9.21.2008
The Wild Hunt's Pop-Culture Round-Up
A brief look at happenings in the world of film, television, comics, and novels.
Well, the first episode of the BBC's new series "Merlin" premiered yesterday, what did the critics think? I think it's safe to say that Mark Pickavance at Den of Geek hated it.
"...it’s all over the place. One minute it’s legend, then slapstick, then panto, then drama, horror and then mystery – they missed out the science fiction and western genres, but we’ve another 12 episodes of this for that to be rectified."
Meanwhile, TV Scoop was far more kind.
"...for those of us who were holding our breath and hoping against hope that Auntie's latest Saturday night blockbuster series wouldn't be another turkey like Robin Hood, or, worse, another Bonekickers, that bated breath was released in a rousing cheer of appreciation. This time, they've really pulled it off."
It seems the more you're expecting historical realism or accuracy, the more you're going to be disappointed. Something to keep in mind when it debuts this Winter in America.
Speaking of Brits who practice magic, the Los Angeles Times interviews Alan Moore, author of "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen", "Promethea", "V For Vendetta", and "From Hell" about his upcoming projects and his opinion about the currently-in-litigation film adaptation of his critically acclaimed work "Watchmen".
"Moore has no intention of seeing the film and, in fact, he hints that he has put a magical curse on the entire endeavor. "Will the film even be coming out? There are these legal problems now, which I find wonderfully ironic. Perhaps it's been cursed from afar, from England. And I can tell you that I will also be spitting venom all over it for months to come." Moore said all that with more mischievous glee than true malice..."
In addition to cursing Hollywood (a regular pastime for Moore) he also plugs a recent documentary made about him entitled "The Mindscape of Alan Moore", and his upcoming book of magical instruction and history entitled "The Moon & Serpent Bumper Book Of Magic".
While I'm on the subject of Hollywood ruining good stories, Neil Labute thinks his atrocious and wrong-headed remake of the cult-classic "The Wicker Man" is misunderstood.
"The director thought he was taking his personal battle-of-the-sexes theme to its logical extreme by presenting “the uber male nightmare of ‘Here’s an island of women, and this is what happens when they rule the world.’” But many folks couldn’t get past Nicolas Cage in a bear suit. “I’d been very used to polarizing people, and there would be as many benefactors as detractors, but people sort of got together on that one and said, ‘You know what? I think we’re all in agreement. We just don’t care for this,’” LaBute reflected matter-of-factly."
He thinks the film, like the original, was simply marketed wrong. With that I can only agree, Labute's remake should have been marketed as a comedy. In a separate interview, Labute actually disses the original Wicker Man, proving he just didn't "get it".
"I love this movie, love the ending, but it's not that well made. The songs are goofy. I can do something else with this."
Well, he certainly did "something else" with it.
In a final, not-really-pop-culture note, go check out the saga of an angry Wiccan taking down a scam money-for-spells online site. This one has it all, multiple identities, drama, intrigue, and pro-anorexia ties!
"FastSpells.com is a scam website that claims they will cast Magick on your behalf for various sums of money. They claim to be able to find you love, give you an abortion, cure your cancer, grant you immortality, and change you sex organs. No, I'm not kidding about any of those."
Make sure you read the comments, here. It looks like his expose has resulted in the offending sites being taken down by the scam-artists.
That is all I have for now, have a great day!
Labels: Alan Moore, Comics, Merlin, movies, pop-culture, Television, The Wicker Man
12.30.2007
Top Ten Pagan Stories of 2007 (Part One)
As we reach the close of 2007, it is time to stop for a moment and take stock of the previous year. When you look at (and for) news stories regarding modern Paganism (and related topics) every day of the year, you can sometimes lose focus on the larger picture. So it can be a helpful thing to look at the broad strokes, the bigger themes, the events and developments that will have lasting impact on the modern Pagan movement. What follows are my picks for the top ten stories from this past year involving or affecting modern Pagans.
10. Important passages within the Pagan and occult communities: 2007 saw the passing of some highly influential and respected members of our extended community, the most notable being the visionary philosopher, author, and mystic, Robert Anton Wilson.
Robert Anton Wilson
Wilson is perhaps best-known for his work on "The Illuminatus! Trilogy" with co-author Robert Shea. The books incorporated elements of Discordianism, conspiracy theory, magick, and various 60s counterculture references to create a "fairytale for paranoids". Since then Wilson published several books exploring philosophy, science, and religion. Most notably his "Cosmic Trigger" series. But RAW was hardly the only notable passing in 2007, we also saw key Goddess spirituality movement figure Shekhinah Mountainwater (author of "Ariadne's Thread: A Workbook of Goddess Magic") cross the veil after a long struggle with cancer, and Tim Sebastion, chief of the Secular Order of Druids, who died after a long illness.
