I was in the process of writing my next letter (which is about trying to find the joy in baking and cooking again when eating and cooking has become so utilitarian) when my kid got sick. When my kid gets sick, everything else gets put on hold because she becomes a velcro toddler on steroids. And then, right when she started to feel better, I woke up with a sore throat. And so did my husband.
So here we are, wearily switching off on toddler duty so the other one can rest. I do not have the brain power to complete my originally intended letter this week, so instead here’s a cute little round-up of what I've read and watched and baked for Spooktember so far. (It is my favorite season, after all.)
Categorized as "suburban horror," We Came To Welcome You by Vincent Tirado is the story of a queer interracial couple who moves into a gated community, where all the houses look the same, the pollen count is out of control, and the neighbors are mostly white, mostly straight, very pushy, and extremely nosy. Of course, nothing is as it seems and the protagonist finds herself fighting to stay true to herself in the middle of white suburbia. So much of the horror genre is about the struggle to stay human, and I love that this novel dives into that while bringing ideas about assimilation, race, mental health, culture, and queerness into that struggle.
If you are a Food Network watcher, you know about all the Baking Championship series. There's an iteration for every season, and at this time of year, we get the Halloween one. It's the only one worth watching. There is a horror movie trope theme for every season (a couple years ago, the theme was "horror summer camp" a la Friday the 13th, this year's theme is mad scientist). The bakes are always creative, sound tasty, and look out of this world cool. The host is hilarious, and the judges dress up in full costume in *every* episode to judge the last bake. It's become a spooky season staple in our house.
It Follows is about a sexually transmitted curse. The only way to "get rid of it" is to "pass it on" to someone else. When I summarize it this way, it sounds extremely silly, and it is kind of. This is the second time I've watched this one, and there's a lot I like about it -- the cinematography, the shots, the music, this little chosen family of people who don't leave each other behind and believe each other no matter what. There's something about the story, though, that is missing, and I can't quite figure out what it is. Is it the message? What is the message? Is it a send up of the idea that getting an STI will kill us and/or follow us around forever? Is it about consent and communication around sex? I don't know. I keep thinking about it though, so maybe that's good enough. I also keep thinking about that pink shell e-reader (iykyk) and specifically thinking, "...wha?"
A maybe little-known fact about me is that I am a big fan of wrestling, and I absolutely adore anything and everything that is about the behind-the-scenes of wrestling. This includes the Vice series The Dark Side of the Ring, and it includes a podcast called The Lapsed Fan that puts out literal hours-long episodes doing deep dives into the behind-the-scenes on all past Wrestlemanias, pay-per-views and other big wrestling moments (like the Montreal Screw Job) and legacies (like the Von Erichs). Mr. McMahon is a new Netflix docuseries that centers around Vince McMahon, the former CEO of the WWE. I count it as one of my Spooktember entries because Vince McMahon is a horrific, soulless, creep of a human being. This documentary does a great job of letting Vince paint a picture of himself in his own words, the members of his little echo chamber's words, wrestlers' words, journalists' words, and his own family's words. It adds up to a highly contradictory, and also very clear, portrait of him, especially when every interviewee is asked, "What will Vince McMahon's legacy be?" And nearly every answer is deafening silence.
Speaking of horrific, soulless creeps! The Fall of the House of Usher follows the demise of the Usher family, who run a pharmaceutical company that is on trial for single-handedly starting the opioid crisis (ripped from the headlines!). It's an adaptation of the Edgar Allen Poe story of the same title, and each episode deftly weaves together adaptations and elements of other Poe stories. I am a recently converted Mike Flanagan girlie, so you can take what I'm about to say with a grain of salt. The Fall of the House of Usher is brilliant. It's everything I love about horror *and* it has something to say that is so relevant to our current late-stage capitalist and corporate-run world and society (and it's not afraid to say it!) -- *and* it enacts horror movie justice, which means bad people don't get away with doing a lifetime of bad things. It is cathartic, and the characters are so incredibly well-written and acted and so thoroughly engrossing that I cheer and/or heave a big sigh of relief when the devil shows up. I read a Letterboxd review that called this limited series, "Succession but Final Destination," and that, my friends, is the most accurate description.
I was very excited about The Watchers, a new film written and directed by Ishana Night Shyamalan (yes, she's M. Night Shyamalan's daughter). I won't say much about it because it is so new and I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but it...was okay. I didn't love it, I didn't hate it. I probably won't watch it again. Dakota Fanning was great in it. Ireland is beautiful.
Silent Hill the movie is based on Silent Hill the video game. I had extremely low expectations for this one. In fact, my solitary hope was that it was so bad it was good. The plot, much like the plot of the video games, doesn't make a lot of sense, so all I will say is that a woman takes her daughter to Silent Hill for a reason that doesn't make a whole lot of sense, and then promptly loses her as soon as they enter city limits. The acting is actually quite good for the most part. The monsters are extremely creepy and well-crafted (if you've ever heard of or seen a villain called Pyramidhead, this is where he comes from). Aside from nothing making actual sense to me (despite it trying very hard to be coherent), my only complaint with this one is that it is too damn long (its runtime is 125 minutes). I also don't recommend you watch it unless you're a Silent Hill fan.
One of my all-time favorites, and obviously the best of the 80s slasher franchises, is A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). It's so campy, so fun, and still very creepy. This time around, my husband commented that Freddy Kreuger's full of dad jokes (it's true). I marveled at the special effects, like the outline of Freddy Kreuger's face and hands pressing through the ceiling above the bed, as if through a stretchy bedsheet (I kept thinking throughout, "Ugh, Jason and Michael Myers could never!"). Not to sound like an ancient cranky human being, but CGI is overrated -- it could never depict Johnny Depp's iconic death scene as beautifully as it was done in 1984 with practical effects.
So far, the only true Spooktember bake I've done are these pumpkin chocolate chip æbelskivers. My kid loves æbelskivers and asks for them at least once or twice a week. She also loves pumpkin puree and chocolate chips, so this was an all-around no-brainer bake for me. It's delish and filling and we don't need any additional toppings or sides, usually, though they wouldn't hurt. I've got plans to bake some pumpkin ginger scones and some pumpkin chocolate swirl muffins eventually.
Once this raging sore throat subsides, anyway.
Spooktember has gotten off to a slow start. Maybe it's because it's been 80+ degrees up until a couple days ago, so it hasn't felt particularly spooky. Maybe it's because I haven't been able to read as much, thanks to my kid dropping her last nap. But spooky season is picking up now, and I'm feeling more and more in the spooky spirit. Maybe I'll do another one of these in a few weeks.
For now, I'm going to crawl under a blanket with a steaming cup of Throat Coat and try to read or doze off while my kid plays with some squishy jelly decal pumpkins (???) (who knew these would offer at least an hour of independent play????).
Stay healthy out there, friends. I'll see you in a couple weeks, and hopefully this cold will be so far behind me I won't even remember what it's like to have a sore throat.
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