"Bees and Zombies" by Rebecca Loebe -- Music Video

Holy hell, Rebecca Loebe sure has some pipes, doesn't she?




Rebecca Loebe, the post-brontosaurus indie folk/crunk singin songwriter, sings about the disappearence of the bees and the coming of the zombies.

Give her other tracks a listen at Rebeccaloebe.com.

The Zombie Movies of Vincent Price, Christopher Lee, and Linnea Quigley

Today marks the birthday of horror icons Christopher Lee (89) and Linnea Quigley (53). In addition, today is the birthday of Vincent Price. Although he passed away in 1993, were he still with us, the legendary horror actor would be celebrating a classy 100th birthday today

To celebrate this trio of terrifying thespians, I wanted to summarize each actor's contribution to our beloved zombie genre.

VINCENT PRICE

During Vincent Price's career, zombies were not in vogue as they are today, so Price's zombie credentials are quite few and far between. While he did have a role in Tales of Terror (1962) in which he played a hypnotized man who returns from the dead, I would argue that Price's first contribution to the zombie genre came when he starred in The Last Man on Earth (1964), a vampire film based on the novel I Am Legend that would go on to directly inspire Night of the Living Dead (1968), which we all know sparked the zombie invasion of popular culture.

Some decades later, Vincent Price would finally make is debut in a true zombie project when he lent his iconic voice to Michael Jackson's Thriller music video (1983). Price lends the track some horror cred as he raps about "grizzly ghouls from every tomb . . . closing in to seal your doom"

Vincent Price's final venture into the world of zombie would be with the zombie action comedy Dead Heat (1988). In Dead Heat, Price played Arthur P. Loudermilk, the creator of a device that would help him and other rich tycoons achieve immortality. In reality, Price died shortly after in 1993.

CHRISTOPHER LEE

Although Christopher Lee's career was very active during the surge of zombie films in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, Lee didn't lend his talents to many zombie films. While he's mingled with the undead in the shape of Frankenstein's monster, mummies, and undead witches -- and even though he's most recognized for playing Dracula, one of the most popular undead characters in all of horror -- Lee has only two movies on his filmography that even come close to being called "zombie films." First, he starred in the anthology film Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1965) in a segment where he plays an art critic stalked by the zombie hand of an artist.



Then, in 1972, Lee starred in the very cool Horror Express as an anthropologist who discovers a frozen alien creature that thaws aboard the trans-Siberian express and absorbs the minds of its victims, turning its mindless victims into its undead minions.



LINNEA QUIGLEY

From the Scream Kings to the Scream Queen, of our celebrated actors  this birthday girl has contributed the most iconic scenes to zombie media. In Return of the Living Dead (1986), Linnea Quigley made a splash with her jaw-dropping graveyard strip and dance as Trash, the hot young punk girl who fantasizes about being eaten alive.





Quigley didn't stray back into zombie films very much for the rest of her career except for bit parts in movies like Corpses are Forever (2003) and Zombiegeddon (2003), but you don't really need to do much else in the zombie genre after you star in a horror workout video featuring aerobic zombies gyrating and twisting by the side of the pool. There's no way of topping that!

The Garden Shed Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse

Finally! A guide to zombie survival using only items you'd expect to find in a garden shed.

Fancy Dress Outfitters, an online costume retailer based in the UK that carries a line of zombie costumes, sent along to The Zed Word their Garden Shed Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse. It's a handy-dandy info graphic about which weapons to use and avoid when you find yourself cornered in your garden shed during the zombie invasion.

Halloween fancy dress by FDO

Pat the Zombie: A Cruel (Adult) Spoof (Review)

REVIEW

Pat the Zombie: 
A Cruel (Adult) Spoof (2011)

By Aaron Ximm and Kaveh Soofi

Ten Speed Press: 2011

RATING:
3 / 5 zedheads



Pat the Zombie has the unique distinction of being the only zombie book in my collection to contain a scratch-and-sniff sticker that very authentically and disturbingly replicates the smell of putrefying corpses.

