Halloween Memories

There you have it folks, 34 years ago, I hated my first Halloween

It wasn't until a few years later and a visit from a certain caped crusader that I changed my mind...

I'm the guy in the generic Spiderman Knock off costume (Thank you, Woolco!), Batman had let himself go and Robin smelled of drinking but I was enthralled with this visit. I couldn't get over how much the dynamic duo looked like friends of my Dads.....

Got a fun extra for Halloween this year, some cool vintage trade advertising for companies like Ben Cooper and Don Post. Enjoy and have a great evening!

Monster Squad Merchandise

Ok, wanting to punch John Travolta is perfectly understandable, especially if you've seen "Be Cool" but why would you want to punch Frank from the Monster Squad? He's a good guy!

Actually this is a piece of merch from the show I'd never heard about, the only thing I'd ever seen before was the Board Game.

Also, did you know that comedian Marty Allen was on Monster Squad? His site includes some rare pics from the series.

Remembering the Vacant Lot

This post has nothing to do with Halloween or the 70's actually, I just came across some videos from the Canadian Comedy Troupe "The Vacant Lot" and I wanted to share. For those not in the know, "Vacant Lot" was a 1993 CBC series that followed the mega successful "The Kids in the Hall".

Critics at the time compared it unfairly to Kids, mostly because troupe member Nick McKinney was Mark McKinney's brother. The show was similiar in structure but the humour was different, some of the things they tried were kind of more odd than funny. I once read a rumour that the amount of gore actually killed the show but the guys could be very clever and inventive when they wanted to.

Here are some classic moments from the Vacant lot, sadly my favourite "Laundry Day Fashion show" is not available....

I'm not wrestling that guy, he's got a boner!

Pumpkin Spider!

Pamper Me!

The Signature Skit: Blinded by the Light

More Halloween stuff on Monday

Make your own monsters some more!

I'd never seen this Monster Bust set but I gotta say it's pretty sweet. I like the fact that replaced Dracula with the Creature from the Black Lagoon.

I wonder if most kids slathered on the testors red paint when putting these together? Most of the vintage kits I see with "little kid paint jobs" go nuts with the blood.......

Lots more Monster Stuff to come.

PlaidStallions.com

Make your own monsters!

Concepts like this copycast make your own monster factory really appealed to me as a kid, I was just missing two things to really make them work, skill and patience. I'd have become Homer Simpson working on that thing......

Plaid Stallions.com

Woolco 76 Halloween Ad

Found this over at Malls of America it's so killer!

The Moving Monster Gun!

I have a weird story about the Hasbro moving Monster Gun which projected pictures of Monsters on the wall. A school friend named Richard had one of these tucked in his closet. I was over at his house once and thought it was the coolest toy ever made. Richard seized the opportunity and said if i wanted to play with with it, I'd have to pay him, eventhough it was obvious he didn't care for it.

I contemplated just grabbing the gun and making a run for it but Richard's parents lived in the middle of nowhere. Needless to say, our friendship dissolved.

Coming Next Week:

Dawn of the Man-Mates!

PlaidStallions.com

Beware the Mego Mad Monsters!!!!

The Mego Mad Monsters are some of the best known Monster toys of the seventies and the story of their inception is kind of interesting.

Mego was scooping up licenses like crazy in the mid seventies but according to Neal Kublan, Universal wanted too much money for the rights to produce monster dolls (Rival AHI scooped up the rights and produced 8" Monsters of their own). So Mego produced generic monsters to keep the retail space.

Despite the limitations, the Mad Monsters have a wonderful charm to them, Frankenstein has bolts in his forehead, the Wolfman looks a lot like he stepped out of a Grimm fairy tale. The figure's eyes and hands glow in the dark, mine still do to this day.

The absolute bomb is the Mad Monster Castle however, a fantastic backdrop for your Mad Monster figures and the lab even has an eyechart because 20/20 vision is important to the undead......

For more information check out the Mego Museum Mad Monsters Gallery

More Remco Monsters

In addition to the mini monsters, Remco did these styling 9 inch Mego like Monster figures. In my personal opinion, these are almost some of the coolest Monster figures ever made, almost.

Two things keep them from greatness, the first thing is the glow in the dark plastic really obscures Ken Sheller's amazing sculpts, all of the monsters (Save for the rather generic Dracula) have beautiful likeness to the original actor.

The second thing are the bodies, Remco included a squeezing action feature that allows the figures to "hug" things, it kind of limited play value

Still, it's a really nice line and the monsterizer is one of the best play sets ever made, look at that thing! Remco also made a Phantom and Creature from the Black Lagoon a year later, they are the best figures in the series and of course, near impossible to find........

Plaidstallions.com

Monster Figures enter the "Star Wars" age

I absolutely love the Remco 3 3/4" Universal Mini Monster figures, they are just so perfectly functional. The campy copywriting in this JC Penney page is also a nice touch.

Remco cleverly recycled the carrying case/playset in their Sgt. Rock line a couple of years later (I just bought one, it rocks!). There was also a really cool Monsterizer playset, that is a must own.

Why don't I own these?

PlaidStallions.com

Vintage Halloween Costumes Part 2

Can I tell you how much I love that Mr Spock costume? It's not helping my recent leanings to become a vintage Star Trek collector, I especially covet that Remco Belt.

Notice that Steve Austin and Jamie Summers outfits are actually different that yesterdays. The thing I remember best about those masks besides the cheap elastic (which many folks pointed out yesterday that they would break before you went trick or treating) was the tiny little mouth hole they had, a gerbil couldn't breath through that!

