All posts by Nimue Brown

Hopeless Film

Dr Abbey casts a spell

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In the summer of 2019, Dr Abbey Masahiro was at the big steampunk gathering in Lincoln. For a whole host of reasons, we weren’t. Tom had one of his moments (not unlike the stuff he gets up to on Facebook) and arranged to get a copy to Dr Abbey via the fabulous Lyssa Lopez Wain (who we later killed in this blog post).

Much to our delight, Dr Abbey was rather taken with Hopeless, Maine and started talking to us about what we do, and might do. The film project had been languishing on a back burner for some time at this point because none of us knew how to proceed.

As luck would have it, cameraman Gregg O’Neill was at an event with Dr Abbey a few weeks later and it gave them a chance to talk about all things film. There was a conversation about the Blind Fisherman project. Then, later in autumn, Dr Abbey took some Hopeless Maine posters and books to the Tokyo Film Festival to see if there might be a potential market for us. People involved with film festivals around the world had a look at us, and the response was positive.

It lit a fire under us, simply. Dr Abbey cast a spell on the project and we knew we were willing to invest a lot more energy and resources to make it work. The whole tone of the conversation changed, from largely daydreaming to entirely serious. We started thinking a lot more seriously about what and who would be needed to make it work, and everything stepped up a gear.

Art of the island

The Hopeless Maine Scientific Society

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Those of you who followed the kickstarter obituaries last autumn may have noticed the presence of The Hopeless Maine Scientific Society. Membership of this organisation is generally a death sentence, and this picture, of the four key members, gives you some sense as to why!

This is a two page spread from the next Hopeless Maine graphic novel, and like most of our two page spreads it has nothing to do with the rest of the story. It is a peek into island life. What we’re doing in addition with these two page spreads, is to feature actual people who have played a key role in the Hopeless Maine project. And while these dodgy scientists may be the kiss of death on the fictional island, in real life they are hugely important to us.

Going left to right…

The young man setting fire to the tablecloth is my son and heir, James Weaselgrease (his steampunk name, not his real name). James is central to our song-based performances, and this is his second time in a comic. If you look closely, there’s a much younger him on a two page spread in The Gathering.

The gentleman holding the tablecloth is Robin Treefellow Collins, who is responsible for the hairy coffee, and who has written a number of ‘Daphne’ stories for this blog.

Next up, a justifiably worried Keith of Mystery, aka Keith Errington, who is responsible for Hopeless Maine prose novel The Oddatsea and without whom we would never have managed a kickstarter. He is an organisational force to reckon with. He’s also performed with us, and is responsible for the Hopeless Maine Home Companion, without which there would never have been a Spidermilk Biscuit song!

Finally, breaking the fourth wall to stare at you from the right of the image, is Keith Healing (whose title I won’t mention as he didn’t get the most dignified nickname). Keith is responsible for the Hopeless Maine roleplay game – an epic attempt at taking the madness of Hopeless and turning it into a coherent and playable system without sacrificing anything much of the magic and mystery.

Hopeless Film

What Tom does on Facebook

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Some of the most important developments in the Hopeless Maine project as a whole have been due to what Tom does on Facebook. It shouldn’t work, and yet somehow, it does. I put it down to how alluring he is. I say this based on having been entirely lured, back before Facebook existed, when Tom was in the habit of doing his thing in yahoo groups.

Having decided that a Hopeless Maine silent movie would be a cool thing, Tom posted on Facebook to see who wanted to make that happen. I don’t think there are many people for whom this would be a viable way of developing a project, but there it is, this is his super-power.

In a very short time frame, two key people stepped up to say that yes, they would be up for that.

One was Gregg McNeil – who I have blogged about here. https://druidlife.wordpress.com/2020/01/04/the-glorious-work-of-gregg-mcneil/ we met him through Steampunk events, and were smitten with his tintype photography. Gregg knows about period film and cameras and was keen to get involved.

The other person to step forward was Walter Sickert, of the Army of Broken Toys, offering to do the soundtrack. We love Walter’s work. Further, this is someone with experience doing scores. It’s Walter’s music that you hear in the background to this video –

A vote of confidence from two people who know what they’re doing far better than we do. It was a powerful moment. It took us from ‘this is a lovely idea’ to ‘this could work’. We started talking to each other a lot more seriously, and Tom spent a lot of time talking to Gregg. It was around this point that we realised a hand wound camera would be the heart of the project. This would be our key magical item, moving forward. All we had to do was find one that works…

Hopeless Music

Shipwrecking on Hopeless, Maine

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The fog by night is darker, deeper, shrouding everything. No stars shine through, no moonlight glimmers. All sounds are muted, colours dim, here is no hope here. No hope at all. Only cold and damp malevolence.

On the mist shrouded, grave dark sea, a boat shatters its hull against the malice of rocks. Hungry water sucks the living down, until only one remains, kept afloat by a large tea chest and drifting towards dawn and the shore.

