Elijah David

As I mentioned in last week's post on The Hunchback of Notre Dame , I've been listening through some of my favorite musicals again lately, along with favorite musicals suggested to me by others. Two of those musicals are inspired in whole or in part by Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera : Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera and his maybe-sequel (he can't seem to make up his mind about that) Love Never Dies . I want to look at what's good (and not so good) in these musicals. The Phantom of the Opera Phantom is one of those musicals that everybody seems to know about. At the very least, they've probably heard one of the show's more popular songs like "Music of the Night" or the title number. If you're unfamiliar with the story, it's the tale of an up-and-coming opera singer named Christine Daaé and her lover, a young nobleman named Raoul, as they are swept into the machinations of the mysterious Phantom of the Op...

Here's a little background for today's post. I recently started listening to the soundtrack from The Greatest Showman  (despite not having seen the film) and the music rekindled an old, oft-buried desire of mine: to write a musical. By way of research, I started looking into my favorite musicals (again) as well as those of my friends who were quick to suggest shows they loved. One of those musicals was the stage version of Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame . Despite trying to listen to other musicals as well, I've been in a bit of a loop listening to this production in the last few weeks. Between this and listening to The Phantom of the Opera  and Love Never Dies , I'm feeling a serious Beauty and the Beast reading/rereading marathon building. But that's beside the point. I want to talk about why I loved reading Hunchback  and why I love the musical. The Novel I will admit that for years I was more familiar with Disney's adaptation than with Vict...

I've got a couple more book reviews for you today: Hellboy Vol. 5: The Conqueror Worm  and Lockwood and Co.: The Whispering Skull . Hellboy Vol. 5: The Conqueror Worm After two volumes of short stories and vignettes, Mignola returns to the larger story of Hellboy's personal journey. Hellboy and Roger (the homunculus from Vol. 2) are sent to investigate the astonishing results of a WWII Nazi experiment: a spacecraft launched in 1939 is returning to its place of origin. During their adventure, they confront a still-living Nazi scientist, Mr. Head-in-a-Jar himself, Herman von Klempt. Von Klempt intends to finish the experiment begun by his compatriots 60 years previous: to bring one of the ancient evil beings called the Ogdru Hem into this plane. The story exhibits Mignola's pulpy action-adventure style to great effect and weaves in Hellboy's moral character in new ways. Departing from the previous emphasis on his choice not to embrace his "destiny" of ...

Welcome to another Watercolor Wednesday, featuring lots of drawing, a few knit/crochet projects, and some actual watercolor! (Ok, so it was done with pencils, but  it's still painting.) On with the show . . . Mirriam did an art auction in which art/crafting projects were acceptable tender (good news for this broke guy), and I won her painting of Azrael from her novel Paper Crowns  (and its sequels). [I bid on him because he looks eerily like how I imagine Merlin from Albion Academy , especially after Chapter 11.] In exchange, I created a wand holster to match the Gandalf gloves she commissioned a while back. et viola! Modified from this pattern After that, I had two scarves commissioned: one for a friend's wife's birthday in a blend of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff colors (and I forgot to take a picture before I mailed it off! :( ) and one for my pastor using the same pattern as my Newt scarf, but in different colors. Yes, my pastor is a Ravenclaw and doesn't...

Ever since I wrote up my ThrowBook Thursday post on Dear Wormwood , I've been somewhat obsessively listening to the entire oeuvre of The Oh Hellos (their Christmas album notwithstanding, because it's Lent/Easter season and I probably won't be back into Christmas/Advent music until at least June). Going through two full albums and three EPs has convinced me of two things. First, I have not given the Oh Hellos' first EP and album enough love in the past. Second, their body of work feels like an extended story that turns back in on itself with new insight. (Before I get any further, you should check out this handy examination of the Oh Hellos' work by Rachel at Let All Be Wick. She does a fine job summarizing the ideas of each album, and her belief that Boreas will be the next "4 Winds" EP matches mine, but with lyrical support.) The Oh Hellos EP The four songs in this collection serve as a sort of prelude to the full album that follows. "...

Welcome back for another Top 10 list! This month, I'm taking a look at my favorite animated TV shows (including a few anime). (I am only including shows that I've seen all the way through at least once, though I do have some honorable mentions that don't meet that requirement.) Without further ado, to the list! Gravity Falls One of the newest shows on my list, Gravity Falls is the story of Dipper and Mabel Pines -- twin tweens who are sent to spend the summer with their great-uncle Stan in the middle of nowhere. As the summer progresses, they encounter all kinds of strange creatures lurking in the woods around Gravity Falls, and eventually wind up taking part in a battle to save the universe. The series puts some clever and touching spins on preteen/tween growing pains tropes and features some gripping storylines. I highly recommend checking it out if you're unfamiliar with it (though some of the later episodes have some very weird/disturbing moments that younge...

I've been listening to the Audible full cast production of Dracula  (each narrator in the novel has a different reader, with Tim Curry as Van Helsing and Alan Cumming as Dr. Seward)   on my commute lately, and I'm noticing things I haven't caught in previous readings. Why do modern versions never keep the mustaches? For instance, there's a bench in Jonathan Harker's early entries that the locals call "word bearer." I assume that's where visitors would stop to share the news. But the loftiness of that phrase started my wheels turning. I know Stoker isn't always the most careful with his details in this book (for example, Lucy's hair changing color after she dies) but this seems like an odd bit of trivia to be throwing in with all of Jonathan's other exotic travel experiences. The very phrase "word bearer" conjures up something grand, important, and even imposing in its own way. If you move out from the obvious meaning I ment...