Tag: Podcast

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News

News Roundup 2024-10-13

Personal / Website News

Yor #1 Review

New article up at this here website!

Folks probably know that I am a big fan of the Margheriti film Yor, the Hunter from the Future. I was excited a month or so ago when I stumbled upon that Antarctic Press was reprinting the comic in English! You better believe I ran to my local comic book store and put it on my pull list.

I got the issue in my paws and it’s pretty cool! It’s amazing how much the film adapted faithfully from the comic. You can read my compare/contrast right here.

Citations News

It’s been a while since I’ve had some citation news, but here is a new one, fresh off the presses!

My essay, “Lost Nights and Dangerous Days,” was cited by Gabrielle Berry in her essay “[Bones cracking]: Reading and listening to Foley and captions” which was published in the journal The Soundtrack, vol 16, Sept 2024 by Intellect. Super flattered!

Panthans Journal #329

The newest issue of the The National Panthans Journal has been published. This issues contains a re-print of my review of Carson of Venus / Warlord of Mars #1.

I love the cover by Mark Wheatley!

Paraphrased from the zine: The National Capital Panthans Journal is a monthly publication issued as a .PDF file on the Saturday before the first Sunday of each month. Contribution of articles, artwork, photos and letters are welcome. Send submissions to the editor: Laurence G. Dunn at laurencegdunn@gmail.com in a Word document for consideration.

Scholars from the Edge of Time

The September episode of Scholars from the Edge of Time is online!

For this vidcast Michele and I discuss the early 80s cult sword and planet film, Krull. How we have gone our entire life without watching this film is near criminal because it ruled.

Personal copies of the Krull Blu-ray and the soundtrack.

The episode can be watched on YouTube, have a listen/watch!

Looking at the rest of 2024, in October we will be discussing The Head Hunter (2018) and then (depending on holidays fall) Gentlemen Broncos (2009).

Publishing Recap

Below is a recap of my publishing endeavors so far in 2024.

Comic Book Review: “Carson of Venus: The Flames Beyond#1″ reprinted in the National Capital Panthans Journal #326.

Comic Book Review: “Carson of Venus: The Flames Beyond#2″ reprinted in the National Capital Panthans Journal #327.

Comic Book Review: “Carson of Venus: The Flames Beyond#3″ reprinted in the National Capital Panthans Journal #328.

Comic Book Review: “Carson of Venus / Warlord of Mars #1″ reprinted in the National Capital Panthans Journal #329.

Calls for Papers/Proposals

Here are some new pop culture CFPs that have crossed my paths. Links to these will also be in the CFP page on the navigation bar.

Roger Corman’s Horror Movies: Collected Essays

Edited by Sue Matheson

Part of the series edited by Carl Sederholm

Indie filmmaker Roger Corman is known for producing and directing hundreds of B-movies, discovering industry stars (like Jack Nicholson, Martin Scorsese, and Robert de Niro), anticipating Hollywood’s New Wave, and founding a profitable empire that included New World Pictures and Concorde/New Horizons. Entertaining, literate, and campy, his fast-paced, low-budget genre films, aimed at the youth market and generally shot in less than two weeks, included horror movies, horror comedies, and sci-fi/horror. The Beast With a Million Eyes(1955), It Conquered the World (1956), The Undead (1957), Not of This Earth (1957), A Bucket of Blood(1959), The Wasp Woman (1959), The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), Creature from the Haunted Sea (1961), The Intruder (1962), The Terror (1963), The Man With X-Ray Eyes (1963), The Haunted Palace(1963), and Dementia 13 (1963) helped make Corman “The King of the Drive-in” and the “King of Cult.” Cult classics, the gothic horror films of his Edgar Allan Poe cycle (House of Usher [1960], The Pit and the Pendulum [1961], Premature Burial [1962], Tales of Terror[1962], The Raven [1963], The Haunted Palace [1963], The Masque of the Red Death [1964] and The Tomb of Ligeia [1964]) also revived the careers of Boris Karloff, Vincent Price, Basil Rathbone, and Peter Lorre. As the “Orson Welles of the Z movies,” Corman was not only an auteur filmmaker and influencer; he was also a producer and distributor of horror movies. The last movie he directed was the under-appreciated Frankenstein Unbound (1990). Corman’s better-known works have been taught in courses on the history of the horror genre and cult films, while many others deserve critical reexamination.

This anthology seeks previously unpublished essays that explore Roger Corman’s body of horror films and mashups. It is open to submissions on films belonging to his Edgar Allan Poe series franchise and his well-known cult horrors, but will particularly welcome interdisciplinary approaches that can illuminate overlooked films like The Beast With a Million Eyes (1955), It Conquered the World (1956), The Undead (1957), Not of This Earth (1957), Attack of the CrabMonsters (1957), Night of the Blood Beast (1958), Attack of the Giant Leeches (1959), The Intruder (1962), Tower of London (1962), The Man With X-Ray Eyes (1963), and Frankenstein Unbound (1990).

This volume will be interdisciplinary in scope, including approaches from philosophy, literary studies, film studies, gender studies, history, psychology, popular culture studies, hauntology, ecology, etc. The chapters will be peer-reviewed, scholarly, and written at a high academic level.

Contributions could include, but are not limited to, the following topics:

  • Thematic and structural analysis of one or more films
  • Visual style
  • Notions of evil
  • Photography and cinematography
  • The supernatural
  • Corman as an auteur and/or influencer, producer, distributor
  • Mash ups and updated horror
  • Soundscapes and music
  • Film as philosophy/philosophy in film
  • Failed parenthood
  • Comedy, black humor, and irony
  • Social and cultural contexts
  • American youth and youth culture
  • Drive-in film culture
  • Landscapes as sites of horror
  • Literary and gothic adaptations
  • Exploration of the sub- and unconscious
  • Class, sexuality, abject, gender and queer readings

This anthology will be organized into thematic sections around these topics and others that emerge from submissions. It is open to works that focus on other topics as well. Prospective authors are welcome to contact the editor with any questions, including potential topics not listed above. Please share this announcement with anyone you believe would be interested in contributing to this volume. Please submit a 250-word abstract of your proposed chapter contribution, a brief CV / bio, current position, affiliation, and complete contact information to Sue Matheson (smatheson@ucn.ca) by the 30th of December 2024. Full chapters of 6,000-7,000 words are likely due in June/July 2025 after signing a contract with the publisher.

