Joey Marsilio's Blog

Setting up my Halloween Village decorations has been a tradition of mine for as long as I can remember. Well, that's not entirely true...I vaguely remember getting Haunted House for the Atari 2600 in an Easter basket at some point, which definitely happened before the first time I set up a Halloween Village, but even that memory is pretty on-theme so whatever.

Anyway, I've written many posts and posted several videos about my Villages, as the setup is different every year, with significant variance in what pieces I display (I would need an entire room fully dedicated to the Village to display everything I actually own. Hmmm...there's an idea...). Consequently, one of my annual traditions that has formed alongside this is browsing each year's new releases from Dept. 56 and Lemax. This usually occurs sometime mid-spring. If nothing else, I can't be accused of lack of preparation.

Lemax and Dept. 56, for those not as deeply ensconced in the holiday village display lifestyle, are the two major companies that produce such decorations. Ever year, they hit us with a fresh wave of autumnal delights, from the cute and wholesome to the gruesome, macabre...and still somehow wholesome. I think the wholesomeness is sort of baked into these types of hobbies. And because those of us who pursue this very niche passion need time to plot these things out, the new figurines, houses, etc. are released many months ahead of time.

As I browsed this year's selections, I noticed something: Dept. 56 was not releasing any new Dia de los Muertos village decorations this year. This was surprising, as they've released several items with this theme over the past few years, which have served as the cornerstone for my displays of late. After pondering this for a bit (and also after being struck by the new Nightmare Before Christmas cat tower they were selling), I decided to take advantage of the development and get creative. It was time to give my display a serious rethink.

Very, very early on in the process

For one thing, I have been setting things up in the kitchen/dining area every year, as that is the place in the home with the most available continuous wall space. The drawback of this is that I have to go into the kitchen to actually see my village, and as a result it often sits desolate and alone, abandoned while we watch TV elsewhere. Less than ideal! So to change things up this year, I decided to try out a corner in the living room. This would necessitate an L-shaped layout rather than a straight line, but would allow for more natural viewing at night.

Next, regarding the theme: I excluded Dia de los Muertos entirely from this year's village. Sure, this meant leaving a number of my coolest pieces in the closet, but it felt like a good time to give some of my other components some shine. I had picked up a Jack's Pumpkin Carving Studio, a retired building from Dept. 56, for a reasonable price in the off-season due to an oil stain on the box (like I care; my skin is so oily I would just as likely have done the same to the box by handling it after wiping my brow). With that, the cat tower, and some other recent acquisitions as my centerpieces, I built outward, and soon organically arrived on the year's theme. Inspired by The Ramones (and Stephen King), I decided to highlight pets and a cemetery. And also a pumpkin patch. But that doesn't really fit in the title.

There are pets in the pumpkin patch nonetheless, so there 

One thing I quickly realized is that I would need to buy some new items to serve as light sources, because the Dia de los Muertos stuff exudes an abundance of glow, and in its absence I would need a helping hand in terms of ambient lighting. No sugar skull streetlamps this year, buddy! But again, this change presented opportunity, as it motivated me to peruse Lemax's offerings more thoroughly in search of options.

I have a confession to make: I generally prefer Dept. 56 to Lemax. Lemax is cheaper, but I feel it shows...the pieces are much easier to break or chip, the detailing on the paint jobs can be somewhat lacking at times, etc. They are very creative and diverse, but I don't have unlimited funds for these sorts of things, so I generally favor the more expensive but sturdier and more luxurious options offered by Dept. 56. Wait, did I just refer to Halloween decorations as "luxurious?" This October heat wave must have really fried my brain.

Lemax really showed it strengths to me this year, as I was less in search of big cornerstones for the display as I was smaller accents. Lemax has those in droves, and it was much easier to buy myriad small things from Lemax than Dept. 56 without having to sell my Accutane-tainted blood to cover the costs, especially with promo codes and whatnot. As such, I leaned pretty heavily on Lemax to spice up the ghoulish gumbo that is my Halloween Village.

Lotta Lemax in this photo, including that beautiful full moon!

My new additions acquired, I set about to the hard but rewarding work of actually setting this thing up. The main idea would be to showcase three distinct environs: cemetery, pet district (seen above), and pumpkin patch, with some bleed between them. Other than that, I just wanted to have fun and see where the design took me. If I do say so myself, I think it turned out pretty good!

The aerial view            

I really do love Jack's Pumpkin Carving Studio, and I get why it sells for so much these days. The thing just radiates Halloween cheer. You practically feel a chill wind on your neck when you look at it. The first time I opened the box and laid eyes upon it, I ended up waking up three days later after a severe apple cider bender. It's just that Halloween-y.

Still got a headache. Worth it.

This is not to take anything away from my other decorations. For example, check out those candy corn streetlights!

Don't believe the Amazon review that says they don't work

And this ghost cat on a tombstone is super cool. And luminous!

I refuse to say "super GHOUL" because I am not the Cryptkeeper

Speaking of cats, here's a glimpse of the some of the pets in here, including the black cat crossing.

For the safety-conscious among you

And also speaking of cats, my dear little kitty Amelia apparently recognized the theme and fully embraced it.

Can you spot her?

One of the fun things about the cemetery area is that it allowed me to use my oldest Halloween village decorations (from Oriental Trading Co., where it all began), which are positively ancient at this point, as sort of a meta-joke.

I still don't think I've ever changed the light bulbs in any of those

This makeshift coven appears to have a flagrant disregard for the posted signage.

The little witch dog wants to join too but the fence is in her way 😢

Is this a cemetery entrance or an exit? Either way, Amelia keeps knocking it over!

I think I need more bone fencing

I hope you've enjoyed this little peek at the 2024 version of my Halloween Village! If you'd like a video tour (with proper soundtrack, of course), please check this out as well:

 

And Happy Halloween to you and yours! Don't forget to take the time to enjoy this lovely and oh-so-brief season. Trust me, you can Christmas shop later.

 

I've written before about Carve-O-Lantern, the company (now known as Pumpkin Masters) that brought detailed, miniature-saw-based pumpkin carving to the masses. One thing I have not done, however, is carve their iconic jack-o'lantern design: the inimitable Mr. Lips. And when I say "iconic," I mean it! Mr. Lips was on the front cover of the very first Carve-O-Lantern pattern booklet back in the late 80's.

  Señor Labios would go on to be a featured element of these pumpkin carving kits for years to come, even as they metamorphosed into the Pumpkin Masters brand we know and love today.
As big of a fan as I am of these carving kits, I never actually endeavored to make my own Mr. Lips. I'm not sure why...perhaps he was overexposed? Or perhaps I was fearful of screwing up the relatively difficult, intricate pattern that made up Mr. Lips's illumined face, thus exposing myself as a carving poseur. Whatever the reason, I decided to shake off the jinx this year and finally carve a Mr. Lips of my very own. Don't be intimidated, it's only a pattern.
 Once made a copy of the pattern, I chopped up the page so that I could more easily wrap it around the pumpkin.

 It actually looks pretty horrific once pinned on.

The next step was the old school method of transferring the pattern onto the pumpkin by punching holes through it.

Not gonna lie, I was feeling pretty good about my progress.

 Once the pattern had manifested in pinhole form upon the pumpkin, the delicate operation began.

Bit by bit, Mr. Lips's face began to appear.

Until eventually, the procedure was completed. With trembling hands, I carried my creation into the darkened kitchen and inserted a light. After decades of delay, would my Mr. Lips cut the mustard?

Honestly...yeah, I think so!

And thus, I finally passed the Carve-O-Lantern rite of passage by bringing their most famous jack-o'-lantern into the world, albeit briefly. It is an honor to be able to present Mr. Lips to a generation of kids who weren't even born yet back when he dominated he pumpkin carving scene. Who knows...maybe some young'un will be inspired to create their own Mr. Lips! Presumably by hitting eBay to find some unused pumpkin carving kits from the 90s. They aren't as common as you might think!

On behalf of Mr. Lips, Mrs. Lips and the entire Lips family, Happy Halloween, everyone!

 

 

 Well, looking at my cute kitty calendar, it's about that time...

 

That's right, it's October again, which means it's time to bust out my Halloween Village for another season of miniature monster madness. I have of course written about it in previous years, but for this year I wanted to do something a little different. For last year's theme, I largely excluded the older elements of my village in favor of showcasing my newer pieces. This year, though, I decided to make it a point to go back to the very origins of my festive decor fixation and include the original buildings and characters that I got from Oriental Trading Company...three decades ago? That can't be right, can it? I'd better confirm with the kitty calendar.

Oh. Damn.

Well, since I started doing this what amounts to a generation ago, I suppose it's only appropriate that I chose to combine what you might consider the first generation of my village with the latest one. As such, I endeavored to break this year's village into three districts, each representing a certain theme. Let's start with the first district: the Past, the classic, the OG Scare Acres.

This district combines the slender, resin buildings and characters and from the first Oriental Trading Company village series with the bulkier lighted houses and more cartoony residents of OTC's second village offering.

This section of the display really captures the look and of what this used to look like in the 90s, the absence of random incongruous Jurassic Park action figures notwithstanding.

By the way, if anyone happens to have one of those ancient Oriental Trading Company catalogues, let me know. I'd love to have more info and images directly from the source about these sets, but it's hard to find these days.

