Showing posts with label angel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label angel. Show all posts

Sunday, July 4, 2021

Implications of Horror Fiction's Natural Antagonists

 Copyright 2021 by Gary L. Pullman

Bela Lugosi is Count Dracula. Source: Wikipedia.

In a previous post, we considered the ethical and metaphysical implications of supernatural villains. In this post, let's consider the implications of horror fiction's natural antagonists.

For those who subscribe to a metaphysical dualism, sources of evil are often divided into supernatural and natural. The latter are often animals or natural disasters. Since such entities and forces are not moral agents, they are not held responsible for the “evil” (destruction, injury, and death) they cause, so there is no ethical dimension to their behavior.

However, when a moral agent controls a natural force or being, a moral dimension does exist, but in regard to the human actors, since they, as moral agents, are responsible for the harm that they unleash through the agency of the natural forces or creatures they direct.

The creature from the Black Lagoon. Source: pri.org

Nevertheless, as anyone who has watched a movie such as King Kong (1933), The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954), or Jaws (1975) is aware, wild animals can cause great havoc.

In The Creature, during an expedition to the Amazon, geologists investigate the fossilized remains of an organism intermediate between Earth's marine and terrestrial life forms. Thereafter, the team leader recruits an ichthyologist to assist them, but when they return to their campsite, they discover that the other team members have been killed, supposedly by a jaguar. (In the leader's absence, a surviving member of the species represented by the fossilized remains, curious about the scientists' camp, visits the site, where, frightened by the researchers, it attacks and kills the victims.)

Kay Lawrence and the creature. Source: reddit.com

The expedition then visits the black lagoon at the end of a tributary. When one of their members, Kay Lawrence, goes swimming, she is stalked by the creature, who loses a claw after becoming entangled in one of the drag lines of the crew's ship. Subsequently, the creature kills other members of the expedition until, caught, it is caged aboard the ship.

Escaping, it kills several more of the scientists and captures Kay, taking her to its lair in a cavern. The remaining scientists track the creature, rescue Kay, and kill the monstrous “Gil-man,” shooting it repeatedly.

Although the monster commits several murders, kidnaps Kay, and terrorizes the scientific team, it acts in self-defense, rather than with hostile intent, in an effort to protect itself and, in the case of Kay, perhaps as the result of its seeking a mate.

At no point does the creature intentionally harm anyone, other than in defense of its own life, and its self-defensive behavior is prompted by its instinct for survival, just as its abduction of Kay is an effect of its mating instinct. There is no malice aforethought. The creature does not plan; it does not act with conscious and deliberate intent; and most of its behavior is reactive, rather than causative. Therefore, the creature is not a moral agent.

King Kong meets Ann Darrow. Source: basementrejects.com

King Kong and the great white shark of Jaws are, like the creature from the Black Lagoon, merely animals that react to threats to their lives or, perhaps, with respect to Kong, the mating instinct (although, in his case, this possibility seems a stretch, given his size respective to that of his captive, Ann Darrow; it may be that Kong carries her off simply because he has been conditioned to do so by the natives' periodic practice of offering him a human female sacrifice.)

Indeed, it is often the human characters in such films who cause the reactions of the animals they encounter, hunt, or harass, which, of course, makes the human characters, as moral agents, morally responsible for the resulting destruction, injuries, and deaths their own behavior toward the “antagonists” sets in motion.

God questions Job. Source: wondersforoyarsa.blogspot,com

In Judaeo-Christian-Christian theology, God is a moral agent because he holds Himself morally responsible for the acts he performs. Although his behavior may be mysterious, at times, to human beings, since they lack his omniscience, He declares Himself “righteous” and “without sin,” and holds human beings, his creatures, morally responsible for their lack of faith and trust in Him and His self-characterization, expecting them to trust that He is the perfect moral agent he declares himself to be. It is a sin for them to characterize him as other than he has revealed Himself to them to be. Angels are also moral agents, with free will; some, rebelling against God, were cast into hell; those who remained faithful to Him reside in heaven with Him, as his messengers and servants.

From a Judaeo-Christian perspective, other supernatural agents are either evil in themselves (demons, the “fallen angels” who rebelled against God) or evil because they participate in evil (unrepentant sinners) or allow themselves to be empowered by evil supernatural agents (witches, vampires, werewolves).

From this point of view of this religious tradition, therefore, moral agents can be either supernatural or natural, although, among the latter category of such agents, only human beings, not animals or forces of nature, can be so classified.

Thursday, January 2, 2014

"The Cabin in the Woods": A Review


Okay, Joss Whedon (Buffy, Angel, Firefly, Dollhouse) is the producer, and the film, The Cabin in the Woods, was scheduled to open on Friday the 13th. So far, so good. Moreover, the poster advertising the movie promises something different, a new twist, an unexpected spin on a familiar story: “You think you know the story.” But, of course, we don't know the story. We only think we do. Surprises—probably shocks, even—are in store. We've been warned.

The imagery suggests a mystery, too, or a difficult puzzle. The cabin floats (or falls) before an indistinct, rather sketchy forest, and, like a Rubik's Cube, it's turned this way and that. In fact, there are three cabins, none of which are actually in the forest (in the poster, at least), and they're stacked atop one another, the topmost right-side up, the middle one set on its side, the lower one upside down. We're disoriented; we're confused; we don't know which way is “up” (or “down” or “sideways,” for that matter). This movie's going to turn us every way but loose.

Those in the know know that Whedon is to movies what Dean Koontz is to novels: a genre bender who throws in a little of everything: comedy, tragedy, romance, adventure, mystery, horror, and the kitchen sink, and, from what reviewers have said about this film, Cabin in the Woods was meant to be no exception to the Whedon formula: it's satire; it's pastiche; it's filmed in Vancouver, of all places. According to the A. V. Club, the script, which took Whedon and co-writer Drew Goddard a whole three days to write, exhibits ”Whedon’s love of subverting clichés while embracing them and teasing out their deeper meaning,” if any. (The film was produced in only three months, too, by the way.) The authors themselves claim that their masterpiece is intended to “revitalize” the slasher film, a genre that so deserves such effort.

It cost about $30 million to make and grossed $65 million worldwide, so it's judged a “financial success.” Critical reviews were mixed, but generally favorable. It seems that the whole thing is a bit unnecessary, to say the least. Whedon has the talent to offer more—much more—than a revitalization of death warmed over.

Perhaps the best thing about the movie, though, is the poster that promoted it.

Thursday, December 29, 2011

G. K. Chesterton‘s “The Angry Street”: An Analysis

Copyright 2011 by Gary L. Pullman
What is an altar but a table made sacred by convention and design?
The first-person narrator begins his story with a surprising statement: he is unable, he says, to recall “whether this tale is true or not”; he follows it with an even more remarkable declaration, stating that he believes that the incidents that he is about to commit to paper “happened to me before I was born.”

Having captured his readers’ attention with these statements, he next begins to relate the narrative proper, hinting at the fact that it involves “atmosphere.” A number of men, all of whom are in a hurry, are seated at lunch, each with one eye upon the clock. The narrator is among them, and, into their company enters another who is dressed as they are, in gentleman’s attire, but who, unlike the others, shows a reverence for the things about him, including his “long frock coat,” his top hat, the peg upon which he hangs his hat, “the wooden chair” in which he sits and the table at which he sits. As soon as he is seated across from the narrator, he begins a “monologue.” At first, the narrator considers him “ordinary,” but is soon disturbed by the other’s gaze, which he describes as that “of a maniac.”

The odd man’s odd manner and the odd thing that he next says continue to intrigue readers. “I thought,” he says, “that another of them had gone wrong,” by which, he clarifies, he means another street. For over forty years, he explains, he has traveled the same street, walking it in the same manner. It is not a long street, he observes; walking it takes him no more than “four and a half minutes.” However, he recently took his usual stroll and found it to be not only tiring but also to have taken him longer. The street also climbed a hill, which it had never done before. The curious gentleman guessed that he had perhaps “turned down the wrong” street, despite the many years during which he has made the same journey “like clockwork.” However, as he continued his walk, it became clear to him, by the landmarks he passed, that the street was, in fact, the one that he customarily traveled. As he continued his walk, the street, instead of turning, as it had always done before, veered steeply, “straight in front of” his “face,” ascending a sharp, long upward slope that caused him to nearly fall “on the pavement.” The street, he found, had “lifted itself like a single wave, and yet every speck and detail of it was the same.” At the very summit of the street, he was able to see the “name over” his “paper shop,” as if the sign were atop “an Alpine pass.”

Quite perplexed and more than a little frightened, the pedestrian was even more astonished when, peering through “the iron trap of a coal-hole” in the street, which had now assumed the aspect of “a long iron bridge into empty space,” he “saw empty space and the stars.” When he looked up again, he saw another man, who was “leaning over the railings,” staring at the hiker, to whom the man seemed to be “not of this world,” despite his “dark and ordinary” attire and the pedestrian’s sense that he had just come out of one of the “grey row of private houses” along the “nightmare road.” The sense of the stranger’s otherworldliness is intensified by the “stars behind his head,” which appear “larger and fiercer than ought to be endured by the eyes of men.”

