From Zombos' Closet

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Gospel of the Living Dead

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging. Up close and personal.

In this installment, author and horror blogger Kim Paffenroth of Gospel of the Living Dead talks about zombies and religion, and how the two meet to provide enlightening revelation.

I think, like many people, my first interest in horror goes back to adolescence, when I was fascinated with some horror movies (especially Romero's zombies), and with some written expressions of horror (especially Lovecraft). I thought gross, bleeding, oozing things were cool. I think it's pretty typical at that age. Then my mother died a slow, lingering death from cancer, and that made my interest a little less "cool" and a lot more brooding and sullen. I put some of my feelings into bad fiction writing and bad poetry at that age, I suppose as a kind of catharsis or self-therapy. It worked, for what it was, I guess.

But when I went off to college, that phase just stopped. It didn't trail off, it just stopped the day I got off the bus in front of Campbell Hall. Something about the place (St John's College, Annapolis, MD) just awed me with the ideas of dead guys who knew so much more than I did; I should stop and read every word I could and not interrupt with my sophomoric attempts to put angst or pain or rebellion into words. (I know, I wouldn't have articulated the feeling that way at the time, but in hindsight, that's what I was feeling at all the ivy-covered walls and dusty books and rather arcane, 19th century-looking lab apparatuses.)

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Fascination With Fear

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging. Up close and personal.

In this installment, Christine Hadden of Fascination With Fear talks about her ominous Saturday night alone, and the ensuing damage it wrought. Lucky for us.

My obsession with horror came at a very young age. As a small child, my grandfather (a Methodist minister, no less) introduced me to The Wizard of Oz and Willy Wonka - both of which actually have horrifying undertones for kids. (Gene Wilder was seriously demented in that freaky psychedelic boat sequence!) To that effect, a lot of the better Disney features can be brutal as well. Exposing a child to Bambi at too young an age--and I'm telling you from experience--you'll scar them for life. My grandpap and I would also stay up late watching Bill Cardille ("Chilly Billy") on Chiller Theater (a Pittsburgh legend). My parents bought me all those crazy Disney ghost story records, I watched all the old Godzilla movies on Saturday afternoons, and, truth be told, I read every last Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew mystery, okay? After school I rushed home to watch the iconic (?) Lost In Space...so there's my sci-fi link.

I can't recall how old I was when my parents left me alone for the first time on a Saturday night to go out. Was I ten yet? I should have been but I'm really not sure. But I was forever damaged (and enchanted) after turning on a movie called The Exorcist. And what was that movie doing on regular TV, anyway? Must've been around Halloween.

LOTT D: Pick a Post Sensation 10

Beware! The game's afoot. Once again, the archives have been unburied, and the hideous horrors unleashed! For your entertainment and edification pleasure, of course.

Members of the League of Tana Tea Drinkers dig six feet deep to find their past misdeeds...and reveal them to you, one favorite and notable post at a time!

 

Classic-Horror dares to delve deeply into Blood for Dracula:

With all the revolutions in the film industry in the late 1960s and early 1970s, many of the older film monsters were starting to appear cliché, even trite. Dracula, long the enemy of Victorian standards, needed to be updated for a time when such standards had long passed. Leave it to pop artist/film producer Andy Warhol and director Paul Morrissey to do this by flipping the rules around and making Dracula the pathetic victim of permissive social mores.

Attentiondeficitdisorderly Too Flat reviews Duncan Jones's indie sci-fi thriller Moon:

I finally saw Duncan Jones's science-fiction character-piece-cum-thriller Moon, and was glad I braved the sweat-soaked journey down to the Landmark Sunshine to do so. Moon is very, very much a creature of its own influences, and owns up to this repeatedly--and wisely, I think. If you're going to do a suspense story about a man stranded in a cabin-fever outer-space environment with a soft-spoken computer for company, what's the sense of playing cat and mouse with Kubrick?

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Cinema Fromage

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging. Up close and personal.

In this installment, League of Tana Tea Drinkers' member Casey Criswell of Cinema Fromage shares his nerd love for cheesy horror. Bring the crackers.

Horror wasn't the driving force to my movie watching ways back in the day, but it was definitely a factor. I watched movies, period, and was happy to do so. When the VCR became an affordable venture and mom and pop video stores started to run rental deals to lure you away from the new chain stores cropping up, this led to countless hours spent wandering the stacks and being overcome by the wonderment of the gruesome scenes depicted in ink upon the old cardboard canvases that was the VHS box. More than anything, it was the artwork that lured me in every time. They say never judge a book by its cover but that is what I did. If the cover looked amazing, I had to see the movie.

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Billy Loves Stu

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging. Up close and personal.

In this installment, League of Tana Tea Drinkers' member Michael Petrucelli of Billy Loves Stu looks for the gay and lesbian subtexts in horror movies as well as the 'straight' scares.

