Cross to Bear
A few issues back, I spoke about the Netflix animated series Bojack Horseman and how that show demonstrated the difficulty of overcoming pain, trauma, and regret in order to become a better person. There’s a line in at the end of the second season that acts, in my mind, as a metaphor for the whole show:
“It gets easier. Every day it gets easier, but you gotta do it every day. That’s the hard part, but it does get easier.”
But what if you didn’t have to do it every day? What if one could erase that pain in an instant? What if those wounds, emotional or physical, could disappear? You wouldn’t have to put in the work to grow stronger or adapt, but you would be spared any more damage and guilt. Of course, nothing comes that easy without a cost. Netflix’s latest horror series Midnight Mass touches on this, among many other topics including one conclusively absent from Bojack: faith.
Mike Flanagan, who also created the two mini-series The Haunting of Hill House (2018) and The Haunting of Bly Manor (2020) for Netflix, has seemingly perfected his blend of ensemble soap opera drama and old school horror. If you're familiar with Flanagan’s other work, you’ll find that Midnight Mass is no different in terms of scares/drama ratio in that melodrama occupies most of the runtime until a terrifying third act. This time, the heavy-handed metaphor in the shape of a phantasmagorical horror takes place not in a haunted mansion, but in a small religious fishing community on an island.
Crockett Island is introduced via the arrival of two characters, Riley Flynn (Zach Gilford), a recovering alcoholic who’s returning to the island after serving time in prison for killing someone in a drunk driving accident, and Father Paul (Hamish Linklater), a charismatic and mysterious priest filling in for the island’s elderly Monsignor. The two create an uneasy bond and regularly verbally spar at AA meetings, debating the usefulness of faith and the point of suffering becoming the two core viewpoints of the show.
Riley argues personal responsibility and how one grapples with their actions to be the most important when dealing with guilt while Paul suggests that it is up to The Lord to make good of your choices. Riley’s philosophy, framed mostly on the Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and Rational Recovery (RR) processes, frames dealing with guilt less spiritually and more independently. A fellow alcoholic asks him if things ever change, if things get better, and Riley says something to the effect of “maybe not, but maybe you will”. Riley consistently tries to move past his guilt and take things one day at a time by doing right in the ways he can. Father Paul, who has his own reasons to feel guilty, finds that by putting faith in a higher power, he can find that some goodness comes out the horror frequently wrecked upon the world, not in a “God works in mysterious ways” kind of way, but more of a “suffering can be good” kind of way. Paul states in one sermon that the horrible things that will come to pass and the resulting suffering, be it one’s own or other’s, transforms you and eventually leads to your salvation. There is some overlap, but the two bristle at the differences frequently and the dissonance only grows as the show progresses.
Midnight Mass does not make it a point to disapprove of organized religion and takes the stance similar to mine that faith can do a lot of good for people; that faith can pull someone from the brink or guide someone to be a better person, but some people will use it to justify horrible things done for selfish desires. Those selfish desires are physically manifested in the shape of an malevolent force that also arrives on the island the same time as Riley and Paul and this evil drives both of their viewpoints to extremes and one into a sick perverse version of it.
I don’t want to give it away (although I was able to guess exactly what it was halfway into the second episode), but it is a really clever spin of a classic horror concept (which is something Flanagan has done many times before). The primary horror of the show is the unnatural changes that take place on Crockett that become more and more twisted, but also how these horrific outcomes are justified. The synthesis of [horror concept that I refuse to spoil even though it is obvious from the onset] and the community on Crockett Island seems ripe for lurid horror schlock, but Flanagan instead makes Midnight Mass a personal story and as he put it in his great guest essay for Bloody Disgusting, “a modern parable about belief, addiction, recovery, redemption, fanaticism, and forgiveness.” It’s a passion project he’s been working on for quite sometime and, although most of the characters speak in monologue rather than dialogue, it’s clear that this is a fully fleshed out and researched story that’s coming from the heart. A complicated, questioning, and sincere heart.
Midnight Mass is available for streaming exclusively on Netflix.
This month of October, I thought it would be fun for me to share some autumnal media recommendations to celebrate the Halloween season. For this first part, I want to recommend works that are not really scary, but have the aesthetics of something scary. Think like how Scooby-Doo! and The Munsters aren’t scary, but deal in the imagery and iconography of horror and the Halloween season.
Over the Garden Wall (2014)
Watching all of Patrick McHale’s ten episode animated Halloween odyssey has become a yearly tradition of mine because of how captures the tone of the season so well. The show follows brothers Wirt and Greg as they venture deeper and deeper into “The Unknown”, a strange forest full of magic, after they lose their way on Halloween night. Each ten minute episode has the two brothers encounter a different obstacle, whether it be a village of pumpkin headed townsfolk in the middle of a mysterious festival, an oppressive witch abusing her kin, or a musical classroom of cute animals, before they go along their way trying to go home. Imagery is lifted from 19th and 20th century fairytale illustrations, but the themes of going through a transitionary period of your life, venturing into the unknown (adulthood), are timeless.
