SRA discontinuing Extended Registration Certificates and ID Cards

Sometimes I bite off more than I can chew, and running the Supernatural Registration Authority is definitely a bone too tough to gnaw through on my own. That’s why I’m discontinuing the part of the SRA that involves me having to physically make and ship things. If you’d like to receive in the mail a certificate or a photo ID card proclaiming your status as a registered werewolf (or one of several dozen other non-human entities), you have until Sunday night to place your order.

The SRA will continue to exist, and I’m going to create a self-service option for people who want to register and then print out their own detailed certificate (the one I mail people, not the free one everyone gets). The current set-up just takes too much time to maintain – time I’d rather spend finding things to post here on Werewolf News.

Werewolf News readers can use promo code STFUVAMPIRES to get 15% off, because you guys and gals are awesome.

Nov. 20th 2012

Watch me watch 1941’s “The Wolf Man” for the 1st time on the next full moon

Regardless of the damage this may do to my credibility as “the Werewolf News guy”, I can’t keep this inside any longer: I have never seen the 1941 classic werewolf movie “The Wolf Man“. Ever. Not even 30 seconds of it. I’m sorry.

This is an egregious failing on my part, and I have no excuse, other than a distaste for the “classic wolf man” aesthetic (I just can’t abide that DA haircut). As a matter of fact, if it weren’t for Craig J. Clark’s outstanding Full Moon Features series here on Werewolf News, my knowledge of werewolf movies prior to the 1980s would be non-existant. I hope you can forgive me for this failing. If you can still tolerate my uneducated words, please read on to learn how I intend to rectify the situation.

The next full moon falls on Wednesday November 28th. On that day, at 6 PM Pacific / 9 PM Eastern, I invite you to watch The Wolf Man with me in real time.

Synchtube is the venue, and in addition to my participation in the built-in chatroom, I will be live-tweeting my comments and reactions. By making my education on that auspicious Werewolf Wednesday a public event, I hope to regain the trust and respect of the several half-dozens of people who are horrified at this gap in my lycanthropic experience. Join me, won’t you?


Nov. 9th 2012

Get your snuggle on with this Squishable werewolf

A Facebook friend (hi, Amurana!) shared an extremely cute link with me this morning: Squishable.com’s squishable werewolf! Squishable makes spherical plush critters which are designed to be snuggled upon with a will, and I don’t mind telling you that if I had this Werewolf, I would go Hug Bot on it. It was designed by RMCAD illustration student Tera S. as part of Project Open Squish, which seems to be a contest organized along the lines of how Patch Together runs. Squishable’s site is frustratingly vague about the contest’s timeline, or what it means for an entry to be marked “In Process”, but a post on the Squishable Facebook page says “The Werewolf from last month’s round made it into prototype thanks to your votes!”, so chances are good the design will be available for purchase soon. You can enter your email address on the Werewolf detail page to receive an email when it’s ready.

Nov. 8th 2012

Adorable werewolf-themed Android mascot figurine by Dead Zebra

When he’s not adding new beasties to Creatures In My Head, Andrew Bell runs Dead Zebra, Inc., which makes and sells miniature figurines of the little green Android mascot. Right before Halloween he announced a limited-edition werewolf collectible which “hails from a day and age when vampires didn’t sparkle and werewolves played basketball”. The figurine is now on sale for a very reasonable $10.00, and is highly adorable.

As a non-partisan iPhone / Mac user, the only thing keeping me from buying this is the knowledge that if I did, my roommate – who’s a zealous Windows / Android guy – would totally smirk at me. That’s all he’d do… and that’s enough.

Nov. 7th 2012

Issue 1 of Holt & Diotto’s “Southern Dog” bites in the right way

I just finished reading the first issue of Southern Dog, Jeremy Holt and Alex Diotto‘s comic series about Alabamian werewolves and racism in the six months before the (first!) Presidential Inauguration of Barack Obama. My skin is crawling, and that’s a testament to Holt’s writing. His script doesn’t waste any time: within three pages we’ve got a battered werewolf, a gaggle of pointy white hoods and a truck full of rednecks. The pace slows considerably after that, but the atmosphere of menace and violence never dissipates.

Every review I’ve read of Southern Dog makes mention of Alex Diotto’s young age (and I guess this is one of them now, too). I sure don’t see anything inexperienced about his art, though – there’s a satisfying, workmanlike quality to his panel layouts, and while I’m not crazy about the “catty” design of his werewolf, it doesn’t detract from his skills with facial expressions and body language.

I enjoyed Southern Dog, and I’m grateful to Holt and Diotto for sharing the first issue with me. For a proper review by someone who actually knows comics, I’ll direct you to Michelle White at Multiversity Comics – her assessments of the issue’s ups and downs are similar to my own, and she’s got more Comix Credibility than I.

Southern Dog is published by 215 Ink. Issue 1 is availablein their online store on comiXology.

