Unless you’re living in a fall-out shelter somewhere awaiting the zombie apocalypse, you’ve heard about Paranormal Activity, the will-it-make-it/will-it-not indie horror flick that’s been gathering dust since 2006. If you haven't, you just lost some major para-points. Redeem yourself asap by checking out this movie. The flick, shot on a handheld in seven days at director Oren Peli’s crib, was made for a scant $11,000, probably about the same price as the smallest ring on Lindsay Lohan’s pinky finger. (Compare that to the $100,000 estimated Blair Witch budget and you can imagine what we're working with here.) It gathered buzz at festival screenings, but until DreamWorks picked it up in 2008 (along with some backing from this guy ... Steven Spielberg? Never heard of him.), Paranormal Activity wasn’t so active. But lucky for horror geeks near uber-cool hipster cities across the country, you can check it out this week.
I’ve heard talk of it being one of the all-time, all-time scary movies. It employs the use of night vision to capture the goings-on inside a young couple’s bedroom while they sleep. Paranormal Activity is not a star vehicle — it features newcomers Katie Featherston and Micah Slot paired up with first-time director Peli. There's this cool anecdote as well: The Chicago Tribune reports that Spielberg (who helped re-imagine the ending) was afraid his copy of the disc was haunted. Apparently the day he watched it, the door to his bedroom randomly locked from the inside. So scared was Spielberg that he brought the disc back to DreamWorks in a garbage bag. True story or publicity stunt? Who cares. I think it just worked on me.
Can it be? Can something so potentially awesome exist outside of my fanboy dreams? I dare not speak it allowed, but will type how giddy - giddy! - I am about this.
Zombies have infiltrated the Star Wars universe! Instead of playing off the predictable vampire genre mashup, Del Rey has kicked not-insignificant amounts of butt by publishing Star Wars: Death Troopers by Joe Schreiber.
Although it won't hit shelves until Oct. 13, I have a review copy in my hands now and will report back on the bloody guts of the story as soon as I devour is like a rancor.
You can pre-ordernow, and the official breakdown synopsis for the book is such:
It was only a matter of time: The age-old road trip movie plotline gets, well, re-vamped. I've watched this trailer for Transylmania - out in December - a few times now and I have to admit: The only part that drew a chuckle was the obvious Twilight burn in the first few seconds. What do you think, parapoppers? A do or a dud?
Stephenie Meyer fans who've wandered out of Forks, Washington, and into her world of adult fiction via The Host will be happy to hear the book picked up a script.
Shocking, right?
The Host jumps para-genres, switching out vampires for "compassionate" aliens (What is with Meyer's bent on sissifying everything we love to fear?) called "souls" who've taken over Earth by catching a ride on the brain waves of every human who walks the planet ... except for one, natch. The heroine, Melanie, battles the soul who tries to take over her body, and the two beings settle on sharing. (We wonder who gets the good parts.)
No, that’s not a typo, my parafriends. It’s Oh. My. Vampire. I couldn’t think of anything else to describe this post bursting with fangy goodness.
But first, an apology: I’ve been missing in action, which I’m sure you’ve noticed (Please, say you’ve noticed). I was on vacation, then I started grad school, then I dealt with some serious time-management issues. I think I’ve sorted out the kinks, however. So she’s back! Onto some fun vamp tidbits that you’ll most likely never have use for in real life … kind of like math.
The Historian I don’t know where I was in 2005, but apparently not in the vampire section at Borders because I missed one hell of read. This is not your run-of-the-mill vamp romp. This is some serious lit that employs all kinds of conventions: post-mod history, epistolary story telling, Indian Jones-type adventure, supernatural elements and more. Boiled down, the young female narrator goes on an epic, globe-trotting search to find the answer to Dracula’s mysterious origins: Did he really live? Does he still? It’s a fantastic antidote to the new legion of vampires thatare googly-eyeing their way across the silver screen as of late(she says, clutching her purchased-a-month-ago tickets for New Moon).
For those of you that dig ghosty paranormal pop culture but are worn out on horror, demonic and frightening fare, you need only wait until 2010 for a change-up.
Wired.com - reporting from the Tokyo Game Show 2009 - has passed along word of Capcom's new Nintendo DS adventure game, Ghost Trick. The concept of the game is you play as a newborn ghost (or is it recently-dead human?) who has to solve puzzles and advance by sending your energy into various objects. You can only move the blue glowing ball of light that is your "core" a little at a time, so you manipulate items to get to
Hey, so I think this whole vampire trend is catching on...
As if vampires weren't already invading every aspect of our lives, the blood-thirsty paranormal creatures are set to invade mobile devices as well.
PCMag.com is reporting that Verizon Wireless has launched Valemont, a vampire web series for mobile devices (that's cell phones for the old folks) and on TV.
