Animated Halloween Video Featuring Sam Heimer's Artwork + Harley Poe's "Pagan Holiday"

I'm posting this a few days late, but this video by Nocturnaloner featuring Sam Heimer's artwork and "Pagan Holiday" music by Harley Poe is a perfect way to kick off October! If you're a long-time reader, you may recognize Nocturnaloner's name from past Halloween seasons (you can check out past videos I've featured here, here, and here!). He painstakingly animates all his videos and sets them to atmospheric music. I simply adore his magical videos that are imbued with the spooky spirit! See his latest creation below:

Vegan Horror Film "Revenge of the Hamburgers" Seeks Funding

The vegan horror film Revenge of the Hamburgers has launched a crowdsourcing initiative to help raise funds for this film to be created. The film sounds like a madcap, bloody, and all-together satisfying horror film for animal-lovers as farm animals finally get their revenge...

Watch Now on Netflix: Extraordinary Tales (2015)

I haven't been posting as many "Watch Now on Netflix" articles as I would like and have a lot of (fairly) new Netflix titles to recommend to you that I need to catch up on (hopefully soon, maybe in one big post)! However, when I saw this animated tribute to Edgar Allan Poe's work, I knew I had to write something about it immediately. You see, I have been wanting and waiting to check out Extraordinary Tales for quite some time now, and was ecstatic when it was recently added to stream on Netflix Instant!

This animated horror anthology features horror greats like Bela Lugosi, Christopher Lee, Guillermo del Toro, Roger Corman, and Julian Sands narrating five Edgar Allan Poe tales and one wraparound story. Each animated short is narrated in a different style, with one having a stark graphic novel look, another one looking like a soft watercolor painting, another featuring bold colors in old comic book style, and so on.

31 Days of Halloween: Misfits' "Ghoul's Night Out" Sing-a-Long Video

I have shared the stunning videos from YouTube user Nocturnaloner in past countdowns (check out Kingdom of Witches and All Hallow's Eve), but I just recently discovered a new video from him/her that I must have missed last year! It is a fun sing-a-long lyric video to the song "Ghoul's Night Out" by the Misfits!

31 Days of Halloween: Vintage Halloween Cartoons

What is it that I love so much about vintage Halloween cartoons? I love how they are creepy-cute, balancing silliness with scares. I love their nostalgic charm and thinking about how many people have enjoyed them, considering some go back as far as the 1920s!

Most of all, I love the Halloween atmosphere and spirit they all seem to exude. Watching any one of these puts me in the Halloween spirit!

I wish there was a box set of these vintage Halloween cartoons, but for now we can watch most of them on YouTube.

Check out a few of my favorites below:

31 Days of Halloween: All Hallow's Eve Animation by Nocturnaloner

Still from "Kingdom of Witches"

I love videos by Nocturnaloner on YouTube. The whimsical "Kingdom of Witches" caught my several years ago, so I am always on the lookout for more videos from this user!

Luckily, Nocturnaloner released the following animation called "All Hallow's Eve" for our Halloween enjoyment:

31 Days of Halloween: Mad Monster Party (1967)

Looking for something ooky and spooky to watch this Halloween? Look no further than the kooky Mad Monster Party! Created by the same folks that brought you stop-motion animation Christmas specials like Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Mad Monster Party is a howling good time for the whole freaky family!

After finding the secret of life, Baron Von Frankenstein (voiced by Boris Karloff) has finally discovered the secret of destruction (“I, Baron von Frankenstein, master of the secret of creation, have now mastered the secret of destruction”)and is inviting all his favorite monsters to his castle for a celebration! He also plans to announce that he is retiring and bequeathing all his secrets to his (gasp!) human heir, the clueless Felix Flanken (voiced by Allen Swift, who also voiced most of the monsters). The Baron’s assistant, lovely redheaded Francesca (voiced by Gale Garnett), doesn’t take too kindly to the news. She and the other monsters, including Dracula, Frankenstein’s Monster and his Mate (voiced by Phyllis Diller), The Wolf Man, The Mummy, The Invisible Man, Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde, The Hunchback, The Creature from the Black Lagoon and so on, plan on taking Felix out before he inherits the Baron’s secrets!

Mad Monster Party is a mad, mad, mad little movie that is a joy to watch around Halloween! With newly restored editions, I really think they should play this on television around Halloween just like they play all of the other stop-animation movies around Christmas! It’s got some spiffy musical numbers, lots of adult humor and overall just looks amazing!

The character design is amazing, especially considering how many monsters are running around. Besides those mentioned above, there is also the hilarious Chef Mafia Machiavelli (“Here we have the antipasto – black widows pickled in their own poison, smoked lizards and snakes, and marinated mice.”), Yetch, the creepy, Peter Lorre-inspired servant (Yetch: “It’s me, your Don Juan.” Francesca: “I Don Juan to look at you”.), a groovy skeleton band called Little Tibia and the Fibulas (“It’s the mummy!”) and, of course, the uninvited It that crashes the party later in the film!

The scope of the film is very ambitious, and seems much bigger than other Rankin/Bass productions like The Year Without Santa Claus or Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer. The setting of Baron Von Frankenstein’s towering castle, with its crocodile-filled lagoon and man-eating flora and fauna, is absolutely stunning and really invokes nostalgic feelings from childhood, especially when accompanied by the stop-motion animation! This is definitely one for the spooky kid in all of us!

If you are looking for some light-hearted fare this October, Mad Monster Party is one classic film to check out! Even though they slip some decidedly adult humor in there, it is still suitable for young tots, too! Anyone looking to regain some Halloween spirit should definitely watch Mad Monster Party – it never fails to put me in a kooky mood!