Pat the Zombie is a grotesque spoof of the popular touch-and-feel publication for babies and young children called Pat the Bunny (1940). In the original Pat the Bunny, babies and children could explore the book with their eyes and hands and experience such tactile sensations as the soft fur of an adorable bunny. Pat the Zombie, however, is a self-styled "touch-and-recoil" book meant to make you feel queasy all over. Readers are introduced to Paul and Judy as two young scamps that explore the world of zombie morbidity with their eyes, fingers, and noses by gutting undead bunnies, smelling human remains, and touching the decaying faces of their zombie parents. And you too can experience the same sensations courtesy of the book's interactive, "touch-and-recoil" multimedia pages. In particular, the scratch-and-sniff sticker that smells like rotting meat is one of the book's most gruesome features.

Why not?

Pat the Zombie, however, is little more than a novelty book or joke gift. As the spoof of a book for babies, it's predictably insubstantial. That's forgivable, but the art is very crude and fails to mimic the solid line work of the art in the original book. That being said, I can imagine Pat the Zombie still becoming quite the conversation piece if left out on the coffee table among horror and zombie fans, but its grotesque perversion of an innocent childhood classic is bound to offend most other people. It makes me chuckle, but for its price Pat the Zombie doesn't offer much else than a few chuckles once you fully absorb the premise.

Good girl, Judy.

Despite the glut of zombie spoofs, you'll probably get a kick out of Pat the Bunny if you like gross-out humour and can appreciate the lighter side of purposely darkening a childhood classic with the blood, guts, and grime of the zombie genre.

The Collapsed: A New Post-Apocalyptic Horror/Thriller. Screening Dates

While at Shock Stock in May, I ran into director Justin McConnell who was promoting his new film The Collapsed that opens in select theatres on May 27th, including a screening here in Hamilton for June's FRIGHT NIGHT THEATRE.

[CONTEST: Win Tickets to see THE COLLAPSED in Hamilton]

You may remember McConnell from our 2009 coverage of Fan Expo when we talked to him about his vampire project The Eternal. While production on The Eternal is on hold, McConnell and Kevin Hutchinson have produced The Eternal, a post-apocalyptic horror/thriller about a family of four desperately trying to survive at the end of the world.

CANADIAN SCREENING DATES

TORONTO: May 27 – June 2 (Rainbow Cinemas Carlton)
CALGARY: June 3, 4 (Uptown Stage & Screen)
HAMILTON: June 7 (The Staircase Theatre)

The Collapsed will also premiere in the US as an official selection of the Fangoria Film Festival, part of the DAYS OF THE DEAD horror convention in Indianapolis

12 Minutes of Dead Island Gameplay (Video)

Confession time: I never bought Dead Rising 2. I just wasn't excited for it at its release price. I am, however, more excited for Dead Island after seeing some of this gameplay footage.



What do you think? Does it live up to the hype of the trailers?

Walking Dead Board Game coming from Cryptozoic Entertainment

I like board games, but I'm not much of a tabletop gamer.

Honestly, all the rules involved in a game like Zombies!!! confuse the hell out of  me, so I've had very little opportunity to explore the world of zombie gaming. I do, however, love a good straightforward board game. Therefore, I'm curious about The Walking Dead Board Game (MSRP: $39.99) coming from Cryptozoic Entertainment this Fall.

While you may know Cryptozoic for their World of Warcraft Trading Card Game and The Walking Dead trading cards, The Walking Dead Board Game is the company's first venture into the board game realm.

While details about the game are slim, a look at the proposed game elements in this promotional from the company suggests that The Walking Dead Board Game may play something akin to Monopoly or the game of Life with players moving around the board and landing on squares that will prompt the player to pick up Zombie cards, Encounter Cards, or Scrounge cards that will change the players' fortunes. Could be fun!

The Walking Dead is turning out to be a highly mechanisable property for AMC to license. With a pop-culture appeal that is far more marketable than Mad Men or Breaking Bad, it's no wonder we are seeing action figures and novels coming down the pipe as AMC and Dark Horse Comics attempt to cash in on the success of the series's first season.

