Halloween Archives » Page 4 of 7

Vampirella 1996 Live Action Movie is mostly ok

10/10/201802/04/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Vampirella is one of those characters that I recognize without question event though I know absolutely nothing about her, I’m surprised with how iconic she is that we’ve never gotten some type of animated film, I mean even Lady Death had one. But when I realized that she got a movie in 1996 I had to check it out, bad reviews or low budget weren’t going to stop me from checking out some type of media based off this character. I think Halloween is the best time to check this out and see what this is all a bout.

Now as I mentioned I’m not familiar with any Vampirella lore or continuity since I just thought she was just a sexualized character for posters with no actual background. But here she is apparently an avenging alien some type of Vampire aliens from another planet called Drakulon and after Ella’s father is killed she goes to Earth to find the killers which include Vlad who is Dracula himself. So yeah plot is not going to be its strong point based on this setup but I definitely didn’t expect Vampirella to have the best origin so yeah I can easily ignore that.

McFarlane’s Spawn’s Concept Album by Iced Earth “The Dark Saga”

10/08/201802/04/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Listen back..

People often forget that Todd MacFarlane’s Spawn was a pretty big thing back in the 90s that rivaled Marvel or DC comics’ best. How big? Well the band Iced Earth made a concept album for the character in 1996 called “The Dark Saga” and I don’t see Batman or even Wolverine getting a concept album anytime soon. Let’s listen back to this album and not only hear if it’s any good but if it’s a good album for Spawn.

Lady Death Movie you didn’t know existed is well Lady Death

10/07/201802/04/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Looking back on..

I had no idea who Lady Death was but the character design seems familiar so I’m guessing I’d seen her plenty of times before and when I found out she had an animated movie I decided to check it out. Looking at reviews online it is apparently trash but I can say that it’s rather mediocre but never truly bad.

The story is really not that great but I guess its serviceable since the movie is only an hour and change. We see Lady Death with an army and from there we get a flashback to how things got to that point and she used to be a blonde innocent woman who apparently was the daughter of Satan himself.

The New Addams Family Reunion Revivals Continuity

10/03/201802/04/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Looking back on..

After two live action movies and cartoon in the 90s the Addams Family became a household name, sadly because the second movie didn’t do well at the Box Office and the death of Raul Julia we did not see a third film even if the property was still popular. However Saban (Yes, Power Rangers’ Saban) was able to get the rights and we got a new movie that was straight to video as well as a new live action tv series, so let’s take a look back at these two attempts and how well they did.

The Addams Family Reunion

Making a third movie after the amazing first films was going to be a difficult task especially without any of the cast and a much lower budget since it was a direct to video film. For this movie they decided to go for a younger audience but it obviously maintained the main ideas that the 90s reboot had established as the Addams Family. The name of The Addams Family Reunion uses a similar pun like the second film and since all 3 are movies it’d be easy to think this was just another sequel with a different cast but I’ll go into continuity a little bit later.

Casper’s Haunted Christmas for some spooky nightmare before xmas style

12/21/201701/28/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Looking back on..

Movies like The Nightmare Before Christmas and its sequel force you to ask yourself if it’s a Halloween or a Christmas movie, but besides seeing some Jack O’Lanterns with Santa hats because X-Mas arrives to stores during mid October there aren’t many other movies that mix both holidays but I found one and well I just had to watch it so have a review of Casper’s Haunted Christmas

Music Match Halloween – 3 Halloweeny Music Videos ft. Ozzy, Marilyn Manson, Midlake

10/30/201701/26/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Music Match

Halloween is here and to celebrate this edition of Music Match we’ll feature 3 spooky music videos to go along with the holidayso enjoy the music recommendations and awesome music videos for a playlist to listen and watch through with your friends at a party.

Ozzy Osbourne – “Bark at the Moon”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnNWUUZ7cEA

Combining the story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde along with the WOlfman and a bit of Dracula for this music video that only Ozzy himself would be able to pull off without many people questioning the decisions. The music video really is something to behold while the song I don’t find it my style at least for a metal song it is easy for pretty much anyone to listen through as it

The Lost Goosebumps Series 2000 books you R.L. Stine published secretly

10/30/201701/26/2021 Luigi Kawasaki

Reading again..

After the original run of Goosebumps ended as sales were slowing down they continued immediately with Goosebumps Series 2000 to capitalize on the marketing for the year 2000 coming up. This series ended after 25 books, partly because kids had been outgrowing Goosebumps but mostly because of a several lawsuits between Scholastic and Parachute Press which lead to R.L. Stine’s contract not being renewed and everything Goosebumps related to be cancelled, including the Goosebumps Gold series that was due to launch at the end of the year 2000.

Ironically because of this only one Goosebumps Series 2000 book came out in the year 2000 as it had already been scheduled for January of that year. We know of the 26th book that would’ve been released in February of that year called “The Incredible Shrinking Fifth Grader”. Thanks to Tim Jacobus we got the cover art for that book that never came out. Or did it not?

A book called “The Adventures of Shrinkman” came out shortly after the cancellation of Goosebumps without any relation to Goosebumps. This book which emphasized that it was from R.L. Stine was not the only one as there were a total of six stand-alone novellas that were published that year and the following. The book mentions that it’s inspired by “The Incredible Shrinking Man” which was the play on the title the Goosebumps book had not to mention that one of the scenes of the book closely resembles what is pictured in the cover art of the Goosebumps 2000 book.

Here is the Synopsis:

When Danny Marin isn’t playing basketball, he spends hours drawing Shrinkman, his favorite comic-book superhero, or watching Shrinkman movies. His hero can shrink to the size of a bug. But, whoa—wait. Suddenly, Danny finds himself shrinking, too! His parents are horrified, his friend Megan thinks it’s funny, and his doctor is baffled. With each passing hour, Danny gets smaller and smaller—until he’s the size of a sparrow. Soon he’s fighting for his life against a grasshopper, a colony of ants, and even his own dog. He isn’t safe anywhere. He has to find a cure—before he shrinks away forever.
Funny and terrifying and filled with BIG surprises, The Adventures of Shrinkman proves that it takes more than size to overcome impossible hurdles.

As you can see the story seems right up Goosebumps alley making this the 26th Goosebumps 2000 book that was never released. But here’s the thing, the other 5 junior novels also feature stories that seem straight out of Goosebumps, featuring a young kid getting into a spooky or weird situation only for things to turn out fine until a twist ending comes. So It’s clear that all these other books that were released were originally intended to be Goosebumps Series 2000 books before it was abruptly cancelled and to not let those stories that were already drafted go to waste he published them with another publisher.

Goosebumps Gold was due to come out in October of that same year, marketing had already begun and there was no reason for Series 2000 to finish and leave a gap as one book was constantly published every month. Counting January’s book was released that left us with 8 series 2000 books that would’ve been published before moving on to Goosebumps Gold. While only 6 of these novels came out that likely meant the other 2 hadn’t even been drafted which made sense the Goosebumps Gold books had also not been written yet, only some ideas thrown around.

So let’s take a look at the other rare Goosebumps Series 2000 books that were published without the Goosebumps name and their synopsis not counting the one already mentioned. Thankfully they’re all easy to get through Amazon even though they are somewhat rare. It’s also worth noting that Goosebumps artist Tim Jacobus is credited as being the artist of these books as well, keeping the connection back to Goosebumps tighter even if it’s not exactly the same style.