Note: Acceptance of a proposed abstract does not guarantee the acceptance of the full chapter.

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2024-07-07

Personal / Website News

Samson Writer Interview

Brand new interview up at this website!

I talk to writer Ben Lacy about their neo-peplum adjacent comic book, Samson. The interview can be read here.

Fan2Fan Podcast Appearance

The cool kids over at the Fan2Fan Podcast are continuing their marathon of episodes devoted to iconic horror director John Carpenter. They just published an episode on the Lovecraftian In The Mouth of Madness, with myself and Joshua Pruett as guests.

The episode can be streamed at the Fan2Fan Libsyn page, in the embedded player below, or in your podcast app of preference.

John Carpenter's In The Mouth of Madness – Fan2Fan Podcast

Sincere appreciation to Bernie and Pete for having me on. In case you missed it, Michele and/or I were on a few other Fan2Fan John Carpenter episodes, (Christine, The Fog, Prince of Darkness), so please check those episodes out as well.

Panthans Journal #326

The National Panthans Journal is a monthly PDF zine of Edgar Rice Burroughs-related reviews, essays, articles, artwork, news, etc.

Laurence G. Dunn, the editor/compiler of the Panthans Journal, has been gracious to give the many Edgar Rice Burroughs comic book reviews I penned in the late 2010s a second life. Issue #326 (pictured here, with artwork by Jim Burns) contains an updated version of my review of Carson of Venus: The Flames Beyond #1. Sincere appreciation to Laurence!

If you’re interested in contributing to Panthans or receiving copies of the publication, contact Laurence at laurencegdunn @ gmail dot com (sans spaces).

Scholars from the Edge of Time

June’s episode of Scholars from the Edge of Time is now online! In this episode we conclude our retrospective of the pepla career of Bella Cortez by discussing the final sword and sandal film she made, Ali Baba and the Seven Saracens.

Poster for Ali Baba and the Seven Saracens from Wikipedia.

The vidcast can be watched on YouTube here. Check it out!

Michele and I have also planned out the next two episodes of Scholars from the Edge of Time. For July’s episode we will be discussing She Is Conan (2023) and in August we will be talking about Pilgrimage (2017). Stay tuned!

Publishing Recap

Below is a recap of my publishing endeavors so far in 2024.

Comic Book Review: “Carson of Venue: The Flames Beyond #1″ reprinted in the National Capital Panthans Journal #326.

From the Archives

This following podcasts episodes and articles were published from 6/24 to 7/7:

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2024-06-09

Personal / Website News

Fan2Fan Podcast Appearances

The Fan2Fan Podcast are doing a themed months for May and June: John Carpenter films! Episodes published during these months are about John Carpenter films, with a few about Pete and Bernie’s travels to locales exploring Carpenter pop culture.

Two of these podcast episodes Michele, Joshua Pruett, and myself got to be guests on The first one is on Christine.

And the second is on Prince of Darkness.

The episodes can be streamed at the Fan2Fan Libsyn website (link for Christine and link for Prince of Darkness), via the embedded players below, or through your podcast app of preference. Do check these episodes out!

John Carpenter's Christine – Fan2Fan Podcast

John Carpenter's Prince of Darkness – Fan2Fan Podcast

Two New Website Sections

I’ve added two new sections to my website.

The first is a “Support Me” page. For a consolidated list on ways to support me and my writing, this is the page to check out.

Next is a page of CFPs – calls for papers, proposals, and conferences. I like to proliferate other scholars’ CFPs when I can, so here is a resource folks can use. If you have a CFP you need shared around, let me know!

Calls for Papers/Proposals

Here are some new pop culture CFPs that have crossed my paths. Links to these will also be in the CFP page on the navigation bar.

“Children of the Night” International Dracula Congress 2024

It is our great pleasure to invite you to 2024 double edition of “Children of the Night International Dracula Congress”. This year, participants are invited to join the ONLINE part of the Congress on October 25th and 26th, 2024 (Friday and Saturday) via Zoom.

A few days later, we will gather IN PERSON for further Halloween sessions in Brașov, Romania from October 31st to November 2nd, 2024. We have decided to hold two parts of the Congress separate from one another, so that Brașov participants were able to fully engage in academic discussions, get to know each other and discover the wonders of Transylvania outside the conference venue.

October 31st (Thursday) and November 1st (Friday) will be devoted to academic speeches and discussions, with a walking tour of Brașov and various evening activities. On November 2nd (Saturday), we will set on a one-day trip to Bran Castle, a nearby Dracula related pop-cultural tourist attraction.

Additionally, from October 30th to November 2nd, International Dracula Film Festival is taking place in Brașov and the Congress participants will be able to join chosen festival events.

We invite everyone who is interested in speaking at the 2024 conference to submit an abstract of 150 – max. 250 words plus a meaningful title indicating the planned content of your presentation to dracongress@gmail.com. The official language of the conference is English. The abstracts must be submitted by email and fit the conference main topics (please, have a look at the slider with 8 workshops on our website). Deadline for abstract’s submissions: August 31, 2024. Please, state if you intend to participate online or in person.

Also, remember to dust your Vampire/Dracula/Gothic costume for our annual Costume Contest (in person and online entries welcome!).

Conference fee

  • 50 euro (physical participation in Brasov)
  • 10 euro (online participation).
  • Listeners join free of charge.

