I found a new way how to depict mind breaking lovecraftian entities on screen!

Discussion in 'Science Fiction & Fantasy' started by Unimatrix Q, Mar 26, 2024.

  1. theenglish

    theenglish Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Exactly. The visible spectrum is there. Most species perceive the spectrum differently than humans, and it is possible to see beyond the visible spectrum. But our limitations on what colors we see is not something that can change, so saying there are other colors in the universe that humans could see is not really credible. Lovecraftian creatures may have the ability to affect the mind into thinking we are seeing some other forms of colors in an effort to perceive their bodies which exist partially outside of our ability to perceive them would be a more credible description, perhaps. Maybe they allow our minds to perceive beyond the three dimensions we are limited to?
     
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  2. Asbo Zaprudder

    Asbo Zaprudder Admiral Admiral

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    Due to someone spiking my drink once with some psychoactive substance*, I temporarily lost the ability to perceive depth. It was quite an unsettling experience with the world seeming to tilt vertiginously whenever I changed my viewpoint.

    *They thought I needed to loosen up, apparently. It was tantamount to assault. I've never been keen on throwing wide the doors of perception.
     
  3. theenglish

    theenglish Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Sorry about your experience, but I think you have a good analogy. Drugs warp how we perceive reality--so much so that normal objects in front of us can appear to warp or change color (or in your case lose depth). It is easy to see why some people feel these altered perceptions of the world are like pulling a veil off reality to allow us to perceive something more real underneath.
     
  4. Rowdy Roddy McDowall

    Rowdy Roddy McDowall Commodore Rear Admiral

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    Ahah!!!!!!

    This just may explain why I keep seeing Jack Benny re-runs in sepia for six seconds whenever I re-open my eyes each morning. And none of that's made up. I previously thought it could be Carpenter-Piper syndrome, which has been kicking around for 36 years....
     
    Last edited: Mar 29, 2024
  5. Asbo Zaprudder

    Asbo Zaprudder Admiral Admiral

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    Sorry to hear that - I wasn't commenting on any individual.
     
  6. Rowdy Roddy McDowall

    Rowdy Roddy McDowall Commodore Rear Admiral

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    I'm not sorry. If your theory holds, I might be a special mutant indeed.:cool:
     
  7. Unimatrix Q

    Unimatrix Q Commodore Commodore

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  8. Asbo Zaprudder

    Asbo Zaprudder Admiral Admiral

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    I think you may have misinterpreted what I wrote. No one can know what another person or animal sees. The sensation you describe as sepia might not what another person experiences as sepia.
     
  9. publiusr

    publiusr Admiral Admiral

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    Last edited: Apr 22, 2024 at 1:58 AM
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  10. Unimatrix Q

    Unimatrix Q Commodore Commodore

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    Thank you, Scott R. Jones story "Assemblage Point" about Daoloth was also a big inspiration for me, beside of course Ramsey's original story "The Render of the Veils".

    By the way, you can hear this story on SoundCloud:

    https://m.soundcloud.com/ross-e-lockhart/assemblage-point-by-scott-r-jones-from-cthulhu-fhtagn
     
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  11. JD

    JD Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Is Cthulhu supposed to drive people crazy like the other Lovecraft creatures? Pretty much all of the stuff I've seen with him in it seems to portray him pretty as pretty much just a Kaiju.
    This is kinda off topic, but what's the general opinion of Underwater among Cthulhu mythos fans?
     
  12. Unimatrix Q

    Unimatrix Q Commodore Commodore

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    Yep, looking at Cthulhu is supposed to make you stark raving mad. It's a shame that a lot of the artworks simply depict him as this octopus kaiju. Although if you really search for it, you can also find some way more imaginative versions.

    Still need to watch "Underwater". So I can't say anything about it.

    But I can say that "The Empty Man" about
    Nyarlathotep
    is still beside "The Color Out Of Space" one of the very best Cthulhu Mythos movies.

    Not to talk about "In the Mouth Of Madness" which is Lovecraftian but not part of the Mythos.
     
    Last edited: Apr 2, 2024
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  13. Asbo Zaprudder

    Asbo Zaprudder Admiral Admiral

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    Perhaps the best Lovecraftian stories are not written by Lovecraft. For example, I find "A Colder War" by Charles Stross much more existentially disturbing.
     
