The Night Has Teeth

Dracula.

If there were just one word to sum up the concept of 'evil', it would likely be Dracula.

In the pantheon of western literature's best and brightest villains, Dracula sits high on some dark Olympus, if not at the apex, then comfortably close. Barely on screen in Bram Stoker's eponymous novel for more than a few chapters, nonetheless it is Dracula who drives the book. It is Dracula who drives the films which bear his name, who drives the action in every appearance.

He's the sort of antagonist that brings out the best in a hero, which may account some for his popularity. He's all of humanity's fears and hates and loathings rolled up into one handy package. He embodies themes as varied as cannibalism, rampant sexuality, the 'other' and the fear of death and the dead, as well as more esoteric concepts (the Faustian bargain, necromancy, plague, taboo animals, etc.).

But is that all there is to it? Just some smelly themes and subconscious symbolism?

No. Dracula is the outsider, always scratching at our door, looking for a way in. The thing at the back of the cave, or waiting in the forest. The omnipresent Night, with teeth. The themes and symbols which trail after him like a cloak are but manifestations of his ultimate identity-that of the Thing That Scares Us.

It's why we go back to him, again and again, much as his victims did. We invite him in, even knowing what he is, foul breath and all. We invite him in with books and films and plays and all variety of entertainments, pitting him against ourselves and our archetypes (Dracula Vs. Sherlock Holmes, Dracula Vs. Billy the Kid, Dracula Vs. Superman, etc.), destroying him again and again, but like the Night, he always returns. We mock him in cartoons and commercials, we make him into comic books and video-games, but the savagery never diminishes, the fear never entirely goes away.

It's the fear that we can't do without. The terror of being hunted. We can't forget it, even with all of evolution at our back, with our science and religion and civilization. Some part of us always remembers the cave, and thing that we saw there, waiting to pounce out of the darkness.

We can't get rid of him, just like we can't rid ourselves of the atavistic fears handed down by our primordial ancestors. No matter how much we try to dislodge him, to remake him or remold him, Dracula clings to us, he is in the back of our head. In our blood.

*Edited to add-if you're interested in seeing more about my thoughts on Dracula check out DRACULA MONTH on my blog*

Fiend Without A Face

"Fantomas."

"What did you say?"

"I said: Fantomas."

"And what does that mean?"

"Nothing...Everything!"

"But what is it?"

"No one...And yet, it is someone!"

"And what does this someone do?"

"Spreads TERROR!"

-Fantomas, 1911

Fantomas, the Lord of Terror, the Genius of Evil. Whatever his name, he (or she) is the ultimate archetype of villainy. No crime is too small, no act too depraved for Fantomas to contemplate, to undertake, to accomplish. He made it his mission to destroy the fabric of society for no other reason than that he could.

Put simply, Fantomas is the first super-villain. Born at the dawn of the Twentieth Century, on the eve of the bloodiest conflict the world has ever seen, Fantomas sprang fully formed into a world teetering on the edge of madness. To say that he did his best to push it over said edge is an understatement.

"He is totally ruthless, gives no mercy, and is loyal to none, not even his own children. He is a master of disguise, always appearing under an assumed identity, often that of a person whom he has murdered. Fantômas makes use of bizarre and improbable techniques in his crimes, such as plague-infested rats, giant snakes, and rooms that fill with sand."

Criminals like Professor Moriarty or Fu Manchu dominated the previous century, spinning Byzantine schemes and matching wits opponents of equal determination, if not skill. Fantomas' opponents could only scramble to keep up. His schemes were chaotic things, not the precision instruments of his antecedents, but rather a form of madness only recognizable after the fact.

His crimes were outrageous, daring and avant-garde...plague-infested rats released on an ocean liner, sulphuric acid hidden in the perfume dispensers of a famous Parisian department store, or the stripping of the gilded gold from the roof of the Invalides Dome each evening; a man hung by his feet inside a cathedral bell like a human clapper, raining blood, brains and bone down on the masses below, and forcing a judge to witness his own execution by placing him face-up in a guillotine.