The 2024 COTN International Dracula Congress is organised by:

  • Transilvania University of Brașov, Romania (Florin Nechita),
  • Maria Curie-Skłodowska University Lublin, Poland (Magdalena Grabias),
  • State University of Rio de Janeiro in Brasil (Yuri Garcia).
  • In collaboration with The Dracula Fan Club, Mexico (Enrique A. Palafox).

More details will be announced soon. https://dracongress.jimdofree.com/

Preternatural in Popular Culture
Monsters & the Monstrous Area of the Northeast Popular Culture Association 2024

The Monsters & the Monstrous Area of the Northeast Popular Culture Association (NEPCA) invites submissions under the general theme of the Preternatural in Popular Culture.

For this year, submissions should focus on creatures and/or creations that exist above, beyond, and/or outside the natural world and the ways these entities are represented in popular culture (anime, comics, fiction, film, manga, streaming video, television, etc.) from across time and space.

The Monsters & the Monstrous Area is among NEPCA’s largest areas, and we often have blocks of sessions running across the full event. To best accommodate everyone, single presentation submissions are preferred over panel submissions.

Please direct any questions or concerns to Michael A. Torregrossa, Monsters & the Monstrous Area Chair, at popular.preternaturaliana@gmail.com, and check out our blog Popular Preternaturaliana: Studying the Monstrous in Popular Culture for ideas and past sessions. The blog can be accessed at https://popularpreternaturaliana.blogspot.com/.

Conference Information

The 2024 Northeast Popular Culture Association (NEPCA) will host its annual conference this fall as a hybrid conference from Thursday, 3 October, through Saturday, 5 October. Presenters will be required to become members of NEPCA for the year.

Virtual sessions will take place on Thursday evening and Friday morning via Zoom, and in-person sessions will take place on Friday evening and Saturday morning at Nichols College, in Dudley, Massachusetts.

For more information about the conference and to submit a proposal, please visit our NEPCA’s dedicated Conference site at https://nepca.blog/2024-conference-page/. Be prepared to answer the following questions about your proposal:

  • Proposal Type (Single Presentation or Panel)
  • Modality (in person or virtual)
  • Subject Area
  • Working Title
  • Academic Affiliation (if any)
  • Abstract (250 words)
  • Short bio (50-200 words)
  • Accommodations
  • Preferences for when to present

The submissions site will be open until 11:59 PM (EDT) on 15 June 2024.

Toyetic Television: A Companion

From G. I. Joe workout routines and Sailor Moon wedding gowns to Bratz doll make-unders and Ferby modding, toyetic, merchandise-driven television from past decadeshas proved remarkably resilient. Toyetic television clearly holds a far greater and more enduring cultural significance than definitions such as “glorified half-hour commercials” (Hilton-Morrow & McMahan 2003, p. 78) might suggest. It is meaningful to individual viewers, it becomes “social lubricants facilitating communication between one child and another” (Steinberg 2012, p. 90), and it can connect generations through shared viewing and playing pleasures. The idea of the program created to sell merchandise has been reversed in cases where the production of a program is funded through the
sale of its merchandise, such as The Amazing Digital Circus. The boundary between quality and merchandise-driven television is no longer clear, with even educational programs such as Sesame Street now associated with significant merchandising. One of the aims of this volume, then, is to ask how we might define toyetic television as we move into the second quarter of the millennium. Intended for Peter Lang’s Genre Fiction and Film Companions series, this volume turns a critical eye to the genre of toyetic television and its many transmedia intertexts, exploring the significance and resonance these texts hold for children, adults, and communities. It examines the
movement of toyetic texts cross-culturally, intergenerationally, and between media. It analyses texts and audiences, industry and regulators, to uncover the significance of toyetic television to the contemporary moment.

Children’s programming is the most widely internationally traded category of television, while simultaneously being subject to intensely localized regulatory systems. Sesame Street has had numerous localized versions, for example, including Nigeria’s Sesame
Square, Mexico’s Plaza Sésamo, and pan-Arabic collaboration Iftah Ya Simsim. When toyetic television moves transculturally, it encounters new reception contexts. Japanese animation Dragon Ball found a devoted fanbase across Latin American, leading to new merchandise such as Argentinian soccer jerseys featuring Dragon Ball characters. A particular focus of research, advocacy, and debate around toyetic television has been concern about potential negative impacts on children from the blurring of boundaries between entertainment and advertising. While it may seem quaint in the current era of toy unboxing YouTube channels, the fear that toyetic
television would cause rampant consumerism, rigid perceptions of gender roles, increased American cultural imperialism, and actual acts of violence amongst children was widespread in the 1990s. Those fears are mirrored in recent years by hope that the same toyetic franchises could reflect socially progressive ideas such as body positivity in the remake of She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018-2020), queer representation in recent seasons of Power Rangers, and greater racial diversity in last year’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem (2023). Toyetic Television: A Companion moves beyond these good/bad media effects binaries to consider how and what meaning is made with, through, from, and by the various networks surrounding toyetic television and its consumers.

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

  • Transnational and intercultural approaches to toyetic television
  • Gender, race, disability, and sexualities in toyetic television
  • Material cultures: Collections, cosplay, and toy modification
  • Toyetic television production and consumption in the Global South
  • The future of toyetic television in the streaming age
  • Remakes and reimaginings
  • Nostalgic engagement with toyetic television
  • Afterlives of toyetic television in fan fiction and paratextual play
  • Video games and digital paratexts
  • Theoretical approaches to transmediation, media-mix, and franchising
  • Regulation, national or cultural identity, and children’s television
  • Educational and psychology approaches to toyetic television
  • Music and sound effects in toyetic franchises
  • Toyetic media for adults and intergenerational consumption
  • Ludic approaches to television
  • Fan studies approaches to toyetic television
  • Toyesis and toyetics in unexpected places

Please send 300 word abstracts and a short biographical note (50-100 words) to Dr. Sophia Staite at staitepublications@gmail.com by August 30th 2024, with a view to having a completed essay by early 2025. Finished essays will be approximately 4000 words long (excluding bibliography), should be accessible but touch on the big ideas, and will ideally take a main example as a ‘lens’ to look at the wider topic.

