Sezin Devi Koehler's Blog, page 3
December 11, 2023
Grinchmas 2023: ‘Hold the Dark’ Is a Cold and Bloody Christmas Horror That Begins With the Unspeakable and Spirals Down From There
‘The Lodge’ (2019) wasn’t Riley Keough’s first turn as a mother who isn’t quite able to handle the responsibilities of motherhood, or the harsh brutalities of the holiday season in a remote cabin. A year before in 2018 Keough extends this narrative in Jeremy Saulnier’s Netflix original ‘Hold the Dark.’
While Medora’s (Keough) husband is away at war in Iraq, her son Bailey (Beckham Crawford) goes missing. She claims he was taken by wolves, and enlists the help of wolf expert Russell Core (Jeffrey Wright) to find the animal that killed her son. But just as Core makes a gruesome discovery of an unimaginable act, Medora goes missing herself. Her husband Vernon (Alexander Skarsgård) returns to their remote Alaskan village Keelut in time to add to the bloody fallout of Bailey’s death.
“When kids are killed the future dies,” Cheeon (Julian Black Antelope), Vernon’s best friend says to local law enforcement, after pointing out their hypocrisy in investigating the death of a white boy and not his Indigenous daughter who died under suspicious circumstances years before. It’s a statement that hits home hard in today’s context of Israel’s war in Gaza, and the staggering number of children who have been indiscriminately murdered by the IDF, stopping entire lineages in their tracks.
‘Hold the Dark’ is as brutal as the icy Alaskan landscape. And as grotesque as the things people will do when they believe they have nothing left to lose. Closing the film with classic holiday tune “I’ll Be Home For Christmas” is a particular gut-punch in this context.
Hunting knife/5 stars. Highly recommend bracing yourself for this one.
Grinchmas Nights of Frights 2023
is the newest installment of my Horrorthon365 project, eclectic and unexpected genre watchlists with accompanying microreviews to suit the changing seasons. Horrorthon365 was sparked by a gnarly hand injury and surgery gone awry, hence the flash-style reviews. Browse the entire collection here.
The post Grinchmas 2023: ‘Hold the Dark’ Is a Cold and Bloody Christmas Horror That Begins With the Unspeakable and Spirals Down From There appeared first on Sezin Devi Koehler.
December 9, 2023
Grinchmas 2023: ‘The Lodge’ Importantly Asks if it’s Ever Possible to Fully Leave a Cult
Since I have cults on the brain at the moment, let’s dive into Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz’s Christmas horror ‘The Lodge’ (2019).
Richard Hall (Richard Armitage) is a journalist who breaks a story about a particularly gruesome religious cult after a mass suicide event with just one survivor, Grace (Riley Keough). As he immerses himself in the story, he falls in love with Grace, who seems to be responding to reprogramming efforts. In the process, Richard leaves his wife. But Mrs Hall — Alicia Silverstone in a brief but explosive and haunting appearance — takes her own extreme measures in the wake of their impending divorce. She leaves behind two hugely traumatized children Aiden (Jaeden Martell) and Mia (Lia McHugh), who resent their stepmother-to-be more than it’s possible to describe.
To encourage their bonding over the Christmas holiday, Richard decides it’s a good idea for Grace and the children to all hang out at their isolated lake cabin in the woods. But when he’s suddenly called back in to work and the three are left alone and snowbound, disturbing things begin to happen. Beginning with Grace misplacing her cornucopia of antipsychotic and other medications that keep her in reality, not the flashbacks of her life in the death cult run by her sadistic father.
As their connections to the outside world are cut off one by one through the bitter cold and raging snowstorm, Grace’s internal torment quickly externalizes, with horrific results.
Since I’ve been on the topic of cults for a few days now, ‘The Lodge’ asks a vital question: Is it ever really possible to fully deprogram? This isn’t just relevant to religious cults. It also speaks to the cult-like behavior of certain political leaders like the USA’s 45th president who have created an entire alternate “post-truth” reality that his followers continue to support. And the resulting violence when these now-fundamental beliefs not based in reality are challenged by outsiders. As we see in ‘The Lodge,’ the results are beyond devastating.
