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The Shark Deck. Hello, I’m Jenny Mack and today we’re celebrating Monster mash Monday. What’s that so across the parent company here, the company that I founded at Caloroga Shark Media. On the various podcasts, we’re all celebrating Monster mash Monday. Today, I’m going to talk about Halloween comedy.
If you listen to Palace Intrigue, the show about the Royal family, it’s all about royal ghosts. There’s a new series Romance Weekly. They have a ghost love story for you. We’re of course doing ghost scary Stories daily, thirty one days thirty one Ghost Stories. That’s a series.
Check that out. And on the best song Ever this week. This week’s best song ever is the Monster Mash. So let’s dive in with one of my all time favorites, Sean of the Dead from two thousand and four. Simon Peg stars as Sean, a salesman in London who’s caught in the zombie apocalypse with his best friend Ed played by Nick Frost.
Sean of the Dead was developed from ideas from Peg and Wright used for their TV series Space, particularly episode where Simon Pegg’s slacker character hallucinates a zombie invasion. In Shawn of the Dead, twenty nine year old electronic salesman Sean has no direction in his life. He’s disrespected by his colleagues. He doesn’t get along with his stepfather. He’s dumped by his girlfriend.
He’s heartbroken. He gets drunk with Ed his weed to dealing slacker best friend at their favorite pub, the Winchester. At home, Shawn and Ed’s flatmate Pete, complains of a bite wound from a mugger. By morning, a zombie apocalypse has overwhelmed London. If you’ve never seen Sean of the Dead, treat yourself another one of my favorites, What We Do in the Shadows.
As much as I like the TV series, I loved the movie. I was blown away by this film when I watched it from twenty fourteen. The plot of that movie revolves around vampires living together in a no not Staten Island, but Wellington, New Zealand. Familiar Beats if you’ve seen the TV show, The crew of a documentary follows the lives of four vampire housemates, all of them have supernatural abilities. Jermaine Clement from A Flight of the Concords plays of Vladislav the poker in eight hundred and sixty two year old vampire who’s a former tyrant with extraordinary powers.
Rhys Darby, who you recognize, appears as Anton, the leader of a local pack of were wolves, in one of the wonderful subplots in that movie. Treat yourself to the film Rocky Horror. Right, you’ve all seen Rocky Horror? Yes, maybe you have it from nineteen seventy five, a musical comedy horror film. The story centers on a young, engaged couple whose car breaks down in the rain near castle.
They want to use their phone for help. You know, pre cell phones, this movie wouldn’t happen now. Right there, they meet strangers in elaborate costumes celebrating an annual convention. They discover the head of the house is doctor Frank N. Furder, an apparently mad scientist who’s actually an alien transvestite from the planet Transsexual in the Galaxy of Transylvania.
If you watch the film at home, you’ll be like, why did John recommend this? This is so bad? You have to see it in the theater where the crowd, and the crowd participates. That’s the whole hook. Of Rocky Horror.
Some of you are like, yeah, we know, man. But for the people who don’t, this is audience participation. You have to go see with other people. The quintessential Rocky Horror props include rubber gloves, playing cards, newspaper, toast balloons, and toilet paper. Go see it in the theater, You’ll see what I mean.
Young Frankenstein from nineteen seventy four, directed by Mel Brooks, co written by Brooks and Gen Wilder. Gene Wilder stars as doctor Frederick Frankenstein. He becomes exasperated when anyone brings up the subject of his grandfather, Victor Frankenstein, the infamous mad scientist. He doesn’t want to be associated with that doctor Frankenstein guy. He insists his name is pronounced Frankenstein.
Doctor Frankenstein finds out that he has inherited his family’s the state in Transylvania, the ghost To check it out. There, he meets a hunchbacked, bug eyed servant named Igor. He introduces himself as Frankenstein, and then Igor insists that his name is pronounced Igor. From nineteen eighty four ghost Busters, based on his own fascination with spirituality, Dan Ackroyd conceived Ghostbusters as the Projects, starring himself and John Belushi. In that version, they would venture through time and space, battling supernatural threats.
Following Belushi’s death in nineteen eighty two and Akroyd’s concept being deemed financially impractical, Harold Ramis was hired to help rewrite the script to set it in New York City and make it more realistic. An all time classic, several sequels of varying quality. How about Beetlejuice. After Barbara and Adam die in a car accident, they find themselves stuck haunting their country residents. Unable to leave the house, a family named the deets Is moves in.
