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sadquickchristmassnowman · 4 months

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Hiiii I have a community question I wanted to ask!!

Abed mentions all sorts of movies and tv shows through out Community, but I just wanted to know if maybe you have like a list of which ones are real and which ones he seemed to like more than others.

I can only think of the dark knight because of the dvd Annie broke, and the Star Wars movies (except he apparently hates the prequels) and cougar town!

great question! sorry for the delay on a response.

so, he mentions/references an insane number of movies and tv shows throughout the series, and I unfortunately do not have a list of every single one. although, I am (VERY slowly) working on an in-depth episode-by-episode analysis of the entire series, and listing every pop culture reference is a subsection in that. but that's not helpful right now. moving on

I don't have the picture, but there's this questionnaire abed filled out (outside of the show, it must have been uploaded to a website as promotional material for the show). he says his favorite movie is a tie between:

ghostbusters (1984, comedy/horror)

an american werewolf in london (1981, horror)

back to the future (1985, sci-fi/comedy)

blade runner (1982, sci-fi/action)

stand by me (1986, adventure/comedy)

stripes (1981, comedy/war)

star wars (1977, sci-fi/fantasy, also called "a new hope")

star wars: the empire strikes back (1980, sci-fi/fantasy)

star wars: the return of the jedi (1983, sci-fi/fantasy)

ferris bueller's day off (1986, comedy/drama)

jaws (1975, thriller/adventure)

raising arizona (1987, comedy/crime)

jurassic park (1993, adventure/sci-fi)

seven (1995, crime/mystery)

the matrix (1999, action/sci-fi)

the goonies (1985, adventure/comedy)

the breakfast club (1985, comedy/romance)

real genius (1985, comedy/sci-fi)

better off dead (1985, comedy/romance)

the fog of war (2003, documentary/war)

pulp fiction (1994, crime/thriller)

(btw if anyone knows what I’m talking about and has the screenshot please rb with it! I cannot for the life of me find it lmao)

I believe this is a list he apparently made in 2009, either in the first few weeks of school or right before the school year started. so it's possible he would answer differently as the series progressed. also, I do take some of these extra-canon things with a grain of salt, as on the same form he said his favorite place on campus was study room D or something, when obviously they definitely meant to write study room F. so, the credibility of my source for this information isn't exactly rock-solid. although, he does mention a lot of these movies on screen, and expresses love for many of them (the most notable ones probably being star wars episodes IV-VI, the breakfast club, and pulp fiction)

as you can see from the list, abed particularly loves american movies from the 80's. just a trend I thought I’d point out.

here's a few others he mentions loving, or just pretty notably references:

the dark night (2008, action/crime, as you mentioned)

rudolph the red-nosed reindeer (1964, musical/animated, is the whole basis of 2x11 abed's uncontrollable christmas)

the shawshank redemption (1994, horror/crime, is the basis for his plot with troy, annie, and shirley in 4x05 cooperative escapism in familial relations)

freaky friday (I believe it's the original one from 1976 specifically, but it's been remade a bunch. comedy/fantasy. it's the basis of abed and troy's story in 4x11 basic human anatomy)

rambo/first blood (series starting in 1982, action/thriller. abed talks about how messy the progressive series titles are in 3x14 pillows and blankets)

ocean's eleven (2001, crime/thriller, the basis for the heist scene from 3x21 the first chang dynasty)

hearts of darkness (1991, documentary/war, abed mentions it while pointedly filming dean pelton's production of his greendale commercial rather than helping with the commercial itself. similarly, hearts of darkness filmed the making of apocalypse now)

apocalypse now (1979, war/action, see the above explanation)

die hard (series starting in 1988, action/thriller, abed mentions wanting to do a die hard homage for christmas multiple times throughout season 4)

good will hunting (1997, thriller/romance, troy and abed's story in 1x24 english as a second language is filled with references to this movie. abed is doing homages on purpose, troy is not)

my dinner with andre (1981, comedy/drama, abed does a very elaborate homage at jeff's accidental expense in 2x19 critical film studies)

indiana jones (raiders of the lost ark, temple of doom, and the last cruscade only. he mentions loving the first three indiana jones movies in 1x04 social psychology)

aliens (1986, action/adventure/sci-fi, he and troy dress up as an alien and ripley in 2x06 epidemiology) (side note, I believe they're specifically referencing aliens, which is a sequel to alien. could be wrong though)

blade (1998, horror/action, they watch it over the course of 3x15 origins of vampire mythology after troy and abed assert multiple times that it is an amazing movie)

I think he generally talks about movies more than he talks about tv shows, but he does mention quite a few of them. some notable mentions are:

friends (1994, sitcom, mentions at least twice)

m*a*s*h (1972, sitcom, mentions in passing in 1x05 advanced criminal law, and references throughout 1x13 investigative journalism)

the cape (2011, action, mentions throughout 4x13 advanced introduction to finality)

who's the boss (1984, sitcom, is the premise of his whole storyline in 2x20 competitive wine tasting)

LOST (2004, sci-fi, mentions at least twice)

obviously there are a LOT more, but I just tried to list some of the most important ones, plot-wise and for understanding of his character. hopefully I’ll be able to get back to everyone with a super long list of every tv show and movie he ever mentions lmao, but that'll take a while. (there are lists online that say they list every movie and tv show abed has ever mentioned, but ngl I don't 100% trust those, so I’ll make my own lmao. but I put the link to one of them if you're curious. here's another one too)

at this point anyone who has seen community knows there are some really really big ones that I haven’t mentioned yet. pieces of media that are INTEGRAL to abed as a character. I was saving them for last lmfao. they are:

kickpuncher

inspector spacetime

cougar town

if I had to pick a holy trinity of media for abed, it would be these three things. these are EASILY the things he talks about the most, which is interesting, as both the kickpuncher movie franchise and the inspector spacetime series are completely fictional, and only exist in the community universe. (this is probably so they can show abed actually watching some of the shows/movies he talks about, without the obvious copyright issues that come with playing clips from an already existing movie/tv show on your screen. they kind of do that with blade in 3x15, but they only play vague fighting sounds, and never show their tv on our screen. anyway. not relevant.) to answer one of your questions from the ask, I believe those two are the ONLY fictional pieces of media abed talks about. as far as I know, everything else he mentions is real, including cougar town.

