Paranormal words break Top 10 for year's most used

Break out the champagne and noisemakers because congratulations are in order! The paranormal apparently had a big year in language because "vampire" and "Mayan Calendar" made the Top 10 Words of 2009, according to The Global Language Monitor.

The Texas-based organization tracks Internet word usage reports the blood-suckers are fourth on the list of words (right behind "Twitter," "Obama," "H1N1" and "Stimulus") with the doomsday calendar being the ninth most popular phrase.

The Language Monitor acquires the data using "a proprietary algorithm that tracks words and phrases in the media and on the Internet, now including blogs and social media ... in relation to frequency, contextual usage and appearance in global media outlets, factoring in long-term trends, short-term changes, momentum and velocity."

Sure, it's not even the bronze, but two entries for paranormal pop culture (three if you count "Michael Jackson" as the second most popular name on the list) ain't too shabby.

And remember vampires, you're in biting distance of first for next year.

'Paranormal Activity' director lands deal for alien flick, 'Area 51'

From "beyond the grave" to "beam me up," Variety is reporting Paranormal Activity helmer Oren Peli has landed a deal with Paramount Pictures to distribute his alien flick, Area 51.

The partnership re-teams Peli and Paramount after Activity, shot for around $11,000, made $106 million since September - making it one of the most profitable films ever. Despite bids for U.S. distribution rights from other studios, Paramount nabbed the deal because of how it "effectively executed the rollout as the film built word of mouth and became a breakout hit."

This time Peli had about $5 million to work with to tell the story of teens who stumble onto the Nevada military base around which much extraterrestrial conspiracies revolve. As with the demon-themed Paranormal Activity, Area 51 will utilize the found footage narrative structure. A release date is expected sometime in 2010.

'New Moon' beats 'Twilight box office, still on the rise

Looks like Stephenie Meyer has been a very good girl this year. As the holiday season officially kicked off, Santa rewarded the Twilight Saga author with a $230.7 million box office for New Moon, the second movie adaptation of her vampire series. Despite a 70 percent dropoff in ticket sales since the Nov. 20 opening, the Sunday morning domestic figures still put Moon far ahead of the entire $192 million domestic run of last year's Twilight.

These are pretty hefty numbers and show that we'll be seeing more of the craze for a few more years. So for those of you still hoping for the demise of the glittering vamp franchise, resistance is futile.

'Ghost Hunters' book targets next gen of TAPS tots

This news hit last week while we were on break, but Publisher's Weekly announced that Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson of Syfy's Ghost Hunters will be launching a children's book series for Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.  The deal, brokered by agent Jody Hotchkiss, is in conjunction with Jane Stine (of Parachute Properties, and wife of author R.L. Stine), and was hinted at in our October interview with the TAPS guys.

The first book of the series targeting middle grade children will hit Halloween 2010 and is tentatively title Ghost Hunt.  More details to come, but can a TAPS cartoon be far behind, and could the animated Jay and Grant ever live up to the high bar set by South Park (pictured here)?

Psychic Tiff Suggests

And now, a few thoughts from our friend Tiffany Smith Johnson, psychic and medium, and author of Picture Yourself Developing Your Psychic Abilities. Every so often, Tiffany will be popping by to share some wisdom, talk about pop-culture and discuss her role in the paranormal community.

Psychic Tiff Suggests:

So many psychics think they have to be otherworldly, fluttering on the edge of the physical and the energetic. I don't think so. Frankly, if you can't be relatable to those who you are supposed to convey messages to, how do you build trust? BE YOURSELF. Don't feel like you have to be held to a higher standard as you do your psychic work. It's OK to curse, eat meat and BE HUMAN.

Tiffany will be appearing next at the Unholy Night in Pittsburg, Tenn., on Dec. 5 where she'll be giving gallery readings.  Make sure to check her out, and remember you can schedule her for appointments through her Web site.

'Ghost Hunters Academy': Steve and Tango on being paranormal professors

Combine an education of science, philosophy, psychology and history with a little electrical and plumbing vo-tech training and the result is a well-rounded, multi-faceted curriculum that many institutions of higher learning would be proud of. Add in ghost hunting and it’s the school of The Atlantic Paranormal Society (TAPS), also known as Ghost Hunters Academy.

Premiering tonight at 10 p.m., EST, on the Syfy channel, Ghost Hunters Academy is the second spin-off from the popular Ghost Hunters brand, which began in 2004 with the flagship show starring plumbers Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson. Following the 2008 travel-themed Ghost Hunters International, the new Academy is a unique reality-TV paranormal series which focuses on training and selecting new members for the TAPS team.

