Re-Animator | Anatomy of a Franchise #6
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- čas přidán 7. 09. 2024
- In today's video, we are looking at the entire history of the Re-Animator story, starting with H.P. Lovecraft's Herbert West- Reanimator and going through the different film and comic book adaptations. Thanks for watching!
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Hey everybody! Thanks for watching the video, I hope you liked it. Two things I wanted to address real quick. Sorry if the video stuttering occasionally is distracting at any point in this. My computer really struggled with this one and I tried to fix it but there are still a few moments where the frames lag a bit. I'm getting a new computer soon though so hopefully that won't be an issue with any videos again in the future. Also I realized after I started uploading the video that my comments when I talk about The Shining might be taken as a slight jab against Doctor Sleep from last year which isn't the case. I really liked that movie and I thought the team paid respects to both King and Kubrick in that, I was just thinking of another highly revered classic horror film based on a great book. Thanks again, and hope you have a great rest of your weekend!
I just like to listen to your voice, I dont mind video stuttering
Anyone who pulls the ''Lovecraft was racist'' should not be making videos about Lovecraft. (just in case this gets pulled in this video)
Trevor Cormier it’s a huge sidetrack of the video and not what I tuned in to had to skip it.
@@HexyRuiz Right? I'm so excited that I now have a video to jam with. Starting the weekend right!
@ In Praise of Shadows Thanks!
Thanks a lot my friend. This message shows how much you respect all your suscribers and viewers 🖒🖒🖒
I love that Jeffery Combs' portrayal of West was so iconic that West went from blonde to dark haired practically overnight.
Lovecraft stated that he disliked this story, but Lovecraft said that about almost all his stories, especially about the relatively few that he actually made any money on. To me this is the result of his deep insecurity regarding his abilities.
Also, as much as Lovecraft made some long lasting impressions, he was also kind of an idiot about a lot of stuff.
Maybe he hated it because he saw it as a black sheep among the others.
Artists and people in creative works tend to be critical of their own work, it's never good enough
it's never "perfect" there's always flaws, and as the creator you know the flaws all too well
@Gasper Vidovic Lovecraft was overly critical of his own work in the wrong ways, and also super racist and not a little bit sexist. Hence, an idiot about a lot of stuff.
@Gasper Vidovic No, I don't think I will. No worries though, you can ignore it all you want.
herbert west is my man
dude has a reagent and is so petty and cryptic weird that he gives his normie roommate a jump scare and laughs at him after he reanimates the guy's cat. guy has just the right amount of overblown ego and sick sense of humor
"cat dead, details later"
He's just a weird little guy who loves to re-animate things. He can't NOT re-animate. It's his whole thing, babyyyy.
As a massive lovecraft fan i hate when people bitch about re animator, it’s usually people who have only read Cthulhu. It’s a fun ass story, not meant to be this deep cosmic adventure.
My ONLY problem with Reanimator is Lovecraft's racism shows when Herbert gets his hands on the "Boxer"...Cringe when I read that description....
@Nicholas Jewell
It really comes out of nowhere too it’s like “oh fun times! look at this funky science man doing science things- wait did they just call this man a monkey who should walk on all fours?” And then they just drop it and move on???
Lovecraft really said “let me just sprinkle in some casual racism, to add a little spice.”
@@Rose-ef2cm you really can't justify that addition
I think it's deeper than it gets credit for. The: "where have you been?" question posed to one reanimated corpse, and implications involved in light of the reanimated bodies' behavior is pretty heavy. What did death bring them in contact with? Or maybe this just is what a body acts like without a spirit?
@@orangeman3220 It's not so much about justifying it, it's about recognizing that it's there and either accepting it or moving on to another author. Is the quality of his stories worth having your 2021 sensibilities upset? If so, then take it all in as a part of the period in which these tales were written and enjoy them for what they are. If not, then there are plenty of modern authors that crank out comparable works without the parts that might offend you. Just don't try to censor Lovecraft himself, or pretend it isn't there. Personally I think that while these sorts of passages don't line up with my own way of thinking, I can read it as a story about someone who DOES think like that. Because those kinds of people were and still are around. Like it or not these kinds of things are a part of real life. "Fear of the other" will always be a thing, no matter how enlightened society thinks it has become, and it makes for some great horror.
Lovecraft critics: Lovecraft never describes anything! He just calls it "indescribable"
Lovecraft: here's 4 paragraphs on a frozen alien's morphology
In Praise of Shadows covering the Re-Animator franchise in a video that's almost the length of the first movie? Sign me up. I just can't get enough H.P. Lovecraft, Stuart Gordon, or Jeffrey Combs, but this certainly helps scratch that itch. Although hearing you say "this is a format I don't plan to re-use" does make me sad. The real deep dive is what many of these subjects deserve. I know videos like this are a tremendous amount of work that takes ages to complete, but it is the content that I crave. You do great work and I'd love to see more feature length type takes of similar subjects. So please reconsider doing more long form content. In a ocean of 10 minute to 20 minute videos that have all started to feel the same, content like this is a Leviathan among what I couldn't even call peers, as this simply goes so far beyond much of whats available on the platform.
I thought this was a pod cast, glad i clicked.
Jeffrey Combs plays a character called H.P. Hatecraft in the Scooby Doo cartoon "Mystery Inc" which is, by the way, very funny. There's a really fun episode where he co-guests with Harlan Ellison who's playing himself. Just thought you'd like to know, if you weren't already aware.
@@meursault7030 I haven't seen it, but I'll remedy that by the end of the day. Thanks for the heads-up! A little Jeffrey Combs makes any day better. I'm hoping we can get a Combs cameo in Doctor Strange 2 as a wink to the Dr Mordrid film from the early 90s that started out as a Doctor Strange movie. Since Rami is directing maybe Bruce Campbell can slide in there as well and I can finally die happy having seen Combs and Campbell together on screen.
@@jeremysmith4620 Wait, Sam Raimi's directing a Doctor Strange film? That's such a good idea! And yeah lol a Dr Mordrid nod would be sort of heartwarming. Hope you like Mystery Inc. The sense of Humour reminds me of Adventure Time sometimes.
@@meursault7030 Yep, Rami replaced Derrickson directing Doctor Strange 2, which should start shooting soon. I think Rami could be an inspired choice if he gives the film everything he's got. Seems like the perfect combination of IP/creatives/funding to deliver a really amazing film if the house of mouse let's them get weird and eldritch with the series.
Still waiting for that ReAnimator/Weekend at Bernie's crossover: Weekend at Dr. West's
Perfection.
That is probably what House of ReAnimator would have been in the first 45 minutes, I imagine.
A Marvel Zombies crossover would also be great: Marvel Zombies Re-Animated.
well watch bride of re-animator. they brought out the sunglasses and everything.
i feel that a lot of things that people don’t think that would translate well into a movie don’t think about animation as a vessel for horror, as it’s mostly considered for kids in the west by the mainstream. a lot of horror would be amazing as animated films, as the medium of animation can convey certain things that would be impossible in live action. not only that, but animation can be stylized in such a way to add to the horror or general mood of the movie. also, exaggerated movements and facial expressions that would be impossible in a live action film would be possible in animation, and using that to your advantage would be amazing for horror
Absolutely agree it's the most underrated medium of storytelling trump's live action.
