My Holiday in Depravity

So I'm staggering through Embankment station with this kind of breezy drunken arrogance that people staring at me probably don't think I deserve, sniffing condescendingly at tourists trying to work out where the surprise chocolate comes out of the oyster card and slapping mine on the reader nonchalantly.  It doesn't work because I overcompensated how simple and inconsequential this task is so the reader doesn't actually get to read it.  My mask slips a bit and instead of laughing out my embarassment I choose to huff at the indignation of it all.  How dare the world around me not bend over backwards to uphold my uselessness as a human being?  The person the commuters would be seeing if they didn't all have frustrated tunnel-vision is not embarassed.  Londoners don't get embarassed, what could possibly ever be embarassing when you're the most important person in the world?
There's a massive hole in the crotch of my favourite jeans, not because I can't afford a new pair but because the idea of taking ten minutes out of my eventless day to stroll through a clothes shop sickens me so I'm playing chicken with the ever growing hole until I can put it off no longer.  If I were to be honest with myself I think these jeans passed the public decency threshold several weeks ago.  I'm sitting open-legged on the District line and the timid young Italian couple opposite me don't know where to look.  I'd have thought anywhere other than my cock would be the obvious answer... I shouldn't have worn baggy boxer shorts I guess, but I tell you this denim cock-hole has been a dream come true during the recent heat wave.
That period where you're already a bit drunk but are an undisclosed length of time away from being able to get another drink is quite nauseating.  Sobering up prematurely has a sort of knock-on effect on the rest of the evening.  I sometimes get this stinging sensation around the jaw when this happens, and the next pint doesn't go down too well but the one after that does.  How long is this journey anyway?  I never take any notice, instead I just tend to call it half an hour.  Central London to anywhere by tube is half an hour, flat out.
When I stand up I reach down and fumble around to make sure nothing's escaping the denim cock-hole (I wish) and stroll out of the dreary zone two station into the blinding light, which does no favours for my weird non-sober pre beer hangover thing.
'There's a five pound minimum to pay with a debit card'
'Alright then I'll pay for two and have the other one in a minute'
What is the minimum age for a man to sit in a pub by himself and not look strange?  It isn't twenty-five, but I've got friends on their way and I have a problem with punctuality; I'm always on time.  My jaw is stinging through renewed activity (I think next time I'll just sing on the tube to keep my jaw exercised.  Fuck you Boris, fuck you and your drinking ban.  Reckon tourists will be less freaked out by a 25-year old Harry Potter lookalike singing Abba songs to the ceiling of the tube train?) and as predicted this beer is not going down well but my headache is going away.  See I haven't had much sleep because I went out last night, got back home to the intrusive sound of birdsong and started work at 8.00am.  Then I had a beer when I finished and instead of killing a pointless two hours in my room where I would have let the last few days catch up with me and dozed off, being then too lethargic to go out again, I just carried on.  Jaegerbombs are like espressos anyway, surely?  Then I haven't really had time to eat, so everything I have to drink is taking no detour en route to my brain.  So am I already steaming pissed or just drowsy?  I need to up my race with the limits of my body. 
'Two jaegerbombs please'
'Two?'
'The other one's for my friend when he gets here, and there's a five pound card limit?  Oh and I'll have that other pint as well.'
The art of 'going to the fucking cashpoint before you walk into a pub' is dead.  Is the minimum spend requirement a half-arsed attempt at discouraging card transactions or is it the complete opposite of that; embracing the plastic revolution and capitalising on it?  Yes, actual cash is dead, but you're going to pay through the fucking nose if you want to latch on to this bandwagon, sunshine.
My friend turns up, finally (I'm trying to turn a drunken blur into prose so forgive the sparse characterisation.  Anyone reading this who thinks they were there can pretend its them, if they want).  We neck our jaegerbombs.
'How long have you been here?'
'20 minutes or so'
'And you're already drunk?'
A dismissive gesture and slurred grunt tell him that I started early.  Anyway, I'm not like those gassy old alcoholics that I quietly deride from the other end of the pub, I'm young and I'm, like, a vegetarian and, um I don't smoke and I'm an artist so its okay when I do it.
The rest is like greasy hands violently smearing themselves across my face so I lose sight and wave frantically to shrug my weird attacker away to no avail, they keep rubbing my face and laughing and it fucking hurts.  Everything I should be able to see is a stretched blur behind the hard-pressing, coarse fingers.  I lose balance and direction and when they finally tire of this pointless abuse I just want to trip dizzily to a barstool and dangle my drunken, bloated face over the bar, daydreaming about putting my penis in things that it doesn't belong in and burping annoyed, pissed-up cliches at nobody who will listen.  This is all fiction as far as I'm concerned, trying to remember it is no easier than writing something new so I will (and already have) dip in and out of actual fact and make things up when necessary.  Semi-fictionalising my life is decent compensation for having no ideas of my own and still looking like I deserve to be a writer.  Maybe I'll change my character's name to Jim or something.  There.  Now it's an original story.
So Jim spends the rest of the night going 'AH LAV THIS SHONG' and dancing like a traumatised grandparent at someone's wedding.  The last pint is always redundant in this state.  Jim has two warm, flat sips and won't even remember it, and it sits on the bar for an hour until the uncertain bartender plucks up the courage to just get rid of it.  Jim doesn't care.
Awkwardly swirling colours that don't appear to show any gradient of change yet change nonetheless dance and quiver around what was Jim as an incomprehensible barrage of unlinked thoughts divorced from any context pound on his functionless brain.  Why does he manage to remain so articulate in his ill-advised texts and facebook rants when he can't even perceive whether the person in front of him is friend, stranger or reflection?  Thoughts of treacle-like blood oozing from the bottom of a black boot as it is lifted from the crumpled skull of the former man beneath it.  Sharpened fingers piercing eyeballs like cellophane and clawing away at the fractured bone outlines of the seeping eye sockets.  The spiral goes progressively more chaotic and the thoughts mesh and distort until nothing more than smears of red and stifled screams curdle in Jim's mind.  He is a werewolf and the very poison that will thump his brain with every uttered syllable next morning is his moon.  He wants to smash bones and twist necks, swipe at jaws with blunt objects and slash at throats, stamp out genitalia with steel toe caps and spit blood on the twitiching remains.  Or dance some more.