kickpuncher is obviously reminiscent of sci-fi/action films from the 80's, like robocop. like I said earlier, taking their place so that they could have a more substantial role in abed's on-screen life without any copywrite worries. it's a whole franchise, so there are multiple movies: kickpuncher, kickpuncher 2: codename: punchkicker, kickpuncher 3: the final kickening, kickpuncher: detroit, kickpuncher: miami (?), and kicksplasher (?). kicksplasher is apparently shown as a poster on abed's wall, and I’m assuming it's from the same franchise, although that could be wrong. the point is there's a very elaborate universe for kickpuncher, and it's a big part of abed's, and later troy's, film taste. the first time they mention it is in 1x15 romantic expressionism, when abed, troy, shirley, pierce, and chang all get together in abed's dorm room to make fun of stupid movies together. it's funny that it was introduced as a stupid movie to watch ironically, then troy and abed both end up genuinely loving it lmao. classic

inspector spacetime is obviously reminiscent of doctor who. they're both british sci-fi series that have been running for decades. doctor who uses a police box to travel the multiverse, while doctor who uses a telephone box. doctor who has malicious daleks who chant "exterminate," while inspector spacetime has blorgons who shout "eradicate." the concepts of the shows are obviously the same, with the actor for the doctor changing every season, etc etc. they're essentially the same exact show, but, like I said before, changed slightly so they can world-build without getting copywrited. there is something a little bit silly about this, though. it's definitely a continuity error and it's up to everyone whether they want to accept it as canon or not, I guess, but there's an episode where abed is actually wearing a doctor who t-shirt. (it also references bill and ted, but the doctor who part is what's relevant.) here's some pictures:

awesome shirt tbh, but it is a little bit funny that is essentially makes it true that doctor who and inspector spacetime both exist in the community universe. and, these pictures are from the cold open of 4x11 basic human anatomy, which is way after inspector spacetime is introduced to the show (3x01 biology 101). so, is inspector spacetime just a rip-off of doctor who? is abed a fan of both shows? if he is, clearly he likes inspector spacetime better. anyway. I would guess that this wasn't intentional. but that is definitely a tardis on that shirt. maybe it's just a classic season 4 continuity mistake. oh well. I guess that's just how the cookie crumbles. anyway.

cougar town time! yes, it's a real show. I didn't think it was but it is. what's not real is cougarton abbey, the short-lived british remake that britta gets abed into in 3x01 biology 101. but yeah. it has 6 seasons and is streaming on hulu, if you're interested. I’ve heard it's not good but who knows for sure. something cool about cougar town is that abed is actually in an episode. let me be clear: not danny pudi. ABED. it's similar to the story abed tells about being invited to the cougar town set and shitting his pants while having an existential crisis about the layers of reality. here is a youtube clip of the scene. I found out about it while stalking danny pudi's wikipedia page months ago, you know, a typical sunday afternoon activity, and I saw a cougar town credit on there. I didn't even know it was a real show at that point so you can imagine my surprise lmao. anyway. idk if you knew that already but it's one of my favorite community easter eggs. so funny.

okay! I hope this is enough information to suit your needs, and I am once again opening the floor to anyone who wants to add anything 💯 this was fun, thanks for the ask, and stay fresh everyone ✌️

#classic sadquickchristmassnowman blunder of writing an entire goddamn essay to answer a simple fucking question #also just to be clear george lucas went back and fucked with the original star wars trilogy #so unless you really put some work in to find the original versions of the original trilogy #you won’t be watching the versions that abed loves the most #sorry my indoctrinated me into his elitist star wars opinions #but I’m keeping it in the tags as to not clutter up the information with more of my senseless yapping #anyway #community #nbc community #community nbc #abed nadir #media analysis #community encyclopedia

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aperiodofhistory · 8 months

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Books to read in autumn

Historical novels

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel: England in the 1520s

The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett: Building the most splendid Gothic cathedral the world has ever known

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon: A back-in-time Scottish romance

Company of Liars by Karen Maitland: A novel of the plague in the year 1348

The underground railroad by Colson Whitehead: Enslavement of African Americans through escape and flight

The God of small things by Arundhati Roy: A family drama in the 60s located in India

The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank: A powerful reminder of the horrors of world war II

Fantasy

A Game of thrones by George R. R. Martin: A Fantasy epic run by politics, strong families, dragons

Red rising by Pierce Brown: A dystopian science fiction novel set in a future colony on Mars

Babel by R.F. Kuang: Student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British empire

Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree: A fresh take on fantasy staring an orc and a mercenary

Jade City by Fonda Lee: A gripping Godfather-esque saga of intergenerational blood feuds, vicious politics, magic, and kungfu

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik: A tale of hope and magic, with brave maidens and scary monsters

The Atlas six by Olivie Blake: A dark academic sensation following six magicians

Mysteries & Horror

The Gathering Dark: An Anthology of Folk Horror by various authors: Short stories perfect for the Halloween mood

Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon: The story of Vern, a pregnant teenager who escapes the cult Cainland

The Weird and the Eerie by Mark Fisher: A noted cultural critic unearths the weird, the eerie, and the horrific in 20th-century culture through a wide range of literature, film, and music

Holly by Stephen King: Disappearances in a midwestern town

Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas: Supernatural western

The good house by Tananarive Due: A classic New England tale that lays bare the secrets of one little town

Nonfiction

Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places by Colin Dickey: The trail of America's ghosts

What moves the dead by T. Kingfisher: A gripping and atmospheric retelling of Edgar Allan Poe's classic "The Fall of the House of Usher

South to America: A Journey Below the Mason Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation by Imani Perry: A journey through the history, rituals, and landscapes of the American South—and a revelatory argument for why you must understand the South in order to understand America

All the living and the dead by Hayley Campbell: An exploration of the death industry and the people―morticians, detectives, crime scene cleaners, embalmers, executioners―who work in it and what led them there

Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas R. Hofstadter: Gödel, Escher, Bach is a wonderful exploration of fascinating ideas at the heart of cognitive science: meaning, reduction, recursion, and much more

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gothhobbithoe · 5 months

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What tv shows/films the Fellowship would watch:

Gandalf: Ok so Gandalf loves his true crime, he's always listening to podcasts and watching true crime tiktok. He also loves the cosy old lady crime dramas such as Poirot or Marple. Gandalf also enjoys hospital dramas. Basically if there's drama he's here for it.

