An Interview with the Makers of The Whisperer in the Darkness

Here is a brief interview with some of the people behind the new Lovecraft based film, The Whisperer in the Darkness, which I'm so hoping to see soon. 

If you haven't seen their previous film, The Call of Cthulhu, do yourself a favor and change that.  It's awesome, and the best adaptation of a Lovecraft story to date. 

-Matt

Comic Review: Fall of Cthulhu

        
    In the first volume, Fugue, Michael Alan Nelson tells the story of a young man thrown into a mad world by the suicide of his beloved uncle.  Nelson interprets some aspects of Lovecraft’s mythos in ways I wouldn’t, especially when it comes to the Dreamlands.  But the very nature of Lovecraft’s work invites these varied ways of understanding and interpreting. 
    The story certainly builds an atmosphere of grim horror.  A lot is set up here, which I can only assume will become more clear and developed in later volumes.  The art isn’t amazing, but it’s passable.  I really don’t care for Andrew Ritchie’s work on the Dreamlands segments.  It’s evocative, I guess, but almost abstract and very ugly. 
    This is probably not for the causal reader, either.  Though not especially gory, it is quite disturbing and very dark.  Suicide, homicide, and eventual deicide are all on the docket in this series.

    In volume two, The Gathering, we start to see the various forces and interests that are coming together for the clash of gods.  There isn’t really a single focal point character in this volume, unless maybe it’s Mr. Arkham’s right hand man, Connor. 
    The art is still a mixed bag, but overall, I found it more palatable in the second volume.  I also really liked the introduction of the Masked Mute, and the imagery that accompanies her. 

    Volume three, The Gray Man, brings in a potentially interesting character in Lucifer, a wayward Brazilian girl with a heck of a lot more going on than one would expect.  And strong jawed cop, Sheriff Dirk helps give the reader a more grounded, everyman view of the unfolding events. 
    The conflict becomes more defined in this volume, too, with the stakes more clearly delineated, and the players all on the board, except perhaps Cthulhu himself (though his agents are in the thick of things). 

    (Mild spoilers ahead) In Godwar, the fourth volume, all hell breaks loose and the war between the gods begins in earnest.  The world starts its journey into madness, the ancient city rises from the depths, and everyone who’s anyone descends on its long hidden streets.  If I have one major complaint about the art from this series, it’s that the first real view of R’lyeh is less than overwhelming.  It looks like a simple Mediterranean village with a flooding problem.  And those angles look pretty darned Euclidian to me. 

    The fifth volume, Apocalypse, brings the series to a dramatic conclusion, with lots of crazy stuff going on, and the obligatory revelations and twists.  Who was really pulling the strings?  Who had the upper hand?  Who guessed one more move ahead on the chess board?  I guess my problem with this finale is that when all is said and done, the actual ending becomes a bit too intimate.  Though normally, I think one must keep stories on somewhat of an individual level, when it comes to the horrors of Lovecraft, especially when it comes to a war between the gods, it feels like the problems of a few people shouldn’t amount to a hill of beans, much less the tipping point of victory. 
    Still, the art here is the best and most consistent.  And I guess the ending is somewhat satisfying.  Like the whole series, it’s not the take on Lovecraft that I’d have done were it in my hands.  But it wasn’t.  And I did enjoy reading it.  So, at the end of the day, that’s what is important to this reviewer. 

    Nemesis, the final volume tells the story of a side character (of sorts) who appeared in the first couple volumes.  It goes back in time to the final days of Atlantis, showing some of the events chronicled in the previous volumes being set in motion.  The story feels more like a Robert E. Howard tale than Lovecraft (not to say they’re totally unrelated), but it’s not bad.  Unfortunately, the art by Todd Herman is only so-so, and by the end appears either rushed or lazy. 

    Of the Lovecraft inspired comics I’ve read so far, this series is among the better, and thanks to having a single writer, most consistent in terms of story and character.  Though the art is not, ranging from kind of crappy to pretty good.  It’s worth reading, and I’m hoping it will lead to more, hopefully better comics dealing with the Mythos in the future.  Perhaps something involving alien conspiracies and the Mi-go?  One can hope.

