratory. There are people who will claim it was a suicide, or a magical ritual gone wrong, but honestly it was in all likelihood exactly what it looked like, an accident during a scientific experiment.

Parsons would continue to be an influence well beyond his death. Werner Von Braun was quoted as saying the Parsons was the true father of American rocketry.

The same can be said of his work as an occultist. His writings and philosophies still influence practitioners today

Writers have found him endlessly fascinating. Moore actually did use him in an issue of Promethea. Other authors would also use him because of his mixing of science and magic.

I think if Parsons Life shows anything it is that it is possible to have these very diverse sides and still make it all work. And if that doesn’t speak to us geeks, I don’t know what will.

 

 

The history of the replacement superhero

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Once again we find ourselves in a place where a classic superhero has been replaced. In this case if you haven’t been following the comic book news, Peter Parker is no longer Spider-Man.  A new Spider-Man has taken his place. According to Marvel this is a permanent change and will be the status quo going forward.

The general consensus amongst fans is that this status quo will last about a year before Parker is returned to his role as the Wall Crawler.

But why do we just assume that this is a temporary situation. Let’s take a look at the history of major characters being replaced in superhero comics.

First I suppose we need to establish that we are talking about characters from the silver age. There was of course the update of most of DC Comic’s characters in the 60s. That was treated as a new launch and not meant to be old characters being replaced.

The first question is why replace the character at all. The answer is naturally to open up new story possibilities. When a character has been in place for so long several of their characteristics are set in stone. If a writer wants to go beyond those a good way is to have someone new in the role.  There is also the idea of character growth.

One of the most successful replacements of a character ever was the Flash. In 1986 during Crisis on Infinite Earths, Barry Allen gave his life to save the universe. At the end of the series his nephew and sidekick Wally West, Kid Flash adopted the Flash identity. Over the next 25 years Wally West was the Flash. The series often examined Wally attempting to live up to the legacy of Barry, and how other heroes and villains who knew Barry reacted to him in the role. Wally went from overcompensating, to insecure, to finally stepping up to the role of one of the leading heroes in the DC universe.  Wally ultimately stood as a member of the Justice League alongside many of other major heroes. Most media projects of the time used the Wally West version of the Flash; most notably the Justice League animated series.  There is an entire generation of comic fans for whom Wally is and has always been the Flash. But the tale of Wally West does ultimately lend itself to why we fans are cynical about the permanency of a replacement hero.

In the 2008 series Final Crisis Barry Allen returned from the dead. The following year saw the release of the Flash Reborn where Barry officially stepped into the role of the Flash again. Wally was still around at this time, but he no longer had his own book, and after a while just faded from the title. With the New 52 relaunch Wally is now not only missing from any title, but is one of the characters that writers are forbidden to use. Again he is the Flash that a lot of fans are familiar with, but since the powers that be at DC want Barry to be unique Wally has been wiped from the universe.

Another example was one we touched on last year when we talked about the old speculation boom and how it went bust, the Death of Superman storyline and specifically the Reign of the Supermen. Here you had the very publicly touted death of comics’ most iconic character.  It was certainly a headline grabber. For all the grief it gets as a sales ploy and the storyline that started the implosion of the speculator market and subsequent shrinking of the industry, it was a well written story. It was broken into four acts, the death, the aftermath, the rise of the replacement supermen, and the return of Superman. Clearly the whole story was planned from the beginning, and savoy comic fans knew this. At shops and comic shows everyone speculated how each stage would be handled. No one expected any of the replacements to permanently take over. Well no one who actually followed the books. As discussed before, speculators assumed this was a permanent change. Just look at the previous article for more on that. The replacements did of course continue on as characters in their own right and Steel and Superboy went on to be important parts of the DCU.

Around the same time you had the Batman books doing a similar idea with Knightfall. Again a new character was brought in as the replacement Batman. This one had less impact on the DCU, with only the new villain Bane having any impact going forward.

In both those cases the fact that new characters were introduced as the replacements was a big clue that it these were only storylines and not lasting changes.

More recently Marvel and DC did some very similar stories that went another route on the replacement angle. Like the Flash these were stories where the former sidekick took over for their fallen mentor.

At Marvel it was Captain America’s sidekick Bucky taking over the role went Cap was killed at the end of the Civil War Story. At DC it was Dick Grayson taking on the role of Batman following Bruce Wayne’s death at the end of Final Crisis.

In both cases some very good writing came out of these stories. Ed Brubaker wrote Captain America at this time and you had a slightly darker Cap with Bucky under the mask and espionage was a bigger part of the story. At DC you had Grant Morrison writing Batman and Robin and knocking it out of the park with a more light-hearted Batman and a darker Robin, who was Bruce’s son Damian.

In both cases about two years later both Steve and Bruce were proven to be alive, their deaths faked by means of time travel. Upon their return both Steve and Bruce left their successors in their roles and the pursued other goals. Eventually both heroes returned to their roles and the sidekicks resumed their previous identities.

When these storylines started fans were already cynical enough about main heroes being replaced that there were betting pools on how soon the originals would return.

These are hardly the only cases I could site on this subject, but the trajectory is basically the same. Eventually the old superhero resumes his role.

As of this writing I can only think of one exception to this, Marvel comics’ cosmic hero Captain Marvel. Marvel’s death occurred in the first ever Marvel graphic novel. Over the years his death has stuck. The problem has been keeping a consistent successor.

Originally the new Captain Marvel was an unrelated heroine with unrelated powers who took up the name. Next up was Marvel’s son taking up his father’s role. Most recently we have the heroine Ms. Marvel, who was connected to the original, taking on the title of Captain. This last is being well received so we will see how it goes.

Which brings us back to Spider-man.

This is actually the second time that Peter has been replaced. In the 90s you had the first attempt to have an unmarried Spider-man thanks to the clone saga, where it was revealed that Peter was just a clone of the original Spidey and the person we thought was the clone, Ben Reilly, was really the original. Peter decided to retire, and Ben took over as Spider-Man.

