Carol Borden was editor of and a writer for the Toronto International Film Festival’s official Midnight Madness and Vanguard program blogs. She is currently an editor at and evil overlord for The Cultural Gutter, a website dedicated to thoughtful writing about disreputable art. She has written for Mezzanotte, Teleport City, Die Danger Die Die Kill, Popshifter and she has a bunch of short stories published by Fox Spirit Books including: Godzilla detective fiction, femme fatale mermaids, an adventurous translator/poet, and an x-ray tech having a bad day. Read and listen to her other shenanigans at Monstrous Industry. For her particular take on gutter culture, check out, “In the Sewer with the Alligators.”
Professional curmudgeon Shamus Young finds his reservations slipping away for Deus Ex Human Revolution: “The videogame sections of this blog can be boiled down to a single long, frustrated lament at everything that’s been going wrong in the industry… The truth is, this is a really good game.”
In his video essay (also available in text form), Matthias Stork details the elements of what he calls, “Chaos Cinema” and their effects on film and viewer experience: “The film doesn’t seduce you into suspending your disbelief. It bludgeons you until you give up.”
In the news: the Seasteading Institute triggers a memory for Screen Cuisine: “Remember that great game, Bioshock, where billionaire libertarian Andrew Ryan built an underwater city because he was tired of government interference, and it worked out really well for him, and it totally didn’t turn into a […]
Kevin Drum, political blogger, knows his SF, and it’s not making him happy: “Nearly every day I find myself thinking that we’re slipping closer and closer to the dystopian marketing world that was mere satire half a century ago in The Space Merchants.”
Abigail Nussbaum over at Asking the Wrong Questions rounds up some reactions to this year’s Hugo winners, and with some of her own: “In other words, Blackout/All Clear‘s win not only rewards bad writing, it rewards cultural appropriation and exploitative business practices. It definitely has my vote for […]
In a guest post at DCWomenKickingAss, former DC Comics’ editor and writer Scott Peterson discusses the secret origin of Batgirl!
Find t-shirts, mugs, totes and more at our new Guttermart location at Teepublic!
The Cultural Gutter 