My love of horror began at a tender age. As a kid I was exposed to the classic Universal horror films Dracula, Frankenstein, etc) by my father. When these movies came on the television, he’d call me over and we’d watch together in the small living room of our row house in South Philadelphia. Often, my dad would add to the flavor of the films by talking like the characters, he did (and still does) a terrific Bela Lugosi as well as Boris Karloff. Later on, well after the movie had ended, he’d come into my room as I was preparing for bed, and freak me out by telling me that he was in the basement earlier and found machines that were probably once used to create a monster, or that he thought our next door neighbor was a vampire (our next door neighbor, Mr.Calabrese worked nights). Needless to say, I was mortified – and yet at the same time, I was fascinated. Many sleepless nights ensued (and I always kept my eyes peeled for Mr. Calabrese), but I never turned down an invitation to watch a scary movie with my dad.

There was this old movie theater a few blocks from where I grew up, you know, one of those palatial houses with marble arches and velvet curtains; and on the weekends, they’d show triple feature horror films, usually something from Hammer studios in England. Often, they would also incorporate a “spook show” between films (which was usually some poor usher made up like a low-rent werewolf walking up and down the aisles of the movie house) and give out prizes for those “brave enough” to make it through the afternoon of horrors. Over time, I accumulated dozens of cheesy door prizes that I displayed as proudly as some kids did with their baseball trophies.

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Uranium Cafe

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging. Up close and personal.

In this installment, League of Tana Tea Drinkers' member Bill Courtney of the Uranium Cafe describes the influences, the places, and the challenges for keeping his love of horror and cult movies alive.

As a kid I was lucky enough to have a dad who was not the least bit interested in watching sports on TV over the weekends. He loved movies and comic books. This was in the 60’s and I grew up on a healthy diet of classic films, TV, and Marvel and DC comics. We had a b/w TV set with rabbit ears and basically three channels to choose programs from. Later, PBS would come along but who the hell ever really watched that. I grew up watching a variety of programs that included weekly showings of Sword and Sandal films, serial Westerns, and of course classic horror and sci-fi features.

A couple films I recall as being really shocking to me are actually pretty tame fare by today’s standards. One was The Mummy with Boris Karloff and in particular the scene where he suddenly rises up and peers into the camera. The other film, also with Karloff, was called Die, Monster, Die! And I recall being terrified to death, and dad telling me it was just a movie and it was all make believe. I would soon be saving up my lunch money from school and going to the local grocery stores and buying loads of comics and Warren Magazines. At the most I would save up two or three bucks but back then Famous Monsters of Filmland was .35 or .50 and I could get six or so comics for a dollar. Matinees were cheap and I remember watching more Spaghetti Westerns and B-horror movies than I can recall.

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Love Train for the Tenebrous Empire

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging. Up close and personal.

In this installment, League of Tana Tea Drinkers' member Tenebrous Kate of Love Train for the Tenebrous Empire tells us about her love for the unusual. Hop aboard!

Between my Halloween-themed birthday parties, early interest in the creepiest fairy tales, and exposure to my Dad's incredible impersonation of Bela Lugosi's Dracula, I was pretty much fated from infancy to be some flavor of spooky. My youthful dreams of earning a living as a vampire hunter were squashed (I read pretty much every book filed under the Parapsychology & Occult section of my local library), so by the time I was fourteen, I began delving into the wild world of horror cinema in earnest.

Applying the same sort of tenacity to my movie-viewing that I'd put into my childhood reading, I methodically worked my way through the "Horror" category at a number of video rental stores. Unlike a lot of my horror-loving colleagues, I entirely missed out on the slasher flick craze due to parental protectiveness and a notoriously weak stomach for on-screen depictions of blood-and-guts. After dipping a toe in the waters of explicit fright films with "Suspiria" (I'd read laudatory words about this movie most likely in an issue of "Cinefantastique" or "Video Watchdog"), my love affair with off-the-wall exploitation epics was born.

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Cinema Suicide

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging. Up close and personal.

In this installment, League of Tana Tea Drinkers' member Bryan White of Cinema Suicide tells us how he leveraged his love of horror into free stuff, a successful blog, and a lifelong passion.

My family picked up stakes when I was seven years old and moved us from Binghamton, New York, to the Lovecraftian seaside of Marblehead, Massachusetts. It took me no time at all to seek out the channels with the best cartoons and in the process of this Saturday morning exploration, I found something that Binghamton didn't have. At least not to my knowledge. This morbid discovery also managed to silently change my life in ways I wouldn't understand until I was well into my 20's.

The Creature Double Feature on WLVI was your classic afternoon monster matinee on TV. Bookended by an echoplex voice-over set to Emerson, Lake and Palmer, The Creature Double Feature introduced me to vampires with British accents, men in rubber monster suits stomping on models of Japanese cities and more pie plates decked out to look like flying saucers than you could possibly ever conceive of. It was all in good fun and just shocking enough to scare the crap out of a 7 year old; enough to keep me coming back week after week in hopes of seeing Karloff, Price, and Lee again.

