A brand new episode of H. P. Lovecast Podcast, and the last one for 2023, is now online.
This is a recap episode where Michele and I talk about what we accomplished with personal projects and podcast stuff for 2023 and what to expect for 2024. The episode can be streamed at the HP Lovecast Buzzsprout website, via the embedded player below, or through your podcast app of preference
Lots of citation news for The New Peplum. Two books have recently been published that cite essays in The New Peplum.
First is “The Performance of Plasticity: Method Acting, Prosthetics, and the Virtuosity of Embodied Transformation” by David LaRocca, published in Plastics, Environment, Culture, and the Politics of Waste by Edinburgh University Press. The editor of this tome is Tatiana Konrad, who wrote the essay “Laughing at the Body: The Imitation of Masculinity in Peplum Parody Films” that appears in The New Peplum.
Next up is Brill’s Companion to Ancient Greek and Roman Warfare on Film edited by Konstantinos P. Nikoloutsos and published by Brill. This collection contains five essays that cite contents from The New Peplum:
“Brad’s Biceps and Dwayne’s Delts: Stardom as Physicality and Digital Spectacle in Troy (2004) and Hercules (2014)” by Djoymi Baker (who also wrote the Hercules essay in The New Peplum)
Swords Made of Rubber: Cinematic Antiquity through the Lens of War” by Konstantinos P. Nikoloutsos
“Romans and Zealots in the Global War on Terror: Asymmetric Warfare and Counterinsurgency in Risen (2016) and Ben-Hur (2016)” by Oskar Aguado-Cantabrana
“Atalanta as Celluloid Warrior in Jason and the Argonauts (2000) and Hercules (2014)” by Patricia Salzman-Mitchell
“Rockules’ Revenge: The Portrayal of the Veteran Warrior in Brett Ratner’s Hercules” by Owen Reese
Unfortunately, I don’t have copies of the above books so I can’t say what specifically is mentioned. Once I suss that out I’ll add the information to the page for The New Peplum. As always, even years later, I am super happy and flattered to see scholars still citing the essays in The New Peplum.
I’ve also started annotating Emmanuelle scholarship and posting it here at my website so other scholars have a nice bibliographic resource. The bibliography and annotations can be found hereand it’s a major WIP.
Publishing Recap
Below is a recap of my publishing endeavors for the year of 2023. Next week this section goes blank, so wish me luck as I crank out a new batch of essays to be published in 2024. Thank you to everyone who took an interest in my publications for last year. You not only supported me, but you supported the different publishers and editors who gave me venues.
Published in February, this collection contains my essay “Dance or Dēcēdere: Gladiator and Industrial Music Sampling.”
Published in late March, the first issue of the zine Footage Fiends, contains my essay “Analisi Della Cosa: Found Footage in Caltiki and Italian Theater Going Practices.”
Published in early August, Dark Dead Things #2 contains my essay “Correlating the Contents: Mimetic Desire in H. P. Lovecraft’s ‘The Call of Cthulhu’.”
Published late November/early December of 2023, my essay “An Imperial Decree? Soitenly! Matri-Phony as Proto-Toga and Sandal Comedy” appears in the debut issue of The Journal of Stoogeological Studies.
New Publication: The Journal of Stoogeological Studies Vol 1
The debut issue of The Journal of Stoogeological Studies is out now!
I received a draft PDF of the first issue and its 88 pages of essays, reviews, and other musings all about the Three Stooges (and, as of 12/27, there’s supposed to be a bit more content added this week, so it’s getting even bigger!). I’m honored to have a short piece in this journal called “An Imperial Decree? Soitenly! Matri-Phony as Proto-Toga and Sandal Comedy.” I am no expert on The Three Stooges or a super fan or anything, but I love writing about sword n’ sandal stuff so this was a unique venue to talk about the genre in an eccentric way.
For information on procuring a copy of the zine contact editor Will Sloan (website is https://www.willsloan.ca).
New review up at my website! I take a gander at the first issue of the sex-comedy comic book Becca Boo the Bimbo Ghost.
The review can be read here. I enjoyed the comic and chipped in the for Kickstarter for issue 2, so expect a review of that when it is published. The issue 2 Kickstarter can be found here.
H. P. Lovecast Podcast
Brand new episode of H.P. Lovecast Podcast is now online!
Episode 59 Thumbnail by Michele Brittany.
