Description

Trigger Warning: Brief, non-graphic discussion of themes of grooming, sexual abuse, and intimate partner violence.

Summary:

Mami Melusine discusses Tananarive Due's short story and Joe West's film adaptation "The Lake," about a mysterious woman with a dark past who is drawn to a lake that something also dangerous dwells in and Christine Chen's Erzulie, a film about four friends' encounter with a Black mermaid goddess at a campsite where they find their lives to be in danger.

Notes:

• Though I warn in the beginning of the podcast that my reviews may not be spoiler-free, I did manage to discuss the story and both films without giving away the endings. Feel free to engage without watching the films beforehand.
• At one point I refer to visuals: for those without the video podcast I am referring to the illustrations of Mami Wata as light-skinned and monstrous from the graphic novel, Mami Wata: Beyond Time and Space, linked in citations below.

Texts Cited/Mentioned:

Tananarive Due, "The Lake" also in Tananarive Due, Ghost Summer

Joe West, Tananarive Due, and Stephen Barnes, "The Lake," in Horror Noire

Christine Chen,Erzulie

Omise'eke Natasha Tinsley, Ezili's Mirrors: Imagining Black Queer Genders

Rollin Ravel Essango, African Tales, Myths, and Legends: Mami Wata Beyond Time and Space

Gabrielle Tesfaye, The Water Will Carry us Home

Jalondra A. Davis,"Crossing Merfolk Narratives of the Sacred: Nalo Hopkinson's The New Moon's Arms and Gabrielle Tesfaye's The Water Will Carry Us Home," and other mermaid research

I debated on whether to cite and link the Vlad Interviews that I referred to in my discussion of sexual abuse in "The Lake." I don't like him and don't want to send people to his platform and the stories themselves are also very disturbing and traumatic. If you would like to verify what I was referring to, the comedians I was referring to who I have seen tell stories of childhood sexual abuse are D.L. Hughley and DeRay Davis and the clips can probably be found on Youtube.