So over the course of this semester I have re-watched the first six seasons of Supernatural. Most people know about Supernatural but for those who don't it's a show about two brothers Sam and Dean who were raised into the life of hunting the supernatural after their mother was murdered by a demon. Through out the first six seasons you see the show unfold and reveal a much bigger story. The first two seasons are mainly about them facing different types of ghouls and creatures while searching for the yellow-eyed demon that killed their mom. After the third season things start getting really complicated. Now it's not just ghosts and creatures, but angels and demons. I don't want to reveal much for those who may not have seen the show.
I've also watched an anime called Witch Hunter Robin. This show is about an organization called the STNJ whose sole purpose is to hunt and capture witches. The funny thing about this organization is that they actually have witches working as hunters. These witches however are called craft users as their powers are not fully activated yet. When a young fifteen year old craft user named Robin is sent to them as a replacement for a lost member, the team learns there is a lot more to her powers then they thought. It's a twenty-six episode series. I'm really into shows about hunters and the supernatural, if you can't tell. I just love shows like these because it's interesting to see the characters reactions when they realize they aren't that different from the things they're hunting.
Wednesday, April 15, 2015
Monday, April 13, 2015
Reader's Choice Blog Post 13
I chose the novel Anna Dressed In Blood by Kendare Blake for my reader's choice presentation. The gap I'm filling with my presentation is paranormal romance. The essential question this story answers is "How does the work conform to genre expectations? Does it bring anything new to the genre?". The novel is a young adult horror but it also includes paranormal romance which we didn't see much of in the horror stories we read in class. It conforms to the genre because it contains the suspense, mystery, and creepy atmosphere that horror stories are expected to have.
Wednesday, April 8, 2015
Blog Post 12
In "Premature Burial" by Edgar Allen Poe the narrator is a man who is terrified of being buried alive. His fear is also very realistic because he suffers from a disorder called catalepsy. The narrator says that this disorder causes him to go into a state that mimics death and these episodes can last from days to weeks. When I first read about catalepsy in the story I had a feeling that it was a legitimate medical condition but the symptoms might have been tweaked or exaggerated. After doing some research I found out that it is a legitimate condition and that back in the times where this story is set cataleptics were confused with being dead many times. A lot of the cases where people were buried alive were people who were cataleptic. I also learned that catalepsy is usually a condition that results from other illnesses such as schizophrenia. Knowing how much Poe loves mentally insane people, it's possible that the narrator of the story was schizophrenic.
"The Monkey's Paw" is a story of the supernatural because it contains an object that is claimed to have magic wish granting powers. The monkey's paw also shows that the claims made about its powers are true when it starts to actually grant the wishes. When the Whites wished for 200 pounds the paw granted their wish and they got it the next day. Besides the 200 pounds they also got their sons lifeless corpse as a seriously fucked up bonus. Later on when Mrs. White wishes for her son to come back to life someone comes knocking at the door. The husband, knowing that wishing for the resurrection of their son was a bad move, probably wished to reverse the one his wife made and then the knocking stopped. It all seems pretty supernatural, like this monkey paw has some serious juju going on but it could also just all be a huge coincidence. Okay the part where the son died the next day and they got exactly 200 pounds is really freaky and pretty hard to believe it was just a coincidence but there's definitely a possibility. The time when the wife wished for her son to be back and then there was knocking at the door it could've been ANYONE. There's no way to say that it was the son for sure. When the husband wished for zombie son to go away it's assumed that the knocking stopped because the wish was granted but it could've just been that these people took 80 years to open to the door and the person got tired of knocking right at that moment. It all just could've been some realllyyyy freaky coincidences.
"The Monkey's Paw" is a story of the supernatural because it contains an object that is claimed to have magic wish granting powers. The monkey's paw also shows that the claims made about its powers are true when it starts to actually grant the wishes. When the Whites wished for 200 pounds the paw granted their wish and they got it the next day. Besides the 200 pounds they also got their sons lifeless corpse as a seriously fucked up bonus. Later on when Mrs. White wishes for her son to come back to life someone comes knocking at the door. The husband, knowing that wishing for the resurrection of their son was a bad move, probably wished to reverse the one his wife made and then the knocking stopped. It all seems pretty supernatural, like this monkey paw has some serious juju going on but it could also just all be a huge coincidence. Okay the part where the son died the next day and they got exactly 200 pounds is really freaky and pretty hard to believe it was just a coincidence but there's definitely a possibility. The time when the wife wished for her son to be back and then there was knocking at the door it could've been ANYONE. There's no way to say that it was the son for sure. When the husband wished for zombie son to go away it's assumed that the knocking stopped because the wish was granted but it could've just been that these people took 80 years to open to the door and the person got tired of knocking right at that moment. It all just could've been some realllyyyy freaky coincidences.
