What happens when you make a movie about the Antichrist and then everyone involved starts seeing signs of evil everywhere?

In this episode of Cursed...ish, Daniel and Angela kick off Cursed Cinema with The Omen, the 1976 horror classic about Damien, a very creepy child who may or may not be the literal Antichrist.

The movie leaned hard into demonic imagery from the beginning, with 666-themed release dates, ominous posters, satanic marketing, and a campaign practically begging audiences to believe something sinister was happening behind the scenes.

Then the stories started piling up: Gregory Peck’s plane was struck by lightning. So was screenwriter David Seltzer’s. Members of the production narrowly missed deadly plane crashes, survived nearby IRA bombings, and dealt with dangerous animal incidents on set. And then came the tragedy that helped cement the legend. Special effects artist John Richardson, who helped create the film’s famous decapitation scene, later survived a car crash that killed fellow effects artist Liz Moore in an eerily similar way. The accident happened on Friday the 13th, and later retellings added even more suspicious details involving 66.6 and a nearby town called Ommen.

Along the way, we talk The Omen curse, Gregory Peck, Richard Donner, Damien, 666, biblical numerology, lightning strikes, near-death coincidences, cursed movie sets, horror marketing, and the very blurry line between supernatural warning signs and a studio realizing that “the devil doesn’t want us to make this movie” is excellent publicity.

Was The Omen actually cursed, or did one very smart marketing campaign teach everyone to start connecting dots that were never really connected?

Maybe cursed. Maybe not. Actually, this one might just be not cursed.

https://www.whatsleepsbeneath.com/archive/the-omen-still-relevant-at-fifty?

https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/moviedetails/55833

https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.com/search-newspapers/results?&enddate=1979-12-31&keywords=%23kills+%23lion+%23tiger&startdate=1970-01-01

https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1975/nov/21/dunsfold-aerodrome-accident

https://www.worldbirdstrike.com/images/Resources/IBSC_Documents_Presentations/Warsaw/IBSC26_WPSA1.pdf

https://catalog.afi.com/Film/55833-THE-OMEN

https://www.tcm.com/articles/021416/the-omen-1976

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/lightning-strikes-decapitations-curse-original-110000012.html

Questions, comments, or your own accursed tales to share? Send us a hex at uhoh@cursedish.com.

The hosts of Cursed...ish are not responsible for any misfortunes that may befall you while listening to this podcast. By listening to Cursed...ish, you assume all risk of bad luck, ill omens, and unexplained catastrophes.

*Terms and conditions may be upheld by unknown forces.

Before Halloween was spooky season, there was Samhain.

In this episode of Cursed...ish, Angela and Daniel dig into the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain, the pagan celebration marking the end of the harvest, the beginning of winter, and a time when the veil between the living and the dead was believed to be at its thinnest.

And the deeper we go, the more familiar everything starts to look. Massive bonfires light up the darkness. People disguise themselves from wandering spirits. Food is left out to appease supernatural visitors. Glowing gourds with carved faces ward off evil. People go door to door asking for treats, and those who refuse might find themselves on the receiving end of a trick.

Somehow, thousands of years later, we are still doing basically the same thing every October. Along the way, we talk pagan holidays, Druids, sacred fires, the Wheel of the Year, ancient Irish folklore, divination, soul cakes, black cats, fae, ancestor worship, All Hallows’ Eve, and how Christianity helped transform Samhain traditions into the Halloween we know today. Is Halloween secretly one enormous ancient pagan holdover?

Maybe cursed. Maybe not. Maybe we’re all just a bunch of pagans with better candy.

Questions, comments, or your own accursed tales to share? Send us a hex at uhoh@cursedish.com.

The hosts of Cursed...ish are not responsible for any misfortunes that may befall you while listening to this podcast. By listening to Cursed...ish, you assume all risk of bad luck, ill omens, and unexplained catastrophes.

*Terms and conditions may be upheld by unknown forces.

What happens when you disturb a body that has been frozen in the Alps for more than 5,000 years?

In this episode of Cursed...ish, Daniel and Angela dig into the strange life, violent death, and alleged Curse of Ötzi the Iceman, one of the oldest and best-preserved human mummies ever discovered.

Found by hikers in the Ötztal Alps in 1991, Ötzi turned out to be a Copper Age man who died more than five millennia ago. His clothing, tools, tattoos, last meal, injuries, and even the contents of his stomach have given researchers an extraordinary glimpse into prehistoric life. They also revealed something much darker: Ötzi appears to have died violently, with an arrowhead lodged in his shoulder and evidence of a brutal fight shortly before his death.

Then the people connected to his discovery started dying.

A pathologist killed in a car crash. A mountain guide lost in an avalanche. A journalist dead from a brain tumor. One of the hikers who discovered Ötzi killed in a freak mountain accident, followed shortly afterward by the death of the man who recovered his body. Before long, tabloids were asking whether disturbing the Iceman had unleashed a curse.

Along the way, we talk ancient murder, spontaneous mummies, Copper Age survival, Ötzi’s tattoos, prehistoric medicine, frozen corpses, archaeological ethics, selection bias, and whether putting someone’s 5,300-year-old body on display for hundreds of thousands of strangers might be asking for a little supernatural retaliation.

Maybe Ötzi was cursed. Maybe the pattern is coincidence. Maybe some things are better left buried under the ice.

Maybe cursed. Maybe not.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/worlds-oldest-murder-mystery-was-430000-years-in-the-making

https://blog.familytreedna.com/otzi-the-iceman-dna/

https://exarc.net/issue-2023-2/at/reconstructing-otzis-shoes

https://www.thevintagenews.com/2017/12/12/otzi-the-iceman-shoes/

https://english.radio.cz/ice-man-weareth-comfy-shoes-8045052

https://www.iceman.it/en/oetzi/the-discovery

https://www.dw.com/en/curse-of-the-iceman-linked-to-scientists-death/a-1765550

https://www.tsemrinpoche.com/tsem-tulku-rinpoche/paranormal/creatures-and-monsters/the-curse-of-otzi-the-iceman.html

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2005/apr/20/science.italy

https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2005/11/05/2003278839

https://www.theguardian.com/education/mortarboard/2007/sep/03/theicemancometh

https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/europe/curse-of-the-oetzi-the-iceman-strikes-again-324955.html

https://www.ripleys.com/stories/the-curse-of-otzi-the-iceman

https://pubs.rsna.org/doi/10.1148/radiol.2263020338

https://lethbridgenewsnow.com/2021/10/08/the-curse-of-otzi-the-iceman/

Questions, comments, or your own accursed tales to share? Send us a hex at uhoh@cursedish.com.

The hosts of Cursed...ish are not responsible for any misfortunes that may befall you while listening to this podcast. By listening to Cursed...ish, you assume all risk of bad luck, ill omens, and unexplained catastrophes.

*Terms and conditions may be upheld by unknown forces.