They want to get rid of them. They team up with Beatle Juice, played by Michael Keaton. Really fun movie. I saw the Broadway musical probably about a year ago. It has since closed.
I saw it right before closing. It was fantastic. There is a national touring version. I highly recommend you go see Beatle Juice the musical. You accounting how many times I’ve said the B word, We’re definitely going to get to three in this episode, so don’t worry about it.
I don’t know what’s going to happen when I say it? Let’s just say it again. There was a sequel in development called Beetlejuice Goes Hawaiian. In that film, the Deets family would have moved to You, Hawaii to develop a resort. Construction begins, and it’s quickly discovered that the hotel would be sitting on top of an ancient burial ground.
Time to call Beetlejuice again. In twenty thirteen, Winona Ryder confirmed that talk about a sequel was swirling around. She told The Daily Beast, I’m kind of sworn as secrecy, but it sounds like it might be happening. It’s twenty seven years later, and I have to say, I love Lyddy eats so much. I’d be really interested in what she’s doing.
Twenty seven years later, they abandon that, but they are currently actually for reels working on Beetlejuice too. I don’t know much about the plot, but Michael Keaton is back, Catherine o’haron, Winona Ryder are back. Jenna Ortiga will be the primary female character in the movie. And who could forget the all time classic, possibly the greatest movie ever made. No, it’s not Citizen Kane.
It’s Adam Sandler’s twenty twenty Halloween classic, Hubie Halloween. You remember this one. Adam Sandler plays Hubee, who most of the town calls Phubee in some highbrow humor of the Adam Sandler quality. Complicating things Hube’s neighbor, played by Steve Buscemi, who may or may not be a werewolf. Sandler hooks up the usual suspects.
Rob Schneider is in this thing, Colin Quinn, Kevin James. For some reason, Shaquille O’Neal makes an appearance. One review I see says, Unfortunately hub Halloween is too long at over ninety minutes, and it suffers from the same pacing issues that plague most of Sandler’s movies. The humor is in time well, and a lot of scenes run on for too long. Same review says hub Halloween is inoffensive in its level of entertainment, although it will likely be forgotten by the time Adam Sandler produces Tommy Thanksgiving.
Don’t give him any ideas on the TV side.
Let’s talk about community.
Who had a wonderful one of my It’s not one of mine. It is my favorite thing in all of community the beetlejuice joke. If you’re not hip to this, let me walk you through this. Season one’s episode Communication Studies, Slater and Jeff are in the parking lot, and rather than use Brita’s real name, Slater pretended to forget it and tried jogging her memory with other b word. It’s like bitter butter beetlejuice.
Okay, that’s one. Nine months later, season two episode called Cooperative Calligraphy, they’re trying to find Annie’s lost purple pen you know that one. To prove their innocence, everybody strips off their clothes. They go down to their underwear. During the search, Britta sees Jeff’s underwear and says that he normally wears stripeye turquoise beetlejuice numbers.
That’s two, and then the payoff season three, Horror Fiction. In seven Spooky Steps, the study group realizes that one member is a secret psychopath after taking a test administered by Britta. They then take turns telling spooky stories to test each other’s reactions. Before the pre Halloween party is ruined. Annie uses Britta’s computer to check her playlist.
She mentions that Britta only has the Beetlejuice soundtrack, and immediately following that line of dialogue, if you look in the back of the scene, someone in a Beetlejuice costume walks directly behind Annie. I caught it at at the time, and I realized what they had done, and I thought it was a maze. And when you see it’s it’s so subtle. They don’t draw any attention to it. If I hadn’t told you this, you might not notice.
But they say Beatle Juice for the third time, and a Beetlejuice walks in the back of the set. It is fantastic. There’s also a possibly darker Halloween thing to community screen. Rant writes Britta’s personal and family history remains a mystery until season three episode twenty two, introduction to Finality. In it, Brita tries to use her newfound therapy skills on Abed, who’s having a hard time dealing with Troy going to work for the air conditioning guys, but quickly evil Abed turns the conversation to Brita’s own traumas.
The episode cuts to a commercial, so we don’t actually hear the conversation, but when we come back from commercial, Britta is talking about a man in her past who is dressed as a dinosaur. The look on her face and the tremble in her voice suggests it’s the fourthest thing from a happy memory. Okay, stay with me. In season two, episode six, Epidemiology, everyone is dressed up for Halloween. Britta is dressed as a dinosaur.