Tuesday, March 31, 2015
Blog Post 11
Well first things first, if I were to ever interview Egaeus from "Berenice" by Edgar Allen Poe there would be some things that would have to be done before I agreed to it. Straight jacket, shackles, and a shatter proof glass between us. This guy pulled Berenice's teeth out and clearly has some severe OCD or even schizophrenia. God forbid he took a liking to my hair and tried to rip it out. Nooo nope, not ok. Anyhow, if I were to interview him my questions would be less about Berenice and more about his own story. Like where the heck was his father? Did he die too? Does he know if both his parents were related? Poe seems to really like to write about inbreeding and about how inbred people seem to always have mental illnesses so I'm assuming that his parents were related and that's why his health so messed up. Has he ever had other moments where he blanked out and then realized that he had done something while he was blanked out and didn't remember? He seems to not really care for Berenice, could this be because he is jealous that she was beautiful, graceful, and filled with light while he was filled with darkness? Was he obsessed with her teeth because as the beauty and light from her body started to deteriorate due to her illness, her teeth still remained white and shining? Was the library the only place he wanted to be in because it was where his life began but where the life of the woman who gave life to him ended? So many questions for this very deranged man.
"The Furnished Room" by O. Henry really reflects his view of city life because he spends a lot of the time describing the rooms little details and wondering what could have happened before the man got there since a bunch of people have inhabited that room before him. In the beginning of the story it says "the houses of this district, having had a thousand dwellers, should have thousands of tales to tell", this really reflects his fascination with the stories that lie within every house. Reading this story was actually really cool for me because I actually think about things like that a lot. Anytime I stay in a hotel room I always wonder who stayed here before me and what happened in the room. I also tend to move to different houses every year so every time I move into a new home I'm always thinking about how the house was once home to someone else and I wonder what stories they have in the time that they lived there and I ponder how they might have decorated the rooms. Houses, apartments, hotels, and so on contain the stories of the best night of someone's life or maybe the worst year of their life which fascinates me and reading this story was just interesting cause I probably would've been doing the same thing as the main character, just sitting there looking around and wondering how or why those stains got there, etc. BTW super creeped out when it said "Marie" was carved on the wall! I'm reading this at night and reading about my own name being carved on a wall in a creepy story at this time of night is not pleasant.
I don't think "The Boarded Window" by Ambrose Bierce actually contains any supernatural factors in it, only things that seem supernatural. At the end when Murlock falls asleep by his wife's dead body we're told he hears wailing sounds, which we might assume is the beginning of a supernatural occurrence. Later on after he wakes up he sensed that there was something there. A ghost perhaps? As the story goes on he hears foot steps and the table shakes beneath him. When he can't find it in him to say his deceased wife's name and is too scared to reach out for her we might think that the wife's body has become possessed or something and is now the living dead. When he was hit by the table and there were scuffling sounds everywhere the idea that the wife had become some type of living dead may have been reassured. Especially when he reaches out for her and there is nothing on the table anymore. It says in the story "there is a point at which terror may turn to madness" which means Murlock probably thought that his wife went zombie on him too. However after he shoots his rifle we found out that it was actually just a panther. The horrify-ling funny thing is that the next morning we find out Murlock's wife wasn't the living dead, she was just living. Murdock basically set up his wife's death by binding her hands and laying her on a table next to a window which attracted the panther and left her helpless since her hands were bound. This story just kinda proves that every one becomes a madman when they're scared.
