Podcasts about grimly

Mike and Tracy exchange fun car activities.

Michael Healy Rae TD describes what happened to him while entering Dáil Éireann amid protests yesterday and Liam Herrick, Executive Director of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, reacts to protests outside Leinster House yesterday during which 13 people were arrested. Later we hear from Senator Jerry Buttimer.

Ukraine says its troops are holding on to parts of the eastern city of Bakhmut, the focus of a prolonged Russian assault, while the head of a major pro-Russian government force says his men are making progress. Meanwhile the Pope says the Vatican is involved in a peace mission to try to end the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

I love malapropisms. My favorite: A number of years ago, a bar mitzvah kid was leading services from an earlier Reform prayer book, “Gates of Prayer.” He was supposed to have read: “In a world torn by violence and pain …” Instead, it came out of his mouth as: “In a world torn by violence and prayer …” He got that right. My guest is Professor Marcia Pally. Professor Pally teaches at New York University and at Fordham University and held the Mercator Guest Professorship in the theology department at Humboldt University-Berlin, where she is an annual guest professor. Her latest book is “White Evangelicals and Right-wing Populism: How Did We Get Here?” We discuss her concerns about right-wing evangelical populism. Want to watch something terrifying? Check out this video of the song “Onward Christian Soldiers.” Watch those young, beautiful children doing exactly as the lyrics would teach: preparing to become Christian soldiers, marching as to war. The images are terrifying. This subject is so hot, so alive and, frankly, so upsetting — precisely because it is about the weaponization of faith. A group of insurrectionists, including Jacob Chansley (shirtless), prays inside the U.S. Senate chamber after breaching the Capitol, Jan. 6, 2021, in Washington. Video screen grab via Luke Mogelson/The New Yorker Check out this quote from Professor Pally's book: Among those who on January 6, 2021 rioted at the US Capitol building claiming that the 2020 election had been stolen from Donald Trump was a small group that stormed the Senate chamber. Removing his horned helmet, a bare-chested “shaman” figure named Jacob Chansley led the group in prayer: Thank you heavenly father for gracing us with this opportunity… to allow us to exercise our rights, to allow us to send a message to all the tyrants, the communists, and the globalists, that this is our nation, not theirs. We will not allow America, the American way of the United States of America to go down … Thank you divine, omniscient and omnipresent creator God for blessing each and every one of us here and now …. In Christ's holy name, we pray. I could not put Professor Pally's book down, and then I went on to watch Andrew Callaghan's documentary “This Place Rules,” which just came out and which is available on HBO Max. It is a chronicle of his trips across the United States, visiting people who wound up — or whose compatriots wound up — on the steps of the Capitol building on Jan. 6. Many of these people were terrifying. I also mean they were physically terrifying. While I believe everyone has the right to do with their bodies as they want to — these people seem to have gone out of their way to alter their appearances so as to look really scary. They define the meaning of terror. It worked. I have to say: It terrified me. The whole issue of how faith becomes intertwined with right-wing politics, violent bigotries — all of that — I was fascinated. Grimly fascinated. I was grimly fascinated and terrified and depressed by the interviews in the film with children who believe in various conspiracy theories, including the QAnon conspiracy theory. But even more than that: I found it absolutely revolting that they were quoting those theories and then using terms like “globalist” or “Rothschilds,” which are antisemitic dog whistles. All of which reminded me of something about faith. The late Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, who served as the chief rabbi of Great Britain and who had a warm relationship with the current King Charles, once said — and it has always stayed with me — that religion has the power to make good people better, and it has the power to make bad people worse. It is ultimately our choice.

Welcome to another episode in our “Best of The Literary Life Podcast” series. Today on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford and Cindy Rollins tackle the topic of fairy stories, discussing the what, why and how of reading them. Angelina shares the distinctive characteristics of fairy stories in contrast to other types of stories, such as myths. They deal with the question of whether fairy tales are “escapist”, the influence of the Grimm brothers scholarly work on interpreting fairy stories, and allowing the story to unveil its deeper truths without forcing meaning onto it. Angelina gives an illustration of how to see the gospel messages in fairy tales by talking us through the story of Sleeping Beauty. She refutes the ideas that fairy tales are about human romance or are misogynistic. She also highlights some of the Enlightenment and Puritan responses to fairy tales that still linger with us today. Cindy and Angelina also discuss some common concerns such as the magical, weird, or scary aspects of fairy tales. Angelina also makes a distinction between folk tales, literary fairy tales, and cautionary tales. Other Literary Life series openers referenced in this episode: Episode 20: An Experiment in Criticism by C. S. Lewis Episode 71: Phantastes by George MacDonald Episode 30: The Literary Life of Caitlin Beauchamp Commonplace Quotes: After a certain kind of sherry party, where there have been cataracts of culture but never on word or one glance that suggested a real enjoyment of any art, any person, or any natural object, my heart warms to the schoolboy on the bus who is reading Fantasy and Science Fiction rapt and oblivious of all the world beside.  C. S. Lewis Children are not deceived by fairy tales. They are often and gravely deceived by school stories. Adults are not deceived by science fiction. They can be deceived by stories in women's magazines. C. S. Lewis Both fairy stories and realistic stories engage in wish fulfillment, but it is actually the realistic stories that are more deadly. Fairy stories do awaken desires in children, but most often it is not a desire for the fairy world itself. Most children don't really want there to be dragons in modern England. Instead, the desire is for they know not what. This desire for something beyond does not empty the real world, but actually gives it new depths. He does not despise real woods because he has read of enchanted woods. The reading makes all real woods a little enchanted. C. S. Lewis Ancient History by Siegfried Sassoon Adam, a brown old vulture in the rain,    Shivered below his wind-whipped olive-trees;   Huddling sharp chin on scarred and scraggy knees,   He moaned and mumbled to his darkening brain;   ‘He was the grandest of them all—was Cain!    ‘A lion laired in the hills, that none could tire;   ‘Swift as a stag; a stallion of the plain, ‘Hungry and fierce with deeds of huge desire.' Grimly he thought of Abel, soft and fair— A lover with disaster in his face, And scarlet blossom twisted in bright hair.   ‘Afraid to fight; was murder more disgrace? … ‘God always hated Cain' … He bowed his head— The gaunt wild man whose lovely sons were dead. Book List: Phantastes by George MacDonald The World's Last Night by C. S. Lewis An Experiment in Criticism by C. S. Lewis “On Three Ways of Writing for Children” by C. S. Lewis Surprised by Joy by C. S. Lewis The Princess and The Goblin by George MacDonald Support The Literary Life: Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support! Connect with Us: You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at Angelina Stanford – House of Humane Letters. Find Cindy at MorningTimeforMoms.com, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at Cindy Rollins – Writer. Check out Cindy's own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let's get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

A Dose of Dave is a series of bite sized podcasts featuring me on my own. I'm just trying it out to see where it takes me. They're only about 5 mins long. If you wish to contribute to the podcast you can here: - https://www.patreon.com/bullshitdetective

R.H. Grimly was born with a fortunately sinister name. He grew up on Goosebumps, Wait Till Helen Comes, and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark and has one goal: to get kids excited to read, and scare them silly while doing it (okay, that's two goals). When he isn't writing scary books, he's usually writing screenplays for films. He lives near Park City with his wife Leah and their four kids. “I have terrifying memories of being the last kid in the basement, and having to turn out the lights and run for my life to the stairs. Books like Goosebumps probably helped me cope (all while hiding their secret agenda of fueling a kid's love for reading). I wanted to pay homage to those stories and the nostalgia I feel for them, while having fun, terrifying new adventures. And of course pushing my own evil plan of getting kids nowadays to put down their phones and develop the same love of reading I did.” Also around the 27 minute mark or so, we pause R.H. to bring in a little segment with Narrator, BJ Whimpey or did the audio book for The Wildman of Shaggy Creek. http://bjwhimpey.com Connect with R.H. Grimly online: Twitter | Facebook Sign up here to be notified about R.H. Grimly's next book release! FRIGHTLAND CURRENT TITLES #1 The Wildman of Shaggy Creek #2 Why I Don't Sleep on Feather Beds #3 The Bones at the Bottom of the Lake #4 Donut Shop of Doom Find the Books: http://frightlandbooks.com | https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/frightland-chilling-tales-of-terror-for-kids#/ --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/ehpodcasts/message

Sacred Stories | Santa Finally Comes to Our House “Listen and attend with the ear of your heart.” – St. Benedict of Nursia, Founder of the Benedictine Order (480-547) In the December-darkened room, the little girl shone brightly. With a mop of golden curls and a sunny smile, she looked like the Campbell's Soup child. Her young mother was caring for her grandmother. The little girl was quiet, but I could see that the hospital room was not much fun for her. With her mother's permission, I began to play with the young girl. We colored pictures and quietly read stories. Day by day, I came to know the child and her mother better. They lived with the grandmother and depended on her home and her wisdom. Her illness troubled them, and uncertainty hovered nearby. One afternoon, Santa came to visit the unit. With her mother's permission, I took the child to see him. She was still with awe. I asked her if she would like to tell Santa what she wanted for Christmas, but she said no. “Would you like to tell me, and I can tell him?” I asked. She whispered in my ear, “A Dora the Explorer doll.” Later, I told her mother what the child had asked for. Grimly, she said, “Santa doesn't come to our house. Santa is just for those who have money.” Suddenly, I realized what kind of Christmas awaited this little family. It broke my heart. I called one of my coworkers to share my sadness. She said, “I have a Dora the Explorer doll under my tree at home. I bought it for a friend's daughter, but my friend told me, ‘please do not give it to my daughter; she already has so many toys.' I am going to call my husband right now and ask him to bring it here.” When the doll arrived, we placed it under the Christmas tree in my unit. When all was ready, I brought the child to the tree. When she saw the doll, she gasped, “Santa listened to me! He really listened!” There are many problems we cannot f ix: broken families, miserable economics, shattered health. But we can listen to each other, and perhaps that is the greatest gift of all. The author is Betsy Kammerdiener Shared from the Sacred Stories Archive Question for Reflection When was the last time you demonstrated our value of compassion by caring with listening, empathy, and love? Share this Story Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on LinkedInShare by Mail Listen to more Sacred Stories The Gift of CitizenshipJuly 1, 2020/by adminOur Famous PatientJuly 1, 2020/by adminFulfilling a Last RequestAugust 1, 2020/by adminThe Power of Being PresentAugust 1, 2020/by adminA Celebrated FarewellSeptember 1, 2020/by adminGod's Perfect TimingSeptember 1, 2020/by adminGod's Presence in GriefSeptember 28, 2020/by adminCompassion in ActionSeptember 28, 2020/by adminEncourage One AnotherOctober 26, 2020/by adminThe Door is OpenOctober 26, 2020/by adminRestoring the SoulNovember 16, 2020/by adminSacred Stories, Sacred GroundNovember 16, 2020/by adminOur Christmas GiftNovember 30, 2020/by adminMessages Placed in My PathJanuary 8, 2021/by adminBeyond WordsFebruary 1, 2021/by adminCare In the Time of COVID-19March 1, 2021/by adminPrayer of Surrender at the End of LifeMarch 8, 2021/by adminWisdom from a ChildApril 5, 2021/by adminGod Has This in ControlMay 3, 2021/by adminReceiving Guests With Compassion and KindnessMay 21, 2021/by adminCommonSpirit Health's Ever-present ValuesAugust 23, 2021/by adminThe Gift of Time in the Giving GardenSeptember 3, 2021/by adminFair, with Occasional CloudsSeptember 28, 2021/by adminAlways a ReasonOctober 12, 2021/by adminIt Only Takes a SecondOctober 26, 2021/by adminA Thank You NoteNovember 9, 2021/by adminWith the Arms of ChristNovember 30, 2021/by adminLadybug's Christmas TreeDecember 6, 2021/by adminA New FriendDecember 8, 2021/by adminJesus Lit Up Our WorldDecember 14, 2021/by adminLike a Grain of WheatJanuary 5, 2022/by adminSanta Finally Comes to Our HouseJanuary 13, 2022/by adminWhenever it Snows, the Memory of Him Comes to MeJanuary 18,

Despite major medical advancements, the pandemic continues - and continues its impact on politics. Hear the "Playing Politics" analysis from WCCO Radio's Chad Hartman and the Star Tribune Editorial Board's Jill Burcum and John Rash.

