Archive for March 2018

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The Terror – – Go for Broke; Gore

March 26, 2018

 

Watching The Walking Dead Sunday night,  I was unexpectedly treated to an unannounced and unadvertised preview of The Terror.  Quite a change of scenario, but I’ll take two hours of horror over one any night!

“An adventure for Queen and Country!”

Probably, not everyone will be able to get into The Terror because of its period drama aspects.  The pilot episode (Go for Broke) was mostly set-up and mood-setter, and some will be turned off by the rather trudging pace initially prevalent.  I love this kind of thing, however, and enjoy its attention to detail and atmosphere.  It’s all there; the dim  lighting, the creaking of the great wooden ship, and the magnificent desolation of the arctic.  Life was far more elemental in the mid-nineteenth century in a way that we early 21st century folks can only dimly imagine.

Executive producer Ridley Scott brings a touch of Alien space horror to this tale, however.  All of the elements are there; combine a bunch of superstitious sailors in close quarters in unknown and dangerous situations, and you’re bound to get a body count.  Even the first episode, Go for Broke, brought us death, disease, delusion, and even a “space walk” in the form of deep sea diving.  

The creepiness factor slowly started to ramp up in the second episode, Gore.  Locked in ice, the two ships send out expedition teams to seek the best passage through the ice, one of which meets with severe mishap when the tense group spooked by a night storm shoots an Inuit man in the company of his daughter.  A member of this team shortly later is seized and carried off by a creature that they think is a bear, but most likely is a Tuunbaq.  Taken back to the ship, the Inuit male succumbs to his injuries, his daughter advising the commanding officers (who profess that they want to help despite having shot her father) that they must leave or will vanish…

The sci fi/horror themes of malfunction, isolation, and paranoia that factored into such classics as The Thing are beginning to kick in here, and I’m on board for this arctic nautical nightmare!

 

Categories: anomalies, anthropomorphic, cryptozoology, furry, furry horror, paranormal, sci fi, television, unexplained

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“X-Files” Season 11 Finale…

March 23, 2018


After leaving explicit instructions that I was not to be interrupted, I sat down to watch the Season 11 finale of the X-Files.  I seldom exclaim “Wow!” at anything that I see on television, but this episode was truly cathartic.  It was one wild ride that took me in unexpected directions, leaving me feeling dazzled, wrung-out, and yes, satisfied if saddened. — Thank you, series creator Chris Carter!

The episode had everything, from Fox Mulder in his Mustang to Mulder impossibly prevailing over three armed men to the freaky powers of Mulder’s “son” repeatedly deployed.  I haven’t seen this much blood on the screen since The Walking Dead, with Mulder himself dispatching several people and son William causing other despicable baddies to literally explode…unexpected gore (a “Wow!” moment), but I don’t begrudge them that, as long as I don’t have to clean it up. We got to see several deaths including those of several core characters, and one startling resurrection that testifies to the regenerative powers of alien DNA.  Death is not necessarily final in the X-Files world, where the impossible happens.  We also saw the deep love and bond between Mulder and Scully, all without a single kiss being exchanged.  More than kisses were exchanged, however, as Mulder is told he’ll really be a father by his partner…

Although Gillian Anderson has said she will not be returning to reprise her Dana Scully character, there are plenty of hooks here upon which a series reboot could be mounted. We true X-Philes will only accept a season finale, and never a series finale.  If Fox Television is sold to Disney as is apparently in the works, we might even learn of a connection between alien-infused William and Disney’s character Stitch…”The impossible is happening, Mulder…”



Categories: aliens, anomalies, paranormal, sci fi, television
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“The Terror” is Coming!

March 19, 2018

I love creepy stuff, and there’s so little of it that’s done really well!  For this reason, I’m really looking forward to The Terror, an upcoming horror series on the AMC network. Based on a novel by Dan Simmons and the ill-fated real life Franklin Expedition, The Terror looks like wonderful stuff indeed.  

Incorporating elements of the movies The Thing with Alien and the rich period atmospherics and fine acting of the Penny Dreadful tv series, The Terror has it all.  It kind of combines a real-life historical event, the Franklin Expedition, with a horror/fantasy overlay. This kind of thing has been done in a lot of sci fi/alternative history fiction, and has lately been seen in films like Abraham Lincoln:  Vampire Hunter.

Now the ill-fated Franklin Expedition was real stuff which was kicked off in 1845 when the HMS Erebus and HMS Terror left England in search of a segment of the Northwest Passage, a kind of 19th century wormhole which it was felt would convey trade to the Orient.  The vessels, advanced for their day, became hopelessly ice-locked in the Canadian Arctic, forcing their crews to abandon ship and walk in search of a settlement.  They faced slow and miserable deaths from exposure, starvation, and lead poisoning caused by their badly-canned food.  All 129 souls on board the ships died from their ordeal.

In the television horror drama, the Royal Navy expedition instead of finding the Northwest Passage discovers a cunning, monstrous gothic-style predator who stalks the crew in a game of survival which could impact the region and its indigenous people forever.  For a tale of frozen wastes, sailing ships, and Arctic monsters I’m booking passage on The Terror for sure!


Categories: animal elements, anthropomorphic, cryptozoology, fantasy, furry, furry horror, historical perspectives, horror, television, unidentified
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