By Elena Selthun
Lovecraft Country is a new American horror drama series inspired by the novel by Matt Ruff of the same name. It follows the story of Atticus “Tic” Freeman, who searches for his missing father and the truth of his family history while navigating the dangers of 1950s Jim Crow America, ancient white supremacist cults, and the price of magic. The final episode of Season 1 aired on October 10, 2020, and since then this show has firmly lodged itself into my mind. Fair warning: Lovecraft Country isn’t exactly what you’d call a casual, easy show to watch, and it’s not because of the Lovecraftian monsters – it’s because of the real ones. The show tackles events like the brutal 1955 murder of 14-year-old Emmett Till, and the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre – and it does so unflinchingly. We see the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre through the eyes of Atticus’s father, who lost his entire family when their house was burned with everyone trapped inside. We see the aftermath of Emmett Till’s murder through the eyes of a child, a Black girl who was one of his closest friends, who was not allowed to have a childhood free of fear and tragedy. One of the writers, Ihuoma Ofordire, explains that in order to honor Emmett Till, Lovecraft Country aimed “to humanize him and show who he could have been prior to his murder, because whenever we think of Emmett Till, we think about that final image of his body.” Although Lovecraft Country does present these events in a fictionalized context, it also includes voiceovers of real speeches, notably James Baldwin’s 1965 speech against right-wing conservative William F. Buckley at Cambridge, in which he is forced to defend his assertion that the “American Dream” is not equally accessible to all Americans, and may not even apply to all Americans, especially if those Americans are Black. While Tic and his friends experience the racist reality of Jim Crow America, Baldwin speaks of systemic racism much like a monster (a Lovecraftian horror, perhaps) which white people have the privilege to not see as a reality, but which is an intrinsic, inescapable part of Black Americans’ lives and realities: “It would seem to me that the proposition before the house is a question hideously loaded, and that one's response to that question, or reaction to that question, has to depend on the effect of where you find yourself in the world, what your sense of reality is” (Baldwin). This theme is reflected throughout the show – the Black characters, like Tic, Letitia, Uncle George, and the rest of the (absolutely incredible) main cast, quickly accept the existence of twisted magic and horrible monsters. Monsters have always been a part of their reality. It is the white characters, like the awful sheriff in the pilot episode and the seemingly morally gray Christina Braithwaite (who eventually becomes an example of the complicity of white women in racist institutions), who either can’t accept the existence of monsters or take for granted that those monsters belong to them, and always will, so don’t pose a threat to them. This mindset, spoiler, does not end well for them. Thus, the power of Lovecraft Country is that the Lovecraftian horrors are not the true terror of the series. Instead, it is white people, the horrors they commit upon Black bodies, and the subsequent dehumanizing reasoning for those horrors as serving a “greater good” of which Black people do not have access to -- at least, not initially. This show is about Black people fighting for access to that power, and in the process, a kind of reclaiming of monsters takes place. Today, America faces a formidable host of monsters, some new and some very, very old. Some have compared 2020 and the beginning of 2021 to a horror movie (including myself), but it’s important to realize that this is reality, and many of the horrifying monsters that have surfaced this year have always been around, even if some had the luxury of not seeing them. Lovecraft Country actor Wunmi Mosaku, who plays Ruby in the show and also plays Rial in the new His House (about asylum seekers who flee South Sudan, only to find hauntings and horror in what should be their safe haven - now on Netflix), explains how the horror genre can be used to a social justice-oriented effect: “The worst parts of His House, the worst parts of Lovecraft, are actually what the humans are doing, and the inhumanity with which we treat people,” she says. “We justify and rationalize and defend it but actually we are the most detrimental to each other. Horror helps me see my responsibility a little bit more.” Her hope is that that horror will create room for empathy (Vogue). Lovecraft Country may not be an easy show to watch, but it is an important one, and it embodies the particular power of storytelling, which can enable the unearthing and creative representation of histories and traumas that refuse to be erased, as well as broadcast voices that have been too often silenced. This show has inspired various responses, including The Chicago History Museum’s “Lovecraft Chicago: History, Horror, & Afrofutures” event, which was a panel on Zoom featuring thirteen panelists who ranged from anthropologists to comic book artists to professors to authors. Additionally, the Langston League has created an episode-by-episode “unofficial syllabus” for the show, which aims to: “highlight the Black history and Black innovation(s) mentioned in and connected to #lovecraftcountry. We uplift the labor of Black authors, Black musicians, Black filmmakers, Black podcasters, Black artisans, Black leaders, and all the Black people creating mirrors” (Langston League). Rather than focusing on the themes of H.P. Lovecraft’s work (which various media outlets covering this show have done, perhaps missing the point of the show), the Langston League centers Black experiences and works and includes various resources to check out at the end of each episode syllabus, like podcasts, books, speeches, movies, and music. You can read the syllabus here. As the showrunner Misha Green explains: “What was so great about Matt [Ruff]’s beautiful novel was this idea of reclaiming a space that’s not meant for you” (Misha Green, Collider.com). H.P. Lovecraft’s horror and the United States’ history and present both have deeply, undeniably racist roots, but Lovecraft Country emphasizes that the path forward is not to keep those roots buried deep and hidden, or else disguised through euphemistic labels, but to reclaim and recenter marginalized narratives, and to use genres like horror to expose those roots in creative, cosmic, and yes, truly horrifying, ways. SOURCES https://www.huffpost.com/entry/lovecraft-country-ihuoma-ofordire-interview_n_5f94a824c5b68dbe93f7e043 (About Emmett Till) “Lovecraft Country’s Wunmi Mosaku On Her New Film His House and the Particular Power of Horror: https://www.vogue.com/article/wunmi-mosaku-lovecraft-country-his-house Lovecraft Chicago: https://www.chicagohistory.org/event/lovecraft/
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January 2024
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