Bookmonkey visits Hemlock Grove: Post Four

Without going into too much detail of the second episode, this is the one that confirms that yes, Peter is a werewolf, and it does it in one of the more startling transformations sequences I've seen in quite a while.

For me the gold standard will always be  Rick Baker's transformation effects in the 1981 film An American Werewolf in London (the makeup for that film was so good that the Academy Awards introduced a new category, Best Makeup, because of it), and although much of what you see in the episode is clearly computer generated, the effects are pretty impressive nonetheless.

The episode itself largely focuses on the murder mystery, but does introduce (through email), Roman's older sister Shelley, a giant girl suffering from some undefined deformities, who wheezes loudly and speaks through a small mechanical device in person, but through her emails, shows herself to be well spoken and quite intelligent.

I actually preferred the second episode to the pilot, and am definitely looking forward to the rest of the season.

RIP Ray Harryhausen

When I think back the earliest monsters in my own memory, before horrifying aliens, or slasher killers, or zombies, heck even before floating vampire kids (shudder), there was one that freaked me out more than any other.

I’m talking about The Medusa (pictured above).

 

And I’m specifically talking about the creature created by Ray Harryhausen for the 1981 film, Clash of the Titans.  This thing, rattlesnake tale, lower body of a snake, and snakes for hair freaked me out like nothing else, and the fact that you could never look at it, or you would be turned to stone, simply horrified me as a child.

Although I’ve seen, and appreciated many more of the creatures created for the movies by Ray Harryhausen, for me The Medusa from Clash of the Titans is the thing that showed me just how dark fantasy could get, and in a lot of ways started my lifelong exploration of the genre.

Thanks Ray.