Toxie wants YOU to have your very own building brick bust of the mopper of justice in your home.
.A brand made by fans, for fans, HORROR BRICKS was born with the idea that a million pop culture-influenced LEGO sets get the green light while the horror genre, unsurprisingly, always gets left behind. With Troma founder and Toxie creator Lloyd Kaufman’s blessings, HORROR BRICKS has launched a KICKSTARTER campaign for a one-of-a-kind brick building bust that any fan of the film, or hell, horror in general, will want to have for their amusement and collection. Complete with a mop and a built-in Melvin origin story sequence. BRILLIANT.
And there’s also the Pocket VHS series — inspired by the golden age of video stores. The first wave celebrates two iconic genres: Slasher and Zombie, each packed into a retro 80’s VHS case. Small sets. Big horror energy. Perfect addition for your video store-inspired corner of your home.
The Kickstareter’s stretch goal is aimed at $30,000 to get production moving with some grand rewards and limited early bird packages available for contributors.
A masterful level of horror, nostalgia, and classy scents that negates the need to look any further for the perfect fragrance.
Parfum and Fragrance company XYRENA is taking the retro and horror community by storm with their stunning line of fragrance products, ranging from world-class XHS (as they call it) Parfums that will leave you sniffing yourself all day (discreetly, as to not look like a smackhead) to Wax Pack Trading Card Air Fresheners you’ll want to collect, especially for the rare chase ones you might find in your order that are also whiffs of joy- as seen below:
Today, the company is adding a long-awaited fan-favorite horror icon to its line of XHS perfumes with Chucky and, more precisely CHILD’S PLAY 2. Like the other parfums, the fragrance is presented in a custom-made Clamshell holographic “XHS” where, upon moving the case side to side, Chucky goes from Good Guy to the iconic VHS cover of CHILD’S PLAY 2– representing the change in scents of the parfum itself when sprayed, like any real parfum should.
The fragrance that is bottled in what looks like a VHS, opens up with an overdose of plasticky peach and lavender, transforms into a spicy heart of basil, black pepper, saffron, and cardamom, then settles into a base of rich tobacco. All an homage to the factory finale of CHILD’S PLAY 2. And let me tell you, this scent is absolute voodoo Damballa magic as my soul transcends into another world as someone who hates those musty perfumes and colognes. This is on another level of something perfect- not overpowering, and a smell that stays subtly throughout your night rituals.
Creative Director Killian Wells approached this Good Guy fragrance with integrity as a superfan, collaborating with perfumer Harry Schreiner, pushing that DNA into a more unhinged, horror-driven direction tailored specifically to the world of Chucky. The result is a completely sexy scent made for both men and women.
That’s not an easy feat, folks.
XYRENA is doing something very special for the retro and horror community by taking us into a whole new world of sensory nostalgia with the scents of our beloved films that we may have first seen wandering around the horror section of our Mom and Pop video store- in the most sophisticated way possible. 10/10 recommend.
When a fictional body that started as a side character in a novel becomes a full-blown horror icon known throughout the world and prompts its own autobiography to be written, you know we’ve got something special here. And so it is with the good doctor that author Brian Rafterty has gone to great lengths and leaving no “quid pro quos” on the process of how famed author Thomas Harris brought Hannibal Lecter to life and all the juicy details that lie in between, taking him from the book to the big screen, spilling the delightful tea along the way in “HANNIBAL LECTER: A LIFE”.
So let’s flip through this book a bit:
We begin with the true birth of a monster, dating back to 1935 with real-life killings and interviews with murderers that later inspired Thomas Harris’ idea for a cannibalistic character—something completely opposite of his “shy demeanor” and a relative noting, “the most non-violent person he’d ever known.” and the book that started it all with “RED DRAGON” and Harris’ painstaking effort into writing this character that the author notes, “wore him out”.
The book became an instant hit, and “RED DRAGON’ hit Hollywood in the form of MANHUNTER, where the world got to see Lecter for the first time in the flesh, played by Brian Cox. While the studios were basically breaking down the door for the rights, the journey wasn’t anything but easy…
Of course, it was 1991’s THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS and Anthony Hopkins’ portrayal of the maniac psychiatrist that really solidified Lecter’s name in the stars of pop culture icons, bringing down a hammer (in the most polite way possible) of psychological fear into movie goers. Raftery really goes the distance, taking us through each film’s journey and providing everything you could possibly want to know about LAMBS, including never-before-seen correspondence between Thomas Harris and director Jonathan Demme. As well as every film thereafter, including the severely underrated HANNIBAL series, which was pulled off the air way too soon, in my humble opinion.
“HANNIBAL LECTER: A LIFE” also includes the true-life inspirations for Clarice Starling and discussions with former FBI profiler John Douglas; entries of which are both incredibly fascinating and informative, pulling in the true-crime enthusiast that resides in so many of us. Speaking of which, alongside the jeopardy knowledge of history that is soaked into these pages, the book builds an argument that credits Thomas Harris and his iconic creation of Hannibal Lecter with modern society’s fascination with serial killers.
The book has a little something for everyone: horror fans, true crime aficionados, cinephiles, and aspiring authors. However, if you’re not a fan of modern climate political deep dives, which is something I think a lot of us are trying to escape from, skip the prologue entirely and just dive into the rest. Other than that, it’s a must-read for all the aforementioned and learn a few things about this legendary character that I never thought about, or believed I needed to know- but pass me a glass of Chianti because I’m sure happy I do now.