Frodo: Frodo loves his period dramas, Bridgerton, Downton abbey, Call the Midwife all that jazz. He loves the old fashioned scandals and dramas. Will cry if a character dies.

Sam: Now sam loves his cooking shows, espcially Masterchef or Bake off and will attempt the challenges if he's feeling really inspired. He also loves gardening shows, you know the really british one where they speak in soft whispers so they don't distrurb the bees.

Pippin: Pippin is an absolutely a sci-fi fan, Dr Who, Star Wars, Star Trek you name it he's watched it. and yes he will talk in great detail about it. He's also obsessed with Marvel and has already decided what member of the avengers each fellowship member is. (Gandalf is Nick Fury)

Merry: Fantasy and horror all the way. He's more into dark fantasy like Game of Thrones but will watch Merlin and other shows to give himself a break from the gritty shows. He will also watch horror until he scares himself but he wont admit that to anyone not even Pippin. Also partial to a good zombie show. Knows all of American Horror Story off by heart.

Boromir: Secret Disney fan but can't let anyone else know. Also enjoys a good comedy show, stand up comedy or the comedy shows with his silly humour. He also loves Action films like Top Gun, Die Hard and John Wicks, has watched all the Fast and Furious films.

Legolas: Loves nature documentaires and finds David Attenborough's voice so soothing. He also enjoys a good fashion/makeover show and has binge watch RuPaul's Drag Race too many times to count (him and Thranduil watch it together)

Gimli: Now Gimli loves his history shows, you know the types that your dad watched on a saturday. Deep dive into the pyramids, Time Team, fancy graphics and digging up bones. Mainly about ancient structures and buildings really. He loves the ancient egyptians and has so many facts about their culture and their buildings. He also loves a good historical drama, as long as it's accurate.

Aragorn: Survival shows, Bear Grylls, Ed Stafford etc. He loves watching their shows and getting tips for future quests. He also enjoys shows about people who live int he wild e.g Alaskan Bush People as it give him nostalgia of his Strider days.

#this was silly but couldnt get it out my head #the fellowship #the fellowship of the ring #lotr #gandalf #frodo #sam #pippin #merry #aragorn #gimli #boromir #legolas

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liesmyth · 25 days

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Any fiction recommendations? I’ve repeatedly read Locked Tomb, natch. I’d love something similarly brainwork inducing but maybe a touch lighter. Also not fantasy or sci fi…I need something to listen to while I do a ton of chores, and those can be hard (for me) because the unfamiliar proper nouns get confusing. :/

anon!! I'm terrible at reccing anything based on “if you liked TLT” because TLT is like five different genres in a trench coat, but I TRIED (⭐) Here are some brainworm-y recs that aren't sff — where by brainworm-y I mean that they stayed with me for a while after I finished them, but aren't overly confusing. (most of them are books, but available on audio)

Podcasts: a tumblr pal recced me the deviser based on me liking the eldritch elements of tlt; it's short and horror-y, and I really enjoyed it.

I haven't checked out the new TMA yet but I see many TLT peeps who are enjoying it (or S1 of the original The Magnus Archives could be a good entry point if you haven't ever listened to it)

TV: Unfortunately I hardly ever watch live action stuff BUT if you haven't seen either IWTV (the series not the film) or Yellowjackets, I do rec those! There's a lot of overlap between these fans and TLT fandom on my dash. His Dark Materials also goes hard and you might enjoy it (dysfunctional characters! worldbuilding! religious weirdness!) but it has more sff elements than other stuff I've recced. Oddball out of nowhere but The Great is a fun show if you enjoy the meme moments of TLT + people being gleefully horrible + having feelings despite your best intentions

Animanga: Utena (!!!!!) also Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, which occupies a very similar space to TLT in my brain

Books!

✧ I went through my “women unhinged” goodreads shelf and found some books that are avaliable in audio format, and might appeal. These are wildly varied in scope and ngl the criterion was just “at least one person (besides myself) who enjoyed tlt also this book” and the similarities stop there. It's all vibes baby! Still, I tried

my heart is a chainsaw by stephen graham jones (horror, slasher), bunny by mona awad (horror, wildly unhinged), the witching hour by anne rice (horror, gothic)

matrix by lauren groff (historical, lesbian nuns), anything by sarah waters (historical fiction + lesbians), rebecca by daphne du maurier (historical, gothic)

the plot by jean hanff korelitz (litfic, thriller), sadie by courtney summers (thriller, coming of age). anything by gillian flynn (thrillers with terrible women).