Fans hated this twist and it was quickly dropped and revealed to all be a plot by the Green Goblin and Peter was the original after all.

Now thanks to a body swap we have Doctor Octopus inhabiting Peter’s body. Doc’s body with
Peter in it has died, so Doc as Peter is the new Spider-Man.

I won’t get into the details, but the first issue of the new Superior Spider-Man on the last page already has the seed of how the original Peter will return. So the question is, how long will it take.

Anyone want to set up a pool.

 

 

 

The Gail Simone situation

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Recently I have been writing about the issues DC Comics has been having with keeping its top talent. Previously it was the high profile departures of George Perez and Rob Liefeld. Both men left due to conflicts with the editorial staff. Then you had the resignation of Karen Berger as Executive Editor of the Vertigo imprint. In her case it may just be that she has done the job for twenty years and it is time for her to move on.

Now you can add the dismissal of Gail Simone to the list. This one more than any of the others is really setting of alarm bells amongst the fan base.

Unlike any of the others writers I mentioned, Simone was dismissed. Specifically she received an email from editor Brian Cunningham telling her that issue 16 would be her last issue of Batgirl. Since that was the only title she was currently working on this was basically her dismissal. Now of course she was rehired not two weeks later, but we will look at that and what it means in a bit.

There can be a lot of good reasons to dismiss a creator from a comic book, but none of the obvious ones are visible in this case. Batgirl is a strong seller compared to many DC books right now. In addition Simone has received critical praise for her run on the title. Another point in her favor is that she is a fan favorite author meaning a lot of people will pick up a book she is writing simply because she is the one writing it. Simone is also an advocate for DC and the new 52, promoting it heavily over social media and at conventions. Finally there is a PR factor; Simone is one of only three female creators currently working on DC titles. Since this is an area that DC has already received a great deal of criticism for, it is a risky move to remove the most high profile female creative talent they have.

So with so many positives in her favor what could have motivated DC to remove her? Right now we have no solid answer as DC has made no comment at all about either the dismissal, or the reinstatement. So we can only speculate as Simone herself has opted to take the high road.  On the dismissal she simply stated that she is disappointed to no longer be on the book, but made no comment about any other circumstance. On the reinstatement she just stated how happy she was to continue working on the title.

However if you look at this as part of a trend a picture does begin to emerge. Starting with the departures of Perez and Liefeld that I have commented on before, which both men cited conflicts with DC editors. Next you have stories of regular last minute changes to stories that have been turned in, with plot elements being added against the writers will. What we are hearing more and more of is editors dictating the stories that need to be written, making certain characters off limits, and making others mandatory. We also hear of editors getting into turf wars with each other. Finally we hear of writers being kept in the dark about plans for the characters they are writing, such as Simone not being told that Batgirl would be joining the Birds of Prey in their title.

I find Berger’s departure at this time interesting as well. She has been in charge of Vertigo for 20 years, and guided it during a period of amazing creativity.  Books that thrived under her tenure and guidance include Sandman, Fables, Preacher, Y the Last Man, The Invisibles, Swamp Thing, Hellblazer and Transmetropolitan. I’m sure there is a good chance that she just decided that 20 years was enough and it was time to step down. On the other hand, after so many years maybe she recognized something going on at the company that made stepping down now a good idea.  Trust me other companies would fall over themselves to hire her, and she would be in an excellent position to grab any talent leaving DC.

And talent leaving the ship is another sign of something wrong. In March Marvel has books coming out featuring creative talent that has been working strictly for DC up to now. That could be a group of creators simply expanding out, or it could be them getting set up elsewhere before it is too late.

But let’s get back to Gail Simone. There are certainly rumors going around about what happened, some based on the conjecture above. Basically the best guess right now was that Simone was not making the DC powers that be happy. She had her own ideas how she wanted the stories to go, and she wanted to push the envelope. She had been clear about wanting to introduce a transgender character to the Batgirl title. Also despite her hard work in promoting DC and the changes she is still one of the strongest advocates for better treatment of women in the industry, both as characters, and the flesh and blood ones working on the books. The best conjecture we can make is that one or more people higher up in the DC power structure decided they wanted her gone, and so that is what happened.

Was this a bad idea? Yes, it was an amazingly bad idea. This more than anything else shows that all is not well in the halls of DC comics. And even if they try to keep this lower profile with the fans, the talent is going to know what is going on. The worst case scenario for DC is that the really good creators jump ship, which will affect the quality of the books and ultimately sales. Add to that pressure from vocal fans about what DC is doing and it does not look good for their long term prospects.

I think that last part, the pressure from the fans, is what led to the decision to bring Gail back. Convention season is just around the corner. Fans have already been in an uproar about a lot of DC decisions. The public reaction to firing Gail Simone made all of that pale by comparison. I promise you that had she not been rehired that every panel at every convention would have asked what the hell is going on.

As a fan I sincerely hope I am wrong in these speculations. I grew up with DC comics and I want them to thrive.  But right now things I am seeing have me concerned. But I also have hope. The fact that fan outcry got Gail Simone rehired means we do have a voice. If we can use that to let DC know how we really feel about things maybe it will all work out.

I have a feeling the next couple of months will be telling.

 

Saving Lois Lane

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Lois Lane.

Everyone recognizes that name.  She is not just a geek icon, she is a cultural icon. You go up to any random person on the street and they recognize her name. Everyone knows she is the plucky reporter that is also Superman’s love interest.  Everyone knows that she and Clark Kent belong together.

Yes in the early days of comics she was often there so that Superman had someone to rescue, but as the medium evolved so did she. In modern lore she is a strong independent woman who is able to meet Clark as an equal and partner. She is also strong enough to give him support when the going got tough, and act as his anchor to humanity.

Well at least she was. All of the above was true until last year when DC Comics relaunched their universe with the New 52.