Michele and I finally conclude our annual Mimic series discussion by talking about Mimic 3: Sentinel. The episode can be streamed at our Buzzsprout website, via the embedded player below, or via your podcast app of preference.
My publisher, McFarland, is doing a holiday sale on ALL their titles. Use code “HOLIDAY23” at checkout to receive 25% off your order. The sale appears to go on for the entire month of December, but McFarland suggests placing orders before the 16th in order to receive them in time for Yuletide.
This is a perfect opportunity to scoop up books I’ve participated in. For editing:
I’ve also started annotating Emmanuelle scholarship and posting it here at my website so other scholars have a nice bibliographic resource. The bibliography and annotations can be found here and it’s a major WIP.
Publishing Recap
Below is a recap of my publishing endeavors so far in 2023.
Published in February, this collection contains my essay “Dance or Dēcēdere: Gladiator and Industrial Music Sampling.”
Published in late March, the first issue of the zine Footage Fiends, contains my essay “Analisi Della Cosa: Found Footage in Caltiki and Italian Theater Going Practices.”
Published in early August, Dark Dead Things #2 contains my essay “Correlating the Contents: Mimetic Desire in H. P. Lovecraft’s ‘The Call of Cthulhu’.”
Published late November/early December of 2023, my essay “An Imperial Decree? Soitenly! Matri-Phony as Proto-Toga and Sandal Comedy” appears in the debut issue of The Journal of Stoogeological Studies.
John 3:16, the composer of the HP Lovecast podcast theme song, “Azathoth,” has released the track on Bandcamp!
Here is the link to check it out, stream it, or purchase it via name your own price. Sincere thank you to John 3:16 for being a super supporter of our podcast, sharing our content, and of course, creating this awesome tune.
CFP: The Mummy Edited Collection
Michele is teaming up with Sean Woodard to do an edited collection on The Mummy series. They have a CFP listed at UPENN, but I am also sharing a copy below.
Essays sought for an edited collection focused on Universal Pictures’ The Mummy franchise.
The 1999 Universal reboot of The Mummy, starring the indelible duo of Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz, remains a tentpole of ’90s popular culture and cinema. Not only did The Mummy launch two sequels, a spin-off series, and a reboot, but it has lived on as a cult film, loved by fans for its mixture of horror, action/adventure, and humor. The film has also developed a strong meme culture on social media — one of the most viral examples contains a photo of a car bumper sticker proclaiming: “Honk if you’d rather be watching the 1999 cinematic masterpiece ‘The Mummy’ starring Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz.”
While academic research has been focused on various releases of The Mummy (1932, 1959, 1999, and 2017), there has not been a singular scholarly text devoted to the film franchise. The recent “Brenaissance” in Fraser’s film career and the film’s anticipated 25th anniversary in 2024 make it an appropriate time to celebrate and re-evaluate the film.
The purpose of this edited collection is to place The Mummy into a cultural and theoretical context, as well as critically analyze the franchise, its connections to other genre films, and its continued influence.
We seek proposals for chapters that approach the subject matter with theoretical concepts that will appropriately meet the rigorous expectations of an academic work, but through a prose style that shall be accessible for both an academic audience and a general readership.
Topics may include, but are not limited to:
Resurgent interest in Brendan Fraser/“Brenaissance”
Stephen Sommers as an auteur
Representation of Egypt in popular culture and early filmic representation
Eastern mythology/culture/religion
Exoticism of non-western cultures
Post/De-colonialism
Heroic representation
Body horror
Eco-horror/Ecocriticism
Gender representation
Toxic depictions in film
Queer/LGBTQ+ representation
Meme/GIF culture
Psychoanalysis
Generational nostalgia
Element of music/film scoring
Genre hybridity
Film cycles/reboots/retcons (such as The Scorpion King, The Mummy animated series, Universal Classic Monsters, Hammer Studios, Dark Universe, etc.) and related adventure/archaeological-driven films (such as Ark of the Sun God, The Sphinx, The Librarian franchise, etc.)
Please send abstracts of 300 – 500 words with a working title and five (5) keywords, accompanied by a short third-person author bio (100 words max), to mummybookproject@gmail.com as a Word document. Final essays should be 6,000 – 8,000 words in length, including endnotes and bibliography, and be formatted according to the Chicago Manual of Style, 17th edition. The collection is being considered by a leading academic press.