We had to wait for an episode where Wen Ning shows up in the first minute, but we've finally created the sequel to episode ten of this podcast! Sam of Juergen' It, Kyle X Why?, and Zero to Zero joins us this week to talk about season 3, episode 9, "Manifest!" Wei Wuxian gets roasted by a toddler, Nie Huaisang commits to the hype, Su She starts a very bad internet commentary show, and all of us learn a very important lesson: kids rule, adults drool! Intro: Carly Rae Jepsen – I Really Like You, arr. & perf. by Olivia Lin Outro: Robert Buckley - Squonk Blues Also used: Frederic Chopin – Nocturne in E-Flat, Op. 9, No. 2, perf. by James Galway Noisespace | Patreon | Tumblr | Discord | Twitter | Fallon | Roy | Sam

The Tommy and Adam Hard to Name Podcast Episode #36 Season #2: Episode 36 The pod has been out for a few weeks but its back with a bang with Godzílo was controlling the board it could have been a disaster. It covers National Avocado Day, AC/DC's Back in Black, the official Greatest and Gayest albums of all time. We even covered some of the Olympics. But Adam is still out and no where to be found. However…we received a secret communicado from a “Grimley Knoll.” Its very in mysterious. It's all on the internet and to the embarrassment of their loved one so they invite you to download/stream this episode on your favorite DSPs. Subscribe, share then write a comment/complaint or send us an email to TommyNAdamPod@gmail.com. Always hashtag them with #TNAHTNPodcast.

Eggplant Evan escapades --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/victory-von-stryker/support

Author R. H. Grimly joins me to talk about his upcoming series, Frightland. Frightland is a new scary middle-grade series inspired by R. L. Stine's Goosebumps series. R. H. Grimly grew up on series such as Goosebumps, Wait Till Helen Comes, and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. Head over to Kickstarter to help back this project, and let them know the Nerds sent you. The current campaign is for the first four books but is planned as a twelve-book anthology. Each book will be a self-contained story but exist in a shared universe. After the first twelve books, R. H. Grimly plans to create a 13th novel that will bring the whole universe together. The series will feature covers by artists from Flavio Greco Paglia and Tim Jacobus. Tim Jacobus is known for his artwork on Goosebumps, Spine Tingles, Bone Chillers, and many more. See below for the covers for the first 2 books. The Team The Frightland series will be published by Barde Press. Barde Press is a small team of independent artists who love fantastic stories. Their goal is to find, publish, and create the best new stories for fellow fans and geeks. Click on the links below to keep up with the author and artist who are working on bringing this series to life R. H. Grimly: Twitter | Facebook Tim Jacobus: Instagram | website Flavio Greco Paglia: Instagram | website David Romero: Tumblr Daniel Brown: Instagram Get our Merch: bit.ly/NerdsMerch Follow us on social media: https://twitter.com/NerdsFTC https://www.instagram.com/nerdsftc https://ww.facebook.com/NerdsFTC Saul: https://twitter.com/Better_CallMe Greg: https://twitter.com/ThatAmazingTwit https://www.instagram.com/thatamazingtwit David: https://twitter.com/DaveyDave503 https://www.instagram.com/daveydave Theme by: Jake Lionhart https://twitter.com/Jake_Lionheart

