Coolest thing I've ever seen!

And all the credit goes to me, haha.  Just kidding I wanna give thanks to Frank Browning for the template.  Seriously though I made this tonight while I was just sittin around thinking of something to blog about.  It turned out so well that I'm inducting it into the HalloweenOverkill Hallow of Fame, that's right I'm inducting myself. (You don't mind right?)  Also check out the bonus shot of Dracula and Roxas, I know you Ghouls are probably sick of seeing my new kittens but they are just too cool for school.

Dracula

Children of the Night

Children of the Night

Ever heard of the Hollywood Stock Exchange (hsx)?

HalloweenOverkill fans unite.  It's time for some competition.  The Hollywood Stock Exchange is a virtual stock market, but instead of buying stocks in companies you buy them in movies!  You can buy stock, sell stock, short stock, and cover stock.  Your portfolio doesn't just consist of Moviestocks though, because you can also buy Starbonds which are stocks invested in the movie stars themselves.  You can also buy Derivatives which are kind of like short investments based on a time limit or special event, such as the opening weekend of a movie only.  They also have something neat called Movie Funds which are basically groups of movies that you invest in and a leader of the investment picks where the money goes.  There are also other options when buying and selling stock on the Hollywood Stock Exchange but you really need to check it out yourself to get a full understanding of how it all works.  They also have leagues which creates kind of like a fantasy sports type setting where friends can keep track of each other for some fun competition.  I have just created a league called HalloweenOverkill so anyone reading this blog NEEDS to head over to HSX.com and sign up for an account, find my league and join so we can have some Hollywood stock trading fun and some bragging rights between us.  Oh and by the way one of those Movie Funds you can buy is a horror themed one called the Horror Fund 3-D, which should be a good one.  Anyhow you guys should seriously get accounts and let me know in the comments so I can add you to my league. Just leave me your email address or search for the HalloweenOverkill league on HSX.com

Update! The kittens have been christened!!!

Well after two days of calling the cats "hey cat" and "you little shit," we have finally come up with names.  We couldn't do it ourselves so we took the 5 names we liked the most and put them in a hat and drew names literally (horrible I know).  This is what the cats were destined to be named.

ROXAS

DRACULA (Count Dracula, hey we thought it was funny)

 

And as a bonus we don't know why but everytime we look at this picture of the kittens we can only think of one thing!

 

Let us know if you like the names!

We adopted two kittens today and they need names!

So my wife and I adopted two stray kittens today and for the life of us we cannot name these little dudes.  They are both boys one is greyish and one is black.  Some of the names we have come up with so far are: Poe, Edgar, Jekyll, Hyde, Jynx, Jack, Sawyer, Sparky, Sparx, Vincent, Lovecraft (they both sleep all over my horror books, and the gray one keeps pawing at The Necronomicon), Dracula (hilarious), Vlad, Merlin, Hocus, Pocus..... these are just some of the names. If you like any of them or have some of your own suggestions please please please comment and let us know--we gotta name these suckers!!!

Halloween: The Happy Haunting of America Review!

5 Jolly Jack-O-Lanterns

Jolly Jack-O-Lantern Rating Scale

Halloween: The Happy Haunting of America 10th Anniversary Edition is a tour of haunted attractions across the U.S. hosted by Daniel Roebuck and company and produced by Chuck Williams.  The 10th Anniversary Edition adds 10 new haunts to the documentary, and the DVD itself is jam packed to the maximum with bonus features. This new edition is also full of small celebrity cameos. Look for stars like Robert Englund, Angus Scrimm, Alice Cooper, Don Coscarelli, Tony Todd, and Doug Bradley. 

My first observation about the main feature, "Halloween...The Happy Haunting of America 10th Anniversary Edition Presented from the Magic Castle," was that it wasn't necessarily a documentary in the traditional sense but more of a visual documentary, consisting of a series of pretty quick videos of each haunt.  That is not to say that the haunts weren't researched very well, because I got the impression that the filmmakers spent plenty of time recording footage. The parts where Mr. Roebuck introduced each video segment were also full of informative anecdotes about each haunt (and about the Magic Castle, which is where the 10th Anniversary Edition was filmed). On a side note: I would like to say that my home state of Michigan was given much love because nearly half of the haunts featured were located in MI.  If you ever get a chance to head up to MI you MUST go to see the spectacle that is Erebus haunted attraction in Pontiac, MI.  As Mr. Roebuck will inform you in the DVD, this attraction actually made it into the Guinness Book of World Records.

Back to the review.  Although I was expecting full video walk throughs of each haunt, that was not what I found here. But that doesn't really take away from the quality and theme of the feature itself, since the images that are provided give you a good sense of what the rest of the haunt must be like. I would also imagine that part of the idea behind this was to get the audience off their asses to go see these amazing attractions in person. I think of the main feature as more of an introduction to what the filmmakers thought were the best attractions to go to.

