Halloween-A-Thon!

[Mighty Jack]

I was thinking of watching a scary MST episode a day for the month of October, make a thread on it where others could join in and watch or just comment on the Halloween episode of the day.

I'm trying to keep it more tuned to scary, rather than sci-fi, though those can be considered scary as well.

Even then I'm finding more episodes than their are days in the month. So I'll turn to you, my friends, what would be your "must see" Halloween experiments?

[Mr. Atari]

The first one that comes to mind would be "The Incredible Melting Man". It was decently gruesome.

Then I remembered "The Screaming Skull". You have a movie so scary it might kill you (or so the tagline said). Plus, you have Peggy Webber in a monster mask for the whole film.

[thebutcher]

Someone here suggested "Being From Another Planet"...the movie features a slow mummy and a costume party, while the host segments include the Bots' Hauted Boiler Room with grapes as eyeballs, etc.

But I can't believe they never did a straight up Halloween episode! If there's one show that lends itself perfectly to this, it's MST!

[sb5]

"Incredible Melting Man" is an episode that I watch every year in October. It's very "Halloween Horror" to me.

"Being from Another Planet", "Zombie Nightmare", and "Squirm" would be good Halloween choices as well.

[Justin T]

Very cool topic Mighty Jack! I agree that Incredible Melting Man, Screaming Skull and Being from Another Planet are all good choices for Halloween time.

Here are a few others I would consider very good Halloween choices.

Tormented: Bert I Gordon does a ghost story with Tom being haunted by his dead ex-girlfriend he allowed to die as he tries to get married.

The Brain That Wouldn't Die: After his fiancee get's decapitated in a car accident, Scientist keeps her head alive on a pan filled with neck juice. He searches for a women who will provide Jan in the Pan with a new body.

Zombie Nightmare: Stupid teens run over a guy with their car, the Mother get's a Voodoo priestess to raise him from the dead as a Zombie to seek revenge on his killers. Sounds like a perfect halloween movie to me.

The Undead: Let's see, you have past lives, witches and magic, a icky Imp, and Satan! (with a Peter Pan look). STAY!!

Horror of Party Beach: Radioactive waste creates sea creatures that terrorize a coastal town. Only SODIUM! can stop them!

Werewolf: Can't go wrong with a guy named Yuri (and his constant evolving hairstyles) turning people into Werewolves left and right somewhere in Arizona. It's absolutely fascinating!

Track of the Moon Beast: Another unlucky guy named Paul get's hit in the head by a tiny meteor. When the moon becomes full, he becomes a Giant Lizard Monster who kills people. Can Paul's friend Johnny Longbow, with his legendary stew, save the day?

Those are the ones that immediatly jumped into my head. There are more but I'll let other people throw them out if they want to.

[mrsphyllistorgo]

The Head That Wouldn't Die is one that's at least supposed to be scary, end result or not. You've got guys selling themselves to Lucifer, a head buried alive that can still possess people, a big dumb guy digging his own grave, a spooky chick in a long white nightgown using a divining rod, and digging up a dead headless body! Spooky, right?

The Creeping Terror has terror right in the title! Giant carpet monsters from outer space eat most of a small town, and manage to send their findings to their nefarious masters before they can be defeated!!! Are we---doomed?

Night of the Blood Beast is of course technically a Sci-Fi film, but c'mon, Blood Beast is, as with Creeping Terror, right there in the title! And if the roasted-mutant parrot alien isn't sufficient to scare you, keep in mind they want your sweet manly parts for mating purposes. EEEEEEEEK!

This sounds like a great project--be sure to post your selections list in case some of us want to follow along!

[mechagamera]

Awesome idea! A lot better than an idea I posted last year around this time for "Best Halloween Themed Episode(s)."

I would do the same kinda thing on Halloween, but I would break down my choices to the classic stable of Universal Monsters and branch out from there. You could potentially use this as a guide when you go selecting films to fill all 31 days:

-Dracula: Or a vampire or vampires. Right away #624 Samson vs. The Vampire Women comes to mind. If pickings are slim, you could extend this title to VAMPIRIC characters, like the Leech Woman from #802. You could even include #424 Manos: The Hands of Fate for it's Dracula-esque like vibe and feel. It's Dracula without the vampires . . . HUH?

-Frankenstien's Monster: If not THE Frankenstien monster, subtitute your own cobbled together monstrosity! The cone headed creepy from #513 The Brain that Wouldn't Die fits this bill to a T!