@Connor O'Neal Scanlan That description is beautifully put, thank you for putting it in my life
totally dude, animated horror like courage the cowardly dog and old goofy horror comics are some of the reasons i love horror to this day. i would love to see heavy stylization combined with quality animation (why i was so excited for uzumaki oof)
Speaking upon horror being done in other mediums
I think junji itos horror manga is really fascinating and have more in common with h.p.s cosmic horror with much less problematic stuff
In terms of animation I really enjoy the series Yamishibai, which is an anthology series based on horror myths, urban legends, and various other inspirations, the low budget allows for this uncanny art style
Animated anthology horror series of adapted lovecraft stories. Quick, pitch it to Netflix, they need something!
Unpopular argument: Lovecraft's racism and life is a central and key tenent to why his body of work is as it is. Lovecraft spent most of his life in worry and fear. Growing up as a sickly child in Providence, Rhode Island, his childhood involved the loss of his grandmother and the gradual impoverishment of his once pseudo-aristocratic New England family. He was insular and bookish and only started to actually become social in the 1920's. Lovecraft's works often focus on the subject of civilizational ruin. This was inspired through his perceived views that American culture was being gradually eroded or corrupted by foreign immigrants be it Italians, the Irish, Africans or Chinese. Lovecraft was often afraid of anything he did not personally know or have familiarity with, he even wrote "Cool Air", a short story reflecting Lovecraft's personal dislike and sensitivity towards being cold.
Horror is almost always innately reactionary. By this, I mean that there is a new force or thing that is introduced into a previously undisturbed setting, and that new thing is intrinsically viewed as harmful. Lovecraft's highly conservative views on virtually everything coupled with his love of astronomy, ancient history and his fear of outsiders created the influential conditions that put him in the mindset to write cosmic horror. I do not agree with the modern idea that a writer who had controversial or unethical viewpoints during their life should be "distanced" from their own body of literary work. Because without the writer, you have no work. Without the work, the writer is not remembered as such. H. P. Lovecraft was and is both complicated and controversial. You can appreciate his writing style and subject matter and still disagree with his personal views on ethnicity, but you cannot deny that his views contributed to the work that you presently enjoy.
I don’t think this is unpopular really. I’ve thought this for years and it is tough to explain that yes he was unabashedly racist in a racist time but you gotta remember he was also scared of air conditioning lol
I agree.. I think he had quite a few mental disorders. I don't think they had actual treatment back then. When we consume any form of his work we are basically audience to the genius yet very hateful writings of an unwell man.
He can and does. Were it up to these up-yours he'd have been long "canceled" (oh, sweet proverbial Jesus, the horror) already.
Yeah, I don't think people with optimistic, humanistic, or "progressive" views can even make real cosmic horror. They can ape the aesthetics, styles and pretenses, but they can't pull it off. I'd go so far as to say it's culturally appropriative, since they come from such a radically different belief system.
@@ThatMans-anAnimal I disagree, I'd say that many of the people who you are referring to, the ones who want his works """cancelled""" today, have much of the same anxieties of different ways of life from their own that they are as perfectly poised to create cosmic horror as Howard. it just won't be about how other races are unimaginable scary beasts, it'll be how our social structures and the ones controlling them are unimaginable scary beasts.
I also think cosmic horror comes from a place of extreme anxiety and perhaps trauma, so that can come from literally anyone. the ability in of itself has nothing to do with politics.
Wow. You failed to mention the brilliant Eurobeat classic "Move Your Dead Bones" by Dr. Reanimator, making this the worst review of anything I have ever seen on CZcams. You should be absolutely ashamed of yourself.
I'm kidding. This video was as masterful as all your others, and I wholeheartedly appreciate the time, effort, and talent that went into it. You're a treasure, and I look forward to your next one!
Had me in the first half...
His work should be remembered and studied the same way history should, with context, knowing well of the ture evil that existed in the past...and that is important, remembering of the horrors of the past helps making them hard to occur again in the future
I mean, he was racist even by the context of his time. People just have to learn to deal with the fact that art can be great, immoral or not.
@@unluckytourist so how much have you studied the 20s? He was not exceptional. He live in the era just past ww1 when blacks couldnt be in shared units with white people until late in the war. Sports and schools were segregated. Blacks were commonly linched all across the us. It was common and normal at the to depict natives and black people as monsters non-ironically in adventure and melodrama. His position was very normal.
@@Huntanor His white contemporaries also lived in his time, the fact that they acknowledged that he was unusually vehement in his racism tells us enough about his character. His racism was disgusting, constant, and also stemmed from his own self-hatred, that's why it's important to view his work in context. You refer to black people as "blacks" and white people as " white people" in the same sentence, so you have experience in how racism can work its way into writing without explicit intent.
I think Lovecraft should (as with any artist) be remembered wholly. By that I mean we should remember what he did for horror fiction but also the horror of the man himself. You can acknowledge both his great influence on fiction and him being a racist bastard. As with any complex topic, every aspect of it should be considered. The good does not wash out the bad, nor the bad the good.
czcams.com/video/kOdBGg8-L20/video.html
Agreed. I think it be worse to ignore one part of this man or any creator, either positive or negative.
@@sep9365 *Sniffs long and good*
@@cannibalisticrequiem Right... Yer point?
It's hard for some people to deal with Lovecraft because it's not a case of separating the art and artist. His racist (even for his time) worldview is what shapes his work. It's like Robert Crumb - his art is great...and it's misogynistic etc. Art can't always be moral.
I met Jeffery Combs a few years back, we sat and talked about Re-Animator and The Frighteners for an hour or so. Stewart Gordon was also at the convention. We got to see one of the last few standard film format cuts of the Re-Animator movie with them in the theater. They spoke on lots of topics. I've always loved the movie but that cemented it as a great movie in my opinion. This video is awesome.
23:15 I really don't see any defensible arguments for the idea that we should go so far as to try purging an author from memory, especially when they're already dead.
Agreed, we can't alter history and ignore him altogether; the context from which his writings, in their entirety, emerged are as important as the writings themselves to understanding that time period, and the subsequent trajectory of such ideas, the good and the bad
Especially that at the end he changed most of his views
Yup. Also, I find the idea that we should purge the past of people that don't fit modern sensibilities an act of unmitigated arrogance. The way that modern people instantly puff out their chests & say "I would have never done that!" is as heinous as the views of the people they try to criticize. In praise of shadows' continual harping on this stuff is not only extremely arrogant, but lacks self-reflection & context of the era. Instead of going out of his way to point from his unearned moral high ground & find excuses as to why every instance of racism needs to be focused on, condemned & stepped on in righteous judgement to push himself ever morally higher, he should focus on what is universal about the work & take what is great about it. The modern focus on his racism is idiotic. We get it, he was racist, it sucks. It requires a minor mention, & a very occasional discussion in context. People need more Jungian shadow refection. they aren't as good as they think they are.
