Chiara C. Rizzarda's Blog, page 49

#Spooktober 13 – The Sinking City

Do you like Lovecraftian atmospheres where you might be either going insane or possessed by the source of all evil? This videogame is for you, provided you like investigative plots.

Developed by the Ukrainian studio Frogwares, who recently published a similarly-themed Sherlock Holmes game called The Awakened, this game features a clever mix of mystery, horror, human monsters and a whole-new-level of fuckery, with investigations on this and the other side of the veil.
The detective part heavily relies on you researching clues and inputting them through an archive system that seems to have been invented by one of the Fallout Vaults engineers (that’s not a compliment), everyone is miserable and there are no right choices. It’s in third-person, and the main character wasn’t particularly relatable to me. As such, I have to admire how they were able to scare the shit out of me.

If you need more reasons, the city was developed by that legend that is Konstantinos Dimopoulos. Here you can read him talking about his work.

#Spooktober 12 – Happy Town

There’s a high chance you will hate me for this recommendation, so let me warn you in advance: the show was never finished and the “ending” will leave you standing like an idiot.
Regardless of that, this 8-episode 2010 tv series really does the trick for the spooky season as it features: a cursed Minnesota town with a mysterious serial abducter called “the Magic Man”, severed hands, mass hysteria, a bird named Cicero, a clever use of music that has no reason whatsoever.
If you like horror in the style of Stephen King and you roll your eyes at cheap tricks or jump scares like I do, you’ll probably enjoy this. And the cast is remarkable too, as it features a young Lauren German, future star of Lucifer, and a Sam Neill whose performance – to quote one of the characters – is “difficult to describe, almost impossible to replicate”. It’s available on Disney+ in almost all Countries (except for mine, of course).

#Spooktober 11 – Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth

There aren’t many places that spell “Halloween” more than Gotham City and, in Gotham, the crown piece has to be Arkham Asylum. Whether you’re a DC fan or not, I suggest you give it a chance this October and, if you don’t know where to start, I can only point you towards this graphic novel written by Grant Morrison (not a fan) and illustrated by Dave McKean (definitely a fan).

The story follows Batman, “the world’s greatest detective”, as he’s called to quell a riot inside the Asylum. As he fights historical opponents such as the Joker, he has to venture deeper and deeper into the building, eventually discovering how it was founded and its connection with ancient, more haunting mysteries. Through the diary of the asylum’s founder, Amadeus Arkham, the story takes us through the horror of how society deals with mental illness, without mercy and without quarters, in one of the few stories subverting the insane monster trope otherwise permeating Batman’s universe.

#Spooktober 10 – Fire City

It’s a weird movie, and I like the story behind it as it was spanning from a broader worldbuilding project and it was basically croudfunded.

Autumn Vine is a fixer for his brethren demons and what he provides is misery. By slowly influencing humans around them, demons have sustained themselves for centuries, living in close quarters with mortals and pushing them to commit horrible acts so that they can feed on the misery they inflict.
One night, too much is too much. A random act of overdue mercy sets disruption in motion, as the demons start to mysteriously die and the community is locked within their condo, for fear that they would spread their disease. But is it a sickness or a shift in paradigm? I guess it’s a matter of perspective.

This is a movie for you if you like the idea of parallel worlds, if you enjoy Del Toroesque visuals and if you have a thing for cyberpunk aesthetics.

#Spooktober 9 – Ghost River

Probably not the best song from Nightwish, certainly not my favourite though I like this a lot, it’s possibly the most haunting. Ghost River is part of the underrated album Imaginaerum, composed for a generic vocalist during a transition period in the life of the band, and the whole album is “about the celebration of life and existence”. According to the composer’s own words, this song is the dark side of this celebration: a duel between the Devil and Mother Earth.

I love the dark side and I love all kinds of evil stuff, so we needed a few songs to describe those.
– T. Holopainen

The duel is reflected by the song lyrics being sung in a duet, originally recorded as a duet between Anette Olzon, the singer at the time, and Marco Hietala, the legendary bassist who recently took a break from the band. Annette’s vocal aren’t particularly powerful, at least in my opinion, and that’s why the featured video is a live version with the new singer, Floor Jansen.

The couple, whoever you prefer, are struggling to influence a third entity we don’t see, possibly a mere human being trying to navigate through the river of life: Mother Earth urges them to listen to her voice and cross safely, while the Devil is foreseeing their demise with a certainty that’s hard to fight.

