The Cultural Gutter

geek chic with mad technique

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." -- Oscar Wilde

On The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes

“Of course I have a copy of The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes on video, but I don’t watch it very often. I even have, on tape now, the audio and video versions of those missing scenes. But it comforts me to know that they are still incomplete, and that there remain other scenes from [...]

Secret Agent, Detective, Genius, Jerk: Modernizing Sherlock Holmes

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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 [...]

“Too Archetypal for their own Good?”

Peter Gutierrez writes about Sherlock Holmes and John Watson and asks, “[S]hould a fan allow for the fact that the archetypal nature of a beloved character naturally, even inevitably, leads to updates that a purist might object to?”

Interview with Steven Moffat

Steven Moffat talks about Doctor Who and Sherlock.  “I’m a geek. I’m a writer. I spent all of my time in my childhood obsessing about Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Who. I was alone, I was an outsider — what do you expect?”

The Geek Interpreter

From the personal blog of John H. Watson comes the Case of the Geek Interpreter.

RIP, Edward Hardwicke

British actor Edward Hardwicke has died.  He is best known as Dr. John Watson in the 1980s and 1990s BBC Sherlock Holmes series co-starring Jeremy Brett as Holmes.The Guardian has an obituary and here is a video of Hardwicke and Brett interviewed about playing Watson and Holmes.

Elementary

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“We have in our police reports realism pushed to its extreme limits, and yet the result is, it must be confessed, neither fascinating nor artistic.”—Arthur Conan Doyle, “A Case of Identity.” When I wrote about Sherlock Holmes and Kolchak: The Night Stalker: Cry of Thunder, I wrote that I picked up that comic because of [...]

A Study in Emerald

Neil Gaiman’s tale of Lovecraftian horror is available as a PDF download of the “daily newspaper for all classes,” The Star of Albion–including ads for such things as “Jekyll Powders.”

The Casefile of Sherlock Holmes and Carl Kolchak, Reporter

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Though I prefer reading —and writing about —comics in collections, I do buy comics in single issues.  Sometimes I need to know what happens next or can’t wait for the collection anymore. Sometimes it’s idle curiosity or the lure of the pretty. But every once in a while, it’s the potential for all-out crazy. I [...]

Self-Defence for Gentlemen (and Suffragettes)

Scare off impudent ruffians and defeat any self-styled Goliath with only your cane or umbrella! Learn Bartitsu, the martial art favored by many Victorian (and some Edwardian) ladies and gentlemen! View a short documentary here. (via Kung Fu Cinema)

1910 Is Now

Bully! 1910 is Now with preview pages from The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen–Century: 1910.

Sherlock Holmes vs. Dracula

The year is 1890.  The city, London. Sherlock Holmes vs. Dracula: Is there anything more to say? (Oh, yeah, it’s a radio drama).

The Dead Body Politic

The mystery of Mexico City needs a private eye.

The adage has it that truth is stranger than fiction. I swear that’s true in Mexico. One of my favourite writers, hardboiled crime novelist Paco Ignacio Taibo II, has to struggle to keep up with the absurd plot of his beloved nation. Although Taibo is a fine writer, I come to him more for his [...]

  • Of Note Elsewhere

    Kate Elliott asks, “How much sex is too much sex in your science fiction and fantasy?” (Thanks, James!)

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    NPR’s Monkey See blog shares a look at Adventure Time. “Adventure Time insists on emotional honesty.” (via @profmdwhite)

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    Recent shenanigans The Cultural Gutter has been involved in: The lost Drive-In Mob Movie S.P.E.C.T.R.E. on Monster Island; a transcript of the Shaitani Dracula tweetalong organized by The Mysterious Order of the Skeleton Suit; and the ongoing Twitter game/story, “Tonight On Mad Men.”

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    At Vern Reviews The Films Of Cinema, Outlaw Vern offers “one Seagalologist’s perspective on the ‘vulgar auteurism’ debate”: “The practitioners are trying to bring recognition to artists who they think are marginalized, but they’re accidentally creating a ranking of ‘vulgar auteur’ beneath ‘actual auteur.’ And that also shines a spotlight on the idea’s most glaring weakness: even the most establishment of the critical establishment have always worshipped directors who were at some point considered lowbrow–Hitchcock, Fuller, Peckinpah, DePalma.”

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    Pornokitsch finishes determining essential epic fantasy, with statistics, graphs and lists of their selections. Nice to see Homer in there.

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    David Simon shares the best deleted scene from the fifth season of The Wire. (via @pornokitsch)

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