Category: Dangerous Dames

The Fiendish Pit of Dr. Fug Manpoo

Hack has long been a fan of English author Sax Rohmer’s supervillain Dr. Fu Manchu, a stalwart role of horror actors like Boris Karloff and Christopher Lee (Karloff’s 1932 film The Mask of Fu Manchu is particularly fun, with a pre-Thin Man Myrna Loy as the doctor’s evil daughter Fah Lo See). The character’s popularity has fallen out of favor in recent years (last being seen as a leading role in Peter Sellers’ film farewell The Fiendish Plot of Fu Manchu in 1979, although Nicolas Cage revived it for a section of the 2007 cult classic Grindhouse) due to its racist attitudes and “yellowface” casting.

That didn’t stop Hack from adapting Fu Manchu into a Korean pug supervillain named Dr. Pug Manpoo who craps into a massive pit in his castle and tortures his enemies by suspending them over it with the threat of dropping them in. Variety reports that Nicolas Cage is in talks to play the role in a film version.

Stairway to Hell

This cover was inspired by Hack’s cover artist Jonny M.’s experiences when his home of Los Angeles was facing the scourge of Tropical Storm Hillary. It began when Jonny texted the cover art for The Bunker to a friend the day before, who responded “You’re going to hell.”

A little later when it was pouring rain from Tropical Storm Hilary, Jonny had a vision of an earthquake and having to evacuate his government-assisted housing outside. Shortly afterward, there was an earthquake (no evacuation necessary, though). When he told the same friend about it, they replied “so the earthquake is YOUR fault.”

Jonny made the cover and Hack dashed out a novel around it.