Read the full press release for The Walking Dead Board Game after the cut

Trailer Tuesday: World of the Dead: The Zombie Diaries 2

Three months have passed since a viral outbreak wiped out 99.9% of the world's population, turning its victims into flesh-eating living dead. In the UK, a surviving band of soldiers and civilians have taken refuge at a rural military barracks. Life in this new world is tough and brutal, but hope appears when a high level communication is received from a military base on the coast, telling of sanctuary elsewhere in Europe... But just as salvation appears to be in reach, the base suffers an overwhelming defeat at the hands of the living dead! The surviving handful of troops and civilians must now make their way to the coast to uncover the truth behind the message. Their perilous journey takes them across a now treacherous, death-ravaged landscape, where the living dead are vast in number and wandering bandits impose their own malicious sense of law and order. What follows is a journey into hell and a desperate battle against all odds for the very survival of the human race

Night of the Living Dead Live: Website Launches

The official website for NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD LIVE has now launched.

Night of the Living Dead Live is a new stage adaptation of Night of the Living Dead that will be performed in Hamilton, ON from September 15th - October 1st, 2011. Created by Christopher Harrison, Phil Pattison, and Rick Rivait (all of Nictophobia Films) with special effects by Carlos Henriques of The Butcher Shop, Night of the Living Dead Live promises to be an artistically and technically ambitious reanimation of George A. Romero's tale of the living dead on stage!

Plans are underway to present the stage play entirely in black and white (including the sets an actors) while incorporating scenes from the original movie and thrilling audiences with zombies that will interactively shamble through the aisles!

I'm very excited that the fellas at Nictophobia Films and Daniloff Productions are launching this production in my own back yard (so to speak). The Zed Word will definitely be keeping you up-to-date with all news about the production.

Stay tuned, zombie fans!

Why was Zombie Apocalypse Trending on Twitter?

For the last 24 hours or so, "Zombie Apocalypse" has been trending on Twitter in large part because the CDC recently updated their website with a popular tongue-in-cheek blog post about Zombie Apocalypse preparedness. But is this the only reason?

Do not adjust your television set....

The CDC blog post, titled "Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse" gives a brief history of zombies before providing readers with survival tips such as what useful supplies to stock and what procedures to follow in the case that the dead rise. Like the Zombie Squad has been doing for years, the CDC is using the imagined scenario of a zombie attack to deliver very real and very important survival tips and emergency preparation education.

But the CDC blog post wouldn't have gone viral if zombies weren't a firmly entrenched part of modern mythology and popular culture. In North America, which is growing increasingly polarized along religious and secular lines, the fictional narrative of the zombie apocalypse has replaced many people's visions of Biblical end times. News providers and websites know that zombies are a popular hook. For example, the CDC article caught the attention of CNN who are themselves no strangers to writing about Zombies in an attempt to capture readers with an interest / love of zombies. Last month, Elizabeth Landau wrote a piece for CNN's Geek Out section called "Inside zombie brains: Sci-fi teaches science" that focuses heavily on Dr. Steven Schlozman's new book: The Zombie Autopsies.






But is it just the CDC, news outlets, and the enduring popularity of zombies in popular culture that fuels this recent flood of Zombie Apocalypse messages on Twitter? I think there's more to it. As we approach the weekend, there is a whimsical sense of apocalypse in the air among skeptical denizens of the Internet. This sense of doom is predicated on the advertising campaign you might have seen from the Christian Family Radio network that predicts the end of the world and Judgement Day to be THIS SATURDAY: May 21, 2011. According to Family Radio president Harold Camping, Judgement Day is tomorrow.

Oh, yeah. That sure sounds "awesome."

With all this talk about the end of the world handing over us at the same time that an esteemed organization such as the CDC posts a Zombie Preparedness blog, I can't help but think the two are feeding off one another in the collective consciousness to push "Zombie Apocalypse" into a Twitter trend.

I guess it never hurts to be prepared, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that we're all going to wake up on Saturday morning -- physical and of this earth -- with the realization that Judgement Day or the Zombie Apocalypse did not occur. Yes, that means you still have to pay your bills and do your homework, but it also means a continued life ahead of you to enjoy all the great zombie movies, books, and video games to come.