Led by Ghost Hunters investigators Steve Gonsalves, 34, and Dave Tango, 24, the group is comprised of five college-aged “cadets” who travel around the country in an RV to favorite haunted hotspots visited on the main show such as the St. Augustine Lighthouse in Florida, Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, Pa., the battleship USS North Carolina in Wilmington, N.C., and the Buffalo Central Terminal in upstate New York.

During the initial six-episode run of the show, which begins at the Revolutionary War-era Fort Mifflin in Philadelphia, Gonsalves and Tango test and occasionally eliminate recruits who can’t live up to the TAPS standards. Along with being a shot across the bow at the other college-focused show Paranormal State on the A&E Network, Academy is a chance for the Ghost Hunters and TAPS team to educate fledgling investigators about what goes into the often-tedious, several-night waiting game of ghost hunting.

Gonsalves and Tango, who both had their own paranormal investigative groups before joining TAPS, spoke over the phone about their new roles as leaders on the show, and what it is like to bring their experiences to the amateur recruits.

'The Fourth Kind' review

Hanging in Fox Mulder’s cluttered X-Files office is a poster showing a flying saucer with the caption “I Want To Believe.” Well, I do want to believe.  Not just in the existence in life on other planets, but that Hollywood could create a quiet, intriguing and eerie alien flick for adults.

But try as he does to convince me otherwise, I never believed in director Olatunde Osunsanmi’s “is it real?” extraterrestrial invader film The Fourth Kind.

The premise of The Fourth Kind is that Nome, Alaska, a small town accessible only by air, has a long history of disappearances. Several residents of the town all seem to be having the same dreams of a white owl watching them, followed eventually by disturbing recollections of being taken by little gray men for experiments.  Milla Jovovich is Abigail Tyler, a psychiatrist studying the town’s sleep disorders through hypnosis when she stumbles on the abduction epidemic.

The Fourth Kind has a clever-on-paper concept where the “true” story of alien abductions is told through dramatizations intercut with “authentic” archival footage, audio and interviews from “real” people (yes, there’s a need for  a lot of quotation marks when discussing the “reality” of this movie). 

Kristen Stewart: I'm a vampire & fame sucks

File this under the "Oh, puhleeaze" category:

In a recent interview with the British magazine Fabulous, New Moon actress Kristen Stewart tells all us little people that "nothing about being a celebrity is desirable" and that she wishes she wasn't famous.

Apparently the Twilight Saga's on-screen Bella - who was presumably forced into continuing to appear in movies and not, you know, holding down a real job - thinks she is much like the vampire Edward Cullen.

"Edward is actually a really good parallel for fame," says the 19-year-old actress. "As a vampire, he has a sad, desolate life - fame is the same."

Whew, that's a relief.  I'm sooo glad I turned down that seven-figure supporting role in Marty's next flick cause I do NOT need those kinds of headaches. Besides, if Stewart is any indication, fame also makes you look like you're constantly smelling poop, and that doesn't sound like much fun either.

Doggone 'New Moon' werewolves

Not being particularly invested in the Twilight Saga, it's taken me a few days to catch this film blog from the Guardian's Ben Child about New Moon's underwhelming werewolves.  Child rightly points out that "werewolves on celluloid have something of a history, and it's a proud one" (see The Wolfman, An American Werewolf in London).

But instead of taking the opportunity to live up to the tradition, and show off the vampire vs. werewolf plotline isn't just a bunch of pretty faces engaged

'Ghost Mansion Party' review

As a rule, I'm pretty suspicious of any pop culture entry with the word "party" in the title.  Typically, if something has to sell itself as a party, it's probably not.

Still, the good folks over at IGN report the WiiWare download Ghost Mansion Party is a pretty fun Halloween-themed shindig that continues to please after the 31st. Inspired by Nintendo's Mario Party game board design, Ghost Mansion is unique in that all four characters travel together in a part-cooperative, part-competitive gameplay experience. The game packs a lot into each set piece, with a lot to actively take part in instead of just looking at.  Also, the chance to either work as a team - until it's every man for himself, or until you just decide to eff other's up - makes it a fun ride.

Visit IGN for the full review.

Winner of the Great Chicago Ghost Story

For true fans of paranormal pop culture, ghosts don't stop haunting us after Oct. 31. It's sort of special, then, that the Chicago Tribune waited until Nov. 1 to announce the winners of their "Great Chicago Ghost Story" contest.

The winner of the contest, Greg Stolze, wrote about the St. Valentine's Day Massacre (the famous gangland hit orchestrated by Al Capone) in a story titled "2122 North Clark," which gets its name from the address of the killings. But the inspiration of Stolze's ghost story came from 2005's Weird Illinois book.

Stolze, who says he knocked out the story in about an hour, describes himself as a skeptic of ghosts.  But, he tells the Trib, "if you ask me at midnight and I'm standing at 2122 North Clark, I might have a different answer."

All four finalist stories of the contest can be read online at the Chicago Tribune Halloween section.