Ray Harryhausen passed away last week. This has been noted by people more qualified than I to discuss the master of stop-motion magic—Rick Baker, Adam Savage, Todd Masters, George Lucas, Peter Jackson, and more. The superhuman talent and perseverance evident in a Harryhausen effects sequence can easily be seen in countless visual effects artists since he first brought his creations to frame-by-frame life on the big screen. That makes sense. So how can I really say anything of worth when I say that I was also profoundly influenced by the artistry of Ray Harryhausen? With modesty, and a story about Clash of the Titans. Continue reading…
See All Categories
- Comics (120)
- First (7)
- Guest Star (45)
- Movies (34)
- Notes (2113)
- Romance (76)
- Science-Fiction (116)
- Screen (58)
- Videogames (71)
Recent Features
Ray Harryhausen and Me: A Life of High Adventure and Escapism
Things That Change You Forever
I have a ghost story of my own. At least, I have a ghost-cat story.
My final year as an undergraduate was spent in relative splendor. My friends and I lucked into tenancy in the house of a professor on sabbatical. Twelve foot ceilings! Built in bookshelves! Three cats! Real, grown-up furniture! Wait… let’s get back to the cats. The professorial family had three cats and a dog, though the dog was sent to a friend with a farm (later, they told us later that we clinched the lease when they told us that cat care was part of the deal and our response was, “Aw, we don’t get the dog?”).
So. Three housemates, three cats. One morning around the (solid oak!) table, we were chatting about the cats’ sleeping habits. Two of the cats routinely slept in my room, the third with one of the others. Feeling a little left out, the third roommate said, “That’s okay, because Ghost Cat slept on my bed last night.” Continue reading…
Secret Agent, Detective, Genius, Jerk: Modernizing Sherlock Holmes
A man with dark wavy hair wakes up in an iron-framed bed in the middle of a windowless room. He leaps out from under the white sheets and stares intently at a corner of the white ceiling. Suddenly, gracefully, he spins to defeat an invisible opponent in four swift motions, finally falling to his knees in front of an empty chair, hands outstretched.
There’s something about the way Benedict Cumberbatch plays the lead role in the BBC series Sherlock that seems like it could be Holmes’ fantasy version of how a brilliant detective behaves. Continue reading…
My New Weapon of Choice
In April, the Guttersnipes like to mix it up a little. This month, Comics Editor Carol Borden writes about romance.
“You hit him with a frying pan,” he said to her. “How come you didn’t grab a knife?”
“The frying pan was closer.” Her eyes slid away. “It’s not like I had time to pick a weapon. It’s not like the frying pan is my weapon of choice.” –Agnes And The Hitman (27)
Growing up in a town where Elvis was sighted post mortem, I despised and mocked The King. Now, I have held wakes in his honor. I used to only like punk. Then I used to say I liked everything but country. Now I don’t even bother arguing that I’m listening to “Americana,” not country. It is a truth universally acknowledged that something I once despised I will come to appreciate and, often, love. So when both Chris and alex recommended Jennifer Crusie, the author of many romance novels, and in particular her collaboration with Bob Mayer, Agnes And The Hitman, I knew I needed to read it. Continue reading…
“Enter A Monster”
The Atlantic profiles Spectral Motion, creators of monsters, “effects, and other mechanical grotesqueries that have since become household nightmares, if not names.”
Anime in 1987
“1987 was a remarkable year for manga adaptations. Not remarkable in volume—manga adaptations were nothing special in themselves—but for the commonalities that emerged. This year, we would find anime reaching for a measure of subtlety.” More at The Golden Ani-Versary of Anime.
Join The Literary Resistance!
The Gutter’s own Founding Editor, Jim Munroe talks about creating an alternate reality game based on Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 for the Toronto Public Library.
Deciding Not To Repel Women
“As nice as it must be to be that [18-25 year old male] demographic—when you’ve got everyone banging on your door, trying to court you, it must be very pleasant—what’s it like for someone who isn’t in that demographic? We know they play our games. We can see that they do. OK, there’s support for [...]
RIP, Ray Cusick
Production Designer Ray Cusick has died. Cusick is most famous for creating Doctor Who’s nemeses, The Daleks, but he also worked on Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple (1985 & 1987), Cold Comfort Farm (1968) and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1975). The BBC reports on his death and the creation of the Daleks here and here.
“‘Girlfriend Mode and Women as Consumers”
“I’m a woman, I’m a consumer and I actually like my first time playing a genre games to include a character option that can destroy my opponents rather than something adorable. I also like to be marketed to. Can this happen? I’m hoping so and I’m looking forward to it.” More, including many excellent links, [...]
“The Unsung Female Game Designers of Japan”
7 Japanese women responsible for “some of the greatest games ever to ever grace the store shelves.”
The Difference Engine Initiative
Started by found CG Edtitor Jim Munroe and Mare Sheppard, The Difference Engine Initiative aims to diversify what kinds of games are made by offering gamemaking incubators for underrepresented groups in the game industry. As part of this, the Hand Eye Society will be running 2 game incubators for women in Toronto and the first [...]
