Our saviour is born!*

*of a jackal

Kevin and James have a chat, then sink their teeth into the first three episodes of the '69 Troughton serial The War Games. Note: this was recorded just prior to the Omicron variant catching people's notice, immediately making it helplessly dated. Good talk! 

Elliot, George, and I are back to talk about William Peter Blatty's fascinating, flawed, ambitious, sometimes brilliant 1990 oddity, Exorcist III (AKA Legion)... with digressions into the other Exorcist movies and books, plus Christopher Lee, Hannibal, Theodicy, mythology, etc etc etc.  Once again, my patrons got advance access.

The plan is for us to do The Omen next and release it on Christmas Day.

@_Jack_Graham_

@E11iotChapman

@EnigmaticElegy / http://www.strangeplaygrounds.com/ / https://www.youtube.com/user/ExaggeratedElegy

Elliot rejoins and the original IITSL gang assays Peter Strickland's 2012 triumph Berberian Sound Studio, a masterclass of aesthetics and irresolvably ambiguous, mysterious, gripping hauntological cinema.

Berberian Sound Studio - Wikipedia

My own piece from a few years ago, written immediately after my first viewing of this film: Carry On Screaming – Eruditorum Press

Movie Soundtrack 

@_Jack_Graham_

@E11iotChapman

@EnigmaticElegy / http://www.strangeplaygrounds.com/ / https://www.youtube.com/user/ExaggeratedElegy

Another podcast excursion into the Media Hauntological, this time focusing on The Shining, the 1980 masterpiece by... well, by several people, including but not limited to Stanley Kubrick.  (See also a triumvirate of brilliant women: Diane Johnson, Wendy Carlos, and Shelley Duvall.)

This time George and I are joined by Kit Power.  Because we've decided we hate Elliot.  No, no, no.  I kid.  If the Joker ever tries to corrupt one of us, it'll be Elliot, because he's the best of us.  Truth is, George and Kit and I have long been planning a Shiningcast, since long before George, Elliot and I launched the project that I, to the silent embarrassment of everyone else involved, insist on calling It *IS* The Same Log.  

Luckily, it fits very well into the running thread of IITSL.  By agreement with Elliot, George and I went ahead with Kit, and this episode slots nicely into the series.

It's a long, long episode in which we mostly talk about the film but also talk a lot about the novel, some about the TV miniseries, and even a little bit about Doctor Sleep (book and movie).  As well as the usual manifold digressions.

Content warnings for discussion of very difficult subjects, and also for gushing because this is very very my favourite movie.

The longest Shabcast ever - both in terms of its total running time and of how long it has taken to release - draws to a close.  

In this final fantastic episode, Holly offers some closing remarks about texts, fan art, fan fiction, fantasy and its relationship to real action, play, etc.  

As you might expect by now, these remarks are complex, thought-provoking, and challenging.  They take in matters of great delicacy, and even darkness and danger.  Touched upon in our final discussion are: the nature of fantasy, the line between the pornographic and non-pornographic, unregulated fan spaces, attempts to regulate them through community pressure, accusations and abuse in fandom, the safety of children to think through their development through fiction and gameplay, possible exploitation of young fans, good and bad faith in discussions of what is or isn't appropriate, the complexity of moral judgement and legality re representations of criminal and immoral acts, realism as ideology, the tension between exploration and normalisation, etc, etc.

Some of this is knotty stuff so content warnings abound.

Elliot, George, and Jack continue their podcasting odyssey into the Media Hauntological, branching off into a related but new direction with Robert Eggers' 2015 masterpiece The Witch. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Witch_(2015_film)  

Content warnings abound.

@_Jack_Graham_

@E11iotChapman

@EnigmaticElegy / http://www.strangeplaygrounds.com/ / https://www.youtube.com/user/ExaggeratedElegy

A little extra.  George, Elliot and I don't consider, let alone take a course of action as drastic as 'stop talking' lightly.  Our Blair Witch conversation continued for another near 40 minutes after the point where I ended the episode.  And here it is.

Come one, come all! Elliot Chapman, master performer and one of the finest storytellers of our Internet Age, is on Human Bondage. He witnesses strange things, like Christopher Lee's third nipple, Kit's defense of Fleming's novel, a shoutout to Wrong With Authority fans, and James bodying Christine near the end.

Welcome back to the loooong discussion between myself, Jack Graham, and the excellent Holly Boson (@fireh9lly) in which Holly explains Final Fantasy VII to me, a total novice, in pitiless detail.

Sorry for the looooooong gap between this and the last installment.

So here, at last, is Part 4

This episode is mainly about why the remake is amazing.  Even so, some possibly disturbing subjects are mentioned, so I must again attach a content warning.

