Black Wings of Cthulhu 5 (2016) edited by S.T. Joshi

Black Wings of Cthulhu 5 (2016) edited by S.T. Joshi, containing the following stories:

• Plenty of Irem by Jonathan Thomas
• Diary of a Sane Man by Nicole Cushing
• The Woman in the Attic by Robert H. Waugh
• Far from Any Shore by Caitlín R. Kiernan
• In Blackness Etched, My Name by W. H. Pugmire
• Snakeladder by Cody Goodfellow
• The Walker in the Night by Jason C. Eckhardt
• In Bloom by Lynne Jamneck
• The Black Abbess by John Reppion
• The Quest by Mollie L. Burleson
• A Question of Blood by David Hambling
• Red Walls by Mark Howard Jones
• The Organ of Chaos by Donald Tyson
• Seed of the Gods by Donald R. Burleson
• Fire Breeders by Sunni K Brock
• Casting Fractals by Sam Gafford
• The Red Witch of Chorazin by Darrell Schweitzer
• The Oldies by Nancy Kilpatrick
• Voodoo by Stephen Woodworth
• Lore by Wade German

Another year, another superior Black Wings anthology of cosmic horror from editor S.T. Joshi. The 'of Cthulhu' is added to the trade paperback editions of these anthologies for commercial considerations, by the way. The hardcovers, per the originating H.P. Lovecraft quote, are simply Black Wings.

As is usual for Joshi anthologies, the stories range from good to excellent. Familiar names that include Caitlin Kiernan, W.H. Pugmire, and Darrell Schweitzer offer up superior tales of dark gods and that menacing, indifferent universe of cosmic dread. Sunni Brock offers a fresh take on Innsmouth, complete with what seems like a nod to the Japanese horror story that would become the American movie Dark Water (that story being "Floating Water" by Koji Suzuki). Schweitzer offers an ambitiously circular mise en abyme. Kiernan's background in paleontology informs the unfortunate findings of her characters. 

There's a sarcastic cheekiness to Nancy Kilpatrick's "The Oldies" that doesn't undermine the horror of its collision of Old Gods and traumatized people. As flies to wanton boys, and all that jazz. Jonathan Thomas (The Color Over Occam) offers a wry visit to Lovecraft's Kingsport that nods to the odd festival held there, and its odder participants, in a story whose droll tone resembles that of a vintage Clark Ashton Smith story like "The Seven Geases" or "The Tale of Satampra Zeiros." 

A couple of stories -- John Reppion's "The Black Abbess" and David Hambling's "A Question of Blood" specifically -- don't quite stick their landings as they embrace a little too much lack of closure. Still, they're worth reading, as the anthology is as a whole. And Wade German's concluding poem is a nice touch, especially given Lovecraft's embrace of weird poetry. Highly recommended.

The Predator (2018)

The Predator (2018): written by Shane Black and Fred Dekker; directed by Shane Black; starring Boyd Holbrook (Quinn McKenna), Olivia Munn (Casey Bracket), Trevante Rhodes (Nebraska Williams), Thomas Jane (Baxley), Keegan-Michael Key (Coyle), Sterling K. Brown (Traeger), and Jacob Tremblay (Rory McKenna):

1. The Predator in this movie gets a definite article because it's 11-feet tall and comes with two Predator dogs and the ability to speak English.

2. The funniest line in the movie was apparently not written by writer-director Shane Black, who was not having a good week when he wrote this movie, but rather by Olivia Munn's sister.

3. Olivia Munn needs to hire an agent who stops putting her in front of green screens. She does look less discombobulated than she did in X-Men: Apocalypse.

4. Because there can only be one active woman in an action movie, Yvonne Strahovski gets sidelined for the most part even though The Predator kidnaps her son.

5. Boyd Holbrook, who plays the protagonist, Strahovski's ex-husband, and the father of that son, has negative charisma.

6. The son has autism. In the Predator universe, this makes him "the next step in human evolution!"

7. Shane Black labours so hard to make the wacky group of crazy soldiers who team up with Boyd Holbrook, um, wacky and memorable, that one can fairly see the flop sweat running down Black's face.

8. The last 20 minutes are so frenetic and (literally) dark that I don't know whether Sterling K. Brown's evil Black Ops guy is alive or dead when the movie ends.

9. The now infamous deleted scene probably involves our wacky group of Predator fighters procuring the RV that mysteriously appears 55 minutes into the movie.

10. Arnold Schwarzenegger turned down a cameo after reading the script.

There are a few moments, and it's not unbearably awful or anything. Lightly recommended.