Blog Set #11

                                       Berenice

Egaeus grow up in a gloomy mansion and was always in the library which is also where he was born and his mother died. His cousin Berenice grew up with him and also lived at the mansion. Berenice was a cheerful and lively girl until a disease affected her. Berenice turned into a sad and gloomy looking girl inside and out. Egaeus ends up marrying her which is weird because they’re cousins. Egaeus develops his own disease himself called monomania which is an obsession over one thing. His cousin or should I say wife, had false impressions of death that came with her disease but she always woke up from them. Egaeus monomania didn’t seem bad until he saw Berenice smile and got obsessed with her teeth. The next night Egaeus was told that Berenice was dead. Coincidence? I think not. When he went to the funeral he said that her teeth were shown. He says he doesn’t remember anything that happened after the funeral but he knew something had happened. Then one of his servants made him put the puzzle pieces together by saying that someone violated Berenice’s grave. He noticed his dirty close, dental surgery instruments, nail marks on his hands, and 32 actually teeth that feel out of the box. So was Berenice ever truly dead? I don’t think she was because where would he had gotten the nail marks on his hands. He literally blacked out and did something horrible without even noticing. Just like every other women in Poe’s poems Berenice was beautiful and ends up dying.

The Furnished Room

A young unnamed man searches for the love of his life in a large city. He commits suicide after not being able to find her. He dies without ever knowing that his loved one had also committed suicide in the same room only a week earlier. The young man asks the housekeeper about his loved one, but gets a horrible reply. He kills himself with the gas from the lamp. The story ends with the two housekeepers talking about the girl, who the unnamed man was searching for, who died in the room. Why didn’t the housekeepers tell him what happened? Did they not know it was the same girl?

The Boarded Window

This story took place in 1830 where a man named Murlock lived. His house had a boarded window and one single door which led many to question why he had it. Maybe he had some type of secret, who knows. I believe he had it up because he was trying to keep something away. He was left alone after his wife passed away. Murlock was found dead in his cabin due to natural cause but we all know that wasn’t the case. Legend has it that Murlock found his wife with a fever and tried to do as much as he could. Murlock prepared his wife for her funeral and he didn’t shed one tear. In his sleep he hears a cry which he says it was a cry from a “beast”. He hears footsteps in his cabin and senses that someone was there. The table suddenly hits him and he grabs his gone. He finds out that it was a panther dragging his dead wife away. He sees that the animal’s ear was ripped off, could that possibly been that wife? Was she ever dead or did she come back to life? 

Update:The activity in class really did break down all the elements of each of these stories. The supernatural elements were probably the best of them all because most of them have you thinking if it really happened or not. In Berenice there really isn’t any supernatural things but the language makes it seem like it. In the Furnish Room he smells her perfume and feels her presence. Now in the boarded window, was the wife alive the whole time? Did she come back to life? No one really knows, but isn’t that the best thing about science fiction? To think about many scenarios that might of happened. It’s like making up your own story but in your point of view. There can be many ways to look at a story; it all ends up in your hands on what you believe. To me that is the best part of this genre. Science Fiction is all about perspective. In every single one of these horror stories there is always a lost love. In Berenice, he lost his mother and his fist love. The madness he had was kind of creepy, the way he unconsciously took her teeth. When he would just talk about random stuff like fairyland.

Viewing Blog Set 3

Supernatural is probably one of my favorite shows of all time just after watching season one. Actually just watching the first episode I already knew it was going to be an amazing series. Now there are two brothers, Sam and Dean Winchesters. Dean is the oldest and he follows his father’s footsteps. Dean is your regular tough guy who drives an impala with a leather jacket on. Sam on the other hand did not want to follow his father’s footsteps. He actually wanted to go to college and study. He didn’t want the life his father wanted him too. He went to Stanford University where he had a full scholarship and lived with his girlfriend. For two years he hasn’t seen his brother or father. Now this is where the good stuff actually comes in, when Sam was a baby and Dean was a toddler, they went through a horrible tragedy. Some type of supernatural creature murdered their mother. She was murdered in Sam’s room. The demon forced her on the roof and killed her. John (Dean and Sam’s father) went to Sam’s room and saw blood on Sam. When he looked up, he saw his wife dead and dripping blood. That’s not all, the mother ends up catching on fire and burning the whole house down. Ever since then, John has had an obsession to kill what murdered his wife. He became a hunter and traveled to many places with Sam and Dean. Now do you see why Sam didn’t want to live this life? But anyways, two years later Dean shows up at Sam’s house and tells them that their father was missing. He asked for help and Sam said yes. They didn’t have any luck finding their father so Dean asked for another favor, to come with him for a longer period of time to find their dad. Sam rages and says no to Dean, when Sam gets back home his girlfriend is killed by the same Demon and the same exact why his mother died. Sam ends up going with Dean and they find their father. Now they have more knowledge of the demon and found a weapon called the colt to kill it. John and Dean end up getting hurt by the demon and same shoots it in the leg. Sam is driving to the hospital when a demon possesses a trunk and crashes into Dean’s impala. Leaving Sam, Dean, and John injured and in the middle of the street. I wonder how the Winchesters will get out of this one.