Fall of Cthulhu: The Fugue, The Gathering, The Gray Man, Godwar, Apocalypse, and Nemesis
Author: Michael Alan Nelson
Art: Various
Publisher: Boom! Studios
ISBN: 978-1-934506-19-6, 978-1-934506-49-3, 978-1-934506-50-9, 978-1-934506-57-8, and 978-1-934506-93-6

-Matt

Prodigal Son: The Pen is Mightier

Part Seven:

       After many weeks of being thwarted by bad timing and busy lives, Brad and I were actually able to get together for a second week in a row to try some more serious gaming.  First, we took a spin by a local game store, though I was frustrated not to find any of the handful of things I was looking for.  Thus is life.  And it took entirely too long to get back to the apartment after the store visit (darned rush hour traffic).  But, once we got back, cooked up some hot dogs and had some IBC (since 1919!) root beer, and watched the first ten minutes or so of the 1927 Clara Bow film “It,” we were ready to go.

    Once again on the tramp steamer, The Sophia, on a voyage between Spain and Innsmouth Massachusetts, things seemed fairly normal.  But soon enough, a crewman was found dead, seemingly cooked from the inside, with no visible wounds or damaged clothing.  This catalyst event started the real story, involving mysterious cargo, a mad captain, a young man with connections to a dangerous faction, a cook who spent a little too much time among some unsavory islanders, and hints of a shadowy battle between groups of people looking for strange artifacts.

    Brad’s character, Paul “Paulie” Connors, made it through the evening surprisingly unscathed.  The deadliness of handguns proving to be a benefit for him.  And he managed to do what so many investigators have done over the years in many games of Call of Cthulhu, not read too much, and destroy the evidence.

    What I found interesting is that Brad fell fairly quickly into the traditional attitude of players.  Struggling with what he knew/thought VS what his character knew/though.  And struggling with his own curiosity VS his character’s sense of self-preservation.  But he also seemed to get into things in general, which was a relief.

    For my own part, I felt far more confident and ready on our second get-together.  I had more written down, more of a plan of attack, and, in spite of having had a rough day, more relaxed and ready to go.  I started to feel better about throwing out some ideas on the fly, and playing with what I had written down, modifying the overall plotline as I went.  And I had a lot of fun playing the captain as he went mad.

    The end obviously left Brad a little frustrated, as he wanted to know what was going on, but didn’t really find out.  And, on the chance that his wife joins us for a follow-up story, I didn’t want to give anything away, because I already have plans for what I’m gonna do in that eventuality.  And as Brad is someone who doesn’t like being kept in the dark, I’m sure it ate at him a bit.  And I guess I’ve got some kind of a poker face or something.  If I do get a follow-up game together with him and Lisa, I think I’m going to try to run it pretty tight, getting a lot of story into one or two sessions.  Though I really like the idea, I don’t want to stretch it out, and I want to have an ending ready to go, assuming the characters survive long enough to find it.

    All in all, I finished the night feeling really good.  I felt the old magic coming back, and excitement for more to come.  And, after talking to some other friends, I may have a small group interested in something else in the near future.  I’m bouncing some ideas around in my head right now, but oddly, Star Wars keeps popping up.  Will that happen?  I don’t know.  But I’ve always liked that universe, even when I haven’t necessarily liked the films.  And, after a semi-realistic (in that death comes easy) game like Call of Cthulhu, something more action packed and outlandish could be a nice change of pace.

    Man, it feels good to be back.

-Matt

New Lovecaft Film on the Way!

The good news just keeps on coming for this Lovecraft fan.  The geniuses behind the awesome silent film adaptation, The Call of Cthulhu, over at The H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society have put out a trailer for their upcoming talkie The Whisperer in the Darkness.  This looks darned ambitious for amateur film makers, but speaks of the great love fans have for the material.  

Prodigal Son: Regrouping

Part Three:

    After getting together with my potential players to enjoy a game of Munchkin Cthulhu (quite fun), I found that my original plans would need to be modified.  Situations being what they are, any kind of ongoing game is pretty much a non-option with this crew.  Perhaps a ‘one-shot,’ single evening story would be a better option.  This was already an option I was considering, but it now seems likely to be the only viable one.  One-shots are fine, and can be very enjoyable.  But now that I’m invested in a return to gaming, I know that it won’t be enough.  A start along the path, but not my destination.

    I want to start gaming again.  More than that, I want to get back into roleplaying games, not just board or card games.  However, I’m not around many gamers in my daily life, so finding a group of 3 to 5 people may be something of a challenge.  Most of the people I know who do or have gamed are either in no position to get into something regular, or have incompatible expectations or philosophies.  Yet, all is not lost.  I still have these friends, even if two will be moving away in the next month or so.  We can still play something to tide me over for now.  Something like Once Upon a Time, one of my favorite non-roleplaying tabletop games.  It even deals with storytelling.