I did splash a couple of newer figurines in here and there, but I think they fit in pretty smoothly.

Now we begin to shift into the second district, inspired by our cat Amelia (who was very interested in the process of my setting this village up).

That's right, it's the pet district! You see, that kitty calendar at the beginning was a sly tease. I'm dropping breadcrumbs here.

I'd like to note at this point that one disadvantage of having such a densely packed village is the extreme difficulty of taking the photos you envision without, like, a tree branch getting in the way or a skeleton toppling over. I suppose I could have deconstructed areas for photo purposes and then put everything back, but this thing already took an ungodly amount of time to set up as-is.

People were really trying to charge some outrageous prices online for this Meow Mansion, but fortunately I was able to eventually locate one for MSRP. I mean, it wouldn't have been much of a pet district with only one major pet-themed building.

 The crazy dead cat lady is right at home in the pet district.

The pet district is kind of like Adventureland in Disneyland: it's a small area, but it really holds everything together. The third district, if you recall my setup last year, should come as no surprise.

That's right, it's the District of the Day of the Dead!

The DotDotD is livelier than ever this year, including face painting and a Pan de los Muertos vendor. She knows a branding opportunity when she sees one!

Of course, the old favorites like the Halloween House and the church are back, rearranged but still dazzling.

It's a dead man's party! Who could ask for more?

One of the things is really like about this layout is, despite three distinct themes, there are areas of overlap that produce some fun visuals.

Bits and pieces spanning two centuries (heck, two millennia, technically) come together in Halloween harmony.

Overall, I'm very happy with how everything turned out this year. The old school decorations proved that, even among fancy expensive newfangled elements, they still have much spooky charm to offer. Who knows what ghoulish delights next year's display may bring? But for now, let us sip upon finest spiced cider and luxuriate in this boo-tiful scream-ery. To wit, a video:

Thank you for joining me for another glimpse at one of my dumb, nerdy little hobbies. It's important to embrace and celebrate the things that bring you joy, even if they are just ceramic witches or whatever. Happy Halloween!

Joey Marsilio may not have created Supervillage 2022 this year, but he has (still) also written a variety of articles related to Halloween, including some about scary stories and pumpkin carving.

I was eating pistachio gelato when I felt a vibration in my pocket. I was in no great hurry to see what this vibration was alerting me to; after all, it was likely just a notification that Rakuten was giving 2x cash back on Nike purchases, or Robinhood telling me that the Dogecoin I impulse invested in last year has become even more worthless. Compared to the frosty treat I was consuming, such things had little urgency.

Still, just in case it might be an emergency, I lazily withdrew my phone. Oh, a text message from my friend Matt! Undoubtedly this would be something amusing, a hilarious surprise just as delightful as my dwindling gelato. As my wife and I pondered aloud where to spend the next portion of our Saturday afternoon, I skimmed the text. Then, suddenly silent, I slowly read it once more. I lowered the phone into my lap, blinking. My mouth was suddenly dry, and I turned to my wife, forgetting to take a breath before I spoke. The words came out nonetheless.

"Garrett's dead."

***

I first met Garrett in Advanced Drama class at Monta Vista High School, during my senior year. I always enjoyed drama class, not because I was an especially good actor (I'm not), nor due to any particular passion for theater. No, I derived enjoyment from the fact that drama class allowed me to do what I fancied myself best at: entertain. It gave me a forum to perform for people, to make them laugh, to shock them-often to the dismay of my teachers. Amid the drudgery of a typical school day, drama class allowed me a few minutes to seize the spotlight and shine in my own weird way. My choices may have been somewhat unorthodox, but I carried myself with confidence. I felt like a star.

So imagine, during that first week of class, when I bore witness to a stranger suddenly occupying my niche. He was a year younger than me, with much nicer attire (I never even owned a puca shell necklace) and a certain joie de vivre about him. What's more, he was funny. Like, threateningly so. He did what I did best, just as well as I did, if not better.

I didn't like him.

Who was this guy, anyway? His presence felt like a usurpation. I was used to people looking better than me, being more likable, being more popular with the ladies. But I was not used to someone being more charismatic than me. And so, when he performed, I laughed along with everyone else, but I didn't feel good about it.

It was under these circumstances that, a few weeks into the school year, Garrett unexpectedly approached me. We were doing some activity or another, and needed to find a partner.

"You're pretty funny," Garret said. "We should work together."

That's not an exact quote. Regardless, my point of view immediately changed. Perhaps, rather than an adversary, this guy could be a collaborator!

With this, our partnership began, and never really ended.

We worked together in class as much as possible, and began hanging out outside of school. We discovered that we had a mutual fondness for eating crap, which was facilitated by the fact that a Jack in the Box was just a quick stroll from his home. It was there, in a booth by the window, that we would order a cornucopia of value priced items and kvetch about our lives. We'd discuss television, music, movies, but mostly we'd complain about girls. Between mouthfuls of two-for-one-dollar tacos that were somehow simultaneously crispy and translucently soggy, we laughed, we sulked, we bonded. 

As the end of the school year approached, our class was tasked with writing short plays. The finest of these would be performed in front of the audience as a sort of denouement to Advanced Drama. Garrett and I each attempted to write plays that would go the distance, but we each fell victim to our individual Achilles heels. My play was disqualified for being overly disturbing, and Garrett's...well, he never finished his. Instead, we ended up performing a script written by the esteemed Matt Blank, in which we played delusional suburbanites just trying to survive on the so-called "mean streets."

The production was enormously enjoyable, and the process of bringing it all together was absolutely the most fun I ever had working on a stage production. I recall one day in particular in which, at Garrett's urging, a group of us from the class sat in his car, barely able to pack ourselves in, as he blasted "P Control" by Prince over the speakers. We roared with laughter at the lewd lyrics and funky beats. The girl I had a crush on was laying across my lap as we all squirmed to find space in the cramped vehicle. For that moment, all seemed right with the world.

When it came time for the live performance, Garrett and I killed it. We challenged each other to reach ever greater heights (despite our aversion to anything more than the bare minimum of rehearsal), and the end result was nothing short of a true crowd-pleaser, a fitting finale to my high school experience.

Over the summer, Garrett and I hung out nearly every day. His home was a welcome refuge from my own, and we would sit on his bed endlessly watching TIVO'd sitcom reruns, DVDs rented from the video store up the street, and on one occasion, after a mad search spanning nearly every public library in the county, Shelley Duvall's Rock N Rhymeland on VHS. When not mesmerized by the television, we occupied ourselves by cruising down Bascom Avenue in Campbell, where we haunted Rasputin Music and Streetlight Records, perused the magazines at Barnes & Noble, and gorged ourselves for a fair price at Wienerschnitzel and Taco Bravo (Garrett was notorious for the absurd amount of sauce he always added to his Super Tacos). I am not exaggerating when I tell you that some permutation of this was practically a daily ritual for us. Consequentially, we ended up with a preponderance of CDs.

Speaking of which, the soundtrack of our lives at the time heavily featured a couple classic rock albums of the era, A Perfect Circle's Mer De Noms and White Pony by the Deftones. The latter album had been available in as a limited edition release with a special bonus track; half of them were in black cases, the other half red. Garrett purchased the red version, and I the black. As I recall, he let a girl he had worked with at Marie Callendar's borrow his copy, and she shortly thereafter vanished. Garrett was always bitterly annoyed by the loss of that album, which was at the time essentially impossible to replace, and he would randomly bring it up in conversation for years to come.

As summer wound down, Garrett returned to Monta Vista for his senior year, and I began my term at nearby De Anza College. Despite our scholarly separation, our greatest adventure was about to begin.

 ***

I've already expounded at length upon the phenomenon that was Steel & Marsilio. Rather than do it a disservice by attempting to summarize it here, I humbly request that review my exhaustive retrospective of the series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4.

Having said that, with the benefit of further hindsight, it's hard not to look back on that period with a certain melancholy. Garrett and I truly loved creating that show, and I believe that if we could have profitably done so, it would have likely continued to be our life's work. Alas, we were just a few years too soon for YouTube, and by the time that became a viable platform, we found ourselves in a vastly different situation that made video production substantially more difficult. In later years, we often mused about what might have been if the timing of things had worked out a bit better.

 EXCLUSIVE: A never-before-seen excerpt from an unproduced Steel & Marsilio script.

But there's little use of dwelling on what-ifs. It's best, I suppose, to cherish the memories of what was rather than speculate on alternate realities. Better a bittersweet remembrance than none at all.

 ***

So many Garrett stories. So many encounters, incidents, excursions. To wit, a mere sampling of Garrett Steel's extraordinary life and times:

-Garrett's overwhelming love for electronic music, which led us to a number of extraordinary shows, including a performance by BT with a live band in San Francisco that remains one of my favorite concerts that I've been to, and the overwhelming Together As One rave at the LA Coliseum on New Year's Eve 2001, which I somehow survived while remaining completely sober. We even went to a few shows in Sacramento on weeknights, leading me to get roughly two hours of sleep before rolling out of bed and going to my morning classes. Garrett, ever sensible, rarely had a class before noon.

-Garrett delivering a rousing speech at a city council meeting in defense of funding public access television, using inspirational quotes he plagiarized from a pro-anorexia website.

-The Roast of Garrett Steel, in which all of Garrett's friends joined together for a tremendous comedy bonanza celebrating his birthday. It was recorded, but the tape seems to be lost media at this point. This is admittedly for the best, all things considered.