I love how Batman has his name written across his logo, he's so hard to recognize otherwise. Note the Remco Utility belt at the bottom, God I loved that thing!

PlaidStallions.com

Vintage Halloween Costumes Part One

Sure, they marketed them as "Play suits" but we all knew what they were. These ones were just a notch above the "smock and mask" I got at Halloween, plus these ones weren't knockoffs!( More on that later)

I love the Bionic people's exposed circutry arms, the fact that Superman has a mask but I wonder if Kong Kong would really need to wear a shirt with his picture on it?

Oh and what an interesting move it is to throw the Remco Spiderman Utility belt on this page but isn't Batman more famous for such an item?

Holy Chiller Theatre Batman!

I love this Wards catalog spread, what could be cooler than the Mego Worlds Greatest Superheroes kicking the crap out of the Lincoln Monsters? Look how Shazam just pushes the Mummy aside. Despite being kind of Dime store, the Lincoln Monsters were distributed by Galoob for a while so they got some cool catalog representation.

Speaking of Monsters, the Hilarious House of Frightenstein is now on DVD, in the US you get the syndicated Half hour shows. Canadians get an exclusive boxed set (when do Canadians get anything exclusive?) that includes 13 of the original hour long episodes! How cool is that?

Frightenstein is also on Drive In Classics and the Space Channel currently as well, now here's my favourite sequence from the show, The Wolfman!

Monster Squad Action Figures Almost Happened

Here's a king sized depressing fact, we almost got Monster Squad and Kids from C.A.P.E.R action figures! This page from an Ideal Toys catalog (borrowed from the Mego Museum) shows a series of six inch figures based on those Saturday morning series using what appears to be Evel Kneviel body.

I'd have killed for these figures as a kid, Monster Squad was one of my favourite shows. Very little merchandising was released (although I'll be featuring some this week). It's funny that they didn't make a figure of Fred Grandy's character (who seemed to serve the same role as Frank on Electra Woman, sit in the basement) but Mego would give him his due later.

Dress in the Dark much?

Note to Guy Smiley: This kind of outfit clash only works if you're a girl trying to be artsy. Wow, it's too early for this.....

Coming Next week!

Kitschy Monster toys and merchandise from the 70's, Halloween costumes and a lot more!

Kitschy Bar Nick Knacks

I remember my Uncle Dan had all this stuff at his house before he had kids, he may still have it. It's all so hilarious, I imagine that a whole evening alone could be spent laughing at that toilet ice bucket.

What's really funny about this is i bet all of this stuff (including a modern variation of the Loser) is likely available at your local Spencer Gifts.

Plaid Stallions dot com

The Justice League goes waterskiing

Added a new page to plaidstallions.com about the kind of weird 1970's Seaworld waterskiing show. You can check it out here.

Soylent Green is Peeeeeepullllll!

I look at this childs outfit (the one on the right, although the one on the left is a doozy) and I can't help but feel this is somewhat influenced by Charleton Heston's outfit in Soylent Green.

All that's missing is the neckerchief!

Coming tomorrow on Plaidstallions.com: The Superheroes go waterskiing!

Fugly kitchens of the past

It's thanksgiving here in Canada and what would be more fitting than to look at some of kitchen tables that we may have eaten our feast on 30 years ago.

Mmmm deep orange shag, perfect for losing table scraps in.

too fancy

I'm reminded of Yard Sales for some reason

My grandparents had this set in their apartment, I used to think it was the coolest thing because it looked like it came from Star Trek.....

Remco Flying Enterprise: Unrequited Toy Love

I never had the Remco Star Trek Enterprise space flight game but lord, how i remember wanting it. The TV commercial is especially memorable but to my disappointment, it's not on youtube.

Essentially a knock off of the Mattel Vertibird, Remco also did a very cool Batman version of this set. Mattel made an Eagle one version for Space:1999 as well, one day they will all be mine......

Mego News: Check out the Mego Museum Blog today, there is so much good news in the Mego World, I don't where to begin.

Return to the Planet of the Apes is now on DVD! The cool Apes animated series has been digitally remastered and available for under $20.

More Mego Star Trek Madness

Mego did a really good job with Star Trek, the electronic role play toys are some of the coolest around. They have a wonderful kind of crudeness that kind of reminds me of the hardware on the original series

I especially remember being interested in the communicators, my neighbor Dan Munns had them and I think that was the reason we were friends. Dan wasn't really into toys all that much (more of a sports nut) so i often ended up playing catch.

Also on the page is the Remco phaser, check out this cool vintage pic of a kid holding one.

Mr Spock's Pimped out ride

Found this ad in a 1978 trade publication, that's pretty late for TOS merchandising, which had cooled down some from the 75-76 explosion. I wonder if it was ever released.

I imagine those thrusters came flying off in the first few minutes of rough driving.

Dorkiest Star Trek Toy ever?

I'm not sure it's a bright thing to encourage people to comb the beach looking for car keys and loose change at an early age.

I'm positive it's a bad idea to combine that behaviour with a proud love of Star Trek. (It would probably be even worse if you combined it with yesterday's fine toy)

The Star Trek Metal Detector is actually, a rare toy in the collectors market. I personally would like to see the toy concepts Roddenberry rejected.

To protect Spock's Brain?

I must have missed this episode, maybe after the whole "Spock's Brain" mess, Kirk made him wear a flashing hemlet so they wouldn't fall into the same trap again.

It's fun to think about Nimoy trying to do his lines with a straight face while wearing this.