    After some discussion, I decided to try my hand at running a one-shot, single player session of Call of Cthulhu for fellow Dork, Brad.  He’s never tried a roleplaying game before, and has always been interested, and I haven’t run anything in a long danged time.  We’re both Lovecraft fans (and as you can read below, we've been getting back into reading him again), and I figure the game is simple, yet structured enough for him to understand and enjoy it.

    With that in mind, I’ve been kicking around some ideas for a possible scenario.  Brad came up with a vague idea for a character already.  So, now it’s mostly a matter of figuring out scheduling so we can create the character and run him through some madness.  I’m not quite sure yet if I want to run one of the pregenerated adventures from the back of the Call of Cthulhu basic book, or come up with something original.  For now, I’m leaning toward a specific story, The Madman, from the back of the book.  Though whenever I do run pregenerated scenarios, I tend to do a lot of work on them to make them my own.

    If things go well, I’ll look at more options for the future.  Brad’s wife has expressed interest in playing as well, though I don’t think horror is her genre of choice.  I’ll have to discuss options with her and Brad and anyone else we might recruit when the time comes.

What do you roll to break the 4th wall?

    In the meantime, I feel I should explain a bit about Call of Cthulhu and my interest in it.  I first became aware of the game through Chaosium Inc’s Worlds of Wonder and The Basic Roleplaying System, which was my first serious game.  Call of Cthulhu used the same game mechanics, with a few modifications, so it was an easy jump.  I was also discovering the original writings of H.P. Lovecraft at this point in my life (junior high), which became hugely important to my future literary interests.

    Lovecraft’s work had inspired many authors in his own time, and countless more on up through the present.  Many of those writers added to the fictional universe created in a loose way by Lovecraft, the so called “Cthulhu Mythos.”  It is this Mythos that serves as the basis for the game.  A limitless universe in which the hopes and dreams of mankind aren’t even a blip on the greater truth, a truth so incomprehensible that people are driven mad from the barest glimpse.  A blind, unwilled, uncaring universe, where beings of incalculable age and terrifying power stride worlds like pebbles of sand.  Worshiped as gods by men who try to tap into some element of their power.  What looks like magic is science beyond our hopes of understanding.

    Taking this vision of a universe with no greater plan, and with no special place for humanity, the game takes players back to the time of Lovecraft himself, the late 1920s (though the game can easily be set in pretty much any time and place).  And it puts players in control of typically Lovecraftian characters; professors, doctors, students, and the like.  People more likely to ask questions and look in those dark corners most try to ignore.  People who fight the good fight against cults trying to bring horrors into the world, against ancient creatures and strange powers.  The last line of defense in an unwinnable war few are even aware of, and fewer still capable of fighting.

    And just to add a little something, the game has rules for dealing with a character’s sanity.  You don’t just have to worry about getting punched, shot, or eaten, you’ve got to worry about seeing something ‘man was not meant to see’ or reading too much and putting 1 and H together.  When the pieces start to fall into place, the realizations are often too much for the human mind to accept, and when this happens, there is permanent damage done to the psyche, not to mention temporary insanity.  I once had a game master tell me, “if, after two or three sessions, characters aren’t dead or insane, you’re not running it right.”  I don’t know that I’m quite that extreme about it, but the game does, or should have a high mortality rate for characters.  That’s why in an ongoing game, the tendency is to have everyone belong to some kind of Gentleman’s Club, or scientific institution, or what have you.  When Professor Albertson goes missing while investigating the strange noises on the hills outside of Prague, his colleague Marianne Watson may just get the assignment to find out what’s become of him from the dean of the Archeology Department of Miskatonic University (Go Pods!).

-Matt

Revisiting Lovecraft

I guess there's a reason Brad and I started this blog.  We're two dorks who think along similar lines.  While I was writing up this little post, he posted something related. 

I’ve been saying, off and on for the last two years or so, that I really need to get back into reading H.P. Lovecraft.  The man is one of the most influential writers in my life, basically shaped horror fiction of the 20th century, and inspired many of my favorite films and one of my favorite roleplaying games.  But I think the last time I read anything by him was more than five years ago, when I gave the very dense The Dreamquest of Unknown Kadath a skimming.  A few weeks ago, around the same time I started getting interested in running a roleplaying game again, an anthology called Cthulhu’s Reign passed before my eyes.  On a whim, I picked it up and read the first story on my way home from work.  Not bad.  And the second story.  Pretty good.  That’s all it took.  I picked up my old Del Ray edition of The Best of H.P. Lovecraft, and started reading one of his major classics I’d somehow never gotten around to, The Dunwich Horror. 