Now Lois Lane is barely in the books anymore, and her relationship with Clark is not a partnership of any kind. In fact she is not even a reporter anymore, she has been bumped up to a TV Producer at a news network.  And her journalistic ethics, which have always been a core of the character, have been eroded.

As for the romantic front, early issues in the reboot showed that Clark had feelings for her, but that not only did she not return those feelings, she was not aware of them. Also she has a boyfriend. He has only appeared in about five panels but he exists.

As one of the most recognizable characters in comics, and the most recognizable character in the Superman franchise outside of Clark himself it seems odd that she has not appeared on a single comic book cover since the relaunch.

So what is going on? Why is one of the core characters of one of the world’s most famous franchises being pushed aside and minimalized?

A lot of speculation about that has been going on, but the consensus comes down to this; DC wants to push Superman and Wonder Woman as a couple.

I know I went over this back in August when I was going over the news of the Superman/Wonder Woman pairing and how it felt forced. What I have learned since is that this was apparently part of the plan from early on and to help facilitate this, the feeling was that Lois needed to be diminished so that she would not appear to be in the way of this relationship.

DC also seems to be getting desperate in their attempts to promote the Superman/ Wonder Woman coupling. In the last few weeks it has been the focus of many polls and features on the DC comics’ blog and Facebook page. It is beginning to have the feel of “You will like this if we have to ram it down your throat.”

This part is just speculation. It is hard to say how long the Superman/Wonder woman relationship was being planned. It still feels like an executive mandate, and in the last few months DC has been known to change plans suddenly requiring rushed updates of issues.

But the diminishing of Lois does appear to be a thing either way.

But how sure are we of this. DC has said nothing explicit on any of this. This is where a bit of good old fashion fanboy detective work comes in.

First we have to look at the comments from the creative staff. The ones that I think back up the point the hardest to this are comments that have been made by Superman group editor Matt Idelson.

Back at San Diego Comic Con in 2011, when the relaunch details were being announced, Idelson referred to Lois as Superman’s “trophy wife” when explaining that the marriage between that two was no longer part of continuity.

Last August he made an even more definite statement on his opinion of Clark and Lois as a couple.

“Clark and Lois are not inevitable, and in fact it isn’t going to happen, at least while I’m on watch duty!”

He later had to walk those comments back; I’m sure due to fan backlash.

“Clark most definitely has feelings for Lois, but he not only sees her as unattainable but also unavailable. I’d much rather see the readers pining for them to couple up, with growing intensity, until we have no choice but make that magic moment happen. And in truth, I engaged in some ill-advised hyperbole there when I said they wouldn’t get together on my watch. I miss them as a couple, I really do, but I also know that good drama comes from complicating the path that leads to the happily forever after ending. My hope is that ultimately, we’ll all look back twenty years from now and see that without Lois in his life, that human representation is something he had to grow towards, and that the absence of Lois in his romantic life held him back.”

Idelson while the highest ranking member of the creative staff to comment, was hardly the only one.

Artist Rags Morales stated that Superman sucked since he got married and he considered it jumping the shark. He also said that Lois worked better as a Damsel in Distress and a pain in the ass.

Publisher Jim Lee had compared the phasing out of Lois as no different than changing the size of Superman’s cape.

Writer Andy Diggle has stated on twitter that he feels Wonder Woman and Superman make a better couple than Lois and Clark.

Also if you look at any promotional material and you will not find any mention of Lois.

And just for comparison let’s take a quick look at another long time supporting character, Jimmy Olsen. Jimmy is still fairly active in the books; in fact right now he and Clark are roommates. I won’t go into details why, but it does allow for some fun keeping the identity secret scenes. So Jimmy is in the books about as much as he used to be.

So it seems clear that reducing her role was always the plan. They couldn’t just make her go away like Wally West or Stephanie Brown, so they did the next best thing and made her a side character.

This brings up an interesting issue for next year. The new Superman movie Man of Steel is coming out. Lois Lane will be featured in it, played by Amy Adams. I assume she will be in her traditional role in this movie. For a company so interested in synergy between its divisions I am curious how Warner Bros will address this and in turn how the comics will deal with it.

In the meantime as a fan I am not pleased with these developments. Lois was a great character because she could be strong and brave in a superhero world even though she did not have superpowers. I feel her downsizing is taking away another role model character and not helping in the perceived boys club mentality of the industry overall. As a fan I want to do what I can to let DC know we do not want to lose her or see her as just a shadow of her former self.

So here is what I purpose. I would like to see a hashtag start making the rounds on twitter and tumblr; #savelois. If it can start trending maybe it will get enough attention that DC will know she has fans that are not happy with her current treatment.

So let’s see what we can do.

Creative Expression in Fandom

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It should go without saying that fandom and geek culture produces a lot of passion. Lately I have been writing about the down side of that passion. While I think it is important to bring those subjects to light, I do not want to lose sight of what it is I and so many others love that brings us together.

So I thought I would talk a bit about the artistic side of being in geek culture.

When you go to a fandom event one thing you will find is that at their heart they are a celebration of some form of art. Be it comic books, film, animation, or literature, they all are based on a form of creative output. And this will carry over to the fans themselves. So let’s take a look at the ways fans will find to express their creative side.

Before I go on I want to make one thing clear: this is more of an overview look at these different creative areas. Each one could support an entire article of its own. In fact I could very possibly do those articles in the future. I am just doing this an overall celebration of creativeness in our community and hopefully as a jumping off point for discussion.

Ok, with that out of the way here we go.

At many conventions there will be an art show, where people will display artwork they have created, usually a painting, often for sale, or as part of a charity auction. Now this art is usually geared towards the specific theme of the event, but not always. Some of it will be what is known as fan art, a piece that is based on an already existing property. Star Trek and Star Wars for years were the dominate fandoms for this, but today it could be anything that has any kind of fandom. While it is easy for some people to dismiss this kind of art since the artist is basing it on something someone else already created, that ignores the time, effort, skill, and passion that go into its creation.  Many successful artists got their start this way.