Nov. 7th 2012

Hilarious Twilight “New Moon” Wolfpack Auditions by The 1491s

I discovered this wonderful sketch from The 1491s via a tweet by Kate Beaton this morning. It’s from way back in 2009 (from the dark days when people cared about Twilight), but I laughed and cringed all the same. In fact, I reveled in the unassailable correctness of Native Americans skewering the faux-tribal stupidity of the Twilight “werewolves”. If you don’t crack a smile at the scenes of these guys (including a nebbish who looks no more native than Taylor Lautner) pretending to turn into werewolves, please just go ahead and add Werewolf News to your hosts file.

The 1491s are a comedy group “based in the wooded ghettos of Minnesota and buffalo grass of Oklahoma. They are a gaggle of Indians chock full of cynicism and splashed with a good dose of indigeneous satire.” You can check out more of their work at 1491s.com.

Nov. 5th 2012

“The Werewolf of NYC” – a gorgeous grotesquerie by Edwin Vazquez

I don’t want Werewolf News to turn into a Kickstarter directory, but I don’t want to pass up cool stuff, either, and Edwin Vazquez’s The Werewolf of NYC is pretty damn cool. It’s a 4-issue comic series – created entirely by Vazquez – about unhinged shut-in Albert Shaw escaping his Hell’s Kitchen apartment and roaming the streets as a werewolf. From what I’ve seen of the preview [mildy NSFW], it’s going to be a surreal journey. The thick lines of Vazquez’s scratchboard art renders a New York neighbourhood literally melting with pop art colours, and the narration describes a man whose mind is even more tortured than his body.

The Kickstarter goal is a modest $3,000 to cover production costs of this first issue. The perks include stickers, buttons, hand-screen-printed t-shirts, and a lovely hand-made accordion-style promo book. The first nine pages of the first issue are available here, and I’ve posted the first three below, so you can get a taste of Vazquez’s delightfully grotesque visuals. If you like what you see, why not support it?

 

Nov. 5th 2012

Allison Moon continues lycanthropic exploration of feminism & queer identity with “Hungry Ghost”

Author, sex educator and distinguished fur vest wearer Allison Moon is writing a sequel to her debut novel Lunatic Fringe, and she’s put together a Kickstarter campaign to help pay her production expenses. Hungry Ghost is scheduled for an April 2013 release. From the campaign page:

Lunatic Fringe is Book 1 of the Tales of the Pack series, which gives werewolf stories a lesbian twist. It follows college freshman Lexie Clarion as she encounters the strange and scary world of feminist politics, liberal arts education, and forests filled with nasty creatures.  Hungry Ghost (Book 2) picks up where Lunatic Fringe left off, as Lexie becomes part of the Pack and takes on her role as a werewolf hunter. She makes new friends, discovers new powers, and has to defend her family and her town against a new Big Bad.  The series explores feminism, queer identity, gender politics, and community, all within the werewolf world.

Allison is looking to raise $4,500 to pay her editor and her cover art designer. Additional funds will go towards the cost of merch production and the setup and distribution of the paperback books. The good news is that the campaign has already surpassed its goal with 6 days left, and is within $800 of reaching the first stretch goal: audiobook recordings of both books.

I’m a fan of Allison’s fiction but I also deeply admire her writing on feminism and gender – please support her work if you’re able!

Nov. 3rd 2012

Watch werewolf Eddie destroy scouts in “Mockingbird Lane” pilot clip

The pilot episode of Bryan Fuller‘s Mockingbird Lane aired on NBC last week, and while the general consensus seems to be that the “Munsters” reboot didn’t get enough viewers for NBC to pick the series up, the pilot itself was actually pretty good. Here’s the opening three minutes, courtesy of Werewolf News reader “C”. Eddie doesn’t know he’s a werewolf, but the rest of his Scout group figure it out pretty quickly, and in manner I found surprisingly dark and graphic for network television.

From the AV Club review by Todd VanDerWerff:

Yes, Eddie Munster, the werewolf, is here as well, and he’s at the center of the pilot, which dearly wants to be about this family reclaiming its heritage and being proud of what it is, after spending so many years trying to hide it away. Eddie, see, doesn’t know he’s a werewolf, and also doesn’t know he’s the reason his family has had to relocate to Mockingbird Heights.

This clip is all I’ve seen of the show, and now I’m kind of regretting that I missed it. If you saw the whole pilot, what did you think? Should NBC re-consider?

Nov. 3rd 2012

Detail shots for limited edition Mondo “The Wolf Man” poster + sale info

Via Daily Dead and the Mondo Blog, here’s a look at the limited edition Mondo poster for The Wolf Man, designed by Laurent Durieux. This 24″ x 36″ poster is part of Mondo’s UNIVERSAL MONSTERS show, and is limited to 380 prints. (more…)

Oct. 29th 2012