Technically it counts as paranormal pop culture, so we have to say something about Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, the Matthew McConaughey flick new to DVD where he stars as a lovably shallow man with a charming smile and Texan drawl.
Basically, McConaughey plays himself playing every McConaughey character from the last several years - witha twist! McConaughey is a Scrooged-up boyfriend who is haunted by exes who show him the error of his playboy ways and encourage him to get his life on track, and back to his true love (Jennifer Garner). I can't help but root for Matthew McConaughey as an actor. Any dude who happily plays the bongos naked while stoned out of his gourd is alright by me. Plus, he's shown some solid acting chops in the past.
It was a simpler time when the Space Invaders first made their appearance in 1978; back when you just grabbed a shotgun and your trusty hound and picked off the evil buggers who dared to appear in America's heartland.
Well, lest you forget, we give you the Life magazine photospread of what it looked like back then - or at least what Ryan Sniederimagines a Life photospread from those days might have looked liked.
After weeks of speculation, Stephenie Meyer's Web site has released the official tracklist for the New Moon soundtrack. Along with the expected contributions from artists Death Cab For Cutie and Radiohead-frontman Thom Yorke, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, OK Go and The Killers among others will be getting into the vampire music business. Each song will be new and exclusive to the soundtrack - although Muse's offering, "I Belong to You" is a remix, so it just barely counts.
And now, a Public Service Announcement from ParanormalPopCulture.com:
When you're an amateur werewolf, things can get pretty hairy. Suddenly an awareness of the lunar cycle is absolutely necessary and that fine silverware you received as a wedding gift is hazardous to your health - a mishandled gravy boat might even be deadly.
So where does a new 'were' turn? Sadly, there's no Lycanthrope's Anonymous support groups to rely on, but fortunately - and perhaps the only fortunate thing to happen since you inherited this curse - there is a self-wolf-help book available to assist in your transition to transformations.
The Werewolf's Guide to Life: A Manual for the Newly-Bitten by Ritch Duncan and Bob Powers is an educational handbook informed by real werewolf interviews and including practical tips. Since "the majority of lycanthropes who do not have access to this book die during or shortly after their first transformations," the book seeks to inform because "ignorance creates monsters; lycanthropy does not."
Remember, in order to survive, you should know about the realities of your condition. So after reading the "Am I a Werewolf?" section (to establish you're not just in the mood for really, really raw steak), pick up the book to help improve your lycanthropic life.
And don't forget to join the werewolf community at The Werewolf's Guide site where you can consult a handy Transformation Dates calendar, read werewolf wisdom from others, prepare a list of supplies every newly-bitten beast needs or watch video dramatizations on coping with your new nightlife (such as the one below about having "The Talk" with loved ones).
Remember: Just because you're a paranormal creature doesn't mean you can't have a normal life.
I am normally delighted to keep anything that occurs in the early morning hours of Saturdays a secret. That was before I discovered the Vol. 1 DVDs of The Secret Saturdays from the Cartoon Network. Debuting in October 2008, and airing at 7 a.m. on that titular day, it's an animated show about a family of cryptozoologists (the Saturday family) who travel the world searching for, and protecting, cryptids and other paranormal beasties whose existence hasn't been proven.
The show has a classic Hanna-Barbera vibe to it, and while it follows a lot of family-adventure cartoon conventions, it's not annoyingly formulaic. Our boy-hero, Zak Saturday is precocious but likable and has special abilities that allow him to telepathically communicate with monsters. His parents, Drew and Doc, are solid adventuring types in the vein of Dr. Quest and Race Bannon (who, let's face it, were a pretty cool same-sex parenting couple). There is also a trio of Scooby-like goofy monster pets who assist Zak in his shenanigans, and the big baddie V.V. Argost studied at the deliciously-over-the-top school of villainy to aide him in his quest to unleash a certain monster and - what else? - rule the world.
By incorporating new concepts and rocking old-school animation influences, The Secret Saturdays succeeds as both family-friendly paranormal pop culture fare and as a show that just draws in cartoon lovers who dig monsters and cryptozoology. Plus, without veering too much into a preachy, touch-feely territory, the show sends a message of conservation and tolerance towards even nature's creepier creatures.
Episodes air on Cartoon Network at 7 a.m. on Saturdays, but I suggest the collected DVDs. The first volume is out now, and Vol. 2 will be released in October. Check out the promo clip below.
Guys grow up choosing sides and play-fighting based on classic rivalries. Ask any testosterone-driven, red-blooded American male and he'll tell you his thoughts on Cowboys vs. Indians, cops vs. robbers, ninjas vs. pirates, G.I. Joe vs. Cobra, Autobots vs. Decepticons ... and Team Edward vs. Team Jacob?