“I cannot pontificate about it, but by the time I'm done, I will have done one movie, and it's all the movies I want.People say, you know, "I like your Spanish movies more than I like your English-language movies because they are not as personal", and I go "Fuck, you're wrong!" Hellboy is as personal to me as Pan's Labyrinth. They're tonally different, and yes, of course you can like one more than the other – the other one may seem banal or whatever it is that you don't like. But it really is part of the same movie. You make one movie. Hitchcock did one movie, all his life.” —Guillermo del Toro, Twitch Film, January 15, 2013 Ok, passengers! First off, if you don’t know who Guermillo Del Toro is, press pause on this show, smack yourself in the mouth and then go watch Pan’s Labrynth, Hellboy or even Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark and then come back to finish. Go on… git! We’ll wait! Del Toro was born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico, the son of Guadalupe Gómez and Federico del Toro Torres, an automotive entrepreneur. Both of whom are of Spanish descent. He was raised in a strict Catholic household. Del Toro studied at the Centro de Investigación y Estudios Cinematográficos, at the University of Guadalajara. Having a taste for the macabre at an early age, del Toro decorated his family home with decidedly spooky elements. Del Toro loves monsters. . He claims that monsters used to crowd into his room at night, and he made a pact with them: If they let him go to the washroom, he’d be their friend for life. It worked, and del Toro says, “To this day, monsters are the thing I love most.” Del Toro liked monsters so much as a child that his Catholic grandmother, fearing for his soul, performed a real-life exorcism on him, and when that didn’t work, she actually performed a second one. Del Toro considers himself a book-person first and foremost, and there were two books that shaped his universe as a child. One was an encyclopedia of health (which led to an obsession with anatomy), and the other an encyclopedia of art. When del Toro was about eight years old, he began experimenting with his father's Super 8 camera, making short films with Planet of the Apes toys and other objects. One short focused on a "serial killer potato" with ambitions of world domination; it murdered del Toro's mother and brothers before stepping outside and being crushed by a car.  Del Toro made about 10 short films before his first feature, including one titled Matilde, but only the last two, Doña Lupe and Geometria, have been made available.  He wrote four episodes and directed five episodes of the cult series La Hora Marcada, along with other Mexican filmmakers such as Emmanuel Lubezki and Alfonso Cuarón.Del Toro got his first big break when he made Cronos in 1993.The movie, about the effects of a device that confers immortality, won nine Ariel Awards from the Mexican Academy of Film—including best picture, best director, best screenplay, and best original story—and also received the International Critics’ Week grand prize at the Cannes film festival.  Del Toro studied special effects and make-up with special-effects artist Dick Smith. Dick Smith had been a huge influence on del Toro throughout his life. He bought Smith’s make-up kit when The Exorcist came out in 1973, and applied for his make-up course in New York in 1987.  He spent 10 years as a special-effects make-up designer and formed his own company, Necropia. He also co-founded the Guadalajara International Film Festival. Later in his directing career, he formed his own production company, the Tequila Gang. In 1997, at the age of 33, Guillermo was given a $30 million budget from Miramax Films to shoot another film, Mimic. After turning in a draft of his screenplay for Mimic to Miramax, the studio was not happy with how little was explained about the creatures at the centre of the story, and decided to commission a number of rewrites. One of these drafts was written by none other than Steven Soderbergh, but almost none of his work ended up in the film. Del Toro is not a fan of second unit work, and for his director’s cut of Mimic he managed to excise the majority of the second unit footage. Robert Rodriguez was one of the second unit directors on the film. Mimic was a very troubled production, and del Toro claims that his experience butting heads with studio execs at Miramax was actually more traumatic than his father’s kidnapping( which we'll discuss in a bit): “What was happening to me and the movie was far more illogical than kidnapping, which is brutal, but at least there are rules.” He was ultimately unhappy with the way Miramax had treated him during production, which led to his friend James Cameron almost coming to blows with Miramax co-founder and owner Harvey Weinstein during the 70th Academy Awards. In 2001 Del toro made The Devil's backbone. The Devil’s Backbone, was produced by renowned Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar. Almodovar afforded del Toro a level of creative freedom that he’d never experienced up to that point, and the eternally grateful del Toro has tried to pay this gesture forward as a producer for many directors’ films. The film was an international co-production between Spain and Mexico. Del Toro wrote the first draft before writing his debut film Cronos. This "very different" version was set in the Mexican Revolution and focused not on a child's ghost but a "Christ with three arms". According to del Toro, and as drawn in his notebooks, there were many iterations of the story, some of which included antagonists who were a "doddering ... old man with a needle," a "desiccated" ghost with black eyes as a caretaker (instead of the living Jacinto who terrorizes the orphans), and "beings who are red from head to foot." As to motivation for the villain, according to the actor who portrayed him (Eduardo Noriega), Jacinto "suffered a lot when he was a child at this orphanage. Somebody probably treated him wickedly: this is his heritage. And then there is the brutalizing effect of the War." Noriega further notes that "What Guillermo did was to write a biography of Jacinto (which went into Jacinto's parents, what they did in life, and more) and gave it to me." DDT Studios in Barcelona created the final version of the crying ghost (victim and avenger) Santi, with his temple that resembled cracked, aged porcelain. The response was overwhelmingly positive, though it did not receive the critical success that Pan's Labyrinth would in 2006. Del Toro considers The Devil’s Backbone and Pan’s Labyrinth to be companion pieces, and claims that they reveal “symmetries and reflections” if watched together. His next film was on 2002, Blade 2. directed by Guillermo Del Toro and written by David S. Goyer, it is a sequel to the first film and the second part of the Blade film series, followed by Blade: Trinity. Guillermo del Toro was hired to direct Blade II by New Line production president Michael De Luca after Stephen Norrington turned down the offer to direct the sequel. Del Toro chose not to alter the script too much from the ideas created by Goyer and Snipes. "I wanted the movie to have a feeling of both a comic book and Japanese animation", said the director. "I resurrected those sources and viewed them again. I dissected most of the dailies from the first movie; I literally grabbed about four boxes of tapes and one by one saw every single tape from beginning to end until I perfectly understood where the language of the first film came from. I studied the style of the first one and I think Norrington used a tremendous narrative style. His work is very elegant". Blade II was released on March 22, 2002. This was during a period of the year (months March and April) considered to be a bad time for sequels to be released. Despite this, the film became the highest-grossing film of the Blade series, making $80 million in the United States and $150 million worldwide.  Hellboy is a 2004 supernatural superhero film written and directed by Guillermo del Toro from a story by Del Toro and Peter Briggs. It is based on the Dark Horse Comics graphic novel Hellboy: Seed of Destruction by Mike Mignola. Del Toro and Hellboy creator Mike Mignola envisioned the film as a Ray Harryhausen film. The film was shopped and rejected by various studios for years due to studios disliking the title, script, and the fact that Perlman was cast as Hellboy.[7][8] Del Toro invited Harryhausen to teach the film's animators what made his effects techniques unique but he declined, feeling that modern films were too violent. While writing the script, Del Toro researched occult Nazi philosophies and used them as a reference for the film's opening scene. In an early version of the script, the gyroscope portal was described being made out of rails that formed into pentagrams, hexagrams, and inverted stars to illustrate the film's magic and occult elements. Del Toro chose to alter the origin from the comic to give main characters interconnected origins. Aside from working with Perlman before, Del Toro chose him for the title role because he felt Perlman can deliver subtlety and nuance with makeup.[23] Del Toro assigned his real life friend, Santiago Segura, to play the train driver who assaults Hellboy. The film was shot 6 days a week for 130 days, Mondays through Saturdays without a second unit. Sundays were reserved for editing.  Del Toro noted that the film could have commenced filming in 1998, however, the film had difficulty finding a committed studio due to the stigma Hollywood associated superhero and comic book films with, at the time. The action scenes were staged after Harryhausen films with little to no camera movement using wide shots. The cemetery sequence was filmed in a real cemetery in Prague. Pan's labyrinth is a  2006 dark fantasy film written and directed by Guillermo del Toro. The film is  a Spanish-Mexican co-production. Del Toro stated that he considers the story to be a parable, influenced by fairy tales, and that it addresses and continues themes related to his earlier film The Devil's Backbone, to which Pan's Labyrinth is a spiritual successor, according to del Toro in his director's DVD commentary. The idea for Pan's Labyrinth came from Guillermo del Toro's notebooks, which he says are filled with "doodles, ideas, drawings and plot bits". He had been keeping these notebooks for twenty years. At one point during production, he left the notebook in a taxi in London and was distraught, but the cabbie returned it to him two days later. Though he originally wrote a story about a pregnant woman who falls in love with a faun,[12] Sergi López said that del Toro described the final version of the plot a year and a half before filming. Lopez said that "for two hours and a half he explained to me all the movie, but with all the details, it was incredible, and when he finished I said, 'You have a script?' He said, 'No, nothing is written'". López agreed to act in the movie and received the script one year later; he said that "it was exactly the same, it was incredible. In his little head he had all the history with a lot of little detail, a lot of characters, like now when you look at the movie, it was exactly what he had in his head".  Del Toro got the idea of the faun from childhood experiences with "lucid dreaming". He stated on The Charlie Rose Show that every midnight, he would wake up, and a faun would gradually step out from behind the grandfather's clock. Originally, the faun was supposed to be a classic half-man, half-goat faun fraught with beauty. But in the end, the faun was altered into a goat-faced creature almost completely made out of earth, moss, vines, and tree bark. Some of the  works he drew on for inspiration include Lewis Carroll's Alice books, Jorge Luis Borges' Ficciones, Arthur Machen's The Great God Pan and The White People, Lord Dunsany's The Blessing of Pan, Algernon Blackwood's Pan's Garden and Francisco Goya's works. In 2004, del Toro said: "Pan is an original story. Some of my favourite writers (Borges, Blackwood, Machen, Dunsany) have explored the figure of the god Pan and the symbol of the labyrinth. These are things that I find very compelling and I am trying to mix them and play with them." It was also influenced by the illustrations of Arthur Rackham.There are differing ideas about the film's religious influences. Del Toro himself has said that he considers Pan's Labyrinth "a truly profane film, a layman's riff on Catholic dogma", but that his friend Alejandro González Iñárritu described it as "a truly Catholic film". Del Toro's explanation is "once a Catholic, always a Catholic," however he also admits that the Pale Man's preference for children rather than the feast in front of him is intended as a criticism of the Catholic Church. Additionally, the priest's words during the torture scene were taken as a direct quote from a priest who offered communion to political prisoners during the Spanish Civil War: "Remember my sons, you should confess what you know because God doesn't care what happens to your bodies; He already saved your souls." Hellboy II: The Golden Army is a 2008 American superhero film based on the fictional character Hellboy created by Mike Mignola. The film was written and directed by  del Toro and is a sequel to the 2004 film Hellboy, which del Toro also directed. Ron Perlman reprises his starring role as the eponymous character. Hellboy II: The Golden Army was released by Universal Pictures.The director sought to create a film trilogy with the first sequel anticipated for release in 2006. Revolution Studios planned to produce the film and distribute it through a deal with Columbia Pictures, but by 2006, their distribution deal wasn't renewed and Revolution began refocusing on exploiting their film library. In August 2006, Universal Pictures acquired the project with the intent to finance and distribute the sequel, which was newly scheduled to be released in summer of 2008. Production was scheduled to begin in April 2007 in Etyek, Hungary (near Budapest) and London, England. del Toro explored several concepts for the sequel, initially planning to recreate the classic versions of Frankenstein, Dracula and the Wolf Man. He and comic book creator Mike Mignola also spent a few days adapting the Almost Colossus story, featuring Roger the Homunculus. They then found it easier to create an original story based on folklore, because del Toro was planning Pan's Labyrinth, and Mignola's comics were becoming increasingly based on mythology. Later, del Toro pitched a premise to Revolution Studios that involved four Titans from the four corners of Earth—Wind, Water, Fire, and Earth—before he replaced the Titans with a Golden Army. Mignola described the theme of the sequel, "The focus is more on the folklore and fairy tale aspect of Hellboy. It's not Nazis, machines and mad scientists but the old gods and characters who have been kind of shoved out of our world." Pacific Rim is a 2013 science-fiction monster film directed by del Toro. In February 2006, it was reported that Guillermo del Toro would direct Travis Beacham's fantasy screenplay, Killing on Carnival Row, but the project never materialized.[48] Beacham conceived Pacific Rim the following year. While walking on the beach near Santa Monica Pier, the screenwriter imagined a giant robot and a giant monster fighting to the death. "They just sort of materialized out of the fog, these vast, godlike things." He later conceived the idea that each robot had two pilots, asking "what happens when one of those people dies?" Deciding this would be "a story about loss, moving on after loss, and dealing with survivor's guilt", Beacham commenced writing the film. On May 28, 2010, it was reported that Legendary Pictures had purchased Beacham's detailed 25-page film treatment, now titled Pacific Rim. On July 28, 2010, it was reported that del Toro would next direct an adaptation of H. P. Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness for Universal Studios, with James Cameron producing.[51] When del Toro met with Legendary Pictures to discuss the possibility of collaborating with them on a film, he was intrigued by Beacham's treatment—still a "very small pitch" at this point. Del Toro struck a deal with Legendary: while directing At the Mountains of Madness, he would produce and co-write Pacific Rim; because of the films' conflicting production schedules, he would direct Pacific Rim only if At the Mountains of Madness were cancelled. Tom Cruise was attached to star in the Lovecraft adaptation. On March 7, 2011, it was reported that Universal would not proceed with At the Mountains of Madness because del Toro was unwilling to compromise on the $150 million budget and R rating. The director later reflected, "When it happened, this has never happened to me, but I actually cried that weekend a lot. I don't want to sound like a puny soul, but I really was devastated. I was weeping for the movie." The project collapsed on a Friday, and del Toro signed to direct Pacific Rim the following Monday. Del Toro spent a year working with Beacham on the screenplay, and is credited as co-writer. He introduced ideas he had always wished to see in the genre, such as a Kaiju birth and a Kaiju attack seen from a child's perspective. The film was shot using Red Epic cameras.[65] At first Guillermo del Toro decided not to shoot or convert the film to 3D, as the effect would not work due to the sheer size of the film's robots and monsters, explaining I didn't want to make the movie 3D because when you have things that big ... the thing that happens naturally, you're looking at two buildings lets say at 300 feet [away], if you move there is no parallax. They're so big that, in 3D, you barely notice anything no matter how fast you move ... To force the 3D effects for robots and monsters that are supposed to be big you are making their [perspective] miniaturized, making them human scale. It was later announced that the film would be converted to 3D, with the conversion taking 40 weeks longer than most. Del Toro said: "What can I tell you? I changed my mind. I'm not running for office. I can do a Romney."  Del Toro envisioned Pacific Rim as an earnest, colorful adventure story, with an "incredibly airy and light feel", in contrast to the "super-brooding, super-dark, cynical summer movie". The director focused on "big, beautiful, sophisticated visuals" and action that would satisfy an adult audience, but has stated his "real hope" is to introduce the Kaiju and mecha genres to a generation of children. While the film draws heavily on these genres, it avoids direct references to previous works. Del Toro intended to create something original but "madly in love" with its influences, instilled with "epic beauty" and "operatic grandeur". The film was to honor the Kaiju and mecha genres while creating an original stand-alone film, something "conscious of the heritage, but not a pastiche or an homage or a greatest hits of everything". The director made a point of starting from scratch, without emulating or referencing any previous examples of those genres. He cautioned his designers not to turn to films like Gamera, Godzilla, or The War of the Gargantuas for inspiration, stating: "I didn't want to be postmodern, or referential, or just belong to a genre. I really wanted to create something new, something madly in love with those things. I tried to bring epic beauty to it, and drama and operatic grandeur." Crimson Peak is a 2015 gothic romance film directed by  del Toro and written by del Toro and Matthew Robbins. The story, set in Victorian era England, follows an aspiring author who travels to a remote Gothic mansion in the English hills with her new husband and his sister. There, she must decipher the mystery behind the ghostly visions that haunt her new home. Del Toro and Robbins wrote the original spec script after the release of Pan's Labyrinth in 2006. It was sold quietly to Donna Langley at Universal. Del Toro planned to direct the film, but postponed the project to make Hellboy II: The Golden Army, and then again to work on The Hobbit films. Langley suggested that del Toro produce the film for another director, but he could not find one he deemed suitable. While directing Pacific Rim, del Toro developed a good working relationship with Legendary Pictures' Thomas Tull and Jon Jashni, who asked what he wanted to do next. Del Toro sent them his screenplays for a film adaptation of At the Mountains of Madness, a Western adaptation of The Count of Monte Cristo, and Crimson Peak. The producers deemed the last of these "the best project for us, just the right size". Universal allowed del Toro to move the project to Legendary, with the caveat that they could put up money for a stake in the film. Del Toro called the film a "ghost story and gothic romance". He has described it as "a very set-oriented, classical but at the same time modern take on the ghost story", and said that it would allow him to play with the genres' conventions while subverting their rules. He stated, "I think people are getting used to horror subjects done as found footage or B-value budgets. I wanted this to feel like a throwback." Del Toro wanted the film to honor the "grand dames" of the haunted house genre, namely Robert Wise's The Haunting and Jack Clayton's The Innocents. The director intended to make a large-scale horror film in the tradition of those he grew up watching, such as The Omen, The Exorcist, and The Shining. He cited the latter as "another Mount Everest of the haunted house movie", praising the high production values and Stanley Kubrick's control over the large sets. British playwright Lucinda Coxon was enlisted to rewrite the script with del Toro, in hopes of bringing it a "proper degree of perversity and intelligence", but she is not credited on the finished film. The Shape of Water is a 2017 romantic fantasy drama film directed del Toro and written by del Toro and Vanessa Taylor. Set in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1962, the story follows a mute cleaner at a high-security government laboratory who falls in love with a captured humanoid amphibian creature. Filming took place in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, between August and November 2016.  