Buy it on Amazon!

(Ed. Note: This was originally posted on Fatally Yours, on October 13th, 2009.)

31 Days of Halloween: The Halloween Tree Animation and Poem

The wonderful YouTube user Nocturnaloner (who created the gorgeous Halloween animation "Kingdom of Witches" that I posted about HERE during last year's countdown) has crafting another beautiful video for the Halloween season!

The animation uses words from Ray Bradbury's immortal book The Halloween Tree, is inspired by a painting of William Fahey of the same name and is accompanied by the score to the opening sequence of The Halloween Tree cartoon. ::Swoon:: What could be more Halloween-y?

Behold, I give you "The Halloween Tree"!

31 Days of Halloween: The Art of Eric Pigors

Eric Pigors is an amazing artist I’ve admired for many years who has a very dedicated fan base in the horror/gothic communities. He has had quite a career, spending 15 years at Walt Disney Feature Animation Studios doing art on such films as The Lion King, Treasure Planet, Aladdin, Hercules, Beauty and the Beast and most recently Princess and the Frog. Eric even sold an original feature idea to Disney called “Silly Hillbillies on Mars”.

After working at Disney, Pigors started his own company, called Toxictoons, where he has created his own monster-inspired art and animation. Pigors even made a seven minute animated film called, Let’s Chop Soo-E! that ran on MTV's Liquid Television. Pigors’ Toxictoons were released as stickers by Posterpop and by Mezco Toys under the line “Let’s Play in the Morgue”.

You’ve probably seen Pigors’ art on concert tour shirts he has done for Metallica, The Murderdolls, The Ghastly Ones, Genitorturers, Scum of the Earth, Psychocharger, 69 Eyes and many others.

Of course, with all his spooky artisticness, Pigors has created some truly memorable Halloween artwork, which you can enjoy below!

AND he has a fun app called MONSTERPIECES where you can design your own monsters!! Check it out on iTunes!

Don't forget to check out all the gruesome Halloween goodies on the Toxictoons' site!

Halloween Costume Ideas - Goth Cartoon and Comic Book Characters

Since I am not throwing a Halloween party this year, I'll be attending a friend's party. This weekend, the theme for the party was announced! People will be asked to dress as cartoon or comic book characters, and as soon as I heard the news I started thinking of gothiky characters I would want to dress up as. The characters below were the first ones I thought of; check 'em out and let me know what you think!

Cassie Hack from Hack/Slash

The seriously sexy Cassie from the Hack/Slash comic books would be so wicked to dress up as! I used to have a similar haircut as her and wouldn't mind having it again, plus I could carry around a baseball bat and maybe a severed "slasher" head for good measure! While she isn't quite trad goth, I think she has a dark look that gives her a modern gothic aesthetic.

Lydia Deetz from Beetlejuice

Photo Source

I've always loved Beetlejuice, and Lydia Deetz is one of my favorite characters ever! I think it would so fun to dress up as her for Halloween...and this just might be the year to do it! She is definitely a quirky goth!

Wednesday Addams

Charles Addams' Wednesday Addams

Last year I threw together a Wednesday Addams costume for a last-minute Halloween party I attended, and it was a hit! In fact, I actually ended up winning "best costume"! I'm thinking about reprising that costume this year, since The Addams Family is another BIG favorite of mine and it all started with creator Charles Addams' comic strip back in the late 1930s.

Emily Strange

Ok, I've never been a big fan of Emily Strange, but I do admit I love her look and it would be super easy to recreate. Not sure if she really qualifies since she doesn't have a cartoon or comic (does she?), but she is definitely super-cute!

Gaz from Invader Zim

Gah! I adore Gaz and the Invader Zim series! I'm not sure most people would "get" who I was dressing up as, though. I would still love to dress up as her (I have the perfect purple wig I could use) and, if I did, I'd be sure to talk about my addiction to my Game Slave and Bloaty's Pizza Hog with other party guests (not that they would get it and I'd probably get really funny looks).

Lenore, The Cute Little Dead Girl

Lenore, The Cute Little Dead Girl was created by Roman Dirge and is about an undead girl who seems to have a rather deadly affect on those around her. However, I would need to get a blond wig and some cute skull hair clips to recreate her look...and again, most people are probably not familiar with this cult character. 

Nara Kilday from Dead@17

The undead heroine of Dead@17, Nara Kilday, would be the PERFECT costume! I mean, she's come back from the dead, has that gothy look and wields a frickin' ax to hack down her demonic enemies. Awesome! The only problem is the obscurity factor again (grrrrrr!) and that people (besides my awesome geeky friends) wouldn't recognize this character. 

Hmmmmm...decisions, decisions!

Do YOU have any suggestions as to what gothy cartoon or comic book characters I should dress up as for Halloween? Please leave me your suggestions below!

31 Days of Halloween: Trick 'r Treat - Season's Greetings

 The animated short by Michael Dougherty that inspired his amazing Halloween horror film Trick 'r Treat!

Meet Sam:

31 Days of Halloween: Disney's Haunted Halloween

With the help of Goofy, the pumpkin from "Disney's Halloween Treat" teaches us about the origins, traditions and superstitions of our favorite holiday.

31 Days of Halloween: The Halloween Tree

An absolute holiday classic, The Halloween Tree is a 1972 Ray Bradbury tale that was made into a cartoon of the same name in 1993 that featured the voice talents of Leonard Nimoy as Moundshroud and Bradbury himself as The Narrator!

Sadly, this amazing cartoon has never made it to DVD (for shame!!). Nevertheless, everyone deserves to see it come October, so I've saved you the trouble of hunting it down by posting it right here (via YouTube) for your enjoyment!