Other notable passages include artist Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge (partner to Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, and member of Psychic TV), influential Salem Witch and event organizer Shawn Poirier, and Starwood organizer, musician, and SubGenius, Chas Smith.
09. Witch School in the News: This past year saw quite a lot of coverage for the (in)famous Internet-based Witch School. The year began with news that the SCI FI Channel was planning a reality television series set in the school's campus (then located in Hoopeston, IL), but this development seemed to fall apart when Ed Hubbard announced he was selling the school through E-Bay.
"Imagine, if you could buy Harry Potter's Hogwarts? Well, the world's first and largest public school of Wiccan and Witches has become available for sale. Starting Tuesday, April 10th, WitchSchool.com will be auctioned off to the highest bidder during an eBay Auction. If you ever wanted to have your very own cyber school of magick and witchcraft, this is the auction for you. So you can own and run your very own Academy for Magick and Witchcraft. If you would love to become the next Dumbledore, this is your chance to do so."
After a flurry of controversy, mixed-signals, and announcements concerning them leaving their physical campus in Hoopeston (due to the alleged unfriendliness of the town) Witch School was sold to a coalition of buyers from the Correllian Nativist Tradition with Don Lewis at the head. I thought that would be the last we head from the school in 2007, but Witch School ended up gaining national press attention after the tiny troubled town of Rossville, IL went on the offensive following the school's relocation there. While tensions have since eased up, it was certainly a PR coup for the Internet business. It remains to be seen if Witch School will manage to gain the publics attention in 2008, or if they will return to relative obscurity sans tales of persecution. But they certainly made a mark on Pagan-related news in 2007.
08. "Bunky" the Multi-Millionaire: The media became positively entranced when Wiccan Ellwood "Bunky" Bartlett won over 30 million dollars in the Maryland State Lottery "Mega Millions" drawing. This encouraged witty bon mots like "Dude, talk about blessed be" and "Christians who pray for lucky lottery tickets but never win might consider switching over to Wicca." Of course the press soon wanted to know how he was going to spend his newly-won loot, and Bunky announced that he plans to build a Pagan-run seminary. While there have certainly been rich or well-off Pagans before (though they are most-often "in the broom closet"), Bartlett is the first to gain a high-profile, and will certainly continue to gain press attention if (or when) he starts spending that money to benefit his religion.
07. Pagans in Prison (and the books they can read): Incarcerated Pagans and Heathens made the news in increasingly large numbers this past year. I personally blogged eight such stories, and I know for a fact that more occurred that I never got a chance to report on. Virtually all the claims regarded the issue of religious free exercise and what materials a Pagan prisoner should/would be allowed. But while those legal struggles mainly happened on the journalistic sidelines, Pagans, prisons, and their religious rights hit center stage when the Federal Bureau of Prisons enacted a controversial new policy that purged every religious book in Federal Prison libraries that wasn't on a then-secret list (in order to inhibit "extremism").
"Government does have a legitimate interest to screen out things that tend to incite violence in prisons," Mr. [Douglas] Laycock [professor of law at the University of Michigan Law School] said. "But once they say, 'We're going to pick 150 good books for your religion, and that's all you get,' the criteria has become more than just inciting violence. They're picking out what is accessible religious teaching for prisoners, and the government can't do that without a compelling justification. Here the justification is, the government is too busy to look at all the books, so they're going to make their own preferred list to save a little time, a little money."
Massive controversy ensued amongst religious groups both liberal and conservative, which only intensified when the amazingly flawed lists leaked to the public. The BOP soon reversed their actions and restored the pulled books, but the policy has only been postponed, and come early 2008 we could be faced yet again with the majority of books for (Federal) Pagan prisoners being pulled, and an approved list made by unnamed "experts" put in its place. So expect the rights of Pagan prisoners to continue to make the news in 2008.
06. Paganism (Ancient and Modern) Continues to Influence Pop-Culture: Pagan and occult themes continued to make headway into popular culture in 2008. The television series "Rome" (which had one of the most accurate portrayals of Roman polytheism to date) aired its second (and final) season, the masterful adult fairytale "Pan's Labyrinth" took home three Academy Awards, while films like "300", and "Beowulf" looked to a pre-Christian era to find its heroes (while a certain Pirate franchise invoked a goddess to help wrap up their story). 2007 also saw the release of documentaries concerning notorious occultist Aleister Crowley, and cultural appropriation within New Age communities, and a new-found emphasis on occult and supernatural themes in television.