To leave a cult requires true humility and remorse. Which seems to be too much to ask in this film, and in real life.
Dollhouse/5 stars. Highly recommend being your own person and not falling into group-think, no matter how convenient or comfortable it may be.
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December 8, 2023
Grinchmas 2023: ‘Fargo’ Season 5 Is a Nightmare Before Christmas, and Pointed Homage to the Original Film
Going back to the franchise’s film roots, the fifth season of Noah Hawley’s ‘Fargo’ is a fabulously updated version of the Coen Brothers’ classic source material. Dot Lyon (Juno Temple) is a typical Minnesota housewife whose main concerns are her daughter, school board meetings, and husband, in that order. But after a math curriculum meeting turned violent and Dot ends up booked and printed down at the station, her long-hidden past becomes present with a violent quickness.
Dot’s husband Wayne (David Rysdahl) is a Kia car dealership owner, but it’s not this husband who has arranged to kidnap Dot as in the 1996 movie. And here, we have a Mommy Warbucks in Mrs Lyon (Jennifer Jason Leigh) instead of the wealthy dad from the film. And Scandia’s main female cop — Frances McDormand’s counterpart replete with thick Minnesotan accent — is Indian American Indira Olmstead, played by ‘Never Have I Ever’ actor Richa Moorjani.
New characters include John Hamm as quietly sadistic white supremacist Sheriff Roy Tillman. His thuggish, confederate-flag displaying brute of a son Gator, Joe Keery going back to Steve Harrington from ‘Stranger Things’ asshole roots. And twisted hitman Ole Munch (Sam Spruell) whose ancestor was a Welsh sin eater and appears to have poisoned his descendent line. Among many others to root for, and against.
‘Fargo’ season 5 is both a Halloween show and a Christmas show, with overt thematic references to ‘The Nightmare Before Christmas’ that similarly blur these holidays, including a Christmas tree up at the matriarch’s manor in October and character masks like Jack Skellington and Boogie’s Boys worn by the gnarly villains.
Like all the seasons before and the movie itself, season 5 is about the butterfly effects of violence and the terrible ripples of bad choices on ourselves and others. Season 5 is particularly and gothically charming, though, with all its homage to original.
Minnesota nice/5 stars. Highly recommend rewatching the 1996 movie before diving into this one.
Grinchmas Nights of Frights 2023 is the newest installment of my Horrorthon365 project, eclectic and unexpected genre watchlists with accompanying microreviews to suit the changing seasons. Horrorthon365 was sparked by a gnarly hand injury and surgery gone awry, hence the flash-style reviews. Browse the entire collection here.
The post Grinchmas 2023: ‘Fargo’ Season 5 Is a Nightmare Before Christmas, and Pointed Homage to the Original Film appeared first on Sezin Devi Koehler.
December 5, 2023
Grinchmas 2023: ‘30 Monedas/30 Coins’ Is an Epic Takedown of Christianity and its Myriad Cults
As a horror fan well-versed in the genre, it takes a lot of creativity to surprise me. But surprise me Alex de la Iglesias has done with his bonkers HBO show ‘30 Monedas/30 Coins,’ which has me shouting, “WHAT THE FUCK?!” every few minutes of every single episode. I speak Spanish fluently, so the fact I’m not exclaiming this en español also speaks to how constantly knocked out of my shoes I am by this fascinating take on the horror of religion.
The very first episode opens with an elderly man walking through Geneva’s downtown with purpose, on the exact same walk I have taken hundreds of times from my years working there. The park with a steeple sculpture he passes in the opening shot is even where I used to eat my lunch and read on lunch or other breaks in town. And the bank the man eventually goes into across the bridge into Old Town is the bank where, once upon a time, I had an account for the human rights NGO I tried to get off the ground. They might have filmed on a sound stage, but that’s exactly what that particular bank looks like on the inside. All gold and high ceilings and staircases everywhere. Chills City, dude. Thank gods for trauma therapy because the man goes on a shooting spree, and that would have set off PTSD in a bad way for me a few years ago. Now I watch with a curious detachment as an event I was so terrified would happen to me in Geneva (and anywhere I’ve lived) actually unfolds. Surreal.