@@draskang Seriously. If you were born in 1890 to the family that Lovecraft was born into, living in his hometown, surrounded by the people that he was surrounded by...$100 says you'd be a racist too. I grew up with a religious family who were also racists, and broke away after high school. I know firsthand how easy it is to be convinced of wrong beliefs simply because it's the only world I knew for a long time. I don't begrudge people for the "crime" of wrongthink unless they are fully aware that what they believe is evil and they choose to believe it anyway, and it's shameful how a lot of people today act like anyone who didn't manage to overcome that or never had the chance to understand a different philosophy was somehow an irredeemable piece of shit.
Yeah this shit aggravates me.
Lovecraft had some things about him that would make him sort of a shithead by modern standards. Sure it was a little much even by the standards of the time but you have to remember that the guy was incredibly neurotic and afraid of almost anything 'other'. It was kind of his brand.
Sure it makes reading a few of his stories somewhat uncomfortable today but he is an important part of literary history and shouldn't be purged just because he retroactively irks people.
I think one thing Lovecraft apologists fail to grasp it's the fact that there is a line that can be traced between "acceptable" and "unacceptable" in the things you do, and saying "he is someone from his time" just don't work anymore. This line can easily be placed around the thought "am I doing something to somehow harm or inflict any suffering in someone?" Lovecraft and those people know exactly what they where doing and they shouldn't be excused. One thing people can do to make things better is work "around" the myth (by avoiding showing him like this "magnificent mind that people just couldn't understand") or even "rework" the mythos he writed itself.
That said terrific video as always! Have been binge watching your channel this quarentine and loving your work.
The care and passion in the making of these videos is always so apparent. I can't think of any other creator on this platform whose hour-long video I would gladly watch every second of.
Acknowledging Lovecraft's flaws should indeed be done. The man loathed everybody, including himself, but he loathed some people more than others in ways that should never be condoned. To single him out for it is not entirely fair, as variations of his prejudices were common all over the world, even by those who claimed such things were supported by science. Lovecraft was but one outspoken example of where the world was at the time, and while that is certainly no excuse for prejudice, to place too much focus on him is a form of scapegoating. He wrote despicable, prejudicial things, it is true,; it is also true that other prejudicial people - of all different types - were led by their similar prejudices to commit atrocities far worse than anything Lovecraft ever did in his lifetime.
I think it's also unfair to view Lovecraft as *only* a bigot fixed in his ways. He may have been antisemitic, but he was married to a Jewish woman named Sonia Greene. It ended after two years, and Lovecraft was known to get upset when someone pointed out this contradiction in his life, but most accounts suggest that he really did love her. I also challenge the idea that was misogynistic, as I recall the documentary LOVECRAFT: FEAR THE UNKNOWN stated that he was supportive of female writers, including Greene. Perhaps he was not a first, second, or third wave feminist, but that alone does not equate to misogyny. One can also deduce a subtle shift in his later work where the Eldritch creatures are viewed with a bit more respect, which some have suspected indicates that his prejudices were beginning to wither. Had he lived longer (i.e., through World War II), might he have changed completely? I won't pretend to have an answer for that, but the war changed many things, so the possibility remains. It would also be a mistake to ignore how traumatizing Lovecraft's childhood was, and how greatly that affected his outlook.
As to the question you raise about whether or not Lovecraft should be buried and forgotten because of his prejudices, the answer must be "No". It can only be "No".
On the one hand, to bury and forget is a mistake. Such things should never be forgotten, because that inevitably leads to people repeating the mistakes of the past. That's not productive in any way, so forgetting Lovecraft and his work entirely would solve nothing, and only make things worse in the long run.
On the other hand, while there is no denying that Lovecraft was a hateful man (even with everything else considered), there is also no denying that practically every author, every entertainer...heck, every *person* has, at some point, said or done something terrible, even if only once. Sure, we can rationalize censoring the likes of Lovecraft or Roman Polanski because of that they said or did, but where does it end? That which is considered offensive seems to change every day, and even the most innocuous of things have been targeted for cancellation on grounds of being offensive. What good does any of it do? Does it bring about understanding? Does it satisfy the people who called for the target's destruction? Does anybody really learn anything from it? Or does it only serve to muddy the waters, obfuscate whatever genuine points might be made, and divide people along lines which did not exist between them before?
The way I see it, if anything can be deemed offensive, no one is safe from cancellation, and the end of that road leads only to emptiness.
Acknowledge that Lovecraft had flaws. Acknowledge that Lovecraft's flaws came from somewhere. Acknowledge that Lovecraft's flaws were not exclusive to Lovecraft, or even the culture he was raised in. Acknowledge that that Lovecraft had good qualities as well as bad. Acknowledge his influence on popular fiction.
But never, EVER even so much as entertain the idea that he should be stricken from the public eye, not unless you're ready to do that for every entertainer with closet skeletons, and you're ready to accept the void that will be left when there's no one left to censor.
Omni Viewer well said. Unfortunately it is fashionable these days to jump on the racism bandwagon so most people are not going to be willing to acknowledge some of the great points u make here.
Edward Bruggeman sadly the liberals have been taking over media rn and pulling that card on anyone who dares challenge their beliefs
@@XSlimSxadyX too true
How dare you defy the Social Justice Inquisition!!
jk, if you couldn't tell. These are all valid points.
I find lovecraft more pitiable than repugnant as a person to be honest. He was afraid of absolutely everything, insecure about himself, and generally just a wreck of a person.
Please please please do a video on the history of horror in theatre! The Grand Guignol is so weird and interesting and more people deserve to know about it!
I saw a night of the living dead production at a local theatre and it was surprisingly terrifying
There's too much of genuine quality and intrigue in Lovecraft's work for throwing it all out to be justifiable, in my opinion. Yes, he was a very shitty person, yes, his racism bleeds into his work in a way that's detrimental to their overall quality, but it's not as if his racism is pervasive enough to make everything he's written unreadable. Especially since he's no longer alive to profit off of support for his works, I don't think there's anything wrong with remembering and discussing his works in a positive light. The racist and overall hateful aspects of them should always be acknowledged, but I don't think they should dominate every conversation about Lovecraft's stories. If we completely threw out his works because of who he was, then a lot of quality works inspired by or even directly adapting his stories probably wouldn't exist, and I think that'd be a shame as well.
I think any functional human being is able to see past that and can appreciated the art beyond the shitty parts.
Me and my sister deal with this by joke worshipping the gods that represented what he hated and feared
@@tomasponizil5498 See, now this is how you go about doing things.
But do you not see the exact same racist and hateful themes being woven into modern entertainment and social media, by modern creators? It is as clear as day that the exact same ignorance of the time is being perpetrated in today’s media. Just look at racially charged and extreme feminist works and, for the love of god, Twitter. And none of the terrible, ignorant people doing the same thing today invented Dagon or Cthulhu
@@OldManDoom That's entirely besides the point. Yes, there are still shitty and racist people making shitty and racist things, but I'm not saying that those things don't exist at all anymore. My point is that you can still appreciate Lovecraft's work while acknowledging it's harmful aspects. You *should* do that, actually. It makes us more aware of the problematic aspects in the media we consume while still allowing us to appreciate the merits they do have. I'm also saying that goes doubly for the work of someone like Lovecraft, who, unlike other harmful authors like one Johanna Rowling, is no longer alive to profit off of his work, meaning that there's no way to financially support him or platform him any longer.
