Snow - Ronald Malfi

            Snow is the story of Ted and Kate’s struggle to survive against horrible spider monsters that get inside people.

           

            Erm, sorry. That’s Todd and Kate’s struggle to survive against horrible snow monsters that get inside people.

                                                                  

From the very beginning, I felt like I’d read this story before. I have, a few times now. For me, there was nothing particularly remarkable about Snow as a whole. It was a pretty standard group of survivors vs. monster apocalypse type story with a small town setting. The cop sacrificed himself, the kids got axed, and the pregnant lady was a psycho. Nothing new here.

They also killed off my favorite character, Shawna. Also nothing new here. I did find her refreshingly tough while she was alive. I really admired her will to survive, and felt a little betrayed when she was killed during a scene in her POV. For some reason I never expect a character to be killed in a scene when it is their POV, especially if they are the only character in that scene. Major expectation adjustment.

The only thing I found nonstandard about the book were the characteristics of the monster. Snow is, no surprise, largely about monsters that live in, or are part of the snow from a particularly large storm that covers the Midwestern United States. I’ve never seen a monster that takes the form of glittering, gravity defying snow in any sort of medium, other than a few select monsters in Dungeons and Dragons. When paired with the setting, which is a remote town in the center of a blizzard, the snow beast is well suited to its environment. In much the same way the alien from Alien uses its environment to its advantage, the snow beasts blend with their surroundings, amplifying the paranoia and fear that they could be anywhere and anytime.

As if incorporeal snow monsters with enormous hook arms that turn solid just long enough to hack and slash you and your shelter to smithereens wasn’t terrifying enough, the snow beasts are also capable of possessing their victims. Some of the human skin suites are used as disposable corporeal toys, and behave much like zombies. The interesting ones are the humans taken for more permanent residence. These retain some semblance of humanity, and are capable of blending in with the human population long enough to move about undetected (as seen in the epilogue), though they inevitably have a strange and alien demeanor that puts normal people on edge. This made me wonder how much, if any of the original personality remained in the possessed being. With Eddy Clement, I had the distinct impression there were still some remnants of his former self, but twisted and strange. This was the element of the story that held the most potential for me, and I was disappointed it wasn’t taken further.

An interesting thing also happens to children in this novel when they are possessed. They lose their faces. Something about the snow beasts doesn’t quite mix with prepubescent humans and the result is corrupted. The children appear to be outcasts from both the surviving humans, and the society of snow beasts. They take to roaming the woods in silent packs, and though disturbing, they never harm any of the human characters in the story, which was fascinating to me. I really want to know more about the feral, faceless children, their motives, and the state of their consciousness.

And lastly, there was totally a penis monster. And it was gross. I think there is something telling about ending the semester with a mention of a penis monster. Somehow, it says more than all my blogs ever could.

Relic - Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child

            Relic is the only book this semester that has made me squirm on the first page.

“Lighting a cigarette, he applied its tip to the forest of ticks on his shin and ankle.”

The forest of ticks. Have I mentioned how horrifying I find ticks? This has no particular relevance to the rest of the novel, but it still deserves a mention. I shuddered on the first page. Good on you Relic.

                      

As for the rest of the story, I found it to be more of a mystery than a horror. The pace was slow at points, and there were times it dragged for me, but the good moments of the novel made up for the low points. What Relic lacked most for me was the presence of strong characters. The only character I developed even a tiny attachment to was Smithback, and this was due to his obnoxious quirkiness, and possibly the moment of complete understanding I shared with him when he hit the buffet table and refused to be stopped even by absolute catastrophe.

What I enjoyed most about Relic was the setting, and the science. The giant labyrinth of the museum, stuffed with countless artifacts was at the same time lonely and compelling. I imagine if I was lost in the museum vaults, alone, afterhours I would be a bit apprehensive. Yet, at the same time, the beautiful realism and details that went into crafting the museum made me really want to go to one. And unlike the frozen Artic wastes, or vast spacecrafts, I can actually go to a museum. Relic actually inspired me to seek out first hand experiences with the diversity of other cultures and time periods. I am now planning a trip to the Smithsonian. Relic will doubtlessly be on my mind the whole time.

The other aspect of the book I enjoyed was the science. Natural science has always been an interest of mine, and I dabbled in a fair amount of biology during my undergraduate degree. Though the science in Relic took its creative liberties, it was clear to me it was based upon the author’s solid understanding of accurate science. One of my favorite puzzles in the novel was figuring out the machine’s predictions before the scientists could interoperate it for me.