Over the Garden Wall is available for streaming on HBO Max.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992)
No, I’m not talking about the hit television show starring Sarah Michelle Geller. I’m talking about the feature film that was released five years before the television series starring Kristy Swanson. The screenwriter of the Buffy film and the creator of the Buffy television series, Joss Whedon, was displeased with how the material was made into, essentially, Clueless with vampires, but, honestly, that’s what I love about this film. Buffy is a cheerleader who finds out that she’s the chosen one and she must undergo training by Donald Sutherland to slay vampires. This Buffy is totally a valley girl so she’d much rather go to cheerleading practice or get to know the handsome bad boy Pike (an endlessly charming Luke Perry), but when dreaded vampire lord Lothos (Rutger Hauer) and his minions (including Paul “Peewee Herman” Reubens who has one of the greatest death scenes in film ever1) start threatening her friends and family, Buffy realizes she has to reconsider her priorities. The film has a light tone, even during some dire vampire encounters, colorful color palette, and fun late 80s/early 90s outfits making Buffy inconsequential fun junk food cinema.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer is available for digital rental on most streaming services.
Night in the Woods (2017)
Full disclosure, I never finished my playthrough of the 2017 crowdfunded video game Night in The Woods, but every fall I come back to thinking about starting it back up again. The art style and color palette make it a gorgeous accompaniment to the season.
You play as Mae, a young adult returning to her sleepy small home town in autumn after dropping out of college. She visits friends, runs errands, and tries to solve the mysteries confronting the town. You run and jump around, but the game is mostly narrative focused rather than a platformer. Mae is suffering from an early-onset quarter life crisis as well as mental illness, so the game has a sort of wistfulness about it in terms of facing who you’ve become and who you are to other people.
Night in the Woods is available on PC, Mac, PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch.
Stray Observations
How could I expect anything other than something sad from a memoir titled Crying in H Mart, especially since it is a sort of continuation of The New Yorker non-fiction piece of the same name that made me cry. Michelle Zauner (AKA the dream pop musician Japanese Breakfast) chronicles her complicated relationship with her family and identity, largely focusing around the time of her mother’s battle with cancer. Between genuinely weepy moments where Michelle realizes how important of a connection her mother represents to her heritage and the deteriorating state of her mother, she describes the Korean dishes her mother prepared for her that Michelle would eventually try to prepare for her ailing mother and later prepare for herself. These delicacies are described in salivating detail that made me (a foolish fool who didn’t eat anything before getting on a four hour flight to Arizona and decided to read Crying in H Mart in the interim) crave a taste. Michelle is able to reach through time with these dishes and with her music to continue her relationship with her mother. Extremely touching stuff.
You may have wondered “Why was Nick on a 4 hour flight to Arizona?”, well I was flying out to meet up with my best friend to see AJJ perform on their Knife Man 10 year anniversary tour. I did write about my connection to AJJ’s music in a previous issue of my newsletter, but seeing them live again made me realize many things. Firstly, I am not the same guy I was ten years ago. The mosh pit, while a fun and exciting way to express the hyped up emotions the songs encourage, tuckered me out almost immediately since most of the crowd were goth and punk teens full of the energy of youth. It made me feel old when AJJ played newer songs that I didn’t know, but the crowd seemed to know by heart. Despite this, singing along to “Distance” and “Big Bird” with my best friend and a legion of equally dedicated fans really made it worthwhile.
YouTuber Patrick Willems released a video about movie title sequences and, if you read my piece about The O.C. in the first issue of I Liked It!, you could easily guess how I feel about them. Willems argues something important in his video, that the loss and reduction of the opening credits robs audiences of showmanship, aesthetic pleasures, and tone setting. In an age where modern audiences care more about plot, plot holes, and plot logic than simply looking at pretty images, it’s nice to have someone like Willems arguing in favor of more art.
I’ve alluded to my dislike of our increasingly digital world in the past, but this New York Times opinion piece about Amazon’s presence in digital streaming expresses distressing concerns over its control over the film industry. Since most film now is viewed over digital stream, it’s important for emerging and independent voices to find an online platform, but Amazon appears to be shutting people out because “Amazon also deleted thousands of independent films from the platform with no explanation or avenue of appeal. And then in February, it stopped accepting most independent submissions altogether.” Amazon is, apparently, being more selective because, as Jeff Bezos has put it “when we win a Golden Globe, it helps us sell more shoes.” Again proving how putting faith in these enormous streaming companies to fairly distribute film and television, new and classic, is hopelessly optimistic.
Caught a screening of this year’s Palme d’Or winner Titane from French director Julia Ducournau and this is all I will say:
It’s really really weird! Honestly, a fucked up movie that not everyone will like, but everyone should see.
Outside from sporadic visits to rock walls in my college days, I haven’t done any rock climbing since I was getting my climbing merit badge in Boy Scouts, but this past week I attempted to pick it up again. With the support of a source close to I Liked It!, I managed to scamper up several rock walls and only embarrassed myself falling a few times. It’s a satisfying experience reaching the top, but I can’t say that happened all too often. “You’re going to suck at first” is a common refrain I’ve been hearing, but fortunately I have gotten my first visit out of the way.
Thanks for reading! I’m working hard to make this month extra special considering the upcoming holiday. Thanks for subscribing and sharing!
I reiterate, this death scene may be one of my favorites ever. Frequently imitated by myself and a number of my friends and evidence of just how silly this Buffy is.