Turning Red By Domee Shi.

Fun Fact:

History's greatest hero deserved better...

The ending to Hercules' story is quite a downer. When Hercules was traveling with his new bride Deianeira, they came across a flooded river and the centaur Nessus offered to carry Deianeira across while Hercules swam in front of them. Only when Hercules got to the shore, he saw that Nessus had turned around and tried running off with his wife. So the hero took out one of his poisoned arrows and sent it ripping through Nessus' chest. Refusing to die unavenged, Nessus told Deianeira that she could use his bloody shirt to cast a love spell on Hercules if he ever got bored with her. And years later, she gave it a try, without realizing the shirt had also absorbed the poison from her husband's arrows and so the moment Hercules was tricked into putting the shirt on, his body cried out in pain. The poison entered his bloodstream, causing it to boil and hiss and the tunic grafted itself to his skin. So the only way to get it off was by ripping off his own flesh. Left with no other option, the immortal Heracles made a funeral pyre to burn away his physical form and soon after, his spirit was welcomed to Mt. Olympus.

Turns out there's a Greek myth for everything...

Where did soulmates come from? Why is love a thing?

According to Greek playwright Aristophanes, there were originally three kinds of human beings: the Children of the Moon were male and female in one body. The Sun's Children were two males in one body and the Earth's were two females in one body. With two united minds and eight strong limbs each, they planned to overthrow the gods and live on Mt. Olympus themselves. But Zeus, wanting to end this rebellion before it started, sliced every couple into two, had Apollo smoothen them out and gave them belly buttons as an eternal reminder of their failure and made it possible for them to reproduce as we do now. Having been whole all their lives, they refused to do anything apart and started dying because of it. So Zeus reshaped their bodies again, making becoming physically one temporarily possible.

Now it's the inborn fate of every person to seek wholeness in another. Those who were once a man and woman desire the other gender and those who descended from a combo of the same gender seek to unite with the same gender.

They are soulmates, and this pursuit is love.

Sleeping Beauty (1959).

Based loosely on Charles Perrault's 1697 fairy tale with a number of elements from Peter Tchaikovsky's ballet, including the title, "Sleeping Beauty", the entire musical score, as well as the princess's name, Aurora.

One of my all-time favorite Disney films (along with Fantasia). Sleeping Beauty is a great movie. It's a really simple story, but the art direction and music are really amazing. I mean the art is so unique and beautiful, I can't overstate that enough. No other Disney production really mimics it. The Forbidden Mountain feels like a real place, they totally nailed the mood with this one.

Best character in the movie would have to be Maleficent, the Mistress of All Evil. She looks pretty much like most goth girls. In fact, there's strong evidence to suggest that Maila Nurmi, more commonly known as "Vampira", was used as a live-action reference for the animation. The character is just so sinister and Eleanor Audley's voice is so expressive. She even has a pet raven named "Diablo" (the Spanish word for "devil"), I mean, how much more goth can she be?

Darkman by Sam Raimi.

Along with Batman (1989) and Spider-Man (2002), this signals the birth of quirky, inventive, modern comic-book movies. This film was very close to the genre, and it wasn't even based on a comic!

Note: I think the explosion that originates Darkman is meant to be an Alec Holland wink to the masterpiece: Swamp Thing.

The Man Who Laughs (1928) by Paul Leni.

One of the most iconic and influential silent films of all time (along with Metropolis, Nosferatu, and The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari).

A magnificent film and one of my favorites.

Highly recommend checking it out.

And, yes, Conrad Veidt's interpretation (and Jack Pierce's make-up) inspired The Joker.

Some of you have probably wondered "Where did the Easter Bunny come from and why does a rabbit give out eggs?"

The exact origins of the Easter Bunny are unclear, but it's believed to have originated in Germany during the Middle Ages. The tradition probably stems from the pagan festival of "Ēostre", which honored the goddess of the same name and was celebrated during the spring equinox in the form of feasting and fertility rituals. Ēostre was eventually co-opted by Christians and it was rebranded as a celebration of Jesus's rebirth.

Following this theme of new life, rabbits and hares (which have long been seen as symbols of fertility and new life, as they often give birth to large litters in the spring) became the holiday mascot. And as early as 1682, it became a tradition for the "Easter Hare" to make the rounds and judge whether children were good or bad, similar to Kris Kindle. If they were good, they'd be given gifts like toys and colored eggs, eggs being another symbol of new life. German immigrants brought the tradition to the United States in the 18th century, where it became popularized and eventually spread to other parts of the world.

Flowery Princess Kairi & Garden's Guardian Aqua

Christmas Album!

2001 test for film adaptation of Paul Chadwick's Concrete comics.

I loved the superhero boom from the 90s/2000s, seeing mega hits like the Spider-Man films (which are some of my top favorite superhero movies, I think the first Spider-Man movie was developed before even X-Men was on film). The superhero set I would've loved to visit the most is Mystery Men. To me, the first Blade movie was instrumental in showing how superhero movies could exist at the end of the 20th century. There was a collision of Dark City and Blade that somehow, in subtle ways paved the way, via anime/manga, for The Matrix to spawn into the world. 

But, still, back then it was a countermovement to try to do superhero films, especially with material that didn't have Marvel or DC numbers. For many years, the proto-comic book movies were Paul Verhoeven's RoboCop (one of the best Judge Dredd movies) and Sam Raimi's Darkman in so many ways.

In my opinion, Paul Chadwick's Concrete is ripe to be adapted (there was a script written by Larry Wilson and Paul Chadwick, but it didn't go through).

Coco by Lee Unkrich.

Viva la Coco!! ^^

It's beautiful.

¡Feliz Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead)!