13 s e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 7 “But wouldn’t it be cheaper just to use a man in a suit?” Chunga is a darkened theater where Lee Hoffman and Ron Bennett sit in the middle third row. Rich brown leans forward in the row behind them, and he won’t stop talking. Other fans are expected, and all three look over their shoulders in anticipation. In the projection booth, Bob Tucker is pouring shots from a green-labeled bottle. One for each reel change — two cartoons, a news reel, the serial chapter, the A picture, and the B picture. A pleasant odor of bourbon and popcorn fills the darkness as he throws the switch. Available by editorial whim or wistfulness, or, grudgingly, for $3.50 for a single issue; PDFs of every issue may be found at eFanzines.com. Edited by Andy ([email protected]), Randy ([email protected]), and carl ([email protected]). Please address all postal correspondence to 1013 North 36th Street, Seattle WA 98103. Editors: please send three copies of any zine for trade. In this issue . The Ascent of Hokum Art Credits A premonitory caution . 1 in order of first appearance Terminal Eyes Marc Schirmeister front cover by Andy Hooper . 2 William Rotsler 3, 26 Take the Hokum and Run (Celluloid Fantasia reprints) Stu Shiffman 7, 9, 10 by Stu Shiffman . 5 Ken Fletcher 12, 14, 15 Woody Guthrie, the Singing Sidekick by Stu Shiffman . 6 Ian Gunn 14 The Most Monstrous Show on Earth! Michael Dobson 15 (bottom), from by Bob Webber . 12 the Highly Inappropriate Toy series Once More with Ftheeling Craig Smith 19, back cover by Randy Byers . 16 Alexis Gilliland 21, 23 The Rainy Town Tickler Potshot 24 by Wil Tenino . .18 Harry Bell 27 (photo, thanks PW) The Iron Pig A letter column . 20 Special “Spelling Rotsler right” Edition T H E A S C E N T O F H OKUM s mystery cheese enthusiast and posthumous Andrew there is hokum. Yet are these publicity-seeking strophes any more or Lloyd Webber confidant TS Eliot said, between the idea and less factitious than other socialized consensual hallucinations like pro the reality, the motion and the act, falls the hokum. (Do you wrestling, mystery novels or the American two-party system? believe that?) The half-fact, the spin, the ad copy, the white lie, the nov- To say more would trigger the Accu-rat Advertizing™ provisions of elization, the simplification to tell the kids, the stories we tell our boss- the patriot Act. We are allowed to sketch, for purposes of our readers’ es and doctors, these have the hokum nature. When 78 year old Pat self defense only, below and elsewhere a scale of relative hokum, nor- Robertson declares his special elixir lets him leg-press Olympic-record malized from 1 (low or none) to 10 (fourth-branch-of-constitutional- weights, that’s hokum. Yea, and everywhere Richard Dawkins attacks government high), along several familiar, and unfamiliar, axes. religion as unscience yet suggests science is its spiritual successor, yea — carl SF author Scientist SF film Herbert S Zim, 1 Isaac Asimov Destination Moon, Marooned Marie Curie Colossus: Pierre Curie, 2 Arthur C Clarke The Forbin Thomas Edison Project William Gibson, Richard Leakey, The Boys from Brazil, 3 CJ Cherryh Francis Crick THX 1138 Leigh Brackett, Albert Hoffman, Apollo 13, 4 HG Wells Albert Einstein The Andromeda Strain Andre Norton, Robert Silverberg, Stanley Pons & Planet of the Apes 5 Greg Bear, Ken MacLeod Martin Fleischman Metropolis Henry Kuttner, Issac Newton, 6 Little Shop of Horrors (1986) Joanna Russ Louis Agassiz James Tiptree, Tarantula, Night of 7 Larry Niven, Iain Banks, Nikola Tesla, Jack Parsons the Lepus Barrington Bayley Zardoz Christopher Priest, Aristotle, 8 Little Shop of AE van Vogt Wilhelm Reich Horrors (1960) Alfred Bester, Robot Monster Immanuel Velikovsky, 9 Kurt Vonnegut, Plan 9 from Outer Brooks Agnew Rudy Rucker Space Philip K Dick, Paracelsus, 2001: A Space 10 RA Lafferty Bob Lazar Odyssey The gentleman under my foot will now give an imitation of a rusty door hinge. Forbidden Chunga Terminal Eyes Andy Hooper UNSEEN SIGHTS REMEMBERED hy Celluloid Fantasia? Once readers have struggled through to lull ourselves to sleep. The idea that these flights the question of whether these cinematic references are of fantasy might reflect half-remembered reality real or imagined, the next step is is to ask why we find the seems impossibly appealing, and I hope to build idea so appealing in the first place. I’ve brushed such inquiries aside my belief system around this illusion as I eventu- for years, but as different contributors offered their own essays on ally become feeble-minded and even more conve- faux-historical movies, the question became more compelling. Why niently forgetful. should these writers find it so appealing to make up imaginary