I've been thinking all day about an interesting detail you noted, how every adaptation of "Reanimator" has either an assistant character, or Herbert West pursuing an assistant. This could just be because "oh, well this version had an assistant, so we must ALWAYS have an assistant," but I think there's something more to it. Herbert West is this...deeply selfish and narcissistic character, but also a rather isolated one. His positive interactions with other characters are slim to basically non-existent, even when it comes to the assistant -- be they Dan Cain, or practically anybody else -- but, he keeps them around anyhow. Even begs for them to stay at times. I think this comes from a place of either deep loneliness or the idea that the self can only shine when observed by others as splendorous, either or is very likely. However, it's also presents a kind of "positive trait" to the audience, one of the few he may have. The idea he ISN'T entirely self-sufficient, and knows this well enough that he's prepared for it, not to mention the idea that there are people actually WILLING to spend time with this absolutely wretched twink in the first place. I don't know what the right answer may be, or if there are others that I haven't thought of, but I think it's an interesting idea at least!
"there are people actually willing to spend time with this wretched twink in the first place" put this on my tombstone
Zombie President: Are you a bad enough dude to reanimate the president?
In reality? Hell no! The world doesn't need any more politicians.
In fiction? Absolutely YES for the sake of unimaginable horror! 💗
SPOILER ALERT: This part gets political. If you do not want to read politics, stop here. YE HAVE BEEN WARNED.
I'm not sure I'd have based the president on Bush. I despised Bush when he was in office, but having lived to see a President Trump... suddenly Bush doesn't look as bad as he once did. A truly terrifying thought when you realize that maybe some day, we'll have one horrid enough to make Trump look better, too. 😱😵😱
No, most career politician's regardless of political party, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, gender and IQ are far too vile to reanimate.
Sadly we've got one hellacious problem on our hands.
Now back to the video.
Only if I get a cheeseburger made from zombie cow.
Lovecraft was a contradictory, hypocritical man in his life who only toward the end started seeing the error of his ways, he ended up moving to areas where he couldn't simply ignore his beliefs now that he would have to live among st minorities of the time and married a Jewish woman. He never totally disavowed of his beliefs, but at that stage in his life he was becoming increasingly sickly and his wife and him agreed to an amicable divorce and separated after 2 years so he was also alone. He was very troubled. He grew up on literature of his Grandfathers estate that was considered old and antiquated when he was reading it as a child and dealt with a mother who treated him less than poorly. I would like to think if his health hadn't declined and he'd managed to start actually getting paid for his work, he might have really made a change of heart. But he didn't and we can only look back and judge him retroactively.
That's the problem with constantly calling a long dead man a racist by only viewing his literature and writings. They are LOCKED to a specific point in time, there's no wiggle room and we can't be there along with him for the ride to see why he thought what he did. I will never defend his opinions because they will never NOT be racist and upsetting, either in past or present, but I will always defend his *Fiction* and his right to write it. I can read his stories with little to no issue. Part of that is his somewhat difficult to understand writing style and word choice and part of it is because I can take those inherently racist descriptions and story beats and turn them on themselves, choosing to view it as something strange and different instead of something inherently racist. I try viewing it not from a hateful, bigoted mindset but from a curious "what if bloodlines and lineage really worked like that?" point of view.
Yeah people with good upbringings dont typically turn out to be racist. The guy was probably frustrated and self conscious. People like that shouldnt be shunned they need help.
You say we shouldn't judge a man based on one point in time, but in the same breath say we should think about how he *could* have changed if given the chance? That doesn't make sense. And saying that you try to look at his deeply racist depictions and think basically, what if that racist remark is actually correct in-universe? That mindset is just denying reality while trying to keep yourself comfortable as a reader, and I really hope you think back on this perspective you're arguing for. Those of us who are targets of his racism, misogyny and homophobia cannot take this perspective, why? because his words and actions have hurt us specifically, and directly. Even if he lived to regret his actions, that still wouldn't change the fact that he DID inject hate and bigotry in his writing, and living to feel bad about it wouldn't have erased the harm he has done. I'm saying this as someone who loves cosmic horror and Lovecraftian work, but I think we can enjoy it while not denying or ignoring what a hateful man he was.
Exactly. I hate when everyone fails to admit Lovecraft started to turn around later in life and just dig up his corpse for the 500th public flogging. And calling Lovecraft a monster when there are currently people doing far, far worse things than writing mean things in a story is idiotic.
True, but we can’t really make assumptions about what he would’ve done if his life didn’t suck. His work is still filled with a lot of racist remarks and comments. We can’t just ignore those aspects of his work, since that is what he wrote and thought at the time. There is an argument for looking at it from your viewpoint, but A LOT of his work encompassing the concepts of fear of the unknown are very much in line to his fear of other races and people in general, not just his disgust or hatred of sea animals. lol It’s sadly all connected, but you have a point about judging people from the past with modern sensibilities without any nuance or context.
@@burtbiggum499 I feel pretty much exactly the same way. We know for a fact he had a mother that was fairly domineering and that was almost it entirely for family other than a Grandfather who I believe passed away very early in his life and some aunts or friends of his mother. He had little-to-no social circle until he was an adult and even then it was strained at best by long-distance correspondence. All that time alone,growing up like he did and with all that old outdated literature from his grandfathers library, is anyone surprised he grew up thinking of other people in the ways he did? It's a breeding ground for that kind of mindset and it only let him further enforce his personal beliefs because he had NOBODY to challenge them or explain why he was wrong.
The first Re-Animator movie will ALWAYS be the best! And one of the most beloved horror films of the decade! I consider Jeffrey Combs as THE definitive Herbert West! He portrayed the character SO WELL! And his acting was magnificent! I love em in other films! But this is the film where I'll always remember him for! This is one of those films the more times I watch it, the better it gets! Great retrospective on the film, man! And on the author H.P Love Lovecraft! You deserve A LOT of praise for this video! :)
Despite the shortcomings of his work from his racist ideas, I believe H.P Lovecraft is an author to be remembered for ages.
Lovecraft and his work will be remeberd forever.
@@schizzo8959 as long as the printers keep running
Eat the chicken spit out the bones.
The only reason I know about Herbert West is because there was that weird horror crossover fighting game. Herbert West vs Pinhead
Ah yes, Terrordrome
Jesus gonna weep lol
The one thing I love the most about West in the original 85 Re-Animator is that although West is clearly a man without a moral compass and a classic archetype of the mad scientist, it's interesting in that he ends up actually almost coming off as, I think, an anti-hero. There's two things that really elevate this thought for me.
For one, the original film shows him shedding a tear when he's affronted by Hill and told that his work was 'brilliant.' I never interpreted this purely as an egoistic statement - rather, that West is showing a moment of humanity. By being told that his work mattered and opening for just a brief moment it underscored a plethora of depth he potentially keeps locked up inside, never showing because he's been ritualistically shunned for his work.