Jim groans back into consciousness in a house that's further away from last night's venue than his own, but a drunk man loses grasp on his perception of finality and at the time there was no end of the night.  If the pub closes then there is the nightclub.  When that shuts there is a willing friend's studio flat.  When they sleep there's that last sip of whiskey and flat coke and if you're still awake beyond that then you truly are a monster.
After self-deprecating, pseudo-intellectual and pointlessly metaphorical reflections on a night nobody can remember, Jim bundles out into the afternoon rain, clutching his thin layers against his shaking skin and whimpering pathetically over his thumping head.  He darts about confusedly trying to remember the way to a tube station and eventually comforts himself with the theory that there is always one around the corner.  There is.  He feels biting cold around the groin and realises that the worn hole in the neglected jeans is now gaping, his bits flapping freely under his thin boxers.  Probably all that dancing.  He takes the tube journey back, now entertaining guilt, pain and regret in replacement of excitement and arrogance.  His entire week has been like this.  Jim breaks into a cold sweat as he remembers his drunken tendency to compound his deep-set, bitter thoughts through facebook on his smart phone.  It will be the better part of half an hour before he has any signal.  He will just have to stew in dread until then.
DELETE.
DELETE.
That one's quite funny and two friends have already liked it anyway.
DELETE.
I was sober when I wrote that, all is good.
Finally Jim gets to crawl into his own bed, sweating poisonous alcohol into his unwashed sheets and staring at whatever ugly-sounding American crap is glowing out of his TV.  But he has to be at work in an hour and preparing to spend the next nine hours convincing people he is a fully-functioning human is only worsening his hangover, thus making the impending task all the more challenging.  Fucking recursion.
He tells himself that 'I'll stay home tomorrow', watch TV or read that book he started four cunting weeks ago.  It's not even that long.  'You are an inarticulate, uncultured prick making vain attempts to look clever and convince yourself you're not interested in the same mundane shit every other cunt is into' he tells himself as he stares at the neglected volume at his bedside.  He wants to spend just one day recuperating and allow himself to be reminded that he is human, just go for a walk, sit down, stay off drink for one day.  What's one day?  Even the severest pissheads in the world can manage 24 fucking hours without a beer.  Are you worse than them?  But he gets a more interesting offer.  Time and time again.  Best friend is coming home from abroad!  Can't miss that shitfest!  Offered a last minute gig?  That rarely happens these days, take advantage!  So he's back at that godforsaken oyster card reader sidling through the gates of sensibility into a lashing rift of depravity and mindlessness.
Its easy to comfort oneself with bollocks reasoning when one is a degenerate fuckhead alcoholic.  'I have to keep doing this' thinks Jim.  'If I stop then I allow myself time to reflect on how despicable the world is.  Humans are cunts and if I drink enough I can periodically forget that I am one.  90% of the casualties in Iraq are civilians and yet we set up a second charity to help the gun-toting bastards that are killing them.  Strangers make snap judgements about me on the street and feel compelled to shout them at me as I pass.  When I'm in company I'm not familiar with I either lash out, grumble snide remarks that undercut their hollow philosophies or just leave.  And between leaving and getting home the overwhelming beckon of self-destruction proves near-irresistable.  There are plenty of high platforms and fast vehicles.  Why don't I just do it now?  Or I stay and rip into people.'  A drunken run in with a lost stranger, a fellow binge drinker, ended ugly this time.
'YOU'RE A FUCKING STUPID CUNT' (him)
He's ugly and his clothes are shit but I never reach for easy targets.  He seemed like a nice bloke before (even though right now I want to grab him by the jaws and tear his head open at the mouth) and I don't want to contribute to any lasting self-esteem issues.  I have no qualms with calling him a prick, because he probably isn't one therefore it shouldn't cut too deeply.
'STOP LAYING INTO MY FRIENDS YOU DULL PRICK' (me)
A previous, similar exchange ended with me hospitalised with a fat eye and a dented skull that I'm yet to have fixed so I drunkenly bow out of this one with drunken conviction in tact.
Next day I dwell on the drama, the fury of it all and the bile rises up in the back of my throat.  I can feel my face turn fire-red and what shreds of hope I may have had for humanity are strewn across the floor like the innards of animal carcasses in a slaughterhouse splashing grimly against the hard stone.  I want to grab the heaviest thing I can find and destroy the second heaviest thing.  Then I receive a text message and I'm saved.  I don't need sleep, the abuse I'm giving my body on a nightly basis has hardened me to fatigue and numbed me to remorse.  I'm leaving my seething brain at the door this time, I'm going to blitz whatever leftover consciousness there is with rivers of alcohol and I don't care how much I'm running my life into the ground.  I want to remove myself from this abomination of a species and I might as well do it through means I enjoy.
Mercy grants me a sunny day (though neglects to omit the arbitrary hangover) and I take some old advice and crawl to the nearest park for a lie down in the shade.  I'm flat on my back under the clear blue sky with my headphones drowning out reality.  Everything is beautiful and I haven't even thought about ducking out for an afternoon pint.  I periodically open my eyes and am greeted by sweltering, sweat-dripping bellies bouncing across the green, children dribbling pink ice cream and snot, tripping over footballs and inhuman shades of tanned, leathery skin shouting things at their equally-cooked mates.  I glance up at a distant plane overhead and despite the serenity I would love for the plane to dip right now and plummet toward me, not soaring gracefully to the ground but defying all physics and right-angling so it hurtles nose-first right into me.  I close my eyes and I can actually see its looming shape, growing by the second until all is darkness and I'm sprayed like shrapnel from a landmine into all corners of this park.
I still haven't replaced those jeans, its getting beyond a joke now.