And the love returned.  I started watching some movies inspired by his work, either directly or in some cases, very indirectly.  I pulled out my old Chaosium Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game.  Watched some videos on YouTube, and finally got around to watching the vague adaptation of The Color Out of Space, Die Monster, Die! with  Boris Karloff. 

Then yesterday, a new Barns & Noble leather bound edition of Lovecraft’s ‘Complete Fiction’ hit the shelf.  It’s a handsome volume to be sure, and it feels good hefting a monster leather bound book.  What can I say?  I picked up right where I’d left off that morning reading The Shadow Out of Time.  Man, I’m loving this. 

Lovecraft’s vision of a blind, uncaring universe where the hopes and dreams of mankind are like tears in rain, and the whole of human history is the briefest of footnotes in the cosmic reckoning is such a breath of fresh air after so much human-centric horror, like ghost stories and possession tales.  The gods of Lovecraft aren’t gods at all, but beings so outside, so beyond our ability to comprehend that even the hint of truth will drive people mad.  They don’t want our worship.  They don’t want our fear.  They don’t even know we exist, and if they did, they would care like we care about gnats. 

This is hardly all I’ve got to say on the subject.  But I felt I had to say something.  I’m going to go back to The Shadow Out of Time now, and find out just what horrors our poor old professor is about to find under the deserts of deepest Australia. 

If you haven’t read Lovecraft, do so.  Pick up any given anthology.  Start with some easy stories, like The Outsider, Cool Air, or Pickman’s Model.  Then try some of the bigger tales, like The Shadow Over Innsmouth, and the maybe eventually film destined At the Mountains of Madness.  Check out The Dunwich Horror, for sure.  And maybe take a taste of his more fanciful stories with The Cats of Ulthar.  It’s good stuff. 

-Matt

Barnes & Noble Ushers in The End Times!?!?!? YES!!!

Leading bookseller, Barnes and Noble, has recently added H.P. Lovecraft into their line of Leatherbound Classics.  Racking in at 1098 pages, The Omnibus retails for $20 and consists of the same table of contents found in their now out-of-print Library of Essential Writers edition--except now it's more Leathery!!!  B&N's Leatherbound line is no longer stuffed with boring Literary types like Jane Austen and Charles Dickens; recent additions have included HG Wells, Jules Verne, Anne Rice, and Michael Crichton.  

So, yeah, Lovecraft in Leather.  Honestly, I never thought I'd see the day.  Growing up I had to scour all the local used bookshops, sifting my way through various anthologies just to get a sneak at Lovecraft.  He was starting to get hip in the 90s with films like Re-Animator, Evil Dead, and In The Mouth of Madness bringing Lovecraft to the schoolyard.  Now, shops like Hot Topic carry Cthulhu plush dolls and Cthulhu fish bumper stickers.  And of course, there's all that Guillermo Del Toro shenanigans.  But when Barnes & Noble starts carrying Leatherbound Omnibuses, you know that Lovecraft has arrived...and that 2012 is just around the corner.

--Brad

Del Toro's Madness

Deadline snagged Guillermo Del Toro in an attempt to clear up all this At The Mountains of Madness brouhaha.  You've got James Cameron producing, Tom Cruise starring, GDT directing--Not So Fast, Says Universal.

Interview Highlights:

        -- Del Toro implies that he's as shocked as anyone at Universal passing, "The week before the decision, I was scouting in the border of Canada and Alaska. We were a week away from opening offices in Toronto. We were crewed up, and frankly, I am as puzzled as most people are."

       -- Asked if this hurts his relationship with Universal Del Toro states, "That’s still unknown. We have active projects where I’m a producer there and I’m still going to pursue my year and a half or two years I have left in my time with Universal. As disappointed and heartbroken as I am, for the studio, this is a business decision."

       -- Despite moving on to his next Monster Film (with a PG-13 rating) Pacific Rim, Del Toro holds out hope for Madness one day, "...I will continue to press forward. I’m knocking on wood...I spoke to Tom, who has been incredibly supportive and who said, ‘Let’s keep going, let’s make this movie down the road.’ He’s definitely that interested and that happy where we were creatively. So we have good legs to travel on, if the time and the opportunity present itself."

