Thursday, October 11, 2012

Franken-fest (Part 1)


So, that's Dracula all done.

Now, on to his partner in crime.
The human hotrod, Adam 2.0, the eternal metaphor for science run amok....


Frankenstein (1818)


The book-

...thing is, Frankenstein is the doctor.
(And...not even a proper doctor, but a snotty rich kid that took some classes).

The monster never gets a name in the book.
And...I don't think of him as a monster, I think of him as a man.
Eh, whatever...

But, cultural inertia has made Frankenstein the monster.
So, here's my loophole.
The monster is Frankenstein's creation, so, that rightly makes him his son, so, that makes him a Frankenstein.

There you go.
If people can give their pets their surname, why not a synthetic guy?

I arm wrestled with it in the Dracula entries to always make it "Frankenstein's Monster", but I slipped in a couple spots, so, fuck it, I'll go back and forth with it.

Aaanyway, as with Dracula, here's the novel for your perusal, if you've neglected to read it all this time.


And, you'll probably notice, this one came out 79 years before Dracula.

Yeah, chronologically, I should have started with Frankenstein, but...the promise last year was Dracula first, and I wasn't sure I was gonna do other classic monsters then, so..y'know.
Meh, it'll all work out.

Anyway...Mary Shelly pretty much invented the modern horror novel with this one.
There was nothing quite like this before.
No small accomplishment.

And, this pretty much inspired Bram Stoker, he was a fan, and wanted to write something that was a major sensation the way Frankenstein was.
He wouldn't have used these words, but, he wanted to be the next Mary Shelly.
I believe he succeeded.
Dracula, and Frankenstein's Creation, have been traveling companions through the decades hence.

And, we're going to look at all of that.

The history-

Um, same comment as Dracula, got it in one volume along with Dracula.
Pretty sure Frankenstein comes first.

My mental movie for this?
Kenneth Branagh's minus the stupid liberties.

And, it was that before Branagh's came out.
I was close there.

Um, so, Dracula-thon gave me the template for this now, so, no need to ramble, let's just get going.

Up next, you guessed it, Universal again.


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