Another element, although more banal but more easily evident and accountable is the sense that Hill is quite obviously a far more sinister and ego driven character than West overall. At the end, it's so easy to root for West as he slings snide snark and contempt at the headless doctor.
That aside, I realize my first point may not necessarily hold water as its totally subjective and, again, West is shown to be purely curiosity driven in the film with a wicked sense of humor. Subtlety may not be West's forte. But I don't think anybody would root against West. He's just too damn charismatic :D
Since I'm early, I just wanna say that your channel is one of my favorites and you're so goddamn underrated. Keep up the amazing work.
Ditto
Kinda surprised that the homoeroticism of the movie adaptation, and the strange book retelling of the movie, was not addressed at all.
i had this exact thought!
I know! I only found out about THROUGH hearing LGBT people online talking about the movie. Especially the second one.
I guess the "homo-eroticism" was lost on me. I remember seeing a naked man. That's about it. Not sure how you're stretching that to suit this idea though.
Dan C we’re talking about dan and herbert’s entire relationship. there’s a point in bride of reanimator where herbert literally hands daniel a human heart, there’s plenty to read into in that one action- let alone everything else that happened in both films previously.
@@cherry-bk2yr I mean I've watched the films and I'm just not seeing it. I don't thinking handing him a heart is necessarily a homo-erotic thing. I took it more like an illustration of how callous Herbert was. You gotta give me some more examples than that.
Lovecraft should be remembered for his work. Discussing his racism and issues is completely valid but trying to ignore his contributions is just ignoring history. We can't let ourselves whitewash the history of horror to make it more palatable. We need to accept it and learn from it in both what makes horror great and how it can be improved.
@@sep9365 I've heard leftist white girls equating racism to paedophilia before. They must be teaching this in colleges. If you have a different view on race, you're the worst thing imaginable to them.
Lovecraft's racism I actually find legitimately fascinating even if I obviously can never condone it. It doesn't come from a place of racial superiority but rather, as reflective of his protagonists, from a genuine fear of the unknown. To him, it seems like other races are not inferior primitive people to be conquered or exterminated for their own sake but rather an unknowable encroaching force that man is powerless to stop.
@@chrisossu2070 Agreed and I think it's probably connected to his Asperger's.
IMO, all the people that bitch and moan about Lovecraft being racist would probably be racist themselves or anyway apathetic towards the well being of non-white people if they lived in the same era he lived in.
Those people should go out and help those in need who suffer real racial injustice, because they aren't accomplishing anything or helping anyone by shitting on a dead guy who had a crappy life for the millionth time.
DeepEye1994 like people then were racist, fucking accept it and move on. It was a long time ago and the man is dead lol
Honestly felt blessed when I saw this in my feed.
This guy makes some good stuff
Same
You felt rejuvenated
Maybe even
Reanimated
That's nice I felt a kind of nostalgia for the past
On Lovecraft's Racism: "I honestly don't know the answer to if he should be remembered in literary history for his creations or not."
*Makes over three hours of content about HP Lovecraft*
IDK man, actions speak louder than words, that fact that you've dedicating this much time to talking about him is probably a sign that you think he's worth remembering lol. Honestly, it just sounds like you feel guilty about loving his work, and are trying to atone for that by attacking him. I feel like I'm sitting in a confession booth listening to it.
As for my opinion on him descending to be forgotten
No horrible people are good as examples of what not to be it’s like forgotten hitler ignorance leads to a cycle
I’d also question him on adaptations criticizing the racism what is there to criticize it’s common knowledge it bad behavior
Thank you. Channels like yours are the reason why I watch CZcams.
And why I feel like it's going to surpass traditional tv type media on real introspectives on pop/movie/book history
Though it may be an incredibly overwhelming task, I do hope you one day complete a history of Dracula. I think this challenge, combined with your own fervor for the project, will give rise to your greatest work. Don't give up on it!
Amazing video as always. I'd love to see your take on a more modern horror franchise like Final Destination or Wrong Turn at some point. Wrong Turn specifically has potential for some really interesting commentary about how cannibalism's symbolism has changed from an anti-aristocratic class metaphor to a means of demonizing the poor for living in poor conditions. Just an idea. Can't wait to see what you have planned next!
Thanks! Yeah both of those will almost definitely be in this series at some point down the road. I know Rob Schmidt who directed the first movie actually has said that he wants to be on the channel to talk, so I might have him on in that video to talk about starting the franchise and how that worked out. We will have to see though, I don’t know yet quite what that would look like or how I would do that. Love both of those franchises though and look forward to working with them some here.
@@InPraiseofShadows I disagree with your notion that horror is about love and empathy. It can be but to limit to that is reductionist. There are so many thoughts and imaginings that aren't about love and empathy but why is that disturbing? Disturbing thoughts can be made into art or entertainment... do they always have to be turned into love and empathy? That seems to limit the human spirit. That doesn't mean I think HP Lovecraft's hatred is cool or even alright. I wouldn't want to think like him! We have to stop being so judgmental if we are to understand our existence. We are all potentially monsters. We're interested in that part of our nature. Interest in it allows us to understand it. Some people that are so disturbed and are able to write it down... well that helps us understand ourselves. We don't have to forgive them if we don't judge and condemn them for thought crimes.
Lovecraft definitely should be remembered everyone saying otherwise is Dumb. His work is way to important and influential
And about his racism in his later life he was ashamed and regretted his views. It shouldn't be ignored but calling him a Monster is too much.
This is like a Ted Talk for Horror fans! Thank You for this epic video essay.
15:00 hard disagree, i hate this rhetoric of lovecraft not describing things, its just blatantly false. Everyone who says this should be forced to read the two page spread of scientific descriptions for the Elder Things in the mountains of madness, or the dry deep dive into the Yithians from shadow out of time. The fear he chooses to present comes from the implications that these stories show us, not that he "doesn't describe things"
I think ppl say this bc they are comparing him to his contemporaries and also the authors that followed him.
If you put him next to Hemingway there is a ton of adjectives
But compared to other early horror he is rather clipped.
Also the passage you mentioned is an outlier and I think the video is right in a way:
The implications are more frightening than an explicit and detailed description and it sets lovecraft apart in a good way.
It is a mistake to separate the mythos from the style of the narration.
Well said.
mmm actually yeah you're absolutely right about that last part, very well said.
I'm sure I remember he goes both ways in that story. He describes the Elder Things but during the escape scene the narrators companion is shocked by something he will not speak of, ever.
He definitely describes the Fungi from Yuggoth and some other things.
Most people never have and never will actually read anything he wrote. They just repeat what they hear other people say
This was a great video. I didn’t even know Re-animator was an H.P Lovecraft novel. I just really think of the 80s movie. I bought a Kindle book of his complete works but I haven’t read it yet. I may start soon.
Thanks, I hope you like him! I love a lot of his stuff but it takes a while to get into. I didn’t like his work at all at first. I would recommend Shadow Over Innsmouth, it’s definitely my favorite of his but most of his stories are strong in their own way I think.
