Tag Archives: Retro horror

Horror Nostalgia

The ‘Child’s Play 2’ Trailer Was Out Of This World! 

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Sometimes watching a good horror teaser can be as much fun as watching the actual movie. Trailers give us a sneak peek into the dark realm awaiting us once the theater lights dim and the movie starts to roll. I’ve always found them to be a lot of fun and whenever a horror trailer was released we all quickly learned to pay attention. Back then trailers didn’t spoil the movie by showing the whole damn thing. Instead only showed enough to give us a ravenous need to go see what they were advertising. Child’s Play 2 did this in spades!

With the tagline ‘Sorry Jack, Chucky’s back’ our tickets were as good as already bought!

REWIND THE CLOCK

Child’s Play was a huge hit upon its release and scared the bejeezus out of us bratty little kids. We were at that tender age when playing with toys was a sacred pastime. Saturday mornings were entirely dedicated to brainwashing us into rushing out and buying the newest and best thing to fill the toy box.

I mean these were the days when grown-ass men and women broke out into literal fistfights while in line at K-Mart over Cabbage Patch Kids of all things. Toys were a red hot topic and even our parents were getting in on the insanity. 

So, gliding a razor’s edge across our societal vein, a little movie about a doll named Chucky (a cleaver resemblance to the famous My Buddy doll was not coincidental) hit theaters with ferocity, and if the idea of a killer doll wasn’t already a subconscious fear malignantly growing in the back of our cultural mind once Child’s Play released it was a full-blown phobia. 

No, Chucky was not the first killer doll to darken our minds. Stuart Gordon’s malicious Dolls had already come out and scared people silly. Not to mention years prior little Talky Tina scared people out of their skin thanks to the Twilight Zone.

But all the chills these guys introduced to the cultural zeitgeist Chucky took to a whole new level. And his infamy lives on today proving what a demonic powerhouse of a monster the little guy has always been.

The idea of a killer doll was amped up on some serious coke thanks to Child’s Play so to introduce its inevitable sequel the marketing team put together one of my absolute favorite little horror trailers of all time. Those psychopathic bastards took a Jack-in-the-Box, something that plays on the fears of a lot of people already, and then showed it being crushed beneath Chucky’s feet. The killer doll was back and was carving out a bloody franchise for himself. He wasn’t playing around this time.

Today Chucky is as recognizable as his bigger brothers like Jason, Freddy, and Leatherface, and has left a landslide of creative carnage across his macabre legacy. Chucky is celebrated for his wit, humor, and that pure love for murder that drives him. He’s become a husband, a father, and overall terrible influence and downright satanic pain in the ass to all who encounter him.

Naturally, we love him for it. It’s also worth noting Spirit Halloween is selling the Jack featured in the trailer. That’s the impact Child’s Play 2 had on us. What a time to be alive!

Relive the thrills of seeing Child's Play 2 in this beloved teaser from the past

There’s no better time than the spooky Halloween season to relive the thrills and chills invested in this psychopathic little guy. So turn down the lights and cuddle up close to the ghoul of your dreams because the fun is about to begin!

Editorials

Stephen King’s “Silver Bullet”- The Criminally Underrated Halloween Movie

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In 2020, the full moon came on Halloween, and a happy coincidence left me fully convinced in the All Hallows Blue Moonlight on a notion that I had always known deep down. That Stephen King’s Silver Bullet was truly a criminally underrated Halloween film.

Heh. I hope you read that in your best Jane voice.

Now, it’s obvious that the film itself models a timeline of sorts from the 1983 novella; which acts like a calendar of chapters rummaging through each month of a chaotic year where a werewolf is violently tormenting the residents of Tarkers’ Mills. The movie starts off in late Spring and the majority of the film is actually set in the Summer, with a few big scenes leading up to and taking place on Independence Day. In which case, makes my argument here a tad trying, but I’m here to fight and will die on the hill that’s forever a Halloween movie.

Midway through the movie, Fall sets in with the climatic final confrontation and ending landing on Halloween itself and although as stated, most of the film is staged at different points of time throughout the year, the last half of the movie really sells that Autumn ambiance flowing into the Halloween Full Moon final chapter. The changing of the leaves, that you can hear crunching in between scenes. The sinister aura surrounding the town is much heavier now, giving off that Halloween lurking around the corner feeling-you all know exactly what I’m talking about. You can practically SMELL the Autumn atmosphere. Especially when we get to the last ten minutes or so of the movie, where Jack-O-Lanterns and die-cut paper skeletons are seen outside the Coslaw residence.

So to me, it feels more like a Halloween flick than anything else. And I’m kind of pissed that AMC Fearfest opts to show Stephen King’s Carrie 20 times a month in October and Silver Bullet a mere ONE TIME. Sure, I get films like Carrie are more universally popular. However, the fact that Silver Bullet consistently gets the shaft, both in the cinematic horrorthons and in the horror community, kind of bums me out. It’s underappreciated, underrated, and the best werewolf movie out of the slew of Lycanthrope films that came out in the early 80s’,

YEAH, I SAID IT. Corey Haim in a gas-powered motorcycle of a wheelchair and Gary Busey wrasslin’ reverend werewolves? Sorry, but there’s no competition happening here.

