There was a crooked man, and he walked a crooked mile, He found a crooked sixpence against a crooked stile; He bought a crooked cat which caught a crooked mouse, And they all lived together in a little crooked house.
Welcome back to the mountain trail, Cromrades! We were just about to get dinner started - a little tin of sardines, some saltine crackers, and a big bottle of homebrew, you know... trail food. All of a sudden, this big red feller come runnin' up the trail. Seemed to be in a hurry, so we let him pass. We figured we'd catch up with him, sooner or later. What's that? You know him? He looked a lot like this...
This week we're diving into The Crooked Man by Mike Mignola, with art by Richard Corben, originally published from July through September, 2008. Hellboy has a lot in common with John the Balladeer, and we think you'll agree, and this story is heavily influenced by Manly Wade Wellman's mountain wanderer. If you haven't read this, you owe it to yourself to check it out. The best way to pick it up these days might be in the Hellboy: The Complete Short Stories omnibus.
The villainous Crooked Man is brought to horrifying life by the artistic talents of Richard Corben. He's a visually striking character, and we could easily imagine him going up against Silver John.
Josh mentioned some literature about witch balls. Check it out here: Sympathetic Magic in the Kentucky Mountains: Some Curious Folk-Survivals
One Things
Luke: Philip K. Dick Energy - Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said, and A Scanner Darkly
Next time - we go to the movies to watch the Cohen brothers classic, O Brother, Where Art Thou? It's bonafide!
Questions? Comments? Curses?
Email us! (thecromcast at gmail dot com)
You know you want to follow us on Twitter!Did you know that we're on Facebook?
We're posting photos on the Instagrams!
Subscribe to our feed on FeedBurner!
Or, check us out on iTunes!
We're also on Stitcher Radio and Google Play!
Finally.... Call us! (859) 429-CROM!
Legal Mumbo-Jumbo
Our episode is freely available on archive.org and is licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ Themes by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0.
Outro: "Crooked Man" by Those Poor Bastards. Music was obtained legally; we hope our discussion of this content makes you want to go out and purchase the work!