-Taking Garrett to karaoke in mid-June, where he sang Elton John's "Step Into Christmas," to the bafflement of the crowd. Later, the two of us somehow did a duet version of "Batdance." 

-Garrett's affection for the dearly departed Fresh Choice buffet restaurant chain, and his eternal bafflement that for a brief period, the Westgate branch displayed the slogan "Where nothing is taboo" in their window. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" he would ask.

-The time Garrett asked me to return to the Monta Vista drama department for an afternoon to assist him in performing a skit. The concept: we were the only two remaining members of the Kris Kross fan club. Fortunately, the fashion at the time was optimal in terms of pants that were big enough to comfortably wear backwards.

-The incident with the man in the tiger SUV.

-Our trip to Vegas with a group of our friends, during which the two of us splintered off due to our refusal to sleep on the floor of someone else's hotel room. We decided to attend a performance of Bite: The Erotic Vampire Musical, during which a performer, while spinning on a curtain, accidentally kicked Garrett in the head, sending him sprawling out of his seat.

 ***

It's too bad Garrett and I never got a shot at making Brokerage. Of course, the very idea of a major network choosing to give our sitcom pitch a chance was such a long shot that it was ridiculous to even entertain the notion. And it's entirely possible, even probable, that had we somehow beaten the odds and developed a pilot, it wouldn't have gone anywhere. But it certainly would have been an experience.

Do you know that Garrett had a different idea for our pitch? He initially wanted to do a show named Chappie (no relation to the robot movie of the same name). The concept was that it was about an alcoholic chaplain who...well, that was about all we had. But Garrett was very fond of the name.

In terms of projects that actually happened, I'd like to take a moment to address Steel & Marsilio: The Drinking Game. The only true S&M project fully developed in the YouTube age, Garrett and I were profoundly proud of this one, and though it's not perfect, in many ways it remains our crowning achievement. If you haven't seen it, here it is:

This idea was Garrett's baby, and though our goal was first and foremost to make people laugh, he insisted on the undercurrent of sadness that runs throughout. It was important to him that the video, despite seeming to be a goofy lark, dealt with the challenges of alcoholism, and particularly that it had a somewhat bleak ending. Anything else, he maintained, would be dishonest.

My father, an alcoholic himself, watched The Drinking Game. He never much liked anything that I was involved in creating, and seldom had a kind word to say about any of it. When he watched this video, it brought him to tears.

He's dead now.

***

Garrett's move to Colorado had long been something he was looking forward to. He had been suffering from health problems for some time, and perhaps the mountain air would do him some good. Besides, he didn't care for the Bay Area, feeling culturally out of place, and doubted he would ever find much reason to return. And indeed, he did not; once his family moved out there, he never again graced the Golden State.

Before he left, though, we were able to go to one final BT concert, a bookend to BT's San Francisco performance we had so thoroughly enjoyed years before. We hung out at my apartment for hours before the show, playing a Ghostbusters board game while listening to the soundtracks for the two films. Regardless of the passage of time, it felt like we were back in our high school days, exchanging pop culture references at lightning speed and excited at the prospect of the evening to come.

 ***

Obviously, we never made Steel & Marsilio: The Movie, though we did talk about it from time to time. We even wrote a script for a prospective sitcom pilot based around the S&M premise, a small indication of the direction we may have gone had one of us somehow fallen backwards into an absurd amount of disposable income. 

The movie, of course, would have been much grander than any pilot, inasmuch as the term "grand" could apply to a couple of jerkoffs just having fun. There was one element, though, that I always envisioned would be a part of the final film, should it ever materialize.

The opening credits would be Garrett and I, driving down the streets of Cupertino, CA, with interior shots of us in the car interspersed with footage of what one could charitably call the "landmarks" of our city, such as the "Welcome to Cupertino" sign, the Taco Bell, and of course the now-demolished Vallco mall. The song that would play during all this, I was absolutely certain, was, "Never Let Me Down Again" by Depeche Mode.

I'm taking a ride with my best friend, it would say, as slow motion shots of Garrett adjusting his Oakley sunglasses and me pursing my lips in the passenger seat filled the screen.

I hope he never lets me down again.

It would have been a splendid introduction to what was sure to be a unique tale of our own particular brand of adversarial camaraderie. Even if we ever filmed it, though, I knew I'd have to fight to preserve my vision. Garrett, after all, hated Depeche Mode.

***

Back around the dawn of the new millennium, during one of our Jack in the Box kvetching sessions, I bemoaned to Garrett my overwhelming fear of death. Pondering my own inevitable non-existence, I said, was keeping me up at night.

“I’m not afraid of dying,” Garrett responded nonchalantly. “It’s basically just sleeping forever. I love sleeping, so I don’t really see the problem.” And with that, he went back to putting way too much hot sauce on his taco.

To my friend, my rival, my partner, Garrett Steel: enjoy your sleep, brother.

I've written in the past about my Halloween village display, an October decorative tradition stretching back so long that I vividly remember listening to Candlebox while setting it up at one point. In recent years, however, I've been facing a bit of a dilemma. Having expanded far beyond its humble Oriental Trading Co. origins, the current scope of the village in terms of sheer volume of options is quite vast, and as a result, I've had to make some difficult decisions. At first, I considered doing a significant expansion of the display, either in the form of one super-huge village or two entirely separate displays. In the end, space and time concerns (plus an injured back) led me to another approach: a single, highly focused village with a cohesive theme. Although this sadly led to the exclusion of many of the older pieces the very concept if this village was based around, I think I was able to put together one of my best displays yet! I'll let you be the judge.

First, here's the whole thing in broad daylight, from above, as though photographed by an albatross that just happens to be passing by:

Of course, the real action goes down at night. Here we get an introduction to the concept behind this year's village via sign-based exposition.

That's right, we're going with a Dia de los Muertos theme this year! Most of these pieces are from Dept. 56, who debuted this line a couple years ago and has regularly added to it ever since. They have formed the core of the layout here, though I've added other bits and pieces throughout, including some stuff from the very first village I ever did.

These wooden pumpkins, for example, are vintage OTC material, though they fit in pretty seamlessly here. On the other end of the spectrum, we have dia de los doggos here, newly released this year but already making herself at home.

This pumpkin stand isn't exactly on-theme, but I like it and it's my display, so whatever.

Meanwhile, the Lady of Guadalupe figurine is super on-theme. Color abounds in this photo, as well as more dogs in costumes. What more could you want?

Here, a mother and daughter remember a deceased loved one in front of a crypt as glowing skull lights grin around them. Can you see why I would focus on this aesthetic?

Meanwhile, here's a full shot of the church next door to the crypt, as a happy couple of skeletal newlyweds celebrate the prospect of unliving the rest of the unlives together.

Creepy lurking scarecrows stalk the sidelines of the village, eager to pounce on anyone mandating vaccines on their farm.

Here you see an illuminated tomb in the foreground, with dancing ladies behind and, in the way back, a jack-o'-lantern water tower. Even the dead need to hydrate.

This band of skeleton mariachis is either playing "Dead Man's Party" or something from Ixnay on the Hombre.

Now, for those of you more cinematically inclined, I've created a short video tour of the village to the tune of "Halloween" by Wade Denning. I shot it in the dark with an iPhone 8, so that's why it looks like the Zapruder film.

Overall, I'm very pleased with this year's village, and I appreciate you taking the time to check it out. Having said that, I still very much like the idea of an expanded display that really shows off the depth of my collection and the history of the decorations, so perhaps next year the stars will align in just such a way to allow Supervillage 2022 to happen. Stay tuned!

Joey Marsilio doesn't spend all his time laying out miniature macabre hamlets; he has also written a variety of articles related to Halloween, including some about scary stories and pumpkin carving. He also wrote the novel Henry Garrison, which you can preview here.

As each evening creeps slightly deeper into the afternoon and bratwurst is back on the menu at Wienerschnitzel, I find autumn on my mind, and in honor of the encroaching Halloween season, I feel the need to give a bit of praise to one of the preeminent old school horror story anthologies. And for once, I’m not referring to Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. No, despite Scary Stories being the king of the hell hill in this particular genre, there was another notable series concurrently haunting the pages of the Scholastic Book Club flyer alongside it. In fact, the first volume of this series even predates the original Scary Stories by several years!    

I’m speaking, of course of Tales for the Midnight Hour, J.B. Stamper’s seminal quadrilogy of terror that caused many a juvenile some sleepless nights with its harrowing depictions of murder, monsters and madness. I used to think of Stamper as a bit of an enigma, an author who dropped their magnum opus, followed it up with a lesser-known work (in this case, Night Frights), and disappeared, sort of like a mass-market paperback horror anthology J.D. Salinger (J.B. Salinger?). However, I was quite mistaken. Stamper has in fact produced quite the extensive body of work in the decades following Tales for the Midnight Hour; she just seemingly tired of writing about supernatural murders, if such a thing is possible. Instead, she wrote a bunch of The Magic School Bus books. And the novelization for the NES game Bionic Commando! God bless the internet for bestowing upon me this knowledge.

