HEY, FUCKERS #27: CAUGHT IN THE ACT

Writers, you must always be wary of your readers. If you fuck something up, they will be all over you. Remember details of your work, or you'll be sorry later. The most famous example was pointed out by Stephen King in regards to ROBINSON CRUSOE. In one scene in that book, Crusoe strips naked and swims out to the wreck of his boat. He then proceeds to fill his pockets with items he thinks will help him survive. Except his pockets are on his pants, which are back on the beach, so . . .


Don't make that kind of fuck up. Be vigilant in the facts of your work, or you'll end up like Graham Masterton.


I just read THE MANITOU, and then I started MANITOU BLOOD. I was not aware that there were a few books in the series between these two, and I don't have them. Not to worry, though. It doesn't seem necessary to have read the others to enjoy this one.


Except . . . well, in THE MANITOU Masterton (spoiler alert for a book older than I am) kills off the character of Amelia Crusoe (no relation?). Yet in MANITOU BLOOD, she's alive and well and as helpful as ever. Wait, what? How does that happen? Did I miss something in the other books I didn't read?


I scoured the internet, driving myself crazy trying to figure out this mystery. I read synopses of the other books, looking for any clue. Did Masterton bring her back to life with some kind of occult ritual?


And then I found the answer in an interview he did years ago. The solution is so much more basic than I ever thought it would be. He admits to fucking up pretty badly on this one. When writing the first sequel, he completely forgot that he killed Amelia. (Which I guess is understandable since he killed her "off-screen." I think maybe that's why all the books after the first aren't strictly told from first person POV.) It didn't occur to him until much later. (I wonder if a reader busted him. That's probably what happened.) (I gotta stop it with these parenthetical statements. It looks ugly, and I shouldn't be doing it in the first place. Sorry.) He gave no reason for her resurrection, but according to the interview, he came up with this lame excuse: that her body was so charred it was easy to misidentify her corpse. Huh.


Let that be a lesson to you all. Thus endeth this edition of HEY, FUCKERS.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #164: STATE OF MY HEALTH

It's been a while since I mentioned my health around here. Once again, I'm trying to quit fast food and sugary drinks (except for my morning Tang). How did I do today? I knew I'd have a lemonade in the morning, but after that? I did OK. No fast food. Nothing beyond that lemonade.


Oh! And, uh, I plan on cutting back severely on my booze intake. Don't worry! It's not a permanent change. I just need to lose some weight soon, or my doctor will kill me.


*ahem* I won't be cutting back much on the booze, though. Not while I'm afraid I have broken my tailbone again. Right now, the only thing that makes me feel normal is drinking. My tailbone kills me, otherwise. The aspirin and ibuprofen isn't working. I'm going to see if I can get into the doctor who looked at me the last time I broke my tailbone. I want to skip all the ER visits and the X-rays and stuff and just skip ahead to the painkillers. Not because I love the painkillers (which I do), but because it's all so fucking expensive. I can feel that my tailbone is broken. There is nothing they can do to fix it except give me painkillers to get through the next three months. That's all I ask.


But yeah. If I get the painkillers, I'll scale back on the drinking severely. If not? Well, I expect to be hungover a lot in the next few months. That can't be good for my pancreas. Wish me luck.

ENNIO'S BACK!

While the rest of you were getting nostalgic chills watching a Star Wars intro scroll and listening to John Williams's iconic theme song, I was busy getting the very same feeling as THE H8FUL EIGHT began playing. (Just kidding. During the start of THE FORCE AWAKENS, I got the same nostalgic chills, but it sounded like a good way to start this.)


Seriously. I was absolutely thrilled to hear the first original western score from Ennio Morricone in how many years now? Morricone is my absolute favorite film composer. You've probably heard his music at some point in your life. If not, get some fucking culture, you goddam savages. Go here. And here. And here. And here. And here. That should get you started.


This score isn't as iconic as his earlier work, but goddam, it is fucking awesome. I whistled some of it on the way to my car. You know how much I loved the music? I broke one of my most sacred rules. I don't buy anything on holidays mostly because I think it's unfair those poor saps in retail have to work when they should be home with their families and friends. Well, I went straight from the theater to Best Buy. I suppose I could have gotten it from Amazon, but I wanted the score immediately in my hands. I got the only copy they had and played it in my car on the way home. I'm listening to it as I type these words. That is how much I loved this music. Here's a small sample. It's completely Morricone. You can hear familiar strains from his work on FISTFUL OF DOLLARS. You can hear some of the harmonica from ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST. It brought me back to my youth when I first saw the spaghetti westerns. I was lucky enough to have seen THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY on the big screen when the complete version played at the Music Box. THE H8FUL EIGHT made me feel like I did back when I saw tGtBatU.


Morricone's music isn't the only wonderful thing about this movie. No. I loved every fucking minute of it. Everyone does a great job. Tarantino nails the spaghetti western so well that sometimes I felt like we'd uncovered a lost Sergio Leone film. (Although Leone would have probably elongated the beginning, leaving it completely without dialogue, just the sound of the whistling wind and some kind of weird sound effect in the background.)


I loved the new Star Wars, but THE H8FUL EIGHT was the one movie I'd spent most of 2015 looking forward to seeing, especially once I learned about who did the score. I was not let down. I loved each and every scumbag character we met. I loved seeing Bruce Dern--the motherfucker who killed John Wayne that one time, and he tried to kill Marshal Dillon a couple of times--back in a western. I loved the atmosphere (I felt the merciless cold while sitting in the theater). I loved the bloodbath. I even loved the flashback. I usually hate flashbacks, but this one is pretty integral to the story. And holy Christ, I loved the ending.


I want to see it again. Immediately. WHO'S WITH ME?!