✧ I really enjoy Tana French thrillers for the strong sense of place, great prose, and the complete emotional turmoil of her character-centric narratives. If anything sounds up your alley, I enjoyed the witch's elm + dublin murder squad series. They're murder mystery procedural but the messy characters really elevate the novels. Available in audiobook also

✧ American Elsewhere, technically scifi but set in New Mexico. Somehow, cosmic horrors who have taken over a quaint little town and worse! They are enforcing HETERONORMATIVITY upon it! They also have tentacles. The main character rocks

✧ Sundial by Catriona Ward: insane, gripping psychological horror. A mother and her unsettling daughter take a trip to the isolate desert ranch where the main chracter grew up. Surrounded by unsettling science experiments

✧ A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan: when the parasocial relationship is so strong, it accidentally summons a hellmonster from another dimension

✧ SFF adjacent, sorry, but set in the real world (historical, tho) — Cuckoo Song by Frances Hardinge, a middle grade novel with fairytale elements that gave me more brainworms than any kids book ought to, mostly because I LOVED the main character. She occupies a very similar place in my brain as Gideon does. This is actually the only book on the list that I'm not sure is available in audio format, but if you get a chance and it's up your alley, I'd check it out

I hope there's at least ONE thing you'll like in here! lmk (also. lmk if you don't have access to a way to borrow audiobooks but would like to)

#anonymous #ask

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odinsblog · 4 months

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Most critics have failed to consider the full implications of the monster's Otherness, overlooking the fact that the main variable upon which the monster's Otherness rests is his physiology, his dark and grotesque body that locates him firmly as an Other within the racial social hierarchy of the early nineteenth-century. (source)

The Whale Frankenstein films have multiple political connotations, including the queer resonances with which James Whale, an out gay man in homophobic Hollywood, sympathetically suffused them. My interest here is in their relation to U.S. racial politics of the 1930s, specifically the rise in lynchings and the 1931 conviction of nine young Black men known as the “Scottsboro boys.” There are, of course, no visible African-American characters in the Whale films, whose setting is an unspecified Europe and whose director and actors are English. But the films indirectly offer a surprisingly radical intervention into American iconographies of race, rape, and lynching. Within their cinematic fantasy space — or perhaps because of their cinematic fantasy space, given that more realist films of the 1930s were more cautious about racial politics — the Whale films offer an antilynching perspective.

In both Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein, for example, the monster is depicted in flight from a crowd of angry townspeople, whose pursuit of him is represented with the visual markers of a lynch mob, including barking dogs, fiery torches, and angry shouts. At one point in Bride of Frankenstein, the monster is strung up on a tree as a cluster of white people surrounds him, their anger sparked by his perceived violation of a white girl.

The monster is presented sympathetically at this moment, his iconography blended with that of Christian martyrdom. Here the Frankenstein monster meets both Christ on the cross and the victim of lynching. Whale’s monster also seems kin to that other 1930s film figure associated with blackness and violence: King Kong. Like Kong, Whale’s Frankenstein monster is as much sympathetic victim as he is source of horror, while the true location of monstrosity becomes the mob who demonizes him.

(continue reading)

#interesting #frankenstein #frankensteins monster #black frankenstein #racially coded #racism #literature

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shadysystem · 4 months

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๋࣭ ⭑

shady !! GENERAL INFO . . . > adult > he/they collectively > queer + open polyam

current host: he/him, 22, fictive.

co host: he/him, 20s, fictive.

☹︎ ☹︎ ☹︎ ☹︎ ☹︎ ☹︎ ☹︎ ☆ autistic, so please be kind.

we're a fictive heavy system looking to make friends. we vary in levels of approachable-ness, lol, but everyone wants to meet someone new. sourceless headmates are especially eager.

READ MORE FOR MORE INFO

all members on this blog will have a sign-off tag and an emoji. in the event they don't want to reveal themselves, we have a collective tag: #shadyspeakz

here is a list of frequent posters and their emojis. always a wip!

COLLECTIVE INTERESTS . . . reading, writing, cold weather, dark colors, horror films & creepy aesthetic, computers & coding.

MEDIA WE'RE INTO . . . homestuck, south park, attack on titan, my hero academia, scott pilgrim, american horror story, dmmd, batman (comics, games, movies), black butler, breaking bad, danganronpa, final fantasy (mostly 14 & 15), haikyuu, jujutsu kaisen, legend of zelda, mystic messenger, regular show . . .

DNI: just don't be a dick. also be an adult. NO MINORS AT ALL. also dni if you interact with syscourse.

#did #osdd #osddid #did system #plural #plural system #system #system introduction #actually did #sysblr #plurality #shadyspeakz

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k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9 · 1 year

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𝔑𝔦𝔤𝔥𝔱𝔟𝔯𝔢𝔢𝔡 (յգգօ) 𝔴𝔯𝔦𝔱𝔱𝔢𝔫 𝔞𝔫𝔡 𝔡𝔦𝔯𝔢𝔠𝔱𝔢𝔡 𝔟𝔶 ℭ𝔩𝔦𝔳𝔢 𝔅𝔞𝔯𝔨𝔢𝔯

#Nightbreed (1990)#Nightbreed #American dark fantasy horror film #90's #90s #1990 #dark fantasy horror film #dark #fantasy #horror movies #90's horror movies #90s horror movies

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nightlylaments · 4 months

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— nightlylaments. a writeblr reintroduction.

heyy, writeblr! it's been a while since I joined the community, and i've been pretty inactive, so I thought I should reintroduce myself. also, since I have more than one wip now, I thought it was time for me to make a master list even though three of them don't have any posts yet. all of my works will contain black mc's, other poc characters, and mentions of mental health. i mainly write fantasy, but i want to get into mysteries and poetry. i am also tag and ask friendly. i love talking about my wips so pls don't hesitate to ask questions. carrd | pintrest | spotify

about me.

my name is Tee, she/her, 22, and I am an African American from tx.