But back to the lecture at hand. Though not quite the abattoir the later Scary Stories for Sleepovers series would be, the Tales for the Midnight Hour books were largely a bit more brutal and hopeless than Alvin Schwartz’s famous yarns, with the protagonists often ending up dead, or at least deeply inconvenienced. No protagonist exemplifies this sense of hopelessness more than Ty. Not to be confused with the company behind the Beanie Babies line of collectible animal dolls, Ty is the only recurring character between the Tales for the Midnight Hour books, though said recurrence poses a bit of a mystery. Because, you see, Ty seems to die. A lot.

Ty is, in a word, a wuss. He is a whiny, bespectacled wimp who tends to find himself in the peculiar situation of encountering malicious cryptids with stunning regularity, and he never handles it very well. Not that he should be expected to, mind you. The end result of these encounters, as one might expect, is his implied death at the claws of whatever beastie he's bumped into. He’s basically a cross between Kenny and Butters from South Park.

The impetus for Ty's grisly fate is always some sort of wilderness excursion with a group of boys, who basically reenact the Ernest Borgnine storyline from the Junior Campers episode of The Simpsons. But none of this explains how Ty seems to perpetually survive certain death, nor why, if he does indeed survive, he would ever put himself in a similar situation not just once again, but thrice again. Let's take a quick look at Ty's various adventures and see just how likely it is that this one kid could somehow live through all this horror.

The book: Tales for the Midnight Hour

The cast: Ty, Ron, Pete, Phil, Eric, Jake

The situation: A group of boys go on a spooky canoe trip with Jake, the shady guide who has no interest in staying on the beaten path. One thing that becomes clear almost immediately is that this squad is like an embodiment of The Seven Deadly Sins: Toxic Masculinity Edition. They're all either sneering bullies or cowards who are more than happy to let their friends be abused if it keeps the target off their back. As the victim of the most vicious abuse, Ty is, by elimination, the most sympathetic figure.

The story finds this cadre of less-than-gentlemen venturing into wilderness occupied by the titular gooney birds, which are apparently a real thing; however, the birds in this story seem less like albatross and more like the boss from the first level of Super Ghouls 'N Ghosts. In any case, Jake quickly reveals himself to be a poor choice of guide; his casual cruelty and smug antagonism of the younger boys is bad enough, but he also clearly has no interest in safety or even basic logic. So when the boys encounter a nest of gargantuan bird eggs reminiscent of the days of the dinosaurs, of course Jake encourages the most irresponsible behavior possible. Ty, sensibly, thinks that upsetting whatever might have laid those eggs is probably a bad idea, and urges the group to leave. Instead, one of the older boys, Eric, decides to smash them, seemingly to impress a smirking Jake.

Predictably, Mama Bird is less than pleased about this, and when the boys set out on their canoes to the next location, she dive-bombs them, focusing oddly enough on Ty, proving that no good deed goes unpunished. She misses, and ends up just circling the boys as they continue their journey.

Upon making landfall, the boys find an empty campsite that was apparently hastily abandoned, with the obvious implication being that the previous campers were killed by the angry birds. This begs the question of whether the other campers also destroyed gooney bird eggs, or if the gooney birds just enjoy killing and the whole egg-smashing thing was irrelevant. Either way, Jake has the brilliant idea to, in defiance of the will of literally everyone else, camp in this same spooky spot, even going to far as to use the same fire pit as the vanished campers. Jake is a bad guide.

The gooney birds attack, of course. Ty catches a beak around the neck and is carried away, thrashing desperately. The other campers follow suit. GREAT JOB, JAKE.

Certainty of Ty's death: 92%

I guess, maybe, possibly, the bird could have carried him away to another location alive, where Ty eventually made his escape. Don't know how likely it is that his neck wasn't broken or that he didn't get beak-strangled, but there is at least some room for speculation.

The book: More Tales for the Midnight Hour

The cast: Ty, Paul, Nick, Brad, Ron, Mr. Robinson (a.k.a. "Robbie")

The situation: A group of boys go camping at Wolf Ridge State Park, under Mr. Robinson's watchful eye. Robbie immediately proves himself to be better than Jake by not going out of his way to try to get everyone killed. He does, however, make the unfortunate decision to go into a ramshackle, apparently deserted ranger station looking for a guide. We never see him again, but soon thereafter Harris, the suspiciously hairy ranger, shows up with a totally legit explanation for Robbie's absence.

Wait...he's named "Harris" because it sounds like "hairy," isn't he? Harris. Hairy. You know, sometimes I think about the fact that one day I'll be dead and gone, and the things that I've written about will be all that's left of me. And here I am, writing about a story where the suspiciously hairy man is named Harris. 

Anyway, the campers realize that Harris's lame excuse is suspect, but in order to avoid upsetting the squeamish Ty, they all decide to roll the dice by accompanying this bearded stranger into the wilderness. Jeez, I know I referenced the Junior Campers episode of The Simpsons already, but seriously, an alternate title for any of these stories could be "Don't Do What Donnie Don't Does."

But hey, the boys note, "at least there's a full moon." ARRRRGGGGHHHHHH

After reaching their intended campsite, Harris leads the boys away one by one to, ahem, help him look for Robbie. You couldn't possibly give off bigger stranger danger vibes than Mr. Hairy does here. The rapidly dwindling group of campers begins to hear strange noises, their panic growing with each subsequent departure, until eventually Ty is left all alone and yeah yeah Harris is a werewolf.

Certainty of Ty's death: 98%

Ty is alone in the wild, facing off against a vicious werewolf. Literally the only argument you can make for his survival is that we don't actually see his death, so maybe Robbie showed up, injured but alive, with a silver bullet or some sh*t.

 
The book: Still More Tales for the Midnight Hour

The cast: Ty, Jimmy, Paul, Brad (the four young boys), and eight older boys (Mark, the barely-mentioned-and-definitely-not-Mr.-Robinson Robbie, and six other nameless meat sacks)

The situation: First of all, was it really necessary to have a whopping cast of TWELVE for this story that mostly focuses on Ty? There are so many boys here that J.B. Stamper starts recycling names. It's debatable whether or not Paul and Brad are the same characters from the previous story-personally, I don't think they are, but there's not much evidence either way-but Robbie is absolutely not the same Robbie from the previous story, being much younger and in no real position of authority. Ultimately, it really doesn't matter, as this story focuses specifically on Ty to a greater degree than the previous two tales.

It's Initiation Night for the Camping Club, and you know what that means: a good ol' fashioned snipe hunt! On the agenda tonight will be roasted marshmallows, spooky sounds from the shadows and, for dinner, a delicious red herring about a murderous prison escapee. Followed by the main event of the titular hunt. The juvenile camper pledges get sent into the woods alone, with the instructions to turn off their flashlights after a certain distance and try and capture a snipe in a burlap sack.

Snipes, of course, do not exist, but Ty somehow manages to capture a baby snipe anyway. Such dedication.

Alas, the adult snipes are less than amused by this young man pilfering their offspring, and as the baby's cries echo through the forest, the grownups surround the group of boys with vengeful eyes. It would not be unreasonable to assume that various maulings are to follow.

Certainty of Ty's death: 80%

This is probably the situation in which you could make the best argument for Ty's survival. The snipes seem ominous, but we never actually see them attack anyone. Maybe the campers manage to call them off by giving the baby back and apologizing profusely? Maybe Ty escapes in the chaos? Either way, he's probably dead, but if given the choice, I'd take my chances with the snipes versus, say, being alone with a werewolf in the middle of nowhere.

 
The book: Even More Tales for the Midnight Hour

The cast: Ty, Phil, Eric, Mark, Brad, Alex, Mr. Conklin, Mr. Anderson

The situation: This time, a majority of the names are repeats, but are the actual characters? Ty, as usual, is Ty, but what of the others? There was an Eric and a Phil in "The Gooney Birds," and we've seen a Mark and multiple Brads in the stories since, but are they supposed to be the same people? There's so little info that it's inconclusive; the best evidence we have for non-Ty recurring characters is that the Eric in this story is, much like his "Gooney Birds" counterpart, a dick. But honestly, most of these guys could be described similarly, and due to the fact that no name is consistently represented across every story except for Ty, I'm going to conclude that the others are just different people with the same names. The odds of two different guys being named Brad have to be higher than the odds of two different guys being names TY, right? How many Tys do you know? Besides, Ty is our special boy today, and I will not have any of these douchebros take his shine. 

Also, I'm starting to think this is a Tales from the Hood situation where Ty is actually the devil, leading young adventurers to their doom by posing as one of them.

Oh yeah, the plot. This time, a group of campers faces their ultimate challenge: each boy is to spend the night alone on a different island in a lake apparently rife with them. Seems like a liability nightmare, but what do I know. On top of that, there's a rumor going around that a, and I'm quoting here, shapeshifter lives on one of the islands. If rumor is to be believed, even the two adults overseeing this excursion, Misters Conklin and Anderson, have been murmuring about this amongst themselves. If this is true, one must wonder: why are they taking this risk with children's lives? Are there no other camping spots in the area not infested with supernatural beasts? And I thought Jake was a sh*tty leader.

The group heads out, depositing each boy on a different island while Ty melts down internally. Finally, two boys remain: Ty and Eric. The scout leader rows up to Ty's assigned island, but in a staggering display of managerial impotence, Eric ganks Ty's island and wades aground despite Mr. Conklin's pleas. Mr. Conklins clearly insinuates that there is something about the following island that Ty (again, the youngest scout) cannot handle. But Eric ignores him and claims the island anyway, leaving a sputtering, apologetic Conklin to ferry Ty in a Charon-esque manner to his final destination. You know, man, you could just turn back, right?

