Category: reviews

Target Is Off-Target…Fruit Snacks.Halloween. Dinosaurs.

Did you know there was a time when I took life too seriously? Really!  I had dreams and aspirations that took a very dedicated approach, completely devoid of a sense of humor or time to stop and smell the roses. Then I found the world of blogging and I was able to have an alter-ego of epic proportions. Here I can write about stupid movies and express how I imagine that chocolate versus vanilla are the cosmic center to all things worth fighting for. It’s an outlet that brings like-minded people closer to me and confuse those who are already in my life. Now that I have justified my hobby it is time to delve into another bizarre topic; Target and it’s Halloween magic carpet ride. Also…Halloween fruit snacks.

I am fascinated by marketing and advertising. Mainly the question of why consumers, for lack of a better word, consume. In an economy that is about as reliable as my great-aunt Rose in an American Gladiator competition, people still will pay hard-earned money on plastic skulls and rubber bats. And that is why I love this country. More over, the companies that provide such retail like Target.

In years past, Target has really been the place to go if you want to host a Halloween party that will make your neighbors like you more and piss off the guy on the block that stuffs flannel shirts and pants with hay, top it with a Freddy Krueger mask and say he has the best decorated house. Yeah, Target will give you the ammunition to make that guy invest in Christmas lights because Halloween is your time to shine. But like any heavy-hitter of a season, you can expect the luster to dim as years go by. I think this year Target didn’t go for the touchdown but rather went for the field goal. Here is a look at the Target here in North Carolina.

Okay, the reason for the bird is that I think I caught an underwear shot by accident. And before you accuse me of being a pervert taking cellphone pictures, I do know her. Trust me, it’s much weirder the fact that I am taking pictures of an aisle in Target. Anyway, here is the Target Halloween decor of 2011. Meh. I don’t know why, but it just feels kind of plain. Perhaps I expect too much?

I can’t really tell if everything is out yet or there is more to come but seeing how it is already mid-September I venture to think that all things Halloween should be displayed. I mean other stores stock Halloween items in July so I hope they are on the ball. Regardless, this is what we gots!

The lawn ornaments is where it’s at with me. I think it is a neighborly finger in the eye to all those who don’t celebrate the seasons and a great way to fire a shot across the bow to the bald jack-hole who puts silhouetted signs of a dog pooping with the word “NO” on his lawn. Target will give me the ability to drop his home equity for less than $50.

The diner decor is lost on me but the girlfriend likes it so I feel it is only fair to talk about it. I must admit I would love to drink my coffee from a ghost mug and though the jack-o-lantern place mats seem impractical for the purpose of protecting the table, I would still eat spaghetti off its face. It’s the little things, you know?

I don’t really understand the theme that Target has decided to go with this year. In seasons past we have had characters like three kids in their alter ego Halloween character representation (witch, ghost and devil) and the famous kitten-killer Domo. But this year seems a bit…plain-Jane. Kind of like the whole set up. It’s really hard to tell only visiting one Target of, I don’t know… ten thousand, but I am remiss if I think that each one has the ability to project the seasonal spirit of every single general manager. If that was the case, of all the Target gm’s in the world, this particular gm would be the Charlie Brownest.

Last year and I believe the year before that, DOTS candy had a wider variety of Halloween flavors to include Ghost DOTS, Candy Corn DOTS and (my favorite) Blood Orange DOTS. This year, I am sad to say, we are only able to buy Ghost DOTS which are just regular DOTS minus the food coloring. So really, the Tootsie Roll company is saving money. And we can all be happy for that. I take that back, eat it DOTS! I want Blood Orange Bat Black back!

Just like Target is known for, there is always something for everyone. My girlfriend, Groucho, has a very nostalgic connection with eyeball chocolate candy and I get that. Half of everything in this blog is a look back to events and items I hold dear. I just love that of all this Halloween retail and candy she gets taken with the oldie and goodie. *sigh*

I, myself, was taken with 30 dinosaurs for $4.00. I am not really sure what they have to do with Halloween but I do know that I love them. I guess it’s just the packaging, “30 Dinosaurs”. That is so simple yet so resounding to me. It makes me want to start an alternative instrument band and call it 30 Dinosaurs. Maybe 34 Dinosaurs. Because 31, 32 and 33 are just silly. And this is a serious blog!

