247: Razor Blade Sold Separately

Hey, this is Danielle Harris from some of the Halloween movies. And you are listening to Movie Meltdown. Good evening. The following feature has been rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America. It is intended for mature audiences and parental discretion is advised.

Our nuclear reactor pumping out one million kilowatts of power. What are you darling? Where's your costume? This is my costume. I'm a homeless little maniac.

They look just like everyone else. Boys and girls of every age Wouldn't you like to see something strange? Come, you'll listen, you will see This our town of Halloween This is Halloween, this is Halloween The world can scream, the dead. Are right This is Halloween, everybody may see Don't cheat on. The game, it's gonna die right This our town of Halloween This town of.

Halloween What's up and welcome to Movie Meltdown. I am Brian, and I'm welcoming you back into the middle of the big Halloween party we've got going on here. We're all pretty much big horror fans, and in particular, just fans of Halloween, so this year I thought, you know, we've always had so much fun with the Halloween episodes, I was like, let's just devote the entire month of October and see how many cool Halloween-themed episodes we can put together. So that's pretty much what we're doing. We've got a good portion of the Meltdown gang together, and we're hanging out, and we're talking Halloween costumes, and what created Halloween exactly, like where it comes from.

And that's, you know, if you haven't heard last week's episode, go back, listen to the one before this one, because we already are like knee deep into that. We've gotten a good amount of that kind of stuff rolling and we're going to continue on. And as far as the crew on hand, as we get back into this, if you remember, we have Ben from Tower of Technobabble. Bo is there. Greg is there.

Marlena is there. Sterling from the Alley Theater is there. And, of course, at this point, the now infamous Daves. That would be, as we've now come to refer to them regularly, Sporty Dave and Posh Dave. You'll remember it.

Hopefully. If not, go back and listen to the last episode because it's pretty damn funny. So we will get back into the action here with another spooky episode of Movie Meltdown. But, yeah, back, though, to this whole, like, horror compartmentalization thing. It seems to me that that's definitely preceded a pace, and that's why we can have, like, the distinct horror convention or the science fiction convention.

And we talk a lot about how brilliant it is when it's like, oh, they mixed horror and science fiction. It's like, well, you know, we... That's where it started. Then it got separated, so when you bring. It back, it's like, oh, that's cool.

It used to be that any time you were telling a story about a guy putting himself in a tin can, flying into the void, yeah, that was a horror story as far as the people in the 50s were concerned. It was to those Russian dogs. It's very much an American thing, too, because just a couple times I've gone to China, just talking about movies with movie geeks over there, You start talking horror films and nobody over there watches horror films. Nobody makes horror films. Any kind of Asian horror film, it's Japanese.

And if you find anything that's coming out of China, it's Hong Kong. Like Mandolin China, there's nothing. And when you try to explain to them about those horror films and the joy of it, their logic is, why would you want to be scared? I mean, they look at it almost like, what's wrong with your culture to where you enjoy being scared? Have you not experienced anything?

The great leap forward. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. That's crazy being so close to Korea, too, because Korean horror is so good. Well, that's South Korea, though.

It's not North. North Korea is a rather effective buffer. North Korea is frightening in itself. North Korea, the Disneyland of crazy people. Even if you go to the big cinemas, you'll have a lot of import American films, like the Transformers and stuff like that.

You don't see insidious paranormal activity or any of that horror stuff. It's just the culture, no one buys it up. And even if you talk to the younger generation that's very Americanized, very Westernized, it's like you try to talk to them about horror films, they just look at you like you're fucking stupid. They really do. They do not get it.

It's very much a Western thing. Well, it is something that caught on. And this, I kind of wanted to go back to our costume thing because I was looking back at how all of mine. Tied to movies kind of in a way. And then you start to realize it's because we took all of the classic monsters, the old world monsters, and made a movie monster.

So when I'm thinking back, it's like I actually kind of hit almost all of them. One year I was a vampire and I had the cape. I was basically a Bella version of the vampire. One year I was a creature from the Black Lagoon. I was a wolf man.

So it's like I hit all of the basic monster movie kind of, you know, I don't know. To me it's like we took all of those and because of that they're all tied together. to the movies, and that's the way I process them now. It's like, oh, like the Universal Classics. That's the way America looks at monsters. I have a question.

I'm sure everyone here can tell me this. The classic monsters, the Universal monsters, you know, Wolfman, Frankenstein, Mummy, and all that, that was from, what, the late 30s through the 40s? Early 30s. Most of the 30s. Okay, we kind of categorize those as classic monsters.

Were there any monsters from that time period that were kind of flops that we don't hear about anymore, that didn't quite make it into classic status? Well, you could argue that there's actually kind of an unspoken phenomena there. For instance, I would think that King Kong actually does belong in that same genre of monster films. But for whatever reason, we don't put King Kong in there with The Mummy. I think it's just because he's huge.

But it's also because we view him as the beginning of a different genre. It's the apocalyptic giant monster attacking the city genre. And that was sort of a standalone film for decades. Because the only people who could make Kong were those people. I guess what I'm getting at is that's it.

And I don't even say– I don't even know if I would consider like Lump Kong and all the other giant things of the 50s because all of those were born out of like a fear of nuclear technology. True enough, but my point more so is just that it seems to me that they're– we look back at the 30s and we kind of segregate out those monsters and call them the classic– There's a reason why. It's because they were all produced by Universal. But it seems like every monster movie that was made back then is considered a classic. Were there any flops?

Was there a monster like the Savage Dog Man? Mostly in the 40s, Universal got around to doing more B-pictures. Like Captive Wild Woman and the Ape Woman and things like that. Okay, that's exactly what I'm talking about. They were very much like B-picture.

Okay. they would have other other monsters would pop up but they were not really distinctive I. Mean there's a lot of them that they still categorize what is there 40 or more that fall into that universal class oh yeah. They'll throw in like the hideous sun demon the thing from another world and like all these other ones that are sort of from there but it's just they're sort of standalone but they didn't really have. But you know the classic monsters they're kind of homegrown I mean there aren't really aliens I mean this was probably pre-alien craze. Well they were all they're all born out of almost all of them out of literature Frankenstein, you've got Dracula, you've got.

I think the only one that was sort of original is the creature. I mean, the creature, we sort of... That's in the 50s. Yeah, but that was the tail end. It was really one of the.

Only iconic universal monsters from the 50s. They kind of created themselves. Well, it's interesting because each one of them also kind of corresponds to a different domain. We have the wolf man who is man plus animal... We have the vampire who's like man plus, you know, maybe sociopathic sexual urge.

We have the creature from the Black Lagoon, man plus reptile or man plus, you know, primordial creature. We have the mummy, which is man plus death. you know, Frankenstein is man plus machine. Yeah, exactly. Man plus man. Yeah, so each one.

The closer you keep something to human, the more frightening and effective it is, which is why zombie movies are as popular as they are. Aren't vampires technically zombies? And somehow zombies got. Jesus, that's an enormous conversation. Depends on how you want to split that.

To me, it's more the mummy. I mean, how is he not? Yeah, if you watch the original Dracula and then watch the original mummy, it's the same movie. Yeah, just because he's... Same story.

Yeah, just because the mummy's Middle Eastern. Why can't he be a zombie like the rest? No, but it seems to me, though, that those old films relied on a combination of factors. I mean, but all of them, it seems, had the uncanniness of, like, this is a man, but. It's not a man.

Mm-hmm. This sort of heightened sense. Like we'd call it camp now, perhaps, but there's this heightened dramatism to the whole thing. Like, you know, you watch the Wolfman's transformation or listen to the way Bela Lugosi talks, you know, like Roger Ebert always says, like he was mocking like the way normal people talk like, oh, good evening. That's what you people say to each other.

How amusing. There's this sort of uncanniness to them, but also this heightened dramaticness to everything they do. And that seems to me to be, I would say, one of the reasons why all these guys tend to get lumped together. There's a similar style to the way they are all presented and the way they present themselves. Yeah, and they were all basically made by European filmmakers.

Were there competing. Movie companies that were competing with Universal trying to get in on the whole monster thing. Not for a while. In the 40s, you finally had Fox coming in with some films. They were doing some stuff in the 30s.

Cat People was Fox. You've got to get into Turner and films like that. One of my favorite 30s horror films is actually, I think it's in MGM, and it's Dr. X. Was MGM.

