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Set Me Free, Why Don’t You, Lou?
Published May 24, 2023 by biggayhorrorfanGLBT issues
All posts in the GLBT issues category
Christmas Coal.
Published December 16, 2020 by biggayhorrorfan
For decades my grandfather Kirst worked at the Niagara Mohawk coal plant in WNY. It was a backbreaking job that was accentuated and/or offset by his wicked sense of humor and love for the written word. One year when I was 6 or 7, he and my grandmother decided to play a joke on me – one that they had probably been anticipating for years. They just had to wait until I was old enough to understand. So, finally, in that moment of my glimmering consciousness, they wrapped up a gloriously shiny chunk and placed it under the tree – a behaviorist coal in your stocking moral come to late winter’s life. The whole family breathlessly waited as I opened it up, expecting me to jokingly howl in protest. I surely hadn’t been bad enough to deserve this as a gift!!
Unfortunately, they hadn’t realized the extent of my grade school angst. “It’s coal, Brian, it’s coal!” they chanted as I sat, bewildered, staring at it. I could tell my grandparents and everyone who witnessed the unveiling were disappointed. They thought the joke had failed. It hadn’t. I knew what it was. I was just lost, as I always seemed to be, endlessly in my head. Was there a hint of reality in this bit of humor? Did everyone, deep down, really believe that I was a bad kid? Even then, I could multiply my darkest thoughts without much effort, so I sat there adding up all the small betrayals and petty lies I had conjured over the past twelve months. Perhaps, I really was only worthy of inky stone at holiday gatherings – and here it was, an instance of truth behind the laughter shining into life. Of course, other gifts were soon dispersed and those thoughts were quickly put behind me.
But on these first few days of freezing seasonal temps here in Chicago, the memory of this evening comes rollicking back and I wish I could tell my grandfather (and all those there long lost) that their game then was strictly on point. But as with any other youthful sport I attempted, I was eternally bound for the sidelines – the minutiae of analysis, my propensity to view both sides of the coin fully, already doing me in.
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan
Lesbians in Horror: Human Experiments
Published October 8, 2020 by biggayhorrorfan
Long before Angela Bettis’ quirky May, Buffy’s beloved Willow and even The Hunger’s sensuous Miriam Blaylock, there were lesbian characters in horror. As an example, acclaimed indie actress Wesley Marie Tackett tackled the role of Jimmy in the odd 1979 WIP-mad scientist terror offering Human Experiments. Despite the biases of the time, Tackett fully embraces all of Jimmy’s rough and often predatory edges.
But as much as one has to acknowledge Tackett’s courage and skill in bringing forth all of the antagonist nature of this perennial inmate, it is also important to make a historical note of how damaging characters like Jimmy were/are to societal understanding and acceptance of the LGBTQIA community as a whole. A woman who tries to terrorize another woman into acts of sex only highlights the perceived perversion of our culture. Thankfully, roles that demonize the gay community are further and farther between…but we still have such a long (and hopefully creatively bountiful) way to go.
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan
http://www.facebook.com/biggayhorrorfan
Dagger Cast: Limerence
Published April 17, 2020 by biggayhorrorfan
The latest Dagger Cast is up ‘n streaming! Lindsey and I catch up a bit, reviewing the world of horror a mere week before the stay at home orders went into effect.
We also have a sweet conversation with talented actress-writer Angela Riccetti. Angela is the lead of Limerence, a fantastical lesbian romance with some Twin Peaks style elements. This episode, which will hopefully go down in our history as the only show where my weak bladder makes an appearance (..pee break, anyone?!?!..), is available for listening at:
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!
http://www.facebook.com/biggayhorrorfan
Thrift Store Find: Art Saves!
Published March 7, 2020 by biggayhorrorfan
I first got The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll as a confirmation present from one of my uncles. For awhile I carried it with me everywhere. A day or so after that confirmation, my parents came to pick me up from some event. I had been confirmed with one of my mom’s students and he overheard some of the other kids saying that I was gay in the parking lot afterwards. He told my mother about this…and she was furious…with me.
“Why would they say that, Brian?!?” “What have you done to make them think that?!?” “Do you know how embarrassing this is for me?!? For my own student to come to me about something like this?!?” As she hammered away at me on the car ride home, I murmured soft responses back while burying myself in this book., wanting to disappear. But as I poured over epic black and white photos of Little Richard, David Bowie, a pre-fame Aretha Franklin, a pert Annette Funicello clinging to a properly attired Dick Clark… I suddenly knew that eventually everything would be okay…that the world was full of magnificence and unusual artistry and someday…it all would be mine!