Death App

A Social Media Epic Tragedy

5th May 2012

3.30pm
Josh Gleeson is Single
4 people like this
    Graham Smythe: Shit mate you alright?
    Kerri BozBoz Boswell: Score! :D  2 likes
    Frank Boyd: Fuck em all and let god pick the right one
    Josh Gleeson: What the hell does that mean?

5.15pm
Graham Smythe: 'What a fucking lovely day.'
2 people like this
    Graham Smythe: All the best to anyone not feeling so lovely.....
    Josh Gleeson Likes This

7th May 2012

8.30pm
Tasmin Troyer: I wish I didn't have to cause so much pain but I mean what I said
    Natasha Smith: Whats up?
    Tasmin Troyer: Personal!
    Josh Gleeson: ..............
    Graham Smythe likes this
    Tasmin Troyer: ??

10.12pm
Josh Gleeson posted a Photo8 people like this
    Harry Parker: You two look awesome together!
    Frank Boyd: .........awkward.......
    Kerri BozBoz Boswell likes this

11th May 2012

2.01pm
Graham Smythe: Bit messed in the head this "morning" after a wicked night with Josh Gleeson and 4 others
4 people like this
    Josh Gleeson: I wasn't there.....
    Graham Smythe: What are you talking about??

2.02pm
Kerri BozBoz Boswell: Sum people need2 lighten up!!! It aint the end of the world!!
16 people like this

5.46pm
Graham Smythe likes David Hargreaves's Page
   Graham Smythe: Who else is up for this??
   Frank Boyd: Shit yeah!

8.35pm
Josh Gleeson: 'I wish I could take a sleeping pill, and sleep at will'
5 people like this
    James Burr: Fucking love the Magnetic Fields...
    Tasmin Troyer: You alright......??

8.42pm
Josh Gleeson: 'I'll dream alone'
    Frank Boyd: Your posting a lot of updates mate...

12th May 2012

7.59pm
Graham Smyth: Got my beer, all set for @David Hargreaves's gig!
    Josh Gleeson: Why are you typing like you're on twitter?
    Graham Smyth: You coming Josh?

13th May 2012

2.07am
David Hargreaves: Last fucking gig I put on for a while... some people cant handle their drink
    Graham Smyth:  I think I know who you're referring to.... you know the situation(?)
    David Hargreaves: No excuse!
    Josh Gleeson likes this

5.12pm
Tasmin Troyer posted on Josh Gleeson's timeline
    Tasmin Troyer:  Why aren't you answering my texts?

6.52pm
Josh Gleeson: I wont find my answers at the bottom of this bottle, I can see the bottom!  Ah well worth a try
7 people like this

7.06pm
Graham Smythe: Being a bit boring after a pretty epic weekend!  TV and stir fry!
2 people like this

8.50pm
Josh Gleeson: What is shit?  Just a piLE of life!
    Graham Smythe:  You feeling alright mate?

10.01pm
Josh Gleeson: It isn't a bare wall I'm looking at, its a relentless, staring void stoicly reminding me that it will never get better.....
    Kerri BozBoz Boswell: Errr... grim!?
    Graham Smythe:  did you get my message?

11.41pm
Josh Gleeson:  So guess I was right about those answers... shoul;d probably sweep up this broken glass
    Tasmin Troyer: Josh please answer your phone

11.51pm
Graham Smythe posted on Tasmin Troyer's timeline
    Graham Smythe: You nearby?
     Tasmin Troyer:  I'm in Cornwall until Wednesday :(
    Graham Smythe:  Never mind.

14th May 2012

1.12am
Josh Gleeson: Goodnight everyone!
4 people like this
    Frank Boyd:  Nighty night Josh!
    Kerri BozBoz Boswell: Finally a cheery one!  Night love x
    Tasmin Troyer: Goodnight xx
    Graham Smythe Goodnight everyone???

