My Favorite Monsters - The Kraken

Countdown to Halloween Day 31

My Favorite Monsters

The Kraken

Welcome to my Countdown to Halloween 2013! I am very pleased to once again participate in this month-long event and my daily theme will be to reveal some of my favorite beasts and baddies from myths, movies, legends and lore. And we begin...

"Release the kraken!"

The giant octopus/squid of Scandinavian lore got a hell of a lot cooler once Liam Neeson demanded it be released in the 2010 Clash of the Titans remake. However, I personally do not care for the version of the creature we saw in the film nor in the original 1980 movie (apologies to Ray Harryhausen fans). I much prefer the gigantic tentacled monster depicted on illustrations in the 1800's.

There's been some recent speculation that the kraken might have actually existed. Real or not, I love a good sea creature yarn, like Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

I understand Verne was inspired by the legend of the kraken and I would not be surprised to find out that H.P. Lovecraft was as well (shameless foreshadowing of future blog entry in the Countdown). I have not yet seen the beast realized to my satisfaction in film, but the cephalopod attack is my favorite sequence in the otherwise lacking Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest.

I'm hopeful that some future filmmaker will get it right someday. The technology is there and with the recent success of Pacific Rim, I hope to see more giant creatures on the big screen. Until then, I'll just have to suffer through another SyFy attempt.