Calling upon the stranger, whom the traveler supposes may be either an “kind angel” of a “wise devil,” to tell him what has become of the street, which, he identifies as “Bumpton Street, which “goes to Oldgate Station.” The stranger’s reply is bizarre (and, therefore, intriguing to the story’s readers): “It goes there sometimes, Just now, however, it is going to heaven” to seek justice for the traveler’s mistreatment of it. The neglect, the stranger informs the pedestrian, lies in the traveler’s ignoring of the street that he has used (and taken for granted) for over forty years: the street, he says, “has grown tired” of the traveler’s “insolence, and it is bucking and rearing its head toward heaven.”

The pedestrian expresses his opinion that the stranger’s talk is mad; it is “nonsense,” he argues, to imagine that a street should be offended or that it should go anywhere other than where it has always led before. To the stranger’s question as to whether the traveler has ever wondered whether the street has taken him for granted, supposing him to be a non-living thing among things, the traveler has no answer. However, he confides to the story’s narrator that he has “since. . . respected the things called inanimate!” and he bows “slightly to the mustard-pot” as he takes his leave of the restaurant.

This is a short-short story. It is an odd one, certainly, as well. Among younger readers, it is apt to seem not only strange but also absurd. Some older readers, however, will comprehend the story’s theme. Because they are created by men and women, objects of art and craft are, as artifacts of design and manufacture, each with an aesthetic or a utilitarian purpose, are invested with a significance beyond their importance as mere products of technology; they are imbued with the spirit of their manufacturers. They are humanized by virtue of the fact that they are made by men and women. In that sense, they have “souls,” a point that Chesterton makes in his essay “A Piece of Chalk” as well as in this story.

If one considers a coat, a hat, a chair, a table, a mustard-pot, or a street not as a simple coat or hat, table or chair, or mustard-pot, but as an artifact designed for service or aesthetic enrichment and as a work into which a man or a woman has poured not only his or her art and craft, knowledge and skill, experience and passion, as if he or she were fashioning a gift to others as well as an expression of his or her own heart, such seemingly commonplace objects would be regarded with the respect--indeed, the reverence--that the “kind angel” or “;wise demon” suggests that they should be accorded, rather than being taken for granted and ignored.

Were the things that people make for themselves and others rightly regarded, Chesterton suggests, in “A Piece of Chalk,” it would be possible to write a book of poetry, of epic length and grandeur, about the things that one finds in his pocket or her purse. This story, absurd on its face, uses the absurdity that it generates to skew everyday reality, as represented by the street and by the restaurant and the things that each contains, so that these ordinary, everyday places and objects take on strange appearances and become, as it were, visible to readers who, in the course of their own everyday lives, are apt to dismiss their surroundings and to take things for granted much as the pedestrian in “The Angry Street” does.

By making the ordinary appear, for a moment, extraordinary, Chesterton helps his readers to see the extraordinary quality and value of the ordinary and the remarkable nature of the commonplace. Such is no mean feat, and Chesterton’s accomplishment of it in “The Mean Street” makes this story remarkable, indeed.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

The Horror Writer's Muse: A Cautionary Tale

Copyright 2011 by Gary L. Pullman


Shadows crawl across my wall,
Dark remnants of Eden’s fall,
Due to Adam’s sin; again,
My brain reels in garish pain;
I rise, eyes fixed on nothing,
Put pen to paper to sing,
In poetry, my memory
Of primordial, eerie
Things, which, both fanged and clawed,
Squirm and writhe upon my wall. . . .


Our ancestors, daughters of men
And sons of angels fallen,
Produce monsters such as Grendel,
Brute minions, all, of deepest hell;
Some beauteous of face and form,
Others of aspect like the worm,
And others still of shadowy
Appearance, but strange and eerie,
Whose task is mine to give full voice,
Not that vile Satan may rejoice,
But that all the sons and daughters
Of ancient Cain who do yet stir
May be heard--and thus evaded--
By the living who are not dead
To the antediluvian
Origins of death and sin,
Mystery of iniquity
That, like a spider on a wall,
Crawls across us, one and all,
Leaving, in its wake, gossamer
Threads of desire, dark and deep,
Our hearts and souls to keep.


“Out, out, damned spot!” the Lady said,
Unaware that she was dead;
Shadow, spider, and spot alike
Are but mute brutes whose terrors strike
From within, their banshee’s voice
An echo of an ancient choice
As much our own as our heartbeat,
From which there is no retreat
But to return, a prodigal
Son, who once was hell’s spawn and thrall,
A shadow writhing on a wall,
As are, or once were, each and all.


(The next time you see a shadow,
Ask not, as Plato did, to see
Its form, for that which slithers forth
from Below had an evil birth,
taking shape from iniquity!)

Monday, March 28, 2011

Redemption, Vengeance, Love, Hatred--Call It What You Will, It's Still Free Will

Copyright 2011 by Gary L. Pullman


Unlike animal behavior, human conduct is motivated (at times, at least). There is a reason for what people do or refrain from doing. The motives may be good or not so good, selfless or selfish, beneficial or harmful to ourselves or others.

To motivate a character, a writer (and, indeed, a director and an actor) needs to know not only what makes people tick in general but also something about the character he or she is depicting or portraying. For writers, such understanding is enhanced by knowing the character’s past, or back story. What happened in the past influences who we are and what we do in the present.


Like any other qualitative television series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer delves into its characters’ pasts, depicting their back stories so that viewers can get to know and understand these characters as well as their creators do. In the process, fans learn what makes Buffy Summers tick; why Rupert Giles is (at first, anyway) a stodgy, all-work, no-play kind of guy; what happens in Xander Harris’ home life to make him the clowning, but loyal, friend; the reason for Willow Rosenberg’s geeky, shy vulnerability; and why Cordelia Chase is snobby and sarcastic but, at the same time, has “layers” to her personality.

Some of the series’ characters seek redemption: Giles, for an irresponsible youth that included practicing dark magic that led to a friend’s death at the hands of a demon that he helped to summon; Angel, for the misery, suffering, and pain he caused his many victims when he was a soulless, bloodsucking creature of the night; Jenny Calendar for her betrayal of Giles, Buffy, and Angel.

Others are motivated by their desire to live normal lives, including their attempts to fit into the larger world and to be popular with their peers (Buffy, Xander, Willow, and, each in her own way, Cordelia Chase and Anya Jenkins).

Still others--and, sometimes, the same characters, at different times--are motivated by a desire for revenge: Buffy, Angel, Jenny, and Willow.

Spike is often motivated by either hatred or love, or, sometimes by both, for the same character, at different times (Drusilla and Buffy, for example), but he is also energized, at times, by vengeance, boredom, loneliness, or sheer mischievousness. More than any other character, except perhaps Giles’ childhood chum, Ethan Rayne, Spike is the show’s trickster.

Buffy is a show that, although its writers recognize genetic inheritance as a factor in human behavior, also insists, rather passionately, that human conduct stems, more often than not, primarily from characters’ exercise of free will. They are what they do; they do what they are, but they both are and do, more often than not, because of the choices they make. They elect to take this action or that or to refrain from doing one thing or another. In the process, from the raw material, so to speak, of their genetic inheritance, they create themselves. Their choices are what make them realistic, believable, likable, or hateful characters, despite the fantastic nature of the series itself.

Buffy is by no means perfect; especially after season five, it is easy to detect flaws, both minor and significant, but the series remains, although uneven, worthwhile television, and its creator and its talented stable of writers have much to teach other writers about how to create complex, dynamic, and intriguing characters whose actions stem from moral conflicts, existential problems, the conduct of others, the social demands upon them, their own natural abilities and weaknesses, and, most of all, their own free will.

Thursday, July 1, 2010

How to Haunt a House, Part VIII

Copyright 2010 by Gary L. Pullman


In previous posts, I have presented ideas concerning how to haunt a house, but I haven’t offered any ideas about residential nooks and crannies--the furniture, utilities, and décor.

Films and novels do include references to and depictions or descriptions of such items among their catalogues of haunted objects. So can you.

For example, in A Nightmare on Elm Street, the stairs down which Nancy Thompson flees from Freddy Krueger turn to goop, retarding the protagonist’s progress, just as might happen during a bad dream.

In The Others, ghost children occupy a bed that the boy, Victor, who lives in the house, claims is his; a piano seems to play of its own accord; and curtains appear to tear themselves from windows throughout the house. (In reality, the apparent ghosts are the house’s flesh-and-blood residents and the apparent flesh-and-blood residents are the actual ghosts, so the ghosts occupy the bed, but the human residents play the piano and remove the curtains.)

An episode of the Angel television series offers an interesting take on the folklore that holds that vampires have no reflection. Cordelia Chase’s knowledge of this “fact” alerts her to the fact that her date is a vampire as she realizes that there are no mirrors in his house. Although vampires aren’t ghosts, this incident does apply a supernatural quality to a commonplace household item.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman manages to write an entire, brilliant horror story concerning yellow wallpaper that may or may not be more than it appears to be. Her protagonist, however, is haunted by her own incipient madness, rather than by a ghost as such.

Stephen King’s novel It includes a boy’s terrifying journey into his house’s basement, to tend to the ravenous furnace that glows as if it were burning with hellfire rather than with coals.

One story--the title of which I have forgotten--shows (or perhaps describes) a portrait in which one of the family members stares in stark terror while everyone else in the photograph looks calm and composed. King’s The Shining features a lobby gallery of ghosts, but this scene doesn’t really count for our purposes, since the story is set in a hotel rather than in a house per se.

A few years ago, a newspaper featured an article concerning a house in Chicago which was allegedly haunted. Fire was said to shoot forth a good three feet from wall sockets. The house succumbed, alas, to a bulldozer when it was later razed.