Did they also do The Woman in the Window and those early noir picks? I think so. Yeah, yeah. And Dr. X was actually in Technicolor, two-strip Technicolor, in like 1932.

It was a weird greenish-orange palette. But it's a really cool, scary movie. Yeah, that's part of the whole. That's part of the same continuum, though, is, you know, when we were talking about The Black Cat a while back, you know, there's a... which is an excellent, by the way, sort of midpoint between horror and noir. There. when we have all those German expressionist filmmakers in the thirties and forties coming into the United States, like basically you see a series of forks occur.

One fork is the classic universal horror films, which are again, very dramatic and very stylized. And then you have another hyper dramatic, hyper stylized genre, but more quote unquote realistic, which is the noir picture. But you line up, but there's something about Dracula and something about the woman in the window or something like that. There's a commonality. There's a, There's a kind of fantasy to both.

There's a kind of darkness in human desires evident in both. And there's a kind of highly abstracted filmmaking going on in all of them. I remember that horror films came under severe censure in the late 30s. Really? Because of the British Film Office.

Universal was exporting their horror films to Britain and their sensibilities were more delicate. They were probably just mad at the fake British accent. That's where the whole tradition of rating horror film X in Britain started because everything was considered X. It was a different certificate, but I mean, no kids. And so there was this big backlash against Universal in the late 30s, around 37.

They stopped making monster movies. They stopped. And it wasn't until they did a double feature of Dracula and Frankenstein on one of the theaters in L.A. They ran it 24 hours a day. Wow.

People just lined up and streamed in all day and all night. And the execs looked at it and said, well, I guess we're back in business. And the next year they were like, son of Frankenstein. And they started that whole second cycle because it was good for business. But for a while they were off.

It was a new ownership as well. And they just sort of backed off. And it wasn't really until Val Lewton in the 40s was doing, you know, Leopard Man and Cat People and I Walked With a Zombie and all those films that anybody kind of raised the level. That's very studio anyways. I don't want to have anything to do with the previous administration.

I want to start fresh and take responsibility for everything I do. And they were doing like, you know, nothing. But Deanna Durbin musicals and nobody's responding. So Monsters came back. When did the Hays Code come in?

30. Late 30s. It was 30, no, it was like, I think around 33. Actually, yeah, because it came in right at the end of Black Cat. Because that's why the black cat in 34 had to be real careful about the Hayes office.

I'm trying to think of all your Halloween staple characters. You know, like your Frankenstein monster, your Wolfman, your Dracula. Skeletor. Yeah. They've all got kind of signature movies that you can trace it back to where they got big.

There's a couple of other Halloween staples. They've never really had like a signature. Like The Witch. A witch. That's exactly what I was going at.

Those are carryovers from the old world imagery because you had all those decorations back in the 30s and 40s with witches and cats. But I'm wondering, is the whole, I guess, blueprint for when you think of a cliched everyday witch, is that from Wizard of Oz or was there a different movie where a witch was sort of firmly implanted? It's a pointy hat, rides a broom. It's all from Pumpkinhead. Illustrations of witches pretty much fed The Wizard of Oz.

Sorry, what? All the old illustrations from old books and stuff. I've got a Halloween decoration. I collect a lot of old Halloween decorations, and I've got stuff back into the teens and 20s. And there's a lot of that witch, the pointy hat and the scraggly nose.

It's all there. But I think The Wizard of Oz is the first film that actually put that. on film, that iconic version. I mean, isn't our, like, comical interpretation, which is Shakespearean for the most part, though, you know? Mm-hmm. That's what I thought.

I think that imagery has kind of always been around. Yeah, the old hags and cackling and all that. I think it kind of goes back to what I was saying earlier about Halloween, too, though. I want to say that I read that, again, when a lot of, like, pagan rituals were sort of being incorporated, I want to say, like, in Rome, they... were kind of picking up on some of the instruments used in some kind of pagan fertility kind of rituals and stuff. And it had to do with like, you know, they wore a certain hat or they used a broom for some part of the ritual.

And it kind of became like they kind of lumped it all together into one character. So the witch was like a priest, basically. I believe it was pagan rituals that, you know, had these kind of, you know, like a doctor has a stethoscope, things like that. Like, you know, there was priests or like people in these ceremonies that used a broom or wore a certain hat. And I think these things got lumped together into one kind of like, you know, singular identity.

So was there ever a movie called like The Witch back in the 40s or something like that? There was I Married a Witch with Veronica Lake, which I may or. May not have seen. Bell, Book, and Candle. And then you had later on Burn, Witch, Burn.

Which is a great movie. Yeah. Bell, Book, and Candle. Which that almost, I mean. Burn, Witch, Burn is sort of a companion piece to Curse of the Demon.

Curse of the Demon has its own fair share of witchcraft mixed in. Curse of the Demon also being the ancestor of Drag Me to Hell. Exactly. It's got a pretty deep roots. Curse of the Demon is my favorite classic era horror film, but it's like late 50s, 50s.

Burn, Witch, Burn is also damn clever too, both of them. Yeah, that was, well, Curse of the Demon was originally Night of the Demon. I think Burn, Witch, Burn was originally Night of the Eagles. They changed the title when they brought it over here. Where did we get, I mean, when you're talking about that kind of era history, it seems like a lot of our ideas for costumes now are because of that.

Where did we get the idea of the sheet and the ghost? I mean, has that ever worked? Outside of that one Scooby-Doo episode, you mean? I've seen illustrations using that concept. all the way back to like M.R. James, which would be, you know, early 20th century, where you'd see a ghost portrayed that way.

I think it kind of transmuted from the shroud. Yeah. And it just turned into a sheet with the eyes. Yeah, the tattered shroud. I know that they make mention of that in descriptions of Varney the Vampire, you know, from the teens and whatnot, which is one of our, by the way, one of our enormous early pulp vampire novels, which really helped to sort of set the tone for those, for a lot of actually this kind of horror stuff and Also is famous for jumping the shark, according to most of its fans.

One of our early examples of a Dexter-type series. It starts off awesome, and just by the middle of it, you're like, what the hell is going on today? I just think it's funny how back then they wanted to burn witches, and now they want to have sex with them. Well, there's an interesting transition. They send them to a nice school in northern England.

Well, that's the thing. There's a transition that occurs in the 70s with the so-called folk horror movement and things like that. Folk horror? Folk horror. For me, the touchstone films are, of course, Wicker Man, Blood on Satan's Claw, one of my all-time favorites, and...

God, there's another one in there, but it's escaping me. Simon, King of the Witches. Remember that one? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Those are films that were all the same.

Devil Rides Out. Devil Rides Out. If you go back and then look at all the old books on witchcraft, then they started realizing, oh, all these women are naked in it. That's that 70s era when they started going, oh, we can use that. We can show them now.

Especially at the drive-in. And that's what the folk horror thing kind of was. It was happening towards the twilight. Of the hippie era. And what you see is, well, okay, we're going to set a film in the bucolic English countryside.

Except that, of course, the English countryside isn't really bucolic because it's always gray. And it's always muted brown tones. And people are going to go out into the woods and they're going to be being one with nature. Which also, by the way, happens to mean killing children and making. Sacrifices to dark powers.

Yeah. In other words, they reintroduced both the raw sexuality of the thing, like Wicker Man, for instance, is a series of teases ultimately leading up to a sacrifice. A lot of that's kind of. Born out of what Hammer Studios started in the 50s, too. It was the culmination of it.

Right. So there's that whole transition and sort of revealing that. Other. Like, there's the comedic witch who's, like, cackling and has her broom and is a very big caricature. And then there's... the sort of, I would say, post-hippie witch of like, we're getting back to nature, but it turns out that's not as pleasant as we thought it was.

Going to be. They want to seduce you, which seems all right at first, but it's like, no, there's a dark motive behind it. Yeah, and there's a lot of messed up psychological stuff going on. So now we have both archetypes with us, and we see that in a lot of movies sort of being played back and forth. We have the goofy, silly witch character, You know, from Wizard of Oz.

But we also have the witch that maybe represents our fear of sexuality or maybe represents in some way our fear of nature. Well, it's interesting that, you know, I mean, even in the Odyssey, that's how the witch was in the Odyssey. Which witch? Calypso or? Not Calypso.