I'm a recent college graduate with a bachelor's degree in criminal justice

I enjoy writing fantasy, magical realism, and mysteries

in my free time, I like to read, cook, and paint. I also enjoy playing games, photography ( I have two film cameras), and listening/finding new music

my wips.

she who owns tragedy | a na dark fantasy.

a girl made of destructive magic and a boy made of shadows. their fates are tied together by prophecy, and they can either save or end the world. [ introduction ] . [ tag ] send an ask to be +/-

midnights in ebondvalley | na fantasy romance with a hint of mystery and horror.

twilight meets nacy drew in louisiana with southern gothic vibes.

the anatomy of a heart | magical realism.

romeo and juliet retelling that follows a girl from a family whose women are cursed to lose pieces of their hearts after heartbreak. chronicles the boys and men who have stolen pieces of her.

untitled | horror and magical realism.

think Jennifer's body and ginger snaps, but the mc is the token black girl, and it explores black feminine rage.

ungodly hours | gothic romance tinged horror and murder mystery.

a girl is raked with grief when her best friend is found dead, his brother wants nothing but vengeance. when the police refuse to help, he takes the case into his own hands, forcing him to make a deal he's not sure he can keep. [ introduction ] . [ tag ] send an ask to be +/-

✧ will be updated as i post/update wips ✧

#writeblr reintro #black writblr #wtwcommunity #writblr intro #looking for mutuals #writeblr friends #writeblr community #tag games #took me a month to make this.#im gonna be active this time.

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benwvatt · 2 months

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scavengers reign

[Image ID: A drawing of a lush, green forest on an alien planet in the TV show Scavengers Reign. On the left is a large, thick, white stone column covered with large, green, round globules of moss. The center contains large, white circular stepping stones on the ground, much larger than any living being in the image. A grey, deer-shaped alien with a slightly lighter grey underbelly and round, grey protrusions coming from its face sits curled up on one of the stones. On another stone, further back, sits a grey robot made up of a three large metal ovals next to each other. It tends to a small lily with four large, white petals growing from the stone.

In the center of the image, two thick, brown columns that could be stone or tree trunks rest behind the alien and the robot. One is diagonal and points to the upper right. The other is nearly upright and is tilted slightly to the left. The right side of the image contains three tall yellow broomstick-shaped stalks of what look like hay, and there are three jellyfish-shaped creatures with very short dark grey legs, small round red eyes, and dark grey bodies. One of the creatures looks sadly at the deer alien and the robot. The other two are walking away, out of the frame. End ID.]

Title: Scavengers Reign (2023-?)

Channel: HBO Max.

Origin: U.S. American.

Genres: 2D animation, science fiction, science fantasy, adventure, and horror.

Runtime: As of March 2024, there is 1 season with 12 episodes. Each episode is ~25 minutes. The show’s executive producers have mapped out future seasons and are excited to do more, but with HBO’s penchant for cancelling animated/sci-fi TV shows and removing them from streaming, I’m not sure if it’ll get renewed for more.

This show feels: Enthralling, wondrous, hypnotic, and horrifying.

Premise: Scavengers Reign is a science fiction show about the marooned survivors of a damaged cargo ship in outer space. They explore their mysterious, lush, and hostile new planet with caution, and, due to the crash, they have been isolated in three groups who must eventually make their way back to each other. Most of the cast are human, but one main character is a robot. The new planet contains fantasy-transformed plants, animals, and aliens. Does danger lurk around the next corner?

Themes explored by the show: Social isolation, mental health crises, survival in the wilderness, the ability to trust, human-alien interactions, grief, death, community, psychological horror/trauma, and the poisonous control that nostalgia holds over humans.

Representation & marginalized voices: Scavengers Reign has several nonwhite main characters, and about the half the cast are female while the other half are male. The nonwhite characters are also voiced by people of color, and there are many female voice actors in the cast. I appreciate that romance isn’t a core part of the show, as the story explores themes like survival and mistrust instead.

Notes:

Scavengers Reign is well-received by the public. It has a 100% approval score on Rotten Tomatoes with an average rating of 8.7/10.

Scavengers Reign originally aired as an 8-minute, dialogue-free animated short film in 2016 on the Adult Swim channel. It is available to watch here on Vimeo.

Most U.S. American shows created by major streaming services or TV networks are available to pirate. Sites like FMovies or LookMovies should have it.

#scavengers reign #tv shows #tv recommendations #science fiction #science fantasy #adventure #2d animation #animation #look i'm just Very Very Enthusiastic #lol can you tell i've never seen it but i routinely absorb tv news through my skin the way that frogs breathe in water?#and i NEED HBO TO PAY CREDENCE TO THEIR ANIMATORS!!!!#welcome to my blog. let's hope my ao3 subscribers don't hate me for posting tv recs to ao3 of all sites #benwvatt #benwvatt alltt

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sewercentipede · 7 months

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hmm after watching/rewatching some movies off my halloween horror list (an American werewolf in London, the omen, the fog, nightbreed, Jennifer’s body, Constantine, I forget what else) and then rewatching legend im feeling like 1) legend is actually a perfect film and 2) dark fantasy magical stuff captures the vibe of what halloween means to me way more than horror soooo it’s back to the basics, really. (Read: im back on my 80s froudian dark fantasy films bullshit!!! with a dash of very specific horror like. interview with the vampire, hellraiser, the vvitch, suspiria, carrie, other such types of things that have haunting and/or mystical qualities to me. also tim burton movies and danny elfman soundtrack movies)

#and poltergeist I just love poltergeist sm #I probably will watch the brood though too and a couple other dario argento movies

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thewarmestplacetohide · 9 months

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<3 your blog! trying to watch more international films and i know there's some classics from Asia. do you have any recs for Asian horror

thank you!!

here are my favorite Asian horror films (note: a lot of these contain triggering content, so please do research beforehand if that's an issue):

Japan

ゴジラ/Godzilla (1954; creature feature, science fiction): US nuclear testing off the coast of Japan creates a giant lizard creature that rampages through Tokyo

藪の中の黒猫/Kuroneko (1968; ghosts): a woman and her daughter-in-law come back as vengeful spirits after they're murdered by samurai

ハウス/House (1977; horror comedy, ghosts): a group of schoolgirls visit a haunted mansion

天使のたまご/Angel's Egg (1985; dark fantasy, surrealist, animated): in a ruined world, a young girl cares for a giant egg

吸血鬼(バンパイア)ハンターD/Vampire Hunter D (1985; vampires, animated): when a woman is betrothed to a vampire, she hires a vampire hunter in an attempt to escape