One thing we both could agree on is this; a cup cake stand. I really don’t know anyone who can justify owning a cupcake stand for $4.99 or really a dozen cupcake stands because we all know cupcakes aren’t made solo, but it warms my heart to know these exist. I don’t think I would go with a bug though but rather a lunar module.

Okay, we have taken a quick trip through the Halloween aisle at Target and while it wasn’t a home run it did have a few gimmicky items that spoke volumes for the season of the witch but what about the candy? I am in my thirties and while I appreciate that this is a holiday for tooth decay, I have no real sweet tooth. Besides, what am I going to say about Snickers or Twizzlers that hasn’t been said a billion times before? No, I think the fact Blood Orange Ghost DOTS are discontinued is enough for me to boohoo the candy topic. I will, however, review something close to candy and arguably the same. Halloween theme fruit snacks!

Yes ladies and gentlemen, I feel justified to review fruit snacks over candy because it is closer to my heart. See, I happened to be the exact age Betty Crocker and Nabisco targeted in the 1980’s when Fun Fruits and Fruit Rollups hit the grocery shelves. They were my heroine. My crack. I was one time caught rubbing the plastic back sheet of a Fruit Rollup on my face behind the school playground. I’m better today. In fact I have learned to control my urges to mash six pouches of Garfield fruit snacks together to form one mega fruit snack and huff the empties because of two…er…three reasons. Here they are:

  1. They don’t make Garfield food products. Well, not in this country.
  2. I have found beer.
  3. I’m an adult.

I may have kicked my addiction but retro-love knows no bounds and I am here to review three different fruit snacks that align with Halloween and are available at fine Target markets near you. Unless you are Canadian or British. Then I am sorry and this whole article is a bit of a waste to you.

I’m going to go ahead and start with the Target brand first, aka, Market Pantry. From the box you really can’t discern these from ordinary fruit snacks other than the name “Halloween fruit snacks” and the picture of spooky shapes. (I use the term spooky as loosely as possible) I expect to find similar packaging for holiday-themed snacks in the former Soviet Union. But what is lacking in packaging creativity is made up for in shapes and taste. The flavors are grape, strawberry, peach, orange and raspberry but the thing that concerns me is that there is clearly a green fruit snack. What of these flavors constitute green? I am going out on a limb and saying raspberry because you could have any color and it could pass for raspberry. It pisses me off almost as much as the silent “p” in raspberry. More on that hatred later.

So, these are pretty good and I can say that with confidence now that I’m on my twenty-ninth pack. They are the same cheap alternative fruit snacks that Brach’s came out with to challenge Fun Fruits. Didn’t work though because they felt and tasted like gummy bears and didn’t stick to the teeth for weeks. I’ll wait to give the grades at the end.

Taking it a step up on the Halloween-theme we have Florida’s Own Au’some Nuggets. Sorry Rev.13 for the term “nugget”. I was pretty excited to see how they crammed 80 pouches into a box that size and had an “ah-ha” moment when I saw that they were the size of mouse heads. I had an even bigger “ah-ha” moment when I saw that the fruit snacks were the size of mouse shit.

I don’t know what I was expecting when I read “nugget” but I was certainly confused how they boasted being a fruit snack. These were Chicklets that you ingest. My girlfriend did the math breakdown since she is an engineer and she figured that in order to equate the same amount in grams as the other fruit snack boxes, you would have to spend twenty dollars to the five dollars that the other boxes cost. I don’t know. This isn’t a financial blog, it’s a blog about idiotic crap and this box of fruit snacks is the poster child. I will say that if you eat them as they are intended they are not half bad. The four flavors are grape, orange, apple and strawberry and they taste shockingly good! Too back you have to eat thirty to achieve that.

Ah, the one that I saved for last. Betty Crocker, you pulchritudinous vixen of snack time. I love you in a way no man should ever love a box.(please don’t read into that) This artwork maybe the result of a community college online graphic design course but this…this is my Mona Lisa. It hits the season like it should be hit; hard and with no regret. This is the way I buy my fruit snacks and will choose to do so far into my diaper years. Nothing can go wrong with these. Nothing.