1.45am
Graham Smythe posted on Josh Gleeson's timeline
    Graham Smythe:  Josh I'm coming round.

3.27pm
Graham Smythe: I can't quite believe today.  It must be a nightmare.  Please
    Frank Boyd: If its on FB it must be true!!
    Graham Smythe:  Erm.  You haven't heard have you?  I'll PM you

15th May 2012

7.52pm
Graham Smythe and 21 others posted on Josh Gleeson's timeline

Graham Smythe: Rest well mate.  Save me a beer up there, we'll see you one day x

Frank Boyd: RIP Josh.  Still can't believe it :(

David Hargreaves: Goodnight mate x

James Burr: A true legend.  rest in peace

Kerri BozBoz Boswell: Miss you Josh xxx

Natasha Smith: RIP Josh x

Tasmin Troyer: I love you Josh.  I always loved you and I always will.  I hope to heaven that you knew that.  Rest in peace xxxxxxxxx
   Graham Smythe commented on Tasmin Troyer's post.

3D Boom!

FW Murnau's Nosferatu (1922) is to be rereleased in mainstream cinemas this summer, after a full and in depth conversion to 3D. The silent classic, currently available on DVD in a multitude of editions, is said to be a sure draw for mainstream audiences upon its imminent rerelease.

The Weimar director, deceased, said 'This is how we always intended the film to be shown, with Count Orlock's fingers poking out of the screen and such.' The late German film maker justified the inevitable decision, claiming 'how awesome would it be to see all those classic moments; the Vampire's shadow on the wall, Max Shrek in the doorway, but leaping off the screen at you instead of remaining in 3D? I always wanted the technology to be ready for this kind of thing.'

The cutting edge, innovative 3D technology has enjoyed occasional mainstream success throughout the last century, specifically in the 1940s and 1980s. The original Thirteen Ghosts was made in 3D and numerous films and terrestrial TV programmes in the 80s (including episodes of BBC sitcom The Young Ones) were also in 3D. There are fears among some that the current run of successful 3D films is just a phase, and that future generations will be completely baffled by a small subgenre of early 21st century films in which characters inexplicably point things at the camera at random intervals. However, experts maintain that this time round it is not merely a trend, it is a leap forward in visual technology. For example, as a spokesperson for home entertainment company LG states, 'if it was a passing trend do you really think we'd make 3D TVs? Do you really think people would sit in their own living rooms with those stupid glasses on if it were just a trend? This is the future of film and television, just like it should have been in the eighties.'

The rerelease of Nosferatu follows in the wake of other much loved, but previously non-3D classics being wheeled out once again, such as self-professed 'king of the world' James Cameron's fifteen year old Titanic (the real life deaths of hundreds of poor people proving even more hard-hitting in 3D), and the entire Star Wars sextet, including the universally disliked prequal trilogy, which has seldom been out of cinemas since its birth in the late '70s. When director George Lucas was asked why he didn't rerelease his films during the 3D craze in the 80s, he stated he was 'too busy making new films back then.' Since the release of the final Star Wars in 2005, Lucas has retired from having ideas and has instead turned his talents to consistently rereleasing his old films, albeit with minor CGI (now 3D) adjustments to justify ticket prices upwards of £15 to see something most of the target audience can watch at home.

Cameron, set also to rerelease his recent hit Avatar next year in 3D-er, picked up on the potential opportunity for box office success when he realised he could profit massively from tweaking previously-told stories after the release of the aforementioned sci fi hit. 'If you can make money simply by giving Pocahontas a blue tail, then surely you can make even more money by having Kate Winslet's boobs jumping off the screen', the Oscar-winner claimed. 'When that mid-coitus hand hits the steamy car window in 3D, I swear to Satan your minds will be blown.'

Odeon Cinemas are confident that new fans will flock to see Nosferatu in 3D and because of the new digital enhancements are considering a 2013 onslaught of 'literally any film that springs to mind'.

Film Review: 'Wrath of the Titans'

First things first. This film really should be called Wrath of the Titan, because there really is only one titan (although Cronus does achieve a fair bit of wrath and that's still one titan more than 2010's Clash). Nonetheless, the latest installment in Sam Worthington's eternal mission to punch as much CGI as possible does feature a fair few more rock stars of Greek mythology than its predecessor, albeit divorced from their proper foes and environments. Chimera beats up a village, the Minotaur is beaten down by the Australian Demi-God Perseus in a matter of seconds and a family of Cyclops all say sorry to our heroes.

Wrath is severely unspecial. Worthington maintains he took the job because he hated himself in Clash and wanted to right his wrongs. He doesn't. Perseus has about as much presence as the elusive titans (plural) when he's not shouting at monsters or randomly snogging Rosamund Pike (equally sparse of character) and the supporting cast seems to be bizzarely made up of a plethora of sarcastic northerners. Granted Worthington's Antipodean tones are hardly accurate, but at least he's performing in his own accent. The mind boggles at the (assumedly) directorial decision to have Bill Nighy's fallen God speak in the manner of a drunk Boltonian and until I specifically learn otherwise, I will fervently maintain that Toby Kebell (nauseating as Agenor, son of Poseiden) improvised the entirety of his dialogue.