From the jump I knew this show would speak to me specifically, and now toward the end of its second season it continues to resonate. And blow my mind.
The first season of ‘30 Monedas’ uncovers the demonic secrets of a Catholic sect who believe actively committing acts of evil are part of God’s plan. And to effect the worst evils the world has ever seen, a faction of the Vatican called the Cainites seeks Judas’ 30 cursed coins in order to amass their powers of magic and destruction. And so much more, centering on the small Spanish Pueblo of Pedraza en Segovia.
With Cainites still in play, the second season introduces a new group of evilmongers, the Baphomists — who are Scientologists in all but name, led by a gazillionaire who writes science fiction in his spare time.
All of this is so deliciously blasphemous, my recovering Catholic heart absolutely leaps with joy to watch these “sacred” notions deconstructed into the horrors they actually are. ‘30 Monedas’ feels like a spiritual relative of Mike Flanagan’s ‘Midnight Mass,’ and I live for both of them.
Overflowing with horror and other pop-culture references, as well as history and literature, this is truly a narrative tailor made for nerds who love hunting for Easter eggs. My favorite references include: Dracula 2000. He Never Died. Constantine. Hable Con Ella (Talk to Her). Lord of the Rings. Alice Through the Looking Glass. The Thing. The Omen. Lovecraft. Labyrinth. Hellraiser. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. The Exorcist. Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Alien. And even The NEVERENDING STORY! It’s spectacular. If I brushed up on my Spanish horror, I’d have so much more to add to this list.
Visually stunning, compelling performances from a wonderful ensemble crew, and nonstop revelations (pun intended) make ‘30 Monedas’ a thrilling narrative feat. Having it air directly after HBO’s 3-episode documentary ‘Love Has Won: The Cult of Mother God’ was scheduling poetry. This added a level of reality to ‘30 Monedas’ that would otherwise be absent. The message that cults are fundamentally evil is vital at this moment in history.
With all this heavy text and subtext, the moments of comedic levity particularly in 30 Monedas’ second season are just amazing and perfectly placed. So unexpected and so welcome. In a word this show is brilliant.
Brujería/5 stars. Do not recommend to anyone highly religious and easily offended.
Grinchmas Nights of Frights 2023 is the newest installment of my Horrorthon365 project, eclectic and unexpected genre watchlists with accompanying microreviews to suit the changing seasons. Horrorthon365 was sparked by a gnarly hand injury and surgery gone awry, hence the flash-style reviews. Browse the entire collection here.
The post Grinchmas 2023: ‘30 Monedas/30 Coins’ Is an Epic Takedown of Christianity and its Myriad Cults appeared first on Sezin Devi Koehler.
December 4, 2023
Grinchmas 2023: HBO’s ‘Love Has Won: The Cult of Mother God’ Documentary Features an Old College Friend, and it’s as Surreal as You Might Imagine
It’s not every day that you find out a dear friend from college has been sucked into a cult. And it’s even more rare to discover said cult is under investigation for potentially murdering their leader at worst, and at best transporting her body across multiple state lines, Weekend-At-Bernie’s style pretending she’s asleep in the backseat. But this is the case of my old friend Gabe Gomez and Amy Carlson’s cult, subject of HBO’s new 3-part documentary ‘Love Has Won: The Cult of Mother God.’
Back in 1997 when I first met Gabe, we were freshman at Occidental College, both living in Pauley Hall on campus. Gabe was warmhearted, sensitive, so funny, incredibly smart, AND gorgeous with a smile that could melt butter. I had such a crush on him for the longest time. I was having a rough go of the transition to Los Angeles from my lifetime abroad and Gabe was one of the few people who would really check in with me and make efforts to help me feel at home. Gabe had the kinds of hugs that make you feel like you’re a real person. Grounded and safe. Gabe always kept it real, even when it was hard talk he found a way to be compassionate. And we had deep conversations about art, politics, and social justice. Gabe changed my worldview when he introduced me to James Baldwin’s writing — an intro that has led to one of my current book projects on white devilry decades later. We were close freshman year, and then as time moved on I saw less and less of him, especially once we no longer lived in the same dorm. But he’s always had a dedicated place in my heart. The last time I saw him was our graduation in 2001, and it would be several years before we reconnected on Facebook. By that point he was bassist in an amazing reggae hip-hop band Sol Rising. Still kind, still beautiful, still so smart.