Hmm. That is funny. Why do they look so fuzzy? This texture isn’t like any Betty Crocker fruit snack I have seen before? Could it…could it be?* Gasp!* They are mother fing gluten-free!!!! Whaaaa? The binding product that molds the perfectly pro-cavity snack has been left out leaving this sweet…nutrasweet-tasting morsel of foul. I feel like I am eating dried dates and papaya! If I wanted to eat fruit I wouldn’t be eating fruit snacks!!!! JUDAS!

I feel like Gage at the end of Pet Semetary after he has been injected with the poison. No fair. No fair.

Well, I have to grade these and seeing how giving them an ABCDF standard grade doesn’t really match up to fruit snacks I will make up my own system. See if you can understand the coinciding grades.

Market Pantry (Target brand) Halloween fruit snacks:

  • Creative box design- waffle-soled running shoe in dog shit
  • Fruit Snack shapes- band new tennis ball smell
  • Taste- Cheez-Its and a Coke

Florida’s Natural Au’some Nuggets:

  • Creative box design- Inside the car during an automatic car wash with your favorite CD
  • Fruit Snack shapes- A gallon glass jar of picks dropped on the foot on a 30 degree morning
  • Taste- Daisies

Betty Crocker’s Halloween Fruit Snacks:

  • Creative box design- Beer and everything feels like rabbit fur
  • Fruit Snack shapes- An October Saturday night in a corn maze. With beer.
  • Taste- A shart in yoga class.

So I have needlessly rambled off a holiday post that is now…2061 words?!?! Man, I am sorry for that. But thanks for coming to Target with me and spinning around the world of Fruit Snacks! That was fun!

OH! Before I forget, while the sign may say Halloween, they really want you to start thinking about Christmas. REE! REE! REE! REE! (Sounds from Psycho)


30

Oh This Movie…

It’s not a little known fact that in the 1970’s the horror movie genre really focused on the Devil and all things Catholic, with a battle for the soul. Capstone by the academy award winning movie, The Exorcist, many films decided to ride the coattails of the success and a few New York Times best selling occult books became films. One of these films really slipped the spotlight but a revisit to it shows that just because you aren’t mainstream doesn’t mean you aren’t a winner. Even if if you are a taboo Satan-filled-lesbo-cake-eating-cat-from-Hell-Christopher Walken-minor-role-need-to-go-to-church-after-watching movie. Let us look at The Sentinel.

Now, I am not going to talk about every scene of the movie because you can just type “Netflix” in the browser and watch the movie if you are a member because it is on streaming. But what I will do is give you a brief synopsis, a highlight on some of the greatest actors in this loaded cast, some real “WTF” moments and above all, a look at the climax in a “you can’t do that on TV” scene. Seriously, you really can’t.

We begin with a quick shot at the Vatican as we meet what is, I guess, a select group of priests and we learn that there is a disturbance in the Force. The Force being all things Catholic and good. It’s not a strange beginning to this kind of film because most religious horror movies begin in another country just to show that what might happen in a familiar setting really has a global impact. Or at least traced from a really old place. Jumping to NY!

Think Fast Frisbee!

Here we are in New York as we meet the main characters of the film, Alison (Christina Raines) and Micheal (my favorite 1980’s horror icon, Chris Sarandon). Alison is a famous model as we can see because she is strikingly beautiful and her boyfriend, Micheal is a shrewd lawyer. Of course. They seem to have a happy relationship but only after a series of rocky starts since Micheal was married when they began their fling resulting is a separation from his wife. Via her death. Coincidence? Also, I should mention, Alison came from a not-so-normal childhood and attempted suicide a few times leaving her dependent on anti-depressants. Just throwing that out there.

So, we find out that Alison wants a place of her own for a while since she has been living with Micheal after his wife’s death. Seems like a plan. And that is where we find out that there are forces at work, drawing her to an apartment with a destiny of preconceived notions. (I don’t think that statement means anything.) She is drawn to a place that has both good and evil in it and there is about to be a battle for her. Better? But, that is temporarily postponed when she finds out her father is dying and she goes home to say goodbye and have a flashback or two.

Love that medicine has improved from the 70's!