"The prevalence of supernatural plots 'is reflective of increasing anxiety - personal, economic and national' that pervades the American mood, said Mr. Rash, who was in New York last week to attend the networks' presentations ... Most of the coming new shows 'are playing to viewers' desire to be in fantasyland,' said Shari Anne Brill, senior vice president and director of programming at Carat USA in New York, part of the Carat division of the Aegis Group, adding, 'The real world has become such a horrendous place that people are looking for magic to avoid the tragic.'"
Pagans continued to make appearances on reality television, and exploitive daytime talk-shows, while a film full of Scottish myths and folktales (shot entirely in Gaelic) gained rave critical reviews. In addition, production news surfaced about a feature film concerning Aleister Crowley, a re-envisioning of the classic cult-film "The Wicker Man", and a possible television show starring Greek gods. Meanwhile, Walden Media learned that if you cut the pagan elements out of a classic story, the movie will flop.
This has been a great year for Pagan-themed music, from Wyrd-folk compilations to Bjork and Tori Amos. Loads of great Pagan and occult books came out this year as well. Oh, and the last Harry Potter book came out, but didn't you hear it was all a Christian allegory? But in any case, popular culture continues to become increasingly Pagan-friendly, and I don't see the trend slowing down any time soon.
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Tomorrow I will post the top five Pagan stories for 2007. In the meantime, I invite you to check out the top religion stories from some different perspectives. Time magazine's top ten religion stories, the 2007 Top Religion Stories as selected by Religion Newswriters, the Barna group's four "mega-themes" from their 2007 research, Christianity Today's top stories of 2007, and Terry Mattingly gives us his vote for 2007's top religious story.
Labels: Ellwood "Bunky" Bartlett, Paganism, Passings, pop-culture, Prison, Religion, Top 10 religion stories of the year, Witch School
12.05.2007
Pagan Interviews of Note
Religious blogger and academic John Morehead has recently posted two interviews of interest to the larger Pagan community. The first is at his Theofantastique blog where he interviews Pagan author, academic, and movie critic Peg Aloi concerning Pagan and occult themes in film, and her forthcoming book (co-authored with Hannah Johnston) "The Celluloid Bough: Cinema in the Wake of the Occult Revival".
"...the first example of occult cinema that had widespread and culture-changing impact was Roman Polanski's 1968 film Rosemary's Baby. In addition to its being a very artful and entertaining film, based on an equally artful novel by Ira Levin, there were some real-life occurrences that added to its aura of evil, and fueled a widespread spirit of protest against all things occult, even as the film ushered in a palpable fascination with the occult."
Then back at his primary blog, Morehead's Musings, he interviews Aloi's collaborator and writing partner Hannah Johnston, Adjunct Professor in Visual and Media Arts at Emerson College, concerning teen Witches and a recently released collection of essays on the subject (co-edited with Peg Aloi) entitled "The New Generation Witches: Teenage Witchcraft in Contemporary Culture".
"...having become aware of the distinctions between teenage Witchcraft and the adult Pagan/Wiccan/Witchcraft communities at the end of the 1990s, I was struck by the emergence of teen Witchcraft as a distinctive articulation of popular culture post-feminism, and I went on to pursue my doctorate in the field, investigating teen Witchcraft as an amalgamation of new religious structures, pop media poaching from alternative beliefs and new age practices and new feminist concepts of 'girl power'."
Both interviews (and books) are worth the effort to read. It is often the case that pop-culture and youth-oriented permutations of a religious movement are devalued by "insiders" and older demographics who see these representations and recent adherents as lacking in seriousness or real worth. But how we are displayed in popular media, and how the next generation of modern Pagans adapt and changes with the times are truly important topics that I'm glad writers like Aloi and Johnston are covering.
Labels: books, Hannah Johnston, John Morehead, movies, Peg Aloi, pop-culture, teens, Wicca, Witch
11.01.2007
Mainstreamed, In Demand, Yet Shrinking?
Is modern Paganism becoming more mainstream, yet shrinking in size? That seems to be the gist of two recent articles that talked to practitioners and academics about the state of modern Paganism today. Reuters reporter Sarah Marsh interviews famed Alexandrian priestess Maxine Sanders, who explains that Witches and Pagans are more in demand than ever before.
"'Witches are getting more and more in demand. People want a pagan wedding,' said Maxine Sanders, high priestess of the sacred mysteries and a promoter of the modern nature-based witchcraft movement of Wicca ... People are more tolerant on the whole nowadays, she added, and more interested in witchcraft."