Miscellaneous Tidbits

The Neverending Streamer – Fallout Episode 1 and 2

My friend, Travis Lakata, has started watching Fallout on Netflix and doing a write up on each episode. Check out his thoughts on episode one and on episode two at his Substack.

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2024-03-03

Personal / Website News

Hearteater #1 Review

New comic book review is now online!

I take a look at the debut issue of Hearteater, a NSFW erotic pirate adventure comic. It can be read here.

HP Lovecast Podcast

A new episode of HP Lovecast Podcast is also online!

We have a returning guest, David Rose, on the show talking about his short story collection of Lovecraftian military fiction, Monsters in the Bush. The episode can be streamed at the HP Lovecast Buzzsprout page, via the embedded player below, or through your podcast app of preference.

HPLCP Transmissions – Ep 29 – David Rose and Monsters in the Bush – H. P. Lovecast Podcast

Scholars from the Edge of Time

The February Scholars from the Edge of Time vidcast is now online.

Michele and I start our retrospective of the peplum films of Bella Cortez with Vulcan, Son of Jupiter. I’ll be typing up my notes as a “Peplum Ponderings” article later this month.

The episode can be watched on YouTube. Stay tuned in March for the next Bella Cortez film we tackle which will probably be The Tartars (1961).

Emmanuelle Legacy CFP Re-opened + Bibliography

Since garnering publisher interest, I’ve re-opened the CFP for the Emmanuelle legacy book. The updated CFP can be found here.

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.

Miscellaneous Tidbits

Recent Peplum Acquisitions

I never heard the term “spear and fang” before as a genre, I just kinda called them “prehistoric peplum,” but alas, it’s a term and it has its roots in a Robert E. Howard story of the same name (story found here).

Coincidentally, at the same time of learning about “spear and fang” I had ordered such a film from Amazon. I never heard of it before, but it is called Alpha (2018). I learned of it while researching my In the Name of the King 2: Two Worlds write up in that both films star Natassia Malthe).

I’ve never seen it, but it looks tough. I also know the poor pupper is not going to make it.

In the mood for some new peplum music to write to I plucked up off discos the soundtrack to the Conan TV series of the 90s.

This was a series that was greenlit to capitalize on the success of the Hercules/Xena shows. Conan managed to slip by me growing up, so I’ll have to hunt down the boxset of it to watch (but it’s way OOP). It does star Ralph Möller who is always bad ass, from Universal Solider to Gladiator. He looks like a good Conan on the cover of the album.

The music is fun – great background music to write to.

On the subject of Möller and music, I’d be remiss if I didn’t bring up his guest appearance in the E Nomine song “Schwarze Sonnne” which has Möller wielding a sword in a post- apocalyptic city while fighting tech ninja. The song slaps hard:

Next up is In The Name of the King 3: The Last Mission.

After seeing Two Worlds, I felt obligated to complete the trilogy. I hope in this one they actually lean into the modern day soldier/merc doing stuff in Medieval times. If you want to read my thoughts on In the Name of the King 2: Two World, click here.

Also procured is Damon and Pythias (1962), another classic era sword and sandal I have not seen.

I’ve been trying to get the Warner Archive releases of sword and sandal films when I can. I heard scuttlebutt that Warner was going to wind down their production of physical media, which would be a shame because they actually took care of their films so their peplum releases actually look decent on home video.

I don’t know how I stumbled across it, but it was random on Discogs, but I had to have a copy of Inferno’s The Roman Empire.

Someone on a Sword and Sorcery Discord I go to said the cover looks like Encarta barfed all over it (they’re not wrong!). I am going to try to hunt down all the pictured that where used in the collage work on this album. I’ve identified one: The chariot and horse scene near the top left is from the Hercules Unchained poster (see bottom right):

The music is early 90s Eurodance style. It’s campy, but kinda catchy and fun. If I can find more image sources I’ll do an article proper on this album.

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2023-12-31

Personal / Website News

End of Year H.P. Lovecast Podcast

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

Ep 60 – 2023 Recap, Podcast News, Upcoming Projects – H. P. Lovecast Podcast

The New Peplum Citations

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.

Emmanuelle Legacy CFP Re-opened + Bibliography

Since garnering publisher interest, I’ve re-opened the CFP for the Emmanuelle legacy book. The updated CFP can be found here.

Emmanuelle 6.

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.”

Vernon Press Product Page

Published in May, this issue of Weird Tales contains my essay “When the Stars are Right.”

Weird Tales Product Page

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.”

Limited to 50 physical copies.

Order via Patreon.

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’.”

Order via Dark Dead Thingswebsite.

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.

Amazon product page.

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2023-10-08

Personal / Website News

New Episode of H. P. Lovecast Podcast

A new episode of our monthly HP Lovecast Podcast is online!

Angela Sylvaine returned to the podcast to talk about her debut novel, Frost Bite. The episode can be streamed at our Buzzsprout website, via the embedded player below, or through your podcast app of preference.

HPLCP Transmissions – Ep 26 – Angela Sylvaine and Frost Bite – H. P. Lovecast Podcast

Later this month we will be discussing Mimic 3 on the podcast, concluding our year tradition of diving into the Mimic franchise (Listen to Mimic and Mimic 2).

McFarland Horror Sale

My publisher, McFarland, is having a sale this month on their horror titles. If you use code HALLOWEEN2023 during check out you’ll get a 25% discount on the horror tiles. An entire list of eligible titles can be found here.

Numerous books I’ve been a part of are included in this sale. If you want to pluck something up I’ve either co-edited or contributed an essay to, now is a good time!

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.”

Vernon Press Product Page

Published in May, this issue of Weird Tales contains my essay “When the Stars are Right.”

Weird Tales Product Page

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.”

Limited to 50 physical copies.

Order via Patreon.

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’.”

Order via Dark Dead Thingswebsite.