James Weaselgrease shipwrecks on the shores of Hopeless, Maine. A man of science, he is in no way prepared to deal with all the folklore and songs of the supernatural. He’s even less prepared for the island’s ghosts, and other uncanny residents!

We’re shipwrecking at Festival at the Edge this summer, all being well, with a new Hopeless Maine project and an hour long performance. More about the festival here – https://www.festivalattheedge.org/

Hopeless Film

Monsters, Matt and Muppets

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We met Matt Inkel at Asylum in Lincoln back in 2018. He was sporting a fetching Steampunk Ghostbusters backpack of his own making, and we got chatting about what he does as a maker with his Arcane Armoury hat on. This was just after we’d started looking at old, silent films, so the timing was perfect.

After the event, Tom and Matt continued chatting online. He expressed an interest in making Hopeless Maine stuff and this led us to the Salamandra’s Key project – Matt made a version of the key Salamandra has in The Gathering. You can find out more about that over here – https://hopelessvendetta.wordpress.com/2019/01/04/salamandras-key/

One of his keys ended up in the award winning Case of Good Fortune – and more of that story over here should you feel so moved. https://hopelessvendetta.wordpress.com/2019/07/19/the-case-of-good-fortune/

One of the things Tom and Matt have in common, is a love of Jim Henson. Hence me sneaking muppets into the title! Matt talked about his experience with Jim Henson’s creature workshop and how cool a Hopeless Maine film would be. Tom of course had a series of muppet-moments.

At this stage it was just a bit of shared daydreaming. The kind of conversation where you go ‘wouldn’t it be lovely if…’ But, this is often where serious projects come from – those idle speculations that at first seem too preposterous to take seriously. And so you keep playing with them because it’s just messing about, and before you know it you’ve set your heart on a Hopeless Maine silent film with puppets and live action.

And so it was that Matt Inkel joined the film project before there even was a film project. He will be making puppets of some of the island creatures, and of course the sea monster whose fight with The Blind Fisherman is a key part of this little story.

You can find Matt Inkel’s Arcane Armoury on Etsy – https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ArcaneArmoury

Births, Deaths, Marriages

Mister Adams probably died last year

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How long Mister Adams has been dead, no one is entirely sure. His haunted house attraction was without a doubt the least popular commercial enterprise the island has ever seen, and as no one visited it for months, his body has remained there, unremarked for an embarrassingly long period of time.

I don’t think any of us truly understood why Mister Adams felt the need to build a haunted house attraction. It’s not like we’re short of actual haunted houses. He put a startling amount of work into creating from scratch the kind of creepy, mouldering environment that occurs naturally all over the island.

The only known visitor to the Haunted House was Weevil Chevin, who said “It was great, it was just like my old gran’s house before she went mad and burned it down.”

It was Weevil who found the body, having gone back for a second visit. He thoughtfully removed Mister Adams from the property and summoned Doc Willoughby, who is quoted as saying, “I don’t know why you bothered, you don’t need a trained professional to see that this man has been dead for quite some time.”

Weevil told me that what impressed him most on his second visit, was how the bloody handprints on the wall still looked fresh and were damp to the touch. “Tasted like blood and all. Dead impressive.”

 

(This death is a nod to the work the real life Mister Adams did for the This House is Not Haunted video, and is a belated addition to last year’s obituaries. We’re sorry it took so long to find his body!)

Hopeless Film

Cat, Greta and Hopeless

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What prompted us to think that making a Hopeless Maine black and white filmA Hopeless Film was a good idea? Let me tell you a story…

It started at Pagan Pride in Nottingham, in the summer of 2018. We stayed with Cat Treadwell, which was a wonderful thing to get to do. She was having a bit of a clear out, and we came home with a box set of Greta Garbo DVDs.

My maternal grandmother was a great fan of Greta Garbo, so this had pushed some nostalgia buttons for me. Garbo was one of the few actors to make the transition from silent films to talkies, and some of the films in the box set were silent.

Watching these films together, Tom and I were struck by the technical similarities between comics and silent films. There’s less space for text in a silent film, making the interplay between what’s done as an image and what is words closer to comics than to modern film, I reckon. Facial expressions are super-important in both forms, and often more stylised than naturalistic.

We spent a lot of time talking about all of this, initially just because it interested both of us. We were wondering what we could learn from silent films that would help us as comics creators. Somewhere in those conversations, Tom said something to the effect that he thought The Blind Fisherman would make an excellent black and white silent movie in the style of these period pieces. I agreed, and at the time that seemed to be the whole of it.

But of course it wasn’t.

So we feel it is entirely reasonable to hold Cat Treadwell responsible for being the catalyst that started this whole idea. You can find Cat’s Hopeless Maine story here – https://hopelessvendetta.wordpress.com/2018/06/22/threads/

And find Cat here – https://druidcat.wordpress.com/

 

Island News, Lonely Hearts

Hopeless Lonely Hearts

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With Valentine’s Day safely behind us, it is time for those less fortunate in love to creep out of the shadows, at least for long enough to wave a hopeful tentacle. We’ve had some great submissions, names of the wonderful, infamous people who sent each contribution are in brackets – if you don’t know them, look them up!