Proposed Timeline
October 1, 2023 thru December 15, 2023 — Call for Papers
January 15, 2024 — Notification of abstract acceptances sent to authors
January 15, 2024 thru June 15, 2024 — Book chapters drafting period
June 15, 2024 thru July 15, 2024 — Initial editorial review of submitted chapter drafts
August 1, 2024 thru October 1, 2024 — Double-blind Peer Review Period
October 1, 2024 thru November 15, 2024 — Contributor revision period
December 1, 2024 — Final editorial acceptance decisions
December 1, 2024 thru January 15, 2025 — Layout design, indexing, and proofing stage
January 15, 2025 thru February 15, 2025 — Copies of chapter proofs sent to contributors for copyediting review
March 1, 2025 — Final manuscript submitted in hard copy and digital formats to publisher
First new article up at my website is an interview with the authors of the brand new book, Heavy Music Mothers: Extreme Identities, Narrative Disruptions.
I had the honor to talk with Joan Jocson-Singh and Julie Turley on their book. It can be read here.
H. P. Lovecast Podcast
New episode of H. P. Lovecast Podcast is online!
Michele and I return back to the Lands of Dream to talk about the one-shot comic Dreamquest by Clay Adams and Mick Beyers. The episode can be streamed at our Buzzsprout website, via the embedded link below, or via your podcast app of preference.
And for fun, here is my autographed copy from the original Kickstarter campaign:
Fan2Fan Appearance – Akira
2023 marks the 35th anniversary of the legendary anime Akira.
The cool kids over at Fan2Fan have invited me on their podcast to talk about the iconic Japanimation film. Part one can be streamed at the Fan2Fan Libsyn, in the embedded podcast player below, or via your podcast app of preference (Akira part 2 is with Allan and Rebecca and can be streamed here).
Also, here is my trustworthy, old school Vampire Hunter D DVD:
Book Reviews
A few reviews of some of the books I’ve been involved in have popped up.
First, there is a fairly positive review of The New Peplum that appears in Cadmo: Journal for Ancient History, 2022, No. 31., written by Inês Simão Sebastião. The review is in Portuguese.
Next, there is a review of Horror Literature from Gothic to Post-Modern in the debut issue of The Incredible Nineteenth Century: Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Fairy Tale. The review, by Hogan D. Schaak, is not a positive one at all. Take it with a grain of salt since the reviewer butchers Michele’s name as “Brittany Michelle.”
Publishing Recap
Below is a recap of my publishing endeavors so far in 2023.
Published in February, this collection contains my essay “Dance or Dēcēdere: Gladiator and Industrial Music Sampling.”
Published in late March, the first issue of the zine Footage Fiends, contains my essay “Analisi Della Cosa: Found Footage in Caltiki and Italian Theater Going Practices.”
Apologies in advance that original writing here at my website has been sparse. Michele and I recently bought a house and we are in the process of moving in. The vast majority of my library is in boxes at the new place. We will be moved in by the end of the month with January being spent unpacking and getting settled. After that, I’ll be up and running again, writing content here but for other venues and projects as well.
Despite this, LOTS of cool stuff is still going on. Read below!
Emmanuelle / Black Emanuelle CFP
The Call for Papers for the Emmanuelle, Black Emanuelle, and Emmanuelle derivative films is open.
The CFP can found on this page. If you know other scholars who would be interested in this project, please share! I’d be super appreciative to get the word out.
New H. P. Lovecast Podcast Episode
A brand new episode of H. P. Lovecast Podcast is online.
This is our monthly Transmissions episode, however we did a longer form interview instead of a handful of smaller ones. Our interview is with P. L. McMillan and her new novella, Sisters of the Crimson Vine. The episode can be streamed at the H. P. Lovecast Buzzsprout page, via the embedded player below, or via your podcast app of preference.
For December we are going to do a recap episode where Michele and I talk about projects completed this year, upcoming news, podcast news, and so on.
A Hero Will Endure Update
A few years in the making, but the collection, A Hero Will Endure: Essays at the Twentieth Anniversary of Gladiator, is set to be published this February by Vernon Press. This book contains my essay, “Dance or Dēcēdere: Gladiator and Industrial Music Sampling.” There is no cover art yet, but there is a product/pre-order page at the publisher’s website.
Footage Fiends Issue 1
Pre-orders are open for the first issue of the Footage Fiends zine. I have a short essay in this debut issue (tentatively) titled “Analisi Della Cosa: Found Footage in Caltiki and Italian Theater Going Practices.”