But no, out of some misguided allegiance to scouting principles or whatever, Mr. Conklin drops Ty off on the final island, a sinister, hulking piece of land. Conklin repeatedly emphasizes that Ty should find a place to camp from which any emergency flares he might need to send out will be clearly visible. This is really starting to sound like a purposeful dereliction of duty.

Ty nervously sets up camp in a conveniently cleared-out area. The only problem is, he keeps finding picked bones in the grass. But I'm sure that's a totally normal thing, and even when considering the cries of a dying animal Ty hears from the woods, is absolutely no cause for concern. In any case, Ty isn't alone for long, as he is soon joined by Roger the scout, who emerges from the trees like a bemeritbadged dryad and sits with Ty around the fire. Roger is clearly completely normal, pulling a skinned rabbit out of his pack and eating it in front of Ty. I mean, being a picky eater is certainly a liability in the wilderness. And besides, any worries Ty might have can be assuaged by the clear, bright light of the full moon suspended in the sky.

OK, hold on. Something really isn't adding up here. We have evidence that the scout leaders knew about this shapeshifter business, but proceeded with this little adventure anyway. Now we have the fact that it's a full moon outside, which means that this trip was planned to coincide with the exact portion of the lunar cycle that is catnip to lycanthropes. At some point, some serious questions have to be asked, as coincidence is eclipsed by conspiracy. Basically, this island-hopping excursion can only reasonably be one of two things: omega level negligence or a plot to murder Eric. From what Eric shows us with his behavior in this story, the desire to feed him to a monster is only natural, but when Eric's own chaotic obstinance foils the plot, why would Mr. Conklin decide to sacrifice Ty instead rather than just call the whole thing off? Was Ty's death an acceptable price to pay to keep the assassination attempt under wraps? This whole thing gets more and more sinister the more I think about it.

Oh, and, uh, spoiler alert, I guess? Roger is a werewolf (already repeating monsters? Really?) who is, by his own admission, very hungry. He transforms to lupine form and attacks Ty. The next day, the scout leaders cannot locate Ty, but they do find freshly picked human bones at this campsite. One must really wonder what Ty's parents think of all this.

Certainty of Ty's death: 1200%

For once, we see a body, or at least the skeletal remains of one. Ty is absolutely, positively dead, and what appears to be a failed byzantine plan to murder an annoying teenager gets kind of covered up when a skittish, innocent preteen gets eaten alive instead. Great job, everyone! 

Unless...

The ending is just vague enough to allow for a different interpretation. Let's just say, for a moment, that Ty's ability to escape certain death is canon. In that case, what if, in this most dire hour, Ty resorted to truly extreme survival methods? What if he, under the extremest of duress, achieved his final form, DBZ-style? What if he unlocked an eldritch energy deep inside him, transforming with a roar into Ty, Deity of the Undead and kamehameha-ing Roger's ass into a skeleton before ascending to his rightful place in the realm of the immortals?

Eh, probably not. But you never know! These days, everything old is new again, and franchises and sequels dominate the entertainment landscape. Brand recognition is, for better or for worse, the name of the game. So, with that said, is Tales for the Midnight Hour ripe for a return? Would J.B. Stamper be game to put Ms. Frizzle aside and plunge one more time into the abyss for Tale5: Midnight Hour? Imagine the synergistic opportunities! We could see an HBO Max series, a breakfast cereal, a Magic: The Gathering Secret Lair featuring a planeswalker Ty, Master Snipe Hunter.

Perhaps I'm getting ahead of myself.

But then again, perhaps I was wrong before when I said that Ty exemplifies hopelessness. After all, what’s more hopeful than eternal rebirth? Even if said rebirth is also guaranteed to end swiftly and painfully in the jaws of some ravenous beast. So cheers to you, Ty, you unkillable bastard. You might not quite be fit for Valhalla, but you can at least...somehow...walk the earth eternally in the meantime, a figurative albatross around the neck of luckless young adventurers finding themselves in the darkest corners of the woods but lacking your resurrective zeal.

Long story short, if your child is in a Boy Scout troop with another kid named Ty, maybe consider withdrawing permission for any overnight camping trips.

Joey Marsilio is really quite happy that he managed to finally mold this draft he has had sitting around for five years into an article by tweaking the theme a bit. And if you're in the Halloween mood already and want to read a book he wrote that happens to take place during the Halloween season, he also wrote the novel Henry Garrison, which you can preview here.

      I started playing Magic: The Gathering back in the fall of 1994 (which was probably still a little too late, from a value perspective, but bear with me here). Unlike many people who got sucked in during the initial wave of mania surrounding the game, I never sold my collection. This ended up paying off for me, unlike, say, Beanie Babies collectors from the same era, who are still waiting for their time to shine. Actually, I'm sort of one of those too, having pillaged my mom's storage locker after she passed away for collectibles that might help mitigate the funeral costs, but let me tell you, the Princess Diana bear is still not worth anything despite pre-TNA Don West's promises of yore and internet urban legend. But anyway.

     Magic cards from back then are increasingly scarce, is my point. And though I don't have anything as brain-meltingly expensive as, say, the fabled Alpha Black Lotus, I just so happen to own something quite a bit more scarce. As in, something absolutely unique, a vintage piece of Magic history that resides with me and me alone. So I decided to make a quickie video to share it with the world.

     At least, that was the idea. As it turns out, even a pretty basic video becomes rather time-consuming when you throw in writing, voiceover, editing, etc. It was quite frankly a reminder why I don't do videos very often, and why the smart Youtubers are the ones who pay editors to put these things together for them. 

     Having said that, I'm pretty happy I did it. It didn't turn out exactly like I wanted it to...for example, there's a weird choppy warpedness to some of the card images that I was unable to figure out how to fix (if you know why that was happening and want to let me know in the comments, that would be awesome. I don't believe that I'll go back and fix it for this one, but it would be nice to know how to avoid it next time). It does, however, convey what I wanted it to: a bit of the history of the card game I've played and collected for what is now the majority of my life, plus a glimpse at the unique card in question. It's not like I'm going to come over to your house personally and show it to you, so this is about as good as it gets. Check it out if it sounds interesting to you, and let me know what you think. 

Joey Marsilio makes videos so infrequently that he always ends up forgetting anything he learns while putting one together by the time he starts on the next one. And speaking of tardy creative works, he's still plugging away at a sequel to his first novel, Henry Garrison, which you can preview here.

                When Disneyland announced its plans to reopen in a reduced capacity for California residents after a lengthy COVID closure, I couldn't help but think that said reopening might prove to be a truly unforgettable experience due to a confluence of circumstances unique to this place and time. For starters, the limited number of guests allowed at the park was sure to result in shorter wait times for the park's attractions, even taking into account that some of them (like the Matterhorn Bobsleds) would be out of commission. I was also very curious to see firsthand how the park would change its operations to accommodate current public safety restrictions. Of course, I was excited at the possibility of visiting the newest, Star Wars-themed land, which had not been open on my last visit, and of experiencing rides that I had either so far missed (the Cars racers ride in California Adventure comes to mind) or that had been changed/upgraded in the interim (like the Haunted Mansion). To be honest, though, my main motivation centered around Splash Mountain.

      Splash Mountain has long been my favorite ride at Disneyland. It was the ride that showed a young me that perhaps my grandmother was wrong about roller coasters and the like being too scary and best left avoided. It's a lively and joyful experience without being saccharine, and though the drop into the briar patch at the ride's climax is hardly the largest plummet in the world, it still produces a thrill, especially when you're too busy figuring out what to do with your hands in the souvenir photograph to be bothered with holding on to the rails. But Splash Mountain is currently in a unique place, as it is soon to be re-themed, ditching its current, shall we say, controversial South of the South aesthetic for an experience inspired by The Princess and the Frog. As such, this would not only be my last chance to ride the Splash Mountain of my youth, but also happened to coincide with a period in time where the ride photograph would reflect the pandemic (e.g. face masks; no one else riding in the same log with you outside of your party). So at the end of the day, my primarily goal was a simple one: get a Splash Mountain photo that would forever reflect a truly unique sliver of time. And when my wife revealed on my birthday that she had gotten us tickets to go to the park immediately post-Memorial Day weekend, I was ecstatic to know that this trophy would indeed be mine.

     I should probably comment at this point about the Splash Mountain re-theming. At first, I was a bit sad about it, due to my fondness for the ride. To be clear, though, I don't have any particular attachment to Song of the South; I've never seen it and don't particularly care to. Some things are products of their time best left in the past, and even when the ride opened in 1989, it was an odd choice of property to base a marquee attraction around. No, my sadness comes more from the fact that my initial experiences with the ride made me go back and read the original Uncle Remus tales from which the Splash Mountain characters originated. Though they're certainly more graphic than one might expect given the Disney pedigree (the violence level can be more Itchy and Scratchy than Silly Symphony), they're a fascinating and essential part of American folk history, and I appreciate that Splash Mountain provided an opportunity for children to discover these stories for themselves. However, with that said, I'm completely fine with Disney giving the ride a makeover. Honestly, having a ride based on a movie people cannot even watch if they wanted to makes absolutely no sense, and the ride itself has hardly changed in the thirty-plus years of its existence. Many of the animatronics used in it even predate that, having been repurposed from the 70s attraction America Sings. Given all that, Splash Mountain is probably past due for a change, and I have no doubt the new theme will be lovely.