"The Furnished Room" by O. Henry really reflects his view of city life because he spends a lot of the time describing the rooms little details and wondering what could have happened before the man got there since a bunch of people have inhabited that room before him. In the beginning of the story it says "the houses of this district, having had a thousand dwellers, should have thousands of tales to tell", this really reflects his fascination with the stories that lie within every house. Reading this story was actually really cool for me because I actually think about things like that a lot. Anytime I stay in a hotel room I always wonder who stayed here before me and what happened in the room. I also tend to move to different houses every year so every time I move into a new home I'm always thinking about how the house was once home to someone else and I wonder what stories they have in the time that they lived there and I ponder how they might have decorated the rooms. Houses, apartments, hotels, and so on contain the stories of the best night of someone's life or maybe the worst year of their life which fascinates me and reading this story was just interesting cause I probably would've been doing the same thing as the main character, just sitting there looking around and wondering how or why those stains got there, etc. BTW super creeped out when it said "Marie" was carved on the wall! I'm reading this at night and reading about my own name being carved on a wall in a creepy story at this time of night is not pleasant.
I don't think "The Boarded Window" by Ambrose Bierce actually contains any supernatural factors in it, only things that seem supernatural. At the end when Murlock falls asleep by his wife's dead body we're told he hears wailing sounds, which we might assume is the beginning of a supernatural occurrence. Later on after he wakes up he sensed that there was something there. A ghost perhaps? As the story goes on he hears foot steps and the table shakes beneath him. When he can't find it in him to say his deceased wife's name and is too scared to reach out for her we might think that the wife's body has become possessed or something and is now the living dead. When he was hit by the table and there were scuffling sounds everywhere the idea that the wife had become some type of living dead may have been reassured. Especially when he reaches out for her and there is nothing on the table anymore. It says in the story "there is a point at which terror may turn to madness" which means Murlock probably thought that his wife went zombie on him too. However after he shoots his rifle we found out that it was actually just a panther. The horrify-ling funny thing is that the next morning we find out Murlock's wife wasn't the living dead, she was just living. Murdock basically set up his wife's death by binding her hands and laying her on a table next to a window which attracted the panther and left her helpless since her hands were bound. This story just kinda proves that every one becomes a madman when they're scared.
Thursday, March 26, 2015
Blog Post 10
After reading "The Fall of the House of Usher" you can really see what modern day haunted houses took from this story. The stereotypes of a haunted house that are in this story are things like the creepy, shiver down your spine, feel you get when you just look at the house. Not to mention that there's a strange glow and a dark creepy lake next to it. Oh and an underground tomb. Poe turns regular objects into seeming creepy. I mean if he decided to go as far as to describe a dust particle it would probably be creepy too. The description of the mansion made me think of the Disney movie The Haunted Mansion which shows how this story inspired the modern day haunted house.
Afterward by Edith Wharton definitely fits the definition of an American Gothic. The story has immense amounts of suspense in trying to figure out where or when the ghost is going to show up. I think this story teaches people that getting what you wished for isn't always a good thing, especially when you have no clue when or where that thing is going to show up. Not to mention when the thing you wished for was a ghost.
Afterward by Edith Wharton definitely fits the definition of an American Gothic. The story has immense amounts of suspense in trying to figure out where or when the ghost is going to show up. I think this story teaches people that getting what you wished for isn't always a good thing, especially when you have no clue when or where that thing is going to show up. Not to mention when the thing you wished for was a ghost.
Wednesday, March 18, 2015
Blog Post 9
"The Raven" by Edgar Allen Poe makes me think about those nights that you stay up till 4 am and you can't sleep but you're so exhausted that your mind starts going a little crazy and you become super paranoid. I don't know maybe that just happens to me. Poe seems to be trying to communicate that very sense of paranoia. The speaker constantly kept repeating to himself "‘Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door—/Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;—/ This it is and nothing more.” every time he heard the tapping sound. He was trying to convince himself that he wasn't going nuts. When he finally decided to attend to the visitor he realized there was nothing there except darkness. He spoke the name Lenore into the darkness as if he expected the deceased woman to respond. At this point he was really losing his marbles.
He went back into the room and opened the window because he thought the sound was the
wind hitting the shutters. Now a Raven has flown into the room and sits upon a bust and when he
speaks to the bird it replies with "Nevermore". Now at this point any sane human would've shit
their pants and ran but instead this man decides to ask it questions. The strange Raven seems to
have uplifted the speakers dark and depressed mood " The Raven still beguiling my sad fancy
into smiling". The speaker begins to think about Lenore and in grief begins yelling at himself to forget her. The
bird interrupts him with his extensive vocabulary of "Nevermore" and this sets him off. He starts yelling at the
bird calling it an evil, even calling it the devil. He starts asking it questions about seeing Lenore despite the fact
that he knows its only answer will be "Nevermore". With this he tells the bird to get lost and basically go to hell.