Cersei. Cersei. Cersei. Yeah, she was, like, the beautiful, like, seductress witch, you know, who came with her magic wand and turned everybody into pigs. Yeah, and who Odysseus was told, like, well, then she's going to ask you to go to bed with her and you can't say no because, you know, she's a goddess and you're a dude.

Yeah. Well, since you mentioned the old school decorations, I forgot I actually brought my original era pumpkin here. Oh, yeah. Oh, nice. Did anybody else have that?

I remember those. Did you have that one? It's like the Amadeus thing. He's a bipolar pumpkin. Is that Empire Plastics?

I think so. And it had a hole that the candy would leak out of. Oh, yeah. She's bad planning. Well, these were all like in the 60s and 70s.

And you had these plastic blow-molded buttons. Well, you've got to drain the water out if it's raining. And you had those light-up decorations with the pumpkin on the haystack that would be in the windows. I've got a bunch of that. Wow, that takes me back.

Way back. Yeah, there's nothing like the smell of that full of candy. You stick your face into that plastic. Oh, I did many times. I love that smell.

Oh, yeah, and that slightly rough edge that the plastic always had. Because they could never make soft plastic edges. It was always scratchy and. Let me ask you something. Whenever you were a little girl...

You're. Talking to me, right? I'm talking to everyone. Whenever Halloween came around, did you ever want to dress up as something scary or was it always Polly Pocket? I was thinking about that.

And I'm wondering, is it because there aren't really that many female scary things? Yeah. I mean, it's true. There are a lot less to work from. I don't recall ever dressing as anything scary ever.

Which is weird because you were a creepy child. Well, no, that's the thing. I was always scary. So, like, I mean, I'm going to dress like that. This was your day.

Your disguise was someone nice. I remember the first costumes I remember was the homemade bunny costume. My mom made the ears out of, like, cardboard and she colored it with crayons. And then I was a ballerina for several years, like with a homemade tall ballerina skirt. And then after that, the Polly Pocket.

One year, my mom insisted that I go to school dressed as a hillbilly. This doesn't surprise me, knowing your mom. No. That's like the hobo. It's always a cute, charming hillbilly.

We got these pants that don't fit you and this old shirt. Let's just not watch. This is a really traumatic experience for me, though, because... She'd gotten a paper that said it was like dress up day. And then I was like, I think they canceled it.

And I was trying to tell my mom this and she didn't believe me. And she was like, she braided my hair and she took a pencil and drew freckles on my face and tooth blackout that she had for some reason. Put me in a pair of overalls and applied shirt. and sent me to school, and no one was fucking dressed up. And this was like preschool. This was preschool, and it was really traumatic for me.

And I think that's why I never wanted a homemade costume again, that moment. By the way, speaking to the student thing, just a brief aside, it seems to me that when I think back to my kindergarten days, we were always dressing up for something. There was always an excuse. Because in Thanksgiving... We all wore costumes.

We were either Indians or pilgrims. There was, like, one pilgrim in our class. Like, one poor child. Her mother made her wear, like, the pilgrim buckle hat and everything, and the rest of us were awesome Indians. I feel like it's probably easier to dress as an Indian, though, to, like, make an Indian costume.

Well, and more awesome. Like, I mean, come on. You're wearing feathers and, like, running around in. And you've got a dead bird on your head, obviously. Well, thank you.

That's what all Indians do. Even now in high school, do the female students, do they dress scary or is it all across the board slutty? I'd say in high school there's no scary. It's mostly slutty. I've got a daughter who just turned, you know, she's eight.

And she's, of course, a huge Halloween fan. She has to live in my house. Don't like it. But early on she was cute and scary. She'd be like a little black cat.

And then she was a witch one year. And then she kind of got the cutes for a couple years where she was like a little fairy princess. But then she's really into scary stuff. She hangs around where I do. So last year she was the girl from The Grudge.

Nice. Seven-year-old grudge girl. That's very cool. People would open their door and they'd hear, ah. She wants to do a more elaborate version of that this year with more blood.

And Dad standing off to the side of the boom box. But this is being marketed and fed to kids more successfully now because you've got monster high dolls oh yeah which i. Don't know they're everywhere money loves those but i think it's. The classic universal you know i really imagine i admire those toys they're viciously marketed but they're. Clever they are and they're pretty well made and they're really.

They put a lot of detail and work into them and they're like linear descendants of classic monsters so you got the daughter of the creature and you've got the daughter of frankenstein. And This is like Muppet Babies. My daughter has like 70 of them. I'll actually ask you, like, policies on trick-or-treating. Because I was having this argument with some of my students the other day because they were talking about, you know, they like Halloween because they get to go out trick-or-treating.

And I'm talking about going trick-or-treating this year. I was like, y'all are in high school. Like, so it's free candy. It's like, in my family, it was really, really strict. My mom, or the rules that we had is if you were big enough to carry your own bucket, that's when you were old enough.

It's a trick-or-treat. And once you hit a teenager, you stop. Because my mom always said, once you get to be a teenager, you don't appreciate it the way you used to when. You were younger. But I can carry it back.

And also, you ruin it for the little kids because you're going around as a teenager and it just sours people. And you're being a jerk, usually. But that's the whole thing that like. That's the whole thing that vexes me. Like last year, I just went out around with Dave because it vexed me.

You're giving away candy. Of course, I also don't like the fact that I live in my district, so I'll see 16-year-old students coming around. It's like, can I have some candy, Mr. Candy? I'm sitting here thinking, fuck you.

But the other thing that drives me crazy, too, is the parents pushing around a baby in a stroller in an outfit, and the parents carrying the candy. I'm sitting there thinking, you son of a bitch. It's just, you want it for yourself. And I don't know, I mean, just because that's the way we were raised. Because part of the fun of trick-or-treating, like, is the element of fear.

You're going around to strangers' houses, like you were talking about earlier, and you're taking a chance just getting this candy from them. And you're going around, especially growing up in the south end of Louisville. I mean, it was just sort of a, you know, it's not a bad neighborhood. It's an adventure. It is.

And so once you get old enough, that fear sort of disappears and you don't appreciate the mystique of it. But at the same time, if you're too little and it's just, It's not your ceremony. It's like there's that range there. Yeah, having a child and then being able to revisit all this has been just the most amazing thing. Because I've always loved Halloween.

But to go back to the root and to be on those sidewalks at night with all the mysterious doors. Going around with y'all last year. It was a cold. Night last year, but it was like still it's that anticipation of ringing the bell, saying trick-or-treat. And, you know, people reacting to you and going up to houses that are really decorated great and being slightly scared.

That's all wonderful stuff that you only experience in that environment. There's a shift, too, that's, you know, A, I fucking hate trunk or treat. Like, that is the most pansy, lazy-ass way to get candy is just to walk around a parking lot and get shit out of the backs of cars. It's like, no... March around the neighborhoods, but, like, all this trunk-or-treat, yes, that's.

Well, that's the point. Part of the point of Halloween, it seems to me, is. And this is kind. Of neat, because if you think about Halloween, again, at its root, or, sorry, at its origins, you know, this idea that the exterior world has somehow become thinner, you know, like we're... It is easier for us to pass into other dimensions by accident, and to run into the ghosts of our dead relatives, good and bad.

Well. In Halloween, the way we practice it, there's a kind of an interiority there, too, where we, for the first time, might get to see the inside of houses that we've only seen on the outside. We actually have a social contract reason to, like, walk up to some stranger's house that we've never even spoken to and demand things from them. You know, and I don't just mean that in sort of, like, the bizarreness of it, but there's... There's an intimacy there that is unusual.

And it happens in this highly stylized fashion where you have to be in costume. And usually they're in costume too. So these two people who have no reason to speak to each other actually... meet at one person's house and exchange things. There's something very mysterious about that whole process. Like from the point of view of someone who lives in a neighborhood and talks to maybe the person that lives right next door to them.

Yeah, I was extremely excited once we got a house, and it was in a neighborhood that you could walk and that people would be out and trick-or-treating. And the first year, I bought the best candy you could buy. I bought it early. I bought the good stuff and was ready. And my daughter was little, and I said, no, you take her out, and she can do her trick-or-treating.

