The Big Show - Newspaper Ad

San Francisco Examiner - November 19, 1963

Five years after five days after debuting as the second-half of a double-feature with Bert I. Gordon's superior giant bug flick The Spider, the time travel thriller Terror from the Year 5,000 aired on Channel 7's pre-primetime filler program 'The Big Show'. A rerun of an episode of The Rebel followed thereafter.

Lady Death: Dark Alliance - Trading Card #42

Maid to Order

Quickly on her way to becoming a pinup icon in her own right, Lady Death has been shown in thousands of poses and costumes. Need some help lighting your Jack-O-Lantern? 

Our Trail Cam - Vol. 35

Amityville 3-D (1983) - Newspaper Ad

Oakland Tribune - November 18, 1983

In 1983 my dad got transferred to Hong Kong, so we pulled up roots and relocated. So I missed the American theatrical release of Amityville 3-D, but I did manage to see it on the big screen in Hong Kong, in 3-D.

I am somewhat certain that this was an occasion wherein I had read the film's novelization, written by Gordon McGill, prior to seeing it. I recognized his name from reading the novelization of The Final Conflict and its goofy tie-in novel sequel, Omen IV: Armageddon 2000. He also wrote a goofier tie-in sequel to Omen IV titled The Abomination: Omen V. I also read that, but all I remember about it is a gross leper joke.

Amityville 3-D was first film in the unconnected and scattershot franchise that fessed up to being entirely fictional. One not based on or inspired by either a real life tragedy or a fabricated huckster haunting. The movie neither bored me, nor did really impress me, either. It is just an inoffensive time waster, nothing more.

Fright Flicks - Trading Card #6

Day of the Dead (1985)

The Major Cooper make-up effect in Day of the Dead was one of several that had me wondering how the hell they had managed to pull it off. The decapitation of Torres was another. Tom Savini really deserved an Academy Award nomination for his work here.

Dracula [Blood for Dracula (1974)] - Newspaper Ad

San Francisco Examiner - November 17, 1974

Here we have a Dracula (Udo Kier) suffering the ravages of the sexual revolution. Seems that the Count can only drink the blood of virgins and, well, they are in an agonizing short supply. Considering the one-two punches of Herpes and HIV-AIDS were forthcoming, this black comedy of sexual suffering might have aged well.

I think I might revisit this one, maybe...

Lady Death: Dark Alliance - Trading Card #41

Which Witch

Like pop icons of decades past, Lady Death has taken her place in the pantheon of femme fatales drawn in different styles and settings by top artists. So what are you after, a trick... or a treat? 

The Spider (1958) / Terror from the Year 5000 (1958) - Newspaper Ad

Oakland Tribune - November 14, 1958

My first ever viewing of Earth vs. The Spider provided a memorable jolt to my childhood psyche. One moment this dude is just driving along a road at night, the next his blood-spattered face is screeching in close-up. Wow. I was not expecting that.

The rest of the movie does not deliver anything close to that opening shock, but it does have a slumbering spider getting snapped out of its DDT-induced nap by a rock band's practice session... and the impromptu dance party that it has started.

Also, all the "teenagers" in this movie look to be in their mid-to-late 30s. Which is fun.

Bits and bobs sprinkled across the last 20 or so minutes of Terror from the Year 5,000 also lodged in my childhood memory as being terrifying. I guess that the image and sound of a sparkling woman lunging from the shadows and squealing like a terrified piglet was just outlandishly weird enough to give me a confused case of the willies.

Hey, I was seven or eight. What do you expect at that age, critical thinking?

Fright Flicks - Trading Card #5

"He's an ugly little spud, isn't he?"

"I think he can hear you Ray."

Now I want to watch Ghostbusters again. 

The House of Hammer - Issue 9, June 1977