In my own novel, Mystic Mansion, windowpanes rebound like miniature horizontal trampolines; carpet rears, rolls, and crashes like surf; and books in the library take flight, their covers flapping as if they were wings.

Think of the furniture, utilities, appliances, and décor in the average house and what could go “wrong” with it--not merely in an electrical or a mechanical, but in a paranormal o supernatural, way--and you have the raw material for a haunting or, at least, many possibilities for enhancing and complementing the more fundamental trappings of the haunted house.

Imagine a clock running backward or striking thirteen hours! Or a flight of stairs converting themselves instantly into a steep ramp. Or the hideous gargoyle lamp that a character’s mother-in-law gave a couple for their previous anniversary coming to life to attack the wife who stole a mother’s son from her.

The possibilities are virtually endless, and, best of all, new furnishings, appliances, and décor can be added as needed to freshen the horrific effects throughout the course of the story.

Remember the haunted mask that Joyce Summers hung upon her bedroom wall, the one that summoned demons and zombies. . . .


Note: Mystic Mansion is available at Amazon.com or Lulu.

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Imagining Hell

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman


The Christian Hell is named for the Norse goddess who ruled the Aesir’s underworld, Hel. The ancient Israelites did not have a hell in the sense that their underworld, Sheol, was a place of eternal punishment. Sheol was much more like the ancient Greeks’ Hades or, for that matter, the Norsemen’s Hel, a place of shadowy existence wherein ghostly “shades” went about the business of postmortem existence. Dante imagined his own hell, in The Inferno, and, for the atheistic French existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre, hell was “other people.” Perhaps the closest place to hell in the modern world is prison--or, possibly, Detroit, Michigan. (Michael Moore would have us think hell on earth is neighboring Flint.)

Hell is the garbage dump of eternity. It’s a cosmic prison. It’s the place of “wailing” and the “gnashing of teeth,” wherein the “fire is not quenched” and the “worm dieth not.” It’s the place that Mark Twain would go for “company,” preferring heaven for its “scenery.” For some, hell is a state of mind or a state of the soul, the opposite of the “kingdom of heaven,” which Jesus said “is within you.”

If anyone should be able to imagine hell, it is the writer of horror fiction. How to begin such a--well, hellish--task? Picture the condemned, which is to say, the types of individuals whose lifestyles or behaviors seem to warrant condemnation, banishment, and/or punishment, not just for a day, but for all eternity. Characterize them. What are the attributes of their personalities? What attitudes do they express? What do they believe? What do they imagine? What do they fear? What hopes, if any, do they have? What do they love, better than God or mankind--in other words, what idol do they worship? What is their besetting sin, and what lesser, but related, sins are associated with it, and why? What do they do all day?

Having imagined the denizens of your hell, picture the lay of the land, or “scenery,” that would be appropriate for such residents. Are there mountains and valleys, molten seas, volcanoes in endless eruption, frozen wastelands, deserts, underworlds within--or below--underworlds? Is your hell multileveled like Dante’s Inferno? Perhaps your hell is unlike anything familiar to mortal men and women, something like, but unlike, the mystical worlds of Marvel Comics’ Dr. Strange?

When you’ve finished peopling and landscaping your inferno, ask yourself what symbolic significance the landscape’s features have. In doing so, you might ask yourself what the images of the Christian hell represent figuratively. What is the symbolic significance of the “fire [that] is not quenched” and the “worm [that] dieth not”? Apply the same process of analysis and interpretation to the images of your own hell.

Remember this, too: now that you’ve gone to all the time and trouble of imagining a hell of your own, your stories may sometimes take place in this infernal abode, or its residents may occasionally escape and visit the world of humanity. Angels, by definition, are, after all, messengers of God, and, in the Bible, even “fallen angels,“ or demons, do sometimes visit--and afflict--ordinary men and women and, if The Exorcist is any guide to infernal behavior, children, too. Their chief, Satan, had the audacity to tempt even Christ! What “message” might one of your accursed bring to one or more of your story’s characters?

In another application of your hell, the residents may be seen as “inner,” rather than as outer demons--as psychological defects and disorders, or diseased elements of the soul, with lives of their own, so to speak, along the lines of BTK’s “Factor X” or Ted Bundy’s “entity.” Of course, they may also be both inner and outer demons, as any particular story’s plot dictates. By imagining a hell of your own, you will be more apt to put your own spin on the action you narrate, making an original contribution, perhaps, to the iconography of the damned and offer a few new insights into the hellish behavior of the demonic soul.

For those who are interested in more information about hell, “Hell in the Old Testament” offers quite a bit.

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Leftover Plots, Part III

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman
 
As a result of considering “leftover plots” or plot-seeds or springboards or whatever we choose to call narrative motifs that occur in the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, we identified several additional storylines that could have been used in the series or (better yet, for us) that we ourselves, with some revision regarding characters, setting, and other narrative elements, could employ to write horror stories (or even novels) ourselves:
  • An imprisoned character can escape, causing more mischief or even a little death and destruction before being killed or imprisoned again.
  • Things that give rise to new organisms or liberate forces or entities, such as eggs, seeds, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, melting icebergs, shifting tectonic plates, earthbound meteors, and the like, can introduce new characters, including such worthy adversaries as hideous, horrible monsters.
  • Problematic characters, such as a naïve, incompetent, or foolish follower or sidekick can create havoc and endanger lives.
  • Physical objects, or artifacts, can function as inciting moments that spark a chain of narrative incidents, setting the rest of the story in motion.
We also learned some important factual matters pertaining to this technique:
  • Ideas cannot be copyrighted, so they are fair game as inspirations for plots.
  • The specific and unique ways in which ideas are developed can be, and often are, copyrighted. Using the characters, settings, and other elements of such treatments could constitute plagiarism and/or copyright infringement.
  • Ideas must be given an original treatment in which characters, settings, and other elements are new, not derivative.
We learned, further, in the second post in this series, that several Buffy plots deal with xenophobia, or the fear of strangers and that, to enhance the mystique of the stranger, the series’ writers used such techniques--okay, they can be called “tricks,” if one prefers to think of them in this way--as these:
  • A possible threat. (Is the mysterious Angel stalking Buffy?)
  • Romantic intrigue AND star-crossed love. (Buffy no sooner meets Angel than they’ve become a couple, but, since he is, as she soon learns, a vampire, and she’s the slayer, theirs will be star-crossed, to say the least.)
  • Juxtapositions. The past (as represented by print-bound books) and the present (as represented by computers and cyberspace) meet, and they don’t get along all that well. Good (Buffy) and evil (Angel and the other vampires) represent two moral extremes. The natural, everyday world of Sunnydale and its citizens’ mundane lives are set against the supernatural world of their vampire foes. Life, as it is lived by Buffy and her friends, is contrasted with the life-in-death state in which the vampires exist, a hedonistic world of the senses and of passions that are cut off from such roots as love and compassion.
  • Similarity of themes. Buffy often explores a theme from several perspectives. For example, Willow, whose love for Xander remains unrequited because of his love for Buffy, which is also unrequited because Buffy loves Angel, leaves Willow lonely, as does Marcie’s neglect by her peers. In each instance, the characters’ loneliness leads them to foolish actions. In Willow’s case, she is saved by her friends, to whose circle she returns. Marcie, having no friends, becomes a ward of the state, so to speak, after Buffy rescues Cordelia and defeats Marcie. Although it may not cure one’s loneliness altogether, friendship, such thematic treatments suggest, is the tie that not only binds but also saves one from a perfunctory, institutional existence as a ward of, and a servant to, the state.
  • Animation of inanimate objects. This is a motif that is popular in fantasy fiction, including the horror and the science fiction genres. The animation of inanimate objects, whether through magical or technological means, is a subtype of the artifact plot device, in which an object, whether a ring (Lord of the Rings), a crystal (The Dark Crystal), or even a spaceship (Rendezvous with Rama) or some other object is the artifact.
  • Trauma’s consequences. As child abuse, spousal abuse, torture, combat and other mistreatment or crisis situations have shown, trauma has long-, if not life-long, consequences and can cause recurring nightmares, acts of violence, and other disturbed behavior.
  • Duty’s duty. Blaise Pascal wrote, “The heart has reasons which reason does not know.” So has duty. Even when there is no logically defensible reason to do so, the claim of duty often holds, especially when altruism, or even self-sacrifice, are directed at protecting others, more helpless than oneself, about whom one cares. Buffy dies that others may live, and, in doing so, she underscores the supreme values of brotherly love, courage, and that pesky pest, duty.

In this post, we’re going to consider how strong supporting characters can suggest plots that could be developed further in additional stories, or, in the case of Angel, even an entire additional series of stories.

One of the many strengths of the Buffy series is its writers’ development of strong characters who are not only individualized and sympathetic, but who also seem like actual people instead of merely a collection of so many personality traits that behave in a predictable fashion. These characters are springboards to action and, since many recur (and others could recur) in later episodes, they represent springboards (or possible springboards) to additional plots.

