Almost Halloween

Halloween.

It's tomorrow ... Thursday. 

You're probably going to see some pretty amazing things costume-wise if you're out and about.

And then, there could be some, shall we say, "unbelievable" sights as well. 

The Unbelievables have documented a few of these items for your dining and dancing pleasure. Take heed, Good Citizens ...

Nothing says Halloween like popping a little tyke in a something cute ...

... then popping the Alien chest burster character out of it ...

 

... and I'm not certain what to make of these two ...

But ... the above are far, far from the worst:

Wow.

... just ... wow ...

... eeeewwwwwwwwwwwwww ...

Then, there's my favorite ...

Strange, but ... Michael loves this ... !!!

Be careful out there, folks. 

And have a Happy, Spooky Halloween ... 

By The Power Of Grayskull

Continuing on a theme from last week (dodgy cartoon characters), the Unbelievables report the passing of Lou Scheimer, founder of Filmation and supplier of the voice of the hated Orko, on the 17th of this month. 

While we are loath to speak ill of the deceased, it cannot just be us that found Filmation's output to be both substandard and depressingly condescending. Who can forget these...?

Rick Springfield has never looked back.

"The jungle; here I was born; and here my parents died when I was but an infant. I would have soon perished, too, had I not been found by a kindly she-ape named Kala, who adopted me as her own and taught me the ways of the wild. I learned quickly, and grew stronger each day, and now I share the friendship and trust of all jungle animals. The jungle is filled with beauty, and danger; and lost cities filled with good, and evil. This is my domain, and I protect those who come here; for I am Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle."

However low-quality these cartoons were, though, we cannot help but feel nostalgic when we think of them. It was a simpler time back then, and we miss it. So for that, Lou Scheimer, even though you were Orko (and the irritating Mo from the Space Sentinels), we salute you. Cheers!

The Rather Sad Case Of Mr. Blobby

"Was there something in the water? Did the nation really once fall about laughing at the clumsy antics of a bloke in a big pink rubber costume with yellow blobs all over it?"

In the end, this was the criticism of the once wildly-popular Mr. Blobby. It made Britain the laughing stock of the comedy world.

But Mr. Blobby is a cautionary tale, a "character flaw" (so to speak) that everyone should learn from.

As Jeff detailed last episode, Mr. Blobby was one of the four most awful characters ever created ...



... and that irked Mr. Blobby's original creator, Charlie Adams. Especially when the rather nauseating yellow-splotched meatbag was included with the likes of Orko, Snarf and ring-leader David The Gnome. If something went wrong some weekday evening? This Foulsome Foursome was immediately blamed. A devious act perpetrated? They had to be the cause. They were the fall guys of everything from halitosis to bad manners.

And, smack dab in the middle of it all, who got the brunt of the blame?

Mr. Blobby.

That didn't sit well with Mr. Adams, knowing a beloved character he'd birthed suddenly became the epitome of vilification, falling into a "wrong" crowd and being blamed by the public for just about everything under the sun.
 
And Mr. Blobby was his own worst enemy. He didn't help his cause any. First off, he didn't say anything coherent but "Blobby! Blobby! Blobby!" He acted like a spoiled child who wouldn't eat his dinner. And he looked like animated gallons of Pepto Bismal that didn't settle well. And that dopey smile ... *yeesh* Is it any wonder he was annoying?

So ... the face of world wide web costume atrocities had its whipping boys ... with Mr. Blobby front and center. Because, really ... what good could come of him? Surely he (along with his cronies) just had to be the culprits behind ill-conceived costume design! Halloween ruined forever more by the quartet!

Thus, the intent of Charlie Adams gone awry, to show the world his creation wouldn't go down without a fight: "I'll show them who's boss! Mr. Blobby will exact his revenge!"

The kicker all along, however, was this: While Charlie may have publickly put in motion the foundering of costume creations everywhere, it really went no farther than that. He didn't actually do anything to warrant such a movement. He just mouthed off a bit, slouched a lot and accepted begrugingly that Mr. Blobby would have a detrimental caveat placed in his history.

In reality, the buying public - thinking they could create the perfect Halloween costume by simply purchasing a simple pattern and some supplies and get to gettin' - was the real problem. You see ... everyone thinks they can sew and put something together ... but look at them: Do you see evidence of such from this family?

Of course not. Word of mouth swept the nation and, not wanting to be embarrassed by admitting they didn't know what they were doing and couldn't create the perfect outfit, they instead pointed the finger at some sad and lowly television characters, compounding their already unpopular states.

Ever hear of "mob mentality" ... ??? Swarming groups of people who instigate general social anarchy and mayhem? With the facilitation of the world wide web, that's just what happened, costumally speaking. They put their inability to create right at the the ends of their fingers and stabbed Mr. Blobby with them. Truly, one of the oddest of The Unbelievables' cases we've ever looked into.

It doesn't mean Mr. Blobby isn't still one of the creepiest, most pitiful and ridiculous characters ever, but ... well ... he comes close.

Unless you're either of these guys ...

... and that's rather sad ...

Dodgy Characters

I'm sure we have all been to bad Halloween parties. The canapes aren't worth bothering about, the 'mulled wine' consists of warmed-over Dr.Pepper and an old bottle of Aunt Phyllis' amontillado simmering in a Crock-Pot, and pretty much everyone's costume looks like they went around the house in a blind panic at the last minute trying to find something, anything, from which to throw together a costume. There have been times, I'll admit, when I myself have done just such a thing, but managed to pull it off simply because I did not try to emulate a TV character or movie droid.