The idea for The Shape of Water formed during del Toro's breakfast with Daniel Kraus in 2011, with whom he later co-wrote the novel Trollhunters. It shows similarities to the 2015 short film The Space Between Us. It was also primarily inspired by del Toro's childhood memories of seeing Creature from the Black Lagoon and wanting to see the Gill-man and Kay Lawrence (played by Julie Adams) succeed in their romance. When del Toro was in talks with Universal to direct a remake of Creature from the Black Lagoon, he tried pitching a version focused more on the creature's perspective, where the Creature ended up together with the female lead, but the studio executives rejected the concept. Del Toro set the film during the 1960s Cold War era to counteract today's heightened tensions: "if I say once upon a time in 1962, it becomes a fairy tale for troubled times. People can lower their guard a little bit more and listen to the story and listen to the characters and talk about the issues, rather than the circumstances of the issues".  In an interview with IndieWire about the film, del Toro said: This movie is a healing movie for me. ... For nine movies I rephrased the fears of my childhood, the dreams of my childhood, and this is the first time I speak as an adult, about something that worries me as an adult. I speak about trust, otherness, sex, love, where we're going. These are not concerns that I had when I was nine or seven." The Shape of Water grossed $63.9 million in the United States and Canada, and $131.4 million in other countries, for a total of $195.2 million. The film had received a universally favorable response from critics and audiences.  Pinocchio is an upcoming stop-motion animated musical dark fantasy film co-written and directed by Guillermo del Toro, based on Gris Grimly’s design from his 2002 edition of the 1883 Italian novel The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi. It was written from a screenplay by del Toro, Gris Grimly, Patrick McHale and Matthew Robbins and a story by del Toro and Robbins. The film marks the animated feature film directorial debut of Guillermo del Toro. In 2008, Guillermo del Toro announced that his next project, a darker adaptation of the Italian novel The Adventures of Pinocchio, was in development. He has called Pinocchio his passion project, stating that: "no art form has influenced my life and my work more than animation and no single character in history has had as deep of a personal connection to me as Pinocchio", and "I've wanted to make this movie for as long as I can remember". On February 17, 2011, it was announced that Gris Grimly and Mark Gustafson would co-direct a stop motion animated Pinocchio film written by Guillermo del Toro and Matthew Robbins based by Grimly's designs, with del Toro producing along with The Jim Henson Company and Pathé. On May 17, 2012, del Toro took over for Grimly. On February 2012, Del Toro released some concept arts with the designs of Pinocchio, Geppetto, the Talking Cricket, Mangiafuoco and the Fox and the Cat. On July 30, 2012, it was announced that the film would be produced and animated by ShadowMachine. On January 23, 2017, Patrick McHale was announced to co-write the script with del Toro. On August 31, 2017, del Toro told IndieWire and at the 74th Venice International Film Festival that the film need a budget increase of $35 million more dollars or it would be cancelled. On November 8, 2017, he reported that the project was not happening, because no studios were willing to finance it.[9] At one point, Matthew Robbins considered making the movie as a 2D-animated film with French artist Joann Sfar to bring the costs down, but del Toro eventually decided that it had to be stop-motion, even if the higher budget made it harder get greenlighted. However, on October 22, 2018, it was announced that the film had been revived, with Netflix acquiring it.  So that's his  film history as a director let's get into some other aspects of his life!!He was married to Lorenza Newton, cousin of Mexican singer Guadalupe Pineda. They have two children. He started dating Lorenza when both were studying at the Instituto de Ciencias in Guadalajara. Del Toro and Newton separated in early 2017, and divorced in September of the same year. He maintains residences in Toronto and Los Angeles, and returns to Guadalajara every six weeks to visit his family. He also owns two houses devoted exclusively to his collection of books, poster artwork and other belongings pertaining to his work. He explains, "As a kid, I dreamed of having a house with secret passages and a room where it rained 24 hours a day. The point of being over 40 is to fulfill the desires you've been harboring since you were 7." Politics EditIn a 2007 interview, del Toro described his political position as "a little too liberal". He pointed out that the villains in most of his films, such as the industrialist in Cronos, the Nazis in Hellboy, and the Francoists in Pan's Labyrinth, are united by the common attribute of authoritarianism. "I hate structure. I'm completely anti-structural in terms of believing in institutions. I hate them. I hate any institutionalised social, religious, or economic holding." Religion EditDel Toro was raised Roman Catholic. In a 2009 interview with Charlie Rose, he described his upbringing as excessively "morbid," saying, "I mercifully lapsed as a Catholic ... but as Buñuel used to say, 'I'm an atheist, thank God.'" Though insisting that he is spiritually "not with Buñuel" and that "once a Catholic, always a Catholic, in a way." He concluded, "I believe in Man. I believe in mankind, as the worst and the best that has happened to this world." He has also responded to the observation that he views his art as his religion by saying, "It is. To me, art and storytelling serve primal, spiritual functions in my daily life. Whether I'm telling a bedtime story to my kids or trying to mount a movie or write a short story or a novel, I take it very seriously." Nevertheless, he became a "raging atheist" after seeing a pile of human fetuses while volunteering at a Mexican hospital. He has claimed to be horrified by the way the Catholic Church complied with Francoist Spain, down to having a character in his film quote what actual priests would say to Republican faction members in concentration camps.[66] Upon discovering the religious beliefs of C.S. Lewis, Del Toro has stated that he no longer feels comfortable enjoying his work, despite having done so beforehand. He describes Lewis as "too Catholic" for him, despite the fact that Lewis was never a Catholic. However, Del Toro isn't entirely disparaging of Catholicism, and his background continues to influence his work. While discussing The Shape of Water, Del Toro discussed the Catholic influence on the film, stating, "A very Catholic notion is the humble force, or the force of humility, that gets revealed as a god-like figure toward the end. It's also used in fairy tales. In fairy tales, in fact, there is an entire strand of tales that would be encompassed by the title 'The Magical Fish.' And [it's] not exactly a secret that a fish is a Christian symbol." In the same interview, he still maintained that he does not believe in an afterlife, stating "I don't think there is life beyond death, I don't. But I do believe that we get this clarity in the last minute of our life. The titles we achieved, the honors we managed, they all vanish. You are left alone with you and your deeds and the things you didn't do. And that moment of clarity gives you either peace or the most tremendous fear, because you finally have no cover, and you finally realize exactly who you are." In 2010, del Toro revealed that he was a fan of video games, describing them as "the comic books of our time" and "a medium that gains no respect among the intelligentsia". He has stated that he considers Ico and Shadow of the Colossus to be masterpieces. He has cited Gadget Invention, Travel, & Adventure, Cosmology of Kyoto, Asteroids and Galaga as his favorite games. Del Toro's favorite film monsters are Frankenstein's monster, the Alien, Gill-man, Godzilla, and the Thing. Frankenstein in particular has a special meaning for him, in both film and literature, as he claims he has a "Frankenstein fetish to a degree that is unhealthy", and that it's "the most important book of my life, so you know if I get to it, whenever I get to it, it will be the right way". He has Brazil, Nosferatu, Freaks and Bram Stoker's Dracula listed among his favourite films. Del Toro is also highly interested in Victorian culture. He said: "I have a room of my library at home called 'The Dickens room'. It has every work by Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins and many other Victorian novelists, plus hundreds of works about Victorian London and its customs, etiquette, architecture. I'm a Jack the Ripper aficionado, too. My museum-slash-home has a huge amount of Ripperology in it". Father's 1997 kidnapping EditAround 1997, del Toro's father, Federico del Toro Torres, was kidnapped in Guadalajara. Del Toro's family had to pay twice the amount originally asked for as a ransom; immediately after learning of the kidnapping, fellow filmmaker James Cameron, a friend of Del Toro since they met during the production of 1993's Cronos, withdrew over $1 million in cash from his bank account and gave it to Del Toro to help pay the ransom. After the ransom was paid, Federico was released, having spent 72 days kidnapped; the culprits were never apprehended, and the money of both Cameron and Del Toro's family was never recovered. The event prompted del Toro, his parents, and his siblings to move abroad. In a 2008 interview with Time magazine, he said this about the kidnapping of his father: "Every day, every week, something happens that reminds me that I am in involuntary exile [from my country]." Del Toro has directed a wide variety of films, from comic book adaptations (Blade II, Hellboy) to historical fantasy and horror films, two of which are set in Spain in the context of the Spanish Civil War under the authoritarian rule of Francisco Franco. These two films, The Devil's Backbone and Pan's Labyrinth, are among his most critically acclaimed works. They share similar settings, protagonists and themes with the 1973 Spanish film The Spirit of the Beehive, widely considered to be the finest Spanish film of the 1970s. Del Toro views the horror genre as inherently political, explaining, "Much like fairy tales, there are two facets of horror. One is pro-institution, which is the most reprehensible type of fairy tale: Don't wander into the woods, and always obey your parents. The other type of fairy tale is completely anarchic and antiestablishment." He is close friends with two other prominent and critically praised Mexican filmmakers Alfonso Cuarón and Alejandro González Iñárritu. The three often influence each other's directorial decisions, and have been interviewed together by Charlie Rose. Cuarón was one of the producers of Pan's Labyrinth, while Iñárritu assisted in editing the film. The three filmmakers, referred to as the "Three Amigos" founded the production company Cha Cha Cha Films, whose first release was 2008's Rudo y Cursi. Del Toro has also contributed to the web series Trailers from Hell. In April 2008, del Toro was hired by Peter Jackson to direct the live-action film adaptation of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit. On May 30, 2010, del Toro left the project due to extended delays brought on by MGM's financial troubles. Although he did not direct the films, he is credited as co-writer in An Unexpected Journey, The Desolation of Smaug and The Battle of the Five Armies. On December 1, 2008, del Toro expressed interest in a stop-motion remake to Roald Dahl's novel The Witches, collaborating with Alfonso Cuarón. On June 19, 2018 it was announced that Del Toro and Cuarón would instead be attached as Executive Producers on the remake with Robert Zemeckis helming the project as Director and Screenwriter. On June 2, 2009, del Toro's first novel, The Strain, was released. It is the first part of an apocalyptic vampire trilogy co-authored by del Toro and Chuck Hogan. The second volume, The Fall, was released on September 21, 2010. The final installment, The Night Eternal, followed in October 2011. Del Toro cites writings of Antoine Augustin Calmet, Montague Summers and Bernhardt J. Hurwood among his favourites in the non-literary form about vampires. On December 9, 2010, del Toro launched Mirada Studios with his long-time cinematographer Guillermo Navarro, director Mathew Cullen and executive producer Javier Jimenez. Mirada was formed in Los Angeles, California to be a collaborative space where they and other filmmakers can work with Mirada's artists to create and produce projects that span digital production and content for film, television, advertising, interactive and other media. Mirada launched as a sister company to production company Motion Theory. Del Toro directed Pacific Rim, a science fiction film based on a screenplay by del Toro and Travis Beacham. In the film, giant monsters rise from the Pacific Ocean and attack major cities, leading humans to retaliate with gigantic mecha suits called Jaegers. Del Toro commented, "This is my most un-modest film, this has everything. The scale is enormous and I'm just a big kid having fun." The film was released on July 12, 2013 and grossed $411 million at the box office. Del Toro directed "Night Zero", the pilot episode of The Strain, a vampire horror television series based on the novel trilogy of the same name by del Toro and Chuck Hogan. FX has commissioned the pilot episode, which del Toro scripted with Hogan and was filmed in Toronto in September 2013. FX ordered a thirteen-episode first season for the series on November 19, 2013, and series premiered on July 13, 2014. After The Strain's pilot episode, del Toro directed Crimson Peak, a gothic horror film he co-wrote with Matthew Robbins and Lucinda Cox. Del Toro has described the film as "a very set-oriented, classical but at the same time modern take on the ghost story", citing The Omen, The Exorcist and The Shining as influences. Del Toro also stated, "I think people are getting used to horror subjects done as found footage or B-value budgets. I wanted this to feel like a throwback." Jessica Chastain, Tom Hiddleston, Mia Wasikowska, and Charlie Hunnam starred in the film. Production began February 2014 in Toronto, with an April 2015 release date initially planned. The studio later pushed the date back to October 2015, to coincide with the Halloween season. He was selected to be on the jury for the main competition section of the 2015 Cannes Film Festival. Del Toro directed the Cold War drama film The Shape of Water, starring Sally Hawkins, Octavia Spencer, and Michael Shannon. Filming began on August 15, 2016 in Toronto, and wrapped twelve weeks later. On August 31, 2017, the film premiered in the main competition section of the 74th Venice International Film Festival, where it was awarded the Golden Lion for best film, making Del Toro the first Mexican director to win the award. The film became a critical and commercial success and would go on to win multiple accolades, including the Academy Award for Best Picture, with del Toro winning the Academy Award for Best Director. Del Toro collaborated with Japanese video game designer Hideo Kojima to produce P.T., a video game intended to be a "playable trailer" for the ninth Silent Hill game, which was cancelled. The demo was also removed from the PlayStation Network. At the D23 Expo in 2009, his Double Dare You production company and Disney announced a production deal for a line of darker animated films. The label was announced with one original animated project, Trollhunters. However, del Toro moved his deal to DreamWorks in late 2010. From 2016 to 2018, Trollhunters was released to great acclaim on Netflix and "is tracking to be its most-watched kids original ever". In 2017, Del Toro had an exhibition of work at the Minneapolis Institute of Art titled Guillermo del Toro: At Home with Monsters, featuring his collection of paintings, drawings, maquettes, artifacts, and concept film art. The exhibition ran from March 5, 2017, to May 28, 2017. In 2019, del Toro appeared in Hideo Kojima's video game Death Stranding, providing his likeness for the character Deadman. Upcoming projects EditIn 2008, del Toro announced Pinocchio, a dark stop-motion film based on the Italian novel The Adventures of Pinocchio, co-directed by Adam Parrish King, with The Jim Henson Company as production company, and music by Nick Cave. The project had been in development for over a decade. The pre-production was begun by the studio ShadowMachine. In 2017, del Toro announced that Patrick McHale is co-writing the script of the film. In the same year, del Toro revealed at the 74th Venice International Film Festival that the film will be reimagined during the rise of Benito Mussolini, and that he would need $35 million to make it. In November 2017, it was reported that del Toro had cancelled the project because no studios were willing to finance it. In October 2018, it was announced that the film had been revived, with Netflix backing the project. Netflix had previously collaborated with del Toro on Trollhunters. Many of the same details of the project remain the same, but with Mark Gustafson now co-directing rather than Adam Parrish King. In December 2017, Searchlight Pictures announced that del Toro would direct a new adaptation of the 1946 novel Nightmare Alley by William Lindsay Gresham, the screenplay of which he co-wrote with Kim Morgan. In 2019, it was reported that Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, Toni Collette and Rooney Mara had closed deals to star in the film, which went into production in January 2020. https://aznmodern.com/2017/10/10/13-facts-guillermo-del-toro-may-not-know/ https://editorial.rottentomatoes.com/guide/all-guillermo-del-toro-movies-ranked-by-tomatometer/ The Midnight Train Podcast is sponsored by VOUDOUX VODKA.www.voudoux.com Ace’s Depothttp://www.aces-depot.com BECOME A PRODUCER!http://www.patreon.com/themidnighttrainpodcast Find The Midnight Train Podcast:www.themidnighttrainpodcast.comwww.facebook.com/themidnighttrainpodcastwww.twitter.com/themidnighttrainpcwww.instagram.com/themidnighttrainpodcastwww.discord.com/themidnighttrainpodcastwww.tiktok.com/themidnighttrainp And wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts. Subscribe to our official YouTube channel:OUR YOUTUBE