CONTEST: Win Tickets to THE COLLAPSED (June 7th - Hamilton, ON)

WIN TWO TICKETS TO THE COLLAPSED

On June 7th, 2011, Horror in the Hammer's Fright Night Theatre is screening the new post-apocalyptic horror/thriller THE COLLAPSED. The Zed Word is giving away free admittance for two to see this intriguing new film.

Screening Details

Time: Tuesday, June 7, 2011 · 8:00pm - 11:00pm

Location: Staircase Cafe Theatre
                 25 Dundurn St N.
                 Hamilton, ON

Q and A: SPECIAL GUESTS IN ATTENDANCE

To enter, email zedwordblog@gmail.com before June 2, 2011 with your full name and the subject: COLLAPSED. One winner will be randomly drawn to receive admittance for two to Fright Night Theatre's screening of THE COLLAPSED at the Staircase Theatre (27 Dundurn St. North, Hamilton, ON). Please enter ONLY if you can attend. Tickets will be held for you at the box office on the night of the show (June 7th). You just have to show up!

MOVIE DETAILS

THE COLLAPSED

Directed by Justin McConnell

Written by Justin McConnell and Kevin Hutchinson

Starring: John Fantasia, Steve Vieira, Anna Ross, and Emily Weaver

In the wake of the end of the world, a family of four desperately tries to survive. Their goal: escaping the city and traveling to the rural community they once called home.

The constant threat of a violent death forcing them to stay as far away from civilization as possible, they take to the forest, soon to discover the danger posed by other survivors may be the least of their worries.

Will they survive? A dark and unpredictable horror/thriller.

Specific contest details after the jump

Bong of the Dead: Sexy and Bloody Stills

Thomas Newman, director of the indie zombie film Bong of the Dead, was kind enough to send along a package of sexy and bloody stills from the film. Vancouver readers: if you missed the premiere screening of Bong of the Dead, make sure you don't miss its encore screening on AUGUST 28th, 2011 @ The Rio Theatre (1660 East Broadway Vancouver, BC V5N 1W1 [Map])

New DEAD ISLAND Trailer

The new Dead Island trailer teases more zombie visuals but shows little gameplay or story

The Undertakers: Rise of the Corpses (Zombie Novel)

Synopsis

The stakes have never been higher for the protection and survival of the human race as protagonist Will Ritter faces a new kind of zombie – a smarter, faster, organized zombie – in Ty Drago’s new novel The Undertakers: Rise of the Corpses. 

When Will Ritter first realized that his neighbor, assistant principal and teacher are all walking, talking corpses he begins to seriously question his sanity—until the corpses attack. Now, these are your standard zombies. The “Corpses” are actually dead bodies that have been possessed like suits of rotting flesh. To make matters worse, only a select few, like Will, can actually see them for what they are.

Forced to join a ragtag army of teenage resistance fighters called the Undertakers, Will finds himself in the middle of a war against an invasion of decomposing cadavers. Unable to return home, Will struggles to accept his new destiny as a fighter—and a leader. Can the Undertakers hold out?

The Undertakers: Rise of the Corpses by Ty Drago

888WuzDead- Zombie Outbreak Tracking

It's 12:00pm. Do you know where the zombies are?

Before you set foot outside of your secure bunker, know what you're getting into by checking in with 888WuzDead.com to find reports of zombies in your local area.

Be on the lookout for outbreak units in your area

Report sightings of your own or learn about 888WuzDead's extermination and protection services.

888WuzDead is "the single most successful undead extermination company in Pittsburgh history, and one of Ireland's "Top 10,000" businesses."

"Zombies!" by The Chris King Maneuver

"Why are we singing? There's zombies chasing us!"

The Chris King Maneuver is a Rock / Punk / Pop band from Vancouver. Their song "Zombies!"  is a thumping four minute punk rock tune full of useful tips for what to do during the zombie apocalypse.

LISTEN TO THE SONG

Top 10 Zombie Survival Vehicles @ Car Buzz

There's plenty of heavy machinery out there perfect for mashing, chopping, and clearing zombies should the dead begin to rise.