I'm going to stay home because I'm going to be the cool house that you get the good candy from, and I want to be that guy. Sticking her clean. Right. And nobody came by. And that's what I was going to say earlier.

I don't know if it's because I live so close to a mall. Because I've worked in a mall but also live fairly close to it. So I've had both situations where I work at the mall on Halloween day and see the hundreds– Of people that come to the mall to do their trick-or-treating. I mean, it's like this constant line that's just flowing. That goes back to what I'm saying.

Within the past few years, it's become like this whole promotion to do trick-or-treating the safe way. Do it before it gets dark. Go to a parking lot. It's not about being safe. Go to the zoo to where everything is cute.

You're going to the mall to trick-or-treat. It's like a recent shit. It's so weird that. Suddenly we're, like you were saying, we go to these horror conventions. Yeah.

Once a month. I don't understand the juxtaposition of where we love and embrace horror so much, but yet the thing that should be like a celebration of it is slowly becoming safer and more passive. It's probably because horror fans, like, you know, there's you and then there's the not-we, you know, the people who aren't horror fans. Halloween is probably the night where people who aren't horror fans, you know, it's their one night to dress up and bring their kids out but they want to keep them safe i mean it's the whole culture is doing that i mean you got playgrounds that are not built on blacktop that was the playground that i played on but now it's it's all with soft rubber and stuff it's across the board by the way and.

You're lucky if you see a kid in one yeah you know but you get this whole movement. Because they're not fun well you know there's actually a research study that was done in japan that they make extremely difficult playgrounds and dangerous playgrounds. One is real popular. It's logs that are almost too far for kids to jump across that are in the air. And no one gets hurt on them because the kids respect the playground equipment and it's a challenge to them.

But here we make things that kids are like, fuck this, I'm going to find a way to make it dangerous. And I'm going to climb on the wrong way. And then I'm going to break my arm. And that's it. I'm going to find a way to make this dangerous.

I'm thinking about basically every Halloween movie I've ever seen involves the gang of 11-year-old boys and probably one or two girls as well who are like, Looking at that one house on the corner that no one ever has the stones to go up to and knock on the door of. And inevitably they run into a gang of bigger kids. Everyone's unsupervised and they're scared of the bigger kids because they might actually beat them up and take their candy. There's a whole ritual aspect to it that's... there's very much like kids on their own with like, with some initiative. You know, there's the opportunity to go to this house, the opportunity to go to that house.

Which is not reality. Well, they're all supervillains. Oh, of course not. Well, it used to be reality. It used to be, well, kids, have fun trick-or-treating.

Or at most, have. Fun trick-or-treating with your older brother who is 17 and is immediately going to find his girlfriend as he walks out the door, like, you know, and abandon you. Yeah, you've got the appeal of the adventure, you've got the fact that you're disguised. Right, yeah. And you're probably going to be crying as you get older.

That's really potent stuff when you're a kid. Yeah, absolutely. And like I said, we're gradually trying to take it all away. Again, it's because everything's become sort of corporatized, and now everything's being filtered through the soccer moms. And what does soccer mom want to do?

Well, she wants to take the kid to the safe place, like the mall, where you can go around. And I think it is that aspect where everything has to be filtered through, like, the lowest common denominator. What's the most generic way we can do this? Halloween mall with real Halloween action. Luckily, you know, there are still places, you know, there are still neighborhoods that celebrate properly.

Germantown is good. And if you ever go over on Hillcrest Avenue. They're amazing. You know what goes on over there. They're professionals.

It's pretty cool. Last year I took my two, she was two at the time, my niece trick-or-treating. And this house across the street from her uncle's, every year they do like this really elaborate haunted house in the yard. And their theme was scary, evil clowns. There's one I don't get.

Yeah. And she's, I mean, she's pretty fearless. But she was standing beside me and she wanted to go through the haunted house. And there were people trying to scare her. And this man in like this terrifying clown mask. came up behind her and was like, oh, and it startled her.

So she, so she jumped and then she turns around and it was like, I was so proud of her. She goes, oh, hi, happy Halloween. Trick or treat. And she was like totally unfazed. I was so proud.

But I mean, like, I don't. Even have any children, but for a second I was like, how dare he be that scary? She's only two. And they're just. Like, I'm one of those people.

Like, ah. It's that same old children. Oh, wow. Man, you know that house up at the end of the road that nobody goes near? Well, let me tell you why they don't.

Well, in the haunted house at the top of the hill, the spooks give around to test their skill. That stroke of 12 every night seems such a frightful sight. Stay, stay awake when the ghosts and the goblins play. When the hands of the clocks blow off midnight, they're getting out of sight. It's intermission time.

So how about taking a break, get out and stretch a little, and relax before the show begins again. And why not make it refreshment time, too? We have lots of tasty, delicious treats waiting for you at the refreshment center. There's hot popcorn, so golden good and fresh out of the popper. And all kinds of refreshing ice-cold soft drinks.

Sizzling hot dogs just bursting with juicy goodness. Ice cream so smooth and delicious you'll hanker for more. Plus, all the most popular candy bars and many other favorite treats. So why not visit the refreshment center now? Our courteous attendants are ready and waiting to serve you with a wide and wonderful variety of.

Good things to eat and drink. So step right up and make yourself at home. Out of the depths of darkness rises... Garganta, the true king of monsters. He's on his way alive.

In person. to. Scare the yell out of you. Garganta, on the stage... in Dr. Silpini's giant triple... dream show for the first time on any stage the stage that brought you the frankstein monster in person now brings you direct from hollywood garganta the giant gorilla of the universe alive and in person in a three-hour performance filled with more chills, thrills, laughs than you've ever experienced in this century. It is engrossing, exciting, fascinating, filled with tense climaxes, gripping scenes, beautiful starlets.

Yes, it's Garganta. This child in human menace. This 782 pounds of dynamite that makes Kong the gorilla look like a monkey. And that's not all. During the dark seance when all the lights are dim, ghosts, spirits, and vampires descend into the audience.

You may find yourself holding a ghost, your girl, or someone else's girl. So watch out when the lights go out. But as Mae West would say, it'll separate the men from the boys. In New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, critics have proclaimed this stage a tragedy. Costumes designed by aliens.

Yes, it's a stage show for every performance in the Dark Sea Ants, but the adult may be afraid. To walk home alone. Now is your first and only chance to see in person, on stage, and alive Garganta, the giant gorilla of the universe. Watch for it. Remember the time, the place, and the date to see Garganta alive and in person.

Dave, I do not get superheroes. Oh my god, I don't get you. What don't you get? Towerbot here. Well, the meatbags were going to say that if you're a geek and like podcasts, then you could try Tower of Technobabble at www.toweroftechnobabble.com.

Then this started. Well, it's up to you. I'm gonna get my taser and put a stop to this. Tower bot out. Okay, monkeys.

It's nap time. Hey guys, look what I've got. Check out these awesome earbuds I'm using right now. Look at that. That's wood right there.

That's actual wood. Why would you use wood to make technology? Because they're... It's like... They're steampunk.

Is steampunk really wood? I thought it was more of a brass thing. Well, you got to work the wood in to hold the brass together. These are the fancy high-end steampunk versions with a mic built in, mind you. But yeah, where would I get these you wonder?

Tweaked Audio. Way to pitch. You want to hear more, you say? TweakedAudio.com. Hey, they are available in three styles and seven colors.

And they sound pretty damn good. I kind of forgot because I hadn't had my old pair in a while and I was using the knockoff crappy ones I bought at the store. And I got these and. Put them in. I was like, oh, shit, that's right.

These are actually really good. So they are professional quality earbuds, mind you. And, you know, noise reducing, compatible with your iPods and most phones, unless you have a dumb phone. You should really get a smartphone, not a dumb phone. But You just.

Keep a bunch on hand for gifts when you don't know what the perfect thing is. Around the holidays, I was putting that word out. I was like, you know, go ahead and stock up. They're good for Hanukkah. They're good for Christmas.

Yeah, for a while there, we were thinking at the alley, we'd have a giant stack of iPads and be like, hey, guys, thanks for coming down. I'm sorry you didn't want to see the show, but here, take a free iPad. That's a pretty good promo, actually. Yeah, yeah. If it said, like, the alley on the back, you'd be like, hey, look at this.

