Welcome to issue #164 of Nightmare Magazine. This month, our prose offerings are themed around a very particular phrase, but to understand it, you might need a little context.
I live at the southern edge of Portland, Oregon, a once-small town with a big, big video store. Now, when I first moved to the area, there were tons of video stores; Portland was even the birthplace of Hollywood Video, which was the second biggest video rental chain in the United States before it died. During my tenure as a Portland metro-area resident, I’ve had memberships at my neighborhood video stores, including Hollywood Video (RIP), Blockbuster Video (RIP), Clinton Street Video (RIP), and most recently, Great American Video & Espresso (still renting flicks while serving up one of the best vegan milkshakes in the area!). And through it all, I have kept my membership at Portland’s video mothership: Movie Madness.
Not as physically enormous or offering quite as extensive a library as Seattle’s legendary Scarecrow Video, Movie Madness is still pretty epic. It’s currently housed in a labyrinthine structure that’s been expanded and rearranged many times over the decades, and on top of renting out 90,000+ film titles, it hosts dozens of famous movie props, set pieces, and costumes. It’s like a museum, and on your first trip, you will find yourself spending at least two hours just getting the lay of the land.
The first time I visited Movie Madness, I was blown away not just by one of the original chestbursters from Alien, but by the amazing section names. Sure, you can find all of Martin Scorcese’s films in the famous director section, with a big red-and-white label reading “Martin Scorcese.” And yeah, the foreign film section is neatly sorted under country of origin. The fun is centered in the horror section, where you’ll find shelves like “Vampires” (self-explanatory), “Werewolves” (self-explanatory), “Technophobia” (where else would you shelve Maximum Overdrive?), and my absolute favorite: “Childhood Icons Gone Horribly Awry.”
Every time I read a story about a cursed doll or an evil clown, I think of Movie Madness and that delightful shelf. It’s stayed with me for nearly thirty years, so it’s no surprise that this month’s theme is just that.
We’re kicking off the month with Sarah Grey’s short story “Hollow Cast,” a tale set in a suburban garbage dump, narrated by a cast of abandoned dolls. It’s Toy Story, Nightmare-style. Bruce McAllister brings us a flash piece: “A Magic Kingdom,” about the fictional repercussions of a summer working at Disneyland. Instead of offering two works of short fiction, we’re also offering up Audrey Coble’s “Art the Clown attends the Jane Hirschfield poetry reading at the Anchorage Museum.” This piece is technically nonfiction, but before you think “Oh, I should skip this because nonfiction is boring,” I assure you it’s a must-read: a little bit eerie, a touch unsettling, and 100% weird. I hope you enjoy it.
Our nonfiction and poetry veer away from the world of childhood stuff run amok. Ash Vale’s new poem “consumed” addresses gender dysmorphia. Our H Word essay is by Eugen Bacon, who discusses the special horror of beheadings. And our Plumbing the Depths column this month is by science writer Lizzie Wade, who will take us on a scenic tour of fiction about apocalypses. We also have terrific author spotlight interviews with authors Sarah Grey and Audrey Coble.
It’s another weird, creepy, and fun issue of Nightmare, and I hope you enjoy it! And if you’re in Portland, be sure to check out one of our fabulous video stores. Even if you don’t have a DVD player, they’ve got great t-shirts and treats!