Tom Shardlow at Car Buzz.co.uk has compiled a list of just such mighty machines in his blog rundown of the Top 10 Zombie Survival Vehicles

BONG OF THE DEAD - Screening May 15th @ The Rio Theatre

Bong of the Dead, Thomas Newman's "$5000 epic zombie film," just screened as part of the Cannes Independent Film Festival official selection in France on May 12th and May 14th.

It will also be premiering TOMORROW on MAY 15th in Vancouver BC at the Rio Theatre at 6:30pm.

Full details: http://riotheatre.ca/movies/?movie_id=259

SHOCK STOCK: Vendor Spotlight (Part One)

Independent horror DVDs, cult t-shirts, and poster prints on display at Shock Stock. 

BLACK FAWN FILMS

Producers of If A Tree Falls and Dead Genesis

 In the world of independent Canadian horror cinema, quality can be as elusive as the legendary Canadian Sasquatch. Black Fawn Films, however, has already produced two very impressive and high-quality films that I've seen -- the zombie drama Dead Genesis (review) and the horror-thriller If A Tree Falls (available on DVD May 31st).

If A Tree Falls writer / star Ryan Barrett and producer Chad Archibald

If A Tree Falls, which screened at Shock Stock, is the story of a group of friends who take a road trip but are attacked in the woods by a group of masked men and women who psychologically and physically torment them. It's a great homage to 70s films and, truth be told, is technically and stylistically heads and shoulders above a lot of independent horror. Check out IF A TREE FALLS on Facebook. This is not an independent movie you'll regret spending some money on.






TWISTED T'S

Twisted T's: So many shirts. Not enough money!

Twisted T's specializes in the more obscure or "childhood memory" type of horror film apparel. With t-shirts and hoodies featuring the poster art for films like Nightmare City (review), The Video Dead, Torso, House by the Cemetery, and Return of the Blind Dead (review), you're bound to find something to satisfy your unique horror tastes. Who needs another Freddy t-shirt anyway?

LOBBY CARD INVASION

If you wanted poster prints at Shock Stock, you went to the LOBBY CARD INVASION booth. If you passed by, like me, you probably found yourself losing track of time as you flipped through several catalog portfolios of rich, sexy, horror and sci-fi poster prints spanning from the 1950s to the modern age. Specializing in American lobby cards, Lobby Card Invasion also stocks posters from many different countries.

A sampling of sci-fi and monster prints

Unlike other poster dealers I've (unsuccessfully) dealt with in the past, the guys from Lobby Card Invasion were incredibly helpful in locating what I was looking for and making sure I got my prints in one piece. In this case, I was looking for - and got - Godzilla!

AWESOME? No. Super Awesome.

TROMA

And what's a horror con without TROMA, everyone's favorite low-brow purveyors of independent bad taste and satire? The Troma booth was decked out with, perhaps, one of the largest selections of DVDs and merchandise on the entire Shock Stock floor. They even had some hard to find movies for your perusal.  

So many DVDs it'll make your head spin

Having wanted to get into the Troma catalog for some time, I decided to begin with the company's tentpole franchise: The Toxic Avenger. For a reasonable price, I picked up the complete Toxic Avenger collection -- the four films as well as the complete Toxic Crusaders cartoon. Yes, Lloyd Kaufman's hideously deformed creature of superhuman size and strength with a penchant for mutilating badguys was once cleaned up and turned into a kid's cartoon show. Only in America....

I don't care what you say. Toxic Avenger 2 was hilarious.

VENDOR SPOTLIGHT to be CONTINUED in PART TWO

ZAICO: Zombie Apocalypse Insurance Company

You might have car insurance, fire insurance, and health insurance, but none of that means shit when the zombie apocalypse goes down. Thankfully, there are entrepreneurs out there preparing for the future -- ZAICO: Zombie Apocalypse Insurance Company

ZAICO™ provides complete coverage for all aspects of rebuilding and recovering from the Zombie Apocalypse, giving you and your family the peace of mind that comes from being truly prepared.

From A (ammunition restocking) to Z (zombie incineration services), ZAICO™ helps in the greatest time of need.