The Tommy Fresh style of promotions. For all you Parks and Rec fans out there. He's on to something, though. If you give someone a free iPad, they're far more likely to look upon you favorably. I'm not wearing his old clothes, though.

That's all I have to say. That's a little weird. So, anyway, the. The basic rundown here, if you need yourself some earbuds, tweakedaudio.com. And if you go there, there's a deal.

There's a Meltdown deal. If you go, there's a discount code, and you put in Meltdown, you get 33% off and free shipping. That's all I'm saying. You guys are excited, right? Yeah.

Oh, yeah. As well you should be. A little more passion, guys. Look, he's directing. Crap.

Told me not to do that. It's like it's a theater or something. Tweet.io.com. Use the Meltdown code. That's all I'm saying.

Oh, no, not the beast! Not the beast! Ah! I love my eyes! My eyes!

Ah! Ah! Hi, everybody. I'm Tony Todd. You're listening to Movie Meltdown.

Pay attention and enjoy the conversations. The unique conversations. It's part of your problem, you know, you haven't seen enough movies. All of life's riddles are answered in the movies. And now, on with the show.

Well, the ghosts and. The witches and the devil too are in there mixing. Up a room. And if a man should. Venture near, his soul inside will disappear.

Your soul and mine is in there. Through the fate of which we had no clue. All we do is hope and pray. We'll be here another day. Stay, stay away.

From the ghosts and the goblins. Play when the hands of the clock spell out midnight. Better get in our house out of sight. I don't know. I mean, to me, I associate more like true Halloween...

Just being in a neighborhood where you see somebody every now and then, but there's a lot of that eerie desolation as you're going around trick-or-treating. That's what's most appealing. Because growing up in Brooks for a few years, because the houses were so spaced far apart, I mean, you could walk sometimes for, you know, 10 minutes before you get to another house. What someone in the neighborhood started doing was there was a farmer that– just actually they ended up, I think they actually just made hay or grew hay. And so he would go around with a hay truck and just all the parents would come and bring the kids and all the kids would just go off with this one person and he would just drive you to a house and you'd get out and stop because the parents didn't go along because they were staying at the houses.

And basically that was the whole thing is you would make the whole circumference around the basic area and then when it finally got back to like, base, the meet-up point, was where they had a big Halloween party for the whole neighborhood. It was really, really cool. I remember them doing that for three. Or four years. It's a rural aspect that's kind of vanishing.

My first Halloween memory is my grandparents had a farm about 100 miles south of here. We still have it. It's way out. I think I was probably one or two. I just remember these being held in someone's arms as someone came to the door and knocked, and they're wearing some creepy rubber mask.

And it completely freaked me out. And that's why you are the way you are. That's exactly. And I had a grandmother who had a rubber mask that she kept in the dish towel drawer. And if I was in any way misbehaving, she'd go get the false face.

She'd put the false face on. Oh, God, she called it the false face. And it was like this pirate, you know, with a mustache. And it really fucked me up. But I love it.

She was a Sunday school teacher. I hear flesh and blood, but I will put on the false face and come after you. I ever hear people, I guess that's a. Popular tactic for keeping your children to behave. Because I hear people say that at work or at the mall.

I'll hear people say, do you want me to go get the mask? I'll put the mask on. To their small child. We're getting back to sexy Halloween. That really disturbed me.

Well, that's what that reminded me. I've heard several people say that. Of like you, Beau, telling the story about like, You couldn't do that now because there's no way in hell anybody would just drop off their kids with somebody. Even if it's somebody in the neighborhood. People don't trust anybody anymore with good reason.

There's a lot of horrible people out there. But I wouldn't do that at this point. I wouldn't just take my kids. I don't think there are anymore. I don't think there are.

It's just it's become more publicized. Yeah, that's what it is. Those people have always been out there and have been doing those horrible things since the dawn of time. But now we worry about it constantly. There are more people, but only because there's more people per capita.

Inhumanity. Yeah, like they said in general. They've always been out there. But that's the thing. It's funny that we didn't worry about that stuff then.

And because, I guess, it wasn't in the news constantly. With the late night news just hammering it home with the teaser, what's going to kill your kid? Tune in at 11. Sixth Ed World. Yeah.

I'm always something. Do they do trick-or-treat every, like, in Europe, or is it kind of just here? I think it's pretty. Much an American thing. It's mostly an American thing.

I mean, I'm sure that they do do it in some places, but I can't imagine that it's. More than that. It really became the thing over here. You know, but. You guys said the word desolation earlier, and that's been ringing a bell in my mind for a little bit.

And I think to myself that. Everything that we're describing that we don't like about what Halloween has become, like I said, Halloween mall with real Halloween action. There's a sense of there's organization to it. There is a cooperativeness to it. And aside from the example with the hay truck driving around, there's this sense of which was a positive example of the same.

There's this sense of planning and organization, and it's like an event. Basically, you're taking your kids to their first con or something like that. But when I think to myself about being a kid in Halloween, when I think about most of the Halloweens that I heard about or saw, it's like, okay, it's evening. School's out. Parents are all in the houses.

No one's out. Except for every now and again, you see this little gang of kids dressed up as demons. And they giggle and run off. Into the distance. Or they're banging on someone's door and demanding in high-pitched squealy voices that you give them candy.

There's something kind of weirdly fun and bleak at the same time. It's like this weird post-apocalyptic world where all the kids are just... You know, running around, you know, looting houses and wearing costumes and TPing trees and. It is. Kind of anarchy night.

It's anarchic. And like I said, trick-or-treat used to be not just something you said mindlessly. It was a threat. Yeah. Come to the door and say trick-or-treat.

If they didn't give you a treat, well, that's when you'd soap their window or TP the door. You'd knock over the outhouse, the good stuff. I do remember one true moment of trick-or-treat that I had. We. we were out and I was in the sixth grade. So almost that end of Halloween.

And we were going around and, um, we went to this door and we were bound and determined. They were kind of come to the door. The lights were out. We kept ringing. We kept knocking.

And this older gentleman came to the door and he told us to, to leave and go home. He didn't believe in Halloween. Um, Atheist. He was going to call the cops if we didn't let him alone. Well, we TP'd the shit.

Out of that guy. That's right. He also said that we were too old to go trick-or-treating. Oh, oh. Fuck that guy.

That was the one time. that I was like, okay. And when the cops came, did you explain it to them? I was one of those kids where I was raised Catholic. So I felt guilty immediately after I did it. So I had to go home and tell my parents, this is.

What I do. Because I wasn't going to be able to eat my candy or go to sleep until I told them to confess. See, I would have been like calling my parents, Mom, you have no idea what this guy just said to me. I need a carton of eggs right now. I have some serious work to do.

I would help my kids now if they ask for something like that. I never really thought too much about the saying trick-or-treat. So the trick. Is from the child aspect or the trick-or-treater? Because I always thought you were like... asking for a trick or a treat, you know, like for them to do something really cool.

If you don't give me a treat, I will, yeah. I will mess you up. Your property will go down in value. It's an ultimatum. I just never really thought about it.

Yeah, like they could have done like a little card trick for you instead of giving you candy. I mean, it's just so. You'll get a visit by the Phantom Crapper. It's just such a meaningless expression that I never really even considered it. Although I like the idea of like, well, you can give me candy or you can have this ultra.

Long scarf that I already have in my pocket. Yeah, like. Sort of absurd, like, I just saw my friend in half. I have a rabbit, and he also was in there. Almost like the idea of just, this year, just baking a bunch of just cookies, and then just putting them in a Ziploc bag with a little note that says, there's nothing wrong with this cookie.

Trust me. Yeah, and just give those out. These cookies will make you feel sick. How much would those bother parents? You know what you should do?

Make up your cookies. You should make your cookies, put them in a plastic bag, but then take a razor blade and put it in a plastic bag. Give it to them and say, if you want to do it, it's not me. It's all up to you. No, no, no.

There's a series of notes. One says razor blade sold separately. The other one says it's okay if these cookies make you sleepy. This bag doesn't have the razor blade in it. Yeah, put that on there.

It's like, but your mom will let you eat this cookie because she's paranoid. Or maybe that's. How the razor blade thing happened because you guys were talking about how if you're a teenager. You're too old to go trick-or-treating. Maybe some guy was like, I'm sick of having kids that are old enough to shave.