Maybe not so much that last one - yet - but the makers of the Twilight movies hope to change that. Ashley Greene, who plays Alice Cullen in the film series, tells MTV that Eclipse, the third movie based on the Stephenie Meyer books will be darker, gorier and more dramatic thanks to director David Slade.
"The first one [movie] was very focused on this love story and really sweet and it was beautiful, but it didn't have a lot of stuff that guys would go, 'Yeah, I want to go see that,' " says Greene.
Um, you think?
Still, Greene adds that "There's going to be a lot more focus on [action], and the fight scene will have more emphasis on it. I definitely think it will be a little more guy-friendly."
Of course, being guy-friendly and attracting a guy audience are two different things. But if Eclipse delivers on a modicum of badassery suggested in this Blade/Twilight mashup from Cinematical, it would be gladly welcomed into the paranormal pop culture guy zone.
Talking about the undead may just be the way to breathe life into your new romances, reports Wired. After analyzing 500,000 first contacts amongst singles, online dating site OKCupid has released results of a study that suggests using words like "zombie" in your initial introduction on those site may lead to a positive first impression. Calling yourself an atheist also helps (because, after all, what kind of a God would allow the dead to walk the Earth??).
Amongst the other dos and don'ts culled from the study:
Don't mention God
Don't make physical compliments
Don't use Internet slang
Do be self-effacing
Do use an unusual greeting
Do be specific
And although it's not clearly mentioned in the study, while talking about zombies is cool, brain-eating references aren't.
That's not the most exciting news of the day, perhaps, but we're quickly heading into our own weekend (vamps optional) at PPC-HQ, and we just dig those pop-preps. So we figured it was as good a time as any to wrap up Friday with "White Sky," a track off Contra as played on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon last March.
From Alien to vampires (albeit with a few... dozen movies in between), Ridley Scott looks to the director for The Passage, a movie based on Justin Cronin's book of the same name - a book which won't even be released until June 2010.
Scott will be working with his Gladiator screenwriter John Logan for the adaptation, but a quick trip to IMDB shows that the director has a pretty busy schedule so there's no telling when this will actually come out. Oh, and if the book sucks (in a bad way), that probably won't help, either. Although Fox 2000 must have high hopes since they shelled out seven figures for the film rights to the upcoming series.
Variety describes the plot as such: "Terminally ill patients become healthy after they are bitten by bats in South America, and the government conducts secret tests on human subjects to see if the virus can cure illness. The result is an apocalyptic unleashing of bloodthirsty vampire test subjects that include death row inmates." -aaron sagers
Last month's shockeroo news of Disney buying up Marvel Entertainment led to the expected mash-ups of characters from the House of Ideas and Mouse House. We've ignored most of those.
Still, when our resident artist David Rosenberg sent this one along, it seemed to fit quite nicely with our paranormal pop culture racket.
And so, we give you the unholy child of Ghost Rider and Goofy: Goof Rider.
Although autumn doesn't officially begin until Sept. 22, most people judge the beginning of the season by one of these three happenings: A return to school for a new semester, a return of cooler weather or a return of the Pumpkin Spice Lattes at Starbucks.
All of these things have now happened, which means you should think of a good Halloween costume, break out the sweaters and begin planning weekend fall foliage trips to quaint bed & breakfasts where you can sample a dozen menu items incorporating butternut squash.
But when you do go to those historic B&Bs to watch the leaves croak, keep in mind you may be bunking with a freeloading roommate who has already expired. Bedandbreakfast.com (via Reuters) has posted survey results from the nation's innkeepers that reveal about 20 percent of the estimated 3600 inns in the United States are haunted.
Bedandbreakfast.com reports that most innkeepers still prefer not to talk about their haunted happenings - despite the current paranormal pop culture boom - but they've managed to compile an impressive list of 100 establishments (such as the Harry Packer Mansion in Jim Thorpe, Pa., shown here) that do openly embrace ghosty guests and offer Halloween packages.
Entertainment Weekly'sPopWatch blog happened upon a slew of 'pre-makes' of modern movies using classic footage. Raiders of the Lost Ark and Forrest Gump both get the old-fashioned, soda shop treatment, but for our paranormal pop culture purposes, check out the 1954 version of Ghost Busters starring Bob Hope, Dean Martin and Fred MacMurray.
Not only is this a pretty ingenious idea, but it's good, clean fun that won't rot your brain like that trash in movie theaters today will! Dagnabit...lousy kids (mutter, mutter) rock 'n roll...give them the what for...in my day...(mutter, mutter)...Matlock
With the new fall TV season officially begun, it would appear the trend in paranormal pop culture is still scaring up interest. No fewer than seven shows, three of which are returning for another season, are premiering in the next few weeks on network TV. Thursday is shaping up to be the biggest of para pop nights with four shows, so supernatural superfans might want to clear out space on the DVR.