No, I went with the generic. Clown is always an easy one to do, as is farmer, scarecrow, and my personal favourite, Charlie Chaplin. If you already have a black suit, then all you need is the little moustache, the cane and the bowler hat. If you possess a black turtleneck sweater and a zip-up leather jacket and black jeans, then just grow three days worth of stubble and you can be a spy, or a terrorist if you have an olive complexion. Add a fake sniper rifle into it and the possibilities are endless. But so many people go into this thing with a preconceived idea of what they want to do that they end up ruining it completely.

 As you can see.

Other people try to be original, which will score you points at the office if you are dressed as some sort of clever visual pun or an everyday household object such as a Twinkie or a Dyson Vacuum Cleaner, but take it one step too far and you and Ms. Herzenbanger from the typing pool could be banned from office parties for life.

Sometimes the best costumes aren't really a costume at all - just your ordinary clothes and a decent make-up job, such as this one modelled by our friend James.

And as our other pal Katherine shows, sometimes the quality of the costume's manufacturing outweighs whether or not it makes any sense at all.

The Unbelievables have been troubled with an increase in recent years of "costume how-tos" posted on various websites (wikiHow, eHow, Instructables, FamilyFun and their ilk, as well as blogs and women's homemaking magazines)that turn out to be completely awful. We were notified of the horrific social consequences of making such costumes by the family that posed for this photo.

The letter that accompanied this photo outlined for us how they were ostracised by their church, mocked at their places of work, bullied at school and even the garbage men refused to pick up their trash. "Please," they implored us, "find out who is putting these shitty instructions up on the Web and stop them!", adding "Help us, Unbelievables - your our only hope!". Well, our task was clear. We immediately replied, saying that not only would we be right on it, but that it was spelt Y-O-U-APOSTROPHE-R-E, for Pete's sake!

Anyway, after utilising the services of our worldwide network of informants, we had figured out that it was a group of some of the most awful characters ever foisted on a viewing public, who were ticked off over their TV careers being so short-lived and were doing this as some sort of payback. Their names were...

 ORKO...

 SNARF...

MR. BLOBBY, and the ringleader behind the whole shoddy enterprise, DAVID THE GNOME.

Once these aggravating little toerags knew we were onto them they changed the location of their hideout repeatedly, in order to throw us off the scent. But as I am sure Michael will be happy to relate, we soon caught up with them...

Some pumpkin-spiced party advice

Hi folks! Halloween is right around the corner and no doubt you're all knee-deep in party planning. But in between preparing the candied meatballs, the haunted weenies-on-a-stick and the bobbing-for-chili tub, is there anything you might have forgotten? Hmmmm....?

"Oh my God! I forgot to prepare a Halloween costume!"

Yeah, you did! Silly! Ha ha! It's okay, though. We're here to help and that's exactly what we're going to do. I'll start us off but my colleagues will be chiming in later this week so tune in often and bring friends!

It's not the very-early-prototype Michelin Men costumes you should be admiring here (although those are nice!) but rather the folks in the background. That's right, get a bunch of friends together and go trick-or-treating as a Creepy, Blank-Eyed Mob!

There's nothing funnier than a human-esque body with a disproportionately sized head. Be it too large or too small, people love it when body parts don't quite line up. Go big and put yourself out there as a Mardi Gras character. Or shrink it and go as whatever that would be. I don't know and I don't really care.

You can be original or you can follow a wildly popular trend. Of course, you'll see this one a lot. It's Mr. and Mrs. Telephonehead from "The Mr. and Mrs. Telephonehead Show". Sample dialogue from that show:

MR. TELEPHONEHEAD: Hey, did you call me?
MRS. TELEPHONEHEAD: Of course I did. I have a telephone on my head. I call you all day long.
MR. TELEPHONEHEAD: Oh yeah. I forgot.
MRS. TELEPHONEHEAD: Oh, you ding-a-ling!

"Oh, you ding-a-ling" is the most popular catchphrase in the history of television.

Ladies, I know you're fed up to here with the pressure to come up with some "sexy" costume. I understand. That's a lot of unnecessary sexism. Look at these Hoochie Mamas, just puttin' it out there. Gross, right? Don't cave in to that mindset!

Just dial back the sexiness! Be whatever you want but just cover up a little. Leave something up to the imagination. Take a peek at these Witches on their way to a party. They look... nice. I'll bet they're going to have... fun. Sure. Sure they are.

When it comes to children, obviously sexy costumes are completely inappropriate. I don't know that substituting Hatred for sexiness is the best idea though.

If you really get stuck for an idea, just go out in the garage, find what you can and go nuts on it with scissors and glue, put Whatever You End Up With on your head and get a stick. If people don't get it, that's their problem. You're wearing a leotard, this is your date and you're going to be blind drunk in less than an hour. Clearly you don't care what anybody thinks. Which is exactly as it should be.

Unbelieva-Dreams

Ah yes, dreams. We all have them. Some people have dreams like these...

In other words, quite beautiful and optimistic, but still a little off. Because ALL dreams are a little off.

Whereas other people's dreams are more like these...

Dark, scary, weird, and VERY off. The people who have these dreams are the ones you need to watch out for, folks. They're the bitter, twisted and strange individdles who can SNAP just like that. Like a heavy steel-toecapped boot stepping on a dry twig.

These are the ones we concern ourselves with on a daily basis. We are ever watchful, ever vigilant, ever Unbelievable. You're welcome, world.

Oh, and what dreams do WE dream? Funny you should ask.

Michael? Well, his dreams tend to be like this...

What can we say? He's a bit freaky. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

And Clark mainly dreams about Maggie Trudeau in double denim.

And why not?

Me? Well, it's a toss-up really. I'll leave you to interpret what you can from these.

And the Dingleheimerwiesen Brothers? What of their dreams?

They dream of enjoying hot soup on the sofa with Martin Landau in Space:1999. I know because they told me so.