Friday, October 31, 2014

HOPE EVERYONE HAD A KEEN HALLOWEEN



Another Neato Ghoulville Halloween countdown is over. This year was a lot of fun! Hard to believe that next year will be the 10th anniversary of the countdown. Crazy!! A big ghoulish thanks to everyone who stopped by this year. All the clicks, comments and emails were very appreciated! Also, thanks to Anita Benarde, the creator of The Pumpkin Smasher. Anita's interview was one of the best treats in the bag! Also, thanks to Tim Williams for all the hard work bringing the weird funny with Castle Vlad

I have some fun things planned for Neato Coolville in the next few months so stay tuned! 

FAVORITE POSTS FROM OTHER HALLOWEEN COUNTDOWN BLOGS

1976 Rexall Halloween Ad

All of us got a haul during this year's countdown to Halloween! So many fine folks have shared so many neato cool Halloween things. I haven't had much time to dig in the trick or treat bag this year, but here's a small sample of my favorites.

If Jason Willis trick or treated at my house, I'd probably give him all the candy. Every year he creates something amazing and this year is no different. Jason has brought to life one of my favorite comic book ads, the Moon Monster

Moon Monster - Animated Horror Fan Club Spot (Comic Book Ad, 1970) from Jason Willis on Vimeo.

Branded in the 80s - Who needs those fancy "making of" books when you have a month worth of blog posts about 1987's The Monster Squad. Shawn at Branded in the 80s knocked it out of the black lagoon with this year's countdown. Go learn everything you ever wanted to know about The Monster Squad! Oh and he's made a set of virtual MS trading cards too!

AEIOU...and Sometimes Why - Dex has pulled back the curtain on many of the Halloween countdowners this year with his interview series.

Secret Fun Blog - It was great having Kirk back in the countdown and this blog post of a hidden monster poster from 1980 made this Halloween so much better!

Secret Fun Blog - It's the little things that make Halloween so great and Kirk shows us some fine examples in this post.

Plaid Stallions - Dig this crazy Kusan Halloween Catalog from 1974!

CollectingCandy.com - Jason shared this amazing 1971 Brach's Halloween candy salesman catalog and it is full of awesome treats and displays.

CollectingCandy.com - I also enjoyed seeing these 1960s and 70s bubblegum vending insert cards.

Gorillas Don't Blog - Major Pepperidge had a guest blogger share some amazing Halloween family photos from 1968. That robot costume is way cool! Follow the links for Part I, II and III.

Dave Lowe Design - It's always fun to see Dave's Halloween props. Check out his yard haunt for the TV show Home & Family.

Garage Sale Finds - This is a lot fun, a blue print or brew-print of a witch. Just go take a look at it. It's kooky cool!

Cavalcade of Awesome - Cult Classics tee shirts ad from 1990. I forgot all about these shirts.

Dinosaur Dracula - I love seeing old plastic trick or treat bags and here's a fun gallery of some classics!

That's it for now and when I get a chance to visit more sites, I'll add them here. Be sure to find some Halloween treasures at the official Countdown to Halloween site.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN FROM CASTLE VLAD



It was a spooktacular October for Castle Vlad this year as the fang faced undead entertainer shared his weird funnies via YouTube, Vine and a live stage show. Below are some treats from Castle Vlad beginning with the traditional blooper reel from this year's season.



Last week, Vlad put on quite the shindig with his Castle Vlad's Mad Monster Party, a live stage show that entertained an all ages crowd of two hundred plus! The family friendly show featured many of the monstrous denizens of Castle Vlad. The best way to describe the show is that it was a mix of Scooby-Doo, 1970s variety hour and some vaudeville thrown in for good measure. Scroll down for some photos from Castle Vlad's Mad Monster Party.


Frankentina tells Vlad to stop whatever he's doing because the live show is about to begin!


The Addams Family show up and Grandmama let's the audience know she has stinky feet!


Vlad's Go-Go Ghouls dance the night away during the Monster Shindig. 


The Go-Go Ghouls summon Vlad out of his coffin!


Frankentina and Tonga the Man-Ape patiently wait for Vlad to come up on stage. 


Vlad puts Frankentina and unknowingly Tonga into a trance. 


Who knew Tonga was a ballet dancer? 


Frankentina tricks Vlad into letting her walk the runway. She's always dreamt of being a fashion model.


The gang finds out the theater is haunted by a phantom and plans to investigate.


Vlad feels the pain and punishment from the horrible puns of Dr. Schlock and Nurse Wound.


Zoinks! Nurse Wound is here to give everyone a shot with the biggest hypodermic needle known to man!


Children from the community submitted stories to the local newspaper. The winners had their stories acted out on stage.


Here's one of the lucky winners with his prize, a Not So Goodie Goodie Bag!


The Phantom tries to ruin the show and causes poor Nurse Wound to faint. Or course it turns out he was just a guy in a costume thwarted by some meddling kids.


Dance break! Vlad goes full hippie and performs the classic hippie song, Incense and Peppermints with his Go-Go Ghouls.  


This last photo is of Vlad's Go-Go Ghouls brought to life (or is that dead) by the LOZ Dancers and Cool Breeze Airbrushed Tattoos & Facepainting.

