The Alphabet of Insects
At Gallica you can peruse Léon Becker’s Alphabet Des Insectes from 1883. Its scanned pages and illustrations are grlorious. Read it here.
Bugs Don’t Need No Radiation
Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn.Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.Lady and the Tramp. They were all legendary couples of the Silver Screen in the 1950s, but the greatest cinematic pairing of the decade was Insects and Radiation, two great tastes that mutate together. If the movies were to be […]
Sweet Character Designs!
Behold these sweet and incredibly detailed character designs for a project simply called, Undergrowth! 70 earthworms in a suit! Bluebird in a mech suit! Leafhopper warriors! See it all here. (Thanks, Dr. O!) (There’s a new link and it should work).
Sci-Fi, Shochiku Style
In the 1960s, Japan’s venerable Shochiku Studio, struggling to stay relevant amid changing times, threw up its arms and said, “Fine. Whatever!” and rapidly produced four profoundly weird science fiction and horror films: The Living Skeleton, Genocide, The X from Outer Space, and the oddest of all, Goke: Bodysnatcher from Hell.
“Insect Jewelry of the Victorian Era”
At JSTOR Daily, Amelia Soth writes about fashionable Victorians and their insect jewelry. “The wing-cases of gold-enameled weevils hung from necklaces; muslin gowns were embroidered with the iridescent green elytra of jewel beetles. Tiny golden scarabs were glued to the petals of artificial flowers. Delicate moths were perched […]
“An Ode to Mothra”
Friend of the Gutter Jessica Ritchey writes an ode to Mothra at Balder & Dash at RogerEbert.com. “The giant moth’s introduction to audiences came in 1961’s “Mothra,” and for all it owed to the conventions of the Kaiju formula it offered plenty that was unique. Instead of a […]
The Cultural Gutter 