I Am a Landless Man!

So...maybe you wonder what I've been doing (and Christ knows, I wonder that myself, somewhat). This weekend, like last weekend, was chore central--the "new" mattress and box-spring arrived on Saturday, while Sunday was given over to trying to get as much crap as possible out of the storage space. I'm proud that I was, in fact, able to convince Steve that since it's unlikely we'll have another kid at this point, we could probably feel okay about getting rid of all Cal's baby accoutrements--highchair, saucer, potty, etc. Less happy-making was discovering that a rug one of my Mom's best friends (now dead) once gave us for our wedding had fallen to mush and was covered in dead moths. Dumped a bunch of impossible-to-use furniture, a whole shit-load of useless tax stuff from over ten years ago, etc., and we finally have room to accumulate/process yet more crap; too bad I still wasn't able to get him to admit that that Smart-Cycle his friend Peter gave us for Cal four years ago (still in its original box, still sealed) should be given to someone who'll genuinely make use of it. But then again, this is the guy who keeps thinking Cal's going to eventually plant his six-year-old bum on a Big Wheel made for a three-to-five-year old, which is why the damn thing is taking up room next to Cal's bed.

Otherwise, much of this week has been about getting to know Robert E. Howard's Puritan swashbuckler Solomon Kane. First I bought the movie--James Purefoy plays Kane, which is pretty suitable--and then I tripped across a new Dark Horse collection of all the various Marvel Kane solos and cross-overs (including two! incredibly slashy encounters with Dracula, a side-trip to fight the dragon of Castle Frankenstein, and the ultimate two-fer, a time-travelling team-up with Conan the Barbarian).

For those who don't know, Kane comes from early Puritan stock and was born in Devon, which is why he talks like a pirate. He's described as whip-lean, wolfish, with a dour, hawk-like face, long hair (sometime black, sometimes white), and wearing the typical Puritan get-up of the time, including that awful tall, buckled, bin-shaped Pilgrim hat--a guy calls him "broadbrim" in one story, like it's an insult. Kane then calls him "offal of purgatory!", and says: "There be MANY FIRES, some HOTTER than OTHERS! But save those of HELL--ALL fires may be QUENCHED--BY BLOOD!"

Kane's been around--he's fought religious oppression in France, privateered with Drake, was a Turkish galley-slave, knocked down various vampire cities, deathless Atlantean monarchies and harpy-plagued villages in Africa. But his basic thing is aimless wandering with a side-order of monster-killing in the Name of the Lord, and when people point out that he himself is a fairly fearsome object given to astonishing feats of blood-letting, he simply says: "I have many sins to repent of, like all Christians," and passes on. (He also has a tendency to lose his shirt at the slightest provocation, and get hit on by ladies wearing little more than a shred upstairs vs. a shred downstairs. Plus Dracula, but then, Drac hits on everybody, and he does seem to like a challenge.)

Though the original Kane was not, like Purefoy's Kane, a mercenary/pirate/general bad-ass whose "life of greed and murder" was cut short by suddenly realizing his soul was in Serious Mortal Jeopardy and therefore he should Mend His Evil Ways ASAP by branding a gigantic cross on his back and taking refuge in a monastery 'til they kicked him out for being scary and damned, I still think Robert E. Howard would probably have approved of the movie--Purefoy's fun as hell, for a guy who only smiles once. Plus, the damsel in distress he has to rescue from an evil magician turns out to be a grown-up Rachel Hurd-Wood, who once played Wendy to Jason Isaacs' Captain Hook/Mister Darling! (Other people who show up briefly include Pete Postlethwaite, Alice Krige, Jason Flemyng and Rachel's little brother, Something Else Hurd-Wood, who's about the same age she was in Peter Pan. Oh, and Solomon's Dad is Max von Sydow, and his asshole older brother is Christopher Heyerdahl from Sanctuary; no down-side to this cast-list, really.)

One way or the other, good times. It make me want to have Puritans in whatever I do next, after The Goddamn Book is finally finished.;)

Other great Solomon Kane lines include:

p. 168: Fighting an annoying asshole--"Enough! This is an ILL DEED! Let it be DONE QUICKLY!" (Stabs the dude through the eye.)
p. 129: Comes across a sexy statue--"God give me the STRENGTH to resist all IMPURE DESIRES--even though they be for a creature that does not EXIST!" (Breaks it, ironically releasing the succubus trapped inside, which then stalks him.)
p. 116: Offered thanks-for-saving-me sex by shred-clad lady--"SAY NO MORE, Cathryn! I have FORESWORN the pleasures of the flesh!...Ever I must remain PURE in thought and deed--to rightly EXECUTE the will of God!"
p. 103 (The original comics version of "Castle of the Devil", lately re-jiggered by Mike Mignola and others) Crashing through a window--"SHADES OF DEATH! This damnable hell-ritual will NOT take place--so I swear upon my SAVIOR's crown of THORNS!"

Oh, Solomon Kane. You so crazy.;))

Amended to add: Click here for a good poster-image of Purefoy-as-Kane (http://dagbladet.se/image_processor/1.2259088.1282115831!/image/3239162008.jpg_gen/derivatives/wide/3239162008.jpg?maxWidth=345). This one's good too (http://moviesmedia.ign.com/movies/image/article/949/949342/solomon-kane-teaser-poster_1233286313_640w.jpg). And here's pre-Saved Kane (http://www.scificool.com/images/2010/07/solomon-kane-review-1.jpg).