Hello friends of meats. And welcome to this, the first of many Monday Meatings here at the Dubious Meat Company.
As you well know, I am your boss (and meat overlord) Chris Cutlets. I hope you are settling in well after the ‘great reforming’ and if you are reading this then that would suggest you were not absorbed into the fabric of the building during the aforementioned reforming, which is good news. For you.
So first order of business for the week is recommendations? Any recommendations? NO!? Well I’ll go first then shall I? I mean I might as well as due to the nature of a written newsletter there’s no back and forth. The format doesn’t really allow for live conversation. I’m writing AT you. I can’t hear you now. Stop screaming at your screens already! Yes I’m talking to you especially Gavin. You’re upsetting little Petey in the next room. He can’t hear his woodworking tutorial videos because of you.
Anyway, I was thinking it might be nice to share any recommendations of good films, television, video games or books that we might have enjoyed recently? And since I’m the one with the microphone and you’re all just my eager to please employee worker drones, created from scraps of meat scraped from the Processing Room floor, I’ll go first. I don’t really want to hear your suggestions anyway.
So this week I had the pleasure of finally getting around to watching an absolutely sublime 80s horror film masterpiece for the first time!
The Blob (1988)
For those of you who haven’t seen The Blob, it’s a gloriously squelchy and gore filled piece of 80s cinema madness! The film takes place (as ever) in a small American mountain town that is terrorised by a carnivorous pink blob of goo after it crash lands on Earth attached to the side of a piece of falling space junk. The setup is pretty standard horror film fare but the execution is just… COOOOOR! Loved it. Just SO many fantastically juicy practical effects. And the film managed to subvert my expectations quite frequently, I won’t ruin anything here as SPOILERS ARE THE DEVIL’S WORK but the first and second acts of the film certainly kept me guessing. The third act is a little weaker and steps rather too heavily into ‘predictable 80s monster/action film’ trope land in my humble (meaty) opinion, but I would still thoroughly recommend this little gem.
I can’t believe I’d slept on it for so long. It’s so good. If you’re a fan of slimy practical monster effects and fancy watching the gruesome consumption of countless unfortunate clueless townsfolk then I would definitely give this one a watch. And if you’ve already seen it, then why not watch it again!?
I’d give it 8 of 10 meaty lumps.
So the next recommendation is a bit more contemporary and yet another horror. I think there’s definitely going to be a pattern emerging here…
M3gan (2023)
So judging by the trailer for this film I was expecting something really quite balls out naff. However having said that, I do love a terrible horror film so I went in with low expectations hoping to enjoy it for all the wrong reasons. Just imagine my surprise when rather than the wet fart of a film I was expecting I was greeted by something I genuinely enjoyed.
Megan (I can’t be bother to keep typing M3gan, it’s annoying to move the ‘3’ key every time when my brain is telling me to reach for the ‘e’ and it looks ugly on the page anyway) certainly doesn’t reinvent the wheel in the genre but it’s a horror comedy that is actually funny. For me I do often find that horror comedies are either not funny enough or not scary enough (this probably does fall into the later category) or more commonly than not, just neither. I found myself laughing throughout and felt it had something interesting to say regarding passing the responsibility of parenting over to screens and digital media. The film does a good job of creating a building sense of tension and crafting characters I actually cared about, so by the time the slightly silly third act comes around it feels earned. Like I said it could have been scarier but it was sufficiently funny and had enough to say for itself that I’ll let it off. JUST THIS ONCE.
And I realise that after complaining about having to type it I haven’t actually written the name of the film again so…. Megan. WITHOUT A 3!!
So I’d give this one maybe 7/10 lumps. And not a lump more!
Next we’re on to book recommendations! An audio book in fact. One I was listening to whilst working on some delicious meaty creations! I don’t have time to read a paper book, not to mention my hands release so much meat juice that the books just become useless and unreadable grease pulp. So I listened to this one okay!?
The Troop takes the feelings of adolescent isolation of The Lord of The Flies and shovels on top the infestation fuelled paranoia of The Thing which combine perfectly to create a bleak and nicely gruesome horror novel which I thoroughly enjoyed.
A troop of Scouts are camping on an isolated Canadian island with their Scout leader when an intruder unexpectedly appears in their camp, bringing with him some bad naughty infectiony style business… inside him. He’s full the brim with infection! To the brim!
So the author does a fantastic job getting into the minds of these isolated young lads and creating some very believable and human characters. The way he stokes the fires of paranoia within the juvenile minds of the cast and how their actions and decisions unfold during the course of the novel kept me gripped throughout. So much so that during one particularly tense moment I was so into the story that I forgot myself and leant on the business end of my cooling hot air gun. It was burny. I do not recommend. There’s also plenty of vivid imagery and body horror (which you know I’m here for) throughout, with plenty of gory demises. It’s pretty grim in places (which I’m also very much here for).
It’s an interesting and captivating story that really made my skin crawl and made me want to wash my hands under scalding hot water every time I even stepped outside of my infection control bunker.
I believe it deserves a very squelchy 8 out of 10 lumps.