I'm going to give them a razor so they'll go home because they're too old. I was thinking that. That may be the cutoff. It's old enough to get a razor blade. But I'm thinking a guy was trying to like, here, you don't need candy.

You need a razor. Go home and leave me alone. You scruffy bastard. Get the hell off my lawn. See, now I just think there are more cookie signs we could do like, you know, Your mom doesn't want you to eat this cookie, so keep it hidden from her and don't tell her about it.

Like, this cookie will give you superpowers. Be sure to tell all the other kids that you can see into their minds. That'll just get some chalk and just on... The driveway. Draw some, like, really bizarre pagan symbols in chalk.

And just be very insistent that the parents have their child stand alone on that spot to get the candy. Oh, yeah. And then be like, you must announce that you desire the candy. You could technically do that at the parking lot where they're doing the trunk-a-treat. So you have to stand in the trunk-a-treat summoning circle.

You could bring the fear back. HP Lovecraft's trunk-a-treat. Actually, I just want to show up there with a van. Be like, you gotta walk through the van to get your candy. No kids!

In the van. I mean, essentially, isn't truck retreat teaching children the opposite of what parents want to teach their children? Then you have to sit in the trunk to get the candy. No, no, no. It's totally true.

It's that desolation. It's like, well, we're going to let these kids wander by themselves in costumes so no one can recognize them and go up to strangers' houses and request things. Actually, would that or would it be just Fun too to do trunk or treat by yourself. Just go out to some weird road where maybe somebody goes by once every 20 minutes and just stop and just set it up. And have like a sign, trunk or treat, just look forward.

Just as people come back, candy, candy, candy. Damn. I'm so happy that one of my closest friends had a baby because like now I don't have to feel so weird. Now I can give her away on Halloween. Exactly.

Like I don't have to feel so weird like doing all these things that are meant for children or people with children. Never stops me. I'm the guy with the band. I like to dress up and go out with Allie in a scary outfit and scare the other kids. We didn't get a chance to do much of that last year because it was so cold.

I was that dad who was always laying in the front yard in the leaf pile. They think I was a dummy. They think I'd be dressed in a clown or something. I hope there. Wasn't a kid dressed as a farmer with a pitchfork.

I would always be lying there and I'd never do the The jump scare, I would always be subtle. They'd walk by me, and they'd get their candy, and then I would just slowly move their hands, and that would be enough. They'd be in the streets, you know, dodging cars. There's nothing much more fun than that, really. It's great.

This year, it's not quite a trunk or treat, but we are taking my kids to a nursing home, where just in the evening before we go, it's... Because all of the residents will come out and sit at their door. That's going to be a great joy for the residents. They're going to love that. That was my first job is I washed dishes at a nursing home.

And the first job I had before anything happened is I took to the people that couldn't leave their rooms, I took their food around to them for the day, for the evening. And my boss was always like, if they want to talk, stop and talk to them. And it was almost like I had 40 grandparents because they all wanted to know how school was doing and just anything about my life just to talk to somebody. And that's why I was like, yeah, I want to do this with the kids. Because any time you have kids interacting with people, it brings them back to life.

Yeah. It does. I think it will be just as much a treat for the adults as it will be for the kids. So we're going to do that and then go do our trick-or-treat. Isn't every day there like Halloween when they hand out the medicine?

There you go. All right. But I think more things like that, you know, if you're going to do a trunk or treat, that's pretty lame. You know, like, you know, with the churches and stuff like that, those seem kind of like we're going to put a dome around our kids and keep them from getting anything ever. But I like this idea.

That's a good costume, a dome around a kid. It's Bubble Boy. Oh, actually, I remember another costume. Scary? One year, my cousin made me dress up as a person in a shower.

She built this. Like, elaborate thing for me and made me wear it to this haunted house we were going to, which was, like, just bulky and completely inappropriate. Because people don't get dressed up to go to haunted houses. Like, it wasn't Halloween. It was, like, two weeks before.

And she made me wear it and I had to wear a shower cap and it was horrible. Like, my whole life has been me being forced to wear really stupid costumes that were embarrassing and. Well, that's a good way to round it out. Let's throw out a good costume that everybody had. At least one, or throw out a few good ones that you had.

Or bad ones. I'll have to give a shout-out to my mom, because I was in love with Star Wars. And the only character that mattered to me was Obi-Wan Kenobi. Good man. She got a brown... blanket, and she could sew.

She sewed it into a hood in the back. By the way, this is proper Alec Guinness Obi-Wan, not the only good one. Yeah, and I had on boots, and I had on khakis and a white t-shirt, one of my dad's white t-shirts. And she even had some makeup that she had to make it look like a beard, a white beard. And the best part, because this was back in the time when you couldn't get a lightsaber.

There was no such thing as getting a toy lightsaber anywhere. Now there's like one at the gas station. Right. Because they're everywhere now. And she took, with some golf bags, they have like a clear plastic sleeve that each one goes in.

And she took, they had just come out, the cracked glow sticks. It was like one of the first years those ever came out. And she had found a way to tape them. into the tube and cracked them all right before we left. It looked like a lightsaber. It was the coolest costume.

It was a sheet and a tube from my dad's golf set. It was the best costume I've ever had. It's probably the best costume I've ever had. Everybody knew who I was. Nobody else was Obi-Wan Kenobi.

You didn't wear a tag saying Obi-Wan Kenobi. Well, then how did they know who you were? It was still the best costume I've ever had. And again, Greg, because your mom made a lightsaber, she is technically now a Jedi. That's like the last step.

She had completed her training. Well, I realize that was mine. It went back and forth. I guess I had classic horror monsters, which, again, this speaks very well of how I turned out. It alternated between classic horror monsters and characters from Star Wars.

So it all makes sense because, yeah, I listed all the monsters earlier. Then I also, in the middle of that, was Darth Vader, was Yoda at one point after Empire came out. And then in the very first run, it may have been before I was Darth Vader. It seems odd now because it's the dorkiest character in the whole series. I was 3PO.

I guess just because he was a robot. I mean, he was still pretty cool because he was a big shiny dude. How'd you do the shiny? What did you do? It said C-3PO on my chest.

It was one of the Ben Coopers, I believe. The mask was actually really good. And it actually did have a weird... Do you remember, though? Like, you could almost see through it, but at the same time.

See through PO? But, like, from one side. Like, it was a weird plastic. I've never seen anything like that. Yeah, it was like a.

Almost like half mirror. Almost like, yeah, like a two-way mirror, one way. Yeah, it was weird. I think I mentioned it, one of our casts a long time ago, about how the Star Wars marketing caught everybody by surprise. So they actually didn't have the Halloween costumes out in the fall of 77.

And the first time you saw one was Darth Vader for Christmas. Which I got. Big stacks. Darth Vader this Christmas. That sounds like a great book, Darth Vader for Christmas.

There's big stacks of those. There's a picture of me in front of the tree. Wearing like i'm there in the christmas morning pjs with a vader mask on oh yeah my the first run of when they did the lightsabers i got a really it's a flashlight with a plastic tube basically but yeah that was on christmas But I got the Halloween costume. Was it the one that had the air effect? Remember the one that had kind of like a whistling thing and the handle says you suck it?

No, it was before that. It was total knockoff. The first one was called the Force Beam. Yeah, I think that was it. It had a black handle.

It had a little guard they put on it and it had a little tube that lit up. It was called the Force Beam. They had it in all hardware stores and everywhere. I think that was it. Kenner didn't get into the business for a while.

A really easy Star Wars costume I never saw anyone do was a jaw lock. That'd be just, I've seen it recently. Yeah. Never. So with the glowing eyes, it's pretty cool.

Yeah. Yeah. Speaking of which I did, do you remember the, the light up? Remember those glasses that had little like light up eyes on them? When I was the, that just reminded me, when I was the werewolf, I put those on before I put the big rubber mask on and I had glowing red werewolf eyes.

I thought that was the coolest idea ever. I think I just weirded out everyone in my neighborhood. I'm going to do that this year, actually. I got one of those werewolf masks where you open the jaw and the lips snarl back. But so far away from your face, it's just like black holes.

So I'm just going to put some lights in there because Allie and I are making our first horror movie for October. So it's going to be one of the. Nice. That episode is called Don't Wear the Werewolf Shirt. Because we discussed that thing with, once again, it ties into costumes.