We see that her father dies and we get a great glimpse of the father he used to be as she flashes back to her teenage years and brother, he was a fucked up unit. She walks in on him naked and in bed with two women and they are eating cake. And laughing. One is fat and the other is rather off her rocker and neither one minds old guy smell and old balls apparently.

Trust me, these boobs aren't worth seeing.

After her father sees her, in a frosting induced furry, he smacks her and really puts all 92lbs behind it. She takes off down the hall and after witnessing that mess, she cuts her wrists and then we flash-forward. Apparently she survived.

Well, after her father is dead and gone she comes back to occupy her residence and is met by none other than Charles Chazen (Burgess Meredith) playing a more devious but quite cavalier gentleman than Rocky’s coach. He invites himself in and introduces his bird, Mortimer, and his cat, Jezebel. This scene reminds me of when Yoda meets Luke for the first time inThe Empire Strikes Back. He’s a quirky guy but you know there is more to him than what he is representing.

Well, after excusing himself he exits, leaving behind a framed photograph of himself. (I find this classy and plan on doing that myself.) But if you think he is a strange neighbor then you gotta meet the two chicks that live below her. Gerde (Sylvia Miles) and Sandra (Beverly D’ Angelo) are two…odd lesbian ballerinas? I think? Anyway, after a brief introduction, Alison learns that Sandra is a mute and unable to talk. Gerde leaves the room to get tea and then this happens…

Claaark! Slow down!!!

This awkward  masturbation scene was both funny and a tad out there. Trying to regain composure, Alison makes an attempt to be conversational but when she asks what they do, Gerde says matter of factly, they fondle eachother. HEYOOO! Alison bolts.

Didn’t I say that I wasn’t going to do a play by play of this movie? Damn. Okay, I will be a little more brief.

Soon the apartment begins to take a toll on her as her fainting spells and headaches become increasingly worse. At night she has reoccurring nightmares and is awaken to her chandelier swinging by upstairs disturbances though it has been vacant for years. All spooky. Though her neighbors seem friendly, especially inviting her to a birthday party for Jezabel the cat, her dreams warn her that something isn’t quite right. “Black and white cake; Black and white cat.” I actually didn’t get that reference. Nevermind. Skip to a scary night.

Alison is again having a tough time sleeping in her new apartment and finally, she gets up and armed with a kitchen knife and a torch she ventures off to see what is going on. And she finds out!

While she is investigating, wouldn’t you know it, her light burns out. That always happens! Especially when a zombie in a diaper robotic-ly  walks past you and stops, facing the wall. This is horror to me! It’s a real “what the fuck just happened” scene. There is no jump scare or some creature attacking Alison. It’s as if she isn’t there and this thing has no real destination. It just mechanically walks from one side of the room to the next! UGH!

Well, curiosity gets the best of Alison and she approaches the remote control Gobot-that-hit-a-wall slowly asking who or what this thing is. You know who?

BAH! It’s her dead father! Alison laughs and gives him a huge hug. It’s very touching.

I’m just kidding. She screams and goes stabby on him, cutting off his nose and all. Bolting, she runs out of the apartment and collapses as people gather around her and call 911.

Jump scene! We are at the hospital.

Oh yeah, remember her boyfriend, Micheal? He is there and being interrogated by police since his new girlfriend is stating she stabbed her dead father and he is still under suspicion for wife’s death. But being the cunning lawyer he is, he gives no details to the investigators even though they coincidentally have a body that fit the description to the havoc Alison said she caused with a knife. This has two great things in that scene; a very young Christopher Walken and the lead investigator’s tie is as wide as it is long.

Micheal starts a little investigation of his own because he believes that there is something more sinister at work after he and Alison visit her apartment to retrace the moments when she stabbed her dead father. But nothing really makes sense to Micheal and after she writes in Latin from a book he reads to be in English, he is convinced the old recluse priest that is on the top floor of the Apartment may know something.

Oh yeah, there is a blind priest that is on the top floor that stares out the window all day. Well, he is seen at the window. That’s an important part. (God, I’m not very good at these)

With no luck getting into the apartment to talk with the recluse priest and even less luck from the Archdioceses, he decides to take matters into his own hands and calls up an old buddy to break in and steal the file on this priest.

THE BLESSING!