Miscellaneous Tidbits

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.

Editors: Michele Brittany and Sean Woodard

Contact email: mummybookproject@gmail.com

Abstract Deadline: December 15, 2023

Chapter Drafts Deadline: June 15, 2024

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

Editor bios:

Michele Brittany is a writer, editor, podcaster, and artist. She edited James Bond and Popular Culture and the Bram Stoker Award-nominated Horror in Space: Critical Essays on a Film Subgenre. She co-edited Horror Literature from Gothic to Post-Modern: Critical Essays and co-hosts H. P. Lovecast podcast with Nicholas Diak. She lives in Glendale, Arizona.

Sean Woodard (MA | MFA) is a PhD candidate in English at University of Texas at Arlington. He also serves as the Assistant Editor for Global Insight: A Journal of Critical Human Science and Cultureand the Film Editor for Drunk Monkeys. He has contributed chapters to the edited collections Journeys Into Terror: Essays from the Cinematic Intersection of Travel and Horror and Bloodstained Narratives: The Giallo Film in Italy and Abroad. His research interests include horror cinema, the American West, psychoanalysis, fairy tales, and film scoring.

Autograph Stuff

Here are some of the autographed treasures I shared on social media these past two weeks.

First up is my copy of Nightmare of Ecstasy: The Life and Art of Edward D. Wood Jr. signed by longtime Wood collaborator, Conrad Brooks.

In the latter 2000s I contacted Brooks via his website and he reached out to me via phone. He actually thought I was a lady, probably because of my less-than-masculine voice. He let me send him all my Ed wood stuff for him to autograph (this book included) and he also sent me back some of his movies he directed himself and released via Alpha Video. He was a charming dude and we talked on the phone a few times, but I lost contact with him after we moved to California. I was sad to find out he died, one of the last vanguards of singular era of exploitation films.

Next, following along with classic exploitation, is The Complete Night of the Living Dead Film book, signed by John Russo.

Back in the latter 2000s Michele and I lived in Federal Way and our comic book shop was Spy Comics owned by Richard Spychalski. Richard was the man and we go to his shop every week to pick up our orders we made from Previews and stay well after the shop closed, talking with him and petting his dog Ollie. The bulk of my comic book collection was bought from Richard during this time.

This book popped up as something to order through Previews. The book is actually from 1985. I suspect Avatar Press, which was publishing some NOTLD comics, probably got a box of these books from Russo who has them sitting in his garage and asked for the publisher to sell them. Slap an autograph on them and a certificate of authenticity and voila! Anywho, I liked NOTLD well enough so I ordered this book with one of my previews orders and Richard was able to get it in for me.

I really, really miss having a local comic book store.

To go with my Mike Nelson autographed copy of Plan 9 From Outer Space I shared on 8/27, here’s my copy of Carnival of Souls signed by the MST3K alumni.

I bought this way back in early 20004 while living in University Place. This was an era I was hungry for more MST3K stuff, and at the time only Mike Nelson was doing anything like it. This version of Carnival of Souls was the first time I ever seen the cult film. It’s a great one – a very slow burn one.

#HorrorGameOctober

For #HorrorGameOctober I’ll be (well, am currently) playing two games: The Evil Within and The House of the Dead Remake.

There’s a theme to these two games: they both have lenticular covers!

Michele bought me The Evil Within as a yuletide gift way back in 2015. I played it for a bit, but something stopped me from getting too far in it. Something wasn’t jiving? I got distracted by another game? I’m not sure, but here I am 8 years later giving it a legit go.

The House of the Dead I used to play when I was a teen in the arcade at the Three Rivers Mall in Kelso. I never got far. The game was for sale dirt cheap on Amazon this summer so I plucked it up. I was able to beat it a few times, something I would never think I would do! The game made me feel very nostalgic. I’m going to give it a few more play throughs this month and score a few more Xbox achievements.

I am going to try and fit in a proper write up about these two horror games before the month ends.

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2023-09-24

Personal / Website News

General Things Going On

As usual, lots of stuff going on behind the scenes. A small recap of things I am juggling:

  • Book reviews galore. I overcommitted myself to reviews I need to dig myself out of.
  • Michele and I are judges for an upcoming film festival, so we’ve been watching lots of short films for it.
  • Submitting the Emmanuelle proposal to publishers.
  • Next HP Lovecast Podcast episode will be an interview with Angela Sylvaine about her debut novel Frost Bite.
  • Will be a guest on a few upcoming Fan2Fan podcast episodes.
  • Next Scholars from the Edge of Time episode will be on Ironmaster.
  • Work has gotten hectic with project management work and implementations.
  • Other essay projects on the to do list I keep deprioritizing to get above items done.

Ooof. I’ll get my desk cleared off. Someday. I hope. It’s nice to get things done, but I need to manage better and learn to say no.

Book Review: The Scourge Between Stars

It’s been a bit since I published something here at my website. To break the spell I’ve done a book review on Ness Brown’s space horror novella, The Scourge Between Stars.

My review can be read here.

Michele and I also had the honor to interview Ness on our H. P. Lovecast Podcast. That episode can be streamed here.

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.”

Vernon Press Product Page

Published in May, this issue of Weird Tales contains my essay “When the Stars are Right.”

Weird Tales Product Page

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.”

Limited to 50 physical copies.

Order via Patreon.

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’.”

Order via Dark Dead Thingswebsite.

Miscellaneous Tidbits

Peplum Acquisitions

I did it. After watching G2: Mortal Conquest and doing a Scholars at the Edge of Time vidcast about it, I went out and bought a copy of The Swordsman 2: Gladiator Cop off eBay.

Oh yes, expect a podcast or an essay or a review – a something! – about this magnificent bastard of a film.

Autograph Stuff

Here are some of the autographed treasures I shared on social media these past two weeks.

First is the xbox game Darks of Days.