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  14. publiusr

    publiusr Admiral Admiral

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    Love his Laundry series.

    “Equoid” ruined the image of unicorns.

    Had I the time and the money, I would love to pour over HPL’s papers (Joshi beat me to it) and see if the March 1925 Tri-State Tornado influenced The Dunwich Horror.

    When I hear sirens wail during outbreaks, I shudder to think about what is hidden above….and we are in the heart of storm season.

    Some have described Tri-State as a “mesocyclone on the ground”…and/or something like El Reno…when pseudopod like satellite tornadoes and suction vortices just appeared…that’s how Tim Samaras was lost.

    Look at Figure 8 here:
    https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/bams/103/12/BAMS-D-20-0251.1.xml

    —specifically at the 04:27 mark…where you see a frightening, lamprey like sub-vortlet draped over a building…as if it were *searching*

    Woe betide anyone who would have been standing there.

    But that isn’t the most chilling image in that paper— see the simulations in Figure 9-10 with the caption:

    “Volume rendered plots of 3D vorticity magnitude”

    Now you know what shoggoths really look like:

    https://bloody-disgusting.com/edito...-found-footage-disaster-movie-10-years-later/
     
    Last edited: Apr 21, 2024 at 9:29 AM
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  15. Set Harth

    Set Harth Vice Admiral Admiral

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    well at least dry them out afterward!
     
  16. Unimatrix Q

    Unimatrix Q Commodore Commodore

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    Now that I've watched Underwater, I'm not sure if it was really about Cthulhu or just about about some lovecraftian creatures that partly resembled Deep Ones and Star Spawns.

    Especially "Cthulhu" was more like a version of Dagon than the Big C.

    Despite the hints of a conspiracy of cultists being active behind the curtain, there is no real reveal that the movie was about Lovecraft's creations.

    There is not even a mention of Cthulhu, R'lyeh or other aspects of the Mythos. It all just comes from the producers and I don't know if such things are enough to make it canon.

    Otherwise it was an entertaining movie.
     
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  17. JD

    JD Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    OK, I had been curious about that aspect of it since I don't know much about the Mythos.
     
  18. Anwar

    Anwar Admiral Admiral

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    You could just do what that 80s movie "From Beyond" did, have being around the creatures simply cause a sensory overload in a person in ways that start out pleasurable but go berserk after and then have the person go mad not specifically because they looked at one of the monsters but because they realized their story would come off so crazy that no one would believe them.
     
  19. JD

    JD Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Maybe the best way to deal with these mind breaking creatures would be to just not show them, and only show how people react to seeing them.
     
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  20. publiusr

    publiusr Admiral Admiral

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    That might be good for Kolchak, but movie-goers want to see the incredible.

    ANNIHILATION was a better example of “The Colour out of Space” than Cage’s direct re-telling…at least to me.

    The creature In Underwater was crab like…so perhaps a lesser Great Old One.

    There is a short story called “The Same Deep Waters As You” that both deals with the aquatic noisemakers called “Bloop” and “Julia,” but it also has a very personal kind of horror at its very end that movie goers may appreciate.

    Cthulhu as envisaged isn’t just a kaiju, but something from Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers.

    HPL wanted his entities to be embodiments of cosmic principles…faces of nature.

    So, this is what Twister 2 should depict:
    https://www.amazon.com/Twenty-three-Popular-Digital-Paintings-Cthulhu/dp/B07BMQR6NQ

    You don’t see a whole figure, just a violent supercell with too many funnels—and then-

    There was a Chaosium publication that had townspeople staring up at the sky, helpless and unable to move…even before Azathoth arrived from the clouds.

    Perhaps Storm Chasers who have never seen anything like the image above try to rescue the citizens….careful to avert their gaze.

    This manifestation made possible by a recital of a play —from another product called “Tatterdemalion.”

    You have a big threat, and a smaller, more personal one…like Event Horizon and Dr. Weir.

    You only show the full enormity of the being at the last…an eyewitness to an event the day before describes the earlier “touchdown:”
    “ I’ve never seen a storm like that…” and so on.

    In the final act, the chasers turn on the automated weather radio voice…only to hear it chanting now.
     
    Last edited: Apr 21, 2024 at 10:05 AM