And then all of a sudden there was a marked change. His posts stopped being about social justice and music and his search for love. Instead, he was sharing odd conspiracy theories and informing us that he had met god’s incarnation on earth. That he called her “Mother God” and she used to be Marilyn Monroe and Joan of Arc and even Jesus, and we should wake up to join their enlightened crew.
I wasn’t the only old Oxy pal who was concerned. These posts were met with a lot of reasonable questions from mutual friends, especially as he was fundraising to send “Mother God” to Disneyland and showing us pictures of her boil-infected back, saying she has been processing the evils of the universe and we should send money to help. I watched him get scary skinny, finding out later “Mother God” decided how much and when they could eat. He turned over his life savings and cashed out his 401k. His family were desperate in the FB comments, begging him to answer their calls, to come at least visit. But Gabe was now “Commander Buddha,” and “Mother God” called all the shots for him and all her followers.
Seeing Gabe’s face pop up again and again in ‘The Cult of Mother God’ documentary was beyond surreal. As was listening to the rhetoric falling from his mouth that would have had the Gabe I knew in 1997 laughing his ass off. And it just got worse and worse from there, watching what has happened to him and where he’s been these past years.
As seen in ‘The Cult of Mother God,’ the group was founded online in 2006, on message boards and blogs, with the claim that Amy Carlson is the physical incarnation of god on earth and this is undeniable fact and truth. Amy’s philosophy involves a mishmash of every religion/faith under the sun including an offshoot of Scientology in “The Galactics,” a team of historic and other figures including Robin Williams and Donald Trump who advise “Mother God.” But, Love Has Won has some key divergences from other religious groups, the main one being its leader encouraged the consumption of alcohol, marijuana, and other drugs, herself drinking a gallon of vodka a day during her peak “power.” Disciples were also very much plugged in to the internet at all times, live streaming events and sessions almost 24-hours a day. Essentially weaponizing the worst inclinations of cybersphere conspiracy theories to take advantage of people desperately seeking community. This is how they ended up with hundreds of thousands of dollars in the bank, and devotees traveling from as far as Australia handing over their entire life savings to “Mom.” My friend Gabe talks about doing this very thing in one of his many on-camera interviews.
This rock and roll lifestyle under the guise of spiritual enlightenment led to “Mom” eventually becoming paralyzed from the waist down as a result of liver and kidney failure due to the alcohol abuse. She also slowly turned blue from ingestion of enormous quantities of the group’s homemade colloidal silver tonics, which they sold online as a cure-all, and which was one of the eventual causes of “Mother God’s” death. “Get your Kool-Aid!,” Commander Buddha says into a livestream, busting up with laughter at the Jonestown joke — and a heartless foreboding of what the product would do to Amy Carlson. Starvation was the third thing that killed her.
And as we watch Amy Carlson dying through the footage of her followers, we also hear the absolutely deranged justifications and explanations for what’s happening to her. Just unhinged shit. We even see “Mom’s” devotees in livestreams essentially praying for her death, while invoking the “Galactics” who were supposed to come collect her. Because once you’re that deep into a cult narrative, you can’t backtrack without admitting you were wrong. And none of these folks had the humility to help a woman in clear need of medical attention — even when “Mom” herself asked to go to the hospital. Or see through the complete nonsense of her “belief” system, that was clearly rooted in deep insecurity, alcoholism, and a desire to be seen as special and important. Watching them pour colloidal silver down her gullet right until the end was sickening. Had the group not been primarily white people, they would have been charged with murder, if not at least manslaughter for their role in her prolonged demise.
And it’s peak irony Amy Carlson called herself “Mother God” when she abandoned her own children for her cult.