Angel, who is also known (particularly when he’s in his evil-vampire, as opposed to his vampire-with-a-soul mode) as Angelus, is a strong character because he suffers and because he switches back and forth between his evil-vampire and his vampire-with-a-soul modes, thereby complexifying both the series’ action and his relationships with other characters, especially Buffy. A lazy and irresponsible youth, Angel wants to see the world, and when a beautiful young noblewoman offers him the opportunity to do so, he accepts, whereupon, transforming into a vampire, she bites him, sucking his blood before, cutting herself across the breast, she shares her own vital fluid with him. He becomes a vampire, losing his soul. With no conscience to inhibit his actions, he kills his parents and his younger sister before psychologically tormenting a young woman named Drusilla by killing her family and, on the night she’s to take vows to become a nun, transforming her into one of the undead, causing her, at last, to lose her sanity as well as her soul. As Angel tells Buffy, for over two hundred years, he has committed one terrible deed after another, “with a song in my heart.” To punish him for killing one of their daughters, a gypsy tribe’s sorceress curses Angel by restoring his soul, and he feels tremendous remorse for the many unconscionable deeds he’s committed. He also falls in love with Buffy. Because of this love, and because he hopes to redeem himself, Angel assists her in defeating demons, vampires, and the other creatures of darkness who come crawling out of the Hellmouth each week. However, the curse is later lifted (before being restored), so that he goes back and forth between good and evil, now a friend, now an enemy, who is both a blessing and a curse to Buffy and her friends, reaching a low point in his murder of Buffy’s mentor’s girlfriend, Jenny Calendar. Angel was such a rich and complex character that he became the protagonist on his own series, Angel, in a spin off from Buffy.

Beautiful Cordelia Chase is the snobby rich girl and a natural foil to Buffy. Concerned, always, with image and the latest fashion, Cordelia appears shallow and facile, but, like the other characters in the series, she turns out to be full of surprises. Initially, she detests Xander Harris, a member of Buffy’s circle of friends, as a gauche, unsophisticated zero. Despite his good looks, hilarious sense of humor, and fearlessness, Cordelia avoids him like the plague, not wanting to be seen in his presence. When, stalked by an assassin with supernatural powers, they are trapped in Buffy’s basement, facing a common threat, and their apparent mutual hatred is revealed to mask a reciprocal attraction, as yet another argument between them ends in a passionate kiss that ignites a sizzling relationship--at least until Xander cozies up to Willow Rosenberg. Cordelia is not an entirely sympathetic character, but, because of her audacious arrogance, her spunk, her sarcastic sense of humor, her extreme sense of entitlement, and her in-your-face narcissism, she’s a character whom viewers loved to hate. Later, after her father is imprisoned for income tax evasion, leaving his family much less well off financially, and Cordelia is reduced to working for her spending money, her character softens, and she becomes more likeable. Although she isn’t a sympathetic enough character, even then, to carry her own series, she does leave Sunnydale, moving to Los Angeles, to seek an acting career in order to be a supporting character in the new Angel series.

Willow, Buffy’s confidante, is a witch whose powers develop over the span of the Buffy series until, in the fifth season, she has become a force with which to be reckoned. A shy, retiring, somewhat naive wallflower early in the series, she has a crush on Xander (who has a yen for Buffy, who likes Angel). Later, she discovers that she prefers her own sex and has a relationship with Tara Maclay that ends when Tara is killed by Buffy’s enemies. Thereafter, Willow has a relationship with a “potential slayer,” Kennedy. Between lesbian lovers, Willow has a relationship with Oz, a guitarist in a local band, Dingoes Ate My Baby, who becomes a werewolf when his infant werewolf cousin, Jordy, bites him. Unable to control his transformation, and fearing for Willow’s safety, Oz leaves Sunnydale to seek a cure for his condition. In his absence, Willow, now enrolled in college, meets Tara, discovering her lesbian proclivities. Willow, a sweet personality, is also a rich, complex character and, because of her witchcraft, could have been successful as a protagonist of her own series, were Charmed, a series about young adult witches not already on the air.

Even Buffy’s mentor, the Watcher Rupert Giles, is (or was, at one time) to receive a series of his own, possibly to be called Ripper. (The status of the show is unclear at the moment.) Dressed in button-down shirts, subdued neckties, and three-piece tweed suits, complete with handkerchief, wearing glasses, and taking tea in his office, the Sunnydale High School librarian (formerly of the British Museum), Giles is the stereotypical stoic, stiff-upper-lip, repressed Englishman--or so, at first, he appears. However, like most of the characters in Buffy, he has a complex back story that adds shades and nuances to his inner self. As a defiant and rebellious youth, Giles resisted his calling to become a member of the Watchers’ Council, which identifies, trains, counsels, and otherwise mentors slayers. As a university student, Giles became a warlock, joining a group of sorcerers (much as Willow, in college, joined a coven). They performed a ritual to summons a demon, which appeared, and has been stalking them, individually, ever since, killing them one by one. Giles blames himself for the deaths. It was partly as a result of the guilt he feels that he accepted his responsibilities as a Watcher, becoming Buffy’s mentor. After the Buffy series ended, its creator, Joss Whedon, spoke with the actor, Anthony Stewart Head, who played Giles, about reprising his role, but as a Watcher, but one who is now semi-retired, living again in England, and investigates paranormal and supernatural incidents. The series’ theme, Whedon said, would be loneliness, exploring how a man alone copes with life on his own. At present, the projected story is said to be still a possibility, although as a motion picture, rather than as a television series, to be aired on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).

One more example suggests, again, how characters who are given a rich back story, solid development, and sophisticated treatment can be used to initiate, sustain, and further develop plots in an ongoing series of stories. In “Lie To Me,” an insecure, rather pitiful, young blonde who survives by becoming a hanger-on of others who appear, at least, to be abler than she is of meeting life’s responsibilities and challenges, joins a cult of wannabe vampires, calling herself, in this, her latest incarnation, Chanterelle. Buffy arrives to save the cult from becoming the feeding ground of real vampires, led by Spike, and Chanterelle shows up again in “Anne,” having moved to Los Angeles, where she is going by the name of Lily and is dating a young man named Ricky. Buffy has moved to Los Angeles after running away from home in Sunnydale, unable to cope with having to send Angel to hell. Despite having renounced her role as the slayer, Buffy assists Lily in trying to find Ricky, and, when Buffy’s life is endangered, Lily foregoes her milquetoast manner to shove a demon off a platform and save the day (and Buffy), thereby gaining autonomy and a modicum of confidence. Before returning to Sunnydale, Buffy allows Lily to take on another name--Buffy’s middle name, Anne--and lets her stay in the motel room that Buffy had rented for another few weeks. Chanterelle-Lily-Anne never appears in another Buffy episode, but she could have, had she returned to Sunnydale or Buffy visited Los Angeles again. Therefore, like many of the other characters in the series, Anne represents what could have been a catalyst for another Buffy plot.

A problem that many viewers and critics have concerning the series is that, despite the richness and complexity of many--even most--of its characters, the writers, particularly under the supervision of Marti Noxon, tended to become too melodramatic and to forego interesting and believable (within the terms of the show’s own mythos) dramatic situations and character development in favor of cheap, maudlin characterization and dramatic spectacle--in other words, to take the easy way out rather than to go for the throat. There’s no question that the series suffered after its third season, going steadily downhill thereafter, until its seventh and final year, when even many of its diehard fans had given up on the show. If there’s a lesson to be learned from this, it’s to always strive for the gold, never settling for just something--anything--to fill the airwaves. Unfortunately, under the inept direction of Noxon, who seems to be more a craftsman than an artist, well versed in all things metaphorical, symbolic, and tawdry without having a clearly defined idea of drama or even the simplest notions of what really makes people tick, the show suffered a long, slow, and painful demise when it could have ended on the same note of astonishment and success on which it started and which it maintained, more or less consistently, until Whedon made the fatal error of turning the show’s reins over to an unaccomplished horsewoman. Part of a storyteller’s art is knowing how much is enough and when to quit. (In fairness to Noxon, she is the author of some of the better episodes in the series. She is a better writer than she is a producer and, as such, another indication of the truth of the Peter Principle.)

Note: One of the intriguing things about Buffy is that many of its characters were recurring, if not regular, members of the cast. Some started out with small parts which developed into larger roles. Others, such as Amy Madison, and Giles’ fellow warlock from his college days, Ethan Rayne, remained fairly static, but reappeared when the plot required someone to get the narrative ball rolling. Indeed, several of the show’s female characters were played by actresses who’d auditioned for the part of the show’s protagonist but were not selected: Amy Madison (Elizabeth Anne Allen), Darla (Julie Benz), and Cordelia Chase (Charisma Carpenter), and Danny Strong, who tried out for the role of Xander received the recurring role of Jonathan. Whedon made the most of all the actors’ talents, assigning lesser, but significant, parts to those who didn’t make the cut for the series’ main character or major supporting characters, thereby capitalizing upon the strong acting abilities of the runners-up, which isn’t often the case in television. As a result, lesser characters were played by skillful actors whose abilities were already known as a result of their having auditioned for other roles. Having considered only a few of the lessons to be learned from a consideration of Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes, we’ll revisit the topic of “Leftover Plots” in future installments.

Sunday, March 16, 2008

A Dictionary of the Paranormal, the Supernatural, and the Otherworldly (A - C)

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman


Note: Unless otherwise noted, definitions are courtesy of dictionary.die.net, an Internet dictionary in the public domain.


A



The Alchemist

Abracadabra--A mystical word or collocation of letters. . . . worn on an amulet. It was supposed to ward off fever. At present the word is used chiefly in jest to denote something without meaning; jargon.

Abominable Snowman (Bigfoot, Sasquatch, Yeti)--a large hairy humanoid creature said to live in the Himalayas.