Fantomas was everyone and no-one, everywhere and nowhere. A man, a woman, a devil...a phantom. He wielded an army of street-apaches, spies and saboteurs in a calculated effort to spread fear and terror across Europe and the world. There was no purpose to this, save that it was Fantomas' will that it be done. He was a satanic hurricane, a typhoon of terror, a nightmare without end.

In his wake came a host of imitators and disciples...Satanik, Diabolik, Kriminal, Demoniak, Sadik among others, though none would ever rival the first and most mysterious master of menace...FANTOMAS.

The Napoleon of Crime

There's an inherent, primordial viciousness to Professor James Moriarty that many of the names you'll see on this blog lack. Whether that's due to the cold-blooded, reptilian nature of the character himself, or to the circumstances of his creation is up for debate.

Moriarty was created to kill. Both literally, and figuratively. Created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in 1893, the good Professor was a literary bullet aimed at the fictional heart of Sherlock Holmes by his creator. There's a sort of sleekness about him, crafted as he was to be the dark mirror of Holmes, an insinuating sort of presence-we know who Moriarty is, because he is the reflection of Holmes. He possesses an implacable intelligence that we, as the reader, only understand as an afterthought. Deus ex Machina in a tailored suit and top-hat.

An evil genius with a criminal strain in his blood, his mental faculties rivalling or, indeed, exceeding those of Holmes and his brother, Mycroft, Moriarty was the emperor of the London underworld-a calculating Caligula, a soulless thing of cogs and gears and ruthless appetites. Where Sherlock Holmes is the World's Greatest Detective, Professor Moriarty is the World's Greatest Criminal. The perfect foil, the perfect executioner for a character that had taken on a life of his own, almost separate from that of his creator.

Too, for a character who lacked even the benefit of an on-stage canonical appearance (true, read The Final Problem...Moriarty only pops up in Holmes' hurried explanation to Watson), Moriarty has had an impact reminiscent of one of those heavenly bodies he supposedly theorized about in The Dynamics of an Asteroid. He's the phantom that haunts Conan Doyle's opera house, trailing his shadow across the life of Sherlock Holmes and causing it to wither, even after his primary purpose had been fulfilled.

After Holmes' miraculous return in The Adventure of the Empty House, he was never the same. Still the Great Detective, but somehow lessened, as if the memory of Moriarty's near-victory had a vampiric effect on Holmes' abilities. There are a number of further stories where the spectre of Moriarty haunts Holmes as he grapples with difficult cases, including His Last Bow, the final story in the official canon. The Professor even managed to worm his way retroactively into The Valley of Fear.

Then, consider the influence Moriarty has had on pop culture-eerily reminiscent of that of his enemy, dogging his footsteps beyond the boundaries of canon even as he trailed him across Europe. He has appeared in countless pastiches, sometimes facing his old foe, other times occupying the limelight alone (John Gardner's Moriarty novels, for instance). He has made appearances in films and various other media. He has locked horns with other malevolent figures, including Fu Manchu and Dracula (both of whom also fought Holmes and neither of whom came as close to destroying the Detective as Moriarty himself). Whatever media Holmes conquers, Moriarty is there, slinking through the back door, inflicting himself on the unsuspecting.

It could be said that Conan Doyle, desperate to kill one egregore, unleashed a second, even more sinister one. Desperate to eradicate the ultimate hero, he crafted the ultimate villain, and one thing that villains are good at is cheating death. Moriarty, created to kill Holmes and then fade away like a bad dream, clung stubbornly to life, thrusting himself into the public consciousness via the very act that was supposed to bring about his destruction. And like Holmes, he has flourished in the aftermath, albeit in a more subtle fashion.

Appropriate for such a shadowy figure, don't you think?