 

If you’d like an option on responding to future things of this ilk, follow us on facebook or twitter.

 

And now, without further ado, onto the latest from the Hopeless Maine Lonely Hearts column….

Travel writer/warlock seeks companion for walks on beach, reading sessions and constant reassurance that the little green abomination with a lisp sitting on her shoulder is real and she’s not going insane oh gods why won’t it go away why why. Non smoker preferred.

(Francesca Dare)

 

Lonely mortician seeks introvert for quiet nights in, surgical practice and possibly more. GSOH and own surgical kit a must!

(Charles Cutting)

 

Melancholic poet seeks occult practitioner for stargazing and beachcombing. Romantic aspirations and love of dustcats a must.

(Craig Hallam)

 

Priestess seeks Worshippers. Bring appropriate offerings to the waterfront at the rise of the Full Moon. Next of Kin details required.

(Cat Treadwell)

 

Man, 45 GSOH seeks woman/man/cyborg for long walks in the attic, light animal experimentation and occasional explosions. LIKES: orang-utans, tannin, occasional explosions. DISLIKES: Coffee, men with banjos and/or moustaches.

(Professor Elemental)

 

Indian exch. witch offers Walpurgisnacht carpet pool York – Harz Mountains. Imperial Persian carpet, 12 places. Departs: York Minster Central Tower 28/04. 1st come, 1st serve. Contact Aaliyah Baba, scry/orb, open astral channel btw 12.00-01.00. Fee: Soul Secrets, Lover’s Vows.

(Suna Dasi)

 

Mild mannered maniac seeking companionship, 1969 vintage, original body (with modifications), full service history, test drive advised. NO TIRE KICKERS. The ideal candidate would need large bumpers or airbags, and go from 0-60 in less than 8 seconds.

(Ian Crichton)

 

Perfectly Normal But Lonely Single F, 40 y.o but with the body of 18 y.o.[stored safely in the freezer], own transport, seeks like-minded individual for good times, long book shop visits and romantic Staring Into The Void. Living preferred but vital status negotiable for right person. Must look good in riding boots and share sense of pedantry. No slime wasters.

(JJ Bannister)

 

Mature gentleman with GSOH and both original hips seeks very patient companion for experiments in unwearable clothing. Human preferred but some exotic ancestry not necessarily a problem. Must be warm blooded and breath air. No fish.

(Nimrod)

Hopeless Film

The Blind Fisherman

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The Blind Fisherman is a sequence of illustrations and poems that you can currently find at the front of Hopeless Maine, The Gathering.

Before we get any further, I’d like to mention that the fisherman in question matches the legal definition of ‘blind’ in that he has significant sight impairment, not total blindness. This is most usually the way of it. Some of the things he does in the sequence have a magical component to them which is why he binds his eyes – it’s just better not to be distracted by looking.

This sequence began life the autumn we launched Hopeless Maine as a webcomic (back when we were itisacircle.com). We’d started this Hopeless Vendetta site already while we were waiting for technical stuff on the webcomic. Tom wanted to launch with something a bit special, and also he is slightly masochistic, so he did this series of images telling a story. At the last minute he realised he wanted an extra image and sat up all night just before the webcomic launch! Not something I can recommend, but we weren’t living together then so getting him to go to bed was a good deal more difficult.

The words followed the images. I was painfully inexperienced around comics at this point, and working with a forgiving webcomic format, not the harsh realities of the printed page. If I was doing it now, I would be thinking from the start about how the words might fit and be big enough that a middle aged person like myself might be able to read them! One of the pieces in the set pre-dates the art, and was written as a song in my late teens. It was such an uncanny match that I felt I’d been moving this way all along.

The Blind Fisherman wasn’t in the Archaia editions, but Nick at Sloth was happy to give it a home when Personal Demons and Inheritance combined to be a single volume. It also meant we had something extra in there, which felt good. So at that point, that we had got an eccentric combination of art and words into the front of a fat comic was the extent of our aspirations.

Tune in next week for another instalment as I try and explain the curious journey of going from this initial body of work, to making a film.

Uncategorized

Upon arrival in Hopeless

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From

The ongoing works of Algernon Lear

(and Pulvis)

(Really Craig Hallam)

 

Upon arrival in Hopeless

 

A veil of mist covers the screaming shore,

smoke pouring into a drowning maw.

A sea of green glass

laced with antique foam

rattles the bones of the beach.

 

The sea tastes the shore and the beach bites back,

splintering hulls and breaking backs.

Hopeless’ dark beauty

looms like a threat,

and a dream sweat prickles the skin.

 

Crawling from the surf to clandestine shore,

paying forth the brine from our lungs,

the island gifts rotten breath,

we arrive in debt

to a ledger writ in abyssal hand.