Fanfiction is another creative activity that is prevalent in the fan community. I know that it gets a lot of flak for the slashfic aspect of it, which for the uninitiated among you is where a story will focus on a romantic pairing, rarely one that appears in canon, and often homosexual in nature. Now a lot of people think Fanfiction is something born of the internet, however writing stories about a favorite character or franchise is a long standing practice. There were published Sherlock Holmes stories at the same time Arthur Conan Doyle was writing.  As for directly fandom based fanfiction, there were homemade zines about Star Trek as in the 70s. Like with the artists there are cases of fanfiction writers making the transition into published authors, and I am not just referencing 50 Shades of Grey. One year at San Diego Comic Con I heard Denny O’Neil say that he gave Devin Grayson a shot at writing for him based on her batman fanfiction.

A variation of fanfiction is the fan film. This is one area where thanks to technical advancements it is no longer the realm of the really passionate fans that can get the resources together to make a film. Now with digital recording, editing programs and the means of online distribution whole groups of fans can get together to make films. I would break fan films down to two categories. The first is the film based on a franchise. There are groups that are dedicated to making fan films based on Star Trek, Star Wars, and Firefly.  The other type is the film based on a geek friendly premise, such as Gamers: Dorkness Rising, or the Collectibles.  The advantage of the second type is that it is something the creators can generate income from. The first type on the other hand is something that gets made because the people involved love the franchise, love making films, and want to combine them. I will admit this one is near to my heart as I was involved with a group of fan film makers and made films based on Star Trek, Doctor Who and Mystery Science Theater 3000.

The one creative area of fandom that has gotten a lot of attention lately is cosplay.  I sometimes think the creative side of this gets lost in all the discussion of how sexy someone is or if the costume was appropriate for the convention. Again cosplayers tend to take two forms. The first is the person who looks at a fan event as a chance to dress up and comes in a costume that was purchased elsewhere. Usually this is a store bought Halloween costume. The second type is the person who takes the time to research the character they are making a costume of, find or make patterns for the costume and then take the time to make the costume. Technically there is a third type, a person whose costume is made for them by someone else, but I tend to think of them as just a variant of the second type.

It should come as no surprise that there are people who are of the type two cosplayers that look down on type one as poseurs. I am of the opinion that if someone wants to dress up as a character and the only way they can do so is to buy from a costume shop, than more power to them.

Getting back to cosplay as art, just go out and look up cosplay and look at all the variations you will see. Sure you will have the faithful reproduction of a Wonder Woman costume, but you will also have steampunk Wonder Woman, Victorian Wonder Woman, or as I saw once, a hybrid Wonder Woman/Slave Girl Leia.

Despite the flak that cosplaying is getting lately, it’s creativity has always been appreciated at conventions through the costume contests. These are often a highlight of most conventions. And again people who are really good at it can go pro. Here in the Seattle area there was a costumer named Dragon Dronet, who use to do elaborate costumes with impressive props. Based on his work at conventions he ended up working in Hollywood and is now a respected Prop maker, having worked on various Star Trek shows, Batman Returns, Alien Nation, and even casting puppets for Jeff Dunham.

I would be remiss if I did not take some time to talk about filking. Filking, or filk music, is basically fandom folk music. While it has never been my cup of tea, it has a huge following. And by huge I mean that there are whole conventions devoted to filking. A filk song can either be a parody of a known song with a fannish twist, or an original composition.

A form of creative that often gets overlooked in fandom is crafting. This is just making things with a geeky slant. You see them in most convention dealer rooms, next to the book stores, and video vendors. These are the people who are selling things they have made themselves. And it can be so many different things. Jeweler, costume pieces and accessories, ceramics, t-shirts, art prints. My wife is part of this, she makes soaps shaped like gaming dice, gelatinous cubes (complete with finger puppet monsters inside), and gems.  I have also seen perfumers, corset makers, and fitted fang makers. Obviously crafters who are vending at a convention are hoping to make a profit and even a living from their work, but this does not take away from their creativity.

The last type of creativity is one that is so close to me that I almost overlooked it for this article. It is the one I practice myself. It’s the people who blog, or make podcasts, or online videos about geek culture. Sure there is an argument that it really isn’t that creative as we are just commenting on what is out there, or reviewing geek friendly media. However it still takes time and effort to put these things together and like all of the above it comes out of a love of the culture and wanting to find ways to participate in it. Again some people are able to take this to the limit and go pro, just look at Chris Hardwick.

One thing I have heard a lot is people saying “I wish I could do that, but I’m not good enough”, to which I so “so what”?

Honestly, I think people should at least give something they want to do a shot.

When I started Fanboy News Network it was out of a need for expression. I had spent some time away from the convention scene and had been working on Community Theatrical productions, mostly behind the scenes. Those productions were great, but I realized that I was missing something, my own voice. I decided to start writing as a creative outlet, and using the old saying “write what you know” decided to focus on geek culture. And let’s face it, there are a lot better writers out there covering the same things I do. But I do not let that stop me. I am doing this because I want to, and I want to get good at it. The only way to do that is to actually write.

In the year and a half I have been writing Fanboy News Network I have learned a lot. I have learned what many of my writing habits, both good and bad, are and am working to improve. I have been able to find a writing voice. I have also joined a writers group, and I am now working on projects not directly related to the site.

So if you want to try any of these things, go for it. Just do not be put off by the idea that you may stumble, or even fail at first. This is part of the learning process.

And go out and try to find other people who share your particular interest. You may find mentors or at least a support network. At worst you’ll make some new friends.

And never forget there is an aspiring writer in Seattle that is pulling for you.

Another Wonder Woman Pilot

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Here we go again with another Wonder Woman pilot.

CW, being a subsidiary of Warner Bros. has a long track record of bringing DC comics’ properties to the TV, or at least trying to. Obviously they had the 10 year run of Smallville and the 13 episode long Birds of Prey series. They produced a pilot for an Aquaman series. There were proposals for a show about teen titian member Raven and about the Grayson family before Dick became Robin that never got past the proposal stage. And of course you have the current series Arrow.