BOB

Established in suburbia as only Twin Peaks creator David Lynch could, through the close up screams of a grieving housewife and mother, and a static shot of staircase and swirling fan, Lynch cuts into dead prom queen Laura Palmer’s perfect all American bedroom. Once inside, the first glimpse of BOB is visible as seen in the mothers’ vision. He is the quintessential demon and/or drifter serial killer. Grinning, unshaven, clad in dirty denim, and with long flowing wolflike silver hair, BOB peers through the bars of the dead girls bed. The deep symbolism of this introductory shot, being ‘trapped’ in the mirror and enjoying a voyeuristic view through the bars of the teenager’s bed, became intrinsic and central to what was to be later revealed about BOB.

Psychotic strobe visions, deep red dreams and childhood memories seemed to be the only places that BOB could be found, whilst back on the physical plane his presence was dismissed for lack of real evidence. That was until the appearance of a one armed traveling shoe salesman named MIKE.

Peddling his ‘Circle Brand’ boots to the town, the smiling salesman at first seemed like simply a humorous homage to the villain in the old television serial, The Fugitive. Once again, Lynch used this to lower the audience’s guard, and make MIKE a terrifying gateway to learn more about BOB.

Without his mix of schizophrenic depressing drugs, MIKE sweats out the story that he is an ageless evil spirit who had an golden epiphany, finding the light of God. Unfortunately his former partner and familiar, BOB, did not experience it. MIKE also revealed that he was inhabiting the body of the salesman to find his old killin’ partner from the road, and stop him.

Lynch’s use of a familiar as the supernatural villain is an unique one. Many websites and fan literature describe BOB as a demonic entity possessing the physical murderer of Laura, her secretly abusive father, Leland. Some elements of the show do support this theory, see BOB’s confession in the police station basement. With shadows of classic demonic exorcism evidence, the usual flailing against the restraints, total possession of the host, playful teasing of the ‘exorcists’ that turns to unholy taunting, violence, and knowledge of evil events that it was not witness too, the show does present a case for demonic possession. But overall, Lynch and co present BOB as a familiar, an animal that aids with the tasks of the witch or the unholy. In this case the animal is an owl. However, unlike demonic possession, followers of the Catholic Church believe that a spiritual familiar is capable of overtaking the personality rather than the body of its host. This is supported by Leland’s ability to quite capably function and maintain his well groomed appearance as both a lawyer and pillar within society whilst possessed by BOB, until it takes over his will for short periods of madness.

After forty years of symbiosis, BOB eventually bloodily escapes the confines of Leland when he has had his fill of the man’s life and soul. In Leland’s final moments on earth, the show’s protagonists learn that BOB first appeared to Leland whilst he was staying at his childhood holiday home in the woods. This could be interpreted as either a metaphor, or literal account of, abuse, or simply that the spirit had found a new home. In his last act to decimate the soul of the man, BOB unloads all of the evil events that he has made Leland commit, and repress, into his mind. Again, whether this is a metaphor for the last act of conscience a dying man faces for a lifetime of sins, or a literal act, the evil nature of BOB managed to have one last slice of fun before breaking free and temporarily returning back to his wooded home. Soon, he finds another host with which to start the cycle again…

In the aftermath of the horrific events, as the witnesses to BOB’s ‘appearance’ discuss what has transpired, some find it too unbelievable to stomach. Cynical FBI man Albert Rosenfeld, taking the stance of both science and government, believes that whether he really existed or not that BOB may have just been a physical culmination of the evil within the world? This question is one that Lynch presents to the audience throughout the show. One which he only ambiguously answers.

Lynch attributes the casting of BOB to a ‘happy accident’, that set dresser Frank Silva was simply captured in shot whilst the bedroom was being filmed. Unfortunately, Silva died in 1995 due to AIDS. Besides working as a set designer on many Lynch productions, his only other non-Twin Peaks acting role was in the Anthrax video, Only. An appropriate final rockin’ appearance for the spirit of small town evil.