Dino Drac’s 2023 Daily Halloween Thing!
Wednesday, October 11th:
I picked up those new Scooby-Doo doughnuts from Krispy Kreme. Actually, that’s a lie. I didn’t “pick them up” so much as “paid Doordash to have some stranger drop them unceremoniously outside my door.”
The doughnuts looked and felt like they were made yesterday, and they didn’t come in the advertised Scooby-Doo window box, but these are the risks you take when seeing or speaking to anyone is completely out of the question.
I’m glad I bought them, though. Staleness aside, they tasted great, or at least, the one with the Scooby-Doo ornament did. Haven’t tried any of the others yet. Oh, and about those ornaments? They’re chocolate. Totally edible!
My plan is to eat one more tomorrow, put a complete set of four into the freezer, and give the rest away to someone who doesn’t mind hard doughnuts. These will only be around through Halloween, so if you want to eat a chocolate Mystery Machine that looks like an enamel pin, act fast.
Tuesday, October 10th:
Shown above is a pile of threequels on VHS. It’s occurred to me that threequels are very often my favorite chapters in their respective franchises – or at least close to my favorite.
A Nightmare on Elm Street 3? Absolutely my fave in the series. Halloween III? Hell, that’s one of my favorite movies period. Friday the 13th Part 3? Well, I like parts 2 and 4 more, but that one is right behind those.
It goes deeper. I’m on record as the weird outlier who prefers Jaws 3, even if I recognize that it’s not the conventional best of the series. I think Child’s Play 2 was Chucky’s finest work, but Child’s Play 3 is still a film that I can watch anytime.
What are some of your favorite spooky threequels? I wanna do an all-day threequel marathon sometime before Halloween, and I’d like to break my usual habits by working in some movies that I haven’t already seen a hundred times. Influence me!
Monday, October 9th:
Jaws is technically a horror movie, and every horror movie is technically Halloweeny, so I think I can wedge this one in without too many protests.
Released by Ideal in 1975, The Game of Jaws was a shark-shaped spin on Milton Bradley’s Operation. You had to use a big ol’ pair of plastic tweezers to retrieve a pile of garbage from Jaws’s throat… but you had to do it gently, or he’d chomp down and you’d lose the game.
This mofo was beyond an indiscriminate eater. The junk in his mouth included a boot, a walkie talkie, a wheel, a glove, a human skull, a gun, a camera and more.
The Game of Jaws was simple, yet very delicate. It isn’t especially hard to find on the collectors’ market, but finding one with a still-working chomp mechanism is much trickier. IIRC, the game was re-released in 1987 to tie-in with Jaws: The Revenge, though that version seems to pop up way less often.
Sunday, October 8th:
I’ve collected some great old Halloween print ads this season, but this might be my favorite. From 1960, this Sunkist fruit punch ad captures the spirit of the season in a single image. If you’re not willing to go that far, at least admit that a jack-o’-lantern filled with glowing fruit punch is freakin’ awesome.
I gotta cut this one short, because ya boy’s had a long day filled with podcasting, tearing my hair out over server issues (hence the site’s downtime earlier), and watching the episode of The Facts of Life where Natalie gets attacked while wearing a Charlie Chaplin costume. I’m emotionally spent. Give me grace.
Saturday, October 7th:
Well, I finally did it. I opened MONSTER FACE.
I’ve had one in a sealed box for years. Always knew that I’d open it someday, but for something this extravagant, I felt like I should wait for the right moment.
Well, the “right moment” never came, so catch me on this random ass Saturday, yanking out 5000 plastic parts and trying to make sense of the novel-length instruction sheet.
Was it worth it? Oh, hell yeah. I didn’t need hands-on experience to know that this was a cool toy, but now that I’ve had it, I can safely say that it’s one of the COOLEST TOY EVER. Legit. It’s so amazing. Like Mr. Potato Head’s incredibly troubled goth cousin.
Just a merry mess of fangs, neon hair, bugs, bat ears, scars and slime. I am so happy with this thing, and I’ve already decided that he’s going to be an all-year decoration, never to return to his cardboard prison.
If you’re able to find one for a semi-reasonable price, grab it. Of course, finding one for a semi-reasonable price is the tricky part. These things aren’t cheap!
Friday, October 6th:
“It’s 10PM… do you know where your children are?”
Not gonna lie. Under the right set of circumstances, those well-meaning PSAs used to terrify me. Well, maybe they didn’t terrify me directly, but they did put me in the sort of headspace where everything else could terrify me.
Don’t get me wrong – if it was a normal night at home, that shit rolled off my back. If I was actually out with friends when the clock struck 10, we’d crack jokes about how our parents had no idea where we were. But if I was home alone and caught that PSA? Totally different story.
There were umpteen versions of that spot, spanning many decades and networks. The ones I remember most were paired with ominous shots of dark, empty playgrounds. The PSAs were never specific about what sorts of threats might be waiting on the mean streets, but they still made it clear that terrible things could happen right outside your door.
I’m not saying that the PSAs freaked me out to the same degree as, say, a ghost-heavy segment of Unsolved Mysteries, but they did sometimes inspire me to check the locks, leave the lights on, and avoid every window.
Strange as it sounds, I miss being so easily prompted into a state of sheer terror. It was fun! A chance to drag a flashlight and a sleeve of Saltines under a big blanket, to pretend I was surrounded by monsters and murderers. I hope that’s not a weird thing to miss!
Thursday, October 5th:
Here’s a complete TV broadcast of Friday the 13th: The Series, from 1988, with the original commercials intact. We covered this on the podcast a few years ago, but even divorced from that, I think it’s a strong watch for a random spooky night.
The episode is called What a Mother Wouldn’t Do, and it’s about a haunted cradle that can keep a sick baby alive… so long as you murder a bunch of people in its honor. I don’t think anyone would call this the best episode of the series, but I like it, and I think it’s one of the easiest ones to jump right into without knowing a lot about the show.
And hey, even if you end up thinking it’s mid, you’ll still get to see awesome commercials for 7UP Gold and Roy Rogers.
PS: Both Friday the 13th: The Series and Freddy’s Nightmares were on TV at the same time, and I’ve always thought that their vibes switched in the transition from the big screen to the small screen.
Whereas Freddy’s movies were more thoughtful and artful compared to Jason’s, on TV it was kind of reversed. Freddy’s Nightmares was the throw-anything-at-the-wall “messy” show, and Friday the 13th: The Series was the brainier of the two. Anyone else feel that way?
