We judge each Halloween season on the strength of its junk food. That’s just how we roll. Lots of interesting new candies? Great season. Nothing worth taking pictures of in Target? Bad season.

So how is 2017 looking so far? Pretty good! Sure, we don’t have the knockout punch of a Frute Brute or a Halloween Whopper, but I think we’re making up for it in sheer volume.

Below are five of this year’s hottest Halloween junk foods. (And keep in mind, I’ve already purchased enough sugary garbage to add two more chapters to this series.)

Pillsbury Grands Pumpkin Spice Rolls!
Found at: ShopRite

These actually debuted in 2015, but I never had access to them before this year.

Pillsbury Grands Pumpkin Spice Rolls are autumnal spins on cinnamon rolls. A less valiant effort would’ve limited the fall flavor to the icing, but here it’s also in the dough, which is orangey in color and distinctly “pumpkin spicy” in flavor.

They’re ridiculously good, and ridiculously LARGE. I can’t believe that the rolls are “only” 300 calories, since each one is practically the size of a baseball glove. They look like giant land crabs and you need five hands to eat them properly.

GRADE: A+. I can’t think of another make-at-home Halloween treat that’s this decadent. There’s also the matter of the smell, which is capable of making you “float to the pie” like you’re in an old Goofy cartoon. Read More…

Happy Friday! Here’s a new podcast to kick off the weekend. It’s about Halloween doughnuts!

We know we’d promised a regular full-length episode this week, but we had to shift gears to make room for today’s once-a-year opportunity. For whatever reason, Krispy Kreme chose today and today ALONE to sell pumpkin spice versions of their classic glazed doughnuts, and there was no chance in hell that we were gonna miss out on those.

…and so, me and Jay from The Sexy Armpit (who is currently off working on his latest Halloween special) were on the road before six in the goddamned morning to hunt down doughnuts. Our mission was a success. To find out how they tasted, give the show a listen:

Click here to hear this week’s minisode!

(We also talk about the new movie It, which we saw last night. Tl;dr: It was awesome.) Read More…

The return of the Halloween Countdown means that I get to dust off one of my favorite recurring Dino Drac features: Classic Creepy Commercials!

Since I’ve now covered well over 100 spooky commercials, the pickings are slim and I’ll need to get creative. So like, my apologies to those offended by me pitching a sneaker commercial as “creepy” just because it makes liberal use of fake fog.

Tales from the Darkside WPIX Promo! (1986)

By now you must realize that I will never shut up about Tales from the Darkside, my favorite horror anthology series.

I’ve mostly given up on trying to turn TFTD virgins into fans, since the show will never hit as hard if you didn’t grow up on it. For maximum effect, you need those childhood memories of lying awake past your bedtime and enduring that creepy theme as a sort of wicked lullaby.

This promo is extra special to me, since I used to watch Tales from the Darkside on WPIX in that exact 11PM time slot. (Maybe not in 1986, but certainly a few years later.) Read More…