Mark Bennear
Bio
I enjoy reading, writing, and sharing ideas and appreciation. Blessings to all.
Stories (8/0)
The Path to Primrose Cohen: Debaucherous Discovery
Unabashed enthusiasm is all too often ridiculed. The woman who laughs at a lame greeting card, the boys and girls who cheer when their characters pass a savings throw, and the grown man who cries at seeing a young Luke Skywalker depicted on the screen are all summarily slapped should their joy go public. Each sardonic self-congratulator sounds his trumpet as he assigns himself judge, jury, and smashocutioner. The followers like and pile on as the innocent and completely self-unaware joy is crushed beneath the feet of a grape-dancer who hates wine. This is the way of the world. Perhaps it always has been.
By Mark Bennear6 months ago in Fiction
I am Not a Merman, and I Told As Much to Primrose Cohen
I was struck with the rumblings and stirrings of those things within me with which I believe I am ethically bound to contend. The slamming and the stomping, the flickers and the penumbra, all specters of disquiet that must mean something. What to do? I wrote. I scribbled and scratched on paper all the symbols I could produce that seemed to, in aggregate, be relevant to the shadows at the corners of my inner vision. It was not neat. It was not pretty. It was messy, in fact, the process I mean. This word was wrong. That phrase was clumsy. This metaphor made me cringe. That simile was too on the bulbous nose of the imp that started the whole thing in the first place. Frustration turned to anger, and anger slid into hopelessness. Finally, it arrived. I glimpsed, just enough, the substance of my pain, and I was able to describe it, to ascribe words to give it form. The obscure silhouettes had become substantive. I had captured the things. As a result, I had tamed them...temporarily.
By Mark Bennear11 months ago in Fiction
The Final Touche (Please Imagine Accent Aigu In Its Proper Place)
The beggars of the divine from the now extinct The Esoteric Order of Snotra.org who commune with me here have absorbed knowledge, perhaps better expressed as “a knowing of sorts,” when it comes to the soul of the man known to us only as Primrose Cohen. While much of his communique is bulging with literary insight and pregnant with psychosocial rumination, he occasionally shares something of the catastrophe of being an involuntary prophet. I think it is clear that Mr. Cohen shares some qualities with Poe's Egæus, and, upon birth, descending from the velvet veil, was startled by the sandpaper we know as reality. Yes, he cast an ardent eye on the ugliness we have created, and for that we are grateful. Yet, the man still shares aspects of himself in his own way, much as does the curmudgeonly speaker in the Blue Oyster Cult classic, “Burnin' For You.” Like that speaker, he reveals little as if he is already revealing too much. It is this hesitancy on these matters that infuses a certain urgency in my perception of Mr. Cohen's more personal words. For me, each syllable drips with a tightly wound passion that nearly strangles its progenitor. Is this the price Mr. Cohen pays for reaching outside himself into the murky depths of the abstruse in an effort to assign order to apparent chaos?
By Mark Bennearabout a year ago in Fiction
Top Gun and the Vampire Chronicles: The Most Underhanded Crossover in Film History
1994's Interview With the Vampire provided few clues that it was the prequel to Top Gun. Likewise, Top Gun gave viewers almost no information that would allow them to realize that LT Pete "Maverick" Mitchell was really the infamous vampire known as Lestat. Filmmakers wove a complex web to keep audiences convinced that these movies, and their subsequent franchises, were unrelated. Apparently, they didn't consider or care that, to the keen observer, having Lestat as a main character in both franchises was a dead giveaway.
By Mark Bennearabout a year ago in Geeks
A Few Notes About Primrose Cohen and His Movie Reviews On My Account
Beginning At This Beginning The few and elite who follow my account on Vocal Media know a portion of what I am about to write. The tiny quantity of supplicants who emigrated with me from The Esoteric Order of Snotra.org know a bit more. There is still more to the story, of course, but I can only publish that which Mr. Cohen allows. The handful of souls who are familiar with Mr. Cohen are aware that he holds loyalty as a virtue above all others. While he would never betray a friend or trusted colleague, he also has zero tolerance for interpersonal treachery. Nonetheless, I feel some responsibility to offer some sort of explanation as to why I publish the writings of another person on my account and give to the reader a sensibility about Mr. Cohen that allows him/her/they to understand why Mr. Cohen insists so firmly that I do exactly that rather than Mr. Cohen creating his own account.
By Mark Bennearabout a year ago in Geeks
The Truth About The Flame
The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window. As was often the case, Elizabeth was observing the cabin from a safe distance. She wasn't sure how long she stood breathless and motionless, but when she regained her faculties, she considered running. Instead, she called Bako and Akilah and asked them to meet her.
By Mark Bennearabout a year ago in Horror
A Lack of Class Consciousness: Doctor Strange and Pizza Poppa in the Multiverse of Privilege
The film, Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness introduces audiences to Pizza Poppa. The scene featuring this recently added hero may be jarring to moviegoers in its brevity. One can see from the clearly abbreviated appearance that MCU newcomer, Pizza Poppa was intended to be a costar of the film assisting Doctor Strange, most likely operating at night in the 838 universe to slow Wanda Maximoff's progress buying time for Strange and Chavez. Pizza Poppa, played with grace and pathos by veteran actor Bruce Campbell of Hudsucker Proxy fame, spends his days trying to make ends meet as a street vendor requiring that he relegate his crime fighting efforts to night time, much like many people in the so called gig economy who have to work multiple jobs to get by. The hints that audiences witness could leave some folk questioning why the original plan for the film was abandoned for more standard fare, perhaps fear on the part of wealthy elitists that a (quite literally) hero from the streets placed in juxtaposition to the upper class snobbery of Doctor Strange would prompt a class uprising?
By Mark Bennearabout a year ago in Geeks
Seeking Safe Passage
Seeking Safe Passage There weren't always dragons in the Valley. On the other hand, the prince was always a royal pain. Besides, I had to rely on third and fourth hand reports of dragons in the valley, reports whose reliability was questionable, but I could witness the prince's behavior firsthand. As burdens go, the prince would have been sufficient, but I had to deal with the prince's two other keepers. I, however, have proven ways of coping with the personalities and machinations surrounding me. I've discovered that being perpetually in study minimizes my involvement and interaction and keeps me out of the drama that tends to surround the royal court and its servants. I was finding it difficult to read due to the bumping of the wagon. Nonetheless, I tried to steady the book in my lap, Arno's Guide to Arcane Physiognomy, a tome both dense and dubious.
By Mark Bennearabout a year ago in Fiction