(These don't include the shows rolling out in November and December, which include the reptilian alien remake V in November, along with new episodes of A&E's Paranormal State and the Travel Channel's Ghost Adventures.)
Eastwick ABC, Wednesdays at 10 p.m. Premieres Sept. 23
Normal breakdown: In the seaside village of Eastwick, three very different women discover bewitching talents they never knew they had.
Paranormal take: Based on the John Updike novel and the 1987 movie, the series is about the supernaturally-inclined ladies who hang with devilish dude. The trailer is spiffy enough and could be Charmed for 30-somethings. Then again, it could also be Desperate Paranormal Housewives.
Flash Forward ABC, Thursdays at 8 p.m. Premieres Sept. 24
Normal breakdown: When the world’s population is given a glimpse of their future due to a mysterious global event, it forces everyone to come to grips with whether their destinies can be fulfilled or avoided.
Paranormal take: The concept of a global blackout where everyone sees their personal future six-months down the road (a possible future or not?) is engaging, but can it remain so for an entire season? With Lost wrapping up its run next winter, ABC needs a mythology-driven drama (but one that doesn't drive that audience insane). The clairvoyant experience won't be enough - nor will the disasters resulting from the blackout - so the payoff better be big, scary and rolled out quickly.
The Vampire Diaries CW, Thursdays at 8 p.m. Premiered Sept. 10 Normal breakdown:Two vampire brothers - one good, one evil - are at war for Elena's soul in the small town of Mystic Falls, Virginia."
Paranormal take:Yes, it's yet another high school vamp entry in paranormal pop culture, and yes, there are clear similarities to the Twilight saga. But this show is based on L.J. Smith's series from the '90s and is helmed by Kevin Williamson (Dawson's Creek, Scream). And based on the first episode, it's a fun, scintillating soap fit for the The CW. I'm betting we can expect more blood and actual vamp action than you might get from Twilight - and hopefully more character development.
Supernatural CW, Thursdays at 9 p.m. Premiered Sept. 10 Normal breakdown:Sam and Dean Winchester are following in their father's footsteps, traveling the country and hunting down evil forces. Paranormal take:Now entering its fifth season, Supernatural is a road trip/horror show about two monster-hunting brothers driving straight into an angels vs. demons armageddon. The season appears to have the boy patching things up a bit, just in time to fight off Lucifer. For those devoted fans who have been following the show for some time, crap gets real this season. But it remains to be seen whether it's enough to attract new viewers to the mythology-heavy cult fave.
Fringe Fox, Thursdays at 9 p.m. Premieres Sept. 17 Normal breakdown:The FBI's Fringe Division formed when Special Agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) enlisted the help of institutionalized "fringe" scientist Walter Bishop and his son, Peter (Joshua Jackson), to save her partner and lover from a mind-bending death. Through unconventional and unorthodox methods, the Fringe team imagines and tests the impossibilities while investigating unbelievable events, macabre crimes, and mystifying cases involving pyrokinesis, neuroscience, cryonics, genetic engineering, astral projection, and other fantastical theories.
Paranormal take:Fringe had a slow build, but The X-Files-lite show hit a stride without getting too swallowed in an impenetrable mythology. Created by J.J. Abrams (Lost), Fringe hit it out of the dimension with a parallel reality revelation and Leonard Nimoy in the first season finale. If it continues to build on the freakiness without losing the quirky humor, the show will have the stuff to win the Thursday paranormal pop wars.
Ghost Whisperer CBS, Fridays at 8 p.m. Premieres Sept. 25 Normal breakdown:Melinda Gordon (Jennifer Love Hewitt) has a gift - she can communicate with earthbound spirits or ghosts who cling to the living because they have unfinished business in our world preventing them from "crossing over" or going into the light ... Melinda navigates between the dead and the living with her sometimes chilling, sometimes heart-rending and sometimes amusing actions as an intermediary between the ghosts and those they haunt.
Paranormal take:At the end of the last season, Melinda got her dead hubby back after he took over Sam's body and they all eventually worked out the details and got hitched - again. This season picks up five years in the future where her son is starting to show abilities that exceed hers. The new season sounds like a more compelling , darker turn for the show when a whole new realm of spiritual beings is revealed. Typically the introduction of a kid to a show is the first sign of approaching jump-sharking territory, but this time it actually sounds like a good move.
Medium CBS, Fridays at 9 p.m. Premieres Sept. 25 Normal breakdown:Medium is a drama inspired by the real-life story of research medium Allison Dubois (Patricia Arquette), an extraordinary young wife and mother who ... has gradually come to grips with her extraordinary ability to talk to dead people, see current events and the future through her dreams and read people's thoughts. Dubois works as a consultant to District Attorney Manuel Devalos, using her psychic abilities to solve violent and horrifying crimes. Paranormal take:After five seasons with NBC, the show was canceled and picked up by CBS. So the show has a lot to prove with this sixth season. To do so, it flashes forward (it appears to be a theme with fall para pop) four months to Allison out of a coma and back to crime solving. But if CBS wants to prove the show is worth saving, there's a lot of work to be done. Maybe a crossover with Ghost Whisperer would help.
