I Just Realized Why King Charles's Haunting New Portrait Looks Familiar—and Now I Can't Unsee it
Earlier this month, King Charles unveiled a new royal portrait that was anything but subtle. From the hand of U.K. artist Johnathan Yeo, the painting of the 75-year-old monarch showcases him sporting a traditional red Welsh Guards uniform amid a blaze of fire. Is he on fire? Is he emerging from fire? Is he the embodiment of fire himself? Honestly, I don't know, and I don't really care—I'm not a royal family buff who pores over conspiracy threads (although I do sometimes look to Kate for a fashion rule).
And yet...
The image of Charles's fiery face kept nagging at me. Why did this sleep paralysis demon seem so, well, familiar?
And then it came to me: It reminded me of that insanely scary demonic portrait in Ghostbusters II.
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The now cult-classic 1989 Ghostbusters II may have been a critical flop, but for some reason, that haunting painting of the sadistic Vigo the Carpathian, an evil 16th-century warlock (and no, not a real person—I had to look that up), stuck with me all these years, up until the unveiling of King Charles's scorched-earth portrait.
And unfortunately for the royal fam, I'm not the only one who made the leap from Buckingham Palace to river-of-slime overlord obsessed with Sigourney Weaver's baby. Per usual, ten steps ahead of me, the internet had already connected the dots.
Who wore it better? King Charles or Vigo the Carpathian from Ghostbusters 2 pic.twitter.com/NH61S2Dlnk
— .. (@adamanska) May 14, 2024
I'm not sure which surprises me more: that "the firm" was down for such a satanic-leaning portrayal? That portrait artist Yeo got away with such a massive sub-tweet? Or that I'm not the only millennial who's been so thoroughly impacted by a film that, as its Wikipedia page notes, "failed to replicate the cultural impact and following of Ghostbusters. Although some critics retrospectively praised it, Ghostbusters II is generally seen as a poor follow-up to Ghostbusters and responsible for stalling the franchise for decades." I argue that Ghostbuster II's influence was so great that British officials should definitely be checking to make sure a river of slime isn't running beneath the entire city and into the Thames. Just a precaution.
Alas, now that I've addressed what was unnerving me, I can sleep at night and move on to other things...like the new portrait of Kate Middleton, which, now that I think of it, kinda reminds me of something I've seen before...
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