With the affordable rates and low deductibles of ZAICO's full coverage, you'll be hard pressed NOT to buy full policies for everyone in your family.

www.zaico.com

Friday the 13th: Jason Voorhees is NOT a Zombie

This Friday the 13th, I thought I'd go on record and state that, in the opinion of The Zed Word: Zombie Blog, Jason Voorhees is NOT A ZOMBIE.

Here at The Zed Word, I review media from time to time that I don't truly consider to be zombie media. These films or books may have many elements in common with the zombie genre, or general fan consensus acknowledges them as important media associated with the zombie genre, but they are not -- by my definition - true zombie media. Take for example Tombs of the Blind Dead (review), The Revenant (review), or The Evil Dead (review). Not zombie films!

To me, there are three types of zombies. I defined them in a post from last year titled "What Are Zombies?". Zombies don't have to be dead to be zombies. Zombies don't have to eat flesh to be zombies. Zombies don't have to be slow to be zombies. The only thing that separates the zombie from any other creature is its lack of will and rational thought.

 

After his Zombie Card was revoked, Jason no longer qualified for discounts at the brain bank

Based on my own definitions, some may argue that Jason is in fact what I call one of the INSTINCT-DRIVEN UNDEAD: An ambulatory dead body reanimated in a corporeal state by scientific or supernatural means that interacts with the world through mechanical or instinctual behavior motivated by a powerful desire or instinct (often violent) that overrides rational thinking.

When is a walking corpse not a zombie?

In the Friday the 13th films, Jason Voorhees does exhibit a virtually single-minded desire to kill. This is true; Jason doesn't seem to think about anything but killing, yet his desire is far from mechanical or instinctual. His stalking, slashing, and countless creative kills suggest to me that, while Jason is certainly undead by the time he appears in Jason Lives, he's also fully cognizant and self-directed in his behaviour. You don't drag a woman out of her tent while she's in her sleeping bag and then beat her against a tree if you're mindlessly compelled to kill. That kind of violence takes creativity from a fully self-aware and self-controlled creature of evil.

Jason is undead. Don't get me wrong about that. As a result, he's often referred to as "Zombie Jason." I'm okay with that although it's not really a correct name. Calling Jason by the name "Zombie Jason" is the same as calling a Koala by the name  "Koala Bear" (pssst! Koalas aren't really bears). To define Jason as a zombie, however, in anything other than a colloquial sense ignores all the characteristics that make zombies unique. Therefore, Jason Voorhees is not a zombie! I just hope I don't incur any bad luck today for saying it.

Agree? Disagree? Leave a comment!

SHOCK STOCK: GUEST SPOTLIGHT

Life intervened, so I'm a few weeks behind on my Shock Stock coverage, but please enjoy these guest profiles for the people I mingled with on the Shock Stock floor at Centennial Hall in London, ON.


ILSA: SHE WOLF OF THE SS

I (left) and my friend Rufus (right) pose with Dyane Thorne (Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS)

Headlining the debut year for Shock Stock was exploitation legend Dyanne Thorne, star of Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS; Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheik; and Ilsa the Tigress of Siberia. Accompanied by her husband Howard Maurer, Dyanne was vending Ilsa merchandise and engaging her fans in the spirit of fun and openness that pervaded all the booths at Shock Stock. Thorne and Maurer are one of the sweetest and honest couples I've ever met on the convention circuit. Their close relationship was as clear for all to see in a very loving Q and A hosted by Lianne Spiderbaby in which Thorne and Maurer shared stories about how  they fell in love.

After the Q and A, Shock Stock hosted an Ilsa-themed auction for posters and other memorabilia to raise money for a cancer charity. I bid on and won (after some confusion) a very sexy French version of the Ilsa the Tigress poster. Other items that sold included an original first draft script for Ilsa the Tigress (sold for $400), a French Isla, She Wolf of the SS poster ($800), and one of the whips bought for use on Tigress but never used on screen ($120).

