Once more, with feeling

The Collinsport Historical Society is up for another Rondo Hatton Classic Horror Award this year for "Best Website," but we've decided not to campaign for ourselves. We're happy with the Rondos we've already received and thought we'd throw our meager weight behind Stan Against Evil and its creator Dana Gould. We announced this effort a week ago and things went predictably terrible from the start.

I say "predictably" because that's just how Facebook functions these days. It's a platform that rewards posts for their interactions, no matter how good or bad those interactions might be. If you have a post that gets dogpiled by Russian bots, all Facebook sees are the statistics and chalks that up as a "win." The human element operates at the opposite end of that spectrum to similarly disasterous results. When presented with an unending cascade of data, people will grab hold of the things that are easiest to process. If you're too clever or give people too much information to evaluate, they'll blink and keep scrolling. It's frustrating to watch this happen from my side of the screen, and that frustration is often difficult to hide.

"Posts that don’t include a photo of Jonathan Frid tend to get the cold shoulder here, but please take a moment to read this piece about Stan Against Evil at The Collinsport Historical Society."

This is how I chose to lure people into my Rondo campaign last week for Stan Against Evil. It was a bit passive aggressive, but also true. Plus, it never hurts to be provocative and that's probably the only reason anyone took the time to comment. Unfortunately, the majority of those comments only served to underline my point.

"Not interested," one person took the time to comment before I hid his post. He later came back to add "There must be other places one can deal with this sort of thing..." Nobody saw this, either.

"Not because (Frid's) picture isn't involved, because it isn't about DS," someone else ejaculated into the void.

Too many people have decided that the only relationship they want with websites today is through a social media buffer, which is why there aren't many sites like The Collinsport Historical Society around anymore. The internet was lousy with blogs when this site kicked off back in 2012. Today, there are so few that the Rondos have merged their "Best Blog" and "Best Website" into one category, pitting my tiny corner of the Internet against Bloody Disgusting, Dread Central and Birth. Movies. Death. (One of the early models for my website, Stacey Ponder's Final Girl, hasn't been updated since June 11, 2018.)

Is that what the future holds for us? Because, getting back to my original point, I've mentioned the ways Dan Curtis has influenced Stan Against Evil on this website many, many times. From how Collinsport helped inform the show's setting, to the House of Dark Shadows homage in Janet Varney's costume design in the episode "Vampire Creek." And hey! There's a witch on the show named Lara Bouchard, and a doctor at a mental institutioned named "Dr. Edmonds." Speaking of Dan Curtis, Carl Kolchak also made a stealth appearance in the third season of Stan Against Evil.

The people who took the time out of their busy schedules to barf up comments about how the Rondo campaign is irrelvant? They don't have a relationship with this website. They have a relationship with Facebook. Consequently, it's incredibly unlikely they've seen any of those earlier posts about Stan Against Evil. It's doubtful they even know the names of the contributors here. Our posts just appear in their feeds as if by magic, cobbled together during the night by elves in the workshop.

But the fight goes on! If you want to cast a ballot for Stan Against Evil, here's how:

As usual, this year's winners will be determined by votes from the public. And that means you. You can copy and paste the ballot and include an X next to your choices, or just type your ballot choices directly into the e-mail. Readers are asked to select winners from this year's nominees and e-mail your selections to David Colton at taraco@aol.com. You can find the entire ballot at https://rondoaward.com/rondoaward.com/blog/.

Note: "Best TV Presentation" is #3 on the ballot. While you're at it, please consider voting for Dana Gould for #29, "Monster Kid Hall of the Year." This is a write-in category.

All voting is by e-mail only. One vote is allowed per person. Every e-mail must include your name to be counted. All votes are kept confidential. No e-mail addresses or personal information will be shared. Votes must be received by April 20, 2019.

I'm not alone in my efforts: The Cheap Chills Show is also stumping for Dana and Stan Against Evil and you can read their pitch HERE. Also, all three seasons of Stan Against Evil are now streaming on Hulu!