Seeing Gabe every few minutes in the documentary and in old footage, participating, rationalizing these terrible actions with monumental leaps of logic, looking just like the boy I once knew — same soulful eyes and beautiful smile — I had my own epiphany. This person might have the same face as the boy I loved who introduced me to James Baldwin. But behind the eyes, that person is gone. I don’t know “Commander Buddha.” I want nothing to do with this pod person who ate my Gabe. This person who continues to promote colloidal silver sales online, even though it killed his “Mother God.”
And more than anything, I miss my friend. Seeing Gabe’s transformation into “Commander Buddha” reminds me of just how many friends I’ve lost in so many ways, concretely and through circumstances, who I’d give anything to see again just one more time like they were before. Gabe, dude, come back to us please. We miss you so much.
/5 stars. I can’t recommend this documentary in good conscience. It’s like watching a snuff film in real time and I feel oddly complicit having seen it.
Grinchmas Nights of Frights 2023 is the newest installment of my Horrorthon365 project, eclectic and unexpected genre watchlists with accompanying microreviews to suit the changing seasons. Horrorthon365 was sparked by a gnarly hand injury and surgery gone awry, hence the flash-style reviews. Browse the entire collection here.
The post Grinchmas 2023: HBO’s ‘Love Has Won: The Cult of Mother God’ Documentary Features an Old College Friend, and it’s as Surreal as You Might Imagine appeared first on Sezin Devi Koehler.
December 3, 2023
ThanksKilling 2023: ‘The Uninvited’ Is White Women Devilry With Surprising Twists
Since the original “thanksgiving” is all about uninvited settler colonizers, The Guard Brothers’ ‘The Uninvited’ (2008) is an appropriate addition to my ThanksKilling Terrors list. ‘The Uninvited’ features Elizabeth Banks as Rachel, a wily hospice nurse with designs to replace her recently deceased patient as mistress of the swanky lakeside home of bestselling author Steven (David Straithairn). That is, until Steven’s daughters Alex (Arielle Kebbel) and Anna (Emily Browning) begin plotting to oust her after Anna’s return from a stint in a psychiatric ward. The first step, proving that Rachel had something to do with the boathouse fire that killed their beloved mother.
But Rachel won’t give up her newfound role as fiancée up so easily, as the sisters begin unraveling who their wicked soon-to-be stepmother really is. All the while the ghost of Anna and Alex’s mother continues visiting Anna with warning upon warning that she might be next to die.
Elizabeth Banks is fantastic — and terrifying — as the villain in this ubercreepy family drama that’s much more than what it appears to be on the surface. And the layers of white women devilry goes deep into pure psychopath territory. The ending is a jaw-dropper. Really shocked the hell out of me. Which is hard to do. No idea how I missed this one when it first came out and now I can’t stop thinking about it.
Watering can/5 stars. Highly, very much, absolutely recommend.
P.S. For a quick primer on the concept of white devilry, here you go.
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ThanksKilling Terrors 2023 is the newest installment of my Horrorthon365 project, eclectic and unexpected genre watchlists with accompanying microreviews to suit the changing seasons. Horrorthon365 was sparked by a gnarly hand injury and surgery gone awry, hence the flash-style reviews. Browse the entire collection here. 
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December 1, 2023
ThanksKilling 2023: ‘Fellow Travelers’ and the Horror of Political Persecution: Unpacking the Real-Life History of the Lavender Scare
Joseph McCarthy’s reign of paranoia and terror in the 1950s and repercussions long beyond began with the so-called Red Scare, a targeting and persecution of Americans believed to be communists or sympathizers. But there was another social and cultural hunt happening at the same time. They called it the Lavender Scare, and it involved outing queer people who worked for the government and effectively ruining their lives. And it’s the Lavender Scare that’s the subject of Ron Nyswaner’s poignant — and heartbreaking — new Showtime miniseries ‘Fellow Travelers.’
Flipping between the present of the 1980s and the three decades previous, Hawk (Matt Bomer) and Tim (Jonathan Bailey) meet while working at the State Department in DC just as McCarthy (Chris Bauer) broadens his targets to include queer folks. An ironic inclusion of persecutions spearheaded by McCarthy’s openly gay fixer Roy Cohn (Will Brill) — one whose antidemocratic and corrupt machinations extended to the Orange Menace who occupied the White House from 2017 to 2021.