Well, in a hurried fashion and better conclusive skills than Velma from Scooby Do, Micheal figured out that all the people who live there have tried to commit suicide at one time in their life and each converted to the Catholic church and reside as a sentinel. And Alison is targeted to be next! No shit!

Armed with a gun, Micheal leaves Alison at a party, though she feels awful, and heads off to stop this rite of…sentinel-passing. When he arrives he sees a split in the wood on the wall and decides to bust it open. Not really sure why. But underneath is a sign straight out of Dante’s Divine Comedy. And sneaking up on him is…

Thank God we haven't invented smell-a-screen yet

…Father Freaky! Yes, the priest tells Micheal this is the gateway to Hell and as random as he came in, he leaves which pisses Micheal off. In a murderous rage, Micheal chokes the priest after he fails to answer his questions. But, little did Micheal count on there being two priests in the room. The other armed with a cement statue. Never expect murder from a priest. Hmmm.

Enter Alison. Of course she returns. She comes back to the apartment only to find Micheal…acting a bit strange. Almost instantaneously Alison knows Micheal isn’t himself. No, he begins to explain how he is damned to Hell because he killed his wife and that she is required to commit suicide and release the gates of Hell. It’s a stretch but that’s what is required.

No, there aren't strings attached to his makeup! What are you talking about?

Now this is the part that separates this movie from all other horror movies. You will never see this again in cinema for a few different reasons. 1: Special effects are much more realistic 2: Plastic surgery is quite advanced since the 1970’s and 3: this would never ever never ever fly with the FCC or any other super PC group. This is as fucked up as cinema gets.

So, Alison runs from decaying Micheal and meets the debonair Charels Chazen who is far less warm and goofy and a tad more…the Devil. He explains that she needs to finish her suicide and become apart of them. Not hearing the noise, Alison turns to run but is met by this…

and this…

and this…

Yes folks, they used real deformed people in the casting for The Sentinel. It is pretty crazy to think that there was an add for extras needing physical deformities to play the role of demons from Hell. This creeps me out to now end. It’s the kind of creep out that makes me want to shower or watch Nickelodeon to counterbalance my “ick” factor.

Well, long story short she is saved by the priests and she takes up the cross as the dominions from Hell shirk back to the abyss from which they came.

This movie is an old favorite of mine. I’m not really sure why? The plot is scattered, the setting seems to be hollow and the lead actress never really makes you care for her outcome. But there is this  1970’s high production feel that I love in horror movies from that time. That fast-paced city life that every-so-often rubs elbows with midevil beliefs and tears at the fabric to what is more important; sanity or soul. Like Matt said. I give it a B+ out of 17.

The End

17

Eddie’s Trick Shop Revisited

In the Fall of 1987 I was an absolute little shit. A unconsoling, blubbering, ashole-ish child that pleaded night and day to his hard-working father who was merely trying to keep the family fed and sheltered for an inevitable “beneath the bed” toy. From the beginning of September to the second week of October, Dad held out until the four millionth “gimme gimme gimme, I need I need” was too much and he caved. He caved over a twenty-dollar Freddy Kruger glove. An item that was worth not even two dollars but that was no matter. In my mind this glove needed to be worn by me during all hours of the day and not just Halloween night.

You see, I never planned an entire Fred Krueger costume for that Halloween. All I wanted was the glove. And where can one find that particular costume accessory? Why Eddie’s Trick And Costume Shop in Marietta Georgia of course, the mecca of Halloween. Recently I came back to see if this home of the macabre was still operating as I remembered it, some twenty-four years ago.

The center to the city of Marietta is an unclosed square made up of 5 parts antique shops, 2 parts restaurants, and a dash of nostalgic glory that is Eddie’s Trick Shop. Today, of course, it has lost a bit of its luster due to the fact that half the store is dedicated to ballerina and dance apparel but the magic of the trick shop is still a focal point.

I know, I know…the picture is blurry. And it kills me that the most important shot of the post is screwed up but it’s all I got. So let’s pretend and just take my word for it, there is amazing stuff all over. Okay? We cool?

There are a few glass cases around Eddie’s that hold all sorts of wonder from severed limbs to novelty dollars with Obama’s face on them to fake dog shit to fake puke.  Hell, they even had…

Yup, liquid ASS. “The worst smell since the famous stink bomb” and only $5.95! The part, however, that was the real seller was the promise that there are thousands of uses. Thousands, eh? Why do I really want to see the Shamwow/Slap Chop guy pitch this?