Elsewhere in the article, pop-culture boosts to Wicca and other modern Pagan religions through shows like "Buffy" and "Charmed" are mentioned, but a metaphysical store owner says these newcomers aren't necessarily in it for the religion.
"More and more people are practicing magic but they are not necessarily interested in the spiritual side of witchcraft, said John Cole, high priest of a Manchester coven and owner of an occult shop selling everything from cauldrons to Viking rune charms."
Some of these themes are taken up in a Samhain-themed article for The Record in Canada. Mirko Petricevic interviews academic Douglas Cowan, author of "Cyberhenge: Modern Pagans on the Internet", who also credits pop-culture for a sudden burst of growth, yet now thinks modern Paganism is entering a "shrinking" phase as that initial surge of interest wears off.
"Cowan says he hasn't had to go far to track the popularity of Paganism. But he has also observed that participation seems to be declining. Not long ago, he says, books about Wicca and witchcraft occupied huge amounts of shelf space at book stores. "Over the years I watched that shrink" ... Cowan suspects the next census or two will show a dramatic drop in the number of Pagans. He says he believes Paganism will grow, but that it will build slowly from the same core group of believers who were practising before interest in Paganism was driven by pop-culture."
While I agree that we may be tapering off of the explosive growth modern Paganism saw in the 1990s, there seems to be no clear picture on if we are shrinking (call it the hypothetical "pop-culture corrective"). Book-buying as proof of growth rates is a pretty shaky indicator, especially if the market was over-saturated for many years (as I believe it was). There will always be transient dabblers and seekers who don't stay long, but the demographics of possible new Pagans keep improving, perhaps mitigating any dramatic "shrink" in population. No doubt harder data will emerge when both Britain and Australia hold their next censuses in 2011. Until then, while I agree we are becoming ever more "mainstream", I'm not sure we are experiencing any dramatic downturn.
Labels: Canada, census, Douglas Cowan, Maxine Sanders, Paganism, pop-culture, population, UK
5.26.2007
Religion, Pop-Culture, Academia
The National Post in Canada has an interesting article posted concerning the rise of interest in academic study of pop-culture and the role of religion within it.
"Prof. James, who has taught at the prestigious Ontario university for the past three decades, is one of dozens of scholars who will be bridging the vast academic divides between high-brow, low-brow and near-satirical esoterica at this year's conference, which is being held as part of the annual Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences in Saskatoon. At this summit where Almighty notions will be poked, prodded and deconstructed, religion scholars will deliver presentations on topics as varied as 'Women's Hair Donation in Japanese Pure Land Buddhism,' 'Durkheim Goes Mainstream: Durkheimian Shadows within Popular Feminism and Media Representation of Sisterhood,' and 'Monotheistic Monsters and the Power of Polytheism in Battlestar Galactica.'"
Why this rise of interest in the deeper meanings within pop-culture? The piece asserts that the post-9/11 rise of two cultural flash-points (from two different religious/political positions) has fueled this interest.
"...the events that followed 9/11, the controversy surrounding the bestselling novel The Da Vinci Code and the flap over Mel Gibson movie Passion of the Christ - and the growth of the pursuit of spirituality - all have contributed to a boomlet of student curiosity in their field of expertise."
Also feeding this trend has been the rise of the Harry Potter witch-hunts, and the popularity of celebrity atheist authors like Richard Dawkins. While all coming from different places they have all helped insert religious and philosophical meaning into our popular culture. Scholars are particularly interested in how themes and trends within popular culture affect how we act.
"The image of scholars searching for allegorical meaning in mainstream movies or popular paperbacks might seem farfetched, but as God scholars point out, holier-than-thou attitudes in religious departments have taken a democratic twist over the past couple of decades. They now focus less on what the masses are thinking - the philosophy or theoretical approach - and concentrate more on what they are actually doing: the sociology of their religion."
Personally, I have always taken the position that pop-culture is important, especially for adherents to minority faiths like ours. Movies like "The Da Vinci Code", television shows like "Battlestar Galactica", comic books like "Phonogram", and even Summer blockbusters starring certain pirates, all help clear a path towards mainstream acceptance and understanding. It isn't so much evangelism (despite the hysterics of some Christian groups), as it is a subtle form of apologetics for outsider views.
This is why I liberally mix "hard" news in with posts about movies, books, and television shows. Because they can be a bellwether for our future, and can prepare us in a way other media cannot. In today's society, what we watch when we are having fun can be almost as important as what we publicly claim to believe.
Labels: academia, pop-culture, Religion