I’ll be honest, I am really apprehensive about the announced Wonder Woman pilot. It shares several traits from the other shows and pitches mentioned above that I think are not workable. On the other hand I had doubts about Arrow too and I have ended up liking that series.

Basically CW has some habits when it comes to DC shows that I am convinced are just there to annoy long time comic fans.

The first is that they seem to think that the best way to go is with a series that functions as a prequel to the comics, with Arrow and Birds of Prey being the exceptions. This started with the original pitch they made over a decade ago, a series that was going to be titled Bruce Wayne, detailing Bruce’s life between his return to Gotham City at 18 and becoming Batman. The reason the series did not get past script stage was that the WB movie division also wanted to explore Bruce’s development into Batman, which ultimately resulted in Batman Begins. On that point let’s go ahead and say that this turned out for the best.

So when Bruce Wayne was shut down they turned around and created Smallville. And as I have said before, at first this was not bad, but it went on too long and stretched the premise beyond the breaking point.

The Aquaman pilot used the exact same idea, only with Arthur Curry. I remember liking it when I first saw it, but in retrospect I think it would have ended up a weak premise for the same reasons that Smallville did not work long term.

The Graysons was just baffling as a pitch. Following Robin’s family and their adventures prior to their murder and Dick’s being taken in by Bruce. This would basically be a series where we know that it will end with the murder of the main characters. Also if we go with the general idea that Dick becomes Robin around 13 than the age you have him at the beginning of the series would set the lifespan of the show. All this of course assumes you intend to remain faithful to the comics, which Smallville showed was not necessarily going to happen.

We now add Wonder Woman to that list, as the pitch is literally the same as Smallville, but with Diana coming to America and I guess learning what it means to be a hero.

Another issue with DC shows on the CW is the names. I think the only show that got to keep its title from the comic was Birds of Prey. Besides Smallville and Bruce Wayne, You had the Aquaman show being called Mercy Reef, Green Arrow became Arrow, and now Wonder Woman’s show will be called Amazon. I assume this is a marketing issue with the film division in case they want to develop a movie using the characters, but it does seem like they are running from the franchises they want to develop.

So here is my main issue with the new stab at a Wonder Woman series. They are using a format that fans are going to be apprehensive about. The whole “Diana before she was Wonder Woman” is at best only sustainable short term. If they are going that route I hope they do not take the “no flight, no tights” mandate that ultimately hamstrung Smallville.

I think if they are going to do this they make it the arc for the first season, with the finale having her become Wonder Woman. From second season on have it be like Arrow, the beginnings of her career.

Do I see that happening? No I do not. I’m afraid they will get locked down into the prequel mode like Smallville and the problems that it brings.

On the other hand if they manage to stay true to the characters roots and persona maybe it will be worthwhile, or at least wipe out the bad taste left by the last Wonder Woman Pilot.

Two things I want to address real quick before I wrap up.

First, the whole Iris thing, where a casting sheet was released stating that the character’s name is Iris along with other back story alterations. This is a not uncommon practice when casting for a very well-known character. It is done in hopes of getting an audition that is not just an attempt to fill the preconceived notions about the character. Rest assured her name will be Diana in the series as has been confirmed by Geoff Johns.

The other is the Justice League movie. Obviously it is being developed and there is a general assumption that Wonder Woman will be in it. How will that work? Good question, and there are a lot of ways to do it. One is they just assume that audiences can deal with two different version of the character at once like when Superman Returns came out during Smallville’s run. Another is that they do not include Wonder Woman in the Justice League movie. This all of course assumes that Amazon makes it past pilot stage.

So there we have it. Let’s hope that DC can give their most iconic female character the adaptation she deserves.

The Fake Nerd Girl Myth.

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Here we go again.

While I was off enjoying my honeymoon, the whole fake nerd girl issue roared back to life with a vengeance. This is not to say that it ever went away, but the day I flew out to Disneyland to build some memories to last a lifetime with my wife, veteran comic book artist Tony Harris decided to let loose on the subject.

I’m not going to quote him verbatim, if you want to read exactly what he said go here. What I took from his rant is this: women who cos-play at conventions are just attention whores with no love and appreciation of geek culture and should just accept that their sole purpose is to be lusted after and it is their fault if men act badly around them.

I feel dirty even writing that previous paragraph.

Tony Harris is one of the best artists working in comics today. As an artist I am always going to be a fan of his work. However, after reading his rant it is clear that he has some issues that clearly need to be addressed. And he is not alone, not by a longshot.  It has been going on long enough to spawn a meme and to have become a catchphrase.

What the hell? How did this happen?

It’s a complex question and a lot of people have been discussing this for a while now. As a simple male geek who loves his subculture while at times wanting to throttle it, I will now give my two cents worth.

To start with we have to understand the idea of gatekeeper behavior. This is where someone in a particular social group decides it’s up to them to protect the group by determining what is and isn’t appropriate for that group and attempting to purge that which they deem inappropriate. Pick any type of group that a person could be in, political, religious, social, or professional and you will find people who act as gatekeepers for that group.

By their very nature a gatekeeper is going to be a conservative member of that community as they want to keep it pure.

Now how do we apply this to geek culture?  You have to remember that as we have said before the various subsets that make up geek culture have traditionally been male dominated industries that cater to a male dominate fan base. But smart business owners know that it is good to expand your consumer base and the best way to do that is to appeal to as broad a market as possible. For a male dominated market this means trying to bring in the rest of the human race, in other words females.

While this seems simple on the surface, there is a catch. That catch is that while someone new may enjoy something, they way they enjoy it may be different than how you do.

I think I need to illustrate that last point.

My sister and I, despite both being very geeky, are very different in how we approach it. Both of us love Horror, Disney, and roleplaying. However she is not a comic book fan and I am not into fanfiction. This is not to say that either of us hasn’t read comics or fanfiction, but there are subcultures to both and those are ones that she and I do not share.