 

No worries, gentlemen...there's always Kingdom Hearts

      It's not like the park itself hasn't gone through extensive changes since then, even in terms of the optimal way to experience it. In my youth, the formula was quite simple: get to the park at opening, hustle to the most popular rides first, knock them out as quickly as possible, then spend the remainder of the day meandering around, either jumping in whatever relatively short line you can find or just toughing it out in the excruciating lines for the big-name attractions. Either way, you were probably best served taking a break in mid-day, because you were going to want to stick around until closing, both for nighttime events and shorter lines after dark. The 2000s brought with them the Fastpass system, adding an interesting strategic element not unlike switching between credit cards to maximize rewards points. As long as you didn't mind frequent long walks all over the park, you could profoundly reduce your wait times for big rides. You still wanted to stay until closing if possible, of course, which often resulting in ending up at your hotel room around midnight, to squeeze in a shower and a few hours of sleep before repeating the process all over again. Let it never be said that the happiest place on Earth is not also more than a little grueling.

     The script has been flipped once again in Disneyland's current plague incarnation. The park opens at 9:00 AM and closes at 9:00 PM, which given the time of year means there isn't much night to speak of. It also means that I was able to sleep more than usual, an unequivocal plus. And Fastpasses are eliminated as well, their dispensers roped off and hooded and their wait time signs empty and blank. Given the truncated hours of operation and lack of the usual ride-averting strategies, one might expect to experience less attractions in a single day than is typical. However, the park's limited capacity more than makes up for this, with even the most popular rides maintaining wait times of 40-50 minutes even during peak hours. In fact, the ride with the consistently longest wait time was the Disneyland Railroad of all things, which hit an hour early on and stayed there for the majority of the day. People must really love that Grand Canyon diorama.

 Not what I'm used to seeing at Disneyland in June

      The exception to all this is the newest ride in Disneyland, Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. Mere willingness to stand in line for extended periods of time is not enough to get onboard this one. Oh, no. If one wishes to partake in the majesty of Rise of the Resistance, one has but two brief windows of opportunity each day. At 7:00 AM and noon, a virtual queue opens for the ride on the Disneyland app, and if one is punctual and fortunate, they can be added to a queuing group for the ride. Basically, it's a lot of refreshing the app and mashing buttons as quickly as possible; anyone familiar with buying limited-edition sneakers and the like online are familiar with the process. Fortunately, we were awake and aware enough at 7:00 to reserve our spot in Group 11. God only knows how swift of finger and blessed of wi-fi you'd need to be to get into Group 1. 

      Armed with a group number, we started off the day by heading to Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge, the newest land at Disneyland and one which, pre-pandemic, I thought I might have to wait years to see, given its popularity and the corresponding overwhelming crowds. However, at the beginning of the day (it was about 8:45 AM...the park wasn't supposed to open until 9:00, as I mentioned, but we entered shortly after 8:30 and people were already free to disperse as they please throughout), Galaxy's Edge was empty, an eerie alien ghost town of abandoned starfighter ships dotted with the tracks of unseen otherworldly beasts. It was, frankly, amazing, its aesthetic a new benchmark for the always lush and detailed Disney park design. Between its looks, emptiness and nestled isolation from the rest of the park, it truly felt like we had been transported to, well, a galaxy far, far away.

     Since we had a bit of time before Group 11 was called in, we wandered about Galaxy's Edge, marveling at the characters and structures, the elaborate rock formations and the way things had a brand-new yet still lived-in feel. We also realized we had enough time to try out the Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run ride, which like Rise of the Resistance I had purposefully avoided learning too much about before riding. I'm glad that I chose to avoid spoilers, as it were, because the ride was a very pleasant surprise (I'm also glad we chose the Pilot position when given the choice between Pilot, Gunner or Engineer). I'm going to avoid going too into detail about the particulars about any of these rides in case, like me, you want to be surprised by them when you visit the park, but it's not giving much away to say that it is very interactive and fun. It's actually kind of hard to imagine being a kid going to Disneyland for the first time and experiencing these rides and then comparing them to something like The Enchanted Tiki Room or what have you. There's certainly a sophistication gap that someone like me who grew up with the latter can find charming, but that kids these days may just find confounding.

     Speaking of ridiculously advanced entertainment technology...Rise of the Resistance. Wow. I was telling my wife afterwards that the last time I can recall being so impressed by new ride technology was probably when Indiana Jones Adventure opened back in the 90s. Again, I don't want to give too much away, but trust me on this: if you get the chance to ride it, do it. It's a shame you can only ride it (at most) once a day, but I understand the limitation. Otherwise, I can only imagine how many hours long the line would be.

Beyond this door lies greatness. Of the Star Wars variety.

     After Rise of the Resistance, it was time to hit Splash Mountain before the line got too long. I wanted to go on it twice (once during the day, once at night), and the mornings are ideal due to people being reluctant to be soaking wet and cold at the onset of their day. We basically walked right onto the ride, and Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dahed our way through our penultimate viewing of Br'er Rabbit's journey. And then had to figure out how the ride photo system is working these days.

     It took some QR code scanning, photo number entering and one day photo pass buying, but in the end, we landed the coveted Mid-Pandemic Original Recipe Splash Mountain Mask Photo.

       I'm not used to achieving my goals for the day by 10:00 AM, but there I was. So the next move seemed to be to head over to what was always the busiest part of the park back in the day: Tomorrowland. Surely yesterday's vision of tomorrow would entertain us! Besides, I was honestly curious how lonely, orphaned Star Tours would hold up now that there was an entire brand new land stepping on its toes. So we decided to hop on a planetary tour shuttle to compare the experiences. Again, there was very little wait; we stood six-ish feet apart from other guests in waiting outside for a few minutes, then mostly hustled through the interior queuing area. Then, off to...well, wherever we were going.

     I'll say this: if you haven't been on Star Tours since Pee-Wee Hermanbot was piloting you through an icy comet on the way to Endor, things have definitely changed since then. And even if you have been on it, you may well not have experienced all it has to offer. You see, years ago, the ride was drastically changed to offer a variety of experiences, so that you would have to ride several times to see everything. And I'm not talking Indiana Jones-level differences, where the ride is technically different but in the subtlest of ways. I'm talking completely different planets visited, each with their own adventure. I had seen a few of these, but the one we saw this time (including the Hoth battle from The Empire Strikes Back) was new to me, and I'm sure there are many routes I have yet to experience. The remarkable thing is how well this all stacks up to the new Star Wars rides. Sure, the physical ride technology is not all that different than that wooden roller coaster flight simulator machine they had at Tilt Arcade at Vallco Mall in Cupertino, California back in the day (too specific?), but the video through which your flight is simulated looks fantastic, and even geriatric motion simulators can still produce thrills with the right footage accompanying them. And this, friends, is the right footage. What I'm saying is, go on Star Tours. As weird as this is to say for someone who remembers when the ride first opened and had two-hour-long lines throughout the day, every day...this ride is underrated.

Disclaimer: Not a photo of Star Tours

      Everything had been running so smoothly at this point that there was bound to be a hiccup. Said hiccup came, of all places, at the churro stand in Tomorrowland. Now before I get into that, let me get into this. Dining at Disneyland in COVID times is a sparse, confusing experience. When the park is fully up and running, you can hardly walk twelve feet without stumbling upon a turkey leg/chimichanga cart, but in these lean times, most of the carts and restaurants are closed entirely. I'm talking closed to the extent that we had a hard time finding bottled water at one point. And when you're charging $4 and change for bottled water, it should at least be easy to find. But that's just the food and beverage carts. Normally, you're surrounded by a veritable plethora of restaurants at Disneyland, with the main limiting factor being what you specifically want to eat at any given point. If you want a lobster roll, you have to schlep over to the New Orleans Square/Critter Country border, but it'll be there. 

     During COVID times, you cannot be nearly so sure of anything. Many restaurants were simply closed, and the ones that were open operated by their own hellish protocol. A few of the more premium restaurant experiences (Blue Bayou, for example) were available by reservation only. By the time I realized that, of course, they were fully booked up. All the other open eateries operated by a mobile ordering system (some also allowed walk-up orders, but it was rarely immediately clear which; all others would turn you aside at the counter and ask you to order through your phone). 

Disclaimer: Not a photo of a restaurant

     By the way, DO NOT go to Disneyland without a smartphone and the Disneyland app. Seriously: if you're still operating off a flip phone or something for some reason, stay far, far away. You do everything through your phone at this point...in addition to ordering food, the app is the only way to ride either Star Wars: Ride of the Resistance or the Indiana Jones Adventure at all right now, the most efficient way to keep track of wait times and ride closures throughout the park, the way to purchase and save photos from rides...seriously, the app has become so deeply integrated into the Disneyland experience that I cannot really fathom a day at the park without it. If you're planning on visiting, do yourself a favor: download the app beforehand and familiarize yourself with how it works. You'll thank me later, if you're the thanking type.

