News
‘Halloween,’ ‘The Thing’ Sound Mixer Thomas Causey Has Passed Away
Oscar-nominated production sound mixer Thomas Causey passed away on January 11 at the age of 76.
John Carpenter’s Halloween was an early highlight in Causey’s four decade career. He returned for Halloween II and Halloween III: Season of the Witch.
Causey reunited with Carpenter on Escape from New York, The Thing, Christine, Starman, Big Trouble in Little China, Price of Darkness, Village of the Damned, and Escape from L.A.
His other genre credits include Jurassic Park III, Clue, Twilight Zone: The Movie, Wes Craven’s Chiller, and William Friedkin’s The Guardian.
Causey’s work on Warren Beatty’s Dick Tracy earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Sound Mixing.
Some of his other notable credits includes Anger Management, Erin Brockovich, The Naked Gun, Lethal Weapon 3, Hot Shots, The Fisher King, The General’s Daughter, Murder by Numbers, The Rocketeer, and four Star Trek movies (Generations, First Contact, Insurrection, Nemesis).
Sound mixers don’t get enough credit for their impact on film, but Causey’s leaves behind a long legacy of beloved and successful work.
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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