The analysis here is that Britta exhibits other behaviors throughout the show that suggests that she’s not one hundred percent mentally healthy. Screen rent right, so a lot can be implied here, but either way, Britta was traumatized by the man of the dinosaur costume. Way to make this episode fun, Johnny mack, Hey, I try and keep it varied. There were several community Halloween episodes. Season one, episode seven’s introduction to Statistics Surely goes as Harry Potter.
Britta is a squirrel. Troy as Eddie Murphy. Annie is a skeleton. Annie is hosting a Day of the Dead party. Jeff tries to find a way into a nearby faculty party so he can hook up with Professor Slater.
Season two, episode six, Epidemiology, Jeff dresses as David Beckham. Surely is dressed as a princess. This is the one where Dean Pelton buys food from an army surplus store for the event, but the supposed taco meat is actually a hazardous substance. Partygoers fall ill, exhibiting zombie like behavior, which results in the Army locking down the campus. Very fun episode, all right.
Some other TV shows you may recall The Munsters Fred Gwynn Frankenstein’s Monster Hermann Munster of Onta Carlo as his wife Lily, Grandpa al Lewis as Grandpa Pat Priest as their niece Marilyn, and Butch Patrick as their werewolf son Eddie. They had a family pet, Spot, who was a dragon capable of breathing fire. The Munsters was the satire of the American suburban lifestyle and the typically family entertainment of the era. The Monsters aired on CBS Thursdays at seven thirty pm from September twenty fourth, nineteen sixty four to May twelfth, nineteen sixty six. Seventy episodes canceled due to low ratings brought on by competition from ABC’s Batman.
Also from nineteen sixty four, The Adams Family and I could have included that in the movies, but I like the show a better the movie. The Adams Family an incredibly close family who share a passion for the macabre and possessed supernatural abilities with no given explanation in the show, Gomez and Mortisha are your parents, a wealthy couple with an endless enthusiasm for life. Their children Wednesday and Pugsley you may know Wednesday from current Netflix series. They also live with Uncle Fester and Grandmama. They all live at zero zero zero one Cemetery Lane.
The theme song mentions that their house is a museum and the interior of the house is filled with odd and unique items, many of which are collector’s items. The family has a butler named Lurch and an appendage known as Thing that appears from different objects, such as wooden boxes. Recurring family members include cousin it Ophelia, who’s Mortitia’s elder sister, and Grandma Frump, Mortsh’s mother. And a quick look at various Halloween sketches over the years from Saturday Night Live, including David s Pumpkins a spooky elevator ride. Now, before I get to that, As I was putting the show together, I had typed David S.
Pumpkins into the dock and then went and did some other stuff. And I came back and I was scrolling through the dock, and in a different story, having nothing to do with today’s episode, I saw Paul F. Tompkins, and I went Paul F. Tompkins David S. Pumpkins.
I wonder if they did that on purpose. I never had noticed that before. Is everybody out there now, are you guys? Like? Yeah?
No kidding John? Or did I just put that together? Paul F. Tompkins David S. Pumpkins Anyway.
Tom Hanks plays David S. Pumpkins. He is accompanied by two swaying skeletons played by mikey Day and Bobby moynihan. He’s clothed in pumpkins. He’s a man of few words, yet he’s extremely spirited.
How about Bill Hayter breaking out his Vincent Price impression in celebrating Halloween with Vincent Price. Along with Vincent Price a crow perched on his shoulder. He’s hanging out with his famous friends Glorious Swanson played by Kristin Wigg, James Mason by John Hamm and LIBERACEI by Fred Ormisen, but none of them have anything to contribute to the event or take any notice of Vincent’s festive activities. In season one, Richard Pryor starred in The Exorcist I two. In this version of Exorcist two, Lorraine Newman played a devilish little girl who was riding about in her bed and slabbering as she hurled personal insults at the priests and their mother’s Richard Pryor noted for his facial expressions that demonstrate his horror and confusion.
And back in nineteen seventy seven, Dan Ackroyd broke out the super bats Omadic and Ideal Blunder for all your potion requirements. This was a sequel scout a variation of the classic bass Omatic sketch from the first season, where Akroyd played the part of a salesman promoting the amazing Superbasomatic seventy six blender that allowed people to make the most of fish. You know, you throw them in a blender superbatt Omatic seventy seven and that is monster Mash Monday. Hope you enjoyed it. Go check out Palace Intrigue for some ghost stories about the Royals.
Check out Ghosts for some ghost stories about ghosts. Go check out the best song ever this week, learn all about the Monster Mash, and check out Romance Weekly. You’ll get a little ghost love story there. All right back to ormand tomorrow. Happy Halloween, say yep.