The Raven once again responds with "Nevermore". By the end of the poem the man has lost all his sanity and is
entrapped in his own personal hell. "The Raven" communicates a very grim feeling of losing all hope and that
can lead to losing your sanity. The mood is really dark and depressing, everything is described as being lifeless
"Once upon a midnight dreary...distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December".
The tone of Annabel Lee seems to be very somber and nostalgic. He clearly misses his childhood sweetheart
very much. The speaker describes their love as something that angels were even jealous of. The song like rhythm
of the poem makes it even more gloomy and mournful sounding.
VIEWING SUGGESTION
The first season of The Following is about FBI agent who is trying to catch a serial killer whose murders are
based on Poe's work. It's really cool, gory, and creepy so if you're into that stuff I suggest you give it a try.
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
Blog Post 8
When someone says they are going to tell a love story people expect to hear about a boy and girl who fall in love but have some type of obstacle in the way of their relationship. In the end they overcome the obstacle, get married, and live happily ever after. In "Day Million" by Frederik Pohl the characters do get married and they do seem to live happily, but not in the way we'd expect them to. One of the first things that makes this an unconventional love story is that Dora is a transgender woman. Romantic stories about transgender women are most certainly not something you hear about everyday or ever really. In the story Dora's change in gender seemed to not bother anyone, if only people were that accepting now. The second thing is that Don and Dora didn't even say a word to each other before Don proposed. And we thought Romeo and Juliette fell in love too quick. Also, there was the fact that after the marriage they never interacted with each other again. If they ever felt the desire to be with one another they would simply go back to the recorded analogues. It was a strange love story that had me thinking "What the @!%$ is going on?!"during every paragraph.
Parthenogenesis literally means virgin birth, it's when an embryo develops from an unfertilized egg. This is something that does not occur in mammals. A mammals egg must be fertilized in order to develop into an embryo. So parthenogenesis specifically may be impossible for humans but virgin birth isn't. A woman doesn't need to have any type of sexual intercourse with a man in order for her to get pregnant, she just needs some fresh or frozen sperm and some intimate quality time with a turkey baster and BOOM she'll have herself a stinky, crying, snot nosed infant in about nine months. There has also been some research done on whether a female egg could be fertilized by artificial sperm and it seems to be a possibility. So will men serve any purpose if women gain the ability to reproduce without them? In “When It Changed” by Joanna Russ, it seems that the purpose of men is to be arrogant a**holes who need to make women feel inferior in order to make themselves feel better. Huh, that actually sounds like a lot of men I know. Don't worry boys I know it's "not all men" but it sure is plenty. In reality men would still serve a purpose even if they weren't needed to reproduce because any woman who is straight, bisexual, pan sexual, or is of any kind of sexuality that has interest towards the opposite sex wouldn't want their potential male partners to disappear. They are companions, best friends, brothers, boyfriends, husbands, fathers, etc. etc. and I suppose they can be entertaining sometimes.
Parthenogenesis literally means virgin birth, it's when an embryo develops from an unfertilized egg. This is something that does not occur in mammals. A mammals egg must be fertilized in order to develop into an embryo. So parthenogenesis specifically may be impossible for humans but virgin birth isn't. A woman doesn't need to have any type of sexual intercourse with a man in order for her to get pregnant, she just needs some fresh or frozen sperm and some intimate quality time with a turkey baster and BOOM she'll have herself a stinky, crying, snot nosed infant in about nine months. There has also been some research done on whether a female egg could be fertilized by artificial sperm and it seems to be a possibility. So will men serve any purpose if women gain the ability to reproduce without them? In “When It Changed” by Joanna Russ, it seems that the purpose of men is to be arrogant a**holes who need to make women feel inferior in order to make themselves feel better. Huh, that actually sounds like a lot of men I know. Don't worry boys I know it's "not all men" but it sure is plenty. In reality men would still serve a purpose even if they weren't needed to reproduce because any woman who is straight, bisexual, pan sexual, or is of any kind of sexuality that has interest towards the opposite sex wouldn't want their potential male partners to disappear. They are companions, best friends, brothers, boyfriends, husbands, fathers, etc. etc. and I suppose they can be entertaining sometimes.
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