Happy Halloween!
A brief respite from the horror of everyday life
Greetings, guys and ghouls, and welcome to this year’s Halloween hootenanny!
Recently, I have written several articles that attempted to not only gaze into the abyss, but to cannonball right in there in the hope of bringing back some roughly hewn obsidian truths from those inky, unplumbed depths. Together we’ve spent a couple of articles analyzing the Anti-Life Equation sweeping across the countryside like a zombie-locust plague, and we’ve grappled with the cruel calculus demanded of us in times of war. So, I figured it would be a nice change of pace, in the spirit of the holiday, to also enjoy the fun side of horror, a little treat along with all those tricks.
To that end, I have a Halloween-themed award that I’ve been wanting to share with you for quite a while: the much-anticipated Innsmouth Look Awards!
Those familiar with my Substack will know that I positively adore a good gala, like my critically acclaimed Harvey Dent Awards, which I encourage you to give a read. Like the Harveys, the Innsmouth Look Awards have an interesting origin. In this case, they are named after a phenomenon described in the novella The Shadow over Innsmouth by horror master H.P. Lovecraft. In this 1931 classic, the intrepid protagonist visits the decrepit port town of Innsmouth, Massachusetts, where he (in true Lovecraftian fashion) discovers the towns denizens are degenerate descendants of vile inbreeding between humans and an amphibious race of Dagon-worshipping creatures called Deep Ones. Zany cult activity and madness ensue.
It is a phenomenal story—one of my favorite of Howard’s and I celebrate the guy’s entire catalog. It boggles my mind that that for all of the films based on HPL’s material, this one remains basically untouched despite having some of the most cinematic moments, like the exhilarating hotel escape sequence. I encourage everyone to give it a read, but for the sake of this article, the important thing we need to take from that story is a fun, little detail that I refer to way too often in my daily life: the Innsmouth Look.
The Innsmouth Look is the name given by outsiders to the peculiar, vaguely amphibian appearance shared by those shady, shambling humanoids who still dwell in the delipidated buildings of old Innsmouth:
"Some of ’em have queer narrow heads with flat noses and bulgy, stary eyes that never seem to shut, and their skin ain’t quite right. Rough and scabby, and the sides of their necks are all shrivelled or creased up. Get bald, too, very young. The older fellows look the worst—fact is, I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a very old chap of that kind. Guess they must die of looking in the glass! Animals hate ’em—they used to have lots of horse trouble before autos came in.”
— The Shadow over Innsmouth
Basically, it means you look like a swamp creature. Now that you know the term, you too will be amazed how often it comes in handy when describing people you encounter in your daily life. Personally, though, I find it particularly fitting for those loathsome creatures dwelling in the worst swamp of them all: Washington, D.C.
With all of that in mind, I am extremely proud to present this year’s coveted Innsmouth Look Award to—oh my stars, ladies and gentleman, this is unbelievable! Never in the long and storied history of the ILAs has such a thing happened; we have a two-way tie!
It seems the committee had chosen former Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot as the inaugural recipient in a landslide…
… but since she is no longer actively holding office—having returned to her barnacled shrine at the bottom of Lake Michigan to conduct her blasphemous rituals—the committee has made a co-winner of Mitch McConnell!
A representative for Mitch McConnell said the senator regrettably can not attend the awards, as he is working with local, indigenous peoples of Kentucky to create handcrafted, ceremonial athames and graven idols, but he is honored to receive the award and looks forward to continuing to serve the fine people of Kentucky—wait, my mistake, it says “to continuing to serve the bloated toad god Tsathoggua… and cocaine.”
Hmph. Worshipping a god other than Dagon may disqualify a candidate, so this is indeed quite a controversial start to the Innsmouth Look Awards! If any of you have gill-necked, bulbous-eyed nominees you think would make deserving recipients in the future, please be sure to share them in the comments below.
We have a lot of exciting stuff lined up here, and I look forward to sharing it with you all… when the stars are once again right. For the time being, I shall leave you with that most infamous couplet from the dreaded Necronomicon: “That is not dead which can eternal lie, and that is why American politicians never die.”
BUT WAIT THERE’S MORE! In a bold and brazen move unheard of in the annals of journalism (except at the blood-sucking NYT and WaPo where they stealth edit their articles constantly), I have decided to furtively—surreptitiously even—edit in this final, bonus section to give you readers who may not keep up with my Notes even more terrifyingly delightful holiday content.
A final treat from me to you is a recommendation for what scary movie YOU should watch this Halloween.
And that film… is When Evil Lurks on Shudder.
It is an AMAZING new horror film from Argentinian director Demián Rugna. Guillermo del Toro (I call him “Billy the Bull.”) and Scott Derrickson (I call him “Scotty D.”) praised it, so I figured I would give it a shot, and I was blown away.
I am a lifelong horror enthusiast, so I don’t say this lightly: it was one of the most interesting, innovative, unique, disturbing, horrifying, beautifully shot, cleverly written, well acted, masterfully paced, compelling films the genre has seen since, at least, the French New Wave horror films of the aughts, and frankly immediately skyrocketed to the upper echelon of my all-time list. And if that didn’t sell you, my fellow horror maven, @Amel Figueroa Sanchez, loved it as well. I think this may be the only film I can recall that actually had both of us grizzled vets wanting to look away from the screen at certain points haha
Final note, the film also further proves my theory that when we emerge from our caves years from now after the Woke Anti-Life Plague has subsided and the forces of Freedom have vanquished the night, I believe it will have been Hispanics and South Koreans who will have held the line against the zombie armies of Hollywood Woke Whiteys, Omega Wave Feminists, and Race Peddlers like (the otherwise actually talented) Jordan Peele. Maybe it is some Grant Morrison-like language virus that is corrupting the minds of Western, English-speaking countries!
Either way, so many of the great game devs, artists, writers, and directors (from Game Kitchen to Del Toro, Frank Cho to Hwang Dong-hyuk) fighting the good fight against The Narrative© today by creating badass characters, intelligent stories, nuanced themes, brazen sex and gore, and innovative aesthetics seem to be coming from those geo-cultural-linguistic bastions. And people with the last name Cronenberg... But anyway, fight on, brave Hispanics and Koreans! And Happy Halloween, everyone!
I think the award has to go to McConnell, as for mine... Lori Lightfoot looks a bit too much like the Creature of the Black Lagoon.
I try not to judge people by their appearances, and time is kind to few of us, but I do find it fascinating how many politicians look so creepy and unnatural. Is it the old Roald Dahl theory that ugly thoughts warp a person on the outside as well, or are they indeed hybrid children of Dagon and Chthulhu sent above to usher in the end times?