There are so many special features on the DVD it would be difficult to review them all, but one that's not to be missed is "Dr. Shocker's House of Horror." In this short segment, you'll get a glimpse of a massive collection of horror related masks, toys, statues, posters, and other treats all housed in what I believe to be a small museum in Mr. Roebuck's basement (?).

Overall, I believe this DVD is a must-own for Halloween enthusiasts. While the DVD has a few shortcomings, as a whole it proves to be a Halloween fan's dream, providing glimpses into the most famous haunted attractions and a wealth of Halloween extras that must be seen to be believed! It is clear that the creators of this video, like me here at HalloweenOverkill, have a Halloween obsession and for that, this DVD goes into the HalloweenOverkill Hallow of Fame.  Also click here to check out the whole extras list and purchase the DVD.

 

Memories of Halloween Honeymoon!

My wife and I shared our honeymoon at the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida and after spending about a week there, we had wayyyy too many pictures (about 400) but not all of them were Halloween themed, so we thought we'd share a few of the more seasonally themed ones here at HalloweenOverkill for your viewing pleasure!  The Magic Kingdom was decked out for the holiday and looked beautiful.  How the Halloween celebration works at the Magic Kingdom is anyone who has access to the parks on designated days can pay an extra fee to stay after hours in the park to enjoy the festivities (otherwise known as Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party)  included free face painting, after hours rides, trick or treating throughout the park, live shows and parades, and a special fireworks show.  It took cast members about a half hour to transform the park from autumn themed to a total Disney Halloween Kingdom.  I mean every building in the park was lit up with halloween lights and they modified all the street lights to look like Mickey ghosts, and then they.... well just look at the pics you'll get the idea.

This was the view as we entered the park the day of the Halloween celebration

Lovin it!

A Mickey doll in a Main Street shop window


A few shots of the Sleepy Hollow refreshments stand which is actually a year round feature in the Magic Kingdom

A sign outside the park letting you know the dealeo

A Main Street island decorated for the holiday

Me standing by one of the Halloween bronze statues that they put out for the celebration

A Mickey pumpkin in Toontown Fair

A shot of Cinderella's Castle from down Main Street
(sorry about some of the shoddy camera work, we were still learning how to use some of the lens since we had just received it as a wedding gift the day before)

A scarecrow on Main Street

Another scarecrow on Main Street

My wife and I after getting our faces painted at the Pirates of the Caribbean Halloween station

These designs were projected on the streets by some special Disney voodoo magic

A shot of one of the Mickey lamp ghosts withe the beautiful castle in the background

A better shot of one of the Mickey lamps

A good shot of the main attraction!!!
Here are some shots of different signage throughout the park during the Halloween after hours

A few shots of Main Street while waiting for the Halloween parade to start

I like how this one turned out so blurry, ads an eerie feel to the picture

The Main Street train station as we left the park



Spooky

This was the bag that you could purchase to Trick or Treat with (another $10, expensive trip)

This was our Trick or Treating candy haul from the Magic Kingdom

This was a bonus shot from inside the Raglan Road Irish Pub & Restaurant at Downtown Disney after the party at Magic Kingdom

Let us know what you thought and if you want us to post some of the short videos we took also by commenting in the comments down below!

Congratulations to the winner of the First HalloweenOverkill Giveaway!

Congratulations to the elusive Scott for winning the Wild Eye giveaway here at HalloweenOverkill (drawn at random using the random.org integer generator). His response to his favorite horror death was, "I would have to say my favorite death scene of all time would be in Friday the 13th part 2. It occurs when the guy in the wheelchair gets roasted in the face with a machete then proceeds to roll backwards down a long flight of wooden steps. Classic! Never thought they would kill the guy in the wheelchair."  I was pretty lenient on the rules because it was my first time doing this and may have been some of yours as well. Anyhow if you are reading this right now Scott your package will be in the mail tomorrow morning (pending that you respond to my email). Congrats and stay tuned this Sunday for our next giveaway which may require a bit more creativity (or maybe not). This time I will be giving away..... well you'll have to come back Sunday to find out what the giveaway is this time.

The Myers' House - North Carolina

You have got to check out this site!  This family totally recreated the Myers' house from the original Halloween film.  The front and side exteriors are exact replicas of the house used in the film, which to my knowledge is still standing today in CA.  The recreated house has been used in various fan films related to the Halloween series and has also been featured in the "Halloween: The Inside Story" documentary on A&E.  "Judith," a fan created film, is featured very heavily on the site and was just released online (on my birthday no less!) this year!  The film is also available to purchase on physical DVD so head on over to the site and purchase one now before supplies run out!  I don't want to steal the site's thunder by giving you all the details so read about it by visiting the site! Click here to visit the site.