     Anyway, the mobile ordering at restaurants works like this: you order food through the Disneyland app for your chosen eatery, and then choose a window of time within which you will be picking up your food and drink. Depending on the popularity and staffing situation of your chosen establishment, the soonest window of time may be substantially further away than you might expect. We were able to get some skewers at Bengal Barbecue ordered around 11:00 AM within twenty minutes or so, for example, while a few hours later, the demand for Dole pineapple whips at The Tropical Hideaway was so massive that the daily ordering window had already closed entirely. So if there's something you absolutely cannot leave the park without eating, plan accordingly.

     OK, back to the churro cart. Immediately post-Star Tours, we headed over to the only manned churro cart we could find in search of some fried, sugary doughnut stick goodness (and a bottle of water). Alas, we were confronted glumly by a staff member who bore grim tidings with the demeanor of a surgeon whose patient had died on the operating table: there were no churros. Not at that cart, nor at any cart. You see, she said through a pained grimace, there was a churro shortage going on, and until that issue was resolved, there was no doughy decadence to be had. We could get the bottle of water, though.

     We wandered off, dazed at the news, immediately replaced by another party destined to be disappointed by this unfortunate purveyor of nonexistent deserts. Oddly enough, we were able to get a churro at the California Churro Company cart in Downtown Disney without incident later that day, so I'm not sure how deep this scarcity conspiracy goes. It was salted caramel flavor, and quite tasty.

     Speaking of Tomorrowland...when we first entered the park, one couldn't help but notice how fresh everything looked. The lights of Main Street looked good as new, and Sleeping Beauty Castle had been repainted since my last visit, a visual that I captured in this action shot:

Shaky-cam

     This sense of revitalization continued as we entered Galaxy's Edge, which as I noted manages to balance a lived-in, grungy feel with a beautiful, crisp newness. Yet Tomorrowland, the ostensible home of the future, leaves quite the opposite impression. Due to what I can only imagine is a combination of deference to the newest sci-fi land and best use of limited resources during an extended shutdown, Tomorrowland looks kind of...dingy, to be frank. This is most clear when waiting in line for Space Mountain. You see start to notice dirty beige tiles that were once gleaming white, dents in metal siding, and saddest of all, the mini-tragedy of Alien Pizza Planet.

     Alien Pizza Planet, for those of you that don't know, is a restaurant in Tomorrowland themed after the pizzeria from Toy Story (where all those little green cultist aliens come from). It, by design, looks like something you would encounter in a 90s shopping mall, like, say, Vallco Mall in Cupertino, California (two specific?). It also apparently has been closed throughout the duration of the pandemic, and has yet to reopen. This fact, combined with the fact that it is more or less outside (under the canopy of the Space Mountain building, but otherwise open), has left the booths and tables coated with a layer of noticeable grime. This is completely understandable (why waste maintenance resources on a closed restaurant?), but is also a bit jarring. Disneyland is, after all, about escapism, with Tomorrowland about as escapist as it comes. But when you're about to board a spaceship for a breakneck ride into the cosmos, the ruins of the Pizza Hut that once gave you a personal pepperoni in exchange for a coupon your elementary school gave you for reading a Three Investigators book doesn't exactly scream "FUTURE!"

     On the other hand, Space Mountain still rules.

     To bring us back to the present from the land of tomorrow, one inescapable element of our trip was the de rigueur uniform for downtrodden Disney dads of all stripes: a black t-shirt with text in the distinctive Disney cursive that read "Most Expensive Day Ever," usually accompanied by a child and/or wife and/or girlfriend wearing a "Best Day Ever" shirt in the same font. I admit that I had to check to see if these shirts were official Disney merchandise, because I wouldn't put it past the 21st century's preeminent media juggernaut to take the idea that their fans are spending beyond their means for the privilege to attend one of their parks and commercialize it, further squeezing them for a few more dollars, but alas, it seems like an unofficial Etsy/Amazon thing. Frankly, I'm a bit disappointed. You're leaving money on the table, Mickey!

     The rest of the day progressed as you might expect. We were able to go on essentially every major ride with no exceptionally long waits, though I will note that New Orleans Square and Frontierland were a bizarre, confusing chimera of queues for the Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, complete with line monitors wandering around with signs to mark the new lines' ends and roped-off traffic crossings. Imagine the carnage if Fantasmic had also been going!

     One amusing thing I couldn't help but notice is that costumed characters had to stay away from guests, with various methods of varying effectiveness. Tiana posing on the balcony in New Orleans Square definitely worked. Minnie Mouse acting like she had been imprisoned in her Toontown home for the past year less so.

      Toontown was also home to the single biggest instance of theme-park-based gaslighting I've ever seen. 

     As night fell, we headed to Splash Mountain for what was likely our last ride on the original attraction before its repurposing. As it was getting a mite chilly out, the line was fairly short, absent those park guests that feared spending their last precious moments before closing shivering and soaked to the bone. As the haunting melody of "All I Want" played over the loudspeaker, Sheila and I settled into our little private log for one last tour through Br'er Rabbit's story. After the ride launched, we positively soared down the artificial waterways; had it always moved so quickly? Yet as we sped inevitably toward the Laughin' Place, I couldn't help but notice that certain parts of the ride had gone dark, certain bits of audio missing. Even Br'er Rabbit himself, upon closer examination, was a bit threadbare. The eponymous Song of the South had become faded and melancholy, an echo of an earlier era funneled to a last gasp delivered by mocking vultures jeering our demise in ignorance of our inevitable triumph on the other side of a fearsome drop.

     Finding ourselves with some extra time before closing, we ended the night with a second trip through Galaxy's Edge to experience Smugglers Run one more time. It remained a brilliant harbinger of a bright, interactive future. And on the way out, I needed to take a moment to truly bask in the grandeur of the newest area in Disneyland. It's especially beautiful at night.

Postscript:

We went to California Adventure on our second day. Without drawing things out too much, here are some bullet points from that experience:

-Though I absolutely miss the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror, Guardians of the Galaxy - Mission: Breakout! may have been the most purely fun ride we went on all weekend. Also, after a day and a half of nothing but Disney tunes and brass band jams, it was nice to hear some 10cc in the gift shop.

 And here I thought I was the only one who owned a golden Benicio Del Toro statue.

-The Cars Radiator Springs Racers, which we passed on during our last visit due to the length of the line, is also a lot of fun. But is it "four hours in line" fun? Or even "two hours in line" fun? Eh, I personally don't think so, though I do look forward to riding it again some day.

-Avengers Campus was a few days away from opening when we went, though the crowd size in the park was not noticeably affected by this.

-The mobile order/counter order disconnect was so potent at the Sonoma Terrace that the angry wine moms in line with me, already incensed at the indignity of having to order a cup of warm cheese sauce as the cheapest possible entree that unlocked the ability to buy an accompanying glass of chardonnay, were openly threatening revolt.

-A weird family stood in line behind us for The Incredicoaster and not only had zero regard for the social distancing rules, but reminded me what it feels like to have a stranger's breath on the back of my neck. America is back, baby!

-Biggest disappointment of the trip: I didn't get any lobster nachos (or anything, for that matter) from Lamplight Lounge due to the reservation system, but don't even get me started on that.

Joey Marsilio is also irked that he was a little too early to hang out and beg by the trash cans for the soggy Pym-ini sandwich remains that social media influencers would be throwing away mere days after his trip.

Back around early 2015, I became aware of a project that sounded absolutely incredible: a documentary about Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. Talk about a movie after my own heart! I was only too happy to donate to the film's Indiegogo, and eagerly awaited what was sure to be an enlightening look at my favorite series of books.

I was not disappointed. Scary Stories is an engaging profile of the infamous horror trilogy, and has something to offer for both longtime fans of the books and newbies to the series. Though it definitely seems more geared toward people already familiar with Alvin Schwartz's work, the film does an admirable job of explaining just what these books are and the sort of impact they've had over the years.

From the outset, it becomes clear that writer/producer/director Cody Meirick has done his homework, and the film's opening credits sequence features not only an acoustic version of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark's "The Hearse Song," but a backdrop of a pile of books that served both as influences to Schwartz's work, such as Maria Leach's The Thing at the Foot of the Bed, and horror literature for younger audiences from the same era, perhaps the most famous of which belong to R.L. Stine's Goosebumps series. It's a nice touch that contextualizes the Scary Stories books as not merely an island unto themselves, but part of a whole genre that has courted controversy while thrilling children for decades.

In this vein, Meirick explores the history of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, from its insane popularity in libraries across the country, to the resulting outcry from parents, teachers and other arbiters of morality regarding the "evil" content of these books, especially the nightmarish illustrations by Stephen Gammell. Delightfully, the film includes animated sequences by Shane Hunt that lovingly adopt Gammell's signature art style, paying homage to his work in such a way that even the cute little librarian lady seems like she has a dark, ghoulish secret behind her cheery grin. These sequences are an inspired choice, immersing the viewer within the aesthetic of the original books while effectively furthering the narrative.

The film does an excellent job of portraying the lasting impact the books have had on people. Artists and writers are interviewed and offer their perspectives on how Schwartz's books have inspired their own work. Some of Schwartz's contemporaries, such as Bruce Coville and the aforementioned R.L. Stine, pop in to offer their perspectives on the infamous series as well, and it's wonderful to hear how other horror writers of the 80s-90s view Schwartz's books. But perhaps the most interesting and unexpected story is that of Schwartz's son, who had a very complicated relationship with his departed father that he still seems to be grappling with to this day. His childhood stories, and the joy and melancholy therein, are the bittersweet heart of this tale, and watching him grapple with his dad's legacy among both fans and foes of his books is quite engaging. Thus, the audience is afforded a raw glimpse of not just Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark itself, but the life of the man behind it.