アキラ/Akira (1988; science fiction, animated): 31 years after a nuke was dropped on Tokyo, a young man tries to save his friend from government experiments

鉄男/Testuo: The Iron Man (1989; techno horror, body horror): a man finds his flesh is cursed to turn to iron

パーフェクトブルー/Perfect Blue (1997; psychological horror, animated): a pop star is driven mad by a stalker

リング/Ring (1998; techno horror, ghosts): a videotape curses anyone who watches it to die in seven days

オーディション/Audition (1999; psychological thriller): a widower auditioning women to be his new wife makes a deadly choice

バトル・ロワイアル/Battle Royale (2000; science fiction, psychological thriller): a group of students are put on an island and told to slaughter each other

回路/Pulse (2001; techno horror, ghosts): a group of young people in Tokyo discover a website that claims to show you ghosts

殺し屋１/Ichi the Killer (2001; psychological thriller, slasher): a sadomasochistic Yakuza enforcer goes on a rampage

仄暗い水の底から/Dark Water (2002; ghosts): a divorced mother and her young daughter move into a haunted apartment building

ノロイ/Noroi: The Curse (2005; occult, found footage): a paranormal investigator tries to tie together a series of supernatural events

シン・ゴジラ/Shin Godzilla (2016; creature feature, science fiction): a giant lizard kaiju attacks Tokyo

カメラを止めるな!/One Cut of the Dead (2017; horror comedy, zombies): people making a cheap zombie flick find themselves in the middle of a real zombie outbreak

South Korea

올드보이/Oldboy (2003; psychological thriller): after being imprisoned in a room for fifteen years, a man hunts down the ones responsible

괴물/The Host (2006; creature feature, science fiction): a monster made when American chemicals were spilled into the Han River emerges to attack a community

박쥐/Thirst (2009; vampires): a Catholic priest is turned into a vampire by a blood transfusion

악마를 보았다/I Saw the Devil (2010; psychological thriller): a man goes on a brutal revenge mission after the murder of his wife

늑대소년/A Werewolf Boy (2012; werewolves, dark fantasy): a girl moves to a country home, where she befriends a strange, feral boy

부산행/Train to Busan (2016; zombies): a zombie plague breaks out on a train

서울역/Seoul Station (2016; zombies, animated): a zombie plague breaks out at a train station; companion film to Train to Busan

아가씨/The Handmaiden (2016; psychological thriller): a woman hired to be a handmaiden to a Japanese heiress plans to defraud her

곤지암/Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum (2018; ghosts, found footage): a group of influencers livestream themselves exploring a supposedly haunted institution

#살아있다/#Alive (2020; zombies): a young man is trapped in his apartment during a zombie outbreak

Hong Kong

殭屍先生/Mr. Vampire (1985; horror comedy, vampires): a Taoist priest must fight jiangshi that descend upon a village

餃子/Dumplings (2004; psychological thriller): a woman obsessed with staying young eats dumplings stuffed with strange meat

維多利亞壹號/Dream Home (2010; slasher): a woman goes on a killing spree to get her dream apartment

India

Bhoot/Ghost (2003; ghosts): a Mumbai businessman and his wife move into a haunted flat

Ek Thi Daayan/Once There was a Witch (2013; supernatural horror): a magician seeks protection from a witch who has haunted him since childhood

Tumbbad (2018; dark fantasy, occult): a father and son seek treasure in a castle inhabited by an evil god

Bulbbul (2020; dark fantasy): the village of a child bride, now grown, is attacked by a chudail

Indonesia

Pengabdi Setan/Satan's Slaves (2017; occult): a woman returns from the dead to haunt her children (this is a remake of a film from the 80s, which i have not yet seen)

Sebelum Iblis Menjemput/May the Devil Take You (2018; occult): a woman and her step-family visit her sick father's old home in search of what ails him

Iran

دختری در شب تنها به خانه می‌رود/A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014; vampires): a vampire targets a small Iranian town, attacking men who mistreat women (technically an American production)

زیر سایه/Under the Shadow (2016; occult): during the War of the Cities, a woman and her young daughter are haunted by djinns

Thailand

ชัตเตอร์ กดติดวิญญาณ/Shutter (2004; ghosts): a man begins capturing strange figures in his camera

Turkey

Baskin (2015; occult, dark fantasy, surrealist): a group of police officers discover a gateway to hell

Taiwan

哭悲/The Sadness (2021; bio horror): a virus spreads through Taipei, compelling all who are infected to commit the worst crimes they can imagine

#ask #anon #rec list #long post

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adarkrainbow · 6 months

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Spooky season fairytales (7)

And finally, my last "spooky season" post! With seven posts of movie (and series and books) recommandations, plus additional reblogs, you'll have plenty on your plate for this Halloween!

And for this final post, I will go into the world of horror movies. I am here speaking of pure horror movies - not fairytale movies, not dark fantasy movies... BUT! Horror movies that were inspired by or heavily references fairytales.

Let us begin with a classic of classics when it comes to fairytale horror:

The Night of the Hunter, the 1955 classic movie. While technically not a horror movie per se, as many call it a "thriller" or a "film noir", it is very close to the horror world, and it heavily draws from fairytales!

Everybody knows by now the plot of this famous masterpiece. Black-and-white, heavily drawing from the silent movie era, "The Night of the Hunter" tells the story of how a dangerous serial-killer pretending to be a preacher worms his way into the household of a widow and her two children, hoping to find the money the deceased husband had hidden... As he kills the mother, the two children have to escape his clutches and wander throughout the American countryside in search of a new hope, while being hunted down by the evil figure...

