Mayhem

Because I have such a deep, deep affection for you all and this most blessed holiday season, I have collected a heap of bloody good links to get you in the mood. Feel free to add your own in the comments.

Around the Web

• Friends: A few friends are dressing their sites up to celebrate this most festive season, Sutter and Niff make Ink Finger fangtastic, Rob channels Bela Lugosi, and Kim not only dresses up Sock Monkey Drawer, but she spawns eight ghastly limited edition Halloween sock monkeys. These won’t last long, and they are really badass. I suggest you get yours now. Update: They’re sold out.
• Googhoul: Enter your zip code to find Halloween events, stores, and resources in your neighborhood. Handy when you just ran out of fake blood.
• Fake Blood: Or you could just make you own fake blood. Even in bulk.

In Philadelphia (sorry everyone else)

• Body Worlds: Not exactly Halloween themed, but one of the most beautiful and gruesome things you will ever see, Body Worlds is an anatomical exhibition of real human bodies, and is at the Franklin Institute now.
• Exhumed Films: The local boys are gearing up for three(!) themed October triple features of horror: Supernatural Shockers, Killer Thrillers, and Grindhouse Horrors. Unfortunately, they are all screening at the International House in University City which means sitting in seats that double as torture devices. I am still going to try and make one of them if I can.
• Laurel Hill Cemetery: 187 acres comprise the country’s second oldest garden cemetery (see it on Google Maps). They offer inexpensive night tours right around Halloween. Not to be missed. Check out some photos I took from a couple years ago.

Viewing

• In Theaters: If you happen to head to the theaters, you may want to skip a lame remake like The Fog, and opt for something like Three Extremes, Wallace and Gromit - Curse of the Were-Rabbit, or Tim Burton’s latest, Corpse Bride, which is exquisitely shot and animated (I could do without the musical numbers, but on the whole just wonderful).
• On The Tube: As always, AMC’s Monster Fest is set to scare with just over a week’s worth of films, and IFC and Sundance are good for at least a day or two of screams. Sadly, the Horror Channel still hasn’t been able to get off the ground entirely. Keep fighting the good fight, gents.
• On DVD: Grab many a great horror DVD (without having to wade through mushy romantic comedies) over at DVD Horror.com.

Reading

• Grimm: A new collection of Grimm’s fairy tales entitled Grimm’s Grimmest has been released. From the book’s description: Newly reissued with a fresh cover, Grimm’s Grimmest presents nineteen original, unsanitized, wholly unholy tales as they were first collected by the Brothers Grimm circa 1822—all fiendishly illustrated. The tales harken back to a time when travelers risked roasting or worse, and bad manners yielded frightful consequences. An insightful introduction makes sense of the mayhem, shedding light on how the Grimm brothers went from macabre to mainstream in fairly short order. From the true horror of Aschenputtel (the original Cinderella story) to Rapunzel’s dark secret, Grimm’s Grimmest features the authentic stories born long ago in the land of the Black Forest, at a time when fairy tales never ended happily ever after. Lovely.
• Ghost Stories: Curl up under the covers with a flash light, and er, laptop, while reading ghost stories at The Devil’s Tramping Ground or Weird NJ. And you really can’t go wrong with greats like Poe and Lovecraft.

Random

• Desktop Love: The screen masters at the Iconfactory have not only dressed up for Halloween again, but have bred a new icon set, Vintage Halloween. Other wonderful icon sets from Halloweens past: Eat Me, Halloween 2004, Ravenswood Revisited, Macabre, Snappy Hour Halloween, World of Aqua: After Dark, and Boo Buddies.
• Recipes: Lots of strange Halloween brews and treats.
• Pumpkin Carving: There’s more than one way to carve a pumpkin.
• Entirely Unrelated: The Complete Calvin and Hobbes was just released yesterday. It collects… well, every Calvin and Hobbes strip ever. It’s a little pricey, but looks to be very worth it. If anyone happens to have a spare copy that’s just sitting around, I would be happy to give it a good home for you :D

• Posted at 10:50 am in Books, Entertainment, Film, Philadelphia, Random, Web
• Commentary Closed (11)