The more stellar portion of the cast are wasted and, in the case of Ralph Feinnes' Dark Lord Volde- erm, Hades, almost look like they know they shouldn't be there. Characters die off the cuff and crumble into a laughable pillar of dust while the vague shreds of a plot fizzle around them. The ending is also completely barmy, and never has the term Deus Ex Machina been more literal.

Why is Liam Neeson's Zeus so helpless? Why does Hades change sides more often than Cronus farts fire? Will the inevitable third installment actually feature more than one titan? None of these questions are raised. The 3D looks gratuitously lovely and the digitally rendered environments are occasionally impressive but these positives don't save a poor outing for Worthington and co. However this much is likely; a third Titans film looks as likely as a sudden leap in quality is unlikely.

Bring your own 3D glasses, Wrath of the Titan is definitely not worth the extra 80 pence.

Film Review: 'The Devil Inside'

Paranormal Activity, you may recall (if you have any fond inclination toward the horror genre) simultaneously marked a return to form for both atmosphere-led, suspenseful horror and the faux-realistic 'mocumentary' genre first given to us in the form of The Blair Witch Project. The film was a joy to horror afficionadoes and anyone who enjoyed being scared when it was released a couple of years ago. However, with each passing instalment (the odd exceptional shock aside) the Paranormal Activity franchise gradually began to dwindle in both quality and originality.

With this logic in place, one could be forgive for thinking The Devil Inside could very easily be Paranormal Activity VIIII, for all its lack of genuine shock, originality and rinsing of its genre's tropes. Its most effective scares -and let's not mistake 'most effective' for 'genuinely shocking'- already over-exposed from its widely viewed trailer (which mainly consist of extended periods of calm followed by gratuitous 'jump' moments that are too expected to actually work), The Devil Inside never really rises above occasionally creepy.

It begins promisingly enough, with a rather unsettling recording of a phone call to the police from Maria Rossi, protagonist Isabella's mother, confessing to the murders of three participants of an exorcism. It then cuts to vintage footage (the only real aesthetic triumph of the film) of a news report and investigation in the wake of the discovery. From then on, unfortunately, the film takes a severe dive that it never manages to recover from.

Jump to the present day, the relentlessly unlikeable Isabella (who constantly sways between helpless female cliche and hard-done-by victim demanding answers) is making a documentary about her mother's demonic possession, jetting to Vatican City where she is being held in psychiatric care. There is then a good thirty minutes, littered with some questionable acting and dialogue, before anything attempting to scare us happens again. During this time we are introduced to a pair of rogue exorcists who perform the ritual without consent of the church and would probably be more suited to their own '80s drama series than a supposedly serious documentary film, and reintroduced to the only good thing The Devil Inside has going for it, the frustratingly underused Maria Rossi, whos two brief scenes are the only genunely creepy sequences the film has to offer.

Perhaps the most infuriating thing about The Devil Inside is that it continually tiptoes around a fairly interesting premise; there are hints at corrupt Vatican officials, a global conspiracy to sweep severe cases of possession under the rug and a malevolent demon that can jump from person to person, but these are all largely untouched plot elements that ammount to little or nothing. What's left is barely more than an hour of limp shocks (the biggest audience reaction came from an angry dog barking), gratuitous Exorcist riffs and oblique, futile references to what could have been. Furthermore, where even the less effective mocumentaries at least fall back on the admirable naturalism of the acting serving to maintain an authentic feel, its a shame to say that in this case, especially when the stakes are raised, the efforts fall between daytime soap opera and late '70s video nasty. The crux of the hamminess comes in the form of one of the exorcists staring straight faced at the camera and comparing himself to Superman (this actually happens).

Ultimately, all of the woes, underachieving shocks and could-have-beens are left at the back of the mind when it comes to The Devil Inside's ending. In short, there isn't one. Without giving too much away, what there actually is is a build up to the third act, that extra thirty minutes missing from the film's running time, and then the credits roll. Just as the film threatens to get interesting, with a genuinely game changing plot development the audience is quite literally told to leave it there. This may be a meagre attempt to one-up the abrupt endings of previous horrors, but it falls tragically short. The Devil Inside does little for the rather small genre of possession movies, does nothing for the horror genre and if anything damages the already waning mocumentary genre.

Avoid paying full ticket price for two thirds of a movie.

Bob's Bridge. A Ghost (?) Story

New evening, its Dad's birthday so we're in his local in Birchington, Kent. Its a nice town to visit with reasonable intervals. Sort of spooky, isolated. But I imagine quite mundane and dull if you had to be there every day. I suppose the older folks like these kinds of places.

The 'Sea View' is a pleasant enough pub. The staff are like friends when its a quiet evening, unashamedly getting involved in your discussions with interest in the manner publicans in London never would.

What a pleasant Sunday evening. Dad bought us all a pint, even though he's the birthday boy. The discussion was good, too. Even when the inevitable drunken commentary on recession, football and "the country going to shit" ran dry, things managed to remain interesting.

I imagine it was the romance of the misty, desolate coastal town he was still relatively new to, because in twenty-five years I maintain I've never heard Dad talk like this, but he quickly propelled the conversation toward the supernatural.