sci- ence fiction and horror films too? After all, Stu Shiffman invented the THE PSYCHOTRONIC INVASION franchise, and I’m as much his imitator as anyone here. Why do I keep We’re far from the only place that you can find a coming back to this curious form of pastiche? kind of alternate cinematic history. Recent years For one thing, I do enjoy a good hoax. It’s fun have seen a series of elaborately constructed but when the glowing swamp creature turns out to be completely phony documentaries on spurious a mean old real estate speculator in a rubber cos- polar editions, imaginary exploitation cinema and tume. And I’m even more fond of considering the life in a victorious Confederate States of Ameri- possibility that the hoax is itself a hoax, meant to ca. The original “Golden Turkey Awards” collec- hide an unseen truth of some sort. Could some or tion famously included a completely imaginary all of these films be real, and our “parody” part of movie among its litany of the film world’s worst a campaign of disinformation with the ultimate crimes — which has not kept it from being listed in goal of rewriting history? Maybe you’d better go other movie guides and databases since then. enter the name “Zetz Tummelman” into the IMDB Even the final two seasons of The Sopranos search engine, just to be safe. have featured a subplot about a mob-backed Most if us grow up as fans loving the idea of lost, horror film, culminating in a spurious “mak- forbidden and unknown knowledge. So much of ing of” documentary on HBO. Imaginary cinema science fiction is based on discovery and invention, might be seen as something of a motif on HBO’s that it seems a natural component of faan fiction series — much of the popular comedy Entourage as well. The competitive recitation of trivia is one revolved around fictional actor Vincent Chase’s of fandom’s favorite pastimes, and Celluloid Fan- efforts to star in a James Cameron production of tasia arises from a mischievous impulse to stump Aquaman. The fictional movie was a blockbust- the know-it-alls by making up a work they’ve never er — and putatively followed by a cheap sequel read, or seen, or heard. directed by Michael Bay. In real life, the team that h o k u m Movies are such a part of our interior land- created Smallville for the WB/CW networks also scape — we recall classic scenes and recite their produced an Aquaman pilot which was not picked 1 lines with pleasure, we use them as a social lubri- up. But following the airing of the Entourage epi- cant for a hundred occasions. And even use them sodes with the imaginary Cameron movie, there Forbidden Chunga If we can freeze frame the picture and say, “Doesn’t that look like the space craft and lunar module have actually was a sudden resurgence of interest in the charac- pillar of salt, That’s more than enough hook to get ter, and persistent rumors that the movie will actu- the green light from most horror producers. Hokum: Theory ally be made. The idea that simply watching a movie, read- A certain kind of orderly There are also intermediate steps between ing a book, or even looking at a work of art can disordered mind (for existence and nothingness in the cinematic realm. lead to death, madness or transformation, appears low values of Asperger’s) delights in quantifying There are thousands of movies that have almost frequently in fantastic fiction. I can remember qualities and mapping never been seen in their entirety, suffering cuts in being heartily scared at age seven by a Star Trek the hitherto incommen- favor of commercial time in every airing since the episode titled “Is There in Truth No Beauty?” Diana surable. There’s joy in film’s initial run. Many films have been recut after Muldaur played the blind, psychic assistant to the comparing digits for some their release, which can create rumors of lost or ambassador of a race called the Medusans, beings of us, and community for suppressed scenes. Given free rein in the sound- of such terrifying appearance that the very sight of others — and for a very few, both, which is con- stage of the imagination, the suppressed material them will drive most other species insane. fusing, I know. Meantime, attains a degree of sensation that reality would be Leaving aside the questionable utility of diplo- as Euterpe dances in the hard-pressed to equal. matic relations with a race that literally drives you woodlit shadows her crazy at first sight, the sequences in which the lid protégé Science enters MOVIES THAT KILL to the ambassador’s carrying case (Medusan diplo- the enameled retaining chamber where history is It seems telling that so much of the mats appear to prefer accommodations that closely Celluloid Fan- made, encumbered with tasia canon has concerned classic horror movies.