So when the Avengers movie came out, as I comics fan I was stoked. What I was not aware of was that the fanfiction community also embraced it. Due to this my sister is now a huge Avengers fan, She loves the movie just as much as I do, but for different reasons. She will never know who D-man and Rage are, and I will never get Tony Stark and Steve Rodgers as a married couple.

Now a gatekeeper is going to say that she is wrong. She needs to appreciate the Avengers for its appeal to the comic fans and that legacy and enjoying stories about Tony and Steve adopting Peter Parker is wrong and should be shunned.

So this is where we have the origin of the issue. Maybe that Cos-player dressing as the Black Widow was inspired by the movie. Her interest is in putting together the costume and after all that hard work she wants to show it off. The best place to do that is at a convention. Does this mean she knows the entire backstory of the character? Who knows? The point is that this is how she has chosen to enjoy the culture. This is fine, and she should be allowed to do so. However the gatekeepers go into hyperventilation. This is the root of the fake nerd girl. The claim that she is a trespasser in our community that needs to be put in her place.

Another part of Harris’ rant was that ok, you have chosen to be here dressed like that, accept that you are going to be treated as an object, not a person.

No, just no. this is not even a little ok. In fact go back and read my article on misogyny in geek culture. Or any article on this subject.

So basically what we have an issue where people are feeling threaten because other people are doing things differently.

And if you scratch beneath the surface you will find it is not just the fake nerd girl meme at play here. I have heard from a friend that right after Harris posted. He had friends of his say that they hate it when people are at an anime convention and their cos-play is not anime specific, and how they want those people banned. I have also heard of a steampunk convention where a member of the convention committee went through the dealer’s hall and kicked out any dealers who they felt did not have merchandise that was “steampunk” enough.

And the worst part is that for every idiot who spews this nonsense, they will have people backing them up. If you read the comments from Harris’ post a lot of people thanked him.

That right there is why I am writing this and why others need to keep at it. We have to point out that this behavior is not right and cannot be condoned. And right now we really need to keep at it as this meme has got legs. This next image is from an ad you can find in DC comic books.

Yes, this got approved by an editor somewhere.

I’m sure I will be writing more about this in the future. In the meantime please keep this issue in mind and let’s do what we can to combat it.

 

May the Mouse be with you

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I’m pretty sure that if you are reading this site, than you have certainly already learned about Disney’s purchase of Lucasfilm. And I’m equally sure that you had all kinds of knee jerk reactions to it.

I’ll be honest; my first reaction to the story was “this has to be a hoax.”

After that it became; “what are the details of the deal”

So to be thorough, here is what I understand the deal to be. The Walt Disney Company has purchased Lucasfilm outright for $4.05 billion in cash and shares of Disney stock.  The result of deal means that Disney now owns all Lucasfilm properties and subsidiaries.

Let’s just take a moment to look at what that includes.

Film properties:

  • Star Wars
  • Indiana Jones
  • Willow
  • American Graffiti

Game Properties:

  • The Secret of Monkey Island
  • Grim Fandango
  • Maniac Mansion
  • Afterlife
  • Loom

Subsidiaries:

  • Industrial Light & Magic
  • Skywalker Sound
  • LucasArts
  • Lucasfilm Animation

Disney has been clear that their primary interest in this deal is the Star Wars property, but let’s faces it Indiana Jones is not small potatoes. Also they now have the Secret of Monkey Island, a game that was inspired in part by the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, which turned around and inspired the Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Who doesn’t want to see Guybrush Threepwood meet Jack Sparrow?

Of course all of this has led to the inevitable fannish reaction. “Oh God, Disney has bought Star Wars, they are going to water it down and make it suck.”

 

Yeah, about that.

 

I heard the same thing a few years ago. Only it was “Oh God, Disney has bought Marvel, they are going to water it down and make it suck.”

And what was the result of that deal. Well we saw it back in May, it was called The Avengers.

Look, not everything Disney does is watered down family fare. They own Pixar and people are disappointed if one of their movies is only really good. They produce Once Upon a Time on ABC which is good subversion of their own fairy tale properties. Disney does not buy up properties and then just “disneyify” them

In fact this is probably the best news we can get as Star Wars fans.

The lament since the prequels came out is that Lucas, while the visionary who created the universe, is not necessarily the best person to Shepard it. Well now he is just in a consultant role, and other people will be developing the next movies. And we are getting the next movies. Part of this deal is the confirmation that the next trilogy is going to happen, which was not the case prior to it.

Another possibility that a lot of people are excited about is the idea that Disney will give us what we have been asking to have for years now, the original trilogy rereleased in its original theatrically form. This means we may finally see Han shoot first in blue-ray.

Not that there isn’t problems. 20th Century Fox owns the distribution rights to the entire film franchise until 2020, and for the original Star Wars the hold the rights forever. But all that means is that there is a deal to be made. Disney has had similar issues with Paramount over the Marvel movies and made it work.

Another reason this should not be so shocking is that there is already so much integration between Disney and Lucas. If you go to Disneyland or Walt Disney World there are rides for both Star Wars and Indiana Jones.  There is also a live audience interaction show called the Jedi Academy. On top of that there is plenty of merchandise for both franchises in the parks. So this means that Disney does not need to worry about renewing those licenses any more.

So I say let’s all chill out, take a deep breath, and see where this new turn of events takes us.

 

(Note to self, write article about fan rage)

 

(Yes I meant that note to be public)

 

 

The Truth about Samhain

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As we enter the final stretch of the Halloween season we now turn our eyes to the origin of the holiday, Samhain. And since this is Fanboy News Network I am going to tie it back in with geek culture by the end.

Before I even get into what Samhain is/was/isn’t/whatever I want to tackle one of the trickiest subjects of all, how to pronounce it. You see Samhain is a Gaelic word and so its pronunciation has nothing to do with how our eyes accustomed to modern English see it. When you look at it I am sure that you assume it is pronounced Sam (as in the common first name) hane (rhyming with bane). And you would be wrong. In fact it is pronounced Sow (like the pig) in (as opposed to out).

