LIBER MONSTERICUM

Originally run on 26 October 2009 for the Union Weekly.

LIBER MONSTERICUM
A People’s History of Monster Slaying

I want all of you to grab the nearest history book. Do it. You got one? Good. Now throw it out the window. Just toss that fucker. Why am telling you do to this? Well, it’s because your standard “history” books completely ignore large swathes of our past—the rad parts, mostly. Namely, the hidden history of man’s struggles with the wicked abominations that God deigned to put on this earth. Now, without further ado, here are four of our history’s greatest monster slayers.


SIEGFRIED
Dragon Slayer, Treasure Hunter, Cautionary Tale
WEAPON OF CHOICE
Spears, knives, and stabbing weapons.
HUNTING GROUNDS
The fetid hollows and squabbling city-states that were medieval Germany.
MOST FAMOUS KILL
Fafnir the Dragon, Bavarian banker.
MORTAL WEAKNESS
Gold! And lots of it!
FALLOUT
Cursed to be sung about for hours at a time by husky Italian women and proto-Nazis.


SAINT PATRICK
Catholic Missionary, Crypto-Limey, Saint of Binge Drinking
WEAPON OF CHOICE
The word of God, harsh language.
HUNTING GROUNDS
Ireland or as it was known at the time “Snake-soaked Hell-Bog.”
MOST FAMOUS KILL
Cúchulainn, a midget he mistook for a leprechaun.
MORTAL WEAKNESS
His love of God, whiskey.
FALLOUT
Every year his deeds are celebrated by hooligans vomiting on Cinco de Mayo.


PETER WASHINGTON
Zombie Killer, SWAT Team Member, Not a Ghostbuster
WEAPON OF CHOICE
M16A1 assault rifle, friendship.
HUNTING GROUNDS
Shopping malls, anywhere people hang out.
MOST FAMOUS KILL
Roger, his best friend. Stone. Cold.
MORTAL WEAKNESS
Has a tendency to shoot his friends.
FALLOUT
Despite murdering every single one of his friends, he’s still ultimately doomed. DOOMED.


LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD
Little Girl, Wolf Murderer, Hiking Enthusiast
WEAPON OF CHOICE
Gumption, spunkiness, dry-cool wit.
HUNTING GROUNDS
Where old people sleep (but not libraries).
MOST FAMOUS KILL
Her grandma (that turned out to be a wolf).
MORTAL WEAKNESS
Completely incapable of distinguishing a wolf from a grandma.
FALLOUT
Nothing. Children are immune to the harshness of the real world.


534 While most of the Nordic countries were busy stealing the entirety of Europe from their lazy neighbors, Beowulf was getting real shit done. After arriving in Denmark he slays the beasty Grendel by ripping off the monster’s arm and beating him to death with it, leading to the single most metal thing to happen at that point in history. This also lead to any girl’s name starting with a “G” to look that much uglier.


1572 Japanese warlord and inventor of karaoke, Oda Nobunaga, destroys the last of the oni (or “ogre” for you baka-gaijin) through a combination of mirrors, windchimes, and crooked bridges. As it turns out oni are really, really bad at doing anything besides messing up how a room “flows.”


1882 German philosopher and syphilis enthusiast Friedrich Wilhelm “Willy” Nietzsche accidentally kills the Judeo-Christian diety YHWH (known as the “King of All Monsters”) with his declaration “God is dead.” His demise is highly exaggerated, the creator of the universe returned three days later with the proclamation, “Nope.” Having been proven a liar, Nietzsche is doomed to be quoted by obnoxious college students for all eternity.


1947 In an ironic twist fit for a pulp novel, former führer Adolf Hitler’s frozen head is eaten by a member of his secret Nazi zombie army somewhere. Good night, sweet prince.


SPECIAL INTERNET BONUS Here is a mummy.

A Very Special Halloween Comic

Originally run on 26 October 2009 for the Comics page of the Union Weekly.

Also Sprach Herzog

Originally run on 19 October 2009 for the Entertainment page.