Issues are tied to tiers at the Footage Fiends Patreon: $5 digital and $10 for physical with issues being published quarterly.
A promotional clip for the Zine can be found on the Footage Fields Twitter:
Horror/speculative award season is upon us. This year I really only have one piece of writing eligible for the various awards out there: my essay “Strange Realities: Twilight Zone-sploitation in Encounter with the Unknown” in The Many Lives of the Twilight Zone: Essays on the Television and Film Franchise. Thank you for your interest/consideration!
New Scholars from the Edge of Time
Michele and I appeared on Hercules Invictus’ Sword and Sandal cinema the last Thursday of November. I talked about the “City of Evil” episode of Thundarr the Barbarian while Michele talked about Ouja Mummy and Luxor. The episode can be heard via BlogTalkRadio.
Tribel Social Media
With all the brouhaha happening at Twitter, I’ve decided to start checking out alternative social medias. Unfortunately my iPhone is at capacity so I cannot install the app-only Hive social media. I’m on a waitlist for Post. However, I did setup an account at Tribel, which can be found here. Tribel is pretty much a ghost town right now, but I’ll wait and see what happens. Come give me a follow if you’re on the platform.
Miscellaneous Tidbits
Mimic Soundtrack (And Plans)
Record Store Day had a Black Friday event this year. There was one vinyl I was really, really gunning for, and that was the new LP of the Mimic soundtrack, composed by Marco Beltrami. When I got to Zia Records, there was only one copy on the shelf and I snagged that bad boy.
Michele and I talked about Mimic and Mimic 2 on our H. P. Lovecast Podcast (check them out – links on the titles) and plan on doing Mimic 3 next year.
I have other plans for the Mimic soundtrack. The first Front Line Assembly album I ever bought was Implode which contains much sampling of dialogue and music cues from both Mimic and Event Horizon. It’s been on the idea board to write *something* about this. We shall see what I come up with.
Elmer Batters Polaroid
I am a huge fan of the stockings photography of Elmer Batters. Back in 2015 Michele and I were able to visit an Elmer Batters and Eric Stanton exhibit that Taschen Books was curating in LA. Lots of great art and photography, and polaroids too!
There was an option to buy the polaroids, but at that point I didn’t have the funds to do so.
Fast forward to autumn 2022 and I was able to work with Taschen to procure a an original Batters Polaroid:
Elmer Batters, unknown model.
The polaroid was taken in the 1970s and it is awesome. The model is unfortunately unknown. It’s a fairly conservative Batters piece and I adore it.
The back of the frame the polaroid came in was autographed by Dian Hanson, known for many of the pinup books and Big Book Ofs that Taschen published (I cited her Big Butt Book for my masters thesis). Sincere thanks to Bernard at Taschen for coordinating all of this.
Rest in Peplum
French actress Mylène Demongeot passed away on December 1st (Deadline Article).
Promotional image from IMDB.
She starred in peplum and peplum-adjacent films such as:
The Call for Papers for the Emmanuelle, Black Emanuelle, and Emmanuelle derivative films is now live!
The CFP can found on this page. If you know other scholars who would be interested in this project, please share! I’d be super appreciative to get the word out.
New Episode of H. P. Lovecast
Our October Transmissions episode dropped a day early (didn’t want to compete with Halloween). In this episode we interview Erika T. Wurth and Chris Philbrook.
Thumbnail made by Michele Brittany.
The episode can be streamed at the H. P. Lovecast Buzzsprout page, via the embedded player below, your via your podcast app of preference.
Other guests on the program are Kenneth Cain and Karen Heuler. The episode will record live on November 10th at 8:00 pm PST. The Galactic Terrors YouTube channel can be found here (check out the archives!).
Scholars from the Edge of Time
The last two episodes of Scholars from the Edge of Time are now online. In these episodes Michele and I discuss Son of Samson (September episode) and The Barbarians(October episode). Click the links to give them a watch!
Miscellaneous Tidbits
Alicia Carter and Robot #2 Kickstarter
The Kickstarter campaign for issue two of The Astonishing Adventures of Alicia Carter and Robot is now live and can be found here.
I really enjoyed issue one of the series, and my review can be read here. I’m excited for issue two to see the continuing adventures of Alicia and GDU-3.
Image taken from the Kickstarter Campaign.