Part love story, part political thriller, and part period piece, ‘Fellow Travelers’ unpacks a perspective about the State Department and government ongoings in Washington DC we rarely, if ever, hear about. The result is fascinating and heartbreaking in equal measure. The hard choices people had to make to either be true to themselves, or escape persecution are both straightforward and surprising.
‘Fellow Travelers’ is an issue-heavy narrative that also touches on racism and the civil rights movement, the AIDS epidemic, and so many other important American historical milestones from a queer perspective that adds fresh nuance to these events. The fact that these stories are being told now in 2023 is a small example of how far we’ve come. But still so far to go yet for equal rights on an intersectional front.
And the irony isn’t lost on me that the descendants of European settlers who were escaping religious and other persecution in their founding of the USA would turn around and do the very same thing to marginalized communities. It’s shocking how many people died by suicide during the Lavender Scare after being outed by their own government. I hope those lost souls will one day rest in peace.
‘Fellow Travelers’ is streaming on Showtime and Paramount+. Watch it.
Snow globe/5 stars. Highly recommend politicians stop legislating their bigotry.
ThanksKilling Terrors 2023 is the newest installment of my Horrorthon365 project, eclectic and unexpected genre watchlists with accompanying microreviews to suit the changing seasons. Horrorthon365 was sparked by a gnarly hand injury and surgery gone awry, hence the flash-style reviews. Browse the entire collection here.
The post ThanksKilling 2023: ‘Fellow Travelers’ and the Horror of Political Persecution: Unpacking the Real-Life History of the Lavender Scare appeared first on Sezin Devi Koehler.
November 25, 2023
ThanksKilling 2023: ‘Rubber’ Is a Bizarre Exercise in Brechtian Fae Horror and the Dangers of Improperly Cooked Turkey
Out in the California desert, a rubber tire gains sentience and goes on a killing spree, starting with a scorpion and culminating in the mass murder of humans. Yes, you read it right: a car tire with psychokinesis. The film is French director Quentin Dupieux’s ‘Rubber’ (2010), and it’s one of the oddest, most surreal, and weirdly hilarious films I’ve seen in a long time.
I’m sure you have a million questions. How did the tire gain sentience? How do you know it’s actually sentient? Why does it kill? How is any of this even remotely imaginable? These questions all have answers, but not that can come from me. Somehow the film is able to flesh out, so to speak, the homicidal tire as an entirely believable character — it’s the humans in its path you end up having unanswered questions about. They are the ones who actually make no sense. And a faction of them use a poisoned roast turkey to slaughter another group, very much in the spirit of the original colonizing efforts of European settlers to the East coast of America.
If you’re familiar with the German playwright Bertolt Brecht and his theatre of alienation, many of those principles are worked into the narrative in a way I’ve been calling Brechtian Fae horror. It was very important for Brecht’s audience to be keenly aware of the fact that they were watching a spectacle, and one huge way to accomplish this was by characters breaking the fourth wall and talking directly to the audience, sometimes not even as their character. And this narrative device is used throughout ‘Rubber’ to excellent effect. And Fae horror rules explain the tire’s sudden sentience.
This is truly one of the most bizarre films I’ve ever seen. And maybe my favorite part has been the side effects. Everywhere I go now I see a black tire on the road. Leaning against a pole. Lying flat on a highway median. Black tires everywhere. Are they waiting for the enchantment that woke up the antihero tire of ‘Rubber’? Maybe. And I’m oddly rooting for them.
Binoculars/5 stars. Highly recommend paying attention to the road.
PS If you’re interested in learning more about Brecht, I wrote a piece analyzing Twin Peaks’ third season through a Brechtian lens. It’s a really cool framework that not many folks utilize on screen.
TwitterFacebookInstagramGoodreadsMediumThanksKilling Terrors 2023 is the newest installment of my Horrorthon365 project, eclectic and unexpected genre watchlists with accompanying microreviews to suit the changing seasons. Horrorthon365 was sparked by a gnarly hand injury and surgery gone awry, hence the flash-style reviews. Browse the entire collection here.
