HALLOWEEN 2013 RETROSPECTIVE

Halloween is so close I can taste it (tastes like candy corn and Jolly Ranchers) so now is a good time to look back and reflect on the season.  First things first: a huge, heartfelt thank you to all of you for reading, commenting, and liking the blog on Facebook.  It’s been tremendously fun and I’ve loved sharing it all with you.  Luckily we have lots more holidays coming up to enjoy together!

I’m thrilled that I beat last year’s record of 65 episodes watched.  It was close but I did it, having watched my 67^th episode last night.  And maybe I can cram one or two more in by midnight on Halloween!  We also survived our trip to Sleepy Hollow and finally made it to the Great Jack O’Lantern Blaze, which was amazeballs.  I read four Halloween books, watched a couple of Halloween movies and ate way too much candy.  Tis the season!

And now I will hand out some random, meaningless awards (hey, if the Academy can do it so can I):

Our number one trope of Halloween 2013 was the inexplicably popular Rag Doll Costume, which appeared in four different episodes.  Coming tied in second and  appearing in three episodes each were the ever-popular Cleopatra Costume, A Dark & Stormy Blackout and Haunting with a Logical Explanation.

Scariest Moment is a tie between Zeke the Plumber in every scene he appeared in along with the moment Greta turned from trick-or-treater to demon in “Hellowe’en.”  Honorable mention for the scene in which Louie and his daughters were menaced in Louie.

Worst Episode goes to The Big Bang Theory’s “The Holographic Excitation.”

Best New Show Discovery is Halloween Wars, with the junior award given to Doc McStuffins. 

Worst New Show Discovery goes to Quints by Surprise—but at least one Facebook poster said they loved the show.  Different strokes, folks!

Fictional Halloween Party I Most Wish I Was Invited To goes to the Taylor family’s two parties seen in Home Improvement, with an honorable mention for Carrie’s party in Two of a Kind.

Unnecessary Excessive Flatulence Dishonor is bestowed upon Jessie with a shout-out to the “fart attack” in Parks & Recreation.

And finally the Batshit Crazy award goes to Girlfriends for bringing us the poignant story of a woman’s nervous breakdown, her shopping cart, and a weirdly long church-set sobfest.

As for tomorrow’s post, I’ve saved the bestest for lastest—can you guess what it will be?!

GHOST BUMMERS

Jessie

Season 3 (2013)

I grew up with the Disney Channel and am a big fan of its original shows like Flash Forward and Lizzie McQuire.  I fully embraced my role as an old curmudgeon, however, when watching this episode of Jessie.  Jessie is one of the Disney Channel’s current shows, one of countless many that all seem the same to me and all feature tweens who all sound like they’re shouting all of their lines.  Even the colors were squint-inducing bright.  I found myself sympathizing with the bitchy adult antagonist character who hated all of the kids and couldn’t remember any of their names.

In this scenario I am the lady in pink.  Rotten kids!

But amidst the shouting and bratty kids this episode wasn’t without its charms.  The premise of the show seems to be that the very Emma Stoneish Jessie is a nanny for a bunch of kids at a posh Manhattan apartment building.  In this episode evil spirits invade the kids’ Halloween party to prepare the opening of a portal that will usher in a demon-lord.  If that sounds familiar it's because the entire episode is a loving tribute to the movie Ghostbusters.  We get the possessed gatekeeper residents, the rooftop showdown with the demon, a Slimer-like poltergeist and some of the characters even don proton packs and jumpsuits at the end to fend off the malevolent spirits.

All of the above was great fun, as were the party scenes and lavish costumes seen throughout the episode (one extra dressed as a box of chocolates kept having trouble keeping the bow on his head).  A glimpsed game of Pin the Tail on the Werewolf particularly pleased me.

Kids these days!  They love their tan jumpsuits and wigs.

The weirdest aspect of the episode was its obsession with bowel movements.  Sadly, “obsession” doesn’t even begin to cover it.  There are several references to one character who “farts on pillows.”  Another little girl vows to eat her underwear and then implies she can’t because she peed (at least I hope it was peed) in them after being scared by a ghost.  There’s even a joke at the very end about a “haunted colon.”

Call me old-fashioned but all of this makes me grateful that I grew up during an earlier, gentler, less gassy era of Disney Channel programming.

Recurring Themes: The “it was all a dream!” ending counts as a Haunting with a Logical Explanation.

Halloween Quotient: 4

See It, Skip It, Own It?

The bad kid acting is grating but this is a fun homage to Ghostbusters and escapist Halloween fare that’s worth seeing (once).

