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Doux News: October 20, 2013

This Week: Breaking Bad. Still. – 11.23. 13 – This Week in Casts – Bogarting the Gumshoes – Community – Did the Ancient Egyptians Like Foxes, Too? – This Week In Cats – Spooky Recommendations


Breaking Bad. Still.

The internet just can’t seem to quit Breaking Bad, although we’re definitely scrapping the bottom of the barrel (in-joke!) as we get further from the series finale. This week, a RateMyProfessor page for Walter White popped up (he has a hotness pepper), and an Albuquerque steakhouse hosted a memorial for the teacher.

It's not all about Walter White, though. Aaron Paul has become an unlikely MC: he and his friend recorded a dance song with a loop of Paul saying “Dance, bitch!” over and over again. You can read more about the song, and listen to it, here.


11.23.13

The BBC has released a new trailer for the upcoming Doctor Who 50th Anniversary special, "The Day of the Doctor," which will air 50 years and one day after the assassination of JFK.




This Week in Casts

• Laura Fraser (Lydia on Breaking Bad) has been cast in ABC’s thirteen-episode series The Black Box.

• Marilyn Manson will voice the character of The Shadow on Once Upon a Time.

• Victor Garber (Alias) will have a one-episode guest-starring role on The Good Wife.

• Seth Gabel (Fringe) will star in WGN’s first scripted series, Salem, about the seventeenth-century witch trials. He will play Cotton Mather.


Bogarting the Gumshoes

Castle creator Andrew Marlowe is developing a project based on Raymond Chandler’s iconic shamus Philip Marlowe (no relation). The new ABC series will relocate Philip Marlowe to modern-day LA, described as a place “where true love can be more difficult to find than justice.” Since that sounds like a perverse rom-com ret-con of the wise-cracking love-em-and-leave-em original, I’m more than dubious about this series’ fidelity to the material. However, Andrew Marlowe has more than proved his familiarity with, and love for, the gumshoe tradition in Castle, so perhaps—as Philip Marlowe was fond of saying—it’s okay with me.


Community

NBC announced the start date for Community’s upcoming fifth season: January 2nd, which is strangely early but—hey!—more Community under Dan Harmon’s leadership can’t be a bad thing.

Also this week, Donald Glover revealed his reasons for leaving the beloved sitcom in a series of Instagram messages. They’re rambly and personal, but the overall take-away is that Glover’s in a transition period in his life, took a leap to make a change, and is both nervous and excited about the future.


Did the Ancient Egyptians like Foxes, Too?

Fox has greenlit a 13-episode series order for Hieroglyph, an “action adventure drama” set in ancient Egypt. According to TVLine, the series “fantasy and reality when a notorious thief is plucked from prison to serve the Pharoah. In his new role, he must navigating palace intrigue, seductive concubines, criminal underbellies and divine sorcerers.”

It sounds like Game of Thrones with scarabs.


This Week in Cats

Doux Reviews writer Gus discovered this adorable IKEA ad. It features cats, but you have to assemble them at home:




Spooky Recommendations

Blastr has compiled a list of spooky short stories available online to whet your appetite for Halloween. The full list (available here) includes a Stephen King short from the New Yorker, a classic Lovecraft tale, and Shirley Jackson’s dark pleasure, “The Lottery.”

I don't read much horror, apart from Stephen King. And, since I don't picture stories in my head as I read them, I am rarely scared by the horror I do read. But the list got me thinking about when I have been scared by a story or novel. House of Leaves was mind-bending, but didn't make me afraid to look in the closet. Ray Bradbury's "The Whole Town's Sleeping" has a frisson-inducing last line that makes slogging through the rest of it worth it, but barely. Rebecca, The Haunting of Hill House, and The Turn of the Screw come to mind.

What is the scariest story you've ever read?



12 comments:

  1. The Lottery is, in my humble opinion, the one short story that everyone should read. It is perfectly crafted, with characters that jump off the page and the most subtle foreshadowing I have ever read.

    I find situational horror much more terrifying than blood and gore. Jackson's story can still keep me up at night.

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  2. Totally agree with Chris: everyone must read "The Lottery." For scary stories, I'm not sure you can beat Poe. "The Tell-Tale Heart" still creeps me out and "The Black Cat" is one of the more disturbing pieces of literature I've ever read.

    Poor Donald Glover. I hope he feels better. I'm 100% not mad at him for leaving Community anymore. He's talented and I hope he gets the break he needs.

    I totally thought of you when I saw the Philip Marlowe thing, Josie! Like you, I'm not getting my hopes too high, but it could turn out to be amazing. Let the dreamcasting begin!

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  3. "The tell-tale heart" is truly scary. Any story from Ray Bradbury's "October country"..truly chilling stuff.
    Plenty of things by Clive Barker..
    Anna

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  4. "The Lottery" is a great story, but it didn't scare me as much as "Rosemary's Baby" or "Salem's Lot" when I first read them.

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  5. The scariest story that I can recall is Stephen King's book The Shining. The first time I read it was like being strapped into a literary roller coaster, unable to get off until I reached the end.

    I discovered Shirley Jackson when I was a teen and went through all of her books and stories -- way too few, since she died young. I can remember The Haunting completely creeping me out. ("Whose hand was I holding?") "The Lottery" deserves its rep as one of the great short stories, but I bet most people don't know that Jackson also wrote amusing stories. One of my favorite short stories ever is "The Night We All Had Grippe", a clever, amusing tale of what happened on a restless night when everyone in her family was sick with a cold. (Or is "grippe" the flu?) It doesn't sound like it would be funny, but it is.

    I remember several of Edgar Allan Poe's stories getting to me the first time I read them.

    Ooh! Ray Bradbury's short story, "Mars is Heaven." Very scary.

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  6. Wow! I was just thinking about The Lottery this morning. It's a story that really stays with you. So it pops into your head at the strangest times.

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  7. I'm glad someone else doesn't find books scary, Josie. I've read most of King's stuff and none of it has scared me. I just like his characterisation. Maybe I don't visualise things either. You've got me wondering now. Likewise, I rarely have a concrete picture of what a character looks like. I think I rely more on personalities and motivations than looks.

    I'm also overjoyed to see some fellow Ray Bradbury and Shirley Jackson fans commenting. I reread 'We Have Always Lived in the Castle' recently, and it still holds up. Ditto 'The Martian Chronicles'.

    On the subject of Halloween reads, Neil Gaiman's 'The Ocean at the End of the Lane' is a suitably weird read. Or maybe some John Wyndham? 'Chocky' or 'The Day of the Triffids' perhaps?

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  8. Paul, according to a comment you left on the review of the pilot episode of Under the Dome, you don't visualize things. :-)

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  9. My scariest story would be Lovecraft's "At the Mountains of Madness". I tend to find the cold creepy too, but it's the feeling when I read, it's absolutely scary and it seems nothing can be done. This sort of cosmic horror works well on me!

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  10. I obviously don't remember saying things either. Thanks for the reminder. Now, any idea where I left my wallet?

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  11. I would vote with Billy re: "The Shining". I stayed up until 5 in the morning reading it and then couldn't sleep. "It" also by Stephen King put me off clowns forever. Bradbury and Wyndham were two of my favourit writers as a teen. I should reread their work. "Lottery" was assigned to us in grade 9 and I've never forgotten the story (and that's a while ago). I've actually never read any Lovecraft but have always meant to. Maybe I will on Hallowe'en.

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  12. I love Charles Dickens' The Signalman. I love ghost stories in general, scary and not-so-scary.

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