We will get back to fun with pronunciation later.

So what is Samhain and how does it relate to Halloween? Well to answer that we need to look to our old friends the ancient Celts.

It’s easy to think of the Celts as a superstitious people who spent most of their time painted blue and hitting things, but really they were a very practical people who incorporated their spiritual lives into their everyday lives. Due to this a lot of their holy days tended to line up to practical matters like planting or harvesting.  It is also good to keep in mind the harsh climate they lived in. Finally you have to remember that they did not look at seasons the same way we do. To them there were two seasons, summer and winter.

So for Samhain, the first thing to know is that its literal translation is “summer’s end”, meaning it was when they marked the beginning of the winter season. Or to put it another way, it was the Gaelic word for November. The festival of Samhain was the feast that they would have to mark the occasion. It was also when they would bring in their livestock from the summer pastures and slaughter any animals to provide food for the winter. Due to this last bit it was sometimes known as the blood harvest.

On the spiritual side of things it was a time when the barriers between the worlds of the living and the dead were thought to be thinnest. Many traditions that we think of as Halloween traditions were born out of this belief. People would dress in ways they normally didn’t to confuse spirits that meant harm, turnips were craved into frightening faces to scare off evil spirits and offerings were left out for the beloved dead.  Thus we have costumes, Jack-o-lanterns, and trick or treating for candy.

For the Celts Samhain was the beginning of their year and the festival of Samhain their most important holy day.

I’m sure some of you are now thinking “But haven’t I heard of an actual mythological character called Samhain?”

I’m sure you have, and let me take this time to explain why this is wrong.

In the 18th and 19th centuries in England the practice of armchair academics was very popular. These were amateurs in various sciences who would do research and get published without any actual field experience. I have always held the belief that the kind of people that did this would be what Monty Python would refer to as an Upper Class Twit.

One such individual was Col. Charles Vallency, who wrote a 6 volume set of books in 1770 that attempted to prove that the Irish people once came from Armenia. This work has the first reference that can be found naming a god called Samhain.

This concept would be picked up by Godfrey Higgins in 1827. Higgins wanted to prove that the Celts originally came from India. Now today there is scientific evidence that backs this up, but the field work that proved it had not been done yet in 1827 and Higgins needed something to prove his theory. In his research Higgins came across Vallency’s work and picked up on the idea of calling a god Samhain. He found a Hindu God named Samana, and figured he had his hook.  But he needed a mythology to go with Samhain to make this work.  Finding reference to the blood harvest it was an easy step to go from a sensible practice to survive the winter to a festival of ritual sacrifice to appease a pagan god. And the belief of the dead roaming the land made Samhain a god of the dead, terrorizing the people as the cold set in.

And this BS is what stuck in a lot of people’s minds.  For years if you did a search on Samhain on the internet all you would find would be references to a “Lord of the Dead”. Fortunately decent research in more recent years has drowned those pages out and most information you find is in the neighborhood of accurate.

Well unless you are talking about mass media, then all bets are off.

It seems that when you want to do a TV show or movie involving Samhain that last thing you want to do is actual research, especially when the BS is so much more fun.

One example that I always think of is an episode of the TV show Supernatural. Now this show has always had its issue when it comes to research. Don’t get me wrong, I like this show, and watch it regularly. When they are working from a mythology they create no problem, but whenever they try to work in any existing folklore, not so much. Let’s put it this way, my sister and I have a game where we predict when the other is going to start flailing at the screen because they got some piece of lore wrong. When they did their Samhain episode she actually called me and said “are you yelling at the screen yet?” The answer was yes by the way. They basically took Higgins’ story and used it whole cloth, adding that Samhain was helping bring about the apocalypse.

Another is the otherwise really fun horror movie Trick r Treat. It’s iconic character is Sam who looks like a little kid in a pumpkin mask, but is in fact Samhain who acts as the spirit of Halloween.

But really it was the cartoon the Real Ghostbusters that solidified the use of Samhain as the spirit of Halloween. In multiple episodes they had a pumpkin headed baddie called Sam Hane who wanted to make every day Halloween.

As for shows that get a bit closer to the facts, even they can have issues.

True Blood for example almost drove me to drink. They did great on the Samhain mythology, but their pronunciation was like fingernails on a chalkboard. They pronounced it Sama Hane. I have no idea where they got that extra A from.

Another show that was not annoying was the show Reaper, about a guy who ended up stuck working for the Devil. In one episode the Devil lamented that he missed the festival of Samhain, and nailed the pronunciation. His mythology was a bit off, but better than most.

The one show I can cite that nailed it on the head was American Horror Story last season. They opened their Halloween two part episode with a character accurately describing the old Samhain traditions, getting both pronunciation and history correct. The best part was that since the story was about ghosts, they were able to take the accurate information and make it relevant to the plot.

So there we have it, a look at what is and isn’t true about Samhain. So when you go out this year, remember that there was no blood god wanting sacrifices, just a people getting ready for winter and honoring their beloved dead.

The Horror Host

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As we continue on through the Halloween season I thought that now would be the perfect time to cover the grand tradition that is the Horror Host. To bring any newcomers to the concept up to speed, Horror Host is the general term used for a character that would host late night horror movies often called creature features.

The genesis of both the Horror Host and creature feature is interesting. Back in the 50’s local station were always looking for cost effective programing to air, as well as trying to bring in viewers.

In 1953 actress Maila Nurmi attended a Los Angeles masquerade dressed as Morticia Addams. A local TV producer saw her there and had the inspiration to have her host horror movies on his station. Making alterations to the look and manner of the costume to avoid copyright issues Nurmi created the character of Vampira, and is credited as being the first Horror Host. The original show only lasted a year, but Nurmi made sure she owned Vampira and was able to bring the character back on a different station a year later. The ghoulish manner and macabre puns she used became the blueprint for all the Horror Hosts to follow.