Here's a parallel that I am surprised to never hear: 1985 ReAnimator and The Brain That Wouldn't Die.
I love the Brain That Wouldn't Die. I always felt the final creature was the inspiration for Sloth from The Goonies.
I think something that people who dislike acknowledging Lovecraft's bigotry is that they assume that means that it's something that they can no longer enjoy, thus why the most common response is to invoke death of the author. Ignore the creator for the sake of the work. To be fair, if looking only to consume a work of media then one can take any approach they desire and nothing can be said against or in support of it because that's their choice. However, I would argue that using death of the author to ignore certain aspects of a media when it comes to in depth analysis is disingenuous at best and defensive at worst. If you're analyzing a work, taking everything into account is important so that there is the most information for any given reading. Also, I would argue that even using death of the author, that only means that the author does not decide what their work means. They are still the one who made it, and their ideas can still influence how the work says things. The snippet from Re-Animator here works well to this end. Even if we don't care what Lovecraft has to say about the story, a racist man wrote a character writing about witnessing something, and that character has racist views. All that said, I'm personally happy to consume Lovecraft and Lovecraft-adjacent works because I think that it has interesting ideas and he's dead so he can't benefit, and also enjoy talking about how Lovecraft's bigotry influenced the works, and how that aspect is addressed or ignored in adaptations and how it is interpreted or subverted in inspired works. Like how Annihilation ignores the bigotry but keeps the hate and fear but turns it inward, fear of betrayal by your own body and the end of your life. Or how The Shape of Water makes the hate the villain of the story and turns your sympathy towards the visibly monstrous. Cool video
Lovecraft’s works would be a great way to explore perspectives and power structures. After all, in an age of European, Christian empire, what’s scarier than a bunch of real gods popping up and allying with the people you colonize and exploit?
The "where have you been?" aspect of this story is the most disturbing aspect to me as well. Is the body even inhabited by the same "spirit" as when it was alive, or did something else come back? Maybe they just went mad from where they had been in death?
I've always said it is the greatest testament to the brilliant creativity of Lovecraft's works that we can praise them even with his horribly racist attitudes. In a lesser author, these works would have been tossed aside long ago.
As a someone of Afro-Caribbean heritage, I do appreciate your acknowledgment & condemnation of Lovecraft’s “racism”. But it all has to be contextualised as a snapshot of thought & opinion of a certain kind of person at a certain time. William Golding, Rohld Dahl, Mark Twain etc Are all guilty of the same.
But with Lovecraft, you just have to admire the pure poetic eloquence of his racism 😄 If he said these things to my face. I wouldn’t know whether to be offended or given him a round of applause.
I am too of Afro-Caribbean heritage and I wouldnt feel bothered if i read all of Lovecraft's hate comments, reading his work is just looking at the past and all of that carries.
I feel similarly being of mixed (mostly Nigerian) heritage. His racism always struck my as awful, but from the pov that he's quite a pathetic person. You'd have to be to write about POC in the way he did and it adds color (pun intended) to dissection of his character.
The most important thing to remember is to not speak over or ignore what POC have to say about it.
This is pathetic , coming from someone with a similar background
Yes, Lovecrafts racism is an issue, but in the given time it was a common sentiment. I don't believe that his work should be forgotten because of it. I tend to ignore it because it's detached from the current era. I don't like it, but it is what it is.
Honestly it wasn't that much of a common sentiment at the time, as Lovecraft was unusually racist even by the standards of his day. A good example of this is how the story of "The Shadow Over Innsmouth," in which a man discovers that he is descended from a horrible species of murderous alien fish-people, was inspired by Lovecraft's own discovery that he was one-sixteenth Welsh. Not even non-white, hell not even Irish, just Welsh. We have letters that were written to him by extremely racist people of the era telling him that he should maybe tone down the racism a tad bit.
Though it is interesting to note that near his death he did become somewhat introspective about his views on race and begin to realize that how he viewed others was a problem with himself rather than with those people, though I'm not sure how much his worldview had actually changed by the time he died.
I would love someone to write a story not only addressing his racism, but writing it into the story as him being an unreliable narrator, or his characters. Maybe tell the stories from the perspective of someone else from the story? It would be a great exercise in perspective.
@@spiritxdancer Many years ago, in the late 80s, I remember a friend of mine lending me a trashy paperback where the Nazis tried to recruit HPL to produce propoganda to keep the USA out of WW2.
It wasn't very good lol.
Dude Re-Animator is my favorite horror franchise, I'm so happy you covered it!
Ah man, I'd love to see Guillermo Del Toro remake the Re-animinator but I really wish he would finally make At the mountains of madness. I know he wanted to make some years back but the studio decided against it due to Ridley Scott making Prometheus and I guess the stories were too similar for them. Ive never seen Prometheus so I don't know just how similar they are... if at all.
I originally found out about the re-animator from browsing around tumblr on posts about people thirsting over horror movie villains and I came across the name Herbert West. Not recognizing the name I looked around Tumblr and found the movie title, I ended up watching the movies and loving them.
This is easily my favorite channel on this whole site. Every video is amazing. Keep up the fantastic work, my man.
Almost everyone thought the way Lovecraft did. That was the norm for thousands of years. Believing everyone is the same is strange if you consider it on a timeline.
No.
Yes
@@calwere no it isn't, it is a well known fact that lovecraft was considered racist even for his time.
I'm from Louisiana and I approve of your rant on the people of New Orleans. And I agree; it is racist and also classist. Thank you for talking about that and all the issues inherent to discussing Lovecraft.
This video introduced me to Re-Animator which has since become of of my favorite movies
I remember in Lovecraft documentary i watched ages ago, said that in his later years he actually eased off the racism and explored the world more before his death. Is that true i was i lied to?
Yes, he was growing as a person and exposing himself more to the world.
I think he got better, and by the standerds back then he probably wasnt racist towards the end of his life, but by today's standerds he was still racist.
I deeply respect and appreciate your look into authors and creators from the perspective of how their bigotry, experiences, or personal lives bleed into their work, and how it's worth measuring. If you have others saying you shouldn't, I think that's missing a big point of art as an exercise.
I have mixed feelings about the "separate art from artists" argument, because as an artist and writer I know objectively that art is a product from an artist, and will always be influenced by who they are and what they believe, even if they say it isn't. It's kind of just a fact of art; you aren't making "something from nothing", you're consciously and unconsciously shaping fiction from your personal reality. And I can't help but notice that, in most cases, "separate art from artists" only ever benefits the comfort of the reader/ watcher and the perceived value of the author as a non-person, which serves to relinquish responsibility to be critical from both parties.
