From Zombos' Closet

Comic Book Review: The Strain 1

Zombos Says: Very Good

Three survivors...one hundred ninety-eight dead...(Flight 753 from Berlin)

"I don't know what to tell them, Jim. We've got something brand new here as far as I can see. I might as well say they were all hypnotized by the Amazing Kreskin." (Everett Barnes, JFK Hazmat Team)

It's Romania, 1927; it's New York City, present day; it's vampirism wreaking the usual apocalyptic havoc, or soon will, in this adaptation of Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan's The Strain. Scripter David Lapham and artist Mike Huddleston keep it tense, fast-moving, and engaging for this first issue. Huddleston's terse strokes are greatly aided by Dan Jackson's colors, especially for sustaining the dark tone and ominous mood.

In 1927, Abraham listens to his Bubbeh (grandmother) as she relates the story of Sardu the nobleman, who carried a wolf-head's cane and was a giant in stature. He loved children until the day he entered a mysterious cave after finding everyone in his hunting party dead. After that, the children began to disappear, one by one.

In present day JFK, a plane lands, but then silence falls, and all the shutters are drawn. JFK's hazmat unit, headed by Everett Barnes, and the CDC are alerted to a possible situation. What they find is the beginning. Abraham, now grown up and owner of a pawn shop, watches the news on television, and steels himself for what he seems to have been waiting for all his life as he reaches for the same wolf's head cane his Bubbeh described in 1927. How did he get it? Why is almost everyone on that plane dead?

This issue makes you want to find out, and I don't say that too often where first issues are concerned.

 

Monster Mini Golf

Over the holiday weekend I paid my first visit to the Monster Mini Golf franchise. Didn't realize they set the mood with black light, otherwise I'd have worn my Dr. Strange t-shirt, which would have been glowingly awesome. The mini golf is tricky because they force you to do a lot of bank shots, but the graphically-inspired environment is superb for horror fans. Here are some shots I took of the more saliently spooky highlights.

Double Bill Pressbook: Beast of Blood and Curse of the Vampires

This double bill pressbook for Beast of Blood and Curse of the Vampires is printed on a large sheet, folded to make 8, 14" x 18" pages.

The Three Wise Men Of TerrorVincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff

Merry Christmas! And Happy Holidays! And let's all toast to a sparkling and spanking good New Year!

Ghoulardi Music Party April 30th, 1997

This is a fun tribute to Ernie Anderson (Ghoulardi), hosted by Chris Quinn. The recording comes from a dusty audio cassette courtesy of Professor Kinema.

Ghoulardi Music Party 4-30-1997 Part 1

Ghoulardi Music Party 4-30-1997 Part 2

Professor Kinema Remembers Susan Gordon

She was small, petite and never lost that little girl look.  Reflecting on the few brief encounters I experienced with her at an occasional Monster Bash, I was saddened to learn that Susan Gordon had passed away on Dec 11. She also went by the married name of Susan Aviner. She left us at the still young age of 62 from thyroid cancer.

At the Monster Bash she usually shared a guest room with her father, Bert I Gordon, and friend (and co-former child performer) Charles Herbert.

Our brief conversations included reminiscences about her most famous big screen and TV appearances.  At the tender age of two, she was featured in a chocolate candy commercial made by her father in Minnesota. She and her father then spoke about her feature film 'debut' in The Attack of the Puppet People (1958). This came about when the original child actor had become ill. Looking around, Mr BIG 'noticed' that nearby was a precocious 8 year old who could fill in.

Soon after, she was appearing in bigger films like The Five Pennies with Danny Kaye (1959). The following year she appeared in The Boy and the Pirates with Charles Herbert, directed by her father. After working a few more times with Herbert, they became and remained friends. The IMDb lists her last feature film credit as Picture Mommy Dead in 1966.

To fans of the classic Twilight Zone series, her immortality was secured with her appearance in the episode, The Fugitive.