Happy Halloween from Castle Vlad! Thanks for watching and don't forget to follow Castle Vlad on Facebook.

HALLOWEEN WALLPAPER: HAPPY HALLOWE'EN TO YOU


Happy Halloween! I made this 1920x1080 wallpaper from an old greeting card that I posted a few countdowns ago. I think it's the perfect one to end the Halloween wallpaper series. These were fun to make and I hope everyone enjoyed 'em!

Check back throughout the day, as I'll have a few more treats before Neato Ghoulville crawls back into the grave!

Thursday, October 30, 2014

CAN YOU GRAB THE GREAT PUMPKIN?

Click the pumpkin and go big!

If you can reach into your computer monitor and grab this floating pumpkin, then the Great Pumpkin will visit you this Halloween!

1973 NEWSPAPER ARTICLE ABOUT BOO BERRY AND MARKET RESEARCH


I've always been a fan of General Mills Monster Cereals for as long as I can remember and Boo Berry has always been my favorite of the gang. Below is an article I found about the intro of Boo and some of the market research that went into developing the famous cereal. Click on the article to go big for easier reading.


Back during in 2007, I shared an article about Boo Berry from the pages of Famous Monsters of Filmland. Here's the same article once again.


Wednesday, October 29, 2014

MONSTROUS GOOD TIME AT UNIVERSAL STUDIOS HOLLYWOOD


This past summer the first lady of Neato Coolville and myself were treated to a fun day at Universal Studios in California. I've always wanted to visit Universal Studios since I was a kid and I'm thankful we had the opportunity. For the Halloween countdown, here are some of the monster related things we spotted on our tour. We entered the park just at the right time to see the mascot parade. I love that Dracula is driving the hearse. Zoinks! If you click on the photo, you'll notice Frankenstein's monster pointing at me. At the time I wasn't sure why. At the bottom of this post I'll tell you why.


The first attraction we visited was Universal's House of Horrors. It's a walkthrough into the world of Universal Monsters. At the time, we didn't realize that 2014 was the last year for this attraction. 


The lobby has lots of monster stuff to see before you enter the walkthrough. Monster movie posters, monster mannequins, monster props and lots of monster etc. It was monsterrific!    



One of the first things you see or glimpse at is Dracula. He only shows up in a flash when lightning strikes. I was lucky to snap a pic at the right moment.


Some of the figures are real people in costume and it was hard to tell between the fake and the real. This statue vamp was a real person and it almost made me drop my phone just after snapping this pic.


Probably the coolest part was seeing the Phantom of the Opera. I wasn't able to tell if this was a person in costume or an animatronic. Sorry for the blurry grainy photos.


Though I like how this pic sort of looks like an old pulp magazine cover!


Wooooooolf Man is in the building! Or is that a Bigfoot? Yeti? Sasquatch? Hmm... I'm not sure.


The Bride of Frankenstein is sleeping on the job in this photo. Wake up Bride and say hello!


Old Frank kept reaching out and trying to grab people. My terrible photo makes him look more like Michael Myers than Frankenstein.

This was a fun walkthrough and it's sad that the attraction went dark forever. Hopefully they'll come up with something else to honor their monsters. Click here to watch a video of the final walkthrough.


Now for the main attraction, the Universal Studio Tour. The hour+ wait was worth it!


The closest I will ever get to the famous Stage 28. This is where some of the greatest Universal Monster movies were filmed including The Phantom of the Opera, Dracula and The Bride of Frankenstein. Sadly, this historic stage was demolished back in September.


The Court of Miracles is hallowed...or maybe I should say, horrored ground. On this site, famous monsters like Dracula, Frankenstein's monster, Wolf Man and the Hunchback of Notre Dame walked the streets. Even though the original sets burned back in the late 1960s, it was cool for this monster kid and his bride to see the replicas. 


 The Black Lagoon! We didn't see the Creature, but I bet he was just below the surface lurking.


We're going to need a bigger tram!


It might not look like it, but this is where the Munsters lived on 1313 Mockingbird Lane. I snapped the photo below of a production model of the Munster House located in the lobby of the House of Horrors attraction.


Production model from the 1988 TV show, The Munsters Today.


Neat, it's a Halloween Universal Studios yard sale! Nope. Just a bunch of props left on the street. Probably from the Home & Family show. They tape in one of the house sets close to the Bates Motel. I'm not sure, but some of those Halloween props look like the work of fellow Halloweeen Countdowner and prop master Dave Lowe.


There! The Bates Motel just looks better in black and white! The house sits just behind the motel.



Mother Bates sits and watches all the trams go by. Day after day after day. When you go on the tour, be sure to wave to Mother when you pass the Bates house.


This almost does it for my monster tour of Universal Studios. Here's the reason Frankenstein's monster was pointing at me in the first photo. He needed an abby normal brain! I said Beetlejuice three times for some help, but that just made matters worse. Luckily, my old Weird Al shirt saved me! Thanks Al!

I will leave you with two Frankenstein images below.


Outside the park and on the Universal's CityWalk is a cool theater with a neat Frankenstein front!


The best parking garage name ever, Frankenstein Parking!