Speaking of the machine’s prediction’s… what a fascinating beast! I found myself more intrigued by the museum beast than I was frightened, but this intrigue kept me turning pages. Though we never got to read in the POV of the beast, it still became a sympathetic monster to me. It was the last of its kind, living in a squalid and pitiful environment compared to the lush, green, expanse of its native home. It was drawn to the figurine of itself. It appreciated things of beauty. Then the beast was slowly hunted down, collecting bullets and injuries as the quiet lonely existence it had was disrupted, then destroyed by ignorant humans. I’d be pissed too. I’d probably go on a murderous rampage too. The beast, despite the opinions of several characters, wasn’t evil to me. The novel succeeded in turning the beast into a natural phenomenon, that like so many, is threatened and destroyed by the advancement of human society. It was a symbol of an old world, still wild, that was lost before it was fully understood, like the dozens of plant and animal species lost every day in the world’s rainforests.

Because I felt this way about the beast, I did not like the epilogue. I felt making the beast into Whittlesay and then having Kawikita attempt to harness the plant that caused the transformation, undid some of the work I appreciated most in the novel. I would have preferred if the beast were a natural born phenomenon, or simply one of the Korthoga, transformed by the virus. This adaptation seemed to destroy the ancient roots the beast represented to me. I prefer the conclusions Margo and Frock drew at the end of the novel.

Now, one last thing. While the science for the most part impressed me with its believability, this made the one flaw stand out in stark, annoying contrast to me. “All big game-lion, water buffalo, elephant- have eyes on the sides of their head”

No. Wrong. Lions, like all predatory mammals, have forward facing eyes. Predators have eyes in the front of their heads because it gives them the advanced depth perception they need to calculate distance to their prey. Herbivorous, prey animals have eyes on the sides of their heads to give them a wider field of vision to spot stalking predators. 

The Thing - John Carpenter

            I first saw The Thing years ago, and I must say my memories of the film do not do it justice. Or perhaps it just gets better with time. John Carpenter makes great John Carpenter films. There's no other category of comparison for them. The first scene involves the worst marksman ever, a helicopter that says “Caution rotating blades” with an arrow, and what is possibly the most glorious beard ever caught on film. Then every scene thereafter pretty much has equally great components along the same vein. 

            The Thing itself is our second alien of the semester, and like Rawhead Rex, is an ancient terror unleashed by foolish humans who won't stop digging. This beast, more than another I've encountered this semester, is terrifying because it is not understood. It is first seen on film as a dog with a strange habit of staring at things in a very poised and ominous way (the animal actor deserves an oscar). Even more than the gross out scenes where the Thing shape shifts, the first scenes where it is in the shape of a dog, but clearly not a dog are the most disturbing for me. It takes something familiar and makes it strange. 

            As the story progresses and it consumes other organisms and replicates itself, we receive very limited information about it. All we know is that it absorbs other organisms, mimics them perfectly, and reproduces in this fashion. Even though it seems to gain intelligence from the beings it consumes (which is perfectly terrifying in its own right), and developed the ability to speak, we never glean any of its motives beyond reproducing. As a matter of fact, every time we see the Thing, it is something else. In this way it is impossible to know the enemy, it is a truly faceless opponent, and that is the true horror of the Thing. 

            I love this movie. I love the monster. I even love the cheesy scenes and the amazing Yosemite Sam hat Kurt Russell insists on wearing with snow goggles and some kind of head wrap. However there is one problem I must point out for the sake of science and common sense. In the scene where Mac tests the blood of his companions with a hot wire and proves that each part of the Think is an independent organism, a lot of sentient blood escapes. The others were too busy burning the once human looking masses of Thing to apparently notice, but that blood would in theory be enough to continue the infection and menace. Also, the thing totally exploded all over everyone in the room and could have infected them that way. It seems odd that they had the foresight to suggest eating only canned food to avoid contamination, but weren’t concerned about being rained on by Thing-goo.

            To end this post I’d like to pose a question about something in the film. There are a lot of theories about the end of the film and whether or not Childs was a Thing. A lot of these theories have to do with the bottle of scotch they share at the end (in one of them it is suggested Mac replaced the scotch with kerosene, and because Childs was a Thing, he wouldn’t know what scotch or kerosene tasted like so that’s why he drank it and Mac had that weird crazy laugh). I paid close attention to the film this time around trying to see the significance of the scotch. Though I was unable to find any concrete evidence, the prevalence of alcohol in the film was very obvious. Liquor was centered in a ton of shots, especially Mac’s bottle of Jim Beam (I think that’s what it was) which was seen in his first appearance, and his last. To me, it seemed intentional, so I think there may be something I missed there. Did anyone see anything relating to the significance of the scotch or have any interesting theories?