She was always cordial, seemed to possess a constant smile as well as williness to talk about her fanta-film and TV work. We shared a laugh when I commented to her father that I considered him "my favorite schlock film director." After a brief pause to contemplate the dubious wisdom of what I had just said, I added, "I truly mean that as a compliment."

She and her father looked at me and gave me a reassuring smile and nod.

Movie Pressbook: Schizoid (1971)

Bats and Go-Go boots, how can you go wrong? Otherwise known as A Lizard in a Woman's Skin by Lucio Fulci.

Book Review: Mail-Order Mysteries

Zombos Says: Excellent

Kirk Demarais is crazy; as a kid he becomes so enamored with all those wild and wacky mail-order items hyped in the pages of comic books that he has to seek them out, years later, to satisfy his curiosity. Years after his parents told him they were junk or cheap crap or not really what the ads said they were and he'd be disappointed and dollar-foolish if he bought any one of them. But Kirk Demarais is a crazy adult, and he goes ahead and hunts those mail-order mysteries down just to scratch his itch. And damn if it isn't a satisfying scratch.

Mail-Order Mysteries: Real Stuff from Old Comic Book Ads! scratches my itch, too, especially because I bought a lot of these cool-looking-in-print mysteries, only to find out many of them weren't as advertised, and all those too good to be true descriptions were spot on: they were definitely TOO good to be true . 

Grouping stuff into chapters like Top Secret, Oddities, Better Living Through Mail-Order, War Zone, High Finance, Trickery, and House of Horrors, Demarais gives us the lowdown on how the ad copy and ambitious product illustration perked our young imaginations, then he reveals the real deal, describing what you actually did receive for your allowance money.

Luckily, not all of these potentially awesome goodies turned out to be bad: the spooky Greedy Fingers Bank, originally made in tin-litho, was a screamer as the skeleton arm reached out to grab a coin; those 6-foot, full-color, Monster Size Monsters posters of Dracula and Frankenstein were freaking frightful; and my favorite, Grow Live Monsters, which came with a space astronorium (illustrated backdrop and stand)  and two colorfully creepy alien monstrosities for a buck,  was the cardboard and grass seed equivalent of the Chia Pet.

From experience I can tell you a bad one could be very disappointing, though, especially after waiting weeks for its mail delivery, all the while dreaming of the endless possibilities once you held it in your hands. The 100pc Toy Soldier Set flattened my hopes when those awfully flat plastic soldiers and armament arrived in their flimsy cardboard footlocker; I never got to see how the Venus Fly Trap plant captured and ate its insect prey because mine never blossomed; and the Magic Art Reproducer didn't produce for me at all. I'm still not sure why I even bought that one. While the Secret Agent Spy Camera didn't work out for me (I couldn't find anyone to develop the mini film), at least it was still cool to show and-tell at school and it made me feel like James Bond.  So at least that one wasn't a total loss.

For those who remember the thrill and empowerment felt when ordering golden junk like this from comic books, then waiting on pins and needles for it to arrive, and then winding up feeling either giddily satisfied, somewhat satisfied, or completely duped, this book will bring back lots of great memories (and maybe some depressing ones, too). For those who don't know anything about this pop-culture staple of early marketing, it's a gold mine of how gullible and desperate our young imaginations were.

And how much fun, and magical, and unbounded, too.

Bela Lugosi Mystery Photo

Quick, which picture is this picture of Bela Lugosi from? (No, really, I haven't a clue!)

Faces of Bela Lugosi

The faces of Bela Lugosi: as Dracula on stage, in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, and in rehab.

 

Lugosi, Carradine, and Tor Johnson

Bela Lugosi, Tor Johnson, and John Carradine have some fun.

Happy Howl-idays From the Dreadful Gang

I enjoy getting my howl-iday card from horror host Penny Dreadful and the Shilling Shockers Gang. Hmm...looks like they'd make a wonderful cartoon; like Scuby Doo and Penny, too, only Scuby would have to be replaced by Garou of course.