Michele and I saw this game demoed at PAX 2009? Around there. We have a shirt in a box somewhere. It’s an underrated time travel FPS game. It mostly takes place during the Civil War, but also WW1 and WW2, with a concentration camp scene being especially harrowing. The ending of the game is totally neo-peplum and totally epic: you’re back in Pompeii as Mt. Vesuvius is erupting. You got future armor and gun and you can just mow down Roman soldiers as folks run about. It is hectic and chaotic. Calls for an essay someday that’s for sure.

Way back then I contacted the developers, 8Monkey Labs, if they would autograph my copy. They said sure, I snail mailed it to them, and voila, here it is.

Next up is one of my most prized possessions, an Arkham House publication, Nameless Places, signed by author Gary Myers, Ramsey Campbell, and over artist Tim Kirk.

Gary is an old friend who has been a big inspiration to me for writing and getting into Lovecraft, especially the Dreamlands. I will never not plug his work when I can (check out his collection Country of the Worm!!!). Campbell I met at StokerCon 2018. Kirk I met at a Vintage Paperback Show in Glendale. He did a doodle in my book and its adorbs.

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2023-09-10

Personal / Website News

H. P. Lovecast Podcast

The monthly Transmissions episode of our H. P. Lovecast Podcast is online.

In this episodes we interview Ness Brown about their debut space horror novella, The Scourge Between Stars. The episode can be streamed at the HP Lovecast Buzzsprout page, via the embedded player below, or via your podcast app of preference.

HPLCP Transmissions – Ep 25 – Ness Brown – Scourge Between Stars – H. P. Lovecast Podcast

In September or October we *should* be resuming our twice a month schedule. This summer has been crazy with projects, obligations, work, and prepping for CoKoCon.

Scholars from the Edge of Time

Michele and I did a second episode of Scholars from the Edge of Time in August. Michele talked about The Swordsman and I talked about the video game Starsand. Check it out on YouTube.

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.”

Vernon Press Product Page

Published in May, this issue of Weird Tales contains my essay “When the Stars are Right.”

Weird Tales Product Page

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.”

Limited to 50 physical copies.

Order via Patreon.

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’.”

Order via Dark Dead Thingswebsite.

Miscellaneous Tidbits

Autograph Roundup

Here is a round of autographed ephemera I’ve shared on social media the last two weeks.

First up is my copy of Bizarre Sinema! Horror all’italiana 1957-1979:

This is an incredible book. There’s an entire chapter + interview with Antonio Margheriti which I’ve cited in my masters thesis on Castle of Blood and in other essays as well.

Michele and I met Barbara Steele at a Hollywood Collectors Show back in July of 2010. She signed many of my movies but also my copy of Bizarre Sinema! in which she penned the foreword:

And, here is a picture of all of us from way back when. Queen!

Next up, part of my comprehensive Oliver Gruner library, is Crackerjack 3.

This DVD is signed by Gruner along with Bo Svenson, director Lloyd Simandl and WWE Diva Amy Weber. We met Amy Weber back in 2010 at a celebrity show in Burbank:

The folks at Boundheat Films coordinated the director signing my DVD. His auteur elements of including WIP/Lesbian Slave elements in his films are found in Crackerjack 3.

Next is Bikini Beach signed by the grooviest babe of the AIP beauty party films, Donna Loren.

These movies are always a lot of fun, especially when old guard folks like Buster Keaton show up.

Any finally, for this week, I have The Year’s Best Fantasy Stories: 3 signed by Gary Myers and George R. R. Martin.

Gary Myers is the bloody man and I would say is the most instrumental of me getting into the work of Lovecraft and cosmic horror. Myers’ Dreamlands stories are the best iteration of the Dreamlands and I suggest folks check his collection out.

George R. R. Martin was the guest of honor at StokerCon 2017 and that is were I got his autograph. I’ve never read Game of Thrones or watched the series, so his short story here is the only work of his I am familiar with.

CFP List

Here are a few interesting CFPs I want to help proliferate.

Music Medievalism In Popular Culture at ICMS in Kalamazoo (May 9–11, 2024)

Sponsoring Organization: Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture
Organizer: Anna Czarnowus

Jonathan Le Cocq (forthcoming, 2024) defines music medievalism as either the influence of the medieval on later music, or the impact on medieval music (real or imagined) on any later cultural practice. In popular culture, we can find both the music that has been influenced by the actual medieval one and music influenced by some folk music imagined as medieval. Medievalist music such as pagan folk music (Troyer in: Meyer and Yri, 2020) can be used in various media and there are various genres of it. Some music videos can be an example of the cultural practice that is influenced by the imaginary medieval music. Medievalist video games also contain “medievalized” music.

Please consider such topics and similar ones:

  • medievalist music as background
  • medievalist music and similar videos
  • medievalist music/folk music as medievalist

Please send your abstract to: annaczarnowus@tlen.pl by September 1, 2023, but an official proposal can only be made and accepted through https://icms.confex.com/icms/2024/cfp.cgi by September 15th.

Creating Camelot(s): The Idea of Community in Arthurian Texts (virtual)

Sponsored by Alliance for the Promotion of Research on the Matter of Britain and International Arthurian Society, North American Branch (IAS/NAB)

Organizers: Michael A. Torregrossa and Joseph M. Sullivan

Call for Papers – Please Submit Proposals by 15 September 2023
59th International Congress on Medieval Studies
Western Michigan University (Kalamazoo, Michigan)
Hybrid event: Thursday, 9 May, through Saturday, 11 May, 2024

Session Objective

Although we often refer to the Matter of Britain as the Arthurian tradition, the figure of King Arthur is merely the center point of the story. The tales are in fact about the community that Arthur builds and the ways those inside it (and outside as well) interact with each other. Through Arthur and those he surrounds himself with, Camelot becomes a living thing, and we experience its birth, maturity, and death, as well as its re-creation across the ages.
In this session, we’d like to highlight the multiple ways that Arthur’s realm has been constructed from the Middle Ages to the present. Submissions can explore the Arthurian legends from across time
and/or space as represented through diverse genres and media.
We seek contributions from a range of scholars–those within the disciplines of Arthurian Studies and/or Medieval Studies as well as those in outside fields, including beyond the humanities–as they
consider at least one of the following questions:

