Welcome to the fourth column of Cyclopean Orm.

So, you are back for more? I really can't blame you, The Blue Rubber Rabbit has a way of drilling his paws into your brain and taking a good firm grip, no matter what I happen to be talking about.

Since the last column, I have sensed an interest in the matchbox which contained The Blue Rubber Rabbit when I found him. I'm no expert on such things, so maybe one of you can tell how old it is by looking at the front cover. SEARCH LIGHT. Good brand name for matches. I think Satan Sticks would be cool, too. And why not? After all, they used to call them Lucifers. . .

The matchbox is the large kitchen sized type and there were four things in it: the rabbit, a small book with strange drawings and writings, and two other items I do not wish to disclose. Couldn't make sense of most of it.

On the very first page of the book are the words "and the gnawing never stops" which I think is a tad bit fucked up.

Kind of throws a wrench in my benevolent totemic entity theory.

But I stand by my assessment. The Blue Rubber Rabbit is a good thing. A great and good thing.

Like most horror writers, I am drawn toward the dark side of reality. This attraction can be eccentric. For example, my most favorite horror movie may not seem like such a big thing to other people. Keep in mind, many horrific things can be broken down into a series of moments that upon close inspection can seem ridiculous or bland. The inverse is true as well. Many plain or silly things can be minutely examined and found to be horrific.

It came out in 1979, two years before I graduated high school. I still remember the advertisements on the tube. Freaked me out. I remember a voice, ". . coming soon to a theatre near you." I can NOT convey how creepy this bastard sounded. I think the commercial opened with the red lettered title fading in and then to black.

I'm talking about Phantasm. Scared the ever living holy bejesus-get-in-line-for-the-judgment out of me. Don't know why. It spoke to me. I identified with Mike, who was being pursued by The Tall Man.

I remember seeing a silver sphere's point of view for brief moments (these spheres are known as Sentinels.) Sort of an infrared thermospirit scene. When I recently went to a nearby cemetery and photographed a beautiful monument using a homemade gelatin lens, I experienced the feeling that there is something bigger than death. Much larger.

Yet most of us refuse to see it.

It was cold & windy. At the end of the cemetery, I could see the city skyline several miles away. The skyscrapers looked like glass tombstones.

I don't know how to explain it exactly, but when you go to a cemetery, if you relax and try to open up the psychic gates, you start to feel a certain sense of camaraderie. Go on a sunny day. Take a picnic lunch and find an old cemetery with trees and benches. Take your camera. You'll hear the birds, you'll feel the breeze.

By now, most of you know I am an avid proponent of the work of H. R. Giger. Some would say "rabid fan." What I find fascinating is his depiction of not exactly life after death, but of life in other dimensions, DESPITE death. Once again, I am at a loss of words to accurately describe these feelings I have. My red gelatin photo of the monument expresses much of how I feel.

Don't judge my interests harshly. I know many of you out there who collect dead meat at the local supermarket every week to take home and ingest. You eat to stay alive, yet, you eat the dead. Think about that for a moment. It makes Giger's artwork seem like tame, surreal sketches of a different world. My interest in things "beyond death" pale in comparison to grocery shopping for a good steak.

And if anyone out there is tempted to psycho-anal-ize me, don't bother. It's not an obsession with death which interests me.

It is, in fact, the wheel of life.

And I feel life out there amongst the markers in the cemeteries.

To learn more about Phantasm, I invite you to visit one of the coolest sites on the web. You'll learn a cranium crunching load of facts about the movie and its sequels as you navigate the mausoleum. The next and possibly last sequel has been finished and is scheduled for release in the fall of '98. The name of this fourth sequel is called PHANTASM: OBLIVION, and it promises to invade our brains like a Sentinel on PCP. You will hear a lot about this movie come Fall and you will like this site, trust me:

http://www.phantasm.com

Don't forget to sign The Tall Man's Guest Book.

Speaking of Sentinels, another excellent site is just that, The Sentinel. Richard Elkin's web page is a killer ride and a must see. I can't do the web site justice, so you'll have to check it out to for yourself. Let's just say that his page is a perfect sister site to the official Phantasm web page. He also publishes a hard copy newsletter by the same name which covers all types of aspects of the Phantasm phenomenon. This includes behind the scenes interviews, photo's, etc. I especially enjoyed the Bill Cone interview in issue #5 and the first half of the two-part Kristen Deem interview in issue #6, as well as the instructions for constructing my own miniature replica of the Hemicuda from Phantasm II in issue #3. Bill Cone was the first casualty in Phantasm and has gone on to great and interesting things. Kristen Deem became imprinted by The Tall Man when she saw Phantasm at the impressionable age of fourteen. Later, she became Angus Scrimm's friend in real life and has worked with director Don Coscarelli on the Phantasm sequels 2 thru 4. (It kind of makes me wish I had stalked The Tall Man years ago. To count Angus Scrimm as a personal friend is definitely some type of strange stone in a necromantic collection.)

To get the full effect of the newsletter, I recommend you buy all the back issues while they are still available. In this way, you can see the evolution of the newsletter in hindsight. With each issue, it is obvious that Mr. Elkin is a true hard core fan of the films, and his enthusiasm is contagious. Issue #1 does indeed look like a newsletter, while in issue #6, The Sentinel has transmutated into the equivalent of a digest-sized small press publication. If The Sentinel continues its growth, I see full color cover art in Mr. Elkin's future. The common thread in all the issues is the near worship of all that is Phantasm. Plus, the price is right. Yes, I subscribe and I own all the issues published so far. Someday they will be worth their weight in dwarves. "Dwarves?" you say. Yes, dwarves.

http://www.garrisonent.com/sentinel

THE SENTINEL
Richard Elkin
726 N. Guyer St.
Hobart, IN 46342

Four issue subscriptions are only $6 check or m.o. made out to Richard Elkin. Individual back issues 1-4 are $1.25 and back issues 5-present are $1.50 each. As of this writing, six issues have been published.

Finally, if you want to construct your own gelatin lenses, visit this abode and request a catalog:

http://www.edsci.com/consumer/index.html

Tell them all the Cyclopean Orm sent you. And if you are nice to Richard Elkin, MAYBE The Sentinel will arrive in your mailbox and not your third eye.

And The Blue Rubber Rabbit says: "Phase four complete. Behold, I was entombed in the Search Light, yet, I WAS NOT DEAD."

Copyright 1998, Cyclopean Orm