Monster Makers from Prof. Heidi Breuer

Ludo from Labyrinth (1986) 👻 Hey Monster Maker, So here’s the thing: I’m back in the classroom, wrangling bright young minds and unleashing dark literary truths (a.k.a. teaching full-time again). Which means . . . our little Monster Maker party is moving to twice a month for the academic year. But don’t pout, sweet batlings. 🦇 That just means you’ll have more time to actually do the deliciously deranged writing prompts in between newsletters. (Think of it as marinating your monsters until...

Count Orlock, Nosferatu (1922) Nosferatu: The Bald, The Bad, and the Boundaries He Breaks Hey Monster Makers! Shifting shadows. Clawed fingers. A silhouette that could curdle your blood before your morning coffee. This month’s monster is the one who haunts every shadowy stairwell: Nosferatu. Our guy, Count Orlock 🎬 A Symphony of Horror (1922) F. W. Murnau’s Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror is one of the most famous Dracula adaptations in cinema history. The name “Nosferatu” itself likely comes...

Sesame Street's Count Von Count When Vampires Are Funny (and Why That’s Delicious) Hey Monster Makers! My very first vampire wasn’t Dracula. It wasn’t Anne Rice’s Lestat, or even the Bela Lugosi classic. It was the Count. Yes—that Count.Purple felt skin, monocle, widow’s peak, tuxedo, cape, and an accent thick enough to butter your bread with. Sesame Street introduced me—tiny me—to a buffet of vampire tropes that still define the genre: The dramatic Eastern European accent The aristocratic...

So Many Draculas, So Much Time! Hey Monster Maker, Let’s talk about blood. And spit. And skin that sloughs. And mouths full of too many teeth. Let’s talk about abjection—the messy stuff that makes us flinch, gag, or squirm. And let’s talk about how that makes monsters really stick in your reader’s brain. Dracula’s been having a moment lately—again—and recent versions are leaning hard into the body horror. Think: The twisted, bat-like ghoul in The Last Voyage of the Demeter (2023) The...

💌 Monster Makers Talky Monsters, Sharp Tongues, & the Terror of What’s Left Unsaid Some monsters bite. Others flirt first, then bite. Hey Monster Maker, Let’s talk about the villains who don’t just stalk, stab, or screech . . . They speak.Smoothly. Seductively. Smartly enough to be dangerous.And let’s be real: they can be way scarier than the ones with claws. This week, we’re diving into the world of talky monsters—the vamps, the devils, the slasher villains with a flair for monologue. The...

Star Wars Cosplay Meet Up Hey Monster Maker! Let me just say this up front: San Diego Comic Con was a freakin’ blast. I wore villain cosplay. I saw villain cosplay. I screamed (lovingly) at villain cosplay. It was like dancing into a Monster Ball, and I didn’t want the music to stop. And let’s be honest: the Dark Side always shows up strong. Darths and Vaders and Mauls, oh my. Entire families in Sith robes. So many red lightsabers swinging proudly, I thought we were about to storm the Jedi...

Hey Monster Maker, Got your snacks? Because this month’s Monster of the Month will definitely ruin your appetite. We’re diving into a legendary villain who oozes power, rot, and grotesque charisma. You can’t look away—even when you want to. Meet your new favorite nightmare: 👅 Jabba the Huttaka: The Galaxy’s Most Powerful Mobster-Slug Jabba the Abject 🐌💀 Let’s be real. Jabba is gross. [And I totally need to take a nerd-minute to clarify that I mean the ORIGINAL Jabba from Return of the Jedi,...

Book by Thomas Macri 💌 Monster Makers What Star Wars Monsters Teach Us About Beast-Building 🧠 Monsters are never just monsters. They’re metaphors in cool outfits. Hey Monster Maker, So here’s a theory:Monsters don’t just go bump in the night.They go bump in culture. And nothing proves that better than my favorite galaxy far, far away. Enter: Jeffrey Jerome Cohen’s “Monster Culture (Seven Theses)”A big, juicy framework for thinking about monsters as mirrors of our fears, boundaries, and barely...

Star Wars Poster 💌 Monster Makers #6 Make Your World Weird (and Don’t Explain It) A Jedi, a swamp witch, and a Grootslang with three mouths walk into a cantina . . . and no one explains a damn thing. Hey Monster Maker, Let’s talk world-building. Not the kind that makes you draw twelve maps and create a trade system for haunted onions (though, mad respect if you do). I’m talking about the kind of world that feels lived-in, slightly grimy, and deliciously, monstrously weird. Because here’s the...