● What are the origins of Camelot? How do Arthur’s literary and/or historic predecessors (Ambrosius Aurelius, Arthur of Dal Riada, Constantine, Fionn mac Cumhaill, Lucius Artorius Castus, Riothamus, Uther Pendragon, Vortigern, etc.) influence the creation of his home base? What real locales inspired the idea or site of Camelot?
● Moving forwards, how has Camelot been built as a physical place whether in the Arthurian past or in post-Arthurian re-creations? What does the site look like? How does it function as a space where
individuals live and work?
● Also, how has Camelot been shaped as a communal space, a location for people to come together in fellowship, and who has been included within this group? In what ways does the community grow and change under Arthur and/or his successors?
● Alternatively, who has been excluded and/or expelled from the space(s) of Camelot, and in what ways have those individuals dealt with this loss?
● Similarly, who has been invited to join the community at Camelot but resisted its entreaties and/or rebelled against Arthur and his rule (or that of his successors)? What are the reasons for their rejection
of Camelot? How do their actions impact the Arthurian world?
● Lastly, do those removed from and/or repelled by Camelot ever integrate (or re-integrate) and become part of the community? How does this acceptance shape them and/or the world of Camelot?

Submission Information

All proposals must be submitted into the Confex system at https://wmich.edu/medievalcongress/call by 15 September 2023. You will be prompted to complete sections on Title and Presentation
Information, People, Abstract, and Short Description. Be advised of the following policies of the Congress: “You are invited to make one paper proposal to one session of papers. This may be to one of the Sponsored or Special Sessions of Papers, which are organized by colleagues around the world, OR to the General Sessions of Papers, which are organized by the Program Committee in Kalamazoo. You may propose an unlimited number of roundtable contributions. However, you will not be scheduled as an active participant (as a paper presenter, roundtable discussant, presider, respondent, workshop leader, or performer) in more than three sessions.”.

Thank you for your interest in our session. Please address questions and/or concerns to the organizers at KingArthurForever2000@gmail.com.

For more information on the Alliance for the Promotion of Research on the Matter of Britain, please visit our website at https://KingArthurForever.blogspot.com/.

For more information on the International Arthurian Society, North American Branch (IAS/NAB), please visit our website at https://www.international-arthurian-society-nab.org/ and consider becoming a member of our organization.

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2023-08-13

Personal / Website News

Black Emanuelle Boxset Unboxing

Severin Films recently released a titanic boxset of the Laura Gemser Black Emanuelle films. I, of course, did an unboxing article of it.

I also bring up prior incarnations of Black Emanuelle DVD releases. Check out the write up here.

Citation News

There’s been an uptick in work being cited lately and I am here for it!

Firstly, my essay “Lost Nights and Dangerous Days: Unraveling the Relationship Between Stranger Things and Synthwave” from Uncovering Stranger Things has been cited in the essay “‘Dad, every serial killer is somebody’s neighbor!’ The Problem of White Supremacy in Summer of ’84” by Erika Tiburcio Moreno and published in the edited collection The ’80s Resurrected: Essays on the Decade in Popular Culture Then and Now.

The book was published by McFarland in March earlier this year. More info can be found on the book’s product page at the McFarland website.

Next, Hannah Mueller’s essay “Male Nudity, Violence and the Disruption of Voyeuristic Pleasure in Starz’s Spartacus” from The New Peplum has been cited by James K. Beggan in his essay “Why is he there? Male presence in a sexually explicit magazine geared towards heterosexual men” that was published in the Porn Studies journal.

The New Peplum
Cover art for The New Peplum

If you have access the essay can be read at the journal’s page at Taylor and Francis.

New Episode of HP Lovecast

A new episode of our monthly Transmission program is now online.

For July we interviewed Chelsea Pumpkins, editor of the horror anthology AHH! That’s What I Call Horror: An Anthology of ’90s Horror. The episode can be streamed via our Buzzsprout page, the embedded player below, or through your podcast app of preference.

HPLCP Transmissions – Ep 24 – Chelsea Pumpkins – H. P. Lovecast Podcast

CoKoCon Schedule

The schedule for CoKoCon 2023 is starting to take shape! You can find Michele and I on the following panels:

  • Saturday Sept 2 9pm – Fiesta Ballroom 2: From EC Comics to Shudder: Horror Comics That Excite and Scare Us
  • Sunday Sept 3 6pm – Coronado: Creepy, Crawly, Otherworldly Bumps in the Night, or Cosmic Horror Films
  • Monday Sept 4 1pm – Coronado: 1pm: Weird West in Popular Culture

I’ll be on premises the entire con, so feel free to hunt me down to say hi! Michele and I will also have a table we were sill be selling and signing books.

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.”

Vernon Press Product Page

Published in May, this issue of Weird Tales contains my essay “When the Stars are Right.”

Weird Tales Product Page

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.”

Limited to 50 physical copies.

Order via Patreon.

Essay about mimetic desire in Lovecraft’s Call of Cthulhu in Dark Dead Things #2/

Order via Dark Dead Things website.

Miscellaneous Tidbits

New Acquisitions

Kino Lorber just had a summer sale on their Blu-rays so I took the opportunity to pluck up some Italian films for the library.

The Last Hunter I already had on DVD, from Dark Sky Films. In fact, here is my copy autographed by Antonio Margheriti’s son, Edoardo Margheriti:

I did a presentation on The Last Hunter at the Southwest Popular/American Culture Association conference waaaaaaay back in 2010. Not my best presentation and still very green at being an academic, but the text of it can be read at my Academia.edu account.

Ironmaster I have not seen. It sounds like an Italian sword and sorcery flick, but in a prehistoric age. I am a fan of Umberto Lenzi’s work so this should be a fun watch.