Shockingly I have never actually watched ET; I just know what it was about. After seeing this film I realized I really did miss out on a classic. Elliot finds ET in his backyard and unlike any other person who would freak out, he actually takes him in. He hides him from his parents and took care of him. I think it was very kind of him for taking in an alien and being very kind. If it weren’t for him, ET would have been found and probably experimented on. Elliot’s siblings meet ET a couple days later. Everyone starts to create a bond with ET and end up loving him. This shows me that it doesn’t matter where the living being is from or how it looks, you could still create a relationship with them. ET ends up learning to speak English. Elliot takes ET to make a call to his family and it was a success. Of course the government ends up coming and trying to get ET but its too late he was already going home. ET finally goes home and Elliot will forever remember him.

During the World War II bombings of London, four siblings are sent to a house where their parents would think they will be safe. The siblings were wondering around the house almost everyday. One day Lucy finds a wardrobe that transports her to a magical world called Narnia. When she gets there she meets someone named Tumnus who told her about the evil White Witch that is making the land winter forever. She tells her silbings but they do not believe her. Then again who would believe a crazy story like that especially from the youngest. She ends up proving them wrong. She returns to Narnia with her brothers, Peter, Edmund and her sister, Susan. They join the magical lion, Aslan, in the fight against the evil White Witch.

Viewing Blog Set # 2

Ever After was just like Cinderella but it was a bit different. I really like how in the beginning it starts off by telling us the actual true fairy tale. She did not want the tale written from rumors so she told it herself. Instead of her name being Cinderella, it was Danielle. Just like ever other Cinderella story, her mother dies and her father brings another woman who has two other daughters. Her father ends up dying also and she was left with her evil stepmother. In this movie the stepmother didn’t really seem as evil as the original does. I mean she was evil but when she talked to Danielle she made it seemed like she was nice when she wasn’t. Danielle was part of their servants. Also, Instead of both the stepsisters being evil, one of them was actually nice. Now Danielle didn’t need anyone to save her, not even a man. She saved herself every time she was in trouble. Fairy tales tend to make it seem like females don’t know how to save themselves and that they also need a man to be saved. She even ends up saving him from a group of gypsy.  She also pretends to not be a servant but he ends up finding out the truth from someone else but that doesn’t stop him from going back to her. They live happily ever after just like any other fairy tale we all know.

The season begins with two siblings who have lost both of their parents in a car crash and they are left with their aunt Jenna. This series is all about vampires, werewolves, and doppelgangers. Elena ends up dating a vampire named Stefan Salvatore. Her best friend Bonnie ends up finding out that she comes from a line of witches. Elena is a doppelganger from another named Katherine Pierce. Stefan and Elena have come from a line of doppelgangers and they always manage to find each other every time.  They literally have people who look exactly like one another from 10,000 years ago and end up being together. It seems to me that they have always been meant to be. There is a plot twist; Stefan has a brother named Damon who has always came between Elena and Stefan in the past. Basically history is repeating itself over and over again. Like every other vampire story, there is a group of people in town plotting against them called The Council. They have a certain device that kind of controls vampires but then they find out that it controls all supernatural creatures. Elena finds out that her parents were actually her aunt and uncle. Her other best friend Caroline ends up getting into a car accident. Katherine ends up killing Elena’s real dad and her brother takes many pills to overdose. I wonder what will happen next, to me it sounds like everyone Elena loves is dying and leaving her alone.

The film starts by talking about the history of the twenty rings. That existed to three for elves, seven for dwarves, nine for men, and one made by the Dark Lord Sauron, in Mordor, which would rule all the others. Sauron wanted to use the ring in a evil way so the elves ended up fighting against the Dark lord.. They won the battle and the ring fell to Isildur, but just as he was about to destroy the ring in, he changed his mind and held on to it for himself. Later on he was killed, and the ring fell to the bottom of the sea. The creature Gollum discovered it and brought it to his cave. Then he lost it to the hobbit Bilbo Baggins. Now it fast forwards to the hobbit’s home where it is Bilbo’s 111^th birthday. Bilbo does a speech and ends up putting on the ring that makes him disappear and fakes his death. He leaves the ring to his nephew Frodo. Gandalf ends up telling Frodo all about this ring and how it belongs to Sauron. Everyone ends up fighting for this ring to have the power of it. Sauron is also looking to get his ring back. This was such a perfect example of a fairy tale. 

Blog Set 10

The Fall of  the House of Usher

Poe like always started the story in a spooky setting by saying  "During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year.” This really does remind me of our typical haunted house that had windows that looked like eyes and a spooky vibe. The character is riding his horse on his way to a friend’s house that sent him a letter about him being sick.  He hasn’t seen his childhood friend in the longest, and when he does, he barley recognizes him. He plans at saying at Usher’s house more weeks. Usher starts to talk about his illness and says it’s a family illness. It heightens all of his senses so that light hurts his eyes, he can only eat bland foods and only wear certain clothes, and most sounds make him miserable. It makes it seem like he is a vampire of some sort. He also tells him that he hasn’t left his house for many years and blames it on the house. Usher also has a twin sister who is the only living relative he has left but she is very sick also.  The whole time the narrator is there, he try’s to get his friend out of his depression. In the process, his sister ends up “dying” and Usher wanted to put her under the mansion because he didn’t want her to be experimented on. After that the Usher started acting weird and the narrator noticed. The narrator reads a story and the sound that happens in the story happens in real life. Madeline appears all bloody and bruised up and she basically tackles her brother down. The narrator runs out of the mansion from fear and watches the house fall apart in half.

