We’re heading back into the woods for another installment of SAW IT FIRST AT ANOMALY, our series revisiting films we first discovered at Rochester’s Anomaly Film Festival before they found a bigger audience!

This time, Mike and Kenya (@reviewsmayvary) are digging into Hellbender, a witchy, metal-fueled folk-horror nightmare about mothers, daughters, family secrets, and what happens when protecting your kid starts looking a whole lot like keeping them prisoner.

We’re talking creepy woodland vibes, killer music, generational trauma, and some seriously questionable parenting choices. Plus, we’ve got a handful of books that pair perfectly with this strange little gem.

Books mentioned in this episode:

● Salt Bones — Jennifer Givhan

● Dark Sisters — Kristi DeMeester

● Lobizona — Romina Garber

● Little Eve — Catriona Ward

Come for the witches, stay for the family dysfunction and heavy metal!

We dig into Huesera: the Bone Woman right off the bat — a Mexican body‑horror that turns pregnancy into a haunted, creaky meditation on identity, autonomy, and the way our bodies get policed by family, culture, and, uh, the internet. We nerd out on the film’s brilliant use of sound design — those bone‑crackling cues that do half the storytelling — and map how its Bruja/folkloric elements (and whisperings of La Llorona) fold into bigger conversations about maternal ambivalence, post‑partum isolation, and who gets to own a body. We thread this into larger literary pairings — V. Castro’s The Haunting of Alejandra and Queen of the Cicadas, Gerardo Simiano Cordova’s Monstrilio, and Andrew Joseph White’s You Weren’t Meant to Be Human — to show how the monstrous woman trope can be both a site of rage against colonial/racist structures and a space for reclaiming agency rather than simple evil.

Along the way we riff on queer angles, trans embodiment, and Frankensteinian hubris, connecting parasitism and consumption metaphors to the lived politics of reproduction and the isolating spectacle of “mommy culture” on social media. We also shout out Anomaly Film Fest and the way festivals can incubate buzzy, underseen films that go on to bigger platforms — which is exactly how we found this gem. Basically: spooky season meets rigorous, messy empathy, and yes, we make jokes about babies being parasites — because sometimes you gotta laugh to stop crying while unpacking the ethics of embodiment.

In this inaugural episode of the Hellscape Literary Society, we delve into the transformative power of literature and cinema as vital tools for navigating the pervasive challenges of contemporary existence. We, the co-hosts, Mike and Kenya, invite listeners to join us on a journey where we explore the intersections of genre fiction, film, and personal experiences, particularly in relation to the Anomaly Film Festival. Our discussion encompasses the significance of storytelling as an escape from the tribulations of daily life, while we share insights and recommendations that bridge the realms of literature and film. Through our engaging dialogue, we endeavor to celebrate the art of storytelling and its capacity to offer solace and connection amid the chaos of the world around us. Join us as we embark on this exploration of narratives that both entertain and enlighten, providing a reprieve from the hellscape we collectively navigate.