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November 24, 2023
ThanksKilling 2023: ‘Kristy’ Is a Thanksgiving Slaughter, Just Like the Original Whitewashed Events
The promoted Thanksgiving narrative is that European settler colonists peacefully coexisted with the Indigenous groups once they landed on the east coast, whether in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1621 or St Augustine, Florida over a hundred years earlier. But the opposite is true. These arrivals were heralded by mass murder and other violence by the unwelcome settlers, and it often came with a religious subtext as well as an ethnic supremacy bent.
And in Olly Blackburn’s Thanksgiving horror ‘Kristy’ (2014), we see many echoes of the religious violence that built the USA, with some key twists. Like, a cult of disparate serial killers mobilized online who target young women they label “Kristy,” or “followers of Christ,” for their perceived innocence and beauty. “Kill Kristy, kill God,” their tagline reads.
They find the perfect next victim in Justine (Haley Bennett), a scholarship student who couldn’t afford to travel home during Thanksgiving break and is the only student on her remote private college campus. But Justine is not so innocent. Or weak. As she gives her attackers the fight for their own lives on the sprawling university grounds. It’s certainly to her advantage she knows the space extremely well, from her regular runs, swims, and work-study.
I’m really super glad this movie didn’t exist on the long weekends I was alone on my own college campus in LA back in 1997 and 1998. Because I never would have stayed.
Red vines/5 stars. Highly recommend not joining bizarre internet murder cults.
ThanksKilling Terrors 2023 is the newest installment of my Horrorthon365 project, eclectic and often unexpected genre watchlists with accompanying microreviews to suit the changing seasons. Browse the entire collection here.
The post ThanksKilling 2023: ‘Kristy’ Is a Thanksgiving Slaughter, Just Like the Original Whitewashed Events appeared first on Sezin Devi Koehler.
November 23, 2023
ThanksKilling 2023: ‘Our Flag Means Death’ Is a Marvelous Fever Dream That Dismantles Toxic Masculinity While Critiquing Colonizing Processes
Historically pirates are among the most ruthless, violent, and destructive humans to have traversed the planet. Thieves, rapists, mercenaries, murderers, and worse combinations of all the above, the fact they’ve been romanticized is one of the odder pop-culture moments to have emerged, one that will not quit. And then came HBO’s Our Flag Means Death, a show that is as anachronistic as it is absolutely wonderful.
With the bloody history of global piracy in mind, Our Flag Means Death takes every truth about pirates and uses them to dismantle notions of toxic masculinity one by one. And it’s one of the best things I’ve ever seen in my life.
Equal parts absurd, hilarious, and heartwrenching, Our Flag Means Death combines beautifully hilarious writing with moving performances that create a tapestry unlike anything else that exists. Like, how?! In todays age of constant remakes and reboots and requels and franchises, how did something so perfectly original emerge from the much of all the sameness? It feels like a small miracle. And the fact that this isn’t just a show about pirates, it’s a show about 
gay pirates, only makes it all the more magical. All the actors understand the assignment, and play their parts impeccably. Every time I think I must have dreamed it I open up HBO and there it is, the narrative about nurturing masculinity I’ve been craving for the longest time.
But it’s not just a gay pirate show. The women and nonbinary pirates (NONBINARY PIRATES, Y’ALL!) are beyond enchanting, especially Leslie Jones as Spanish Jackie and Vico Ortiz as Jim. It’s also a show that’s hugely critical of military industrial complexes and colonization, which even features an episode in St Augustine, Florida, the site of the first colonial genocides on USian soil by Spanish and then French invaders. St Augustine is also the site of the actual first “Thanksgiving” meal between the indigenous Timucuan and the Spanish settler colonizers who eventually wiped them out entirely.
All of this is weirdly and thoughtfully wrapped in the love story between Blackbeard (Taika Waititi) and Stede Bonnett (Rhys Darby).
And did I mention it’s hilarious? I don’t know how Our Flag Means Death manages to be everything in just 18 30-minute episodes. But it is.
Fuckery/5 stars. Highly recommend organizing a Calypso Night.
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