Today on The Literary Life Podcast, Angelina Stanford and Cindy Rollins tackle the topic of fairy stories, discussing the what, why and how of reading them. Angelina shares the distinctive characteristics of fairy stories in contrast to other types of stories, such as myths. They deal with the question of whether fairy tales are “escapist”, the influence of the Grimm brothers scholarly work on interpreting fairy stories, and allowing the story to unveil its deeper truths without forcing meaning onto it. Angelina gives an illustration of how to see the gospel messages in fairy tales by talking us through the story of Sleeping Beauty. She refutes the ideas that fairy tales are about human romance or are misogynistic. She also highlights some of the Enlightenment and Puritan responses to fairy tales that still linger with us today. Cindy and Angelina also discuss some common concerns such as the magical, weird, or scary aspects of fairy tales. Angelina also makes a distinction between folk tales, literary fairy tales, and cautionary tales. Be sure to be back next week for the beginning of our series on George MacDonald’s Phantastes. Commonplace Quotes: After a certain kind of sherry party, where there have been cataracts of culture but never on word or one glance that suggested a real enjoyment of any art, any person, or any natural object, my heart warms to the schoolboy on the bus who is reading Fantasy and Science Fiction rapt and oblivious of all the world beside.  C. S. Lewis Children are not deceived by fairy tales. They are often and gravely deceived by school stories. Adults are not deceived by science fiction. They can be deceived by stories in women’s magazines. C. S. Lewis Both fairy stories and realistic stories engage in wish fulfillment, but it is actually the realistic stories that are more deadly. Fairy stories do awaken desires in children, but most often it is not a desire for the fairy world itself. Most children don’t really want there to be dragons in modern England. Instead, the desire is for they know not what. This desire for something beyond does not empty the real world, but actually gives it new depths. He does not despise real woods because he has read of enchanted woods. The reading makes all real woods a little enchanted. C. S. Lewis Ancient History by Siegfried Sassoon Adam, a brown old vulture in the rain,    Shivered below his wind-whipped olive-trees;   Huddling sharp chin on scarred and scraggy knees,   He moaned and mumbled to his darkening brain;   ‘He was the grandest of them all—was Cain!    ‘A lion laired in the hills, that none could tire;   ‘Swift as a stag; a stallion of the plain, ‘Hungry and fierce with deeds of huge desire.’ Grimly he thought of Abel, soft and fair— A lover with disaster in his face, And scarlet blossom twisted in bright hair.   ‘Afraid to fight; was murder more disgrace? … ‘God always hated Cain’ … He bowed his head— The gaunt wild man whose lovely sons were dead. Book List: (Amazon affiliate links) The World’s Last Night by C. S. Lewis An Experiment in Criticism by C. S. Lewis “On Three Ways of Writing for Children” by C. S. Lewis The Princess and The Goblin by George MacDonald Support The Literary Life: Become a patron of The Literary Life podcast as part of the “Friends and Fellows Community” on Patreon, and get some amazing bonus content! Thanks for your support! Connect with Us: You can find Angelina and Thomas at HouseofHumaneLetters.com, on Instagram @angelinastanford, and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/ANGStanford/ Find Cindy at https://cindyrollins.net, on Instagram @cindyordoamoris and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindyrollins.net/. Check out Cindy’s own Patreon page also! Follow The Literary Life on Instagram, and jump into our private Facebook group, The Literary Life Discussion Group, and let’s get the book talk going! http://bit.ly/literarylifeFB

