Mastodawn

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Jun 14, 2023

I have several nested theories here. First, I have a suspicion that #Lost checks off a lot of the tropes in what I call the "Forbidden Planet" plot, or "Haunted Ship" motif. I'm only on the second season of my rewatch after over a decade of last seeing it, so I'll be looking to see if it continues to match up, if maybe at times only vaguely. At best, the Haunted Ship motif is happening in the backstory rather than the front story.

Nested theory #2: Then I have to explain what I mean by the Haunted Ship motif. Last December, I watched Netflix show #1899. This show was resonating strongly with Forbidden Planet, which I hadn't seen for a long time, but I remember thinking that Event Horizon is also the same plot/motif/thematic blob.

So I wrote a huge thread on that which is now lost to mastodon.lol (I fucking hate that). I still have these toots archived, but not neatly threaded, so I'd have to piece them together bit by bit and repost them here. #ForbiddenPlanet

1/

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Jun 14, 2023

📽️ Forbidden Planet (replace “ship” with “planet”)
📽️ Event Horizon
📽️ #1899
📽️ (And maybe #Lost? As backstory plot?)...

...all contain:

✔️ Hubris of science themes
✔️ Arrogant scientist character
✔️ Ship is lost
✔️ Ship is found
✔️ A rescue crew explores ship looking for answers
✔️ The rescuers slowly go mad
✔️ Specters from the subconscious drive the plot
✔️ There are themes of trying to destroy the ship
✔️ There are themes of trying to leave vs. staying
✔️ Mysterious monster/beast/ghost

I actually went back and rewatched Event Horizon AND Forbidden Planet to confirm. I had a lot more in the old thread to say about some of the symbols, how The Last Unicorn shared some of those symbols but less on the nose, my thoughts on rewatching the other films, etc etc. I do hope someday to track it all down and copy/paste it here again, but that's going to take a manual timestamp sort and a spreadsheet.

2/

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Jun 14, 2023

Anyway, so far based on my memory and 2 refreshed Seasons of #Lost, it has:

✔️ Hubris of science themes (backstory)
✔️ Arrogant scientist character: (or organization, backstory)
✔️ Ship is lost (plane is lost)
✔️ Ship is found (lots of lost people finding lost people)
✔️ A rescue crew explores ship looking for answers (survivors of plane crash looking for answers)
❌ The rescuers slowly go mad
✔️ Specters from the subconscious drive the plot (lots of hallucinations)
✔️ There are themes of trying to destroy the ship (there's the button!)
✔️ There are themes of trying to leave vs. staying (first season tackled characters who didn't want to leave)

I'll keep watching and see what falls out!

#1899 #ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

3/3+ (stopping for now)

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 1, 2024

I found another story that fits the Haunted Ship motif:

The Terror series on Netflix. It’s about two explorer ships in the 1840s that were lost. It doesn’t tick all the boxes neatly, but it’s got lost ships, hubris, debates about going or staying, and a terrible beast (I talked more about the beast themes from Forbidden Planet in my missing thread). Less psychological so far, but there’s time.

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 1, 2024

I also wanted to rewatch Sunshine to see if it fit the haunted ship motif, but I started watching it with my son and he got bored (🙄) so I’ll have to try again later.

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸

If you have ideas of movies or shows that might fit all or many of these tropes, let me know! Lost ship, psychological/sanity themes, a beast or ghost, hubris, etc.

(It was uncanny how many Forbidden Planet themes The Last Unicorn hit, just minus the ship, so sidetracks like that are ok too as long as it’s fun to watch. Motifs are squishy.)

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 1, 2024

Oh snap! In book form there’s also Paul Russo’s Ship of Fools, which I freaking loved. Creepy haunted space ship. Rendezvous with Ranma almost counts. I feel like Frank Herbert’s The Jesus Incident treads these waters as well, though I hadn’t identified this trope yet so I don’t remember clearly.

And there was an anime haunted space ship one, it was a short included in a 4-part film, I think called Memories.

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 1, 2024

And since I have a playlist for everything:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3yYLwWJ0NhqD6fbKOKNPKq?si=hC2ITzZ1RB-YmBDFl7oAvQ&pi=u-UcM3d8IgSYa7

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Haunted Space Station

Playlist · Luna Corbden · 214 items · 2 likes

Spotify

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 2, 2024

Oh hells, Bioshock checks some of the boxes, too.

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 4, 2024

Just random tangential thoughts about how both the Forbidden Planet and Last Unicorn beasts are red bulls, a Taurus theme, wondering if these could have connected psychological symbols to the Greek labyrinth myth (which I don't know much about but there's a Taurus-based monster in that, and some of these other stories I've referenced have a "maze of the mind"), and just for fun wondering if any symbolic connections can be made to House of Leaves, which makes quite a big deal of the Greek story. 🤔

I don't know what I'm doing with these ideas, just jotting down the connections. I don't have a thesis at all about which part of the human condition these stories are reflecting and what they say. But it seems like it will be obvious someday. Just waiting for something to "click." (The Sea represents the unconscious, hello.)

Also still planning to search my archives to restore the lost thread, which had more details when these viewings were fresh.

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 4, 2024

I mean, Forbidden Planet was pretty obvious what it was trying to say about the Ego and the Id. I'm looking for a bigger picture, something I can describe in a couple of sentences, that connects all of these stories. The Deep Truth.

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 4, 2024

Oh, and for the record, The Haunting of the Queen Mary does NOT fit this motif. That movie is hot garage that doesn’t know what it is. I wrote a review in a different thread.

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 10, 2025

Got another one. Classic Doctor Who, The Face of Evil fits the haunted ship trope fairly well.

Notably, The Evil One is an invisible "beast" that appears as a glowing projection, much in the vein of Forbidden Planet and The Last Unicorn, although it isn't using bull imagery.

🧵

#ForbiddenPlanet #motif #HauntedShip

Sarah Conner Sep 1, 2024

@corbden The Leftovers? Sort of/not exactly, but seems vibe-adjacent

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 1, 2024

@sarahconner Hmm interesting. I’ll think about that. The Well episode is the greatest single ep ever filmed.

🚫👑Sep 2, 2024

@corbden Firefly. Farscape.

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 2, 2024

@tirrimas Not “haunted” or even spooky. That’s just sparkling space opera.

🚫👑Sep 2, 2024

Mx. Luna Corbden 🐸Sep 2, 2024

@tirrimas You’ve waded into my nerdy special interest area, maybe call it “niche story motifs that resonate with me.” I don’t even have enough data to make a hypothesis, just a curiosity. 🤓

It’s a fairly niche motif in that I can list the ones I’ve seen & read from memory, but I would like there to be more. The idea is these stories are outlining a certain part of the deep subconscious that hasn’t been explored as much as say, the Hero’s Journey plot, which is everywhere. Those core symbols are the outline of that brain space. A different way of saying it is it’s the Forbidden Planet plot. This all started decades ago when I realized Event Horizon was a remake of Forbidden Planet.

I find it fascinating that The Last Unicorn somehow manages to mirror the symbols of Forbidden Planet without even having a ship. (I need to find the lost thread where I make that case, but it’s uncanny, even the beasts look the same.)

Some of my examples are stretches, hoping to see the outline better.

Once again, I have nothing of worth to contribute.