No naughty covers for me this time, I went for the standard Shikarii cover (see above) which depicts Kira, a sniper bounty hunter introduced in issue one.
Solomon and Sheba Blu-ray
A recent acquisition for the sword and sandal library, I plucked up a relatively new HD release of Solomon and Sheba (1959).
Personal Copy of Solomon and Sheba.
The film stars genre veterans Yul Brynner (The Ten Commandments and Westworld [Roman World counts as peplum!]) and the maggiorata fisica actress Gina Lollobrigida (Crossed Swords). Have not seen this film before, so it will be nice to check it out in HS.
Also, this is a perfect time to show off my Gina Lollobrigida autographed 8×10:
Good day everyone! Final update for October. I hope everyone has a great upcoming Halloween!
The Many Lives of the Twilight Zone
The academic collection, The Many Lives of the Twilight Zone, edited by Kevin Wetmore and Ron Riekki has been published by McFarland and is now out in the wild!
Me!
My contributor’s copy arrived and it looks awesome. The TOC sports some great academics.
My essay is titled “Strange Realities: Twilight Zone-sploitation in Encounter with the Unknown” and is probably the most in-depth article out there on the movie. Note: this essay is eligible for various 2022 short non-fiction awards out there, so if it is a piece you enjoy, consider recommending it!
The collection is available to purchase at McFarland.
Galliano Mai Tai
I’ve got quite a handful of cocktail books from the 70s and 80s, most of them filled with recipes of a dubious nature. However, it’s fun to play cocktail archeology and try out some of the recipes in these books.
I have a new old school recipe exploration written up. It is on the Galliano Mai Tai. It can be read here.
H. P. Lovecast Transmissions
This month’s Transmissions episode for HP Lovecast will feature interviews with Erika T. Wurth and Chris Philbrook. This episode will publish on the last day of this month – Halloween!
Galactic Terrors Vidcast
Galactic Terrors is a monthly YouTube midcast from the Horror Writer Association’s New York Chapter. Each episode features three authors doing readings followed by Q/A. I’ve been invited to appear on the program, which will stream November 10th.
If you want to know more about Galactic Terrors, check out their Facebook group or have a look at their episode archive on their YouTube channel. Michele was a guest last month, so check that episode out for sure!
Miscellaneous Tidbits
New Edge Sword and Sorcery
Issue 0 of the new magazine, New Age Sword and Sorcery, it out.
Personal copy of the hardback edition.
The magazine looks like a great endeavor to make the S&S genre more inclusive. The digital copy is free (link here), while the paperback and hardback iterations are available at cost (Amazon link here). Consider plucking up a copy, show interest, so the magazine can get a great start.
Amon Amarth Album Review
Hal C. F. Astell has a new review up at his Apocalypse Later website.
It is on the Viking metal outfit Amon Amarth’s new album, The Great Heathen Army. Check it out here.
Welcome to the second instance of my biweekly news roundup. I am digging this schedule more than my prior weekly schedule. There is a lot of content below, so make sure you scroll through it all.
Alicia Carter and Robot #1 Review
The physical first issue of the crowdfunded pulp/sword and planet inspired comic The Astonishing Adventures of Alicia Carterand Robot arrived last week.
One of my favorite things is finding new citations of the essays by the authors who appeared in the books I edited.
Dr. Hannah Mueller’s essay, “Male Nudity, Violence and the Disruption of Voyeuristic Pleasure in Starz’s Spartacus,” which appeared in The New Peplum, has been cited in Dr. Amanda Potter’s essay, “From Female Stereotypes to Women with Agency: Elite Women and Slave Women in Howard Fast’s 1951 Novel, Spartacus (1960), and Starz Spartacus (2010–13)” in Gender, Power, and Identity in the Films of Stanley Kubrick, edited by Karen A. Ritzenhoff, Dijana Metlić, and Jeremi Szaniawski.
Super congrats!
The Kubrick collection has been published by Routledge and the product page can be found here.
H. P. Lovecast Podcast Updates
New episode of H. P. Lovecast is online!
Thumbnail by Michele Brittany.
In this episode we talk about the second film in John Carpenter’s informal apocalypse trilogy, Prince of Darkness. This episode can be streamed at our Buzzsprout page, in the embedded player below, or via your podcast app of preference.
On the 30th this month our September Transmissions episode will publish. This episode will have Brenda S. Tolian and Ian Welke.