Of course we had to take a look at the 2011 Halloween mask aisle that hasn’t really ever changed since the 1970’s and I love that oh so much. Sure, the masks look a bit more realistic but it is comforting to know that kids can still gaze at the display just as they did in ’78. Perhaps less risk of lead paint inhalation and sudden combustion. There were a lot more people who smoked back then, you know?

The glove/hands of a costume seem to be a bit more eccentric than I remember. They are 8 times the size of the mask so me being the bum I am, I have to ask, how does one hold a beer? This trivial dilemma is lost on a 12-year-old I know but seriously,  that is something to take into account. Moving on.

Another big innovation to the Halloween craft of dress-up is the anatomical or medically accurate, I should say,  scars and wounds that today’s kids can inflict on themselves. “Slashed Trachea” is one of those kits I can’t recall. Let’s see…I had fake blood, vampire teeth, witch warts and maybe pale zombie completion but a slashed trachea? I wonder if they have ocular contusion kit? I guess that would be just a black eye. I’ll stick with the masks.

Some people find beauty in a sunset. Some in the innocent wonder of a child’s eyes. Some people find it in a bond between people who are in love. Me? I find it in a plastic skeleton rock band. And that is why I want to be your president for the United States of America. If this was in my house it would be in the kitchen.

I will leave you with the ol’ cliché’ rabbit in the hat trick. Sure Eddie’s Trick Shop lost a few steps over the years and I really don’t know if that is the shop or me? Perhaps Eddie has not changed but seeing this as a man rather than a boy makes it a tad less wondrous. I would imagine that to be true but I also think Halloween was a bigger deal back in the eighties. It’s hard to tell the difference between our adult mind and the memories as a child. I think that is why I always come back to these places. I never want those to fade.

Wait a minute….I wonder. They couldn’t possibly still carry it could they?

Great Nell Carter’s Ghost they do!!!!

And it is still a piece of shit.

 

 

15

Epic Tales From When TV…

…was everything an adolescent boy could hope for.

Starting out this year’s season of all things macabre, I figured I will write a review or a recap, if you will, of three shows that I distinctly remember getting a case of the heebs over. (heebs- feeling the need to shower after witnessing an event that did not make one physically dirty) I used to love staying up past the surgeon general’s recommended bedtime and filling those late hours with nonsensical television until either there was a disapproving knock at the bedroom door from what I am sure was tattling flicker of luminescence leaking under the said door or Rhonda Sheer’s bubbly personality of USA’s “Up All Night” was replaced by a commercial for a turkey-jerky dehydrator. But of all the nonsensical TV that gave me an allergy to books, there are a couple shows that still manages to stick with me, especially as we creep towards  September and October. Let us take a look at a few, shall we?

Tales From the Crypt was a staple of my teen years and while most of the shows were a HBO platform for many actors to get their feet wet directing without any real reprisals from a critic committee because let’s face it, horror isn’t a critic’s forte, it did produce some of the best casted and fun TV still today and every so often this show would hit a home run in the creep department.

The episode “The New Arrival” starring David Warner and Zelda Rubenstein was a really dark, claustrophobic, disturbing and down right pee-pants oppressing story that left you wanting nothing more than to never chew grape gum or trust anyone shorter than 4 feet.*pours coffee on the floor out of respect for the late Zelda*

David Warner plays a corrupt and arrogant child psychologist that preys on over protective mothers who spoil children with behavioral issues only to boost his failing radio channel.  So in his plan to save his ratings he decides to air a live session at a fan’s house who calls his station. Little does he know that it is Zelda Rubenstein calling him with a case that is most likely not in any text-book or case study he has read before.

When he gets to the house of the caller to begin his radio show he sees how controlling Zelda is and the problematic child is running a terror through the house and is very illusive. Right from the beginning the audience can feel that something is far from routine about this behavioral case. From the screams of the child to the walls caked in grape bubble gum, this reeks of “get the hell out of the house”.  And then we meet the kid.

Where does one even begin to state the things wrong here? Ok, I am not going to go through the entire episode because I’ll post the climactic part below and it would seem redundant for you to watch what I just wrote about so I will just express my feelings.