Acupuncture--The insertion of needles into the living tissues for remedial purposes.

Ad hoc hypothesis--an interpretation of facts that explains away evidence that contradicts a favored idea or belief (the author).

Akashic record--a spiritual or incorporeal plane upon which all knowledge is stored (the author).

Alchemy--An imaginary art which aimed to transmute the baser metals into gold, to find the panacea, or universal remedy for diseases, etc. It led the way to modern chemistry.
Alien (Extraterrestrial Biological Entities, EBEs)--a form of life assumed to exist outside the Earth or its atmosphere.

Allopathy--That system of medical practice which aims to combat disease by the use of remedies which produce effects different from those produced by the special disease treated; -- a term invented by Hahnemann to designate the ordinary practice, as opposed to homeopathy.

Alpha wave--the normal brainwave in the electroencephalogram of a person who is awake but relaxed; occurs with a frequency of 8-12 hertz.

Altered state of consciousness--a trance or trance-like state of mind (the author)

Amityville (New York) haunting--a hoax; the Lutz family, owners of a Dutch Colonial house in Amityville, NY, claimed their residence was haunted; prior to their purchase and residence in the house, Ronald DeFeo, Jr., killed six of his family members in the same house (the author).

Amulet--An ornament, gem, or scroll, or a package containing a relic, etc., worn as a charm or preservative against evils or mischief, such as diseases and witchcraft, and generally inscribed with mystic forms or characters.

Angel--spiritual being attendant upon God.

Animal ghost--the ghost of an animal.

Animism--the doctrine that all natural objects and the universe itself have souls.

Anomaly--deviation from the normal or common order or form or rule.

Appeal to authority fallacy: the idea or belief that the credibility or authority of an expert is sufficient cause to accept the claims of an argument (the author).

Apollo--Greek god of light; god of prophesy and poetry and music and healing; son of Zeus and Leto; twin brother of Artemis.

Apparition--the appearance of a ghostlike figure.

Apport--the transference of an article from an unknown source, to you, or another place by unknown means (Wikipedia).

Argo--The name of the ship which carried Jason and his fifty-four companions to Colchis, in quest of the Golden Fleece.

Argonaut--one of the heroes who sailed with Jason on the Argo in search of the Golden Fleece

Argument from design (teleological argument)--the argument that the order the universe and the inetraction of its myriad parts necessitates the belief in God as a ominscient and omnipotent designer (the author).

Argument from incredulity--see "Divine fallacy."

Artemis--the virgin goddess of the hunt and the moon; daughter of Leto and twin sister of Apollo; identified with Roman Diana.

Astarte--a Phoenician goddess; counterpart of Ashtoreth and Ishtar.

Astral plane--an otherworldly plane of existence or one in a parallel dimension (the author).

Astral projection--the spiritual body’s travel from the physical body (the author).

Astronauts, ancient--extraterrestrial visitors to earth (sometimes mistaken for gods) during prehistoric times to manipulate or control human evolution or culture (the author).

Aura--a distinctive but intangible quality surrounding a person or thing.

Aural hallucination--hearing things (that aren’t there) (the author).

Autism--an abnormal absorption with the self; marked by communication disorders and short attention span and inability to treat others as people.

Autokinetic effect--the apparent movement of a stationary light in an otherwise dark environment (the author).

Automatic writing--writing produced without conscious thought; often considered a means of channeling (the author).

B

Baal--any of numerous local fertility and nature deities worshipped by ancient Semitic peoples; the Hebrews considered Baal a false god.

Backward Satanic messages--supposedly diabolical communications created by backmasking (the author).

Ball lightning


Ball lightning--a rare form of lightning sometimes seen as a globe of fire moving from the clouds to the earth.

Banshee--In Irish folklore, a female spirit who wails to warn of impending death.

Begging the question--circular reasoning (the author).

“Believe It Or Not” strip--a comic strip in which the artist-writer Robert Ripley recounted strange and mysterious incidents and recorded odd facts and trivia.

Benzene molecule--a ring-shaped chemical molecule the structure of which was perceived by Friedrich August Kekulé, a German chemist, during a dream in which he saw a snake biting its own tail (the author),

Bermuda Triangle--an area in the western Atlantic Ocean where many ships and planes are spposed to have been mysteriously lost.

Bible Code--information patterns said to exist in encrypted or coded form in the text of the Bible, or, more specifically, in the Hebrew Torah, the first five books of Old Testament (Wikipedia).

Biorhythm--a hypothetical cycle in physiological, emotional, or intellectual well-being or prowess (Wikipedia).

Blavatsky, Madame Helene Petrovna--founder of the Theosophy Society (the author).

Book of shadows--a witch's personal collection of spells and incantations (the author).

Brainwashing--forcible indoctrination into a new set of attitudes and beliefs.

C

Cardiff giant--a hoax perpetuated by P. T. Barnum in which it was claimed that a giant “petrified man” had been dug up on Cardiff, NY, by laborers digging a well (the author); this alleged giant is the basis of “A Ghost Story” by Mark Twain (the author).

Cartomancy--the art of telling fortunes with cards.

Castenada, Carlos--a Peruvian mystic (the author).

Cayce, Edgar--an American psychic who claimed to channel messages from the dead concerning health, reincarnation, Atlantis, and other matters (the author).

Cattle mutilation--the evisceration of cattle, often on isolated farms, allegedly by extraterrestrials, presumably for research purposes (the author).

Celestine Prophecy--a 1993 novel by James Redfield which discusses various psychological and spiritual ideas which are rooted in many ancient Eastern Traditions (Wikipedia) .

Centaur--a mythical being that is half man and half horse.

Cerberus--three-headed dog guarding the entrance to Hades; son of Typhon.

Chakra--a anatomical energy center (the author).

Channeling--opening oneself as a medium for the receipt of messages from spirits, often during séances (the author).

Chariot of the Gods--book by Erich von Daniken in which the author claims ancient humans were visited by extraterrestrial beings (ancient astronauts) (the author).

Chemtrail--gaseous trails released by aircraft; they are believed to consist of dangerous, but unidentified, chemicals sprayed by the government as part of a nationwide (possibly worldwide) clandestine mission (the author).

Chiropractic--a method of treatment that manipulates body structures (especially the spine) to relieve low back pain or even headache or high blood pressure.

Chopra, Deepak--Indian mystic and author who influenced the New Thought movement in America and elsewhere (the author).

Christ, foreskin of--a holy relic.

Chupacabra--a legendary beast that roams North, Central, and South America, attacking goats and other animals, from which it sucks blood; also known as a “goatsucker” (the author).

Close Encounters of the Second Kind (CE2)--an observation of a UFO and associated physical effects (heat, radiation, damaged terrain, human paralysis, frightened animals, interference with engines or TV or radio reception, and/or crop circles found in the vicinity of the UFO (Wikipedia).

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (CE3)--an observation of. . . “animate beings” in association with a UFO sighting (Wikipedia).

Coelacanth--a supposedly extinct fish caught (several times) by Japanese fishermen and others (the author).

Cold reading--a medium or other’s use of people’s innate need and tendency to make sense of experiences by imposing order and cause upon otherwise random or seemingly random incidents as a means by which to ascertain information and to seem credible as fortunetellers or others who are adept in the use of allegedly paranormal or supernatural abilities (the author).

Collective hallucination (mass hallucination)--the same hallucination, shared by several (often many) people (the author).

Conspiracy theory--the belief that many individuals or organizations are involved in an attempt to conceal evidence, mislead the public, discredit individuals, secure power, promote a hidden agenda, or otherwise extend influence and socio-economic and political power over the unsuspecting masses (the author).

Cosmobiology--the metaphysical study of the universe; the astronomical study of the universe (the author).

Course in Miracles, A--a book that Helen Schucman (1909-1981) claims was dictated to her by Jesus Christ (the author).

Crop circle

Crop circle--geometrical patterns cut into the crops or grass of a field, allegedly by extraterrestrials, possibly as messages or navigational aids; some have been revealed as elaborate hoaxes (the author).

Crowley, Aleister--author of several books of occult mysticism, including Magick in Theory and Practice and The Book of the Law (the author).

Cryptomnesia--forgotten or repressed memories (the author).

Cryptozoology--the study of legendary, mythical, or unknown animals (the author).

Crystal skull--skulls carved in quartz or other stone and sometimes alleged to be endowed with magical powers of various kinds (the author).

Cult--adherents of an exclusive system of religious beliefs and practices.

Cupping--a treatment in which evacuated cups are applied to the skin to draw blood through the surface.

Curse--an evil spell.

Cyclops--In Greek mythology, one of a race of giants having a single eye in the middle of their forehead.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Unfinished Plots: The Cliffhanger

Copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman


The Buffy the Vampire Slayer series is famous for its cliffhangers. Charles Dickens invented this literary device, which ends a narrative sequence, such as a chapter in a novel or an episode in a television series, on a note of heart-pounding suspense that virtually guarantees that the reader will read the next installment or that the viewer will tune in again next week to watch the next episode and see how everything turns out. Constant cliffhangers keep readers reading and viewers viewing.

The first season of Buffy ended with the death of the protagonist as The Master, an ancient vampire with hypnotic powers, bit into Buffy’s neck before letting her unconscious body fall into a pond, where she drowned. Was this the end for Buffy? Would The Master gain control of the world, ruling the earth as he’d planned? What would become of the slayer’s friends? If Buffy was to return, how would such a wonder be effected? With an ending like this, viewers were bound to tune in again when the second semester began, several months later--and tune in, they did.