Its funny, the adamant fervour you give to a discussion when drunk, the hindsight with which you laugh at the seriousness you gave the rhetoric the night before, but lets not get ahead of ourselves.

"I shit you not," my Dad egged on, "I wouldn't make this up"

We (being myself and my friend Jake, who was visiting because his job closed down and he had shit all to do) listened intently and with wide-eyed genuity. In hindsight it would be comical to observe. Anyway.

"I used to deliver papers in Ruislip" he carried on, "one night, I was driving (I'd just passed my test, as it goes) through Denham on my way to deliver the papers, and I promise you I clenched the steering wheel like no living person ever has before or since."

I giggled with drunken sincerity. "Why?" I laughed.

"It was the middle of fucking nowhere" he maintained, waving his pint at me for emphasis, "and I promise you all" (because there was also a nice, middle aged man called Bob at our table. We sort of commandeered him from his own misanthropic loneliness, into the conversation), "I hit a woman in the road."

We all shuddered. I know.

"My heart went", Dad said. "I can see it as clear as this pint in my hand. I hit a young woman and she went tumbling over my bonnet and hit the ground beside my car."

Dad took a slight breath, and carried on.

"Then I never saw her again."

Jake and I squinted. "In what way?' asked I.

"I mean" he said, "that she was never there. My girlfriend told me I'd just met the 'Grey Lady'."

I would be lying, and I don't lie, if I neglected to mention the quiver in my skin and the hairs on the back of my neck finding a tingle, at this sentence. What is the grey lady? Well, its not that important but supposedly she's a terrible spectre that jitters across the neglected West London suburbs, rigid fingers outstretched and a horrid, upset turn across her withered white face. Apparently her eyes are so wide you can see the back of them on a clear day. Not that she'd ever materialise on a clear day. As it stands she floats along, horrified and crooked, across woodlands and flat grounds. Supposedly she's buried near Ruislip, in a mistakenly-marked tomb that was never properly sealed.

"So what!" I exclaimed. "What about here?"

Dad smiled through drunken haziness. "You know my house is 150 years old?" He asked, playfully.

"No"

"Well," he began, "I'm not confirming anything, but you know little Lyon?"

Little Lyon (real name Lyon) was the seven year old boy that lived with his parents next door to my mum and dad. Each house on that terrace, bare in mind, was a decrepit old, converted sailors lodgings from the early eighteenth century.

"Yes" I said with coast.

"Well apparently, little Lyon's mum and dad woke up one night to hear him in his room, alone, talking. They went in and asked him what was wrong, and he turned to them, smiled, and said 'nothing.'

Apparently, Lyon's dad insists, Lyon was talking to 'the lady'. His dad went pale when he said this and asked 'what lady?' Lyon simply said 'the Lady that comes here every night. She always comes. She doesn't usually talk.'

Afterwards, Lyon's dad asked Greg next door but one, about the Lady, and Greg laughed and said, 'yeah, there's a lady. She walks through these walls, through all of these houses, every single night. She doesn't do any harm, because the dead can't hurt the living, but she always comes. Every night, snake-like and cold, floating through the walls of these old houses. I don't know who she is.'

I guess I've always been interested in that sort of thing" Dad continued, "but I never took it that seriously since I've moved here" I nodded, drunk and slightly intimidated. "But I maintain that Del (his dog) has funny turns every now and again."

"What?" I asked.

"Well," said Dad, "God bless your mother for steadfastly ignoring this, but I fucking promise you that one night, we were sat around the telly, I notice Del's eyes darting left and right, like he was following something. (They say animals can sense things), it startled me a bit, but I brushed it off.... until Del started barking, furiously, at the wall. Del stared intently at nothing at all and barked, his eyes transfixed.... I don't know, just a wierd moment."

We sipped our beers in silence. I stared at our new friend, Bob, and snickered silently. Although if I'm being truthful to myself I will admit that the back of my neck tingled slightly at that story.

We drank in silence for an interval, and I sat back in my chair. I then stared into an in particular corner of the pub. My relaxedness withered. I suddenly felt edgy and irritable. The particular corner consisted of a slightly narrowed section, leading to the toilets. It wasn't that anything specifically changed, but there was a certain desolation coming from that section. It was well-lit, but there was a darkness, somewhere. And it came creeping, no, scrawling, out from a forbidden corner and slowly infected the light, seeping rigidly and horribly into everything else like a malevolent spider, until it was black with shadow. I stared, tears may have welled behind my eyes and my hair may have tingled and moved as this happened. That visible corner screwed and shrank into darkness and I do believe, drunken hindsight permitting, that a set of animated, black, crooked fingers poked bleakly out of the shadow and gyrated horribly back into it.

THE BELL rang. Time at the bar, they say. We started up into reality.

Me, Dad, Jake and Bob slowly and awkwardly gathered our things. We bade a mumbled, grim farewell to the barmaid and started for the door.

It was so beautifully silent in the Kentish coastal village at night. Nothing like London. You can see stars and "hear angels fart", if they will. Bob was funny, all through the night he sneered at Dad's adamant ghost stories, being the staunch atheist he is. We strolled through the brisk, biting cold and Dad INSISTED on carrying on the ghost stories;

"she looks at you through the conservatory window"

"I couldn't sleep, yet I saw the grim, black shadow crawl across my bedroom"

"there's something in that alley just before my house"

They were all his. We were liberal in our listening, but in all seriousness we just wanted to get home.