Howard Maurer, Dyanne Thorne, Rufus, Aaron Allen (me), Jay Winger

JON MIKL THOR

While movie audiences are rushing out to see Marvel's Thor in theaters, I was more excited to get to Shock Stock and meet the legendary Jon Mikl Thor (THORCENTRAL.com). I interviewed Thor for episode #35 of the Screamwave Horror Podcast, and quickly learned that Thor is not only an amazing Canadian rock warrior but also an honestly enthusiastic and gregarious guy. For the uninitiated, Jon Mikl Thor has been both Mr. Canada and Mr. USA, he fronted for the glam metal/rock band Thor, and his act used to consist of blowing up hot water bottles on stage using only his lungs and then bending steel with this teeth. He also starred in Zombie Nightmare (review) and Rock 'N' Roll Nightmare (review), which he also wrote and produced.

THOR! ROCK WARRIOR.

THOR - KEEP THE DOGS AWAY (1977)

Unfortunately, Thor doesn't blow up hot water bottles with his thunderous lungs anymore, but he still makes music, tours, and involves himself in film projects. Thor was on hand to promote his new project, Thor: The Rock Opera, a low budget montage of concert footage, old music videos, and new footage from half-completed film projects. Thor: The Rock Opera reunites Thor with the director Rock 'N' Roll Nightmare: John Fasano. Unfortunately, Thor: The Rock Opera is not a very cohesive or polished product, and it's plainly silly at times, but it is powered by Thor's mighty brand of infectious rock music that I enjoy. Like his music, Thor himself is a man of seemingly boundless enthusiasm. Meeting and greeting, shaking hands, promoting the film, handling the Q and A -- all the time Thor had a smile on his face. Like a true Asgardian, he even offered to help me out of a bind. When I couldn't find a copy of Rock 'N' Roll Nightmare to buy and get signed at Shock Stock, Thor offered to send me a copy. By the end of Shock Stock, I felt that I had been initiated into the Thor Corp. Now I'm ready to help Thor wage his rocking battle against the powers of evil. Check out THORCENTRAL.com for more information about tour dates.

By Odin's beard: I help hoist Thor's hammer!

LIANNE SPIDERBABY

Lianne Spiderbaby bugs out at the Fangoria Booth

Over the years, I've encountered two very troubling misconceptions about horror fans. 1.) Many think our ranks consist of overwhelmingly unsophisticated and inarticulate men. 2.) We are, on a whole, considered antisocial and misogynistic. In stark defiance to these stereotypes, I present Lianne Spiderbaby -- the sprightly writer for Fangoria and co-host of the new webshow Fright Bytes. Not only is Lianne sharp and insightful but she's engaging and enthusiastic about the legitimacy of horror and exploitation film. Currently working on a book-length project entitled Grindhouse Girls, Lianne stirred up some debate in recent months in the world of over her take-no-prisoners denouncement of Steven R. Monroe's I Spit on Your Grave remake. It was a negative review so controversial, she told me, that she even received death threats over it. You can hear all about Lianne's thoughts on women in horror and exploitation in our interview with her as part of episode #35 of the Screamwave Horror Podcast






As well as writing, Lianne produces the new webshow Fright Bytes with co-host Jay 3KB.  Fright Bytes is a review,  horror discussion, and interview show; their first episode takes on Scream 4. Subscribe on Youtube to make sure you catch their upcoming Shock Stock episode! You can also follow her on Twitter @liannemac or at her blog: liannespiderbaby.com

BILL ZEBUB

Bill Zebub: The King of B-Movies

Walking past Bill Zebub's table, you will see DVDs with lurid images of hot women under incendiary titles like Forgive Me for Raping You and Zombiechrist. After stopping to watch a loony sizzle reel of outrageous scenes from his films, I was surprised to find Bill Zebub a very relaxed and plain-spoken man who made no qualms about producing rape pictures in order to finance his experimental projects such as the "anti-horror-movie" movie Night of the Pumpkin. I've never seen a Bill Zebub film, but he was kind enough to give me a screener of Night of the Pumpkin for consideration. A reveiw is forthcoming at my general horror blog: Monster Chiller Horror theatre.






Since I couldn't really speak to the content of his films at the time, I spent some time discussing censorship with him and listening to his stories about groups trying to get this films taken down off Amazon. You can experience these films for yourself at BILLZEBUB.com.

Bill Zebub and Lloyd Kaufman at Fan Expo 2009