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The Horror of "Resident Evil Village"
Resident Evil Village, set to be released May 7 for the PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X and Series S, Google Stadia, Microsoft Windows will be continuing the same balancing act of new and classic elements that Resident Evil 7: Biohazard had.
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Is "Godzilla Vs. Kong" the Ultimate Culmination of the MonsterVerse?
It’s been seven years since Gareth Edwards released Godzilla in 2014, kicking off the American “Monsterverse” (which has certainly panned out better than the Dark Universe), and was followed by Kong: Skull Island and Godzilla: King of the Monsters. Now Kong and Godzilla square off for the first time in almost 60 years in Godzilla Vs. Kong, and after decades of waiting the resulting film was surprisingly decent.
Sculptors Issue 4 Quick Read
We take a look at the latest issue of the modeling exhibition magazine Sculptors, which is currently available in the Phantasmic store.
You can see our coverage of the third issue here.
The Super Creators: H.R. Giger in Japan
Hans Ruedi Giger (1940 - 2014) took the creeping unknowable world of nightmares, and brought them to life through airbrush, plasticine, and paint. His book Necronomicon, released in 1977, garnered the attention of writer and producer Dan O’Bannon and from there, the rest of science fiction history was rewritten in thanks to a script about the working class being subjected to the the dual terrifying whims of Corporations and uncaring cosmic horror in Alien. A global sensation, the reverberations Alien had are multitude, and one of those was introducing Giger to the world at large. How were those reverberations felt in Japan?
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"Shin Ultraman" Trailer and Posters Revealed
Tsuburaya Productions has released the trailer for the eagerly anticipated "Shin Ultraman", slated for release in the summer of 2021. Helmed by Shinji Higuchi and written by Hideaki Anno, the two previously collaborated on 2016's Shin Godzilla.
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The Nirasawa Filmography: Deep Fear
During his artistic career, Yasushi Nirasawa has done concept art for video games going as far back as the early 90s with Beast Wrestler on the Sega Genesis. By 1998, the world of games was evolving to new narrative and visual heights. Colloquially considered one of the best years in video game history, it includes titles such as Half Life, Parasite Eve, Metal Gear Solid, and Resident Evil 2.
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The Nirasawa Filmography: Archangel Thunderbird
Yasushi Nirasawa’s (1963 - 2016) career spanned garage kits, video games, film, and comics. In the realm of TV he was particularly prolific in his work for the Kamen Rider series in Japan. In the English speaking world however, the first time viewers got to see his unique character designs on TV came courtesy of Sci-Fi Channel UK.
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Kaiju Memories: Looking Back at the Gamera DNA of Tokusatsu Exhibition
On the southernmost tip of Tokyo, a stone’s throw from Haneda airport and about an hour from Ikebukuro’s Otome Road is the quiet neighborhood of Kamata. It’s glitzy or glamorous nor is it a historical destination or the site of some religious ceremony, one of its bigger claims to fame is a scene in 2016's Shin Godzilla when Godzilla, in his nascent larval-like form, makes landfall. Yet for a brief period, it was laid siege by some of the greatest monsters in cinema history.
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Remembering Richard Corben
On December 2, 2020, Richard Corben passed away at the age of 80, leaving a visceral legacy across comics and illustrations spanning fantasy, science fiction, and horror. My own first time witnessing (just “seeing” art feels too passive) Corben’s art was in Banner, written by Brian Azzarello for Marvel in 2001. I was taken by the sheer ferocity of Corben’s Hulk contrasted by the dread and gripping anxiety of his Bruce Banner. I didn’t have the mental vocabulary for it, but I realized later on how it deftly combined grace and grotesquery, craft and carnage.
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Maids: Katie Skelly's American Grand Guignol
Since 2012 Katie Skelly has been drawing a world of pastel colored carnage. Not interested in anything that would typically be considered grounded, Skelly’s worlds are sensational, sensual, and sanguine. Nurse Nurse, released in 2012, played with elements of science fiction evocative of Jean-Claude Forest as a space faring nurse encountered strange new worlds and dismembered ex-boyfriends. Operation Margarine from 2014 exists in a Russ Meyer-esque world of stylized biker gang violence as two women go on the run in the desert. My Pretty Vampire from 2018 is a parade of wonton bloodlust and secret societies evoking the sleaze cinema of Jess Franco. Skelly’s erotic anthology The Agency, also published in 2018, is sort of a sampler platter of all of the above but with the ribald sexual excess of Guido Crepax or Milo Manara. In her latest comic, Maids, Skelly enters into a world of class struggle, teenage rebellion, and murder.
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"Ju-On: Origins": A Cycle of Terror
This Halloween season it’s pretty easy to feel dread and fear around us. Maybe you have some fears that go further back than 2020 or 2016. Perhaps you have a building on your street that’s vacant of people, but is full of uneasy dread. Or did your parents tell you about a time when they nearly had a brush with death in their own neighborhood? Do you have lingering unanswerable memories of past trauma? Ju-On: Origins, currently streaming on Netflix, suggests that ghosts are the residue of a perpetual cycle of cruelty and tragedy.
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DNA of Tokusatsu Ultraman Genealogy Safely Lands at Tokyo Dome City
Article and photos by David Namba
The DNA of Tokusatsu Ultraman Genealogy exhibition on Ultraman, the reigning king of Japan heroes and the history of Tsuburaya Productions safely lands with COVID-19 prevention measures at Gallery AaMo in Tokyo Dome City. From the first program in 1966 to today, no Tsuburaya hero or program is left out at this game multimedia exhibition that additionally highlights Reiwa era hitters like Ultraman Z, now running Saturday mornings on TV Tokyo and the Ultraman Tsuburaya YouTube channel.