HALLOWEEN

Malcolm in the Middle

Season 7 (2005)

It’s always a fine line in crafting anti-heroes.  They need to be just rascally enough to still be lovable and it’s so easy to go a bit too far and end up with an unlikeable punk.  That was always my problem with Malcolm in the Middle: the brothers just seem like bullies and assholes and I end up just feeling bad for everyone who has to deal with them.  It doesn’t help that “Halloween” is from the 7^th and last season of the show, so they’re not young anymore but rather gangly teens whose “antics” are less of the zany variety and more just mean-spirited.

Yeah, I want to punch them in the face too.

In this episode brothers Reece and Dewey take their youngest sibling trick-or-treating only to egg an old man and then be pursued by him (very, very slowly) for the rest of episode. Eventually he catches up with them (it involves a sticky mattress that traps them in place—don’t ask).  The old man is rather terrifying in his relentless pursuit of the brothers, with his walker and his creepy eyes.  But even more terror is in store.

Insert obligatory Bryan Cranston Breaking Bad reference here.

An under-the-weather Malcolm (and really, Frankie Muniz already looks sickly so Frankie Muniz made up to look sick is even worse) and his dad are stuck home, a home that they recently discovered was the site of a multiple murder.  But the weird sounds and eerie happenings are really being caused by the aforementioned youngest brother, who has crawled into a vent and is attempting to devour all of his Halloween candy.  Bryan Cranston plays scared with aplomb but their scenes are intercut with really disgusting shots of the youngest brother stuffing his face with candy.  It’s torture for the eyeballs to watch saliva and melted chocolate dripping from the mouth of a toddler, replete with disgusting stomach-rumbling sound effects.  And we get more than one scene of this.  Bleh.

Would you accept candy from this man-child?

The strongest scenes revolve around mom Lois and her frustrations with her partying co-workers at the drug store as they drink, make lewd announcements on the PA system and rifle through the customer’s photos.  It made me wish that this show was entirely set in a drug store and was about its wacky employees throwing a Halloween party.  I could so do without the jerky brothers, the creepy old man and the gross candy guzzling.

Recurring Themes: We’ve got the all-time favorite, a Haunting with a Logical Explanation.  Reese and Dewey engage in an Egging Gone Wrong.

Halloween Quotient: It’s pretty holiday-centric but I have a hard time getting over some of the ick factor, so it leverages out to a 3.

See It, Skip It, Own It?

You can skip this one with a clear conscience.  Time is precious and we’ve got bigger and better episodes to watch!

THE NIGHT HE CAME HOME

Martin

Season 1 (1992)

It’s not easy sharing your name with the name of a sitcom.  There must be some sort of support group for us, the Maudes and Ellens and Martins of the world.  I was haunted by the theme song of this show for years.  My high school crush would sing it every time I entered a classroom (but I didn’t mind it so much when he did it—at least he was talking to me!).  But despite having its theme song thrust upon me I’ve always enjoyed Martin, a goofy 90s sitcom with some truly excellent holiday episodes.

Martin loves scaring his girlfriend Gina around Halloween but the tables are turned when, unbeknownst to him, Gina and his friends concoct a story about “Old Man Ackerman,” the cantankerous (and murdered) former tenant of his apartment.  When they gather at his apartment on Halloween they conduct a séance that quickly spirals out of control (thanks to their hidden friend who just happens to be a special effects wiz). 

Tommy is seemingly possessed and man, can this guy bulge his eyes and roll his tongue with the best of them!  Cole gets beat up by invisible “ghosts,” resulting in one of the episode’s funniest moments, in which Martin tries to fend off the invisible assailants.  Gina and Pam eventually disappear while cupboard doors slam open and shut, plates and a vase go flying and a skeleton dummy in the closet comes to life and attacks Martin.  All is revealed as an elaborate prank except when Martin and Gina are making out on the couch afterwards the REAL ghost of Old Man Ackerman shuffles by.

Perfection!  Everything about this episode is done right, from the heavy reliance on many tried-and-true Halloween sitcom tropes to the over the top antics of a terrified Martin Lawrence.  There are lots of black and orange candles and drugstore variety Halloween decorations.  And just in case you forget that this is a sitcom about African-American people in the 90s, Whoopi Goldberg, Rodney King and Chaka Khan are all referenced.

Here’s a bit of bonus Halloween trivia: Tisha Campbell and Tichina Arnold, the actresses who play Gina and Pam respectively, are both excellent singers and appeared together as two of the three chorus singers in the film musical Little Shop of Horrors.

There is one other Martin Halloween episode but just wait until Thanksgiving—that’s when things get REALLY good!

Recurring Themes: We’ve got ourselves a trope bonanza in this episode: a Dark & Stormy Blackout, Prank War, Haunting with a Logical Explanation, Séance and a Real Ghost Shows Up at the End!

Halloween Quotient: Our first 5 of the season!

See It, Skip It, Own It?

Own it and enjoy it year after year!  It’s up on YouTube or available for cheap on DVD.