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan
http://www.facebook.com/biggayhorrorfan
29 Needles Trailer
Published June 7, 2019 by biggayhorrorfan
You have to admire the determination of some creators. It took director-writer Scott Philip Goergens a number of years, with a limited budget and a cast of eager yet nonprofessional performers, to finish his intriguing 29 Needles, a horror fueled look at one man’s journey into extreme body fetishism.
Goergens has recently released the film’s first trailer and, nicely, this Baltimore, Maryland lensed adventure seems to gladly attack Cronenberg territory with a delightfully twisted gay flourish!
Be sure to dive deep into the film’s further developments at https://www.facebook.com/pg/29-Needles-1160222874130070/, as well.
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!
ReQueered Tales Presents Steam
Published June 1, 2019 by biggayhorrorfan
It is perhaps any artist’s worst fear that their work will be forgotten as the decades spin in their unrestrained progression. Nicely, the folks at ReQueered Tales are focusing on re-releasing the important works of previous generations of queer horror and science fiction writers. Now these creative giants can be discovered and celebrated by a new millennium of readers.
Excitingly, one of their first major entries for renewed and (hopefully enthusiastic) consumption is Jay B. Laws’ Steam. Celebrated in his brief career for his plays and novels, Laws’ Steam takes the horrors of the AIDS epidemic and gives them a fictionally horrific facade. The author, who died of the disease soon after the book was published, would surely be thrilled that his work was being given a big push in this time of morally reprehensible politics. His words, surely, ring just as true now as they did almost 30 years ago.
Steam, highlighted by beautiful new cover art, can be purchased at
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07RJL2SPM
Be sure to also follow ReQueered Tales at https://www.facebook.com/ReQueeredTales/ to learn about the important reissues that they will be emphasizing in the future.
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!
www.facebook.com/biggayhorrorfan
Steam’s Original Cover Art
Wicked Enigma Season Trailer
Published May 18, 2019 by biggayhorrorfan
One of my favorite things about soap operas is how they add elements of horror and suspense to their mix – people rising from the dead, gothic vaults filled with kidnapped heiresses and Frankenstein inspired mad scientists either saving or destroying the day.
Thus, I am really excited about the independently produced series Wicked Enigma, a dramatic show based around a slasher film motif and featuring a number of characters that fall within the LGBTQIA spectrum. A first season trailer has recently been released, promising plenty of beautiful people and beautiful kills!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_6WQxG-XUM
Be sure to find out more about all the bloody surprises in store for viewers at https://www.facebook.com/WickedEnigmatv.
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!
http://www.facebook.com/biggayhorrorfan
Dagger Cast
Published March 8, 2019 by biggayhorrorfan
Stevie Nicks may have celebrated the Edge of Seventeen, but as I stand on the verge of 51, I have to laud Dagger Cast! Initiated by Jared Olsen, one half of edgy production company nite smoke, this podcast looks at horror from the sense of the other. By the celebrating the LGBTQ, Black, Latinx and female (etc. etc…) viewpoint of horror, this podcast aims to reach into the hidden depths of the horror community, gazing far past the straight white gaze that has dominated it for so many years. 
As my co-host, the dynamic Lindsey Charles (lead singer of The Cell Phones), has often asked of our guests, we want to find out what you, that special and unique force in society, needs from this genre – a genre that can so beautiful express the hopes and fears of outsiders everywhere. Of course, we aim to do this with a sense of fun and irreverent punk rock spirit, as well!
To determine if we’ve succeeded, you can check out our first few episodes at https://soundcloud.com/daggercast.
Meanwhile, more information is available at https://www.facebook.com/daggercast/, as well.
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!
Review: Wicked Enigma
Published September 21, 2018 by biggayhorrorfan
Move over, Riverdale! The sexy cast of Wicked Enigma is ready to take your place.
Big words, perhaps, but this LGBTQ friendly project, revolving around the gothic, soap strewn craziness that ensues after a tragic onset accident, is full of attractive, well cast people doing their devious best to stay alive….very much like a certain, very popular CW show.
Nicely, queer fans are sure to thrill to the complicated romance of Max (Terrence Edmonds), an out and proud cinematic genius in the making, and Austin (Andrew Etzel), a well known yet extremely closeted actor. Edmonds and Etzel provide nice layers to their characterizations, aligning themselves, sympathetically, with the audience. But directors Edmonds and Jake Doull work wonders with all of the performers, particularly with Charlotte Evelyn Williams, who shines with vibrant defiance as the rejected Sasha, making the first episode a true pleasure to view.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=widX_SdHF_0
When you’re through, you can keep exploring the wild mysteries of Wicked Enigma at http://www.WickedEnigma.com, https://www.instagram.com/wickedenigm, https://www.facebook.com/WickedEnigmatv/ and https://twitter.com/WickedEnigmatv, as well.
Until the next time, SWEET love and pink GRUE, Big Gay Horror Fan!
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