I'd like to tell you a little story about me and a guy called Richard Stanley. Many years ago, when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, and the most Boris Johnson had fucked up so far was the buses, I was attending the SCI-FI-LONDON film festival at the Apollo Cinema in Regent's Street. I had picked on a whim a showing of a 1990 film called Hardware, not knowing a whole lot about it, and after the film started late due to the guest who was going to introduce it, 2000AD's Kevin O'Neill, turning up late (whole other matter), I was really impressed. That began a fascination with the writer/director Richard Stanley, which led me to a lot of fascinating titles… and a later crushing disappointment.
After Hardware I later picked up his film Dust Devil, a powerful supernatural horror set in Zambia. It was visually stunning, it has moments that haunted me for years. I then learned that Richard Stanley's career had been derailed by the debacle of The Island of Doctor Moreau (the one that South Park referenced). So as a result, I, and many other film geeks, lapped up the 2014 documentary Lost Souls, where he finally told his side of the story. It's exactly the sort of "eccentric artist vs the money men" story we all love. And I was thrilled when off the back of that, he returned to feature films with his take on The Colour Out of Space; a screening of that with friends was one of the last normal things that I did before Lockdown, so you know it means a lot to me.
And then it came out that he was a domestic abuser.
Suddenly, this oddball underdog I had spent a long time championing, was a truly terrible person, and it's why I haven't been doing my usual thing of including trailers of his films in this article. It made me look back at his works very differently; there is a whole subplot in Hardware about a voyeuristic pervert neighbour. Whilst that alone looks so much worse in the light of these revelations, I later discovered that the film's distributor in the US, Harvey Weinstein (BOOOOOOOO!!!!) had to be reassured that the character wasn't a pastiche of him. Ick. Yeah, all of a sudden there were things on my Blu Ray shelf I was no longer OK with having there, and trips to CEX and eBay ensued (at least I got a fair amount of instore credit for 'em!).
In fact, I wasn't the only one washing their hands of Stanley. Spectrevision, who distributed Colour Out of Space, have said that they wouldn't be going ahead with his planned follow-up of The Dunwich Horror, and would be donating money that Colour made to domestic abuse charities. Arrow Video confirmed that they had been working on re-releasing his earlier films, a project that had gotten very far along, but scrapped the project. Nucleus Films in the UK, distributors of Lost Soul, said that they cut ties with him, and would not be printing any more copies. Severin Films in the US did the same, and actually pulled some DVD special features that he was on from future editions of those films. The whole horror community turned its back on him… and I'm kind of proud of that, encouraging to know it can do good when the times call for it.
But it still hurt, having something I had a strong fondness and connection to tarnished. So you know what I did? I moved on. I went looking for new things that would scratch that same itch, and I found them. Hell, as much as that night watching Colour Out of Space with friends meant to me, I made new memories with them, checking out other weird things together. I went back to the 2010 German edition of Colour, and realised it's the better version. There's a whole wide world of films out there, with so much to discover, so the loss of his means little compared to how much I have discovered since.
It's not the only time I've done this; I have had a lot of soul searching with stuff that previously meant a lot to me, and moved on in the same way. For instance, the first time I saw An American Werewolf in London and The Blues Brothers will always mean a lot to me, but after reading more about the Twilight Zone tragedy, all I can see in their stunt sequences is the same recklessness from John Landis that lead to that infamous day. (And I used to like some of Max Landis' stuff before… y'know). Hell, in my other hobbies, there's a Doctor Who writer I used to really admire, who did work across all media Who has been in, but who has gone off the deep end in recent years, and has made me reevaluate certain running gags in his early work.
Have I always been perfect in this, is it a hard and fast rule? Well no, I will admit that a few things have slipped through; I have been catching up on some of Big Finish's Torchwood range, and must admit a bit of guilt with getting the ones John Barrowman's in. But I do agree that considering his behaviour, quietly retiring the character of Captain Jack Harkness going forward might be for the best, at least if he doesn't properly start making some amends. Also, props to Big Finish for dropping James Dreyfus as the Master as soon as that became an issue (I imagine them still releasing his appearances is a contractual thing).
With the particular way Dreyfus has been unpleasant, it's time for me to stop circling the issue, and make clear what this is all really about… though I reckon some of you have already guessed what it is. The Bad Wizard Game. I'm not going to get into the full Ins and Outs of the matter, as wiser souls than I have done so; I recommend Commander James Stephanie Sterling's look below, I can't put any better myself.
I think the point I have made with all the above is all to clear; you need to let go. I get it, the Potter franchise is important to you, it was to me once (I drifted away from it pretty much as it became clear that no editor was going to hold JoKeR back), but it's time to accept that supporting it these days just plain can't be justified. If you buy it, you are literally putting your nostalgia above the lives and happiness of trans people.
In fact, we need to stop that with a lot of franchises and properties chasing nostalgia cash. Yes, I know, Michael Keaton saying "I'm Batman" again is the shit; however, the star of that movie has been on a literal crime-spree, at the very least take a second thought about going to see it opening night. (I still feel sorry for Keaton, Sasha Calle and everyone else caught up in the whole mess). Or how about Mel Gibson still being in movies… playing Santa no-less! Guys, we just need to vote with our wallets here.
As the first part of this rant showed, I have learned to let go of stuff that I used to love, but is now tainted by too much baggage, and actively putting money in the pockets of people I wouldn't piss on if they were on fire. I am asking everyone to learn to do the same. I won't pretend that it will be easy to do, but it's something you need to learn to do. I guarantee also, once you start doing it, you will find more content that will recapture that feeling, it is out there if you look. And you will feel better, not having to make excuses, not having to look at stuff connected to spoilt memories; it worked for me. So go on, forget about picking up the Bad Wizard Game (which on top of everything else doesn't even sound that good anyway), and Marie Kondo this shit!
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