FLEECED RESISTANCE

With the new movie version of Hercules now in theaters…

Monster-of-the-Week: …let’s acknowledge a monster from an earlier Hercules movie, this cool dragon from the enjoyable 1958 Italian spectacle starring Steve Reeves…

The beast, which rather resembles a cranky ceratosaurus, is roused from what appears to have been a pretty long slumber beneath the Golden Fleece—he’s covered with leaves which scatter when he gets up—when Jason climbs up to filch it.

You can get a glimpse of him in action here.

HORNING IN

Happy Thanksgiving everybody!

In honor of that holiday…

Monster-of-the-Week: …let’s turn to classical mythology for this week’s honoree, the river god Achelous, sometimes depicted as a sort of snake or fish monster, as in this pottery…

…or in Francois Joseph Bosio’s sculpture in the Louvre…

…and sometimes depicted as a giant bull, as in this mural by Thomas Hart Benton…

But what does Achelous have to do with Turkey Day, you may ask? Well, while scrapping with Hercules, Achelous got one of his horns ripped off, and, according to Ovid at least, said appendage became the Cornucopia, or Horn of Plenty. May it shower bounty upon us all.