A few months ago, I reviewed the much talked-about Netflix television show The Haunting of Hill House. And as requested, I’m back with a review of the follow-up season The Haunting of Bly Manor! Like Hill House, The Haunting of Bly Manor was created for Netflix by Mike Flanagan and it features many of the same actors, but it is not a direct sequel. Instead, while Hill House took on Shirley Jackson’s most famous novel, Bly Manor tackles the works of another beloved American author, Henry James. Loosely inspired by James’s ghostly novella The Turn of the Screw, with plot elements from a few of his other stories thrown in, the nine episodes of The Haunting of Bly Manor debuted on Netflix on October 9, 2020—just in time to be the perfect mid-pandemic binge. Continue reading Review of Netflix’s The Haunting of Bly Manor
Category: Film
Review of Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson has been adapted many times. It has become, in popular culture, the quintessential haunted house story, although Shirley Jackson’s novel leaves the veracity of the haunting intentionally ambiguous. One thing many adaptations struggle with is how to maintain that ambiguity while still evoking horror. The recent Netflix series, directed by Mike Flanagan, accomplishes this balance by diverging from the source material significantly while preserving its central themes. This series arrived on Netflix in 2018, so I’m a little late to the bandwagon. But I finally finished watching it and wanted to share a few of my thoughts with you. Continue reading Review of Netflix’s The Haunting of Hill House
Netflix’s Dracula Miniseries Review
Do we really need another Dracula adaptation? I say, if it does something new and clever, then yes! And I think the new miniseries released earlier this year on Netflix and BBC One delivers on that. Dracula, created by Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat, is a very loose retelling of Bram Stoker’s novel that takes the vampiric Count in a unique direction and explores his relationship with a new, original character: Agatha Van Helsing. If you’re looking for something quick to watch during quarantine, I definitely recommend it! Continue reading Netflix’s Dracula Miniseries Review
Grief: The Raven and The Babadook
What does Poe’s most famous poem have to do with an Australian horror film from a few years back? More than you might think. “The Raven” and The Babadook utilize similar plot lines to explore the inescapable nature of grief after the loss of a loved one. (Warning: This post contains spoilers for the movie The Babadook.)
Most of you are likely familiar with “The Raven,” Poe’s 1845 poem that first skyrocketed him into literary fame. The poem is told from the perspective of an unnamed speaker who mourns for his lost love, Lenore. One night, a raven comes in through his window and answers all of the speaker’s questions with one word: “Nevermore.” At the end of the poem, the speaker acknowledges that the raven is still sitting above his door, and his soul will be under its shadow forever. If you’d like to refresh yourself on the details, you can read the full text of “The Raven” here.
Somewhat more niche is The Babadook, a debut horror film written and directed by Jennifer Kent, which made waves among horror fans when it was first released in 2014. The story features a single mother named Amelia, whose husband died the same night she gave birth to her son Sam. Years later, Amelia and Sam discover a mysterious pop-up book that features a terrifying creature called the Babadook. Though Amelia initially dismisses the Babadook as fictional, it soon begins to take over her mind, showing her visions of violence and causing her to act erratically. Amelia finally confronts the Babadook, and the end of the movie shows the monster now somewhat docile, living in her basement. Amelia visits occasionally to feed it. Continue reading Grief: The Raven and The Babadook
Review of The Hunted: Encore–A Vampire Musical
Remember the musical episode of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer? What if you could have a whole show like that? The Hunted: Encore is an indie-made musical web series about a team of vampire hunters living in New York City. The show is one of many spin-offs from the long-running web series The Hunted, but the first to take the musical approach. Producer Ned Donovan stars as a somewhat clueless newbie hunter who teams up with a badass vampire-slaying veteran played by Megan Dorn. Together, they crush villains and make allies while singing and dancing their way through original songs with music composed by Marcus Thorne Bagala. The minute I heard the words “vampire” and “musical” in the same sentence, they had my attention. 
Continue reading Review of The Hunted: Encore–A Vampire Musical
10 Literary Horror Films to Watch This Halloween
Halloween is looming closer and closer, which mean it’s time to start prepping your Netflix queue for a spooky movie marathon! Of course there are the fun classics like Hocus Pocus, Halloweentown, and The Nightmare Before Christmas (which has a few literary references of its own). But if you really want to get in the mood, you might want to opt for something a bit darker. Grab some popcorn, a buddy, and nightlight because I’ve compiled a list of book-based horror films that will make you scared to close your eyes at night! Continue reading 10 Literary Horror Films to Watch This Halloween
Modern Takes on the Vampire Classic, Carmilla (Part Two)
Last week, I reviewed a modern illustrated edition of the vampire classic, Carmilla. As you can see from my last post, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this story of a teenage girl who discovers her friendly new houseguest may not be as innocent as she looks. However, if reading books from the 1870s still isn’t your thing, even after it’s been disguised as a modern paranormal romance—or if you’re just a huge fan of The Lizzie Bennet Diaries and love seeing classic texts brought to life in front of the webcam—then I definitely suggest that you check out the Carmilla web series.
Continue reading Modern Takes on the Vampire Classic, Carmilla (Part Two)
Literary Influences on The Nightmare Before Christmas
Halloween is just around the corner, and you know what that means—time for one of your bi-annual viewings of The Nightmare Before Christmas! Wow, I can’t believe we’ve gotten this far into October, and I haven’t even mentioned Halloween on the site. But The Gothic Library is kind of like Halloweentown—every day is Halloween, here! It was hard to think of how to do something different to commemorate my favorite holiday. But today I’ve decided to explore the literary roots in one of my favorite movies, Tim Burton’s spooky Halloween classic. Some of the allusions are obvious, like the one in the title, but as I began digging, I realized that The Nightmare Before Christmas has a much greater literary wealth than I would have imagined. Read on to learn about the five major literary influences I noticed in Jack Skellington’s story: Continue reading Literary Influences on The Nightmare Before Christmas
Lucifer, a Lover of Literature in Alleluia: The Devil’s Carnival
*Contains only vague and minor spoilers*
Some of you may have heard of the latest series of cult classic films to lure the dark and morbid out of their caves and into movie theaters around America. If you haven’t, I highly suggest that you check out The Devil’s Carnival. This project is the brainchild of Darren Lynn Bousman and Terrance Zdunich—the producer and writer behind the beloved gothic musical, Repo: The Genetic Opera. Bousman is also well known to horror-lovers as the director of several of the Saw movies. This new project, however, is not horror in the traditional sense. Much like Repo, The Devil’s Carnival is a musical with dark themes and aesthetics. The first movie, The Devil’s Carnival: Episode One was released in 2012, with Terrance, Darren, and several of the actors touring around various movie theaters with the film to drum up support for this independent project. After a long wait, the sequel had finally arrived and is currently touring around the country. I went to see the show not once, but twice in the past couple weeks and I was not disappointed. Alleluia: The Devil’s Carnival is the perfect film for dark-minded book lovers. Continue reading Lucifer, a Lover of Literature in Alleluia: The Devil’s Carnival