Looking for a striking, easy carnivorous plant? How about a beautiful companion to your tropicals that will pitch in and help catch those gnats? Stephen can't stop saying good things about this one. Grimly, Matthew tries to "improve his drosera outcomes." Let's support him, yes?

There's only 3 endings left and the stakes couldn't be higher! PLUS it's time to VOTE FOR THE NEXT BOOK! But wait, everyone's on lockdown... how will the brothers find a hot new read? They have a plan for that!

The 7 million dollar man could buy anything he wanted. But when told he had just 30 days to live, his money couldn't purchase even one extra second of life. Grimly he decided that if he couldn't unlock the secret of life, then he would explore the secret of death - enter, The Grim Reaper.

In today's podcast, we hear that spies like Apache Struts exploits. Server vulnerabilities described. A new cryptojacker steals at least four varieties of cryptocurrency. North Korea may have hacked UN sanctions enforcers. Dutch Intelligence (and Microsoft) warn of cyberwar, but it's not a declared war, which makes response harder. Update to the pack rat defense, with considerations of mens rea. ISIS terror inspiration. And a possible assassination attempt. Chris Poulin from BAH on next generation IoT devices, like security robots. Guest is Sylvain Gil from Exabeam on business by design, and the importance of the design process in security solutions. 

TO CELEBRATE 750 @TinDogPODCAST S HERE IS A SHORT STORY  MarginaliaMarginalia by Michael Gilroy-Sinclair   The fake monk was not happy. The school party was late and he had been reduced to simply staring out of the window. In the brightly lit education suite, he had neatly laid out a collection of fake parchment and quills in order to give the primary school children a taste of life as an eighth-century monk. It felt to him that he had been doing this, day in day out, for months and he was frankly bored. He knew from the minimal research he had been required to do, that the real monks had used goatskin and octopus ink, but such extravagances were beyond most education department budgets. Idly, he straightened a pile of A4 paper, which didn’t need straightening, only to return to the window and glance across the car park for the fiftieth time that morning. The sky was the clearest blue with only wisps of white dancing in the heavens. Surely, that blue portaloo hadn’t been there this morning. How could he not have noticed it until now? Maybe the council were finally going to fix those potholes? Only… Now that he could see it properly, there seemed to be a flashing light on the top and it clearly wasn’t a portaloo at all.   Rose was not impressed with the Doctor. He had landed the TARDIS without any of the usual build-up about their destination and headed for the door. There had been no talk of strange creatures or stranger lands. The Doctor’s behaviour may have been out of the ordinary, but Rose reasoned that it must have had something to do with the sound. Moments earlier, the extraordinary time and space ship had made an extraordinary racket that sounded almost exactly like it had a stone in its shoe. Rose knew fine and well that the TARDIS didn’t have shoes to get stones into, so this was a worry. She had come out of the kitchen and headed straight to the control room, where she saw the Doctor heading past the pale coral roof supports and out of the old wooden door and into the daylight beyond. “Oi, hold on!” “Hmm,” replied the Doctor; he was distracted by his sonic screwdriver as it bleeped and flashed in a way she had never seen it do before. “Do you have any idea what we are looking for?” asked Rose in her most patient voice. “Err… no…. but I will know it when I see it.” He seemed very positive about this. “And the bleeping helps?” “The bleeping will tell me when we are close to the source.” Rose’s patience was wearing thin, “The source of what?” The Doctor stopped walking and looked directly at Rose as if she were a child. “The source of the temporal disturbance. Honestly, it’s like I don’t explain anything to you…” “You don’t. All I know is that the TARDIS started making a weird noise and then we stopped and you stormed off with that thing in your hand.” As if it were joining in the conversation, the bleep of the sonic screwdriver suddenly became slightly more frenetic, taking away the Doctor’s concentration and causing him to walk off in a new direction. “Where are we anyway?” demanded Rose as she raced to catch up with the Doctor. “You tell me, Rose Tyler.” Rose looked around. “It’s cold. And it’s Earth… England.” “Why do you say that?” “Because… unless we are in some pretty weird parallel universe, that’s a Ford Escort and that’s a Volvo.” Rose was on a roll. She took a deep breath and smelled the air. “We’re near a river or close to the sea.” “Correct on both counts,” the Doctor said, beaming. “Anything more specific?” She looked over the Doctor’s shoulder and said, “We’re in Jarrow at a place called Bede’s World, near the river Tyne. Quite close to the tunnel, apparently.” “Amazing! And how do you know that?” “There’s a whopping great sign on the other side of the road,” said Rose smugly. The Doctor beamed with delight. “Fantastic! Anything else?” “It’s a World Heritage Site and it looks like the tea shop is open. Fancy a Hobnob?” The Doctor flicked at the screwdriver until it stopped making a noise. “I don’t mind if I do. Grab your coat, you’re paying.”   Calder, son of Eric, had not always been the Viking warrior he was today. He had been nothing more than a farmer with a sideline in jewellery making, when the Northern Lights had come down to the land to visit him and him alone. It had been an ordinary afternoon in the fields when the storm had risen. It was a tempest unlike any he had seen before. In a single heartbeat, the sky had ripped apart causing his flock to scatter and Calder to shelter under the nearest tree. From his refuge he could see the incredible colours swirl and pulse as the afternoon sun twisted and bent in the storm. Suddenly, a gash of darkest night filled the air above him. Beyond the hole in the sky, the stars swooped and curved, with a single shooting star at its centre, resembling a pendant of the gods. And then it was gone. Like a vivid dream, it passed and seemed to leave nothing but a memory. Calder shook his head as if to shake something loose, only finally to look up and see a small trail of smoke on the other side of the hill. He ran, stumbling over loose rocks to see what was beyond the crest of the hill. He arrived to find a short furrow in the ground, smoother than any plough could have made, with a small mound at one end. Calder could see something small and black embedded in the earth. He reached out and grabbed it. From that moment onwards, he was a changed man. Now, all of these year later, he stood on the prow of the longboat and looked deeply at his left hand, examining the stone that had changed him so much. It was the shape of half an apple and blacker than a winter’s night. Across its surface a billion points of light. The stone had taken him and his brethren on so many journeys. It had guided them from their homes in the West, across the seas to the fertile land again and again, only to have him return with a hold full of treasures and slaves and always an all-consuming feeling of loss. Calder was their guide; he used the stone from the heavens, the obsidian map of the sky to point the way, always listening to its silent whisper. Until today – today there was no wind; there were no birds in the sky and only tiny ripples on the surface of the water beneath the hulking mass of the longboat. Tentatively, Calder’s friend Tarben had suggested releasing the ravens in order to find the direction of the nearest land. Magic stones were one thing but the crew were realists. Calder had told them to be patient; the stone would show the way. After all, it had never let them down before.   The tea shop was a small affair with a view over the river and beyond. Through the bay window, Rose could see the port with thousands of identical cars neatly lined up, ready for distribution around the world. They had come in through the main entrance which also acted as a small gift shop, complete with pointless stationary and guidebooks. The woman behind the counter had a smile as wide as the Doctor’s and had welcomed them in like a seasoned pro. “Welcome to Bede’s World, home of the Venerable Bede. As well as the Monastery and Visitors’ Centre, we have a special exhibition on at the moment with some of the finest examples of…” “Is the coffee shop open?” interrupted Rose. “Yes, it is. And we do a storming hot chocolate, pet.” “Pet?” said the Doctor, worried that the TARDIS translation circuits might be on the blink. “Aye, pet. The tea is nice too… I can bring it over if you like? Have you come far?” Rose smiled to herself. “Oh, about six parsecs as the crow flies,” said the Doctor absent-mindedly. “Yeah you sound like you’ve come a long way. That accent… Somewhere in the South…? Manchester…?” “South?!” sniggered Rose. “Oh yes, pet lamb. Anything beyond Sunderland is the South as far as we’re concerned,” half joked the woman behind the counter. The Doctor was clearly affronted and headed for the comfiest looking chair for solace. “Your friend a bit touchy about his accent? Never mind. Now, what shall I get you?” Rose ordered then joined the Doctor. “Did that woman really call me ‘pet lamb’?” With a snort of derision, the Doctor busied himself with his screwdriver once again. “I’ve ordered you a tea, if that’s all right…” The Doctor didn’t answer. “What’s up? Gone off in a huff because you aren’t quite northern enough?” She tittered. “I’ll have you know I used to be Scottish. Is that northern enough?” he said, then stared out of the window. Whispering to himself, “And, for all I know, I might be again one day.” Clearly she had touched a nerve. “You don’t half talk some rubbish… So… What’s all this about then?” “I have my suspicions about what made the TARDIS…” The Doctor started to wave his hands about as if to explain something complex. “…Make an appalling noise and put you in a bad mood?” “Yeah! Only… it shouldn’t be possible. Not here, not now.” The drinks arrived and broke the conversation. “One tea and one hot chocolate, both with complimentary biscuits. Enjoy your visit. Make sure you see the special exhibition and be careful of that dig site. God only knows when they will be back.” At the mention of a dig site the Doctor sprang to his feet, almost knocking over his tea. Looming over them was a fake monk.   Calder smiled. A smile that the crew knew of old. That magic stone of his was telling him something. The wind began to rise and they were on the move again.   The monk stood directly in front of the Doctor and Rose. His face was full of nervous energy, which Rose found more than a little appealing. Suddenly the Doctor became tense. As Rose glanced in his direction, she could see that all of the usual warmth had evaporated from his face. He regarded the figure in front of them with the sort of suspicion he usually reserved for the galaxy’s most wanted criminals, rather than a man in a brown habit. The two men faced each other in silence. “Welcome to Bede’s World,” said the monk. “I am the Venerable Bede, born in 672 and died on the twenty-sixth of May, 735.” He paused for effect. “And I will be your guide today around my world. A world of knowledge and darkness and light and…” He paused. “And inspiration!” shouted the woman from the counter. “Gary, the line is ‘and inspiration.’” “You really know how to spoil the moment, Doreen… Anyway I thought the line was ‘and faith.’” “They changed it at the last meeting, which you would know if you had been on time. You know, we never get this problem with Pete. Now there is someone who really inhabits the role.” The truth dawned on the travellers. “Inhabits the habit,” joked the Doctor, his smile quickly returning. Gary, the fake monk, was not happy with Doreen. “Look, it’s Pete’s day off and I am Bede today.” Rose felt sorry for the man in brown. “Don’t worry… Gary, is it? I’m sure you’ll get the hang of it… Why don’t you tell us more about this place? Think of it as a practice run.” Doreen was still unimpressed. “Shouldn’t you be with that school group?” “They called and said they were running late. Engine trouble outside Middlesbrough, or something.” “There you go,” said the Doctor. “Gary can tell us all about the place before the school gets here.” “For a start, you can tell me who this Bede bloke actually was,” said Rose.   It felt like it had been raining for months. The land squelched underfoot. The sky, the river and the sea beyond were all the same dark murky grey. Beyond the pond, where the trout waited until Fridays, lay the wooden fence which held the young goats, next to the tanning shed, where the living raw materials were turned into parchment and would form part of their greater purpose. Beyond the rudimentary farm was the small, wooden jetty, the edge of which disappeared into the light fog over the river Tyne. The mist spread its tendrils out across the land, and yet the sun was fighting through increasingly larger gaps in the gloom, allowing shafts of light to warm the land. A small bell rang calling the monks to prayer, dragging them away from one form of devotion to another, their rough garments soaked from the constant drizzle. The heavy air made everything sound so much closer than normal. The echoing ring of the bell was both muffled and yet piercing, and the constant bleating of the goats seemed more immediate than usual. Most of the monks now stood in the chancel in silent contemplation while one, standing at a wooden lectern, was reading from the Scriptures. As always, one of their number was not at prayer. Novice Randal had a considerably more earthly task to fulfil. At the edge of the jetty, he sat listening to the sound of his brothers’ devotions travelling gently on the breeze, while his eyes were firmly fixed on the horizon. This was an important job reserved for the novices of the order, as the younger monks had better eyes and could see further. It was Randal’s job to keep a watch out for ships. Some would carry emissaries or pilgrims, while others brought those with darker motives. It had been some time since the last Viking attack, but you never knew when an innocent looking trading ship would conceal different intentions. He did not know which would be worse: to die or to be sold into slavery. He had read the accounts of attacks on monasteries further up the coast. Such earthly horrors kept Randal awake at night. For a fleeting moment, the sun fought the mist and won. At first Randal couldn’t be sure. He blinked and strained his eyes. Yes, there it was, he was certain now. He could make out a black dot on the horizon and it seemed intent on heading their way.   As the Doctor, Rose and Gary (the fake Bede) walked away from the Visitors’ Centre and down the small incline, the sounds of modern life went on around them. On the river, a gigantic tanker floated its way out to sea, while in the distance massive cranes were being dismantled. All around, the constant murmur of traffic impinged on this island of tranquility. Gary explained as they walked, “In all honesty, I’m just an actor in between gigs… And a bit of ‘theatre in education’ always looks good on your CV.” “You were going to tell us about Bede,” reminded Rose. The Doctor interrupted, “Bede was a monk and a historian who wrote one of the first history books.” “I think she was asking me,” said Gary, “but like he says, Bede was this priest who wrote… Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum…” He pronounced the Latin words with exaggerated care. “I knew I’d get that right.” “And what’s that when it’s at home?” The Doctor couldn’t help himself: “The Ecclesiastical History of the English People. It’s the first history book to use the AD system of dating. Without that book, you lot would know even less than you do.” Rose gave the Doctor a gentle punch in the arm. “Is it me or is it getting nippy?” “Time displacement does that… Or it could just be the wind off the sea.” “I’m just glad I get to keep my thermals on underneath this habit.” “That’s hardly historically accurate,” joked Rose. “And neither are his sandals.” “I’ll have you know, if eighth-century monks had had access to Crocs as comfortable as these, they would have worn them.” They were now getting closer to the actual monastery and could see it in more detail: a squat church made from heavy stone. Gary continued with pride, “We’ve always got archaeologists of one type or another poking around. It’s not like when Time Team came…” “Time Team?” asked the Doctor with interest. “It’s a TV show. Now shush and let Gary tell us about the place,” said Rose. Gary smiled. “Well, it was long before my time; they made a hell of a mess and they didn’t find anything much of interest, just a few pots and a lot of dead goats.” “Dead goats?” “Yeah, goat skin is what the monks made their special paper from,” explained Gary. “This lot are from the university; they only come a couple of times a week… The trench is just round this corner.” The Doctors sonic screwdriver began to buzz once more.   Novice Randal ran for all he was worth. The mist had cleared enough for him to be sure that the oncoming ship was the Norsemen returning. They had reached the river mouth itself. He had to raise the alarm. His feet pounded the soft earth, almost kicking a chicken as he ran haphazardly towards the church and his unsuspecting brothers. The large wooden door felt as light as a feather as he pulled it open with all of his strength, the fear coursing through his body. Eyes turned to him and he shouted a single word: “Vikings.” Every moment counted before an attack. Some of the older monks had sharp memories of times when the Norsemen had come and taken their friends and precious artefacts. Panic gripped them all.   Rose was not impressed; after all, if you have seen one hole, you have seen them all. “There’s not much to look at it, is there,” she said, stating the obvious. The Doctor thought for a moment. “I don’t know, you can tell a lot from a hole.” “You can?” asked Gary. “Like what?” “Well, for a start, you can tell that there aren’t any archaeologists about.” “I did say they only come a few days a week. In fact, I’m pretty sure they’re due tomorrow,” Gary explained. Rose joined in: “Go on then Mr. Smarty-Pants, what else can you tell from this hole?” “Well, the ground has been recently disturbed.” “Yes, it’s a hole, someone dug a hole. They disturbed the ground. That’s how you make holes.” The Doctor gave Rose the same sort of hard stare that Paddington Bear was famous for. “The earth at the bottom of the hole has been disturbed. There…” He pointed. “That line down the middle. The darker, dryer earth, it looks burnt.” Now that the Doctor had mentioned it, it was obvious. “I’m guessing it rained last night,” inquired the Doctor. “Bucketed down,” said Gary. “Why do you ask?” “Because whatever made that mark in the dirt happened after the rain and left a dry scorched line…” He peered into the ditch. “And as there are no muddy footprints, we know your students haven’t been anywhere near. I’m guessing whatever did it is still down there.” “Ohhhh! Get you! The new Mr. Holmes,” Rose quipped. “It’s a shame really,” said Gary. “What is?” asked the Doctor. “That we aren’t allowed down there to see what it is.” “Tell that to Rose,” replied the Doctor as Rose jumped into the hole.   The monks had only moments to act but they had prepared. With a few swift swings of an axe, the jetty had collapsed into the river and now lay beneath the surface. This would only delay the landing, but there was no point in making it easy for the invaders. The novice monks had very precise instructions: they were to go to the library and rescue as many of the books as they could carry. Each one had been given a specific tome to protect. They were to run and hide in the woods, and only come back once it was safe to do so. The older monks would defend the buildings for as long as they could. Once Randal had reached the library, a small room off the cloister, he was pleased to see that most of the other books had already been rescued. Only one remained and it was in the hands of the old monk, Brother Bede. The scholar was muttering to himself about the Norsemen and about how they would never take his life’s work. In his hands he held his history book. Randal had yearned to read it for himself and hoped one day to do so. It had taken years to complete, and the old man was not going to let it go. Quickly, the novice decided to do the only thing that was available to him: he would rescue the book and its author. Together they would protect the book. The knowledge would not go up in flames like so much had done in the past. He was convinced that the Norsemen might burn the church, but they would not take these words. By the time they left the small room, it was already too late – the Vikings had arrived, splashing and slashing their way on to the land. Some of the warriors had split from the main force and were busy gathering up the animals, while the others burned the tannery. From the mists of the river they came, organized and strong. At their head was a single figure holding a sword in one hand and a small black rounded object in his other. The sword was already dripping with blood. “We must go!” the young novice urged the older monk. Seconds later, the warrior was on them.   The jump into the hole was further than Rose had been expecting, but she had managed to avoid twisting her ankle. And, after all, any landing you can walk away from is a good one. “Hold your horses, Rose, I’m coming down,” said the Doctor, as he jumped the short distance, much to the protestations of Gary. “I only brought you here so that you could have a look.” From his position in the hole, the Doctor looked up and smiled his goofiest of grins. “And that’s exactly what we’re going to do. We’re going to have a look… and maybe a poke around. But mainly a look.” Gary gave in. “Hold on then, I’ll come too… I suppose someone from the museum should be present.” “That’s the spirit, come on down.” Gary slowly slid himself down the side of the hole, revealing the manufacturer of his underwear at least twice before arriving at the bottom. “They’re rather anachronistic, aren’t they?” said the Doctor judgmentally. “Do you mind!?” said Gary, as he straightened his robes. “I’m only joking,” said the Doctor. “No, not you, her! I said, do you mind not poking about! Do you want to damage any priceless artefacts?” “Since when is mud priceless? I just want to have a look.” Gary still seemed unimpressed: “You look with your eyes, not your hands.” Rose bent down. “I think there’s something in there.” “Whatever it is, don’t touch it. I want to take a reading,” said the Doctor, pulling out his sonic screwdriver. Gary moved forward, making a grab for Rose’s shoulder. “I told you not to touch anything.” As he touched her, she must have made contact with the thing that had made the gash in the dirt. It was small and black, and looked as if it contained a million tiny dancing points of light in the night. “I just want to have a…” And then Rose and Gary were gone… leaving the Doctor alone in the trench.   Randal was terrified; his master held tightly onto his greatest possession, clutching it safely to his chest. They both knew they were about to die. Randal knew that the Norsemen had no interest in the sacred words. Grimly, he realized that his last thoughts would be about the loss of the text, rather than concern for his own passing. The old man suddenly seemed to be at peace, as if he knew his destiny and was willing to accept it without question. He pushed the novice to one side and urged the boy to run, forgetting the manuscript clutched in his hands. The Viking was huge, at least two spans taller than the monk, and he had clearly seen battle. With a distant look in his eye, he raised his sword, ready to dispatch the old man. The monk simply held out a hand in friendship, his faith guiding his actions. This caught the Viking off guard, and he froze with his sword ready to strike. The monk touched the Viking’s sword-less hand, breaking the moment. The sword came down and hit the book with so much force that it embedded itself into it. In the same movement, the old monk touched something smooth in the warrior’s hand. There was a flash like lightning… and both monk and Viking were gone. Novice Randal stood in disbelief; had God taken his master and his attacker to heaven? Was this the Rapture? Standing before him, where his master had once stood, there was now an angel with purest yellow hair and standing next to her, her herald, a monk in the cleanest habit he had ever seen.   If the Doctor had been surprised by the disappearance of Rose and Gary, he was even more surprised by the sudden appearance of the huge Viking and a more authentic-looking monk holding the tattered and smouldering remains of a book.   The angel remained still, in a crouching position, her hands held as if unexpectedly and suddenly empty of something that they had previously been holding. The look on her face told of her confusion, but then which of God’s creatures would not be confused, after a fall from heaven? The blinding flash had attracted the attention of all the Vikings. Randal watched their confusion as they struggled to understand the disappearance of their leader. For a moment, there was silence, then an uncertain muttering. Randal knew enough of their strange tongue to pick out some of the words: “It’s magic! Thor has taken Calder! What have we done to anger him? It’s Freya! She’s not taking me to Helheim.” As the young monk watched, panic set in and the Vikings ran, back towards their ship, abandoning their captured treasures and animals. Randal felt a surge of pity for the Vikings, who seemed to have taken this angel for one of their own heathen gods, when clearly she had been sent from On High to save the monks from these savage invaders.   Rose gathered her thoughts. She was in almost exactly the same spot, only the ferry terminal, Visitors’ Centre and car park were all gone. The ancient church looked newer and there were more wooden buildings dotted around. With astonishment, she noticed the group of people running towards the river – who seemed to be a group of Vikings. Admittedly they were Vikings without horns on their helmets, but nevertheless they were clearly the warriors of legend. It also occurred to her that her sudden appearance may have grabbed their attention. Not one to let an opportunity slip – the Doctor had taught her that – she stood up and looked directly at the young novice. “Hello, I’m Rose.” It was then she noticed Gary, the fake monk, lying at her feet, with an expression of utter disbelief on his face.   At the Viking’s feet lay something the Doctor recognized. The Doctor smiled to himself in realization of what had happened. Oblivious to his change in circumstances, the Viking raised his sword once more, taking the heavy book in which it was still lodged with it. He lifted the weapon high above his head and again prepared to dispatch the cowering monk. “Oi, we’ll have none of that!” shouted the Doctor as he brought his sonic screwdriver level with the new arrivals. The blue light on the end pulsed and the book on the sword blade burst into flames, showering the Viking’s head in debris and breaking his concentration once and for all. The Viking stood in silence, finally aware of his new surroundings. “What magic is this?” he spat. “Now… I think one of you has something that doesn’t belong to you,” said the Doctor. “Is this Valhalla? Or Helheim…?” continued the confused Viking. “No, this is Jarrow. Just off the A19… Now, like I said… one of you has something that doesn’t belong to them… Small black stone?” Automatically the warrior raised his left hand. It was clear that he had no control over his actions: the stone was guiding him. With the Viking’s palm open the Doctor could see the hemisphere reacting to his words, a million points of swirling light danced. The Doctor spoke to the stone directly, “You are beautiful… and I think you’re looking for your friend, aren’t you?” As if in answer, the pattern of stars shone in unison, and the stone slipped from the warrior’s hand and into the Doctor’s. The Viking’s expression changed almost instantly, as if he had been released from a long captivity. “Well, I think your friend is over here in the mud.” Carefully the Doctor took the Viking’s stone over to the other, which remained embedded in the mud. Gently, he laid them together. A white light glowed and then began to shine like a small sun as the two halves became a single ball of energy. “I think we can leave those two to get reacquainted for a bit, don’t you?” The Doctor turned his attention to the two confused humans. “Now, did either of you see a girl in a white puffer jacket? She was probably with a very surprised-looking monk.” The old monk ignored the Doctor’s question; he was weeping at the smouldering remains of his life’s work, now reduced to little more than a pile of ashes. He had used it to defend himself from the blow from the sword, but the stranger’s wand had utterly destroyed it. “Erm… Sorry about the book… Here, let me help you up.”   Once the Vikings had gone, things began to return to normal at the monastery. Even the novelty of having an angel among them had worn off after a few days. Rose and Gary had settled in quite well. They had started by lending a hand where they could, and Gary had even suggested more than a few changes to the overall layout, using all he could remember from the scale model in the foyer of the Visitors’ Centre. He was experiencing life in the eighth century first-hand and was surprisingly adept at the general day-to-day tasks such as milking the goats. He had even taken to attending early morning prayers. Rose was sure that Gary wouldn’t have thrown himself into his new life quite so quickly, if she hadn’t been able to calm him down and had assured him that that the Doctor would be along to rescue them sooner or later; so they may as well make the best of things while they waited. This news had cushioned the shock to his system, and being treated like a visiting angel wasn’t something Rose was going to turn down. She knew in her heart that the Doctor would arrive… sooner or later. It was however the best part of a month before she heard the familiar tones of the materializing time machine in the cornfield that would one day be the visitors’ car park. With a familiar squeak, the wooden door opened and revealed the Doctor and a smiling elderly monk looming over the Doctor’s shoulder. “We just had to drop off a couple of friends before I picked you up. I hope you don’t mind.” Hiding her joy from her travelling companion, Rose said, “We’ve been here almost a month, Doctor. Honestly, for someone with a time machine, you really have no idea about time.” “You haven’t been changing history behind my back, have you?” joked the Doctor. “I had this confused Viking to take home, but he seemed pleased enough to be back amongst his own people. And he did promise to give up on the pillaging and concentrate more on trade… so that’s okay then.” “So who was this other person you had to drop off?” Rose asked. Smugly, the Doctor explained, “Oh, that was just your standard sentient time- and space-travelling sphere.” “Come again?” The Doctor loved these moments: “That rock you touched… It was part of a couple who escaped the Time War.” “A couple? It was a rock. Was it a ‘silicon life form’?” Rose grasped at a sci-fi reference in order to make sense of the Doctor’s words. “No, don’t be silly, silicon life is incredibly rare. This was graphene life.” Rose was catching up: “So it was a couple? There were two rocks?” “Yes, a couple… You know… a mummy and daddy, pair bond, lovers… that sort of thing. And they were attacked… out there.” The Doctor pointed up, beyond the sky and towards the infinity of space. “They were split and they fell through time onto the Earth. One of them could influence time and the other, space. Together they’re quite formidable.” The Doctor looked off into the distance. “You know, strictly speaking, they shouldn’t have been able come to Earth at all… Well, not after some bright spark time-locked this whole planet at the beginning of the War.” Rose knew when he was remembering the dark times in his life, and touched his shoulder gently. “Doctor, sometimes I have no idea what you’re talking about. So are Mister and Missus Rock okay now?” “Let’s just say a shiny rock found its friend and they have gone back home, amongst the stars… to start again.” Novice Randal had heard the strange sound and came running from the other side of the buildings. He threw his arms around the old monk, before remembering his place and stood back, still contemplating the miracle of his master’s return. “Thank you. You truly are an angel,” he whispered to Rose. “Look Randal, we’ve talked about this… I’m no angel.” “That’s true,” said the Doctor. “It is good to see you again, Brother” said Randal to the old monk. “We thought we had lost you forever.” The old monk smiled. “Don’t worry, my son, it takes more than an angry Viking and a few magic journeys to take me away from my work.” “Do you still have the book, Brother?” “Sadly, the book was destroyed… But we can still make another.” “How?” The old monk simply held up his hands as if in prayer. “The Lord will provide.” In the monk’s hands, Rose noticed a Penguin edition of Bede’s own famous history book. “So how come me and Gary ended up here?” asked Rose. “Well, the hemisphere in this time wanted to be with its partner in your time. It used your spare artron energy to shift itself through time… dragging you and Monkey Boy along in its wake.” Gary had finally arrived, wheezing into view. “Rose tells me you can take me home in your magic box.” “Magic box?!” The Doctor appeared to be affronted. “There is nothing magical about it. It’s simply a box that’s bigger on the inside that can go anywhere and anywhen… What is in any way magical about that?” “So you can take me home again?” “If that’s what you want, yes.” “Hell yes! I’ve got a classroom full of kids, and I’ve got so much to tell them. Now that I’ve experienced life as a real eighth-century monk first-hand… I’m the ultimate in living history.” “Well, let’s get you home then. Into the TARDIS with you both.” Before the Doctor closed the door, he popped his head out for one last word: “Oh and Bede… One more thing… Try and check some of your facts will you?”   After saying his goodbyes, Gary headed out of the thing he had mistaken for a portaloo and headed across the car park, up towards the Visitors’ Centre. The genuine monk sandals made an odd scraping noise as he walked. Gary hoped that brother Randal would be happy with his Crocs and that the archaeologists wouldn’t get too upset if they found them in their ditch. His head was full of new ideas about the things he wanted to teach the children – and according to the Doctor, the coach would be here in a few moments. “You look awful,” said Doreen as Gary walked through the doors. “This is one-hundred-per-cent authentic Dark Ages monk,” replied Gary as he headed to the teaching room, full of new-found confidence. Outside the classroom, Gary paused to look at the new exhibition – Marginalia, the marks made by monks on manuscripts, beside the columns of text. He stopped to read an information panel, which explained how these doodles had revealed new and exciting facts about life long ago. The most mysterious of them all was from Bede’s history of the British people: a drawing of an angel with a Saxon inscription, “Réðnes Heoruwearg.” Underneath was the translation: “Bad Wolf.”   Before setting forth on that inevitable journey, none is wiser than the man who considers – before his soul departs hence – what good or evil he has done, and what judgement his soul will receive after its passing. —Bede’s Death Song    