In the romantic drama Ghost, Swayze plays Sam, boyfriend to Demi Moore's Molly. When Sam is killed in a mugging that turns out to have been premeditated, he misses his chance to "go into the light" and wanders around New York City with a desire to avenge his death and protect his gal.
Basically, as a ghost he's got a big to-do list and has a lot to learn.
For a movie that pre-dates the current paranormal pop culture boom, and was released before we all knew the lingo oft-repeated on paranormal reality-TV, Ghost gets a lot right - as far as we can know it to be right.
The movie deals with shadow people, intelligent hauntings, poltergeist activity, mediums and possession. The concept of ghosts being just like regular people with an assortment of personalities, motives and dispositions - just without a body to inhabit - was pretty novel. And ghosts learning new skills, drawing energy to move objects and harassing a medium (Whoopi Goldberg as Oda Mae, in a role that earned her an Oscar) weren't plot devices widely used in ghost movies when the film was released.
"They did get a lot of things right from my perspective," says psychic and medium Chip Coffey of A&E's Paranormal State and Psychic Kids. In a recent interview with The Paranormal Pop Culture Show on the Paranormal TV Network, the film came up and Coffey added that while he couldn't verify whether every aspect of the film is correct, it is "not so far off from the way things happen with a psychic and a medium."
Although Ghost may have been close to the target, it was alone in being so when released in 1990. That year, ghosty paranormal pop culture tended to be dark (The Exorcist III, Flatliners). Meanwhile, despite spooky scenes, Ghost is never overly preposterous (pottery-making sex scene notwithstanding) or foreboding, and is an optimistic flick at its core.
Frankly, I can't help but get a case of the warm fuzzies (bordering on the misty-eyes) when - once he's resolved the issues that held him on Earth and tells Molly he loves her - Swayze delivers the line, "It's amazing Molly. The love inside, you take it with you."
The film provided a relatively new approach to the entertainment industry's take on the in-between realm after death. We talk a lot about there between more of a mainstream acceptance of the paranormal, and I believe that that seed was planted with pop culture fare like Ghost.
Patrick Swayze passed away Monday after nearly two years battling pancreatic cancer, but it was a good fight. And if he can hear his colleagues, family and fans saying how much he was loved, I'm sure he's saying, "ditto."
I have always had a fondness for old-school pin-up models with their strong yet delicate looks - and awesome hair. The ones with the birds in some sort of career get-up (nurse, mechanic, cowgirl, Santa - solid job choices, all) were my particular favorite and the best had a flirtatious gaze which seemed to be saying, "eat your heart out, boys!"
Well, these pin-ups girls would rather eat your heart out for you. Collected in a 2010 calendar, the My Zombie Pinup is 12 months of gore-geous undead dames "dying to get under your skin."
The site describes the style as Gil Elvgren mashed with Night of the Living Dead. And while Alberto Vargas might not dig it, Zombie Vargas would definitely approve.
2009 hasn't even expired yet and already I'm looking forward to killing off next year. But be warned, fellas, these gals like a guy with brains.
Yesterday we interviewed Josh Gates - monster hunter, paranormal investigator and all-around nice guy.
As far as the crypto field goes, Josh has got it all: The respect, the mainstream appeal, the money, the women, the power (OK, so I'm purely speculating on the last two). The point is, he's a smooth operator while Emerson Wild is ... not so much.
Still, Emerson looks like a far better monster hunter than I, and his regular Joe (and regular schmoe) appeal and sense of humor makes me hope he sticks around.
Starring Zack Finfrock, Emerson Wild: Monster Hunter is a new web series about a dude who has the calling to trap the big bad beasties of the para-world, but still has to live with a roommate and pay rent.
So far there is only one episode to the show, but it looks cool and if it continues down this way, it could click as a solid Ghost Busters meets Spider-Man paranormal pop culture entry. Kudos to Tubefilter for writing about it first.
It was another big week for paranormal comics fans out there; a ton of quality releases came out, including new single issues of Buffy, Army Of Darkness, Solomon Grundy (a Blackest Night tie-in ?!?) and an awesome new ongoing Vertigo title called Sweet Tooth, about human-animal hybrids set in a post-apocalyptic world. But forget about all that right now and let's get to the meat of the week ...
