News
R.I.P. Special Effects Technician Joseph Livolsi
Horribly tragic news today, as Fox 5 reports that Hollywood special effects technician Joseph Livolsi, who had just completed work on the Dwayne Johnson-starring monster movie Rampage, was found dead inside his apartment in Atlanta over the weekend. Police say he was shot multiple times by an unknown murderer.
At this time, they have no suspects and no known motive.
Livolsi was in town to work on Michael Dougherty’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters, and a red flag was raised when he didn’t show up on set this past weekend.
“We started making phone calls, a lot of people got in the loop and no one could reach him,” said friend Eric Cook. “A couple of days went by and it was really at that point we had tried everything and we were running into dead ends, so it was a little alarming at that point.”
He added, “Real stand up guy… there’s nothing bad you can say about Joe, everybody loved him.”
Joe Livolsi was a special effects technician on over 40 high-profile projects since his career began in 2002, including Minority Report, the Pirates of the Carribean sequels, Spider-Man 3, The Avengers, Furious 7, Ant-Man and Captain America: Civil War.
In the grim darkness of the far future there is only war, but it was a cheerful illustrator from England who helped to define the terrifying war-torn imagery that inspired what we now know as Grimdark (a hybrid genre combining horror with sci-fi/fantasy).
Unfortunately for fans of Warhammer 40,000, Trench Crusade and countless other sources of Grimdark thrills, veteran artist John Blanche passed away this week after struggling with health issues for the past few years.
While the artist retired back in 2023, he leaves us with an enormous legacy of iconic artwork that continues to inspire gamers and storytellers around the world to this very day.
The news is especially gloomy as it was only last year that Daniel Lowman and Napoleon Dynamite himself Jon Heder released The Grim & the Dark: The Search for John Blanche, a documentary following Heder’s exploration of the Grimdark genre culminating in a heartwarming encounter with Blanche in his own home.
Below is one of my favorite pieces by Blanche, his highly influential depiction of Warhammer 40k’s God-Emperor of Mankind on his Golden Throne.
We send our deepest condolences to John Blanche’s family, friends, and fans.
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