 Afterwards

Mary is in her library thinking about the events that led up to her husband’s disappearance.  She didn’t know much about her husband’s work, all she knows is that he worked in a mine. There was a young man who appeared at the house twice that Mary did not know. His name was Robert Elwell and he was Ned’s business partner. Mary finds a letter from Elwell treating Ned about money that he lost. Parvis comes to Mary’s house and shows her a picture of Elwell and tells her about his death. Mary put the puzzle pieces together and realizes that Elwell came to the house as a ghost. She replays the moment where her cousin tells her that there’s ghost but she would not know about them till long afterwards. It is American gothic because he didn't have all the spooky elements like every other scary stores. It only had a house that was claimed to have ghosts. It also had a ghost who kept coming till it got what it wanted. The sense of guilt was in it because Ned knew exactly who that young man was and felt some type of way towards him.
Update: The language of the house of usher being a haunted house was dull, dark, and a soundless day. There were bleak walls and vacant eye-like windows. White trunks of decayed trees and a depression of soul. The haunted palace described how the house used to be before evil corrupted the house. It was said that the house was a beautiful place but it became filled with evil beings which destroyed the house. I think since the house always had one owner it turned evil. The twins kind of broke the tradition because there was two of them. That also lead me to the conclusion that that’s why the house had a crack in the middle. Since there’s two people the house was split into a half. I also thought it was weird how Usher buried her sister as if he knew that she was going to come back to life. Also when he heard all the noises he says “she’s alive” before he even saw her. How did he predict that it was her making all the noise coming out from the coffin? The narrator literally left without helping his “friend” and watched the house split into two with both of them inside.

Blog Set 9

The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe is all about a man who is going through depression on a dark December night. Poe jumps right to the point in the beginning, he is giving us that dark type of atmosphere. It reminds me of those nights where you're tired and maybe a little depressed, but you can't go to sleep at all? You start over thinking everything in your life and you just end up feeling worse? Or even if you’re reading a scary book or just finished watching a horror movie and the world just seems to get dark? That's exactly where Poe wants to put us and how he wants us to feel. He is basically half awake and starts to hear a noise which he refers to it as a “visitor”. He even starts to see things when his fire is going out and the “Dying embers” are making shadows that looks like ghosts on the floor. He is depressed because his loved one Lenore has passed away. He shouldn’t be home up late and reading books because then he will be setting himself up for depression. If his loved one passed, he should be trying to get his mind off of things even though it’s really hard too. Poe goes to the door for the “visitor” and there’s nothing there. This reminds me of a scary movie scene where the character hears something at the door and when she opens it, nothing is there. He starts to go insane when he starts asking the bird more and more questions but all the bird says is “Nevermore”. The bird is sitting on a bust of Pallas which is another name for the Greek goddess Athena, She is the goddess of wisdom. Maybe he wants us to think that the bird is wise? Pluto is also said, he rules the underworld. Poe gets angry because all the bird says is nevermore and he tells the bird to go back to where he came from but he ends up not moving.

Annabel Lee has many similarities from The Raven. The character is still depressed about losing a loved one but Annabel Lee starts differently. Poe talks about heaven and angels which was also mentioned in The Raven. It actually starts off as some type of fairy tale about how he fell in love with her and they were both children. He made it seem like they weren’t even teenagers and they were younger than that. He expresses that that even if they were children their love was very strong, stronger than people who were older than them. Even though she dies, the speaker says that their love is still there and will always be. At the end it says that he actually lays down next to her dead body in the tomb which is kind of creepy.

Update: I finally understand why Poe wrote so depressing and dark in most of his stories. He had a very hard life that I wouldn't even know how to handle myself if I was him. He really did have his reasons for being the way he was. When he was born, both of his parents died. Then he was adopted and both of his foster parents ended up dying also.  His foster mother was the only mother figure he had ever had and she ends up dying of tuberculosis. Shortly after his foster father ends up remarrying which makes Poe very angry. Most of the women in his life died of tuberculosis. Everyone he ever loved basically just died and he ended up being an alcoholic and using drugs. He writes The Raven while his wife is dying so we could see where the depressing story came from. In the raven, when the bird says “Nevermore” it means that people never get their lost ones back. Annabel Lee was written after his wife dies to show their undying love. The Raven was written to forget about everything while Annabel Lee was written for him to remember. Both Lenore and Annabel are angelic. His death was the most mystery thing ever and I really wish I could find out how it happened. Its crazy how he was found dead in someone else’s clothes at a bar.