Marvel Zombies Return: Spider-Man Marvel Comics Writen by Fred Van Lente, art by Nick Dragotta
No it's not just a clever name. After two confusing mini-series dealing with Deadpool's zombified head, a couple of horny robots, the Midnight Sons, A.R.M.O.R. and the Hood's plan to use the zombie virus as a weapon, the real Marvel Zombies are back. Remember those remaining infected heroes infused with the power of Galactus forcefully teleported away to another dimension by Malcolm Cortez at the end of Robert Kirkman's Marvel Zombies 2? Well, I barely remember myself, so let's thank Fred Van Lente (Modok's 11, Action Philosophers) for getting us back on track.
In this issue, the first installment of a five-part weekly series, we follow the exploits of Zombie Spider-man. Our undead web-slinger gets bit with a case of déjà vu when he realizes he’s not only in a different dimension, but a different time as well. It’s a page ripped straight from his college yearbook(or more like Amazing Spider-man #68) when he seizes the opportunity to once again stop the Sinister Six from getting their dirty mitts on a mysterious tablet.
Now, with a second chance to prove he may still have a hero inside him (and not one that he ate), can Zombie Spidey save the day? Will he unlock the secrets of the tablet and prevent the plague? Or will he just eat everyone? There's only one way to find out ... buy this book!
Now let me be frank. I've always had a bit of an issue with the interior art for all of the previous Marvel Zombie titles. I stick with it because I know with writers like Robert Kirkman and Fred Van Lente, it would be good even if Helen Keller was drawing. Don't get me wrong: the art’s not that bad, but I expected more and Nick Dragotta finally delivers.
First off, it’s much brighter. He still uses that black splattered ink effect to make it look gritty, but not so much that it looks like he's covering up stuff he was too lazy to draw. The art is strong to the point that even I - a seasoned professional in observing gory images - felt a bit queasy while absorbing each putrid panel.
Now that's how a zombie comic should make you feel!
Did I mention that the MZ Returns is weekly? Oh yeah, I did! But did I mention that it’s also a platform for some of today's hottest zombie novelists to sink their teeth into the Marvel Universe? With Van Lente writing every other comic on the shelf lately, how could he possibly have the time to do a weekly? In comes his buddy, David Wellington (Monster Island), to save the day with next week’s Iron Man issue. Then Marvel hits the ground running with Jonathan Mayberry (Patient Zero) tackling Wolverine, and none other than Seth Grahame-Smith (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies) “hulking out” in the issue after that. Then Van Lente wraps up the whole shebang in the final Avengers issue.
Thumbs up to Marvel for reinvigorating a series that may have been on its last shambling leg (no offense, Spidey).
Are you hunting Yeti for business or pleasure? Do you have any Chupacabra or Sloth Monsters to declare? Have you accepted any gifts from Swamp Dinosaurs, Bat Demons or Devil Worms while traveling?
The questions Josh Gates encounters when flying across the world for fun and adventure are slightly more exciting than what the rest of us have to answer at the airport. Still, even though the third season of his hour-long showDestination Truthpremieres Wednesday, Sept. 9 on the Syfy Channel, the gig of monster-hunting host hasn’t become mundane.
Since June 2007, Gates has traveled to remote, off-the-grid locales with a small crew to investigate claims of encounters with beasts that could take a bite out of Bigfoot and Nessie. As if that wasn’t enough, his repertoire has recently extended to exploring curses and ghosts – and his adventures with the unknown all occur after he deals with known dangers. But Gates is an affable guy who, at 32 years-old, sports a professorial-meets-adventurer look. Not completely unlike another such explorer who favors a whip and fedora, Josh Gates has learned to take life-threatening work environments in stride.
“There are two different types of scary occurrences on the show,” says Gates. “There’s the scary occurrence where you’re looking for whatever creature or phenomena that you’re looking for where you think, ‘wait a minute, maybe this thing is here.’ And then there’s the scary occurrence when you’re doing something that’s sort of physically perilous.
“This year we had a very close call in an airplane on a very old plane in Romania,” he adds. “Whether or not you think that there’s some sort of unknown creature lurking in the jungles in the Amazon or wherever we happen to be, there’s certainly plenty of other things that are that we know are there. And so we’re always very mindful of, ‘what if a tiger comes out right now?’”
Gates also admits that a reality of off-the-map exploration is that he often finds himself in very local political systems in tribal communities surrounded by “dudes with machine guns.”
“There’s a lot of assessing, you know, ‘Who am I with and who’s that guy with the AK-47?’,” he says. “We try really hard to not get in over our head in those kinds of situations because those can get sticky quickly.”
But Gates acknowledges that sometimes “scary stuff happens,” and when it does, it’s pretty mind-blowing. During the second season, Gates was in the Himalayan Mountains in Nepal on the trail of the “Abominable Snowman,” aka the Yeti, when he found a rather large set of three footprints. The sets were considered legitimate and non-human by Bigfoot expert Jeffrey Meldrum of Idaho State University.