When Charles Laughton decided to adapt the novel this movie was based off, he called it a "nightmarish mother Goose story". And, faithful to this description, he made sure his movie would be a dark Mother Goose fairytale. A tragic family drama forcing children to flee through the wilderness... Young ones fleeing from their wicked step-father, and seeking comfort in a kind grandmother-figure... A dark story filled with threats and creepy sights that ultimately ends well... Most significantly, the antagonist of the story, Harry Powell, played by Robert Mitchum, is actually designed to be the fusion of all three most famous male antagonists in Perrault's fairytales.

As a sinister serial killer who murders his new wife in a story about greed, he is Bluebeard. As a monstrous father-figure who hunts down two children across the wilderness to kill them, he is the Ogre. And finally, he is the Big Bad Wolf - but in this case the references are more to the early 20th century cartoons involving the character, since some of the mannerism of the villain, coupled with dark-humor slapstick scenes, clearly evoke the cartoonish Big Bad Wolf one can see in pieces such as Disney's Little Pigs cartoons.

Overall, this movie would be best described as a "realistic take on Perrault's fairytales". Remove the magic and the intemporal nature, and you've got this story.

Psycho, the 1960 classic of Hitchcock, also deserves to be on this list. Just like "The Night of the Hunter", it is another black-and-white, stylized thriller-movie about a serial killer, adapted from a novel it overshadowed. But whereas Night of the Hunter was purposefully designed as a fairytale, Psycho has little to do with it.

So why is Psycho on this list? Because while it wasn't designed as a fairytale piece, it ended up being a "fairytale horror movie". You see, many before me have pointed it out and analyzed it, but "Psycho" reuses a setting, a plot and characters that are eerily similar if not completely parallel to fairytales. The most notorious example is that Psycho is usually called a "modern Bluebeard". Indeed, we are yet again dealing with a male figure murdering women in the context of romantic/erotic relationships, and a forbidden room (well, a forbidden house) hiding a female corpse... [Note: Given Psycho's huge success, I do not think I need to put spoilers warnings]. In a lesser way, Psycho can also be read as a retelling of Little Red Riding Hood. A charming male figure seemingly harmless and playful charms women... only for them to end up being murdered. The erotic undertones and the fact the male murderer little dresses as an old woman accentuates the Little Red Riding Hood parallels.

But more generally, one can tie up this movie with a lot of fairytales that all share the similar canvas of - the seemingly sweet young man is a murderer killing women (for example Grimm's The Robber Bridegroom, which also has an elderly mother-ifugre), or the mother-in-law is a deadly antagonist (the second part of Sleeping Beauty where the prince's ogress-mother wants to kill Sleeping Beauty).

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre sees us leave the world of more "quiet" and "suggestive" black and white movie for the gritty, disturbing, repulsive and yet morbidly poetic and nightmarishly oniric world of... what stood between the slasher-to-be-coded and the redneck-horror-yet-to-be-created.

Did you know that this movie began as a Hansel and Gretel project? Oh yes! It all started out with a project to make a movie out of Hansel and Gretel, a dark and adult movie. As this project was settled, the influence of "Night of the Living Dead" reshaped the creation, and an attempt at re-creating the feeling of this movie was worked on... Then it was just a question of adding disturbing real-life facts, from the social rot of the Rust Belt to the life of Ed Gein, and you've got this classic of horror. The Hansel and Gretel origins of the movie still remain - the heavy topics of food and cannibalism, the treatment of young adults as cattle, teenagers being lured into the depths of the woods to a seemingly peaceful but in fact deadly house... You can also read in it a dark retelling of "Goldilocks and the Three Bears". Youth enters an unknown house uninvited and must flee when the three beasts that inhabit it come home... Except the beasts are here human serial-killers.

But the thing that should be highlighted with this movie is that... Despite being a disturbingly realistic piece with no actual magic or fantasy in it - it is the story of disturbed, mentally-ill serial killers in the depths of the dying American South - this movie has something magical to it. Or maybe "eldritchian". Most people agree that this is an actual Southern Gothic movie, and there was a fascinating video essay on Youtube about the cosmic horror aspect of this movie, and some would even classify it as a "folk-horror" piece... And there's a reason to all that.

Once again, this is probably due to the original direction of the movie as an "Hansel and Gretel" story, but despite being a "realistic" piece, the movie makes itself oniric and unreal. It uses very simplified and thus symbolic presentations and framings of the world that evoke this dark fairytale feeling - the clear cut between night and day, the unfolding of the story between a sunset and a sunrise, the limited locations that are the road - the house - the woods. There is a true "passage into the Otherworld" as the characters leave the sane, rational, civilized and human side of Texas to enter the disturbed, insane, monstrous and nocturnal domain of the antagonists, where very human taboo is systematically broken. There is something very Lovecraftian in the madness and degenerescence presented here by the murderous family, which adds to the "cosmic horror/eldritch horror" feeling when you consider the ritualistic way the various murder and grave-robbings are performed, and the extremes nature imposes on the character (scorching hot sun, pitch-black night), and the astrological foreshadowings...

Finally, the antagonists themselves are just fairytale monsters. They are modern ogres, human yet monstrous dwellers of the desert woods, beast-like man-eaters all too disturbingly human. They are the robbers killing and eating people in the woods from the Robber Bridegroom. And while they are "realistic", as in they are just insane and (possibly) inbred serial-killers, there is so much mystery left around them that they become almost supernatural. We never know their names. We never know their exact relationships to one another. We never exactly know where they came from and how they came to be as such. Just like the monstrous families of trolls and giants in fairytales, they just happen to be here, and are just known by their role. And of course, the presence of the vampiric impossibly-still-alive grandpa adds the final touch to the nightmare that truly breaks off from reality into the full uncanny valley of the fantastic in its literary sense.

Two for the price of one! Dario Argento's duology of "Suspiria" and "Inferno". (Yes there is a third movie forming a trilogy, "Mother of Tears" or "The Third Mother", but we will NOT talk about it).