If you're making intellectual essays examining the horror genre, why would you purposely avoid the topic of the creator? Would the same argument be made in the case of a totally unproblematic creator? Probably not, because it wouldn't be difficult to hear, it wouldn't make fans want to be defensive, to excuse the thing that they like. I feel like this is the fallacy of the "separate art from artists" argument; acknowledgement of a problematic creator doesn't -ruin- a piece of art, it only introduces a huge swath of information and context to that art. And yes, it might re-contextualize it. It might make you uncomfortable. It might even make you question your enjoyment of the art. But all of that is valuable, because knowledge is valuable. Examination of creators is vital to fully understanding fiction, and I'm very appreciative that you take the time to do so.
sorry for the wall of text!! I just wanted to say as much after listening to 24:00 ! I'm working my way through your library and definitely want to join your patreon!
They might as well use it as the next excuse to bring back Jason Voorhees. I'd watch that crossover.
Oh ye
I detest the modern obsession with reducing every person to their worst characteristics. We can reject aspects of a person or work of art and still appreciate other aspects.
I VEHEMENTLY disagree that memoryholing Lovecraft and his work and influence is a valid idea to consider.
It isn't valid, its maniacal
I just cannot get enough of your videos. You are one of the most criminally underrated CZcamsr on this platform. Your content is amazing and I love this channel. Thank you for hours of entertainment.
THANK YOU FOR MAKING THIS VIDEO! This is one of my favorite tales/ movie series. Stuart Gordon(RIP) and Brian Yuzna did an amazing job bringing the story to "life".
I saw Beyond Re-Animator at a film festival back in the day. Brian Yuzna was there to say a few words after the movie. He absolutely loved that getting public funding for films wasn't dictated by genre in Spain.
Love the art not the artist. Regardless, remember they have changed the world. Monsters who did a good thing.
The author should stay dead, in this case.
The words "Kanye West, Reanimator" delt like 50 points of psychic damage. I love it.
"Lovecraft is problematic" starts at 21:54, and ends at 25:13. In case anyone has heard this before and wants to skip.
Thank you
Yes, appreciate that. I tapped out at 22 min.
This guy has some crazy cognitive dissonance going on.
Thank you for letting us skip the same info and condemnation we have heard a dozen times before.
A little crowd of racists gathered here under this comment. Gross.
I was just looking this up the other day, actually, it seems the story 'Call of Cthulu' hasn't yet passed into public domain (thanks Disney) but the character of Cthulu is certainly free use. There may be a few other Lovercraft stories that aren't public yet either, I can't remember for certain.
The thing about Lovecraft is that he was a very big advocate of people borrowing his works. Even during his lifetime his group of pen pals and himself would borrow ideas and characters from each other. It could almost be considered as an early creative commons license the way they treated it.
In a way, I think Lovecraft would've liked how anyone can now read his books, and how writers and artists have been using aspects of his work for years now. I think he also wouldvd been ecstatic about inspiring other horror writers, just as he was inspired by Poe and others.
Society is incredible. One of my favorite body horror movies.
27:48 "I think an important distinction to make on if a story is inspired by Frankenstein or Reanimator, is the presence of an injection."
I have to disagree. While that may be a distinction, it's hardly the core difference between the two.
Reanimator explores the concept of bringing someone back to life, where Frankenstein is more about creating life. After all, Frankenstein's monster is not any specific individual revived from the dead, but instead a creation made from many different body parts, from many different bodies.
Re: the racism, I think you're overlooking its importance in his work. He specialized in examining fear of 'the other', of the 'unknown'. His xenophobia is integral to these explorations. You can dislike him, but his stories reveal insights into how and why human being fear and hate that which is different. To throw away his work in condemnation is like throwing away a vaccine out of contempt for patients being weak enough to succumb to the disease.
He isn't exactly eloquent about his hatred like your pitch'd claim, what intelligent dissection is there in him throwing in stock terms like comparing a black person to a gorilla? Get over yourself.
@@abbynormal2210 I'm not claiming that Lovecraft was attempting to expose his own racism. I'm saying that his fear of people unlike himself is directly connected to his approach to story-telling, and if you want to understand his mindset (as opposed to just suppressing it) you need to look at how it operates.
The difference is between pretending racism doesn't exist (the PC approach that's been utterly unsuccessful for the past several decades) or to actually look at how xenophobia finds expression to understand it.
You can write about the fear of the unknown without resorting to racism and antisemitism. It was possible long before Lovecraft was born, and it's still possible now.
You are honestly one of the top reviewers and analytical content creators on CZcams
If you want a more accurate story, look at the HPLHS audio drama, “Dark Adventure Radio Theatre” and it’s episode is the same as the Lovecraft story, “Herbert West - Re-Animator”. If you want to listen to it, it’s a pretty nice and (more or less) accurate story done by fans of Horror.
That’s my favorite! It’s done so well
Yessss, you finally updated! The amount of work and dedication that goes into these videos is well worth the wait.
As a New Orleans native, and having set a semi-lovcraftian novel there... THANK YOU!
I honestly love the fact that there is a Reanimator musical. It just is something that appeals to me and only me.
Thank you for making this video. In recent times I've been unfortunately hit with a bad bout of writers block, discarding several started scripts before they even reach five pages. As of yesterday I'm 13 pages in on an adaptation of Herbert West: Reanimator purely from this video. Thank you
i'm from the future!! army of darkness versus reanimator is currently being re-written and now sports the subtitle "necronomicon rising"! it's really an amazing series and has ash and herbert going to the future to stop herbert west there after he perfects his reagent with the power of the necronomicon! amazing video! thank you!
Superb work man. I'm a huge fan of Re-Animator too, it almost made cry tears of pure nightmarish horror.
Interestingly the part of the zombie re-burying itself reminds me of a CZcams animation by Lumpy Touch about Mario of all things. After worm-mario breaks out of an egg he starts yelling "Put me back! I'm not done!"
Oh my goodness, your anatomies are super killer… I subbed when I saw the tremors one… I had recently seen the first reanimator so I am super stoked to see what you have to say over the whole IP
It's the dream I never knew I was chasing. Thank you so much in praise of shadows, I hope somebody loves you
I'm honestly getting tired of the Lovecraft bad cycle. It's like every time anyone wants to talk about his work, especially in a good light, they have to pay the toll by decrying his racism ad nauseum. Pretty much any historical figure won't hold up to modern values so I think is silly to do so to begin with. I'm not saying people shouldn't adress it where relevant but it really has become so tiring every time anything even tangentially related to lovecraft is discussed online. I'm not refering specifically to you but it specially makes me angry when people borrow extreme heavily or even outright leech off of his work while spitting on his grave for holding views most held at the time. Anyway, great work, keep it up dude!
You're tired of people decrying racist writings? The people who are the targets of racism are tired of the racism itself, but there's no escape from it. And while such racist views were more acceptable at the time, we cannot let them go unacknowledged as we attempt to right the wrongs of the past. Besides all this, the passage that was read in this video was from the original Reanimator story, so a full breakdown of the story and its subsequent adaptations involves analyzing every aspect. It has been brought up where relevant. Would you prefer facts be left out of this analysis? I think he was a brilliant horror author, but he had some sadly misguided views, and as much as it sucks to talk about, we can't afford to ignore them
Here's how you deal with problematic favs such as Lovecraft. Whenever they are mentioned in any kind of analytical capacity, you must acknowledge their problematic viewpoints and behaviors. You can't assume everyone participating in the discussion or watching the video is aware of their bigotry because new people discover new IP's every single day. What we shouldn't do is cancel or edit their work. People need to read it and experience it for themselves to form their own opinions about the creator. If a creator is dead, there's not much you can do. If a creator is alive, like JK Rowling, you can absolutely pressure corporations not to do business with her. That's your right as a human being to protest and boycott creators you find morally objectionable. No one can stop JK Rowling from writing or publishing a novel, but you can raise awareness, petition stores not to sell her books, etc.
