Hello, monsters and zombies!
I woke up Sunday morning to find that my tailgate had been stolen off of my truck, what the hell? Evidently, the stolen tail-gate market is thriving these days, but insurance came to the rescue and paid me for my loss. We (GF & me) took our 8mo-year-old boxer (Salem) to the vet last weekend to find out why her fur was falling out, and it was freaking mites! We got her some medicine, and she is looking better. We got both her and the male pit (Zero) weighed. Zero is a whopping 63 lbs at 8 months old, wow! Salem is a healthy 42 lbs at 9 months. I love these little devils! They make me laugh on a daily basis.
Now, let's get down to brass tacks...
Let me just start by saying, I never saw the 2017 Mummy starring Tom Cruise, until today. I have always loved the old Universal and Hammer monster films, but I didn't want my imagination influenced too much while writing my own shared monster verse, so I decided to wait until I had locked in my story. This Mummy was supposed to be the first installment of a new Universal Monster Universe. So, after finishing the plotting and writing of the first five issues of my comic The Forbidden Museum, I finally watched it.
Making good movies and telling good stories is no easy task, but this film was not well executed The Dark Universe trailer at the beginning of the new Mummy foretold its doom to me, as it showed a montage of classic monster movies heralding a new Dark Universe (and basically a copy of what Marvel had done with their universe trailer). This reminded me of a new 'pop' country song's lyrics espousing such legends as Merle Haggard or Waylon Jennings (the ole nostalgia association to hid the fact that what your about to see or hear is nothing like that). These new films had not earned such an association, and not only that but the film was inundated with long and torturous flashbacks and tons of dull voice-over exposition (don't they tell aspiring writers and filmmakers to not do that?)
The old Indiana Jones films did a great job of blending adventure, horror, and action. Setting this Mummy in modern Iraqi with terrorists was a choice, but then try and add Marvel humor and Indiana Jones wit made it directionless. It seemed to be searching for its identity, a product of too many chefs in the kitchen?
I like that they made Cruise's character a cursed being by the end of the film, which my main protagonist starts that way early on, but the hero in Forbidden Museum is slowly rotting away throughout the course of the story. I don't think Cruise would be down with having that in his contract.
A successful shared monster universe (in my opinion, which I'm sure that no one gives a crap about lol) has to have a strong reason that the monsters are encountering each other, and a mix of creeping dread and horror. Henry Harker ( my main hero) is cursed, until he recaptures the other monsters and returns them to his grandfather's museum, or he will eventually rot into nothingness. You actually care for the protagonist's plight, which you should.
Forbidden Museum is inspired by British Hammer Horror, the literary versions of the monsters, H.P. Lovecraft's and Clive Barker's writings. A fish out of water Henry Harker the protagonist, with Dracula being my story's main antagonist, makes for a good opposition. They are both after the monsters for different reasons, but both of their motivations are to be freed from a curse. You can be a little campy with a monster tale (and you should), but own it with a bloody vengeance. I feel that this kind of story has to have the gothic and macabre at the forefront of its storytelling and visuals. Hey Guillermo Del Toro or Blumhouse, have I got a great story idea for you!
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Trailer: https://youtu.be/ul1rxin3a8k
The Story:
Dracula did not die at the hands of his hunters Jonathan Harker, Van Helsing, Mina Murray, and Quincey Morris...
He was imprisoned, along with the Wolf Man, the Mummy, Gill-God, and Frankenstein's Monster inside Harker's Forbidden Museum, which is located a mile under the British Museum. Now, the monsters have been freed again to walk the Earth by Jonathan's great, great-grandson Henry Harker, who must re-imprison them or stay the museum's undead curator for eternity.
The series is written by Craig E. Sawyer (Mars City Vice, The Rifleman, Weirdbook) and interior art by Luke Archey (The Rifleman, Kubert School graduate). We have some fiendishly good artistic talent lined up for this book and Kickstarter: Tom Mandrake (Grimjack, The Spectre, Martian Manhunter) doing the main cover, Terry Wolfinger (Stan Winston Studios, Master Character Designer) Puis Calzada (Zorro: Rise of the Old Gods, Creepshow Creepzine.) doing collectible prints.
The series will take Henry Harker across the globe on adventures, using his grandfather's magical tome The Book of the Dead, while battling classic horror monsters, as he slowly rots.
Insta: @theforbiddenmuseum, @csawyerwriter @lukearchey
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