They're here! After so many weeks of marching, Kara Mustafa's terrifying host reaches the walls of Vienna, but after a few critical days' worth of preparations, Vienna's remaining populace were as prepared as they would ever be for what was to come. Grimly reconciled to the arrival of their greatest foe, only great acts of bravery, tenacity and ingenuity would hold back the Grand Vizier's determined assault. As we can see in this handy homemade diagram of the Vienna defences, such defences were as rudimentary as they were to be effective. Mercifully though, Vienna was not alone.Several hundreds of miles away, the allies of the Holy Roman Emperor marched in the name of rescuing Vienna from this grave threat. From Bavaria, Saxony, Poland, Lithuania and elsewhere they marched, but the real question still lingered in the air - would they get there on time? This episode is episode 14 out of 16 my lovely patrons, so we are in fact nearly at the end of this incredible story, but under no circumstances should you expect it to go out with anything other than a bang!Remember history friends, YOU can help make history THRIVE by heading over to www.patreon.com/WhenDIplomacyFails and by engaging in some healthy dosages of BEFIT today! Thanksss :D See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This podcast is brought to by TheBechdelGroup.com | Special thanks to our writers and actors contributing their talent for the readings. Credits: Writer Tommy Grimly Actors Amanda - Pam Karp Mitch – Anthony Kat – Laura Winters Music Mosquitoes by Zapac (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial (3.0) license. http://dig.ccmixter.org/files/Zapac/30469 Ft: Mind Map That! (mindmapthat) Sounding mixing and editing MJ Moneymaker