Nurmi may have set Horror Host template, but it was production company Screen Gems that assured that they would be an American institution. In 1957 Screen Gems was the television subsidiary of Columbia Pictures, and had syndication rights to over 50 Universal Horror films. These films were marketed as a cost effective syndication package called Shock to local stations. As part of the package the stations were encouraged to have a host following the style that Vampira had set. Many markets called their show Shock Theatre after the name of the package. There would be a later package in the 60s called Creature Feature, and due to its rhyming nature it became the generic term for the show type.

John Zacherle was hired as the Horror Host for a station in Philadelphia. He created the character of Roland, a cross between an undertaker and a mad scientist. Later incarnations of this character were called Zacherley. Zacherle would take the macabre humor and ramp it up, including having Roland break in during the middle of a sequence of the film doing something odd or ghoulish and then go right back to the film. Zacherle would also go on to do things like record a novelty song called Dinner with Drac. Dick Clark gave him the nickname the cool ghoul. If Vampira set the stage for Horror Hosts then Zacherle codified how to do it.

Most stations had purchased the Shock package, and later Creature Feature as a means of low cost programing. Since they were interested in keeping costs down the Horror Host was often an employee of the station who did an off-screen job such as an announcer or program director. Sometimes it would be an on-air talent such as a weather man.

A great example of this type of Horror Host is Count Gore De Vol. Dick Syszel who played the count was an announcer at a Washington DC station. The character of Gore De Vol debuted in 1973. Syszel took the standard Horror Host routine and upped the ante. As he was in the nation’s capital he would often include political humor. De Vol was also one of the earliest, if not first, Horror Hosts to regularly include sexual innuendo as part of the act.

One other early Horror Host that deserves mention is Sinister Seymore. Seymore was played by actor Larry Vincent and hosted a show called Fright Night for a Los Angeles station. Seymore would use the Zacherle model of interacting with the movie, but instead of a cutting to him he would either appear in a pop up screen in the corner of the film to make a remark or blue-screening himself directly into the movie. He was also clearly an inspiration for the character of Peter Vincent in the movie Fright Night. Vincent played Seymore until his death in 1974.

Six years after Vincent passed the station decided to revive the show, and looked for a new Horror Host. The person they found became the Horror Host that is almost universally known, Cassandra Peterson better known as Elvira, Mistress of the Dark.

Elvira combined aspects of many of the Horror Hosts that came before. Her look harkened back to Vampira, she did break ins like Roland, she had innuendo like De Vol, and she added a sharp wit. Peterson would go on to do several acting gigs as Elvira including headlining two movies as the character.

A lot of the Creature Feature shows in the early to mid-eighties saw their viewer base erode since they were on Saturday late night and the audience was being drawn away by Saturday Night Live.  On top of this it became harder for stations to afford to pay broadcast rights for the old horror movies as they became more expensive with the rise of cable stations. However there were some notable exceptions

One was Commander USA’s Groovy Movies on the USA Network. Unlike the traditional Horror Host Commander USA, played by actor Jim Hendricks was a blue collar superhero, and would play the character more in the style of an old Kids show host. Another difference is that the show would run on Saturday and Sunday afternoons. The show ran from 1985 to 1989 and produced 200 episodes.

Around the same time as Commander USA, TBS had Al Lewis host an afternoon creature feature show as Grandpa Munster. Due to copyright issues, even though he wore the same basic costume that he did on the Munsters, Lewis’ character was only called Grandpa.

One other show that I would be remiss if I did not mention was of course Mystery Science Theater 3000. Originally a creature feature show for a station in Minnesota, the shows premise of riffing throughout the program, rather than the break-ins practiced by Roland and Seymore, brought it to the attention of the newly started Comedy channel, which later became comedy central.

When MST3K went off the air in 1999 it seemed that the era of the Horror Host was over. Most local stations found the broadcast price for the movies too expensive and the cable networks had moved on to other programing. While it appears that there was never a time without a Horror Host, the tradition appeared to be fading.

But it is hard to keep a good ghoul down, and the Horror Host as American icon was too strong to stay down long. By the mid-2000s you saw new Horror Hosts spring up, either on local station or on Internet broadcast. These shows dealt with the broadcast rights issue by showing public domain films.  One show, Cinema Insomnia hosted by Mr. Lobo, managed to get a syndication deal. Elivra has also returned using a similar format

The Horror Host image is one that has become such a part of our culture that it shows up in many interesting places, especially around Halloween.  Back in my Halloween Horror Nights article I talked about their use of characters they call the Horror Icons. Most of those characters have the qualities of a Horror Host. Last year they had a house called H.R. Bloodengutz where a Horror Host goes mad and starts terrorizing the station.

With such a history it should not be surprising that web series have also used the Horror Host. Internet Reviewer Jack Shen reviews horror movies as Count Jackula, who refers to himself as a Horror Host.

Just this month popular reviewer Lewis Lovehaug, who hosts comic book review show Atop the Fourth Wall, has started a new daily review show for the month of October called Longbox of the Damned. In it Loevhaug does a five minute overview of horror comics as Horror Host Moarte. Moarte embraces all the tropes of a Horror Host and would not be out of place on late night TV.

Clearly I have only scratched the surface of Horror Hosts here. And I found that people will feel a real connection to the host they grew up with. For me it was a character on the local Seattle station called simply the Count. He was a very generic Dracula rip-off, played by Joe Towey who directed the stations kids show, but I still have strong memories of the show as a child, and I did grow up loving the old horror films. Other friends of mine who grew up elsewhere were enthusiastic about their horror hosts including Gore De Vol, Sir Graves Ghastly, Ghoulardi, Joe Bob Briggs, Bone Jangler, and Penny Dreadful.

If you are interested in learning more, many hosts have a Facebook presence and have become a well networked community. I also came across a great blog called the Non-productive Network. The do a great series covering individual Horror Hosts.

So it looks like the Horror Host is here to stay. Who knows maybe one day I can finally produce Dr. Caliban’s Nightmare Theater.