Looking to the future, for October we will be covering the movie Mimic 2 (we covered the first Mimic film almost a year ago – here is the link). We are also solidifying our Transmissions guests as well.
Fan2Fan Podcast Appearance
The folks at Fan2Fan Podcast are collecting top five Halloween season films from their guests and I was honored to contribute mine.
The episode I appear on with my top five was published last Wednesday and can be heard at this Fan2Fan Libsyn page. Present in this episode was also Joshua Pruett. His top five movies can be heard on this Fan2Fan episode. Keep an eye out for Michele’s list!
Miscellaneous Tidbits
Footage Fiends Zine
Evan Jordan of the Void Video Podcast and Madeleine of the Unnamed Footage Festival are launching a brand new zine called Footage Fiends that is devoted to all aspects of the found footage genre of films. Tweet embedded below:
Exciting news: my good friend @DVDBoxSet and I are starting the first ever zine exclusively covering in-world camera films (found footage, mockumentary, faux doc, screenlife, hybrid, etc.) and we're now accepting pitches for the first issue!
This, of course, inspired me, so now I am working on an essay about the 1950s Italian cosmic horror film, Caltiki: The Immortal Monster (one of the first films to have a found footage scene). If you’re interested in submitting, check out the Tweet thread above for more information.
The Warrior and the Sorceress Re-Release
Shout Factory, under their Scream Factory label, is did a re-release of the Roger Corman 1980s sword and sorcery (sword and planet since it takes place on another planet?) film, The Warrior and the Sorceress.
My copy of The Warrior and the Sorceress with the poster.
I have not seen this film before, even though it is included in the four movie DVD release Shout Factory did a few years ago that contained Deathstalker, Deathstalker 2, and Barbarian Queen (side note: if you want to hear me talk Deathstalker 2 with the Fan2Fan Podcast crew, click here). Of course I had to pre-order the Blu-ray incarnation, plus it comes with a poster and the cover is reversible to a Cthulhu-looking one.
Emmanuelle director Just Jaeckin passed away earlier this month.
The filmmaker may be gone but his legacy lives on. Later in September Cult Epics released two Blu-rays of Jaeckin’s work: Madame Claude and The Last Romantic Lover. Commentary on the discs is done by Jeremy Richey who wrote Sylvia Kristel: From Emmanuelle to Chabrol (read my review here). Check out the Cult Epics website for more info on these releases.
Artist Gilead Kickstarter Campaign
Sword and sorcery artist Gilead has started a Kickstarter campaign for his Sketch book and print art.
Check out the campaign on Kickstarter and consider supporting!
I am revamping my news roundups for the time being. I don’t think I am quite prolific enough to merit a weekly aggregation, so instead I’ll be switching to biweekly. Think that will also help reduce the clutter of news articles at my website. I’m doing some other changes as well, so read on!
Personal / Website News
Not changing anything in the “Personal / Website News” section. If anything, they might get longer (such as this week’s) as I’ll be sharing more news in each biweekly post.
New Website Articles
I’ve published two articles at my website over the past two weeks.
I haven’t quite written enough essays here on cocktail and tiki culture, so I felt one was overdue. I’ve got a handful of other cocktail pamphlets like this from the 70s, so expect some more write ups of a similar ilk in the future.
Next, there is a new issue of Weird Tales that will be coming out very soon. This issue will focus on the sword and sorcery genre so I thought it would be awesome to help do my part to promote the issue by doing some micro interviews with some of the authors and poets within. I put out a call on social media for interested parties and this aggregation of short-form interviews is the result.
The article currently contains interviews with Brian W. Matthews, Teel James Glenn, Dana Fredsti, and Dave Fitzgerald.
H. P. Lovecast Podcast Updates
For August we got a little off track with H. P. Lovecast as we had to hunker in and prep for CoKoCon (see below) and other projects. This means that while August had only one episode of H. P. Lovecast (our dive into Douglas Wynne’s collection Something in the Water and Other Stories), September will have three episodes!
First, we have a Fragments episode that contains our interview with Wynne about his new collection, Something in the Water. The episode can be streamed at the H. P. Lovecast Podcast Buzzsprout page, via your podcast app of preference, or via the embedded player below.
Second, our primary episode for September will be on the movie, Prince of Darkness, direct by John Carpenter. This episode will drop on Sunday the 18th. This episode will act as a companion episode to an upcoming Fan2Fan appearance (see below).
Personal collection.