If you go looking at werewolf costumes, commercially made werewolf costumes, 99% of the time they're wearing a red and black checkered shirt. Yeah, it's really weird. And it's like, why? Okay. And jeans.

Yeah. Like it is. Let's just go back to, like, you know, are they all lumberjacks? What's the deal? How did this start?

They're all really big nerf guns. They're all grunge werewolves. The original werewolf was the brawny man. I don't know. If you knew that.

So I order one of those shirts off eBay, and I order my daughter not to put it on. Of course she does, and she turns into a werewolf. It's pretty awesome. That's awesome. It's like Teen Wolf.

Preteen. Preteen Wolf. Tween Wolf. Tween Wolf. You better trademark that right now.

Oh, Tween Wolf. I think my best costume, I think I was seven. Dark Shadows was still on TV. And it was like 1970, 71. And I wanted to be Barnabas Collins.

So my mom took a conventional cape and cut it off at like half length so it would be his length. And she actually dyed my hair black and actually did the bangs with like, you know, some dippity-doo or whatever it was called, you know. And I had makeup and fangs and stuff, and that was probably the most elaborate. And we made a fake cane with the wolf head on it. Did anyone know who you were?

Yeah, I mean, you know, Barnabas Collins was a big cultural icon, so most of the kids knew who he was. Growing up as a kid, I mean, my last Halloween that I dressed up was actually, I mean, when I trick-or-treated. I was Big Boy Caprice from Dick Tracy, and that was actually where I won a little costume contest for that. This is no surprise to me. Yeah, and the way of, like, as an adult at school, because it's sort of like, probably like I was saying earlier, the one from not last year but the year before, which they haven't said that that's why they don't do Halloween there anymore, but I don't know.

They didn't name the role after you. I kept having to top myself, and so this year it was going to be on a Monday. And so I set up everything prior to the weekend. I went to like, um, the grocery store and, um, I like just got some meat and I just put it in the sink in my back prep room. So that way it would just sit out.

And so when you would come in on Monday, I mean, just like the smell of something rotting was in the room. And, um, I took a ladder and unhooked, like you had the strip fluorescent bulbs and there's like 12 of them in there. And I just slowly like tweaked each one to where it was like a David Lynch sort of thing where it was like this weird flicker. What do you teach at this school? More lies.

Underneath, like, since you have all the gum underneath, like, the big tables that they sit at, I took the fake cobwebs and, like, connected it to the gum so that way if you, like, were, like, kind of had your hands idly underneath the table, like, it would brush up against you. So I did all that stuff to make it kind of unnerving as it was. And then. I even set it up. I said, well, because, you know, I like to take off Halloween, I'm not going to even be there.

And when students first came into the classroom at the beginning of the day, I was wearing just like a suit, but with like lawn gloves, like you'd clean, you know, used for like cleaning up there, pulling weeds or something. And just like a burlap mask that I just like stitched together. Yeah. And I was just ignoring them, and I was just, like, stabbing at pumpkins. Just stabbing.

Basically, I wasn't carving. I would just stab them enough until it made an eye and stab it enough until it made another eye and stab it until it made, like, a mouth. And they would sit down, and I would ignore them for, like, five minutes because, you know, the first five minutes is them all just, like, trying to figure out what you are. You can blame this on Halloween, but this is just Tuesday. And so I'm just like, I waited until they would finally settle down.

And when I noticed they'd finally like, you know, quit guessing who I was and all this stuff, they were just kind of like waiting for like, okay, what's next? That's when suddenly I would like look up. Like I just noticed over here and I went over and I like had a TV on a cart with a VCR and a VHS. And so I just popped in the VHS and it was me as normal saying, sorry, I'm not there on Halloween. And basically I conducted the whole class from the persona of me.

So in case the sub was there and then the whole time I'm like sitting there, I still keep carving the pumpkins in the room itself. And they stopped paying attention to me and start paying attention to me up there. And I actually guided them along reading a piece from the October country. I think I picked the wind, I think is what I picked for it. And so like, they're actually reading along with this Ray Bradbury piece.

And like, at some point in time, I actually would go up to like this podium in the front of the room and sit on top of the podium and just stare at the pumpkin. I just made like, don't move, just sit there for like 15 minutes, just staring intently at it. At which point, right about that time that's over, on the video, since my brother has about the same build I do, on the video, he enters the room, wearing the outfit that I'm currently wearing in the room. And the me on the movie is like, what's this? I'm kind of amused by it, and it just comes over and it just kills me.

And then it props up my corpse, and it sits there and it starts carving a pumpkin to look like my corpse. And then it just notices the VHS, and then it kind of cuts off. And so then it's just static on the TV, and I'm just sitting there staring at them with the pumpkin. Yeah, this is why they don't do Halloween. Well, that wasn't the kicker, though, because the kicker was, like, some kids would just be like, they were really freaking out, like, tears streaming.

Down their face. Like, can you please take off the mask? And then when I would take off the mask, I had, like, this hideous prosthetic, like, in my skin. And so that, like, pushed them off the mask. Would you please put on the mask?

Did you do that for every period that you had? No. I basically treated it like a spook show every period of time. But see, only about half of them wouldn't even get to the point where I would take off the mask. The next day the kids are like, how come you took off the mask for their class and not for ours?

What do you mean? I wasn't here yesterday. We had the VHS where you were killed. What on earth are you talking about? And that's the thing that pisses them off is never admit it.

Because they want you to wink. They want the wink to the audience, and if you never give it to them, it drives them crazy. Horrifying them and tormenting them. I like that. But it's like they get a good scare.

Maybe that's why they're dressing in sweats. They want the wink. That's just you, Ben. That is pretty spectacular, though. Points for the flickering lights and the cobwebs.

It's called tenure. I was going to. Say, having a classroom as your stage and a group of people that has to come see you every day gives you a significant advantage. They're legally bound to be there. Once the kids, some of them just screamed and ran out.

I don't know where they went. I'm sorry, do you have a hall pass? That's awesome. Do we have any other elaborate costumes? Or at least memorable ones?

I grew up on base. My Halloween's were kind of boring. Cause like, you know, everyone shot from the same spot. It was like, you know, so like a local, you know, PX, I mean, in a sense, like God, until I was like nine, you know, I was always on base. So like essentially had all these kids running around doing a Halloween thing, but it was like all the same 12 costumes.

It was a bunch of Superman's a bunch of like star Wars guys. Like, Girls had, like, maybe two Barbies to choose from. But it was just, you know. Anybody dress as a soldier? You know, I don't think so, ironically.

Well, I remember as a kid asking my dad, you know, if I could, like, you know, wear, you know, camouflage clothing and stuff, just being a kid. What, did you want to dress as a Soviet? You know, could y'all? I had a very strict dad that was like, you know, it's not legal. For a city to wear, you know, military uniform on the street.

I'm like. It was probably, I mean, the fact that it was on base, they probably adhered to that rule pretty strictly because they were going to get caught for sure. Yeah. No, it was very, it was kind of surreal in a way. You know, like I said, you know, your kid out trick or treating and it's just like the same.

12, visually to say 12, 16 outfits going on everywhere. And it's like, wow, I'm. One of 13 Superman. Was the candy standard army ration came in like MRE wrappers? Yeah, I was going to say, did they give you MREs?

Did you have to crack it open and. It heats up? Yay, more iodine pills. You know, I lived on a, and when you say that, it's kind of surreal. I lived on a military base for a while and It was about the closest thing to the neighborhood in Edward Scissorhands that I've ever seen in real life.

It's everything. Everyone trusted everybody. I mean, like, you know, you were on base. Because everybody had a gun. So, yeah, that's true.

They know where your dad works, you know, usually. But, yeah, it was, yeah, everything was the same. Everything was the same color. Every house was identical and curved to the street. It just was.

It was perfect. Did all the banks say bank and the stores say store? The thing is, the closest thing to the idea of communism that you've ever seen is our military. That's what communism is, is that whole top-down directed, you live here, you bank here, you do this here. It kind of sounds like a Smurfs village to me.

Well, the Smurfs are communists. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, the blue is just a deception. They're reds in the boat, baby.

But this was in Alaska, and all of these kids had never got off the base. They were like, have you gone out hiking? Have you gone out fishing? No. Rock climbing?

