It's (Not So Much) A Halloween Mystery

Negative Charge

The single-most puzzling (and polite) villain ever

Remember Monday's post? Where Clark suggested you send entries into us to be judged Halloween Day? This very day?

And Jeff's? Wherein he intimated cryptically "there may be a prize in it for you" ... ???

Have you seen the comment sections on both those posts? You'll notice they're blank as a 5th grader's newly purchased spiral-bound notebook - as blank as the day they were created.
 
Now, as popular as The Unbelievables are, you might be asking yourself: "Hey ... Unbelievables: How can this possibly be?!? Where are all the entries?"

Well ... we thought that very same thing. And, doing a little digging, we've got an answer for you ...

It just so happens 1,258 entries were submitted to both Clark's and Jeff's posts combined. Not a single one of them showed up on the site though.

And currently? There's no way those entries are showing up any time soon.

How do we know this? Is there anyone behind the gaff? You bet your sweet Aunt Patootie we know:

So called "Master Of Electricity" Negative Charge.

He and his "minions" Kevin, Bob and Ted are the instigators and "master minds" behind the absence of entries with Negative Charge himself taking full credit for the deed. How do we know this?

A letter we received from the dolt:

Dear Unbelievables:

Thought I would pull a little Halloween "prank" on you and your plans to hold a costume contest. (Sorry ... but, you know ... I'm a villain. It's my nature.)

Consider it "payback" for you three foiling my plans over the years. (Apologies for holding a grudge.)

Sincerely,
Negative Charge

P.S. Again, please accept my heartfelt acknowledgments for messing with your contest. It's what I do.

(Seriously, the guy is one of the weirdest super criminals we've ever encountered. Who apologizes for being bad?)

So, Charge put the ki-bosh on our contest plans, folks. We know all of you we're looking forward to some high-falutin' costumed fun. Things don't always work out. The best laid plans, y'unnerstan' ...

As consolation, I'm providing one of my all-time favorite (and puzzling) costumes ever:

I absolutely love this costume ...

At any rate, have a Happy Halloween, Unbelieva-Fans ... !!!

Ghosts of Costume Parties Past

Now, you may be wondering (you may not be wondering actually, I've no idea), "Since you guys are experts in disguise, you must love getting dressed up for little or no reason, so why do you only have ONE costume contest per year?".

Well, it's true, we ARE rather fond of dressing up. And we LOVE a good costume party.

Us with Marissa at the 1968 Halloween Mixer. Who's who? Hint: Marissa's on the right.

We've been holding costume parties since forever. But it was only after a couple years we realised what a good opportunity fancy dress balls present to us crimefighting types. Opportunities to gather information.

We decided it would be a rather brilliant wheeze if we were to put the word out on the grapevine that we were hosting a costume party, knowing that eventually, word would reach the criminal underground.

Master criminals are very fond of dressing up and showing off (think The Joker, The Penguin, et al). Even ugly toddler Henri Petit and the diabolical Lester Von Hornrimm have been known to slap on some greasepaint and funny clothes from time to time - and to dress up for a party too (see what I did there? Ha ha ha!).

That's Henri in the middle.

Any road up, what we'd do is this...

Get some of the Unbelievababes to work the door, serve the drinks etc. All in costume, of course.

Guests arrive, in costume.

Everyone's in costume, nobody knows who is who, the guests eat, drink, relax and start talking shop.

We have microphones placed everywhere, recording conversations between evil-doers and ne'er-do-wells.

It's brilliant. And because nobody knows who is wearing what, sometimes we don't even show up!

We're elsewhere, kicking butt and fighting crime. 

But anyway, that's not the point. I was supposed to talk about entries from previous Unbelievables costume contests. There were many clangers and howlers I can recall, but my favourite one is this - it's wrong and right on so many levels I have to give it a special mention.

The name's not quite right, and there are only two, but come on! Borderline genius, Elsie and Fay Rectangle from Attleboro, MA!

Oh, and a special Happy Halloween greeting to our spectacular friend Monica Lewis (yes, that Monica Lewis, who is seen here getting in on the act.)

P.S. The real reason we only have ONE costume contest per year? Halloween, natch.

Get those entries in! There may be a prize in it for you! Or not.

Erin Go Kablam!

Apologies for being a day late, folks... but as you can see, we got caught up over a long weekend dealing with these guys.

Well, I say dealing with. I should I suppose be more technically accurate and say partying with. And what a party.

I mean, if there is one bunch of people on good ol' Planet Earth that know how to have a serious shindig, it's cosplayers. Like for example...

Partee animals!

Beer in hand = quality.

So anyway, you might be asking, what was the occasion? Why, St. Paddy's Day of course! And how did we dress for the occasion? Well, here's me...

Faith and begorrah!

  Clark...

Exterminated several pints of Guinness.

Marissa and Laura!

and Michael was the hit of the party.

I think I can see his Lucky Charms.

More info on this party weekend to come...

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 ... 

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.