-The Wolfman: #904 Werewolf has not one, but FOUR werewolves, even though two end up deader than door nails and one has to have sex with Paul to become one. Now that IS scary! Again, you could extend this category to other shapchanging characters, like the Man Bat Puss from #1010 It Lives by Night or the lame-o Native American Space Man Lizard from #1007 Track of the Moon Beast. Don't forget poor young angsty Michael Landon from #809 I was a Teenage Werewolf. You could even STRETCH things a bit and include the boxy Gary that gets turned into a sorta-spider man in #1011 Horrors of Spider Island.

-The Mummy: Like folks have already said, #405 Being From Another Planet has a slow movin alien mummy, a costume party IN the movie, and the bots performing their own haunted house skit. And of course, who could forget #102 Robot vs The Aztec Mummy? You could even make your dinner themed to match the movie, and enjoy some tasty tacos or burritos for any of the Mexi-horror/masked wrestler films!

-The Creature: from the Black Lagoon. Now some purists might not consider the Creech as part of the 'classic' group of monsters, but I sure do. We even get to enjoy his second major film in the first season MST was on Sci-Fi with #801 Revenge of the Creature. Extending this out to include other aquatic fish folk brings up a whole bunch of options, like #808 The She Creature, #817 Horror of Party Beach, #1005 The Blood Waters of Dr. Z.

That doesn't quite bring you up anywhere near 31, but hopefully it does get your brain thinking in the right direction. Here's some other suggestions that I think fit the bill:

-#818 Devil Doll: Creepy Hugo, the possessed and murderous ventriloquist dummy. Creepy Varelli, his leacherous, scheming, and murderous owner who denies him ham.

-#812 The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies: The title pretty much sums it up for you. Cackling mole covered fortune teller, creepy grunting Ortega as her assistant. A few murders, and a parade of Incredibly Strange Creatures causing mayhem at the end. Also, the whole look and tone of that movie just has the stench of horror on it.

-#206 Ring of Terror: The whole film has it's basis on an old urban legend and is SUPPOSED to be scary, but it just ain't. However the bots do have to witness the autopsy of a vacuum cleaner while a grinning skeleton watches on.

-#406 Attack of the Giant Leeches: Aside from the leeches, which are giant, the whole beginning of that movie has the dark undertones of a Tennesse William's play. Almost makes you want to nip out and kill yourself.

-#607 Bloodlust: Yeah, it's full of weird pirate like guys and has a whole "Dangerous Game" knock off feel to it, but remember those odd horrific parts? The heads being preserved? That dead lady floating in the tank? The one pirate who gets tossed into the vat of acid? And of course, the big game hunter guy getting skewered in THREE places at the end of the movie. Weird dark mama jama of a movie.

-#907 Hobgoblins: I think I've said enough already . . .

Hope this helps you out, and good luck on your project! Post a list once you have it ready, and the rest of us can follow along at home!

Marc

[ramasha007]

Godzilla vs. Megalon. Not really a scary movie, but it does have the Cheap Halloween Costume invention exchange.

[Mighty Jack]

Thanks for the suggestions, using them (and my own "must sees") here's the schedule for the month

Haloween-a-thon
1. Brain That Wouldn’t Die (5)
2. Track of the Moon Beast (9)
3. Tormented (4)
4. The Thing That Couldn’t Die (10)
5. Werewolf (9)
6. Night of the Blood Beast (7)
7. The Undead (8)
8. The Slime People (1)
9. Ring of Terror (2)
10. Samson vs the Vampire Women (6)
11. Being From Another Planet (4)
12. I Was A Teenage Werewolf (8)
13. Zombie Nightmare (6)
14. Leech Woman (8)
15. Earth vs. Spider (3)
16. Monster a Go Go (4)
17. Incredible Melting Man (7)
18. Deadly Mantis (8)
19. Projected Man (9)
20. Horror of Party Beach (8)
21. Attack of the Giant Leeches (4)
22. The Touch of Satan (9)
23. The Giant Gila Monster (4)
24. Devil Doll (8)
25. Squirm (10)
26. The Creeping Terror (6)
27. Killer Shrews (4)
28. Screaming Skull (9)
29.
30.
31.

I;m still trying to decide on the final 3, and I have this lengthy list to chose from...

Final Sacrifice, Merlin’s Shop, Deadly Bees, She Creature, Mole People, Revenge of the Creatiure, The Crawling Hand, Human Duplicators, Bride of the Monster, Mad Monster, The Crawling Eye, Attack of the Eye Creatures, The Beast of Yucca Flats, Beginning of the End, Bloodlust, Hobgoblins, Zilla vs Megalon, Manos: The Hands of Fate, Bride of the Monster, Terror From the Year 5000, It Lives By Night, Incredibly Strange Creatures

Right now I'm not sure I'm feeling brave enough for Strange Creatures - I have at least 1 ep from each season and season 8 and 4 are pretty heavy already. I'll have to think about it (and will continue to take suggestions)

[Mighty Jack]

Well here we are, a little after midnight and I’ll start off the Halloween season with the only experiment from season 5 (at this writing). So grab a handful of candy corn, fuse them together to create a new, grotesque form and enjoy!