In “What’s My Line, Part I” (episode 21, season 2), a trio of assassins, “some” of which “are human, some. . . not,” are hired by Spike to kill Buffy so that the slayer won’t be able to interfere with Spike’s and Drusilla’s plan to kill Buffy’s vampire boyfriend Angel to restore Drusilla to full strength. Aware that “a very dark power is about to rise in Sunnydale,” Mr. Buto, the Watcher of a second slayer, Kendra, dispatches her to Sunnydale to assist Buffy in thwarting the threatening catastrophe. Buffy is awakened by Kendra, who attacks her as she lies asleep, in Angel’s bed, informing Buffy that she is “Kendra, the Vampire Slayer.” Since the series, several times previously, has made it clear that there is only one slayer in the world at the same time, viewers want to know all they can learn about this young woman who tries to pass herself off as a slayer. Kendra’s appearance and the fight between her and Buffy that ensues is a cliffhanger extraordinaire.

“What's My Line, Part II” (episode 22, season 2) also ends with a powerful cliffhanger. After the audience gets to know Kendra and to care about her, she’s killed by Drusilla who, after hypnotizing her, as The Master had hypnotized Buffy, slits her throat. Informed by Angel, with whom Buffy is fighting, that he has lured Buffy away from her friends as a ruse, Buffy dashes back to the Sunnydale High School library, where she has left her friends, to discover that Xander Harris is unconscious and that her fellow slayer has been killed. As she kneels beside Kendra’s corpse, holding her hand, the sound of a gun being cocked is heard as a voice yells, “Freeze!” Buffy jerks her head around, and the words “To be continued” appear on the screen. Is Kendra really dead? Will she be brought back to life somehow, as Buffy was when she died? Who’s holding a gun on Buffy, and what does he or she want? Will Buffy be able to avenge Kendra’s death? Can she stop Angel and the other vampires? Will Xander be all right? What about Willow, who was knocked out by a bookcase's having fallen on top of her? Cordelia Chase fled for her life. Did she escape? These unanswered questions have but one meaning: to find out what happens next, viewers will have to tune in again, next week.

In “Becoming, Part I” (epidie 33, season 2), Angel seeks to awaken the demon Acathla, whom a virtuous knight has turned into stone by plunging an enchanted sword into his heart. He has invoked the ritual that is supposed to awaken the demon, but it didn’t work. To find out why, he dispatched Drusilla and other vampires to abduct Buffy’s watcher, Rupert Giles. After a fight in which Xander and Willow Rosenberg were injured, Kendra was killed, and Giles was knocked unconscious, the watcher is brought to Angel, who tortures him in an effort to learn the secret of awakening Acathla. Assuming the form of Jenny Calendar, the teacher with whom Giles was in love before Angel killed her, Drusilla persuades Giles to tell her how Angel can awaken the demon. In a confrontation with Buffy, as Willow tries to reverse the spell that removed the curse that had restored Angel’s soul, Angel is stabbed with a sword and sent to hell after Willow succeeds in restoring his soul, because he has already opened a vortex that can be closed only the same way that it was opened--with Angel’s blood--and, if it is not closed, it will suck the world into hell. Horrified, Buffy looks on as her lover, his soul restored, is sucked into hell, where he will spend eternity, suffering unimaginable misery. This event changes everything for her, and the episode ends with Buffy aboard a bus, leaving her hometown. Where will she go, and what will she do? Has she given up her duties as the slayer? What will become of Sunnydale, her mother, and her friends without her? Can anything restore her spiritual health? This episode, like many others in not only this season of the series, but also in many episodes of every other season of the series, ends with a tantalizing cliffhanger.

Season 2 of the series teaches many other lessons about how to write an engrossing (and, sometimes, a gross) horror story (albeit one with comedic moments to leaven the terror), but, in this post, we’ve chosen to focus on the cliffhanger, a powerful narrative technique invented by one of the world’s greatest writers, Charles Dickens, as a means of keeping his readers coming back for more. The technique worked for Dickens. It worked for Joss Whedon. It has worked for countless other writers, and it will work for you. It’s especially effective when a writer employs it with the deliberation that Edgar Allan Poe developed his short stories, plotting backward from the end of the tale, as he explains in “The Philosophy of Composition,” which we will examine in a future post.

Sunday, March 2, 2008

Leftover Plots: Part II

copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman
 

As a result of considering “leftover plots” or plot-seeds or springboards or whatever we choose to call narrative motifs that occur in the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, we identified several additional storylines that could have been used in the series or (better yet, for us) that we ourselves, with some revision regarding characters, setting, and other narrative elements, could employ to write horror stories (or even novels) ourselves:

  • An imprisoned character can escape, causing more mischief or even a little death and destruction before being killed or imprisoned again.
  • Things that give rise to new organisms or liberate forces or entities, such as eggs, seeds, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, melting icebergs, shifting tectonic plates, earthbound meteors, and the like, can introduce new characters, including such worthy adversaries as hideous, horrible monsters.
  • Problematic characters, such as a naïve, incompetent, or foolish follower or sidekick can create havoc and endanger lives.
  • Physical objects, or artifacts, can function as inciting moments that spark a chain of narrative incidents, setting the rest of the story in motion.

We also learned some important factual matters pertaining to this technique:

  • Ideas cannot be copyrighted, so they are fair game as inspirations for plots.
  • The specific and unique ways in which ideas are developed can, and often are, copyrighted.
  • Using the characters, settings, and other elements of such treatments could constitute plagiarism and/or copyright infringement.
  • Ideas must be given an original treatment in which characters, settings, and other elements are new, not derivative.
They’re lots more we can learn from considering other Buffy episodes, so let’s get started. In “Angel” (episode 7, season 1), viewers are introduced to a mysterious stranger who comes to Buffy’s aid, helping her to defeat three vampires who attack her in the proverbial dark alley. Viewers wonder who this stranger is, what his interest in Buffy may be, and how he got the strength, agility, stamina, and fighting prowess to take on vampires alongside the supernaturally gifted slayer. Later, when, sharing a passionate kiss with Buffy, the stranger transforms into a vampire himself, one of these questions is answered, but the answer raises further, even more intriguing questions, one of which is why a vampire would be interested in (and apparently smitten with) his mortal enemy. Willow Rosenberg, Buffy’s nerdy computer geek friend, starts an online romance with a stranger in “I Robot, You Jane” (episode 8, season 1). Buffy is concerned about the possible dangers of Internet dating, and, as it turns out, she has good cause to be concerned, for Willow’s newfound boyfriend turns out to be a demon that, once imprisoned in the text of a book, was liberated into cyberspace when the book was scanned into Sunnydale High School’s library database. “The Puppet Show” (episode 9, season 1), which is one of the lamer stories in the series, is a takeoff upon the Chucky movies about a demon-possessed doll, except that this toy is a human who was cursed by having his soul confined to a ventriloquist’s dummy by the same brain-eating demon who’s been killing Sunnydale High School students and lunching upon their brains. (See! High school kids do have brains.) Nightmares come true in “Nightmares” (episode 10, season 1). The bad dreams are products of an abused boy whose Little League baseball coach believed in making an example of him after blaming the boy for the team’s loss of a big game. Some of the dreams, although nightmares, are amusing--Xander’s fear of going to school in his underwear, his fear of the clown that performed at one of his childhood birthday parties, and Willow’s fear of theatrical performance--but others are truly terrifying, as when Buffy’s mentor, Rupert Giles, dreams that she has been killed or Buffy’s own dream that she has been transformed into a vampire. Interesting because of one of the more transparent metaphors upon which Buffy plots are typically based, “Out of Sight, Out of Mind” (episode 11, season 1) equates being neglected and ignored with becoming invisible. In this episode, an invisible girl, Marcie Ross, uses her invisibility to gain revenge against Cordelia Chase and other Sunnydale students and, indeed, teachers who mistreated, neglected, ignored, and otherwise abused her before becoming a spy for the federal government. “Prophecy Girl” (episode 12, season 1) is the two-part finale of Buffy’s first season. The slayer learns that a prophecy foretells her death at the hands of an ancient vampire king known as The Master. She tries to quit, but, when The Master’s minions attack and kill several of her fellow students, traumatizing Willow, Buffy reluctantly accepts her destiny and is first bitten and then, unconscious, cast into a pool of water, in which she drowns--only to be resuscitated by her friend Xander, who arrives in the nick of time with Buffy’s vampire lover, Angel. Revived, Buffy finds that she has taken on some of The Master’s strength--and darkness--becoming stronger and is now immune from his mesmerizing gaze. A fight, to The Master’s death--ensues. Okay, so what have we learned? Most of these episodes deal with xenophobia, an irrational fear of strangers, except that, as it turns out in most cases, the fear doesn’t seem all that unwarranted when one is residing atop a Hellmouth. The introduction of a stranger who is mysterious in some ways is a universal and well-used plot device. When used adroitly, the mysterious stranger creates and maintains suspense because his or her sudden introduction into the setting and circumstances of the larger story naturally arouses curiosity on the reader’s (or viewer’s) part, especially when the entrance is a grand one, dramatic and--in the case of the horror genre, at least--unsettling. In Buffy, to enhance the mystique of the stranger, the series’ writers used such techniques--okay, they can be called “tricks,” if one prefers to think of them in this way--as these:
  • A possible threat. (Is the mysterious Angel stalking Buffy?)
  • Romantic intrigue AND star-crossed love. (Buffy no sooner meets Angel than they’ve become a couple, but, since he is, as she soon learns, a vampire, and she’s the slayer, theirs will be star-crossed, to say the least.)
  • Juxtapositions. The past (as represented by print-bound books) and the present (as represented by computers and cyberspace) meet, and they don’t get along all that well. Good (Buffy) and evil (Angel and the other vampires) represent two moral extremes. The natural, everyday world of Sunnydale and its citizens’ mundane lives are set against the supernatural world of their vampire foes. Life, as it is lived by Buffy and her friends, is contrasted with the life-in-death state in which the vampires exist, a hedonistic world of the senses and of passions that are cut off from such roots as love and compassion.
  • Similarity of themes. Buffy often explores a theme from several perspectives. For example, Willow, whose love for Xander remains unrequited because of his love for Buffy, which is also unrequited because Buffy loves Angel, leaves Willow lonely, as does Marcie’s neglect by her peers. In each instance, the characters’ loneliness leads them to foolish actions. In Willow’s case, she is saved by her friends, to whose circle she returns. Marcie, having no friends, becomes a ward of the state, so to speak, after Buffy rescues Cordelia and defeats Marcie. Although it may not cure one’s loneliness altogether, friendship, such thematic treatments suggest, is the tie that not only binds but also saves one from a perfunctory, institutional existence as a ward of, and a servant to, the state.
  • Animation of inanimate objects. This is a motif that is popular in fantasy fiction, including the horror and the science fiction genres. The animation of inanimate objects, whether through magical or technological means, is a subtype of the artifact plot device, in which an object, whether a ring (Lord of the Rings), a crystal (The Dark Crystal), or even a spaceship (Rendezvous with Rama) or some other object is the artifact.
  • Trauma’s consequences. As child abuse, spousal abuse, torture, combat and other mistreatment or crisis situations have shown, trauma has long-, if not life-long, consequences and can cause recurring nightmares, acts of violence, and other disturbed behavior.
  • Duty’s duty. Blaise Pascal wrote, “The heart has reasons which reason does not know.” So has duty. Even when there is no logically defensible reason to do so, the claim of duty often holds, especially when altruism, or even self-sacrifice, are directed at protecting others, more helpless than oneself, about whom one cares. Buffy dies that others may live, and, in doing so, she underscores the supreme values of brotherly love, courage, and that pesky pest, duty.
So, these episodes provide quite a bit of fodder for horror story writers, with regard to characters’ usefulness to plot, popular narrative motifs and techniques, and popular themes. With modification to suit one’s own interests and the demands of one’s own story, they can enrich and enhance a narrative. As such, they are useful tools--or tricks--to have in one’s authorial kit.