Right so that’s the recommendations over with. If you have of your own then please keep them to yourselves. Or I suppose you could comment them below if you really feel the need. Helen from HR has expressed the need for more back and fourth between employees and overlords in this company. I’m not sure I agree with her. But one of her fourteen beaks was telling me last Tuesday that it increases the moral of the worker drones. Or at least I think that’s what she said, one of the other beaks was reciting sexy Lord of The Rings fan fiction at me at an awkwardly loud volume whilst another was regurgitating a half digested stick of celery into the mouth of one of her mutant meat chicks. I often find it hard to concentrate on what she is saying. Does she want me to miss out on the erotic escapades of the sexy Hobbits!? Anyway, I digress. You can comment if you want. I’ll get my admin lump to forward them on to me.
So next order of business is that new gateway that has opened up in the basement, they have been commonplace since the reforming but you should know by now not to listen to them! The janitor has informed me that it has been whispering to personnel and even convinced a few of you to enter it! How many times do I have to tell you that any new organic opening in the walls of this building are not to be trusted! Even if it does offer you free DVD copies of ‘Britian’s Fastest and Most Naked Police Chases’, I know it’s tempting but you can get your own copy from the office gift shop. I’m 90% sure that’s where the opening has stolen them from anyway. Suffice to say, any employees that enter one of these openings will be fired. As well as probably digested by the building. It’s for your own good! That is to say, the deterrent of firing you is for your own good, not the being digested by a living meat building. That probably stings.
Onto the birthdays for the week! Wishing a very happy birthday to worker meat drone L-453 on Tuesday this week, it feels like only yesterday that I can remember assembling their misshapen meat parcel out of various pieces of gristle and bone and bringing them to life in the Birthing Vat. Fond times. Where do the years go? Soon you’ll have reached your expiry date and have to make your final trip to the grinder room… Anyway, many happy returns worker meat drone L-453!
So finally I’d like to share with you part of a short story I’ve been working on during my down time here at the office. It’s a short work of fiction following the blossoming romance between two non humanoid masses of organic matter. It’s set to be a rollercoaster ride of a story that’s sure to keep you on the edge of your seat until the end and I must say, it’s pretty damn steamy… that is to say, it’s literally steamy as the story is essentially about steaming piles of meat and organs… You’ll see, I don’t want to ruin it. But here is part 1 of
The Flappening
1.
She studied him from across the rolling flesh hills, noticing the exquisite texture of his flaps as they danced delicately in the cool autumnal breeze.
The hills stretched out as far as the eye could see like great undulating vascular mounds, breathing softly and occasional venting jets of methane gas from sporadic hillside sphincters.
Her ankles were wet with hill juice. She’d chosen not to wear water proof boots as it was a warm day, however the heat had made the hills sweaty. She had correctly predicted that it wouldn’t rain, but she had failed to account for the clammy terrain. A choice that had left her socks sodden with perspiration that was not her own.
She hastily adjusted her own flaps, whilst summoning the courage to approach him and his own glorious flaps. From here he looked perfect. His aforementioned flaps perfectly premed and glistening in the sun and his bulbous protuberance jiggling as he laughed casually with friends. Even his fungal sack was pert and tight. She must go talk to him.
He was surrounded by a small group, talking excitedly amongst themselves. A few of the friends had shaved a small patch of hillside free of hair and all were now having a hair ball fight. They had moistened the hair with the land sweat and then rolled the moistened hair into balls. It was the best way to pass the time on the hills and as long as someone remembered to bring a large land razor with them then it was a source of near limitless fun.
She squelched up towards them along the side of the hill. Her food sack bubbled with anticipation and she gasped as a stray hair ball whizzed past her own bulbous protuberance and plopped to floor behind her. She was very close to him now. She could almost taste the warm haze that was emitting from his back folds.
She stopped behind him. The top half of her flaps continued slightly with the shift in momentum as she came to her abrupt stop. She shifted her weight to correct herself and stop from toppling over into him. That would have been disastrous. But all was fine. However now she was starring. The group had noticed her sidle up behind him and pause, she had become transfixed on the beads of grease rolling down his back folds. They trickled mesmerising between the fleshy contours of his back meats until they dripped off of his overhang, cascading to the ground.
He began to turn.
I would say I hope you enjoyed that short snippet of my magnum opus, but I do not need to hope. I, Chris Cutlets, know that you enjoyed it. I know you can’t wait for more. And you’ll get more. I promise. Patience my sweet meat children. You’ll get more when the time is right… and that will probably be next Monday Meating.
And that concludes this Monday Meating and now for another fantastic week of work here at the Dubious Meat company! I trust you are suitably inspired and energised.
Go fourth and meat.
If you fancy taking a look at anything I mentioned in the recommends and want to help the Dubious Meat Company (Me) out in the process then I’ve provided my Amazon affiliate links:
US
The Troop by Nick Cutter - https://amzn.to/3Jwjqd1
The Blob - https://amzn.to/3mCtpEp
M3gan - https://amzn.to/4209XBR
UK
The Troop by Nick Cutter - https://amzn.to/3JudT6F
The Blob - https://amzn.to/3ZJEmmw
M3gan - https://amzn.to/3yrdkEg
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I have not heard from her since the reforming.
An absolute delight Mr. Cutlets! I'm practically chomping at the meat bit for the next chapter. It greased the flaps just right if you get me ;) I knew they were making the right choice when they ascended you to overlord.