In terms of criticism, overall, I found very little to complain about. Meirick did a fantastic job putting this film together, and his affection for Scary Stories is apparent in every shot. The one thing I do wish we had seen more of was Stephen Gammell, the legendary illustrator of these twisted tales, whose artwork has inspired many a pants-soiling. The film does mention him, but also notes that he is quite private and reluctant to agree to interviews and whatnot. As such, it is understandable that we don't hear much about him (and kudos to Meirick for finding an ancient interview with him that provides us with at least a modicum of insight as to his thoughts on all this), but his relative absence here is nonetheless a bit disappointing. Other than that minor quibble, I struggle to think of any complaints I have with the documentary. It is a fascinating, well-rounded film with a clear vision, a fun, fitting score, and a quick pace. If you're a fan of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, do yourself a favor and give it a watch.

Finally, I'd like to note that, as an Indiegogo supporter of this film, I got some neat goodies, including a DVD copy of the film, and this sweet shirt, which I am normally afraid to wear because I know I'm going to immediately spill mustard on it:

And of course, being that I am only human, I had to search for myself in the end credits and point out my name when it showed up on screen like that Leonard DiCaprio meme. 

 Look, there I am!

 

Real talk: I have referred to myself as the internet's self-proclaimed greatest authority on Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. I have read the books cover to cover countless times, including all the notes on sources in the back. I own most of the author's other works, and many of the books of myth and folklore from which the scary stories in question are derived. And yet, I still learned some things from this documentary. As I've noted before, this is truly a golden age of Scary Stories fandom, what with a successful feature film, multiple tribute books, and even apparel! But given the date of its announcement, the Scary Stories documentary was at the forefront of this hype, and foreshadowed the renaissance for the franchise that was to come. For this, I am awed, and grateful that I got to be an infinitesimally small part of the production process through Indiegogo. I thank Mr. Meirick for bringing his labor of love to the screen, and for speaking for the rest of us Alvin Schwartz fans in recognition of the man's timeless work that has touched so many lives.

Joey Marsilio has written extensively about the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books, most notably in his Power Rankings Series (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3). He also wrote the novel Henry Garrison: St. Dante's Savior, and re-used the majority of this bio text from a previous blog in a marvelous display of efficiency.

 

Happy October! I have to say, I've had a rough few months, but now that we're officially knee-deep in autumn (albeit with some distinctly summery heat in the Bay Area), it's nice to be able to find some comfort in the spooky trappings of the season. And speaking of spooky: I recently had to clean out two storage lockers chock-full of stuff that had hardly been touched in years, and the thick layers of dust, perilously teetering mystery piles and abundance of spiders and harvestmen definitely brought to mind an old fashioned haunted house. Much like being murdered by a vengeful ghost in one of these houses of horror, this experience was absolutely dreadful. I mean, look at this photo...this is of just one of the storage lockers, after hours of work:

It's like a giant lasagna made of garbage. However, there was an amazing payoff for sifting through these giant junkheaps in the form of a heaping haul of Halloween treats! Yes, this is going to be a photo-heavy post.

Let's start off with what y'all came here to see: Beanie Babies!

I'm kidding, of course. I'm planning on selling those off. Well, except this one, which I have to keep for obvious reasons:

Up next, we have a veritable treasure trove of seasonally appropriate books for my childhood, such as the following:

These movie monsters books by Ian Thorne have got it all: orange and black and white color scheme, vintage thrills and chills, dubious film trivia (no, there weren't two different endings to King Kong vs. Godzilla filmed, for the American and Japanese audiences). These were an indispensable part of my childhood, and I read them from cover to cover countless times. Even today, they include wonderful photos and tidbits related to these horror/sci-fi classics. My only regret is that I don't own the others in the series. Alas, these days they are INSANELY expensive, unless you happen to get very lucky.

These three books, from the Scary Stories for Sleepovers series, are for those readers for whom Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark is too bright and cheery. The illustrations are good, albeit nowhere near the level of Stephen Gammell's, and the stories are extremely dark. The sheer violent bleakness of these tales certainly makes them disturbing, and I distinctly recall certain elements giving me actual childhood nightmares. These three volumes represent less than half the series, but as of now they're the only ones I've read.

Holy crap, these books. Both hailing from Usborne's The World of the Unknown series (don't let the Scholastic FunFact rebranding of this later printing of Ghosts fool you), these slim volumes are insanely entertaining, chock full of dope art and memorable microtype accounts of ghosts and goblins both of yesteryear and today. There is a third installment as well that focuses on UFOs, which I unbelievably have never read despite it being right up my alley. Up until recently, I didn't know anyone else had ever even read these, let alone had a fondness for them, but apparently they were so popular that they not only were reprinted for decades before disappearing in the 90s, but have such a cult following that Usborne has actually recently reprinted the Ghosts volume. This is incredible, wonderful news! Now let's reprint the other ones so I can finally get my flying saucer fix.

An assortment of various other Halloween books. Nice to see the homies Arthur and Bunnicula get some shine.

Now it's time to get into some Halloween decor. Check out these pieces of early 90s flair from AVON:

Yep, these are mine, though I have no idea what I was attaching them to back then. I love the jaunty little scarecrow that's on his way to curling practice, but I have to admit that I favor the jack-o'-lantern, what with his rhinestone eyes and faux fall foliage.

I think this wall tapestry was another AVON purchase, though I'm not positive. In any case, if you can find any other woven hanging that more thoroughly exemplifies Halloween, I'd like to see it. I distinctly recall our cat peeing on this back in the day and my mom wanting to throw it away, but I managed to salvage it through some combination of resolve and Resolve. Its urinary travails a thing of the distant past, I'm hanging it this year for the first time in probably 20 years, and I couldn't be happier about that.

This cadre of characters are mostly wonderful relics of the distant past. The two witches and grim reaper all (should) do a little robot dance while their eyes flash and the default spooky melody of the 80s and 90s emanates from the base of the figurine. At their age, however, they're not quite at their fullest potential, as the witch on the right and grim reaper no longer move. Regardless, the fact that they function at all is reason for celebration, even if I had to go buy C batteries specifically for them, because why the hell else would I have those?

The pumpkin-headed thing on the left is a fiber-optic doll that doesn't move, but still provides a neat visual contrast to the others, and according to the box was purchased at T.J. Maxx for 99 cents. You can't even get two Jack in the Box tacos for 99 cents anymore, so this was clearly quite a value.

I cannot believe that his haunted house still lights up. I know we used to display it as the mobile home, which dates it at probably 30 years old or so, and I don't think the bulb has ever been changed, Yeah, sure, it's a dull, eerie shade of smog twilight orange at this point, but doesn't that add to the charm?

Given the fact that these ghosts contain three different colored lights and are approximately as old as the haunted house above, I really can't believe they still light up. But they do! I guess they truly don't make 'em like them used to. This was always one of my favorite Halloween decorations, and I'm thrilled that I was able to salvage it before some Storage Wars-esque scavenger scooped it up to sell at a flea market for $3.25.

This may be the most interesting discovery of my storage locker sojourn. A few years ago, I wrote about The Haunted House , and noted that my copy of the audio book record had long since disappeared. While I was in the process of going through all this stuff in storage, I joked that it would be nice to finally find the record. However, once I was done sifting through everything and bringing home the items I would be retaining, I still seemed to be out of luck. Despite finding Disco Duck and some old Three 6 Mafia on vinyl, there were no spooky poems and tales to be seen.

Yet as I was flipping through some old books and magazines, I happened to find the item pictured above tucked within the pages of some random issue of Shonen Jump. I yelped like a stricken puppy. It was the missing Haunted House record! I honestly was a surreal moment, and I couldn't help but feel that perhaps my mother had guided me from beyond the grave to find it, if for no other reason than to finally stop blaming my grandfather for stealing it. Truly, this was the greatest Halloween miracle since the canonization of Marguerite Bourgeoys! That one was for my Canadian readers.

Finally, we have the talking doll version of everyone's favorite child-murderer, Freddy Krueger! Here he is, looking properly sinister, although I suppose the cat hair on his slacks takes away from his mystique a bit. Otherwise, he looks about the same as he did when he came out of the box thirty years ago.

Sadly, appearances aren't everything, even for melted psychopaths, and the ravages of time eventually come for us all in one way or another. Specifically, pulling the string on his back to unleash one of a series of his catchphrases reveals a dark secret: these days, ol' Freddy is sounding more like Fred Figglehorn.

And with that truly ghoulish revelation, I will leave you so that you may focus on your Halloween festivities. I hope you enjoyed this glimpse at some long-buried treasures. And speaking of which, here's an old illustration of mine for high school Spanish that I also discovered during this storage excavation, featuring Raiden Leonardo DiCaprio versus Johnny Cage, somehow based on the novel Bodas de Sangre:

 

...yeah, I don't know either. 

 

For further October reading, consider Joey Marsilio's novel Henry Garrison: St. Dante's Savior. It's so full to the brim with tenthmonth goodness, you'll practically forget that your city canceled Oktoberfest this year! Practically. Check it out here!