Having considered only a few of the lessons to be learned from a consideration of Buffy the Vampire Slayer episodes, we’ll revisit the topic of “Leftover Plots” in future installments.

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Buffy and Kendra: They Just Slay Me!

Copyright 2008 by Gary L. Pullman



In the “What’s My Line, Part I” episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s second season, Kendra Young debuts as a second slayer. Neither Buffy Summers, the “real slayer,” as her friend Willow Rosenberg calls her, nor Buffy’s Watcher, Rupert Giles, knows of Kendra’s existence before her Watcher, Sam Zabuto, sends her to Buffy’s hometown, aware that “a very dark power is about to rise in Sunnydale.” Kendra also appears in the second part of the episode and in a third episode. “Becoming, Part I,” of the same season. She’s a foil to Buffy, and, as such, she highlights Buffy’s traits, but, at the same time, reveals both Buffy’s flaws and foibles and her own, suggesting that neither is the ideal slayer and that neither of them is more effective in the slayer’s role than the other.

Buffy and Kendra are evenly matched in age, strength, stamina, agility, speed, and fighting prowess, and both are adept in the use of weapons, wooden stakes and otherwise (although Kendra has trouble with a crossbow, destroying “an evil lamp”). Otherwise, the two slayers couldn’t be less alike.

Kendra takes orders from her Watcher; Buffy prefers to do things her way. Kendra reads her Slayer’s Handbook and conducts her own research concerning vampires, demons, and other monsters. Buffy lets others do the book learning. Kendra evaluates others on the bases of her studies and what she has been taught. Buffy judges others on the bases of her own experience and beliefs. Kendra has no friends, is not allowed to date, and was taken from her family at such a young age that she doesn’t remember them other than as images in photographs. Buffy is surrounded by friends who call themselves “The Scooby Gang” or “The Scoobies,” lives with her mother, and has a vampire boyfriend, Angel. Kendra is serious and single-minded about her duties as a slayer, whereas Buffy seems to be casual about her slayer’s responsibilities. Kendra is rational, Buffy romantic. Kendra believes in taking a deliberate, rational, and logical approach to slaying. Buffy says her emotions are “total assets” that empower her. While Kendra defers to men, Buffy is a modern, liberated young woman. Kendra considers her calling to be a slayer a privilege and an honor as well as a duty, but Buffy would rather lead a “normal” life.

Which of them makes the more effective slayer? Concerning Kendra’s death at the hands of the mesmerizing vampire Drusilla, who orders Kendra to look into her eyes so that she can hypnotize her, Jana Riess contends, in What Would Buffy Do: The Vampire Slayer as Spiritual Guide, that Kendra’s willingness to follow orders without question leads to her death. However, as Kendra herself tells Buffy, when Buffy says “I don’t take orders; I do things my way,” “No wonder you died.” Buffy may act with autonomy and independence, but she is also headstrong at times and rash, and it may be argued that these traits led to her own death in her fight against The Master, at the end of the series’ first season. It seems that the show’s writers, in positing Buffy and Kendra as opposites, suggest that neither of them is the ideal, or more effective slayer, because each is too extreme and dogmatic, in her own way, insisting that hers is the better--indeed, the only true--way to discharge her duties as the slayer. The ideal slayer, the show implies, lies somewhere between these two extremes. Kendra is too dependent; Buffy, too self-reliant. Kendra is too academic; Buffy, too pragmatic. Kendra is too theoretical; Buffy, too empirical. Kendra is too staid and reserved; Buffy, too garrulous and affable. Kendra is insensitive; Buffy is oversensitive. Kendra is straightforward and honest; Buffy, although dutiful, pretends to be carefree. Kendra is too repressed; Buffy is too uninhibited. Kendra allows men to subjugate her; Buffy tends to be disrespectful and rude to men. Kendra is willing to sacrifice herself for the sake of her calling; Buffy is willing merely to do her duty. Neither is the ideal slayer, and neither is the more effective slayer, for each lacks balance. Both are too extreme in their attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors.

The writers intimate that the ideal slayer is the one who is self-reliant but also accepts assistance from others; participates in research rather than leaving it to others; has friends, including a boyfriend, if she likes, without letting her friendships interfere with her duties; understands that, as sacred as her calling as a slayer may be, it is no more hallowed than her family; uses both her learning and her own experience to evaluate situations and to judge others; takes her duties seriously and is not afraid to let others see how earnest she is about her role as a slayer; is neither overly repressed nor too unrestrained; interacts with men with respect but as an equal; and is willing to make sacrifices but also seeks to enjoy a personal life to the extent that it is possible to do so without shirking her responsibilities. Neither Kendra nor Buffy occupies the position between opposing extremes that Aristotle referred to as the “golden mean.” Therefore, they both show tremendous promise and potential, but neither is as effective a slayer as she could be were she the ideal slayer.

Since the ideal slayer doesn’t exist except as an ideal, one might conclude that both Buffy and Kendra are all that they can be--themselves--and, as such, are the most effective slayers that they can be. Kendra calls herself “the vampire slayer,” as does Buffy, and both are right: they are each a slayer and the most effective slayer that they, as themselves, with all their faults and strengths, can be. That’s all they have to offer. As it turns out, all they have to offer is both never sufficient and, at the same time, paradoxically, always enough.

Paranormal vs. Supernatural: What’s the Diff?

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

Sometimes, in demonstrating how to brainstorm about an essay topic, selecting horror movies, I ask students to name the titles of as many such movies as spring to mind (seldom a difficult feat for them, as the genre remains quite popular among young adults). Then, I ask them to identify the monster, or threat--the antagonist, to use the proper terminology--that appears in each of the films they have named. Again, this is usually a quick and easy task. Finally, I ask them to group the films’ adversaries into one of three possible categories: natural, paranormal, or supernatural. This is where the fun begins.

It’s a simple enough matter, usually, to identify the threats which fall under the “natural” label, especially after I supply my students with the scientific definition of “nature”: everything that exists as either matter or energy (which are, of course, the same thing, in different forms--in other words, the universe itself. The supernatural is anything which falls outside, or is beyond, the universe: God, angels, demons, and the like, if they exist. Mad scientists, mutant cannibals (and just plain cannibals), serial killers, and such are examples of natural threats. So far, so simple.

What about borderline creatures, though? Are vampires, werewolves, and zombies, for example, natural or supernatural? And what about Freddy Krueger? In fact, what does the word “paranormal” mean, anyway? If the universe is nature and anything outside or beyond the universe is supernatural, where does the paranormal fit into the scheme of things?