Lastly is Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, which I also have not seen. I’ve seen the iconic image of Sophia Loren slipping off her stockings that I feel like I’ve seen the film. I always think of Mastroianni from Divorce, Italian Style.

Pasolini’s The Gospel According to St. Matthew Commentary

Matt Page, author of 100 Bible Films, has recorded a commentary for Paolini’s 1964 Biblical peplum, The Gospel According to St. Matthew. The commentary and be streamed from YouTube. Criterion Collection recently released a Pasolini boxset that contains this film.

Call for Papers

Michael Torregrossa has a few CFPs out there. I’m sharing them here to help get the word out. Check them out and consider submitting!

Beowulfs Beyond Beowulf: Transformations of Beowulf in Popular Culture (Panel)

Sponsored by the Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture and the Monsters & the Monstrous Area of the Northeast Popular Culture Association

Organized by Michael A. Torregrossa, Richard Fahey, Carl Sell, and Benjamin Hoover

Call for Papers – Please Submit Proposals by 30 September 2023

55th Annual Convention of Northeast Modern Language Association

Sheraton Boston Hotel (Boston, MA)

On-site event: 7-10 March 2024

The Old English epic Beowulf remains an important touchstone for connecting us to the medieval past, yet it also has continued relevance today through its various transformations in cultural texts (especially works of popular culture). Our hope with this session is to expand our knowledge of these works and assess their potential for research and teaching. 

Please visit our website Beowulf Transformed: Adaptations and Appropriations of the Beowulf Story (available at https://beowulf-transformed.blogspot.com/)  for resources and ideas. 

The full call for papers (with complete session and submission information) can be accessed at https://tinyurl.com/Beowulf-Transformed-NeMLA-2024.  

Session Information

Over a millennium old, the story of Beowulf is disseminated primarily through its editions and translations and its transformations. These three types of Beowulfiana represent a massive corpus of over 1000 works according to the Beowulf’s Afterlives Bibliographic Database; though, as medievalists, we tend to focus on the first two categories rather than the last concentrating on scholastic pursuits rather than entertainments. Consequently, many are often surprised by the variety and vitality of this corpus and its vast potential for research and teaching.

New versions of the Beowulf story feature in all forms of modern mediævalisms, yet (as is true with most medieval texts) research continues to focus primarily on depictions of Beowulf on screen (about 100 examples according to the Internet Movie Database). We hope in this session to expand our view of Beowulf’s reception by creators and look more deeply at the text’s wider use. 

We are particularly interested in explorations of the adaptation and/or appropriation of the text, its characters, and its themes in works of fiction (at least 250 examples according to the Internet Speculative Fiction Database and much more recorded by the Beowulf’s Afterlives Bibliographic Database) and comics (at least 380 examples according to the Grand Comics Database), as well as their representations in new and neglected works on screen (including film, television, entertainment consoles, and the Internet). Additional versions of Beowulf can be found in works of creative, performative, and visual arts that also need more attention. 

We hope to make our conversation productive. Therefore, we request that submissions highlight the ways the new text transforms the old (for example as interpretations or appropriations of the poem or as an intertext for another work) as well as its value in furthering the Beowulf tradition rather than focusing solely on any perceived defects. 

Please see our website Beowulf Transformed: Adaptations and Appropriations of the Beowulf Story (at https://beowulf-transformed.blogspot.com/) for a growing list of ideas, resources, and support. 

All proposals will also be considered for a themed issue of the open-access journal The Heroic Age: A Journal of Early Medieval Northwestern Europe.

Please address questions and/or concerns to the organizers at popular.preternaturaliana@gmail.com.

Submission Information

All proposals must be submitted into the CFPList system at https://cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/20596 by 30 September 2023. You will be prompted to create an account with NeMLA (if you do not already have one) and, then, to complete sections on Title, Abstract, and Media Needs. 

Notification on the fate of your submission will be made prior to 16 October 2023. If favorable, please confirm your participation with chairs by accepting their invitations and by registering for the event. The deadline for Registration/Membership is 9 December 2023.

Be advised of the following policies of the Convention: All participants must be members of NeMLA for the year of the conference. Participants may present on up to two sessions of different types (panels/seminars are considered of the same type). Submitters to the CFP site cannot upload the same abstract twice.(See the NeMLA Presenter Policies page, at https://www.buffalo.edu/nemla/convention/policies.html, for further details,)

Thank you for your interest in our session. 

Again, please address questions and/or concerns to the organizers at popular.preternaturaliana@gmail.com.

For more information on the Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture, please visit our website at https://MedievalinPopularCulture.blogspot.com/.  

For more information on the Monsters & the Monstrous Area of the Northeast Popular Culture Association, please visit our website at https://popularpreternaturaliana.blogspot.com/.

Categories
News

Biweekly News Roundup 2023-05-21

Personal / Website News

Heavy Music Mothers Authors Interview

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.

Ep 58 – Dreamquest by Clay Adams and Mick Beyers – H. P. Lovecast Podcast

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).

Akira 35 Year Anniversary Part 1 – Fan2Fan Podcast

Fan2Fan also did an episode in their 5 Minute Friday series, this one devoted to the famous motorcycle slide.

This episode can also be found at the Fan2Fan Libsyn, on your podcast app of preference, or in the player below.

5 Minute Friday – Akira Bike – Fan2Fan Podcast

And just for fun, here are my two copies of Akira, one of them autographed by old school Streamline folks, Robert Payne Cabeen and Wendy Horowitz.

In addition to the Akira 5 Minute Friday, Fan2Fan also has a 5 Minute Friday on Vampire Hunter D!

This episode can be streamed here, in the player below, or via your podcast app.

5 Minutes Friday – Vampire Hunter D – Fan2Fan Podcast

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.”

Vernon Press Product Page

Scheduled to be published in May, this issue of Weird Talescontains my essay “When the Stars are Right.”

Weird Tales Product Page

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.”

Limited to 50 physical copies.

Order via Patreon.