Stephen King’s first handwritten screenplay from his own novella adaption deserves a little more respect this Halloween. Give it a viewing closer to the holiday, and you’ll get the same Halloween ambient fuzzies as I do every time I watch it.

Pick it up here from Amazon if you don’t own this cinematic masterpiece yet!

Editorials, Nostalgic Eats

Celebrating The Wonderful History Of McDonald’s Halloween Buckets

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Celebrating 35 Years Of McDonald's Halloween Buckets

Halloween in the eighties ruled. Being born in 1982, allowed me to live most of my childhood throughout the glorious decade, following being an angsty pre-teen during the Grunge era, and ending my adolescent years as the Class of 2000. I feel pretty lucky to have experienced this monumental changing of the tides, but one thing that has changed too much, and I fondly miss, is the way Halloween WAS growing up. Most people could attribute that to, “eh, it’s never the same as when you were a child”; which is of course, true. However, some Halloween traditions should never have gone away- and that one is the McDonald’s Halloween Buckets.

I’ll never forget the first commercial I saw for these national treasures. It was during a CBS airing for Garfield’s Halloween Adventure, which I had originally uploaded in its entirety WITH that commercial included before YouTube flagged it… but hey, I tried. Anyway, I along with all other kids my age became obsessed. The arrival of October meant shopping for noisy plastic costumes with masks at our local Sav-On drugstore, Halloween community carnivals, Halloween parades at school, and of course, McBoo and friends.

The orange bucket Happy Meals that originally were released in 1986, resembled that of a pumpkin and had a variety of three available; McPunk’n, a traditional jack-o-lantern face; McBoo, a ghost face; and McGoblin, the “scariest” of the three-which is the one I still have to this day!

The buckets themselves were nowhere near large enough to take on a night of heavy tricks or treats, but they sure were great storage pails and maintained a versatile function for the past 30 years. This little bastard went from holding my Polly Pockets and stickers in the 80s’, to pins, hair accessories, and makeup in my teenage 90s’, and circling back today in 2023, where I actually use it to hold my rather respectable collection of McDonald’s employee pins.

While most know to believe the Halloween buckets weren’t available until 1986, that’s not actually entirely accurate. McDonald’s ran a test promotion in the Boston and New York area with prototypes of several Halloween Happy Meal Buckets from October 11 through October 31, 1985. After a successful run, they were introduced nationally in 1986. They came back the following year after, but for some reason were absent in 1988. Then in 1989, the buckets got a mild makeover with McBoo turning white and a new friend-the McWitch, complete with pointy hat on the lid!

In 1990, the buckets added some glow-in-the-dark flair to the designs, while changing the faces entirely to a more cartoonish look- one that I personally think is less than the originals, but not a bad second-place prize if these are the ones you had. In 1991, the buckets were replaced by vinyl glow-in-the-dark trick-or-treat bags, which get a LOT OF SHIT by Halloween bucket lovers, but I actually used this fucker for trick-or-treating, and it served me well. The handles seem pretty flimsy, but this bastard held up for a full bag filled with Tootsie Rolls and Mr. Bones. So I can’t hate on them.

To keep in with the now tradition of refreshing the successful Halloween product, 1992 saw another makeover to McPunk’n, McBoo, and McWitch with minor facial changes, but with the addition of a new cookie cutter lid!

And that my friends, was the last time we got a quality Mcdonald’s Halloween Bucket. After taking yet, another hiatus in 1993, the pails came back, with a more “modern” makeover that just sort of plain sucked. McWitch looked like an angry cartoon drunk, and even though they still had the cool cookie cutters, it seemed less magical than their predecessors.

After this monumental modern fuck-up, the pails again disappeared until 1999, when they came back only as a duo, with no more spoopy faces. Instead, we got Halloween scenes that wrapped around the bucket featuring McDonald Land characters. On the upside, the cookie cutters were still there.

In 2001, the quality diminished further and the cookie cutter lids were abolished entirely. We got the same cartoonish scenes around the pail, but we got bat handles instead on the lid now-which although sort of cool, were so damn uncomfortable, cutting into your palms like Shakaka the Great White Bat trying to escape Ace Ventura’s hands while running through the jungle.

In 2010, Mr. Potato Head was apparently spooky enough to get a themed Halloween pail. This is where the downfall of a soft society began folks.

The 2011 pails were somewhat of a return to nostalgia with a pumpkin or a monster face, along with the again, gnarly bat handles. But that was the last time we would see Halloween-faced pails at all. Following years brought cartoon-themed buckets such as Scooby-Doo, Monster High, and eventually Minions pails. Then, the year that ended it all in 2016, the pails made their final appearance with It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown-in which I guess if they’re gonna go out, at least it’s with a Halloween classic and not a damn Potato Head toddler toy.

In 2022, the Halloween bucket made a much-welcomed, and triumphant comeback. McDonald’s hearing our cries for nostalgia for many years, decided it was time to give in to the relentless people, such as myself, and bring back some favorite retro designs of yesteryear, minus a fully functional lid. Regardless of outcries of a paper sticker sheet for a lid, I was just happy to have them come back after many years of whining about it.

It’s been 37 years since the nostalgic Halloween buckets entered our childhood Halloween fantasies and while these little pieces of big corporate plastic may seem trivial, they serve as a staple of our childhoods, and I’m just glad the Fast Food King of Halloween is continuing the tradition into 2023!