No. Never do anything. They might go to the movie on the weekends, and it was staying on the base. Choice of two movies. Yeah.

That theater had two movies. It was just horrible. I mean, it was horrible. And so these kids would sign up for these rec courses that we would take them out and do real things outdoors. It was like– they're like, oh, there's a world.

So– Two movies and one of them is a military propaganda film. Right. And how awesome the Marines are. But it really, it. Stayed for months.

You know, I mean, it's like back then, it's like, you know, when the theater got new movies, that. Was like a holiday. Like the theater would be packed like that weekend because it's like, oh my gosh, they got a new movie. We're going to go see, you know, even if it was terrible, you know, it was like the new movie at the theater. Something i'd love to see a kind of a study of i'm sure someone's written a book about it but like american military culture.

It's a documentary called brats brats okay it is fantastic like it was weird for me um because i didn't realize these things had like molded my way of interacting with people so much um and it was actually you know my mom actually kicked it down to me when she sold a documentary and she's like you really have to see this for a long time i left it on the shelf i'm like whatever um And when I finally watched it, it was just bizarre to have these people that were, like, analyzing children that had grown up in these situations, like, you know, kind of, like, bullet point these things about their personality. And it was me. Like, it was just me. And I was like, if I'd seen this, like, 20 years ago, I would probably be socially much more functional.

Like, well, it's just, you know, and some stuff is silly. Well, it's not to place blame in one place or another. Sorry. When people ask you, like, where are you from? You know, that was like this weird thing because, you know, if you grew up on base, you're like, well, do you want to know where I was born?

Do you want to know where I've lived the longest? Do you want to know where I went to school? It is always a story. You know, it's like you can't just answer questions like that. And, I mean, that's kind of a light thing in a documentary.

But even just about the way that you interact with people and stuff, children that grew up on base, you are either way outgoing or you're way recluse. Like there just really is like no middle. Yeah. Greg, do you live in the same neighborhood as Missy and Jay, essentially? A couple neighborhoods over, but yeah.

Not as many serial killers. Not as many serial killers. That's what I was curious as to, like, your. In like a block. It's close.

It's really close. I'm just curious if like having an, a legitimate serial killer in the neighborhood has changed. Like, well, you know, and the people in that area, the thing is, is right down the street from there, right. There was a house where there was like grisly murder. I mean, it was, it was a son and his friend and, and killing his mother.

And, um, and I know not far from there, there was another where it was a series of, um, Not murders, but horrible crimes and beatings. All within, you know, a quarter mile. And it was all the same neighborhood. Almost the same street. And it's just.

Because it's not an unsafe neighborhood, really. No. And back, you know, when I was there, it was like, you know, the perfect suburban neighborhood. And it had the darkest history of our town is right there. Well, I don't know.

I find it. This might be superstitious to some people, but I find it pretty easy to believe that some places just naturally have pretty bad juju for people. You know, it's like just some places it seems like a lot of negative activity just gravitates towards it, despite seeming normal or ordinary. All right. I think we better wrap up this Halloween talk.

We're out of control. We've covered a lot of ground in our Halloween talk, and yeah, I think... I don't know. It's pretty awesome. I like when we throw out these general topics and you just kind.

Of run with it. Interesting note. When I stepped out just now to use the bathroom, there's people using my desk in my office to publish scripts. I'm sure. Yeah, I know, right?

And stage manager was there with his, I guess, his niece or something. And my desk has all these skulls on it. Right? She's just sitting there. That's normal.

Yeah. And she's just sitting there like being bored and whatnot. And I said, here. Picked up the most realistic one. I said, here you go.

I have a skull. It's real. And immediately she's like, cool. And then she flipped over and she's like, hey, it has a price tag on it. And I just thought it was interesting, given the tenor of our conversation, everything has gone.

I was like, what we said about Americans and our relationship to horror and everything. Here's a real human skull. That's awesome. Wait, it's not real. That's a disappointment.

Everyone knows human skulls are free, the real ones. My wife's father has it handed down. His grandfather was a surgeon in the war and he had his kit with military stuff and his medical bags and he actually has a Not the jawbone, but everything else from the skull from a German soldier. And actually, I think it was an officer is the story. And they call him Herman the German.

He sits on the mantle in the living room. And it's just kind of that accepted thing that he's the skull. Of the house. I've got a real skull at home. And like I said, my daughter's fascinated by it.

Is that legal? No. She's terrified of animatronic Halloween decorations. I'm like, this is a real human skull. This is a dead guy.

That's cool. Kids are just kind of morbid, really. They embrace that stuff on a weird level. She's kind of the way they are. But in fairness, and I think this kind of speaks to some of the things we notice in horror movies, there's something uncanny about some animatronics.

There's something really unrealistic about certain... horror movie situations, but, you know, when you see these things in real life, you're like, oh, that's actually more mundane than I expected it to be. Like, I remember the first time I saw a set of human bones, I was not creeped out or weirded out at all. But there are some skeletons, some animatronic skeletons I've seen, and I'm just like, whoa, that really shouldn't be moving. Well, bones are usually all cleaned up and freshly scrubbed. I think if you were to see them, you know, Well, I'm.

Pretty sure if I dug up my backyard and saw a half-rotted. Corpse, I'd be pretty freaked out. Nah, you'll be fine. Check the price tag on that. Maybe I'm ballsier than I think.

The Bodies Humane exhibit that they did a couple months ago, that was kind of hit and miss. Some things I look at and be like, I'm fine with this. This is almost, in a way, aesthetically kind of pleasing. And in others, I'm just like, oh, I can't really look at this one. This one's just creepy.

Yeah, it was hit and miss for me. It creeped me out. It's creepy. The ones where it was, like, the thin slices that had the light underneath. Like, it created this, like... church glass kind of look.

It was aesthetically amazing. But I'm just like, but that's guts and kidneys and stuff. But it's like. We are all a temple. Go to 21C sometime and see the exhibit of a guy who made an entire body basically out of paper mache and yarn.

And it's just a video of him, like, cutting into it. And it's all made of different materials. So, like, you hear him snapping the fake rib cage and tearing apart the stomach. And then he pulls out all this yarn from it. And it's, like, 100% anatomically accurate.

And it's all just, like, creepy paper mache and cardboard. Wow. Plastic. All right. That's horrifying.

You know what's even more horrifying? What? Okay, kids, get out your decoder pins. Our next feature is going to be Satan's Little Helper. So, yeah, in the next few weeks, prepare yourself.

Go watch it now. Suckers. Anyway. Satan's Little Helper will be our upcoming. Hey, it might be really good.

What do you mean? You'll find out. Between now and then, you'll watch it, and then we'll talk about it. I look forward to this. Otherwise, that about does it.

Thank you for joining us on our Halloween journey, and we will return next week. Same geek time, same geek feed. Thanks for listening. I'll remember Halloween, dead cats hanging from poles, little dead are out in droves. I'll remember Halloween.

Ground leaves vertigo, where skeletal life is known. I'll remember Halloween, this day anything goes, burning bodies hanging from poles. I'll remember Halloween. . . . . . Out of the way Out of the way Out of the way. Have you heard his voice?

Everything he says sounds professional to me. I mean, it's just like. It's the tie. I have a. Little bit of a crush on his voice.

The tie does strange things to a man's voice. He's like, baby, let's listen to Bo's voice while we do it. In fact, Greg, would you mind leaning forward just a little bit more so you can block him? I'm looking for anything that's in this notebook that I could read that would be a sequence. Oh, here we go.

Important notes. Bills are taken care of and advanced. Most are auto-draft. It's got gravitas. I will mow on.

Thursday, so this does not need to be taken care of in my absence. He doesn't really whistle when he talks. Trash doesn't need to go out. It went out this past Monday, and that should take care of it in my absence. Okay, at this point, I think either William.

If you. Visit with the cats, it should be. It would be appreciated. If interested, I just picked up the entire Adam West Batman series. Did you hear the way he did the series?

It kind of had some vibrato in there. Is the Adam West Batman series? No, that's what they have to. Now ask for pledge money. At this point, Garrison Keillor is going to show up and be like, hey, I want to sponsor you.

I like your style. I hope you haven't taken my stories too seriously. Talk hard! Woo-hoo-hoo!