Thesis Presentation: When Your Darlings Bite Back
Channel: howeMU
Date: 2022-05-06

This project formed my capstone work in MICA's Data Analytics and Visualization graduate program (Spring 2022). Drawing its title from Stephen King's writing memoir, it visualizes the shape of feature-length horror film, particularly horror about art subjects, as described in IMDb from 1900 to 2020. The complete project takes the form of an interactive network visualization, as well as three 2D visualizations imagined as vinyl wraps in an arthouse cinema.  Carol Clover, who in 1992 coined the term "final girl," writes that “[a] strong prima facie case could be made for horror's being...the most self-reflexive of cinematic genres" (168). I wanted to test this with data, by extending her observation to its logical conclusion: horror is also, then, about the act of making, creating aesthetic objects or experiences, often through the rubric of unmaking. Throughout the project, I used Python, R, Tableau, Tableau Prep, Gephi, and Illustrator.