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the word “paranormal,” formed of the prefix “para,” meaning alongside, and “normal,” meaning “conforming to common standards, usual,” was coined in 1920. The American Heritage Dictionary defines “paranormal” to mean “beyond the range of normal experience or scientific explanation.” In other words, the paranormal is not supernatural--it is not outside or beyond the universe; it is natural, but, at the present, at least, inexplicable, which is to say that science cannot yet explain its nature. The same dictionary offers, as examples of paranormal phenomena, telepathy and “a medium’s paranormal powers.”

Wikipedia offers a few other examples of such phenomena or of paranormal sciences, including the percentages of the American population which, according to a Gallup poll, believes in each phenomenon, shown here in parentheses: psychic or spiritual healing (54), extrasensory perception (ESP) (50), ghosts (42), demons (41), extraterrestrials (33), clairvoyance and prophecy (32), communication with the dead (28), astrology (28), witchcraft (26), reincarnation (25), and channeling (15); 36 percent believe in telepathy.

As can be seen from this list, which includes demons, ghosts, and witches along with psychics and extraterrestrials, there is a confusion as to which phenomena and which individuals belong to the paranormal and which belong to the supernatural categories. This confusion, I believe, results from the scientism of our age, which makes it fashionable for people who fancy themselves intelligent and educated to dismiss whatever cannot be explained scientifically or, if such phenomena cannot be entirely rejected, to classify them as as-yet inexplicable natural phenomena. That way, the existence of a supernatural realm need not be admitted or even entertained. Scientists tend to be materialists, believing that the real consists only of the twofold unity of matter and energy, not dualists who believe that there is both the material (matter and energy) and the spiritual, or supernatural. If so, everything that was once regarded as having been supernatural will be regarded (if it cannot be dismissed) as paranormal and, maybe, if and when it is explained by science, as natural. Indeed, Sigmund Freud sought to explain even God as but a natural--and in Freud’s opinion, an obsolete--phenomenon.

Meanwhile, among skeptics, there is an ongoing campaign to eliminate the paranormal by explaining them as products of ignorance, misunderstanding, or deceit. Ridicule is also a tactic that skeptics sometimes employ in this campaign. For example, The Skeptics’ Dictionary contends that the perception of some “events” as being of a paranormal nature may be attributed to “ignorance or magical thinking.” The dictionary is equally suspicious of each individual phenomenon or “paranormal science” as well. Concerning psychics’ alleged ability to discern future events, for example, The Skeptic’s Dictionary quotes Jay Leno (“How come you never see a headline like 'Psychic Wins Lottery'?”), following with a number of similar observations:

Psychics don't rely on psychics to warn them of impending disasters. Psychics don't predict their own deaths or diseases. They go to the dentist like the rest of us. They're as surprised and disturbed as the rest of us when they have to call a plumber or an electrician to fix some defect at home. Their planes are delayed without their being able to anticipate the delays. If they want to know something about Abraham Lincoln, they go to the library; they don't try to talk to Abe's spirit. In short, psychics live by the known laws of nature except when they are playing the psychic game with people.
In An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural, James Randi, a magician who exercises a skeptical attitude toward all things alleged to be paranormal or supernatural, takes issue with the notion of such phenomena as well, often employing the same arguments and rhetorical strategies as The Skeptic’s Dictionary.

In short, the difference between the paranormal and the supernatural lies in whether one is a materialist, believing in only the existence of matter and energy, or a dualist, believing in the existence of both matter and energy and spirit. If one maintains a belief in the reality of the spiritual, he or she will classify such entities as angels, demons, ghosts, gods, vampires, and other threats of a spiritual nature as supernatural, rather than paranormal, phenomena. He or she may also include witches (because, although they are human, they are empowered by the devil, who is himself a supernatural entity) and other natural threats that are energized, so to speak, by a power that transcends nature and is, as such, outside or beyond the universe. Otherwise, one is likely to reject the supernatural as a category altogether, identifying every inexplicable phenomenon as paranormal, whether it is dark matter or a teenage werewolf. Indeed, some scientists dedicate at least part of their time to debunking allegedly paranormal phenomena, explaining what natural conditions or processes may explain them, as the author of The Serpent and the Rainbow explains the creation of zombies by voodoo priests.

Based upon my recent reading of Tzvetan Todorov's The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to the Fantastic, I add the following addendum to this essay.

According to Todorov:

The fantastic. . . lasts only as long as a certain hesitation [in deciding] whether or not what they [the reader and the protagonist] perceive derives from "reality" as it exists in the common opinion. . . . If he [the reader] decides that the laws of reality remain intact and permit an explanation of the phenomena described, we can say that the work belongs to the another genre [than the fantastic]: the uncanny. If, on the contrary, he decides that new laws of nature must be entertained to account for the phenomena, we enter the genre of the marvelous (The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre, 41).
Todorov further differentiates these two categories by characterizing the uncanny as “the supernatural explained” and the marvelous as “the supernatural accepted” (41-42).

Interestingly, the prejudice against even the possibility of the supernatural’s existence which is implicit in the designation of natural versus paranormal phenomena, which excludes any consideration of the supernatural, suggests that there are no marvelous phenomena; instead, there can be only the uncanny. Consequently, for those who subscribe to this view, the fantastic itself no longer exists in this scheme, for the fantastic depends, as Todorov points out, upon the tension of indecision concerning to which category an incident belongs, the natural or the supernatural. The paranormal is understood, by those who posit it, in lieu of the supernatural, as the natural as yet unexplained.

And now, back to a fate worse than death: grading students’ papers.

My Cup of Blood

Anyone who becomes an aficionado of anything tends, eventually, to develop criteria for elements or features of the person, place, or thing of whom or which he or she has become enamored. Horror fiction--admittedly not everyone’s cuppa blood--is no different (okay, maybe it’s a little different): it, too, appeals to different fans, each for reasons of his or her own. Of course, in general, book reviews, the flyleaves of novels, and movie trailers suggest what many, maybe even most, readers of a particular type of fiction enjoy, but, right here, right now, I’m talking more specifically--one might say, even more eccentrically. In other words, I’m talking what I happen to like, without assuming (assuming makes an “ass” of “u” and “me”) that you also like the same. It’s entirely possible that you will; on the other hand, it’s entirely likely that you won’t.

Anyway, this is what I happen to like in horror fiction:

Small-town settings in which I get to know the townspeople, both the good, the bad, and the ugly. For this reason alone, I’m a sucker for most of Stephen King’s novels. Most of them, from 'Salem's Lot to Under the Dome, are set in small towns that are peopled by the good, the bad, and the ugly. Part of the appeal here, granted, is the sense of community that such settings entail.

Isolated settings, such as caves, desert wastelands, islands, mountaintops, space, swamps, where characters are cut off from civilization and culture and must survive and thrive or die on their own, without assistance, by their wits and other personal resources. Many are the examples of such novels and screenplays, but Alien, The Shining, The Descent, Desperation, and The Island of Dr. Moreau, are some of the ones that come readily to mind.

Total institutions as settings. Camps, hospitals, military installations, nursing homes, prisons, resorts, spaceships, and other worlds unto themselves are examples of such settings, and Sleepaway Camp, Coma, The Green Mile, and Aliens are some of the novels or films that take place in such settings.

Anecdotal scenes--in other words, short scenes that showcase a character--usually, an unusual, even eccentric, character. Both Dean Koontz and the dynamic duo, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, excel at this, so I keep reading their series (although Koontz’s canine companions frequently--indeed, almost always--annoy, as does his relentless optimism).

Atmosphere, mood, and tone. Here, King is king, but so is Bentley Little. In the use of description to terrorize and horrify, both are masters of the craft.

A bit of erotica (okay, okay, sex--are you satisfied?), often of the unusual variety. Sex sells, and, yes, sex whets my reader’s appetite. Bentley Little is the go-to guy for this spicy ingredient, although Koontz has done a bit of seasoning with this spice, too, in such novels as Lightning and Demon Seed (and, some say, Hung).

Believable characters. Stephen King, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, and Dan Simmons are great at creating characters that stick to readers’ ribs.

Innovation. Bram Stoker demonstrates it, especially in his short story “Dracula’s Guest,” as does H. P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson, and a host of other, mostly classical, horror novelists and short story writers. For an example, check out my post on Stoker’s story, which is a real stoker, to be sure. Stephen King shows innovation, too, in ‘Salem’s Lot, The Shining, It, and other novels. One might even argue that Dean Koontz’s something-for-everyone, cross-genre writing is innovative; he seems to have been one of the first, if not the first, to pen such tales.

Technique. Check out Frank Peretti’s use of maps and his allusions to the senses in Monster; my post on this very topic is worth a look, if I do say so myself, which, of course, I do. Opening chapters that accomplish a multitude of narrative purposes (not usually all at once, but successively) are attractive, too, and Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child are as good as anyone, and better than many, at this art.

A connective universe--a mythos, if you will, such as both H. P. Lovecraft and Stephen King, and, to a lesser extent, Dean Koontz, Bentley Little, and even Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child have created through the use of recurring settings, characters, themes, and other elements of fiction.

A lack of pretentiousness. Dean Koontz has it, as do Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, Bentley Little, and (to some extent, although he has become condescending and self-indulgent of late, Stephen King); unfortunately, both Dan Simmons and Robert McCammon have become too self-important in their later works, Simmons almost to the point of becoming unreadable. Come on, people, you’re writing about monsters--you should be humble.

Longevity. Writers who have been around for a while usually get better, Stephen King, Dan Simmons, and Robert McCammon excepted.

Pacing. Neither too fast nor too slow. Dean Koontz is good, maybe the best, here, of contemporary horror writers.


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