The series will conclude with a fifth part, probably next month.  Or possibly in eight months, knowing me.

Aaaand here's another spooktobery new episode of It IS The Same Log (because these days we are *all* Heather in the woods sobbing "It's not the same log!" over and over again but... I gotta tell ya... it *is*) and once again I (Jack) am joined by Elliot Chapman and George Daniel Lea.

This time we tackle the legendary and infamous Ghostwatch, created and aired by the BBC in 1992 much to their own horror.  Written by Stephen Volk, directed by Lesley Manning.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghostwatch

I would probably call this one of my very favourite pieces of uncanny media, brilliantly crafted, genuinely scary, and a veritable bottomless pit of implications.  I don't find much disagreement from my co-hosts and, once again, our enthusiasm runs riot.  We cover many topics from the BBC internal reaction, the public furore, media 'realism', gothic marxism, etc.  We were even plagued during recording by terrifyingly appropriate technical glitches.  Skype got media hauntological on our asses.  

Once again, my backers got days of advance access.

Spoilers and content warnings

@_Jack_Graham_ https://www.patreon.com/jackgraham

@E11iotChapman

@EnigmaticElegy / http://www.strangeplaygrounds.com/ / https://www.youtube.com/user/ExaggeratedElegy

Spooktober continues with IITSL (because these days we are *all* Heather in the woods sobbing "It's not the same log!" over and over again but... I gotta tell ya... it *is*) and a new episode that is genuinely one of my (Jack's) favourite things I've ever done, a conversation with the same team as last time (Elliot Chapman and George Daniel Lea) about the classic 1972 Nigel Kneale TV ghost story The Stone Tape, the terrifying and multi-dimensional masterpiece of the BBC gothic.

Spoilers and content warnings

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Stone_Tape

Whole show on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtvJWKaDI9s

@_Jack_Graham_

@E11iotChapman

@EnigmaticElegy / http://www.strangeplaygrounds.com/ / https://www.youtube.com/user/ExaggeratedElegy

Welcome to the first episode of It IS The Same Log, a new series for October, in which Jack Graham (of I Don't Speak German and the Shabcast) talks to his erudite friends Elliot Chapman and George Daniel Lea about lesser-known landmarks in the cinema and television of the uncanny.  This week, it's 1980's The Changeling, an underappreciated classic of haunted cinema.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Changeling_(film)

@_Jack_Graham_

@E11iotChapman

@EnigmaticElegy / http://www.strangeplaygrounds.com/ / https://www.youtube.com/user/ExaggeratedElegy

Christine and Kit welcome Roger Moore with Live and Let Die. They're joined by their brilliant and hilarious friend Miranda, who has never seen a James Bond movie and proceeds to gloriously dunk on the source material and this show's gringo hosts.

Kevin and James talk the 1965 artifacts the Rescue, Bringing It All Back Home, & Highway 61 Revisited

Christine, Kit, and James tackle Diamonds Are Forever, Connery's second (and last, yes, shut the fuck up) swansong as James Bond. It's a weird fucking movie and they have some takes on it. Things go to hell.

Kevin and James have a great time saying "chumblies" to one another and then get into a deep dive in the second part of their subseries about Bob Dylan's albums, covering The Times They Are A-Changin' and Another Side of Bob Dylan.

Chumblies. 

Hey, Bobby Dylan, we recorded you a 'cast.

Christine and Kit are joined by James Slater-Murphy to talk about the horribly anti-Japanese You Only Live Twice.

Kevin, James and Jack get wet. 

The year of Pex Lives continues! This month: Resurrection of the Daleks. 

Kevin and James shoot the breeze and talk about the third Dr. Who serial. 

Here is the next part of the loooong discussion between myself, Jack Graham, and the excellent Holly Boson (@fireh9lly) in which Holly explains Final Fantasy VII to me, a total novice, in pitiless detail.

In this episode we delve into the history and politics of sequels and remakes, and fandom as a way of constructing the self.

Content warnings apply because some potentially troubling issues are mentioned.

Part 4 will be posted in advance of publication for my Patreon backers. https://www.patreon.com/user?u=4196618&fan_landing=true

Kevin and James talk current events and then gush about a great serial.

Here is the next part of the loooong discussion between myself, Jack Graham, and the excellent Holly Boson (@fireh9lly) in which Holly explains Final Fantasy VII to me, a total novice, in pitiless detail.

This episodes moves on from preparatory context to the basics of the game and its history, Holly's textual approach to the game, and such subjects as Cloud Strife, fandom, shipping, etc.

Content warnings apply from this point on because some potentially troubling issues are mentioned.

Part 3 will be posted in advance of publication for my Patreon backers. https://www.patreon.com/user?u=4196618&fan_landing=true