The roads were silent. Old, detached houses and little else lined the way. The stars were so visible it was absurd. Jake had already gone home a separate way.

We came to a bridge. It passed above us, pure concrete and starkly rigid, almost accidentally art deco. It was largely in shadow and it protruded and jolted out in all sorts of bizarre places. The dim, yellow-lit road passed under it.

Bob went crooked and let out a low, ugly squeal of discomfort. "I don't want to" he groaned.

"What?" I asked in disbelief.

"I can't go under it" he cried, staring ominously at the jagged concrete of the overhanging bridge.

Dad laughed, for some reason. Bob hesitated as we each looked on in slight disbelief, and he eventually passed under.

"Do you mind me asking what that was about?" I blurted out, with regards to the bridge.

Bob said nothing. He simply looked up to the starry sky and sighed.

"Look." he said. "You can see all of the bright universe in the sky at night."

I think me and Dad both smiled amicably at this.

Then Bob slowly, eerily arched his head toward the ground. His expression blinked abruptly to a blank, unhappy one as he stared at the concrete.

"And you can see the grimness of hell beneath us, all the same", Bob hissed. He didn't sound himself, at all.

Dad was undeniably drunk, but all the same he turned bravely to Bob and said "Go home, mate." We all three of us stood awkwardly on the spot for a moment. Bob stared into nothing beyond us, looking like he was dead. Nothing my Dad had just said even registered, although he quickly turned and left all the same.

Dad and I staggered home. The evening was indeed weird, and obviously my first instinct was to take to the home computer and type it all up, before I forgot any detail.

Ghost stories are always creepy when you combine them with intoxication and mistaken interest in such an environment, and I know that human beings are eternally susceptible to unexplainable things when its interesting.

I'm not saying I believe any of those silly stories, or take Bob's odd actions very seriously, although, if I'm honest, when I sit here at this desk late at night, in this long, cold living room, and think of that dark thing that just drifted by me in the distant shadow (knowing that everyone in the house is upstairs, asleep) not a minute ago, and slithered shakily into the darkness, the hair on my head tingles and a slight tear forms behind the eye. I've always been a bit rational, but I can't ignore that.

I dread the trip upstairs to bed.

The Great Detectives - Sherlock Holmes/Batman Comparison

While the two seem culturally worlds apart, it is easy to forget that Bob Kane's 'Batman', the phenomenal 'great detective' began barely a decade after the final story in the canon of 'Sherlock Holmes', Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's own 'Great Detective'. While few hold these two popular characters in close regard as equivalents, with some simple scrutiny it becomes clear that, despite their many differences, 'Batman' and 'Sherlock Holmes' have more in common than it appears. Personally I regard Batman as the American, 20th Century Holmes (although popular perception loses sight of the caped crusader as a detective first and foremost, he is NOT a super-hero. A cape and mask do not grant you super-hero status), and through a character comparison, my reasons will become clear.

Batman/Holmes

The protagonist is the most obvious. Both are detectives with cognitive skills far outmatching their contemporaries, both have prominent psychological defects (Bruce Wayne derives his strict moral code from the witness of his parents' murders at a young age and is constantly traumatised by these events long into his adult life, while Holmes' remarkable skills come at the expense of a near-complete lack of human emotion, allowing every living being to be viewed as a puzzle to be solved, and every crime a game that he thrives in and even enjoys, regardless of the seriousness.) Each character operates at the behest of the law, despite the law's reluctant pleasure that they do so, and the exploits of each see them rise to fame in their respective cities. Despite being famously lauded as heroes, both Holmes and Batman possess a somewhat dubious morality. Holmes has little interest in personal justice for the victims of the crimes he investigates, each factor is just a puzzle piece. He shows, for example, no remorse for inadvertedly causing the death of the antagonist in 'The Speckled Band', and on occasion withholds evidence from the police and takes the law into his own hands. He allows the thief in 'The Blue Carbuncle' to go free, simply because it is Christmas. Batman, while holding a strict sense of right and wrong and vowing never to kill, is hubristic in regarding himself above the law and exacting justice without the consent or approval of the police. His methods of apprehending criminals, meanwhile, are somewhat hypocritical in their brutality.

Robin/Dr. Watson

Not immediately equivalent; a Holmes story would be almost unthinkable without the presence and perspective of Dr. Watson, (although they do exist), whereas a Batman story without Robin is not only reasonable but increasingly common, especially among writers that view the character as detrimental to the franchise's darker, adult tone (Robin has not appeared in a 'Batman' movie in fourteen years). However, in each case, the character's initial purpose was to align the story with the reader where the main protagonist is to abstract or austere a character to immediately identify with. As a comic with a strong child readership, Robin makes for an invaluable audience-identifier in the earlier Batman stories, while Watson in the Holmes canon allows for the reader to see Sherlock with the same admiration and awe that he does. Furthermore, each character expands on the protagonist's remarkable abilities by bringing their own to the table. Dick Grayson is a phenomenal acrobat, able to spring Batman from traps and tackle enemies with agility and speed, while John Watson is an accomplished army doctor, often identifying medical anomalies that even Holmes occasionally misses.