Also Sprach Herzog: Fitzcarraldo, Being a Hornet, and Why School is a Waste of Time

The first Werner Herzog movie I ever saw was his documentary on the doomed naturalist Timothy Treadwell in the documentary Grizzly Man. I saw it on a lark with one of my friends and when I walked out, I walked out as a slightly different person. I didn’t know that documentaries could be this engaging, that there was people this crazy walking the earth, and that brooding German lecturing on the chaos inherent in nature made for good movies. Since then Herzog has become one of my favorite directors, so when I heard that there was a screening of his magnum opus Fitzcarraldo, followed up by a question and answer session with the director himself at the Aero Theater in Santa Monica, I jumped on the opportunity (after hunting up the nine dollars for admission). Watching what might be his best film, Fitzcarraldo, and listening to him speak, reaffirmed all of the reasons why I dig Herzog so goddamn much.

The production of Fitzcarraldo is probably every bit as legendary as the film itself (which is about an opera enthusiast, played by Klaus Kinski, who dreams up a scheme to move a steam ship up a mountain). It’s frought with disasters both man-made—such as the original lead actor leaving production half-way through the shoot—and those made by nature— such as a woodcutter who after being bitten in the foot by a snake, cut off his appendage with a chainsaw to keep the venom from spreading to the rest of his body. What results from all of this turmoil is a work of art that was entirely worth it. Even though parts of it are somewhat clunky (like the English dubbing) and the clearing of the woods and use of indigenous workers is morally questionable, it shines past all of this. Even the guy breathing through a tube two rows behind me couldn’t dim the experience. It also didn’t hurt that I was watching this movie for the first time on the big screen—the way the Lord Jesus Christ intended us to watch movies.

The real treat came after the movie concluded, when Herzog spoke about the film. He’s always a man worth listening to. Though he did repeat a few stories I’ve read enough times to feel like he’s told me himself (such as the story of an Indian chief asking him for permission to kill Klaus Kinski, Fitzcarraldo’s lead actor), he touched on a lot of subjects, such as how he believes that our society is “starving for discourse” or that, despite the trouble surrounding Fitzcarraldo, he said that “Any idiot could do it.” I think my favorite quote came when he talked about cinema vérité. He said that he didn’t want to be a fly on the wall,” observing a subject in its natural habitat, but rather, he wanted to be “the hornet that stings.”

Then Herzog capped off the evening by saying something that my parents have been saying for years, which is that my education is a waste of time. This comment came after the second fan of the night asked a question regarding parallels between his other South-American-adventure-film-on-a-river, Aguirre: The Wrath of God, and Fitzcarraldo. He blew off the question, probably half out of being tired of hearing the comparison for nearly thirty years, and mostly because he sees academia as an organization that “vivisects poetry” and that the people who pick apart films like this are “completely without human pathos.” Big talk for someone who stole a camera from the Munich Film School.

I have to disagree with Herzog’s blanket statement of film scholarship being bankrupt, but there’s a tinge of truth in his words. We don’t take in a work of art to tear it apart and poke at the insides, we do it to experience something outside of our normal lives. They show us something more delicate Herzog himself describes as the “ecstatic truth.” This is what film is supposed to do, and Herzog succeeds in this with Fitzcarraldo—even if movie dorks keep on asking him the same stupid film school questions over and over again.

So, while the questions weren’t quite up to snuff and my choice to go to college was assaulted by one of my heroes, I still had a full, worth-while evening because I didn’t feel like I wasted my time, because none of that junk can ever be as magnificent as seeing a ship sail up a mountain on the big screen. Werner Herzog is a guy that we could all probably learn something from. He’s a man driven to tell stories, no matter the hardship. Filmmaking is his vocation he lives up to every ounce of that potential.

Image stolen from Vice Magazine many moons ago.

Omelettes: It's What's For Brunch

Originally run on 19 October 2009 for the glorious Comics page!

Li'l EXPLOSION!!!

Originally run on 12 October 2009 for the Literature page.

Send this comic back to hell!

Originally run on 12 October 2009 for the Comics page of the Union Weekly!

Tasteful Comics About the Concept of Death

Originally run on 5 October 2009 for the Comics page.