Finally, for September’s Transmissions episode, we will be interviewing Ian Welke about his new novel, Union Station, and Brenda S. Tolian about her debut short story collection, Blood Mountain. That will drop the last day of September.
In no particular order, three episodes were recorded:
Discussion on John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness
Top Five Vampires Films
Top Five Halloween Films
Our forthcoming H. P. Lovecast Podcast episode on Prince of Darkness will act as a companion episode to the Fan2Fan In the Mouth of Madness. Check out both episodes when they are online!
For Scholars at the Edge of Time later this month, (Thursday, September the 22nd), Michele and I will be discussing Son of Samson.
Personal copy of the recent Kino release.
Finally, to have on the radar, I’ll be doing a reading on the HWA New York Chapter’s Galactic Terrors vidcast. That will be in November.
All of these appearances, along with their publish dates (if known) have been added to the Podcast Index page. As always, if you feel like I’d make a great guest on your podcast, please feel free to reach out to me at vnvdiak@gmail.com.
Miscellaneous Tidbits
I am going to cease doing peplum-specific news go forward. While one of my expertise is peplum, my interests run in a variety of subject matters. Instead, I’ll have a section called “Miscellaneous Tidbits” (temporary name until I can think of another) where I’ll post news relevant to my research or projects I’m working on. Could be peplum, could be something else.
However, if folks do have their own peplum news they want to share with me to promote here, I am still very much available to do that. I am here to help others.
Blog and Adventures
I’ll be adding a new section that will appear time-to-time, and that will be “Blog and Adventures.” I’ll kick it off for this post with a re-cap of CoKoCon.
CoKoCon 2022 Experiences
CoKoCon is a Phoenix fan convention in the old school sense of the early days of fandom: smaller, more intimate crowd taking over a bit of hotel convention space. This is the first in-person version of CoKoCon since 2019 due to the pandemic.
Hal C. F. Hastell and Dee Hastell are the two primary folks behind CoKoCo. Despite us being still fairly new to the Phoenix area and not really knowing anyone, they extended an invitation to us to be on a few panels. We are both extremely flattered and appreciative. Michele and I wound up on two panels: Pre-Code Hollywood Horror Films, and Swords, Sandals, Sorcery, Planets and Other Worlds.
Our first panel was Saturday and we got to the Tempe Double Tree around 9am-ish. This was our first appearance at any sort of public event, let alone a con, since the Covid Pandemic started. We were a little bit nervous as we both have evaded getting Covid thus far. We were so relieved that CoKoCon has strict mask mandates and vaccination or negative Covid test requirements. We felt so much better: everyone was masked, all spaced out. We felt super safe.
We also got a cool swag bag filled with books, stickers, and other goodies. There was also a nice program booklet which had our brand new H. P. Lovecast Logo as an advert! We were pumped.
The Pre-Code Hollywood Horror Films panel started at 10:0am. Hal was the moderator with Michele and I as panelists. Michele is an expert on silent cinema, particularly the city symphony genre, but because of her interest in mummies, she had seen a lot of Universal Horror films. So, she was the big subject matter expert. I’m not too much of a specialist of the period, but know enough since it is all precursor to my Italian genre film/exploitation film studies (but I do love Busby Berkeley musicals). We spent all August prepping for the panel by watching quiet a few Pre-Code horror films: Dracula (1931), Frankenstein (1931), Kongo (1932), King Kong (1933), Island of Lost Souls (1932), and Life Returns (1934). Michele watched a plethora of even more films.
Pre-Code Horror from our collection.
I suspect this might have been a panel that Hal had wanted to do for a while, and it turned out to be a lot of fun. We talked about how transgressive and ahead of their time these movies were compared to the films released in the years following the Hayes Code going into proper effect. We all agreed that Life Returns was a terrible film while Kongo was the most controversial and squeamish film we all saw. Definitely worth an experience.
After the panel we meandered around the con for a little bit. We ran into Beth Cato, steampunk author and baker extraordinaire. She gave us ooey gooey delicious cookies and a ribbon for our con badges that proclaimed we had taken part of her baked delectables.
We visited the dealers’ room which housed a handful of authors with tables along with the art that was up for auction. We met authors Adam Gaffen and David Lee Summers.They were cool folk and of course, we had to pluck up some books (can’t walk away empty handed!).