Alfred Pennyworth/Mrs. Hudson


An obvious comparison to those familiar with both franchises. Alfred is the butler, seldom seen outside of Wayne Manor in the comics, whilst Mrs. Hudson is the landlady, seldom seen outside of 221b Baker Street in the stories. Each character acts as an iconic piece of living furniture in their respective famous addresses, but they are not merely sympathetic drink-dispensers to their protagonists. While Alfred and Mrs. Hudson often remain separate to the principle story, they are always on hand to aid in their own way. Mrs. Hudson tends to Holmes in 'The Dying Detective' and even assists in his scheme in 'The Empty House', moving the wax dummy of Holmes in the window in order to portray it as living and trick the assailant. Alfred, meanwhile, often assists Batman from the confines of Wayne Manor, conducting extra research and mending damaged gadgets when the protagonist can not. Above all else, each character is the spiritual parent of the franchise, a human signifier of comfort and safety. As Benedict Cumberbatch's Sherlock remarked in the most recent episode of the BBC series, echoing the sentiment of Holmes buffs throughout history, 'If Mrs. Hudson left Baker Street, England would fall.'

Commissioner James Gordon/Inspector Lestrade

The reluctant professional admirer of the protagonist, and by and large the sole link between law and vigilante. Gordon and Lestrade are almost identical in that they serve as the only sympathetic member of the police force and recognise the benefit of Batman/Holmes in crime solving. Lestrade is perhaps treated with less sympathy in that Holmes and Watson continually mock his pedestrian abilities when compared to Sherlock's remarkable skills, but like Gordon, he is unafraid to express his occasional frustration with the protagonist's unorthodox methods of detection. They are dwarfed by the titular heroes, yet Gordon and Lestrade are continually alluded to being the best of their kind. Gordon shines through in a force of corrupt and ineffective police officers, while Lestrade is remarked as being the most competent detective amidst Scotland Yard's bumbling elite.

Catwoman/Irene Adler

The most popular female character of each series (even Dr. Watson's wife Mary is largely absent beyond her first appearance), and both antagonists that are nevertheless held in a light of respect by their respective protagonists. Adler possesses an intelligence equal to that of Holmes, and remains the only character in the canon to successfully outwit him, while Selina Kyle's athletic, stealth and combat skills are an easy match for Batman's. Both characters cause conflict in the morality of the central character by possessing a trait that completely conflicts with them (the painfully mysoginistic Holmes admires 'the woman' Adler despite her sex, judicially-minded Bruce Wayne enters into a romantic relationship with Selina Kyle despite her proffession as a criminal). While Holmes has no truck with romance, there is proffessional admiration for Irene in place of Batman's actual romantic feelings for Catwoman.

The Joker/Proffessor Moriarty

The iconic foil. Neither Holmes nor Batman would be complete without their ultimate adversary. Both serve as the opposite side of the same coin, and both utterly match the abilities of the hero. They operate ominously from off stage, testing the limits of the hero, then finally reveal themselves for a physical showdown with devestating consequences. While the Joker is a constant presence in 'Batman', Moriarty only actually appears in one Holmes story, although Doyle later retroactively made him a presence in the shadows, orchestrating crimes from afar in 'The Valley of Fear', a story set before but written after Moriarty's defeat. Clearly Doyle recognised the character's impact as arch enemy enough to increase the prolificacy of his crimes. Furthermore, Moriarty's absence from the later stories is as keenly felt as his presence in the earlier, and Holmes makes numerous references to his departed foe right up until the very last story, 'His Last Bow'. There is a keen reversal of roles in that, while the Joker recognises how much he enjoys his conflicts with Batman, it is Holmes that continually remarks how much he misses the thrill of the chase with Moriarty, remarking that crime in London has become uninteresting since his death.

There are also some comparisons to be made among the lesser recurring characters;

Bane/Colonel Sebastian Moran

Both criminals that arrive on the scene with the express intention of murdering the protagonist. Moran wants to exact revenge upon Holmes for the death of his boss, Moriarty, while Bane wishes to kill Batman to remove Gotham's overwhelming fear of the Dark Knight. Each possess violent skills that cause the hero to fear for their life (Bane is stronger than Batman, Moran is an expert marksman).

Tim Drake/Stanley Hopkins

Tim Drake, as successor to Dick Grayson's Robin, shares similarities with minor 'Sherlock Holmes' character Stanley Hopkins, who is mentioned as being a young police officer with keen detective skills. Hopkins appears in later stories, where Watson spends increasing amounts of time away from Holmes, and is vaguely alluded to being a possible successor to Sherlock Holmes.

Gotham/London

It would be wrong not to mention the respective cities in which the great detectives solve their crimes. Each city is vivdly realised in the fiction, thriving and complex to the point of being something of a character itself. The reader is immersed in this artificial world (while London has the obvious advantage of being a real place, the London of 'Sherlock Holmes' is unique in its stark descriptions of gas-lit, foggy alleyways, rolling hansom cabs and ominous shadows. It is as exclusive to Sherlock Holmes in that respect as the fictional Gotham City is to Batman). Each character is completed, given a degree of dimension, by the city they live in.