Missing Duncan
“Maybe it’s too bad that a game with such a strong visual imagination is entirely about kicking people in the face. But violence is your compass. You’d be lost without it.” It’s only been a few weeks since Duncan has stopped writing his fine, thoughtful pieces on games, but I miss them. Go read Hit [...]
Who Wants to Play Velociraptor Offroad Safari?
Who wants to play Velociraptor Offroad Safari or Minotaur China Shop or Blush, where players are neon attack squids? I do. Gamasutra interviews indie game designers, Flashbang. (via Make It Big)
Bejeweled Prison of the Mind
Infinite Lives’ Darren Zenko is given to understand that “the crack-like qualities of the Bejeweled experience were no accident, but rather the result of the kind of nefarious mind-control alchemy normally attributed in science-fiction thrillers to shadowy organizations bent on world domination.”
Bringing Chris Ware Into It
“Chris Ware Can Show Video Games the Path to Manhood.” There’s extensive quotation but there’s also thoughts, and a link to more thoughts, about games pubescing. Maybe when they’re all grown up, they’ll realize some of them aren’t men. (via Fantagraphics)
An Ultima Gift
Origin Museum director, Joe Garrity, writes the Artful Gamer about building Richard “Lord British” Garriott an Ultima reagent box: “The Reagent Box ended up to be a 2-year effort in finding the individual reagents and binding each to a velvet base with brass wire, presenting them with a 19th-century-scientific look.”
Games Through a Comix Lens
The book Understanding Comics, published in 1993, was comic writer and artist Scott McCloud’s attempt to deconstruct, demystify, and lay out the magic of the sequential art form. Written in the form of a comic itself, it was one mechanism by which comics rose from the shadows of culture to become a more accepted art [...]
Gojira To Kitty Cats
20 years ago, his job was demolition. Now Godzilla’s a web designer in Portland. This is his story. Or at least the first episode. (Thanks, Flusty!)
Sauron For the Win
When a writer puts a story down on paper, one version of all possible outcomes becomes the final version. The ending is part of a carefully constructed framework of theme and comment and all that good literary stuff, and it’s never going to change. For example, the evil lord Sauron is never going to win [...]
Keep Playing, It Might Get Better
There comes a point in every game where the player asks themselves why they’re wasting time on a terrible game. It’s a scenario no gamer wants to be presented with – and it’s a developer’s worst nightmare. Depending on how the storyline is integrated with the game, a game’s quality can be easily determined within [...]
The Name Game
While I wait in the lobby of one of the largest game studios in the world, I watch someone go through to the inner sanctum. The shiny barrier, with transparent doors that whir apart at the wave of a card-pass, looks familiar — I think I’ve seen the devices being used as turnstiles in a [...]
Making smarter trash cans
I’ve managed to climb down the scaffolding in the pouring rain and get to an open window. It leads to a kitchen, and from there I hear voices: it’s the cleaners, or rather the hired killers masquerading as cleaners who have been dogging my every step. They’re watching a program called “Lords and Ladies” when [...]
Is it possible to have too much fun?
Is it possible to have a pleasure circuit overload? “Girls are to be kept away from those activities of civilization that over-stimulate the imagination and the senses, such as fashionable novels, paintings, music, balls, theaters… as this can lead to uterine epilepsy, sapphic tastes, and nymphomania.” While this is Victorian-era advice, it’s reflective of how [...]
Of Note Elsewhere
At Sequart, Julian Darius makes the case that Star Trek: Into Darkness damages the Star Trek franchise and that “Starfleet must be destroyed.” (via Mike White)
“It’s easier to tell the same stories everyone else does. There’s no particular shame in it.
It’s just that it’s lazy, which is just about the worst possible thing a spec fic writer can be.
Oh, and it’s not true.”
Kameron Hurley writes about lazy writing, cannibal llamas, female soldiers, and women here. (Thanks, James!)
Patton Oswalt’s multi-franchise super-movie described in his Star Wars filibuster from Parks and Recreation, animated.
Corrigan Vaughan writes an open letter to “Fans of Geek Things“: “I appreciate that you think I have a nice rack and that some of you even find my friends and I to be pretty. That’s very kind. I’m not, however, super in love with the fact that having a rack at all seems to preclude me from being considered a ‘real’ fan.”
The Book!
Obsessive?
Weekly Notifications
Search the Gutter
What We’re Talking About
1930s
1940s
1950s
1960s
1970s
1980s
1990s
2000s
2010s
action
adaptation
animation
art
Canada
capitalism
China
comedy
comics
fandom
fantasy
feminism
film history
games
geekery
gender
history
horror
interviews
Japan
martial arts
monsters
movies
music
RIP
romance
science fiction
space
superheroes
the ladies
trailers
tv
UK
USA
video
writing