Day 181

As I’ve been feeling better I went and got my hair cut, before I got this inner ear problem/panic attacks a half hour walk to the barbers was a chance to listen to some music and to get some exercise, how it’s a chance to get some exercise and worry a bit that I’m going to faint/collapse and die!

I also went into town to buy some DIY stuff, so that I can replace old, slightly mouldy sealant in the shower with new, fresh, mould free sealant, watched some more Castle episodes and John Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness, listened to Mike Simonetti’s Mike Feel Love EP and read some comics.

Prince Of Darkness is part of John Carpenters Apocalypse Trilogy (the other two films are JohnCarpenter’s The Thing and In The Mouth Of Madness) and, for me, is a near perfect film, where every part of the film making process (story, script, actors, direction, wardrobe, music, etc.) comes together to make a top-notch film. 

In a nutshell, God, Jesus and Satan are aliens and Satan was banished many years ago, but Satan’s Son (who is green goo in a weird container) has awoken and is working to bring Stan back to Earth, lined up against him are a priest, a University Physics professor, his students and some scientists from the future. It might sound wacky/weird, but the tension just builds and builds throughout the film, as creepy things happen and happen, and then it explodes as the Son of Satan escapes the container back and surrounds (and starts to take over) our heroes with his followers. It’s then a desperate fight for our remaining heroes to survive and stop the Son of Satan from bringing his father back to Earth. During all this the future scientists are sending back warnings, that appear as dreams, to our heroes.

The first half (or so) of the film almost feels like a documentary, with everyone going about their normal business, but slowly the supernatural is introduced and subverts the earlier optimism of the film (we’re scientists studying an ancient artefact, there’s nothing to be worried about) as one by one they fall prey to the Son of Satan.

Prince Of Darkness does a great job of combining sci-fi with (religious) horror/the supernatural and like many Carpenter films it has a real sense of pessimism and uncertainty, even when our heroes win it is (a) at a great cost, as many of thee don’t survive, and (b) it is never clever entirely clear that they have won (can’t go into details as it would spoil the film or those that haven’t seen it).  

On the Mike Feel Love EP, Mike Simonetti covers the legendary I Feel Love. The bassline and beat are still there propelling the track along, but he takes it into a more post-new wave/new romantic territory. Everything that made the original so great is still there, but is amped up, it almost sounds more analogue, which is weird as the original was written in 1977. The second track ‘Midnight Or Late Afternoon’ is a straight house banger that can get any party started right.

In The Damned #3 Pauly’s plan is put into effect, but you can feel Eddie and Pauly’s rickety partnership starting to fall about under each other’s mistrust, just as the demons (and others) are circling round. We also have a new, unknown player, who takes out a carload of demons in a great action sequence. A great read. 

Savage Dragon #225 is a 100-page monster of an anniversary issue and as with all his anniversary issues Larsen gives us plenty of bangs for our bucks. There’s a great action packed main story with thrills, spills and shocking changes a-plenty and tons of back-up stories, some are one-page comedy strips and others let us catch up on characters we haven’t seen in a while:

 

Kyle Starks does a great job in capturing the tone and voice of Rick and Morty. In #28 (https://oni-press.myshopify.com/products/rick-and-morty-28) Rick and Morty are hiding out in a motel and to pass the time they watch interdimensional cable. Starks has come up with some great interdimensional TV shows:

and in the back-up Marc Ellerby has Rick and Jerry discussing movie history, as only Rick and Jerry can: