Dark Muse News: There is something about Return to Silent Hill - It's Mary!

Simulcast on Black  Gate: Dark Muse News: There is something about Return to Silent Hill - It's Mary!

The movie Return to Silent Hill (2026) is an adaptation of the psychological horror Silent Hill 2 (SH2) video game that was rebooted by Konami under Bloober Team in 2024. This 'return' film is directed by Christophe Gans, who championed the original 2006 film (which loosely adapted the first video game released in 1999). With the resounding success of the Bloober SH2 video game reboot, fans of the horror series had hope that the movie would pack a 1-2 punch, but it has been received poorly. Why?

Not helping the United States release was an ill-timed blizzard that stretched across the country (Wikipedia even has an entry about the storm). I suspect if that were a fog-storm (do those exist?), then ticket sales would have skyrocketed. At this point, almost every blogger and reviewer who has seen the movie has been pissed since it did not seem to represent the core elements of the game; I was in a similar camp until I dissected the film for this article. Here’s the Deal.

James Sunderland appears to be the focus since the movie opens with him driving a car to a lookout featuring Silent Hill, as would be expected from the video games (both original and release) and the Trailer.  The truth is, the movie is really not about him. Also, you'll meet a ton of characters, and they will mirror characters in the game... except in the movie, they aren't really different people. So:

• If you do not know the lore, you’ll take the characters at face value when introduced (different names imply different people), and you'll get confused later
• Fans knowing the lore will watch assuming the same...and get confused... and pissed

To deliver this sucker punch approach, Gans' production delivery had to be perfect. And it was off. I had to meticulously screen capture, crop, and dissect the movie to change my mind about the work. Why reveal spoilers here?  Most of the internet already has, including Gans in his interview (links below), and, for me, the movie would have been more enjoyable knowing what I know now. What at first appears to be a big mess is actually a coherent offering. Anyway, in short, as teased by the header image, there is something about Mary.

Read on! Maybe you will enjoy the film more!

Dark Muse News: Reviewing Arcane Arts and Cold Steel by David C. Smith

 Simulcast on Black Gate: Dark Muse News: Reviewing Arcane Arts and Cold Steel by David C. Smith

Arcane Arts and Cold Steel (Pulp Hero Press, December 24, 2025)

From History to Writing Sword and Sorcery, Pulp Hero Press has us covered

In 2019, Pulp Hero Press published Brian Murphy's Flame and Crimson: A History of Sword-and-Sorcery, which was notably covered by David C. Smith (link to review) and John O’Neill (link) on Black Gate. O'Neill highlighted that Brian Murphy was one of the earliest contributors to Black Gate, from way back in 2012! Six years have passed since the publication of Flame and Crimson; whereas the subtitle and focus of that was a history of Sword & Sorcery (S&S), Pulp Hero Press just followed with a sequel focused on writing it, penned by David C. Smith with a foreword by John O'Neill.

This post covers the complementary book Arcane Arts and Cold Steel: Writing Sword-and-Sorcery Fiction (Pulp Hero Press 2025, 298 pages).  Greg Mele recently posted a Black Gate article on how this book is The Literary Sorcerer’s Toolkit; read that to learn more about the author.

Windy City Pulp and Paper 2026 - Highlights

Desi Accent Indian restaurant, left to right:  

Jojn Majka, Seth Lindberg, Greg Mele, Scarlet, friend of Arin Komins, Arin Komins, John O'Neill, Josh Dinges, Erik Mona, Rich Warren

Black Gate contributor and S&S author Greg Mele, see here with the spirit of Bob Byrne (who may or may not have been present)

Hotel restaurant Harry Caray's: Left to right:

Van Allen Plexico, Greg Mele, Scarlet, John O'Neill, Dave Ritzlin, Joe Bonadonna, Seth Lindberg, Steven Silver, David C Smith

Van Allen, pulp writer, Black Gate contributor, and friend of Andy Fix

Dave Ritzlin of DMR books

Hanging out with the esteemed Joe Bonadonna, one of my best friends, co-author, and Dyscrasia Fiction fan!

David C Smoth signing books for me

Randy Broecker, artist of lots of cosmic horror, including Tales From the Magician's Skull ( pictured here with a Shinatro Oba piece for C.L Werner.

Joshua Dinges, Erik Mona's consigliere

Black Gate chief editor John O'Neill

Todd Warren, collector of Pulp Fiction artifacts such as Clark Ashton Smith original art

Arin and Rich encouraged me to snag a 1987 copy of the first Arkham Horror Board game

 

Dark Muse News: Horrific Art – Interviewing Tim Waggoner

 Simulcast on Black Gate: Dark Muse News: Horrific Art – Interviewing Tim Waggoner

This Dark Muse News column continues its coverage of Beauty in Weird Fiction/Art via interviews (a series that began in 2014 on my author blog and was taken up by Black Gate in 2018). We’ve hosted authors such as Carol Berg, Anna Smith Spark, Darrell Schweitzer, CSE Cooney, Scott Oden, CS Friedman,  Bryn Hammond…. and many more… the latest being  Waclaw Traier.

Now we corner author Tim Waggoner, who has published over sixty novels and eight collections of short stories. He’s a four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award, a two-time winner of the Scribe Award, and he’s been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award and the Splatterpunk Award. He’s also a full-time tenured professor who teaches creative writing and composition at Sinclair College in Dayton, Ohio.

Waggoner has been getting a lot of press, and an award, for his novelization of the Terrifier movies that feature the serial killer named Art. You'll learn more about that in this interview. Check out the juxtaposition of Art (the Terrifier on the Left, for clarity) and Tim Waggoner (innocent author on the Right). What wonderful hats they have!

Dark Muse News: New Edge Sword & Sorcery Magazine, Issues #8, 9, & 10

Simulcast on Black Gate.com

Dark Muse News: New Edge Sword & Sorcery Magazine, Issues #8, 9, & 10

 Cover Artists Cover #8 - Jimmy Makepeace  Cover #9 - Plastiboo  Cover #10 - Matej Kollár

Black Gate has been tracking the inception and growth of New Edge Sword & Sorcery (NESS) mgazine, starting with Micheal Harrington’s 2022 interview with Oliver Brackenbury (champion and editor of NESS), through 2023 with NESS’s first two magazine releases (also Greg Mele’s review of #1), and then into 2024 with NESS’s first book “Beating Heart and Battle Axes and its two-novella combo book Double-Edged Sword & Sorcery, and then in 2025 we covered NESS‘s publication of a NEW Jirel of Joiry tale! (2025) and we interviewed one of their key New Edge authors, Bryn Hammond.

Now in 2026, NESS brings us more with promises of Issues 8, 9, and 10!

The campaign to fund and expand them ends just days after this posting (March 14^th )!  Hurry now to Backerkit to get some exclusives like a poster featuring live models in full S&S costume, discounted back issues, and a cover art postcard; also, backing unlocks more interior art and bumps author payments. If you miss out, or want some of the prior rewards from previous crowdfunding, get back issues and other NESS offerings in their shop, noting that print copies often have limited print runs.

So what is in the next three issues? We asked Oliver Brackenbury that, and his answer is below. And we had a feeling Jirel of Joiry would return, and we asked Molly Tanzer to provide a bit of perspective on the heroine.

Dark Muse News: Sword & Sorcery Chain Story (#14-#18)

 Simulcast on Blackgate.com: Dark Muse News: Sword & Sorcery Chain Story (#14-#18)

In August 2025, we hailed the emergence of a second Chain Story project championed by Michael A. Stackpole. This is a Sword & Sorcery-focused, contagious set of connected (“chained”) stories. Each is:

• A standalone tale
• Readable in any order
• Free to read
• Interconnected via a theme involving a Crown

Stories are being released every few weeks. We'll round up groups, but check the Chain Story website. for the latest. In this post we highlight the latest set of five, Episodes 14-18:

• 14 Blight by Katherine Monasterio
• 15  In The Land of the Giants, by Bryan Young (second in the series via the chain!))
• 16 Demonfire: A Tale of Shintaro Oba by C. L. Werner
• 17 Terror Above Icehenge by Malcolm T. North
• 18 The Sapphire and the Sorceress by Bryan Young (third in the series via the chain!)

Dark Muse News: Reviewing Conan – Spawn of the Serpent God by Tim Waggoner

Simulcast on Black Gate:  Dark Muse News: Reviewing Conan – Spawn of the Serpent God by Tim Waggoner

Conan: Spawn of the Serpent God by Tim Waggoner (Titan Books, October 28, 2025). Cover artist unknown

Titan Books is on a roll, publishing Conan novels in quick succession: S. M. Stirling's Blood of the Serpent (2022), John C. Hocking's City of the Dead (2024), James Lovegrove's Cult of the Obsidian Moon (2024), Tim Lebbon's Songs of the Slain (2025), and Tim Waggoner's Spawn of the Serpent God (2025).  And their 2026 schedule promises more with John Langan's The Brides of Crom.

Here we delve into Tim Waggoner's Spawn of the Serpent God. He's a Bram Stoker Award-winning author known for horror and media tie-in fiction. Recently, he was honored for his Terrifier #2: The Official Movie Novelization with a Scribe Award for Best Adapted Novel from the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers. With approval from movie writer and director Damien Leone, Waggoner had doubled the size of the hack-and-slash script by adding lore and characterization (I plan to interview Tim Waggoner about this for Black Gate's Beauty in Weird/Horror series). Anyway, Waggoner's knack for tie-ins and deepening characters is demonstrated again in Conan: Spawn of the Serpentas he highlights the dangers of Zamora.