Hello,Welcome back to the blogspot for Monster Creature Feature. The horror host show out of Raleigh, NC.Today we are making available our special on Blobfest out of Phoenixville, PA at the Colonial Theatre.Phoenixville, PA is where the original film The Blob was filmed, and every year they do a theater run out of the same one used in the movie.We did a special on the even last year. This special also includes performances from the band The Alcazar Hotel, and a very cool short by Screen Novelties called Mysterious Mose. You can find out more about BLOBFEST HERE!

Greetings Folks,This week we bring you our special on the event TRASH O RAMA by Rik Surly. Also in the den a special performance by The TREMORS, and an interview with the film makers from Mental Scars. Plus PsychoCharger!!! Hope you enjoy this one as Ormon twists those dirty knobs on his Plasmatron.

This is the first podcast of Monster Creature Feature. A lot of folks said that they missed our Halloween special from last year so we thought we would make it available for download via Podcast.Just subscribe to the blog here through Itunes or whatever and we will be updating episodes for you to grab and watch.Just click on the subscribe button to the right and pick your poison, we recommend ITUNES.In this show which is BIG, not only in terms of megabytes but talent. You will be treated to the musical goodness of  the band Killer Filler,a performance by lord of illusions Michael Casey,an interview with the phenomenal artist Gris Grimly, and much much more.External Links for some of our guestsKiller FillerGris Grimly

Greetings my ugly ducklings!Next week I will be posting another episode from Monster Creature Feature but before then I wanted to talk about a cool group we have had on the show THE TREMORS.The Tremors are Jimmy TremorSlim Perkinsand Jason "Stretch Armstrong"You gotta hear these guys to fully get where they are coming from but think Jerry Lee Lewis crossed with Carl Perkins mixed with some killer moonshine.The visuals for the band are all created by Jason and Death Ray Design, which are killer and are soon to be part of the The Southern Folklife Collection at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. You can check out more of the poster art, on their myspace page HERE.You may recognize these posters from two of the previous Monster Creature Feature events that the Tremors played at. The Tremors site can be found HERE and they have a brand new CD called Demon Boogie Fever which is totally worth picking up. The Tremors will be playing with the Nekromantix this Friday in Greensboro at Greene Streets, if your in the area and want to catch a great show. The Tremors are scheduled to play again this Halloween at the Monster Creature Feature hosted event so stayed tuned for more info on that, but for now here is the video we shot when they played a couple years back. Late Night Drive In Monster Show!!!!