I hate Harlan Ellison as a human being. He's a misogynist pig who despises women and sees them as sub-human. But he's also a brilliant sci-fi writer. I have to reconcile my hatred of him with the quality of his work. I grew up listening to Lostprophets. When I was an adult, the lead singer was arrested for raping children. I'll never deny he's a worthless sub-human, but I won't let him ruin music I enjoy. I won't let problematic creators ruin the things I enjoy, but I also won't pretend they aren't horribly problematic people. I think it's important to analyze and discuss media to introduce it to new audiences, but also never forget the horrible people who make our favorite things.
The worst thing you can possibly do is pretend these people aren't awful or even worse, they are products of their times. That is the worst excuse. By that metric, some creating art today who hates gay people, trans people, black people, immigrants, etc. will simply be a product of their times 50 years from now. It was never okay to hate black people the way Lovecraft did. Go look at someone like Neil Gaiman who prominently featured gay and trans people in his Sandman comics decades before the vast majority of people were accepting of LGBT people. There's no excuse for bigotry in any decade.
I'm going to be brutally honest: I'm pretty tired of everyone who wants to discuss/use H. P. Lovecraft's work metaphorically digging up his corpse to give it the 500th trial in the court of public opinion. Especially for a court that wouldn't even be interested in his work in the first place, and a trial where the exact same damn thing happens: "I don't approve of x, but since I want to discuss it/create works based on it/make money off of it, I'll just put in a PSA in the middle of my project to cover myself." And them proceed to lecture/ham-fist it. I've heard this song and dance at least 15 times. And never once did it feel organic in the project. Every time it was an unwelcome intrusion. Sometimes just anannoyance, other times cringe inducing, but this time? God awful.
Especially when racism is actually happening *in the present* that everyone wants to conveniently ignore, to target a guy who hardly benefited from his works in his lifetime. Jesus Christ on a Crucifix. The idea of every piece of Lovecraft adaptation having to take you out of the story, to remind everyone that we must condemn this man and cannot enjoy his works without guilt is ludacris. I'm tired of society self-righteously flogging itself like it makes up for the sins of the past. You can't change a dead man's works. You can't undo wrongdoing by dwelling on the past almost psychoticly. You'd got to take the lesson from the past, put it behind you, and move on.
Context is key, if you're so upset about people criticising racists, imagine how the people the racists discriminate against feel.
Lots of nonsense in this comment.
I'm glad you brought up Dwain Esper's Maniac. I felt it had a strong connection to Re-Animator.
This was a great watch, and as always very comprehensive.....or should I say, almost comprehensive! Did you really think you would get away by not mentioning the most amazing thing connected to this franchise, the song Move Your Dead Bones by Dr Reanimator?! ;)
Moral Standards would prevent someone from presenting such an information hazard as powerful as that ear worm.
BTW, You owe me medical grade ear bleach.
"Re-animate your feet".
This is one of my favorite videos you've done so far I think. I love the original Re-Animator film, and recently I've started reading a collection of Lovecraft's most popular works. And your admiration for the source material has not only made me excited to read Herbert West: Re-Animator, it also makes me excited to read some of the better comic adaptations you've mentioned. Thanks for opening my eyes to more of Re-Animator.
I drop everything to watch your channel whenever there's a new upload. Awesome content my dude.
Thanks, I appreciate that.
As a Louisiana native, I think one of the reasons they chose the state for the comic is due to it being considered one of the most haunted; there's so many stories of supernatural creatures here
(Also krewe is the term for a group of people manning a Mardi Gras parade, ie. krewe of bacchus)
Thanks for the good content. Would love to see you cover lovecraft's body of work and what has spawned from it in a broader context. I have really been wanting to get into his work but have been unsure of where to start. I think, despite his numerous flaws, one can appreciate the worlds he gave us that could only have come from such a twisted individual. I like to view art almost like children, that the kid shouldnt bear the burden of the sins of their father, but also not to disregard the effects of the parent.
Thank you so much for all the effort you put into your videos. Not only do I like the style and thoughtful contemplations but the way you cut the material, and carefully structure your videos shows a lot work and thought behind it. Perhaps this could be said about all your videos. First, I want to thank you for your videos and give a you a huge compliment for their great quality!
When you ask if Lovecraft should be remembered, he should be remembered, without a doubt. While his views were vile and a product of his time, they had influence on his writing. It is something to learn from. Should we get rid of works influenced by anything we do not agree with? Should we get rid of Orwell, Shakespeare, or Homer because times have changed and our civilization has different views? No.
Do not let the political bs of this era steal away wonderous stories just because the person who wrote them held beliefs counter to today's beliefs. Judging people of the past with the curent views as if they could just wake up from death and apologize is, quite frankly, idiotic. Accept that their views are wrong, understand that they were a product of a different time, and enjoy the story for what it is.
I'd add in even someone like Thoreau had some pretty pernicious views, and if the likes of MLK and Gandhi can draw sustenance from him, exactly what will be left when the vanguard roots out all lineages of offending thought?
People are complex and it is all too easy to condemn dead men who can't exactly answer their accusers.
Especially when most of these writers were just that: writers. Even if they were the most vehiminent racist/sexist/what ever, most of them never acted upon it, or couldn't even act upon it even if they wanted to.
My guy, you belong to an exclusive club among my thousands of subscriptions, who I will stop whatever I am doing irl to watch your videos. There are only two other people in this club, and I am so happy to add another
I haven't watched it yet but I know I'll love it. It's just nice to see some quality content get recognized.
Stuart Gordon is honestly such an underrated horror director. Reanimator is a Halloween must watch for me. It really encapsulates spooky fun. There are few movies I can think of that can pull off being funny while also being gruesome and disturbing, sometimes all at once.
I had no idea this was an unpopular short story. I really liked it when I first read it, maybe one of my favorite Lovecraft stories. Maybe I just have bad taste lol!
Of all Lovecraft stories, the one that became a successful movie franchise, was his Frakenstein crack fic.
Omg!! I love you for doing this!! One of my all time favorite movies!!
God bless Stuart Gordon, he totally got Lovecraft, and knew that Jeffrey Combs was amazing!
Rest In Peace to Stuart, a true loss in cinema
No censorship. Ever!
The 3rd movie was censored when it was first released but now it not
You know... I might not agree with you, and it has been more frequently, but man... Every time I watch your videos I feel inspired. Thank you
Wow, this is fantastic. Thanks for putting it together.
I love your videos because i cannot for the life of me watch horror movies without getting super paranoid after
But these videos let me enjoy the art of it on a small enough scale that i can actually enjoy it!
And i just like listening to you