Dr Robbie McAllister
Robbie is a senior lecturer and programme lead for Film at Leeds Trinity University, UK. His research explores debates of genre filmmaking, retrofuturism and nostalgia, much of which led to his first monograph: Steampunk Film: A Critical Introduction (Bloomsbury, 2019). His upcoming book, a biography of actor and photographer Roddy McDowall, examines the intersections between genre, Hollywood history, and queer stardom. His ongoing writing on issues such as folk horror, animation, foodways and East Asian cinema can be found in numeorus different academic publications. Creature Features is designed to showcase his two greatest passions: animal rights and film studies.
Publications:
Forthcoming: ‘COVID, Caste, and Censorship: Regulatory Interference and Indian Nationhood in Neeraj Ghaywan’s Homebound (2025),’ (ed. Tanima Kumari) Global Bollywood: Cultural Appropriation, Streaming Media, and the Politics of Representation.
Forthcoming: ‘Queer as Folk Horror: Revisiting The Ballad of Tam Lin (1971) and the Faerie Goddess,’ (ed. Michael Wheatley) Queer Horror: A Companion, New York: Peter Lang.
Forthcoming: ‘Going Underground: Delving into the Subterranean Nightmare of Takahide Hori’s Junk Head (2017),’ (ed. Adam Whybray), Animated Global Horror, University of Wales Press.
2022. ‘Streaming Steam: Crafting Online Retrofutures in Steampunk Short Film,’ (ed. Gerry Canavan, Dan Hassler-Forest and Ida Yoshinaga) Science Fiction Film & Television: 15.3, pp. 295-313.
2021. ‘Punking the Machine: Steampunk Hollywood and the Adaptive Practices of a Grave-Robbing Genre,’ (ed. Shannon Wells-Lassagne and Eckart Voigts) Filming the Past, Screening the Present: Studies in Anglophone Literatures: 44, pp. 55-66.
2021: ‘Twenty Thousand Leagues East: Around the World with Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water,’ (ed. Aris Mousoutzanis and Yugin Teo) Science Fiction Studies: Extrapolating Nostalgia PP. 46-61.
2019: ‘The Clockwork Occult: Evaluating the Scientific Fantastic in Steampunk Cinema,’ (ed. Andrea Grunert) Film Journal 5 / Screening the Supernatural pp. 12-25.
2019: Steampunk Film: A Critical Introduction. Monograph, New York: Bloomsbury.
2018: ‘Reengineering Modernity: Cinematic Detritus and the Steampunk Blockbuster,’ (ed. Chris Louttit and Erin Louttit) Screening the Victorians in the Twenty-First Century (Neo-Victorian Studies 11: 1), 15-37.
2017. ‘Dreams of Steam: Fetishising an Age of Industry in Contemporary Steampunk Cinema,’ (ed. Anna Annotnowicz and Tomasz Niedokos) Studies in Literature and Culture: 14. pp. 41 – 60.
2016. ‘Branding the Beagle: Reworking Peanuts for the Blockbuster Age,’ (ed. Cristina Formenti) Animation Studies 2.0 [online].
Conferences & Events:
Quantum Sauce, Old Woollen, Farsley, 22 October 2025 ‘“It Runs on Steam!”: Steampunk Goes to the Movies’
International Conference on Film Studies: Identity and Otherness, Birbeck University, 1 – 2 February 2025 ‘Queer as Folk Horror: Revisiting The Ballad of Tam Lin (1971) and the Faerie Goddess’
Empire for Sale, Abbey House Museum, Kirkstall, 23 – 24th November 2024, ‘Looking Back to the Future: Steampunk in the Contemporary Blockbuster’
Ukraine Culture Festival, Leeds Trinity University, 31 May 2022, Chief Organiser and Chair
The International Research Centre for Interactive Storytelling Conference, [virtual] 28 – 29 June 2021 ‘Postgraduate Panel,’ Chair
Xena Warrior Princess 20 Years On: An International Conference of Classical Reception and Popular Culture, [virtual] 18 – 19 June 2021 ‘Session VI: Xena, the Amazons, and War,’ Chair
PCA/ACA Annual Conference, Boston [virtual] 2 – 5 June 2021 ‘Roddy McDowall: Twentieth Century Moppet’
PCA/ACA Annual Conference, Washington D.C. 16 – 19 April 2019 ‘Neo-Victorian Science Fantasy and the Contemporary Blockbuster’
CEA 49th Annual Conference, St Petersburg Fl. 5 – 7 April 2018 ‘Rethinking the Neo-Victoriental in East-Asian Cinema’
Japan in the Digital Age, Manchester Metropolitan University 28October 2017 ‘Rethinking the Neo-Victoriental: Retrofuturism and Technological Fetishism in Japanese Steampunk’
Neo-Victorian Screen Adaptations, NUI Galway 22 – 26 August 2016 ‘Punking the Machine: Reengineering Victorian Literature in Cinema’
All Things Victorian, University of Portsmouth 19 March 2016 ‘Clockwork Detritus: Neo-Victorian Machinery and Steampunk Cinema’
Victorian Modernities, University of Kent 25 – 27 June 2015 ‘Alternate Histories: Commercial Steampunk as Off-Modern Practice’
Cult Cinema and Technological Change, Aberystwyth University 15 – 26 April 2014 ‘Steampunk and Hollywood: the Massification of a Cult Movement’
Neo-Victorian Cultures: Victorians Today, John Moores University 24 – 26 July 2013 ‘The Past made Present: 21st Century Steampunk Cinema and Neo-Victorianism’
Theatre, Film and Television Annual Conference, Aberystwyth University 2012-2014 ‘A Cog within the Machine: Steampunk as Film Genre’
Creature Features: Animal Welfare on Screen 