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Day of the Woman

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging. Up close and personal.

In this installment, League of Tana Tea Drinkers' member Brittney-Jade Colangelo of Day of the Woman brings a youthful approach to an old genre.

Horror has always been a huge part of my life. Before Kindergarten I was a Craven Crusader, I had conquered Carpenter, and I bellowed with laughter at Barker. My mother introduced me to the films at a young age, but my father brought me into the horror culture. My parents also used to run the haunted hayride for our community.

People from all over would come to our town to experience the terror that my family would provide. While it would drive down creepy trails and scary wooded areas, my parents were lurking. My father may have been the big man in the hockey mask that jumped on top of the ride towards the end, but my mother was Pamela Voorhees. She was a woman dressed in the hockey mask at the beginning of the ride. Sort of a symbol for the terror that was about to come. In my opinion, it was brilliant.

My mother also chose a babysitter for me who shared a love of horror. I had a babysitter named Jillian who LOVED horror films. She would come over to watch me for the evening while my parents went out galavanting and she would come over with bundles of horror films. While most parents would probably freak out, my mom encouraged it! We even had a night where all the neighborhood kids came by and we watched Sleepaway Camp. Knowing it would scare us sheetless, it lead to an up all night party of ghost stories shared by not only the children and the babysitter...but my parents as well.

Meet the Horror Bloggers: Vault of Horror

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging, up close and personal.

In this installment, League of Tana Tea Drinkers' member Brian Solomon of The Vault of Horror squarely places the blame for his horror fanaticism.

I've been fascinated with horror ever since my parents let me watch The Exorcist at 8 years old (what were they thinking??), and I ran up to my bed screaming when Linda Blair's eyes rolled into the back of her head.

There were also all those classic Universal and Hammer flicks that syndicated TV piped my way on lazy weekend afternoons. But the one that grabbed my attention and didn't let go, the film that truly sparked my lifelong fascination with the horror genre, was The Return of the Living Dead (or ROTLD, as its fans so succinctly call it.)

Much as with my very life, it all started thanks to my parents. You see, they were horror freaks from back in the days when I had to stay holed up in my room just listening to the screams from downstairs, too young to sit in on the "grown-up" horror movies.

For me, ROTLD was a gateway movie, opening the door to so much more. My next stop was the Evil Dead flicks; then came George Romero, and the rest, as they say, is history.

The Vault of Horror

Meet the Horror Bloggers: TheoFantastique

Many fans of horror, amateur and professional alike, have devoted themselves to blogging about the thrills, chills, and no-frills side of the genre as seen in cinema and print. In this ongoing series that highlights the writers behind the blogs, we meet the unique personalities and talents that make the online horror scene so engaging, up close and personal.

In this installment, League of Tana Tea Drinkers' member John W. Morehead of TheoFantastique tells us about his life-long journey with the fantastic on film and television, and how it provides a catalyst for his studies in religion and culture.

I have had an almost lifelong connection to the fantastic, including horror. Some of my memories going back to early grammar school in Stockton, California include my dad's offer to my brother and I to forgo the weekly family viewing of The Wonderful World of Disney for a scary movie. Although we loved Disney, we jumped at the chance to see something we had never seen before. The movie that evening was The Creature from the Black Lagoon. I was younger than eight at the time, probably five or six, and although the creature frightened me, it also opened the door for a love of horror and science fiction even at this young age.

LOTT D: Pick a Post Sensation 9

Beware! Once again, the archives have been unburied, and the hideous horrors unleashed! For your entertainment and edification pleasure, of course. Members of the League of Tana Tea Drinkers dig six feet deep to find their past misdeeds...and reveal them to you, one post at a time!

 

Attentiondeficitdisorderly Too Flat looks at the almost indescribably brutal self-published minicomic Cockbone by Josh Simmons:

It's safe to say that this comic contains the most extreme material I've ever actually come across in a comic.

The Drunken Severed Head interviews Shane Briant, in three parts, about his Worst Nightmares.

Each segment is about twenty minutes. In Part One, Mr. Briant talks about his new book, about his writing process, and working on Dan Curtis' The Picture of Dorian Gray. He does a cool bit of impersonation when reminiscing about two of the people involved, actor Nigel Davenport and producer Dan Curtis. In Part Two, he talks about what working at Hammer studios was like, and in Part Three, he riffs on a few dysfunctional fans.

Cinema Suicide continues woeful tales of the fanboy circuit with this Bruce Campbell encounter.

While my encounter with Bruce Cambell was a far cry from the heart breaking meeting with Tom Savini, it still marks another moment of disappointment and the sudden realization that maybe Fango was wrong and that these high profile personalities aren’t as fan friendly as they make them seem.

Don't touch that dial! There's more...