513: The Brain That Wouldn’t Die
A sleazy doctor drives poorly and in the process causes his fiancé to lose her head. He keeps her noggin alive in a pan and goes searching for a new body.

What’s the scary?
Jan in the Pan and a botched experiment in the closet that loves necking. Mad scientist, ala Dr. Frankenstein doing experiments with the human body.

Observer-ations?
I wonder how different this experiment would have been if Joel had remained on the SOL? What would the tone have been, what riffs would have Joel added? Apart from these ruminations, I felt that the Mike era began on a high note humor wise, though the poor sap has to plow through an extremely ugly, sick movie.

It’s fun to see the bots train the newbie, and how Mike reacts to the Mads. His first experiment (The Gutter-Bumber-Chut) was cute, but it’s evident that this was more in Joel’s bailiwick and would soon be abandoned. Mike is no father figure and the bots get him to confess a wetting incident.

What’s the funny?
Skits are fair – the most Halloweenish was Mary Jo’s notable turn as Jan in the Pan.

The riffing is solid, there are the required head puns, and quips about neck juice and being stuck in another dimension.

I liked Tom’s Batman related riff... "What's this? Our fanatical physician and his fickle fiancée speeding toward their country cottage?"

Mike’s William Proxmier line was clever and Halloween twisted (as it was spoken while we see Jan’s lifeless hand)

Speaking of twisted: I’ve never really laughed all that much at sports ply-by-play jokes, but I got larf out of the one here, when Dr. Slimeball tucks Jan’s head under his arm like a football and runs for the house. Mike [as Sports Announcer]: Riggins is at the 20… He's at the 10… No one will catch him!
Crow: He's either gonna win the Nobel Prize or the Heisman Trophy.

Tom does a call-forward, when he makes a radar reference.

Ha Ha Ha, Have you seen Frankenhooker?




That’s my thoughts, now I turn the kill floor over to you. What do think about this Halloween experiment?

Tomorrows experiment: Track of the Moon Beast

[Justin T]

I really enjoy The Brain That Wouldn't Die, Mike's first episode
as host was filled with some very good riffing. I liked the Bots
training Mike beforehand too, that was clever and fun.

As a sports fan, I loved Mike's "Riggins is at the 20" riff as the Doctor runs with Jan's head like it's a football. I laughed so hard at that, and Crow's Nobel Prize or Heisman Trophy riff is also great and a nice compliment to Mike's riff.

It is a pretty creepy and despressing movie. That failed experiment in the closet is creepy, and when he rips the arm off the assistant *shudder* not pretty.

So you have good riffing on a very Halloween themed movie, I think it's a winner.

As for the last 3 choices, I would go with Bride of the Monster (Bela, Tor, Ed Wood, Giant Rubber Octopus!) Beginning of the End (Peter Graves vs Giant Mutant Grasshoppers! I saw this recently and loved it) and Hobgoblins *shudder*.

[thebutcher]

I'd go with "Bride of the Monster" as well, and "Merlin", because (as awful as it is), it has the feeling of those anthology films like "Creepshow" or "Twilight Zone".

And also, household pets get routinely immolated, so, scary.

[angilasman]

Samson vs. The Vampire Women is the ultimate MST3K Halloween episode. Creepy old house, old-fasion movie vampires who turn into rubber bats, The devil, Mexican wrestlers...

[mrsphyllistorgo]

Definitely throwing in my vote for Samson--a terrific Halloween film. There's even a costume party!

As for Head That Wouldn't Die, I love this fim and experiment, unabashedly and unironically. A great, funny, debut for Mike, and the bots quickly adjust to his new style.

This episode was also the source of one of my greatest laughs when I first saw it. When the not-so-good-in-the-strict-definition-of-the-word doctor is running with Jan's freshly liberated head, he falls to his knees in a Darth Vaderesque wail to the heavens. Crow instantly bellows "Oh THANK YOU God! Thank you so BLOODY MUCH!"

When I first saw this I had very limited knowledge of the John Cleese ouvre, and had barely heard of Fawlty Towers. I honestly thought that was just a line the writers came up with on their own and Crow was using a British accent to be funny. Slayed me. I could not stop laughing.

You'll enjoy the tight suspension of the Mercury Comet!

[Trumpy's Magic Snout]

I watched this one the other week on Gaia and loved it yet again. This was my first episode of the show along with Mike as it was the first DVD to arrive from Amazon after I saw the movie and ordered everything I could find.

A particularly seedy little movie, I think its attitude to women is the most terrifying thing about it.