ORWELLIAN TIME:

 

SO LONG, FELIX SILLA...

To generations of fans, you were iconic twice over, as the Addams Family's Cousin Itt and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century's Twiki. 

But there's even more to admire, as your vast credits convey: Don't Be Afraid of the Dark '73; Batman Returns; Planet of the Apes '68; Bonanza; Star Trek ("the Cage"/"The Menagerie"); Demon Seed, H.R. Pufnstuf; Lidsville; Battlestar Galactica; Return of the Jedi; Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom; E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial; Characterz; the Black Bird; the Hindenburg; Point Blank '67; the Golden Child; Kentucky Fried Movie; Howard the Duck; The Munsters (as Butch Patrick's stand-in) and She Freak, where you met your sweetheart, Clare Brennen. 

You were known and appreciated for good cause and great affection, Mr. Silla. Thanks for the many gratifying memories you gave us and a perennial legacy that will continue to overflow with influential luster and cultural wealth. 

MARK ALLEN VANN'S FATEFUL EIGHT RETURN (#2)

Mark Allen Vann's much anticipated sequel to his highly acclaimed, Xepico Press anthology, Eight Against the Darkness, is now in print and supplies more connecting, New Pulp wonderment, with a stand-out, ensemble cover by Steve Bryant. 

For the sake of the Fateful Eight, Vann's valiant guardians and their faithful companions return to stir the pulpy pot: the gargoyle-morphing Thomas Greyclaw; courageous Corr and lovely Luthena; monster-busting Alistair Synne; magical Mary Minverva (protégé to the mighty Merlyn); sky-high, pirate captain Redd Havick; occult investigator Blake Spector; masked-vigilante Nathan Porter (aka the Revenant); spirited voyager Crypt Bannon and his observant confidants, William and Tuesday Danvers.

For this outing, our protagonists wrestle such astounding phenomena as a spellcasting author, witchcraft, dimensional portals, zombie criminality, deadly insects, a coveted gemstone, tiger-men, and much more, all spurred by the dogged Darkness, which influences through a variety of fantastic forms, in a series of diverse time frames. 

Because of its unique nature, The Fateful Eight permits Vann to flaunt his writing skills in many nuanced ways. Such spans from classic, heroic pulp to weird, foreboding mysticism: a combination that will please both fans of seasoned speculative fiction and those who delight in the daring newfangled.  

Beyond any doubt, our eight, great crusaders are here to stay, with more volumes on the horizon. Get in on the ground floor and order Mark Allen Vann's the Fateful Eight today:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1734511826/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

PIN-UP TIME: SAMANTHA FISH (WHAT A CATCH!)

EXCELSIOR, ROBERT FLETCHER...

You were respected for your Broadway costuming, Mr. Fletcher, but in the world of Star Trek, you were a cinematic influencer of cosmic legend.

On this basis, your aesthetic patterns for Star Trek--the Motion Picture through Star Trek IV: the Voyage Home left an indelible mark on popular culture and will continue to impact not only Trek, but imaginative productions yet to come.

Your remarkable overlap of past, present and future is a feat that few could have achieved, but one sincerely suited (pun intended) for the greatest space opera of all time.

TERRIFIC TEAM-UP IMAGE: BATMAN & CAP/JOKER & SKULL (JOHN BYRNE)

ADARCAH IANQU'S FOR CATHERINE

Adarcah Ianqu's for catherine is more subdued than the artist's previous industrial constructions, but no less engrossing in its haunting range. 

Its attributing title invokes something personal, but for those on-the-outside-looking-in, there's clear and present danger among the tracks. It's as if its six offerings were chiseled to lure extra-terrestrials to Earth (and all to an invading fault) or perhaps to hatch a forbidding plan in some dark, decrepit chamber: you know, subversive, man-made stuff.

The initial entry, "Oh big father Hades you missed me undead" references a Euro horror/sci-fi, director's cut, bearing a label as extended as the imagined film itself. Subsequently, it opens with a cylindrical screw (a twisted jar lid that implies the outstretch of Martian tentacles), but as the content progresses, it slams hard on the baroque keys and weaves a tolling clock that signals a dire destiny for those who encouraged the parasitic descent.

With "the most beautiful trip from the existence", the projected doom is more relaxed, tingling like a skeleton in a cold, unkempt graveyard. Here we have preparation music for Burke and Hare or ceremonial revs for Psychomania's motorcyclists: wicked and weird. 

For the third entry, "singing in philozof bordel {shamanic determinism's antique poem}", one faces the most terrifying horror of all: the scholarly sort. The notes are ponderous enough to suit the track's Hegel/Marxist motif, babbling a nonstop, dungeon cry from which unrealistic promises keep one shackled, misguided and weak.  

With "singing in Morpheus arms death sleepy whispers", a corpse rests in a station of clanging scalpels and yanked thread. From its pricking allusion, one senses a doctor and his hunched henchmen mending and dabbing to sculpt new life. And in bold reply, the track is complemented by an electrocuting sequel, subtitled "{poet negra v!vers", where the results are now dispatched, stomping the stormy night hungry for supple flesh. 

The album concludes with "beloved sons of Israel", which sounds endearing enough, but Ianqu's execution strikes a wearisome struggle, a flight from all the daunting strife, told as a plodding march to plaintive parts unknown. 

For catherine is a mechanical anthology of romanticized pessimism and vain escape: a catalyst for one's deepest, darkest dreams, as anesthetizing as it is chilling from beginning to end. 

Open one's ears (and subconscious) at 

https://bizarrechats.blogspot.com/2021/04/ianqus-ink-new-interpretive-sounds.html?fbclid=IwAR24J8EToYYH_NT_-pHR43Wj6jdFqvcfcau4RcClnYKzDznKOoYb_pM8aRY