Odds & ends #1
The world record for the tallest stack of doughnuts totaled more than 3,000.
Well, turns out that things have gotten off to a better start than I imagined. While I don’t want to say the exact number of subscribers I got upon opening this thing, because it’s probably pitifully small when compared to other writers, but it’s more than I expected, so that’s good enough, and thank you very much. With that though comes the pressure to keep up with this thing, with the goal of posting twice a week, so I’m giving you permission as of now to nudge me if you don’t get anything in a week or two (gently at first, and then if I start making excuses you can give me a hard kick in the ass). As some of you know, I’m dealing with a lot of bullshit (kidneys don’t work, brain is broken, day job is always insanely busy), but since writing is one of the things that keeps me sane, I owe it to myself to continue making time for it. After all, there’s nothing left to do on my Animal Crossing island, so what else am I going to do, something productive?
Animal Crossing, man. The creators of that should get a medal for keeping people from running in the streets screaming during the early days of the pandemic.
The week in Gena
On Kill by Kill, we’re almost to the end of our Hannibal rewatch, as we cover episodes 10 and 11. Too much time is devoted to talking about the sight of Richard Armitage in boxer briefs, and how Hannibal Lector went to the bathroom after Alana Bloom removed the toilet from his cell as punishment. A classy discussion as always.
If you’re a member of our Patreon, you’ll have been gifted by now with an exclusive episode devoted to Ti West’s X, which I described as “Boogie Nights meets The Texas Chainsaw Massacre with a sprinkling of Stephen King.” If you’re not a member of our Patreon, then too bad for you, but you should watch X anyway.
We also did our very first live stream with Bryan Christopher of Daily Dead, where we watched and talked over Hellraiser: Revelations. Have you seen Hellraiser: Revelations? It’s fuckin’ terrible!
On White Ladies in Crisis, a podcast side project I’ve been working on with some Horror Twitter friends, we end our run on Hulu’s true crime docudrama Candy, starring Jessica Biel and my wife Melanie Lynskey.
I saw Blonde! It was really depressing! But also surprisingly…good? Stay tuned for my review, once I can figure out how to say what I want to say without being wildly misunderstood and attacked, which is something that, as we all know, never happens on Twitter, so what am I worried about?
The week in links
My dear friend Megan Sunday wrote an excellent anniversary retrospective on the good Hellraiser, the original Hellraiser, and how it’s come to be a comfort film for her. Mine are The Thing and Zodiac, so, y’know, I get it.
Author Emma Straub wrote a lovely essay about her late father, Peter Straub. If you haven’t read Peter Straub, stop reading this nonsense right now and get to it. Start with Ghost Story, and then move into The Talisman, his epic collaboration with Stephen King.
Have you folks watched the trailers for Babylon and Please Baby Please yet? Big weird cinema is back, baby.
Speaking of movies (because I usually am), I am 95% certain I figured out the twist in Don’t Worry Darling. Now, granted, I watched most of The Usual Suspects convinced that Gabriel Byrne was Keyser Soze, so I could be wrong. But I don’t think I am.
Should I watch and review My Son Hunter? Check yes or no.
I just bought Bob Odenkirk’s memoir. I’ll tell you how it is once I get around to reading it, which could be next week or six months from now.
Finally, I’ll admit it, I fell for this dumb shit.
I think that’s enough stuff for you to click on. The actual writing will return on Tuesday, and we’ll keep Fridays for the silly stuff (and if you have anything you want me to share, by all means let me know!). Plus, I really meant what I said about kicking me in the ass if you don’t get any updates on this for a week or two. Look, I’m telling with this:
Desperately waiting for you to review Barbarians.