The find was an exciting one for Gates and he’ll be heading back to Nepal to continue the search in the third season. He also describes a fairly freaky experience that happens to a crew member in “Haunted Forest” in the season’s first show.
“Evan is one of these guys who’s a road warrior; he’s shot on a million reality shows. He’s shot in war zones,” Gates says. “He got really shaken up by something unseen in this forest. It’s a really compelling moment where a member of the crew has an experience that fundamentally physically knocks him around.”
The footage of the event even leads Gates to paying a visit to Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson, hosts of another Syfy paranormal investigative show, Ghost Hunters. Gates asking the duo for some spiritual guidance on the ghostly forest incident is yet another installment of what he calls the “the Flintstones meets the Jetsons routine” on the similar shows. Gates, who has previously hosted two live Halloween shows for the Ghost Hunters, and is appearing on their show on Wednesday as a lead-in to the Destination Truth premiere, hints there are more crossovers to come.
However, Gates stresses that his show complements the “Ghost Hunters” but he wouldn’t want to duplicate them.
“They’re really great at what they do. They have great hit shows because they have a very specific way of doing things that really works. And we wanted to be something different.”
That something different is the show’s heartbeat as a globetrotting adventure program. Monsters aside, Destination Truth is a travel show with a comedic element and a “If it can go wrong, it usually does” attitude.
“We really try to blend into every episode some interesting and really comedic travel up at the top of each show. So you'll see a taste of the cities and the people and the culture and the food of the places we go. Then we clearly, on the show, are kind of going off the beaten path to look for these creatures or to experience these phenomena.
Gates says the travel “full of mishap and full of the unexpected” is actually more important to him for the show. “That’s the part of the show that I think pulses the best for me, he says. “People really respond to it.”
During the adventures, Gates’ reputation as a “big movie guy” pops up often. “Jaws” is referenced in watery episodes and he says that when recently filming a werewolf episode that “it’s hard not to hearken back to some of the classic monster movies.”
But it’s his well-worn passport, not movie pedigree, which landed Gates the job. An accomplished traveler, he is a SCUBA diver with a degree in archaeology (and drama) from Boston’s Tufts University, and was just getting back from a trip to Africa when he met to discuss the show.
“They didn't want someone that was necessarily an advocate for these creatures or these stories,” he says. “They wanted someone who seemed authentic as a traveler … someone who had been out there.”
Gates’ sense of adventure and wanderlust comes honestly, he says. His father, a commercial diver, was always coming back from someplace exotic with gifts from the other side of the world. Add to that the fact Gates was “fixated on Indiana Jones” and you have a natural explorer with a dream job.
But Gates’ tenure as a creature seeker hasn’t been without grief from a very visible, if unwieldy beast, the Internet. A handful of forums and bloggers have accused the show of being culturally insensitive or condescending to the villagers and locals from remote areas featured weekly on the show. However, Gates dismisses the accusations.
“Nothing could be further from the truth in terms of the kind of respect that we have for the people that appear on the show.”
“People sometimes look at other cultures around the world and there’s something sacrosanct about them,” he says. “They get this idea that you can't have fun with or fool around with people in the developing nations or people in other cultures because it’s somehow insensitive.”
He adds that the fun is mutual and shared, and “when the cameras turn off, we go have a drink with them … they cook for us and they introduce us to the people in their community.”
As for this season, Gates is heading to the ruins of Chernobyl in the Ukraine for an investigation, as well as conducting the show’s first United States investigations in Alaska and Florida. Destination Truth will also have an episode set in King Tut’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt – which is the world’s first overnight paranormal investigation of the tomb.
Regarding future investigations, Josh Gates says he always “has a whole list cooking” for Destination Truth.
“I'm really kind of intrigued by a lot of these small Pacific island nations,” says Gates. “From Polynesian curses to cursed or haunted islands, there’s shipwrecks, there’s all sorts of amazing things that are floating out there in the middle of nowhere … Maybe we [can] do a season where we take the show on a boat and we go around the Pacific or something.
He then adds, “I'm of course always secretly plotting to take the show to places that I've never been to before.”
So I like to provide readers with ample opportunity to mock and ridicule me, which is why this is for you, really. As you may remember, several weeks back we discussed the new Paranormal TV Network. Well, we here at ParanormalPopCulture.com are enjoying what they're doing so much that we wanted to add our flavor to the channel.
Oh, dear me. And dear you, most likely, as I’m willing to bet you’ll face the same dilemma I have once I spill the news that Sept. 13 at 9 p.m. is becoming even more of a paranormal pop culture conundrum.