So, basically, I'll believe when I see it.  I'm curious about Pacific Rim.  I think that it's really interesting that they were able to keep its development pretty much under wraps.  PG-13?  Whatever.  Del Toro just needs to get back behind the camera.  Cronos, The Devil's Backbone, Blade II, Hellboy.  These are some of my favorite movies of recent memory.  After the wonky tone of Hellboy II I need to see Del Toro knock one outta the park again.  

--Brad

Tom Cruise, Guillermo del Toro, and H.P. Lovecraft: Cosmic Horror on Ice

    If you had told me ten years ago that James Cameron was going to produce a movie by the guy who made Mimic, starring Tom Cruise, based on one of my very favorite stories by one of my very favorite writers, I’d have laughed in your face.  That would be like the director of Bad Taste winning an Oscar; just unbelievable.  Yet, that very thing seems to be in the works.  Perhaps the stars are right, and the Old Ones are returning after all.

    I’m not a fan of Tom Cruise.  OK, there.  I said it.  I didn’t care for him as a young pretty boy, as a slightly older handsome man, or as a middle aged crazy dude.  There are a few exceptions, but most of his performances are one-note, and not a note I like to hear.  But once in a while there is that one movie that works.  Eyes Wide Shut, Tropic Thunder, and Collateral for examples.  And, in spite of his recent public madness and religious zealotry, he’s still a name people know.  And at least his madness hasn’t involved drunken anti-Semitism yet, so he’s got one up on some other train-wreck celebrities. 

    James Cameron has always been a good money man.  Like George Lucas, he’s better at producing than he is at writing or directing, so having him in that seat for this film doesn’t phase me one way or another, unless he pushes to have it made in 3D, which I’m sorry, is just lame.  3D should be reserved for ridiculous, campy films like Drive Angry or Step Up 3D, where that sort of shenanigan is acceptable. 

60 years later, still a lame gimmick.

    H.P. Lovecraft is pretty much the creator of modern horror as we know it.  Clive Barker, Stephen King, Robert Block, Ramsey Campbell, and hundreds of other authors are direct descendents of Lovecraft’s body of work.  For a man fairly obsessed with the past, he kind of invented the future for writers of weird fiction.  And his story, At the Mountains of Madness is one of his most epic, and wonderfully revealing.  It’s not the story I would have expected to be the first to get a major Hollywood production, though.  The Shadow Over Innsmouth is the more obvious choice, as it’s action heavy and would probably translate fairly well to an hour and a half feature film with plenty of what viewers want.  Still, Madness is a great story, so I love the idea of it being brought to a larger audience through film, and for Lovecraft in general to get a little more recognition. 

    The wild card in this venture for me is del Toro.  Six years ago, I’d have called him one of the most exciting modern directors, alongside David Fincher, Christopher Nolan, and Peter Jackson.  Unfortunately, like those three, del Toro has spent the last several years hurting his image in my eyes.  I know everyone loved Pan’s Labyrinth.  But I didn’t.  There are some great elements, but much of what I liked about the film was lost among the things that upon reflection I disliked.  My overall feeling toward the film now is quite negative.  Then Hellboy 2 became one of the most painfully disappointing film experiences of my life.  I came out of the theater feeling shell shocked.  Everything I loved about the first film had been torn away to make room for a great looking bit of annoying gibberish that bore little resemblance to the comic that inspired it, and with inane Danny Elfman music accompanying my path to disillusionment.  Then two years wasted on a Hobbit production I hardly care about at all.  Ugh. 

    And del Toro has danced around this project for so long, I'd kind of given up hope he would actually do it.  Now that it’s happening, and Tom Cruise of all people has been attached to it, I’m less than thrilled.  Does del Toro really get Lovecraft?  Can Cruise put his ego and madness aside long enough to do his job (act)?  Will Cameron demand a PG-13 rating, 3D technology, or horror of horrors, a go at the script? 

    Who can say?  I can’t.  I love the idea of Lovecraft getting a big screen adaptation and the attention of generations of new readers that will bring.  If nothing else good comes out of this project, I’ll be happy with that.  But what if the movie is good?  What if the project is successful?  Nyarlathotep knows I’d be shaking with excitement like a shoggoth at a Wal-Mart 2 for 1 sale, if the movie turned out well.  Only time will tell.  But maybe, just maybe the stars are finally right. 

-Matt