Lady Death: Dark Alliance - Trading Card #63

Combining East Asian occultism with her own formidable vampiric powers, Jade is like nothing the earth has ever seen before - a force that cannot be stopped, and quests to control all of the Asian continent! 

Our Trail Cam - Vol. 39

CBS Radio Mystery Theater - Newspaper Ad

Oakland Tribune - January 20, 1974

At one point in the late-seventies the family television started emitting smoke, resulting in my mother calling the fire department. Turns out our only television had become an electrical fire hazard and needed disposing of.

How long we were without a television is everybody's guess. But it was a long enough period of time to allow my mom and dad to introduce my brother and I to the glories of Old Time Radio.

One of our local AM stations, KSFO, broadcast a complete line-up of 'prime time' radio programming. The eight o' clock hour would feature shows like Lum n' Abner, Boston Blackie, The Shadow, The Whistler, Our Miss Brooks, Burns and Allen, and many, many more. 

The nine o' clock time slot was taken by an all-new Old Time Radio show, The CBS Radio Mystery Theater, which fast became a fascination and addiction of mine. Fueling that fascination and addiction was how the program's use of the descriptive mystery in its title was both literal and figurative. 

Because each and every night was a delightful and frustrating coin toss as to what that particular episode would or could be. Yes, there were lots of mysteries. But there were also a lot of gothic melodramas, comedies, spy stories, ghost stories, monster stories, historical dramas, and even quite a few science fiction and fantasy stories. There was no way of knowing unless you listened.

My all time favorite episode remains Hickory, Dickory, Doom. You can give it a listen here.

The remainder of KSFO's evening line-up was a ten o' clock comedy hour, which played selections from stand-up or skit comedy albums. The eleven o' clock hour offered the likes of Lights Out, Inner Sanctum, Suspense, or Escape.

The witching hour featured a repeat of the CBS Radio Mystery Theater. Good times and wonderful memories.

Fright Flicks - Trading Card #27

A Nightmare on Elm Street 3 Dream Warriors (1987)

I do like the whimsical High School Prom photo vibe New Line's marketing team indulged in with this entry. Fangoria would also use a photo from this shoot for the cover of issue 62.

 

Shogun Assassin (1981) - Newspaper Ad

San Francisco Examiner - January 16, 1981

Shogun Assassin was the Americanized edit of the first two Lone Wolf and Cub movies, Sword of Vengeance and Baby Cart at the River Styx, into a single feature. While I have the first two films, I do not have a memory of seeing this version. Even though I do remember its release and the excoriating review Gene Siskel gave the film.

But I do have the limited edition soundtrack of Shogun Assassin that was released by BSX Records in 2022.

Being a New World Pictures theatrical release, it comes as no surprise that it was coupled with a re-release of 1980's Humanoids from the Deep at most venues. Although the Balboa Theatre, which I once lived three blocks from, had it coupled with a re-release of 1977's The Hills Have Eyes.

The debt The Mandalorian owes to Lone Wolf and Cub, or to Shogun Assassin, is quite obvious and acknowledged. I got quite the geeky giggle when the first film's "Choose your destiny" scene was restaged in, of all things, and episode of The Book of Boba Fett.

 

Lady Death: Dark Alliance - Trading Card #62

Nemesis!

In the hopes of killing the Asian vampire called Jade forever, the mysterious Progeny sent the Iron Racer to kill her. A perfect mixture of science and magic, the Racer is no match for Jade's rage.
 

Home Box Office - Newspaper Ad

Oakland Tribune - January 15, 1978

Of the six films listed in this Home Box Office ad, I have seen two. Those would be Futureworld (1976) and Empire of the Ants (1977). But I had, or have, some pop culture awareness of another three of them. The novel Audrey Rose was a bookstore staple in the late 70s and early 80s, and I think I watched the first Sounder at some point in 1989 or 1990, and I had heard of, but still have yet to see, Bugsy Malone.

Birch Interval is the only one I had never heard of. A quick check of the IMDB revealed why, the film is a fish-out-of-water melodrama about an eleven year old girl spending a summer in the rural home of relatives who live near an Amish community. Not something I would have found as interesting or intriguing as, say, Futureworld or Empire of the Ants, way back in 1978. But today I would more amiable to giving it a look, should I ever stumble across it while scouring a streaming service for something "different" to watch.

Fright Flicks - Trading Card #26

An American Werewolf in London (1981)

 

Tremors (1990) - Newspaper Ad

San Francisco Examiner - January 14, 1990

This scan of an ad for a Sneak Preview of Tremors in the Sunday Examiner/Chronicle Datebook might be a tad murky, and thus hard to see, but what is not the slightest bit murky is my complete and utter love for this delightful 'little' monster movie. I went to see it twice on its opening day and have watched it countless times since.

I have also seen all the sequels and own a DVD set of the complete, albeit very short-lived, monster-of-the-week formatted television series that ran on the Sci-Fi (maybe SyFy by then) Channel.

"Damn prairie dog burrow!" 
 

Lady Death: Dark Alliance - Trading Card #61

Comedy and Tragedy

Before her life was changed forever by vampire, Chastity wanted to be an actress and model. Little did she know that the twin masks signifying drama would come to represent her life - a combination of utter comedy and heart-wrenching tragedy.