You already know True Blood signs off the airwaves that night at 9. You also know, thanks to moi, that a pretty awesome docu about a girl who cries blood will be running on Nat Geo at the same time. But hold on, parapoppers, because the Holy Trinity of Paranormal is now complete, thanks to MTV’s news that it will premiere a brand spankin’ new extended trailer of New Moon at the 2009 VMA awards going down that night.
I’m thinking this is not the kind of trailer you can Google and enjoy in the privacy of your own home — it’s probably under better lock and key than Robert Pattinson’s home phone number. So what to do? I have a DVR, but not even that glorious miracle of man is equipped to handle three para pop culture events simultaneously. But If I know MTV (and the Twilight kids’ maddening too-cool-for-school mentality), the trailer will kick off around 10:40 p.m. in an effort to reel viewers in until the bitter end. (READ: In order to get to the promised land, you might have to sit through Taylor Swift.) But boy. What a night, eh? I was one of the fervid fans who sat with bated breath on the night of the '08 VMAs, just itchin' for a view of New Moon. Damn you, MTV, but count me in again. Your devious plots know no bounds.
Is it paranormal? Is it pop culture? I really struggled with whether or not to post this for two reasons: 1) There are no ghosts or zombies or vampires in the mix; rather, just a very abnormal human being, 2) I don’t intend to make light of what is a super serious situation for a young girl.
But for people like me who have a serious jones for things that just don’t seem to have any kind of rational explanation, this is must-see TV. On Sept. 13, National Geographic presents The Girl Who Cries Blood at 9 p.m. (I would fail at my job as a parapop artist if I didn't point out that for perhaps the first time in television history, if you wanted, you could catch not one but two separate occurrences of females who cry blood — The Girl butts timeslot heads with True Blood. And judging from Jessica’s fight with Hoyt last week, she will be crying a river o’ blood in the finale).
Check the teaser out below — it’s legit. So what's the story? Is it stigmata? Is it a demonic possession? Is the girl blessed? Modern medicine seems to be stumped, as well as religious pundits the world over. What happens when we apply "paranormal" to bona-fide muggles? That might be the scariest question of all. Tune in and draw your own conclusions.
By now, we all know conventions of the ghost hunting paranormal investigator shows. We understand the what the K-II and thermal cameras are for, and most of us can define EVPs, debunk orbs and predict that a lot of ghostly activity in people's homes can be attributed to electrical and plumbing issues.
Although I still love watching them, the reality-TV paranormal shows follow a certain formula - largely attributable to Ghost Hunterson Syfy - much like Survivor, Top Chef and America's Next Top Model does. That formula allows us to anticipate and follow along, and it even spoon feeds us the suspense in the exact right moments.
Now, those formulas have influenced the movies. As far as I know, the indie flick Ghosts Don't Exist, produced by Washington Redskins tight end Chris Cooley, is the first fictional entry of paranormal pop culture to play directly off of those conventions. And honestly, there hasn't been a ton of great ghost movies lately, so maybe this modern pop-savvy approach is the way to go.
The movie doesn't have much in the way of famous faces, but the new trailer looks good. I'm intrigued. The synopsis from the films site is as follows: A popular ghost hunter losing faith in what he believes is about to retire, but decides to take one last case when a potential client guarantees he’ll provide the proof he’s been looking for.
Upon arriving at the home, the client announces that he will make good on the promise by contacting the team himself, from the beyond.
We'll keep track of this one and let you know as we learn about release dates and such. The trailer is below.
Writer Angela Hill of the Oakland Tribune is not feeling the Zombie Love. In a lively column about the walking dead, Hill encourages zombies to finally croak and make room for the lycanthropes.
Yes, the debate over zombies vs. werewolves has begun, and Hill is an impassioned supporter of the latter. Skipping right over the vamp train and into the next genre trend, Hill writes, "Seriously, for all your drool and drama ... You all look alike, you're uncoordinated, you have a limited vocabulary, you're single-minded ... And don't even get me started on your highly questionable personal hygiene."
Wow. She's going to get letters from the NAAZP for that one.
Still, other than noting their "outdoorsy appeal," Hill doesn't seem to be pro-werewolf as much as she is anti-zombie.
I don't personally know where I fit in this debate, and am still waiting to hear each camp's solution to healthcare, but zombie lovers out there better make themselves known or they might lose the message battle.
Neil Gaiman is one of those guys in paranormal pop culture that just seem to get it. Like Stephen King, Gaiman is a genius who possesses a knack for creating fully-realized worlds, and his work reflects an influence and old-school appreciation of fantasy, sci-fi and horror without being derivative.
Obviously, I'm a fan. That's why it was interesting to hear his take on the current vampire trend in July's Entertainment Weekly, where he said the bloodsuckers had reached a saturation point. Well, apparently I wasn't the only one who liked The Sandman creator's thoughts on the genre, because EW went back for more (technically it seems they just expanded the previous interview, but it's more to me).
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