It’s a long road down the river deep ‘n wild
Every twist and turn a wonder-dale
It’s a scary ride we’d give anything to take
Let yourself bleed
Leave a footprint on every island you see

Hey you, child of rape, the riverbed awaits
Snow white, pitch-black, your life such strife
Heavenward, deep down, I’ll show you such sights
Believe it, we live as we dream, scream

He will go down he will drown drown, deeper down
The river wild will take your only child
He will go down he will drown drown deeper down
The mills grind slow in a riverbed ghost town
He will go down he will drown drown, deeper down
The river wild will take your only child
He will go down he will drown drown deeper down
The mills grind slow in a riverbed ghost town
He will go down he will drown drown, deeper down
If you want me, then do come across

What is it you dream of, child of mine?
The magic ride, the mermaid cove?
Never met a kinder heart than yours
Let it bleed
Leave a footprint on every island you see

I am the painted faces, the toxic kiss
Sowing of doubt, troll beneath the bridge
Come across
Death by a thousand cuts
Believe it, we live as we dream / scream

He will go down he will drown drown, deeper down
The river wild will take your only child
He will go down he will drown drown deeper down
The mills grind slow in a riverbed ghost town
He will go down he will drown drown, deeper down
The river wild will take your only child
He will go down he will drown drown deeper down
The mills grind slow in a riverbed ghost town
He will go down he will drown drown, deeper down
If you want me, do come across

I am the desert-scape, the sand inside your hourglass
I am the fear and abuse, the leper children
Every eye sewn shut

We will go down we will drown drown, deeper down
The river wild will be our last ride
We will go down we will drown drown, deeper down
The mills grind slow in a riverbed ghost town

Beautifully shy as you are
Never lose your heart
And do come across

#Spooktober 8 – Ghosts of Wales

It’s Sunday again, which means we take a look at a book on spooky stuff.

The Folklore of Wales: Ghosts by Delyth Badder and Mark Norman recently dropped in both paperback and digital edition, and it’s a delight to read. After an introduction, the book analyses the concept of unfinished business of lingering spirits and then proceeds to talk about different kinds of ghosts: those haunting the outdoors, spectral beasts, holy ghosts, poltergeists, water spirits, and ghouls, down to more specifically Welsh stuff like Ladi Wen, the woman in white commonly seen at Hollantide. The last chapter is dedicated to Death Omens.

And from that brook was heard an untimely roar, the lifeless huntsman would be calling his pack. The hounds of fell would howl in the dead of night, seeing some phantom shapes on the moor.

#Spooktober 7 – George Roux’s Spirit

Today we talk about this painting: drop by at my Patreon to take a look, if you can spare a dime!

#Spooktober 6 – Dragon Age’s Orphanage

I don’t like jump scares, as I already said, and this means that most of the horror videogames have me rolling my eyes. Every once in a while, however, a genuinely haunting piece of narration occurs and this often happens within a videogame of a different tone. Take the 2009 role-playing game Dragon Age: Origins, a masterpiece of storytelling and worldbuilding. It incorporates many elements of horror, from the darkspawn being some sort of zombie epidemic to the grey wardens who basically curse themselves to try and fight them, from the broodmothers that are the stuff of nightmares and that cheerful moment when you meet a dwarf who cursed her own companions into become broodmothers for the sake of war science. And how do you discover that? Through a poem repeated by her captain and lover, who lost her mind.

First day, they come and catch everyone.
Second day, they beat us and eat some for meat.
Third day, the men are all gnawed on again.
Fourth day, we wait and fear for our fate.
Fifth day, they return and it’s another girl’s turn.
Sixth day, her screams we hear in our dreams.
Seventh day, she grew as in her mouth they spew.
Eighth day, we hated as she is violated.
Ninth day, she grins and devours her kin.
Now she does feast, as she’s become the beast.
Now you lay and wait, for their screams will haunt you in your dreams.

The Abandoned Orphanage however wins in my personal top ten of creepy: children there were massacred during an elven riot in Denerim, but you’d be mistaken to think they have left the place. You explore the site with audio on, following screams and creepy laughter through the dim-lit rooms, and eventually discover that it’s even worse than you thought.

 

#Spooktober 5 – Penny Dreadful

One of my favourite tv shows when it comes to the Gothic, with a stunning Eva Green as the mysterious and haunted Vanessa Ives, and a hauntingly intense Rory Kinnear as the Frankenstein Monster (though he would resent the definition). Vanessa’s stance and demeanour has been greatly influential in shaping how the Lady of my novel walks and acts, especially when she calmly keeps walking around while her companions shoot vampires like there’s no tomorrow, and my favourite scene has to be when an otherworldly creature possesses her during a supposedly fake seance. You can see the cast and crew talking about the scene in the featured video.

#Spooktober 4 – Snow, Glass, Apples

Today’s feature is a comic books and as soon as I started thinking of a haunting graphic novel, browsing in my mind for something special to give you, this adaptation of a story by Neil Gaiman kept popping up in my mind, pressing for attention. So I had to give it to you. And though it might not seem very dark to you at first, I guarantee you it will haunt you for a very, very long time.

In his masterclass on writing (I published some notes for the folks in the Patreon middle tier a while ago), Neil Gaiman talks about this story when he talks about the writing process of starting from something known and looking at it with new eyes. So the question is: what kind of creature is white as snow, and can lie in a coffin for months without being really dead?
Yeah, you got it.

Take apart a story you’re familiar with, and inspect it new. See how it ticks, see what makes it work, look at the things that people take for granted. A lot of the time, if you look at something you’re very very familiar with, but just look at it as if it’s the first time… suddenly it can open up into a story… see where the bits are that don’t quite make sense. See where it could be completely reinvented. And then write your own take on it. Try and make people people.

Marvellously illustrated by Colleen Doran, this graphic novel retells the story of Snow White from the point of view of the “evil” stepmother, a woman who finds herself battling an impossible battle against the cursed offspring of her husband the king.