These movies are staples of Italian horror, of the supernatural side of the giallo genre, and of witch horror movies in general. Suspiria is now a well known classic : a young American girl gets enroled into a German dancing school, but strange events, mysterious disappearances and gruesome murders led her to invastigate strange, eerie and oniric conspiracies - with the final twist (now what the movie is famous for) being that a witch coven is located in the school and killing people in their occult rites. Inferno, the sequel, deepens the mythology brought in Suspiria: after his sister mysteriously disappears in a New-York building, a young man comes to investigate the reason she was so afraid recently. A book about the existence of three evil witches hiding their dark magic within three different buildings - and the one the young man's sister lived in might have been one of those buildings...

These two movies follow the typical codes of the giallo (bloody murders with intentionally-unrealistic effects perpetuated by masked assaillants with a whodunnit structure), while having Argento's typical touch (the use of unnatural red, blue, green and yellow lights giving the whole movie a surrealistic and oniric tone, very unique soundtrack choices), and ultimately delve into occult and esoteric horror as they are filled with a web of evil witches, human sacrifices, deadly curses and terrifying undeads, all inspired by the Three Mothers invented by Thomas de Quincey.

However another very important if not fundamental aspect of Suspiria should not be ignored: it is a Snow-White movie. One thing that tends to confuse people when watching Suspiria is why women in their 20s such as the protagonists are acting extremely childish. The answer: they were supposed to be children. The movie was originally written to have a child protagonist, and all the students in the dance school being children - but since the murder of children as a no-no in 70s Italy, it was decided to make them adult... However Argento wanted to make a horror version of Snow-White, about an old witch targetting and murdering young girls to gain more power. So what he did was keep the original dialogues, and then create a strange set where everything was of the wrong size - too great, too tall, too big, with for examples door handles at the level of people's chests rather than hands - to have the adult protagonist look and feel like a child inside this strange academy. More obviously, Argento heavily references Disney's Snow-White in his movie - from the use of heavily saturated colors and of extremely unique, colorful, almost surreal architecture, to the presence of a neon-glass peacock in the witch's lair designed after the peacock motif of Disney's Evil Queen.

Inferno, the sequel, as a continuation of Suspiria, also has a basis and roots in a fairytale - this time Hansel and Gretel. But the references are more sparse and trivial than in Suspiria, where the fairytale theme was very present. You have a sister and a brother lured into a witch's house ; it is strongly implied if not outright confirmed that the witch's coven are cannibals ; and the movie ends up with the witch burning down. But beyond that, Argento wanted to focus much more on the "Three Mothers" mythology than to make a true fairytal rewriting.

[A warning: if you want to watch Inferno there are depictions of animal abuse. So be warned, it isn't for animal-lovers. Well the guy who performs the animal abuse gets brutally murder as a consequence, but still.]

"The Shining" is one of my favorite horror stories, and I am the first to admit it isn't a fairytale story at all. It is a familial tragedy about alcohlism, isolation and domestic abuse, interwoven with the supernatural story of a little kid with powerful psychic abilities being targetted by the ghosts and demonic entities inhabiting an hotel symbolizing all that was corrupted and wrong with upper-class 20th century USA... And the movie is certainly one of the best horror movies of the second half of the 20th century.

But there is something in Stanley Kubrick's movie that is not present in Stephen King's novel. Or rather it is present in just a few lines of the entire novel, and Kubrick had the great idea of expanding it as a recurring underlying, secondary theme... Fairytale references.

People have already written articles about it, but Stanley Kubrick decided to insist and even add fairytale references across his movie, so that, when you decide to look at the story under a certain angle, you realize there is a "dark fairytale" undertone to it. Of course, the famous behavior of insane-Jack as the Big Bad Wolf from the Three Little Pigs, with explicit references, comes to mind. But there's also the fact that The Shining is a familial tragedy about a parent figure becoming a monstrous threat - something very common of fairytales. The supernatural notably acting by having warning messages coming from nowhere and previous victims appear to the future ones recall of how in fairytales involving murderers (like Bluebeard variants, or The Robber Bridegroom, and other variants) there will always be disembodied voices, or ghost of previous victims, or talking trees warning the protagonist. And the line of Wendy evoking "breadcrumbs" to find her way through the kitchen is working with numerous other elements of the story: the labyrinthic Overlook Hotel works as the forest in which children or girls get lost ; there is the same clear rich vs poor plenty vs hunger dichotomy as in Hansel and Gretel, the woman in room 217 has been compared to a fairytale witch, and some even pointed out that the strange decoration of the Overlook rooms can evoke whimsical candy-buildings.

Of course, the movie also offers clear subversions of typical fairytale tropes - a wicked father figure rather than the wicked mother ; or how the benevolent helper called in the role of the typical "Woodsman" actually completely fails...

So, while not intended as a horror-fairytale, Kubrick's The Shining is a great horror movie which happens to have an underlying fairytale angle you can read the movie under.

And let us conclude with... The Visit! Another movie by the very controversial M. Night Shyamalan, who produces among the best and worst movies we saw recently.

I haven't watched The Visit yet, though I plan to - but I have to include this because of how obvous the fairytale references and the fairytale theme is. Two children at sent by their mother to live with their estrange grandparents. The grandparents are nice and kind, though a bit strange, with bizarre rules and a possible start of dementia. However, the longer they stay there, the more the children start noticing a much more disturbing and dangerous behavior from their grandparents...

This movie is basically a real-life take on two fairytales intertwined together - Hansel and Gretel (with explicit references such as the grandmother asking the children to climb inside the oven to clean it) and Little Red Riding Hood (the same feeling of arriving at your grandmother's house only to realize there is something WRONG with your grandmother). And the whole thing comes with a final twist that actually clearly set this movie in the line of so many American urban legends such as "The killer on the backseat", "The old woman with hairy legs" or "The clown statue".

Ad what's a urban legend if not a modern-day fairytale? Or rather a modern day orror fairytale...

#spooky season fairytales #spooky season #fairytale horror #horror movies #dark fairytales #suspiria #inferno #texas chainsaw massacre #the visit #shining #the night of the hunter #psycho

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