This episode touched on a few nightmare nerves of mine. The fact that all the creepy shit happens during the afternoon is a big one.  Some people have a certain witching hour and mine was always 4 o’clock. I think it is the way the sun is dimming or the fact that 90% of all horror movies happen at night so when bad stuff happens when Judge Judy is on TV, I just don’t feel right about it. The wallpaper in the house also made me itch. The house had a very dark feeling about it and the wallpaper from the 1940’s didn’t help.

I know those two creeps aren’t creepy to most others but that is what I hung on to. Call me weird but…okay, call me weird. Please watch this. You will see why this episode stands out the most.

Tales From the Darkside was an amazing show that was pretty corny in retrospect but an absolute humdinger when it came to adolescent entertainment of the 1980’s. When I think about Saturday nights as a nine-year-old the theme to Tales From the Darkside is usually the anthem. Back then these 20 minute stories would cause me to sink deep in the covers, never wanting to peer out the window for fear there would be another set of peepers peering back. I lucked out watching this show in an era when kids would be scared over something that makes five-year-olds today laugh.

Of the hundreds of tales, I think the early episode called “Case of the Stubborns” was not just my favorite but also the most unsettling. Along with an amazing cast like a very young Christian Slater, Eddie Backren, Bill McCutcheon and Barbera Eda-Young, this famous story is about an old man who is too set in his ways to realize he died. When every one begs and pleads for him to come to terms with his own mortality he merely scoffs at their insensate nagging all the while….decomposing. It really is awesome.

After Slater’s character seeks advice from the neighborhood witch he returns home to try once more to lay his already deceased grandfather to rest. Only with a sneeze that blew off Grandpa Titus’s nose did he finally realize that perhaps, he was actually dead.

There are so many reasons to love this episode and while I wish it was an original story from the show, it is not. I remember reading “A Case of the Stubborns” as a child growing up in the south. It’s just nice to know Hollywood didn’t muck it up. I will say, the first scene when Grandpa Titus walks down stairs, I would have put my breakfast down my pants because it was going to end up there anyway.

Who wants to be disturbed? I do! I do! Well, for the final segment of the first real kick off of the 10 week count down, I present to you a gift; these three Tim Currys. In another Tales From the Crypt episode, “Death of Some Salesman”, Tim plays all but one role and is even given an Emmy for his performance.

Ed Bagely Jr plays a corrupt traveling salesman who preys on naive customers thinking they are buying what really is an imaginary cemetery plot. He does pretty well too until he happens upon the home of Ma, Pa and Winona Bracket, all played by the infamous Tim Curry. He thinks he knows who they are but he has no idea what they do. They collect salesmen. (As a sales person myself, this speaks to me more now that in it did back in the day)

I love this episode for so many reasons I can’t even narrow it down to just three. All I know is that Tim Curry manages to do what he does best and that is make you squirm. Especially the god-awful sex scene between Winona-Tim and Ed Bagely. Man, that must have been an awkward shoot! Enjoy this magnificent clip!

There was a shorter clip of just the weird sex scene that I was going to post but the guy who made it was videotaping it from his TV with severe asthma. A tad distracting.

Well I hope you enjoyed these three classics in B Television. Whether you can identify with them or not they really are fun. And if you are going to destroy your vision, waste your life or rot your brain, shouldn’t it be a little fun?

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Review the World Takes On Some Heat

This was a very happy moment for me in my many years as a blogger and new webmaster. I can’t tell you how awesome it is to connect as a long time fan of a page and see that you are somehow apart of it. And oddly enough hurt the members that I spend several hours of web-observance watching. Brain, I mean Brian, is the creator of Review the World TV, Go!, The BroCave, and other such entertaining web-programs all viewed on Review the World.com. If you have been here before, you know about this very site. Over the past year we have worked on a couple things very loosely but not until recently have we really been able to connect and bring you the joint amazing-ness of….

A collective RtW star cast: Hot Sauce Challenge! Watch and be amazed.

 

Thanks for letting me be a part of this, Brian. Thank you to Tim, Paul, Jessie, Steve and Adam. You guys rocked this and I can’t wait for another fun review to come.

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