Michele and I returned Monday for the Swords/Sandals/Sorcery/Other Worlds Panel which was at 1:00 pm. This is a panel of Michele’s own creation which she has moderated at other cons, such as Long Beach Comic Con and LA Comic Con. I brought the sword and sandal knowledge while artist Gilead brought the sword and sorcery expertise. I believe this was the first time Michele had an artist instead of a writer on her panel, so it was nice to get a different perspective.
Gilead is an amazing artist. I had to purchase his original painting “Ziggurats and Tentacles” which was part of the art gallery/auction.
“Ziggurats and Tentacles” by Gilead. Now hanging in our living room.
This panel was a lot of fun. Gilead brought a list of sword and sorcery resources (websites, podcasts, Discord servers, etc.) and invited folks to copy it and check them out. He was super knowledgable about all facets of sword and sorcery.
Overall, CoKoCon was. a blast. It was a low-key event for us, which is exactly what we needed during these pandemic times. The 2023 conference is already being planned and has GoH information at the CoKoCon website. We will definitely be back!
The CoKoCon Facebook page is uploading photos, so keep an eye there for photos of the event.
I had the honor to interview Tom Simmons and Mike Dubisch, the creative team behind the comic book adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ novel I Am a Barbarian.
This is the first episode of our themed month on the anthology, Even in the Grave. In this episode we take a look at “What’s Your Secret?” by Trevor Firetog and “Blind Spot” by Steven Van Patten. The episode can be streamed at our Buzzsprout website, via the embedded player above, or at your podcast app of preference.
For our transmissions episode this month we will be interviewing editor Carol Gyzander, and contributors Firetog and Van Patten. Stay tuned!
Short Film: Dinosaur Joke
I made a short film and put it on YouTube!
I bought a box of Trix cereal this past week, and on the back, to promote the new Jurassic Park film, there were cutout dinosaurs and pop up trees, inviting you to make a movie with the back of the box. I don’t know how many kids actually do these things, but I decided I would! So, give it a watch, and maybe a like or a comment. It was silly, but a fun thing to do.
Fan2Fan Podcast Appearances
The folks at Fan2Fan had me back on their podcast for two (2!!) new episodes that dropped this past week!
The first episode is about sword and sorcery cartoons of the 80s, which can be heard at the Fan2Fan Libsyn page (or via your podcast app of preference).
A chance to show off my autographed animation cell of Teegra from Fire and Ice!
The second episode is an entry in their series where they ask folks about their dream Saturday morning cartoon lineup. You can hear mine here.
Here’s four of my dream line up! Gotta listen in to hear the rest.
Sincere thank you to Pete and Bernie for having me on their show. It has been a wonderful experience and I always appreciate their support.
CoKoCon 2022 Panel Appearances
Michele and I will make an appearance at CoKoCon 2022 this labour day weekend!
CoKoCon is a local (Phoenix) sci-fi/fantasy fan con. Michele and I will be appearing on a few panels. More info to come, but for now, check out the CoKoCon website for ticket information and guest news.
General Neo-Peplum News
Blog Entries at DMR Books
Here a listing of genre relevant blog articles at DMR Books this past week:
The episode can be streamed at our Buzzsprout page, the embedded player above, or via your podcast app of preference.
CoKoCon 2022 Appearance
CoKoCon is a Phoenix speculative fiction conference that is being held over Labour Day weekend.
Michele and I will be in attendance as panelists. Programming is still being solidified, but keep an eye out at the CoKoCon website or Twitter as news comes in.
The New Peplum Citation
The New Peplum appears in the bibliography of the edited collection La Strada: The Cinema and Cinematographers of Italy, edited by Alexander A. Sinitsyn.
I’m not sure which specific essay(s) in the collection cites The New Peplum, or what specifically from The New Peplum has been cited, but you can see the bibliographic entry in the uploaded paper “Antiquity in the Cinema of Italy in the 1910s – 1930s” by Alexandra Solovyeva, which happens to include the bib for the entire book.
Very cool. I’m always humbled and honored to see other academics referencing The New Peplum.
Exotica Moderne Book Review
Turned in a book review to be published in an upcoming issue of Exotica Moderne (hopefully the next one!). In the meantime, check out the publisher, House of Tabu, who has various mugs, pins, and the latest issue, #15 with the Shag cover, still for sale.
General Neo-Peplum News
Blog Entries at DMR Books
Here a listing of genre relevant blog articles at DMR Books this past week, both are author interviews:
