“Weird Science” – 80s Alchemy Based on Gnostic Myth

By: Peter Parker

Although the idea that Weird Science is rife with occult underpinnings might, at first, seem a ludicrous contention to some, on closer examination of the text numerous esoteric currents begin to emerge. The film and by extension the music video make use of numerous cultural artifacts that have their origin in the western occult tradition, whether the film/video makers themselves were fully aware of it or not.
Most people will immediately be able to identify Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein as one of the primary keys to fully appreciating the film. Anyone unfamiliar with Frankenstein will miss the central parody of the movie. Though the idea of Frankenstein can be reinterpreted as a critique of scientific or occult hubris, it is difficult to discern whether this was the intent of Mary Shelley herself. The novel’s protagonist Victor Frankenstein (based, to some degree on Mary’s husband Percy) starts out a vociferous reader of alchemical and occult authors, such as Agrippa and Paracelsus. After attending Ingolstadt University, birth place of the infamous Bavarian Illuminati, a fact that goes unmentioned in the novel, (serving, essentially as a wink to the knowing reader) Victor’s schoolmasters teach him that his occult heroes were full of unscientific hogwash. Despite this he swears to carry on the spirit of their great work using the tools of modern science. To this end he creates a golem out of expired human body parts, in what is a perverse imitation of both the creation and resurrection of Man. The story perfectly encapsulates the ethos of the Romantic Revolutionary, who rejected Christianity yet sought some manner of spiritual ground beyond Enlightenment Materialism.

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