Imagine Batman and Bane in some well-known films ... and now imagine a twist for Halloween.
Away we go.
Imagine Batman and Bane in some well-known films ... and now imagine a twist for Halloween.
Away we go.
Says Henri, le chat noir, and he ought to know, no?
[Surf’s Up, as published in the St. John's Telegram, on Thursday, October 18, 2012.]
While it’s evidently customary now for stores to start draping products in orange and black pretty much as soon as the back-to-school sales feel tired, I actually try not to pay attention to Halloween until, well, about this time of October.
While I applaud my self-control for not (yet) buying a box stuffed with tiny chocolate bars – as if the entirety would make it to the door! – I’ve been checking out a few treats online.
It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown
iTunes
Last year, I loved playing with an app that breathed new life into A Charlie Brown Christmas, which turned the iconic TV special into an interactive storybook. This year, the same makers are back with a take on that other seminal Peanuts holiday classic, It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.
As with the first, it’ll cost you some money (about $5 in this case), and while I had no trouble recommending the Christmas edition, I’m not as enthralled at all with the Great Pumpkin.
I have nothing against Linus’s hero, I should note. Rather, I have a few gripes with how this particular app is designed, and what it expects users to do.
Again, the app opens with a wonderfully nostalgic tableau: a child’s record player gently spins while you hear a jazz theme by Vince Guaraldi. If you want to be transported back to the Sixties, this will do the trick.
The problem is that as soon as you get started, you’re taken not to the story, but instead to a staging area where you first must create an account (or log in via Facebook, which I somewhat reluctantly did).
This left a little grit in my mouth, and that uneasy feeling got worse. I could not proceed until I had created an avatar – and I was not at all amused to see the creators trying to sell upgrades, all within moments of getting us to pay for the app in the first place.
Fortunately, you can create a decent avatar and trick-or-treating costume (your character will join the famously dressed Peanuts gang) for no extra cost. Still, by the point that I was finally able to get into the story itself, I was ready to toss an egg at someone’s house.
The saving grace is that the main part of the app is wonderful. The graphics are crisp and in high-definition, presented as if the elements were layered paper cutouts. The original voices from the TV special are used, as well, and a reader can move through the chapters (tug on the bookmark to advance) or skip to favourite moments. I think this will appeal more to the nostalgic, but maybe children will love the story, too.
In all, I liked it – but having to go through all those hoops left me feeling a bit like Charlie Brown on his back, foiled yet again by the football-swiping Lucy.
Elsewhere this week
Shock Till You Drop
When did getting the pumpkin scared out of you turn into
such a huge business? Even beyond their home base of October, frightening
things demand a lot of our pop-culture attention, and if you need proof, just
try keeping up with the movies, shows and games based around zombies alone. Shock
Till You Drop caters to the fans who can’t get enough of what scares them, from
trailers of upcoming movies to tidbits and links to horror-genre goodies.
Ultimate Pumpkin Stencils
Carving a pumpkin used to involve a steak knife and a few
minutes. The artistry of a few, though, is now widely accessible thanks to the
web, where templates for fairly complex patterns are easy to find. Search for
free pumpkin stencils (or templates, as an alternate keyword) and you’ll no
doubt find something nice, but if you want something cool and of the moment,
you may well have to pay. I’m recommending this site, which sells templates for
several dollars, often in batches.
All the Angry Birds, for instance? Got them. Same goes for comic-book heroes, movie characters, music fads (Gangnam Style, meet One Direction) and even oddball choices, like Walter from Breaking Bad. (That, I guess, is if you want to scare the wits out of the higher-brow TV aficionado.)
Give your monitor or laptop an all-hallows makeover. Again, you can find an endless supply of options with a search engine, and these are just two options you might like.
I hope to have some more Halloween options in next week’s column. Now, off to watch our son turn a pumpkin into a spaceship!
John Gushue is an editor with CBC News in St. John’s. Twitter: @johngushue.
I posted about this New Yorker cover when it appeared in 2009 ... but I loved it so much, I wanted to look at it again.
Tonight, incidentally, was the first time our son hit the neighbourhood on his own, so I wasn't one of those parents glancing at their phones while the little monsters tricked-or-treated.
A tote bag that any young kid would want. Or an adult who's either irony-obsessed or just plain creepy.
The poor pigs. The title of the new promotional video, Ham'O'Ween, says it all.
That's the title Muppet Studios put on this Halloween-themed video featuring the Swedish Chef, and released a couple of years ago.
I like the fitted sheet ghost best, having seen one once. By Adam Koford, and seen on Hobotopia.
Carving a pumpkin or two is something two of the three of us are good at. (Hint: I'm not one of them.) We bought a pumpkin the other day. It's early, and I'm not sure how well it will last until Halloween, but then again Nick wants to have a zombie pumpkin. We'll keep you posted.
Martha incidentally is a dab hand with pumpkin puree. That's another thing to look forward, too!
I snapped this a while back at Michael's, while Martha was hunting around for supplies. (I suspect I'm far from the only husband to stroll around there for something interesting to look at, or just pass the time.) There's a full Halloween display, of course. I thought these had that creepy-cute thing going on.
Click on the image to go to my Flickr feed.
My thanks to my friend Tim for pointing me to this picture, the best family outfit for Halloween I've seen this year, by far. As seen here.
The New Yorker's Halloween cover is brilliant. Although I saw nary a parent out there tonight (mind you, we weren't out long) with a smartphone, I think artist Chris Ware - more from him here - nails something about the obsession grown-ups have with their gadgets, perhaps at the expense of their kids.
This wasn't the plan. The plan, hatched in February, when we visited Disney World, was that Nick was going to go as the Sorcerer's Apprentice. (You know, Mickey Mouse in the red cape and blue hat, the one with the stars. The side deal, which I was willing to go along with, is that I would go as one of the brooms carrying pails of water (the pails actually holding treats and such), with Martha more than willing, somehow, to turn a grass skirt into the broom part of my costue. Like I said, we were all willing to do what we had to do.
Well, that got cast aside, as nine-year-old boys are wont to do. Instead, in September he informed us that he was going out as the Grim Reaper. And that was that. Martha stitched the costume this week, and it turned out really well, given that it was just one big heaping pile of fabric at the start. Our friends Christine and John donated their (plastic) scythe.
I'm suggesting that Nick go around tonight with a sack with "soul food" on it, for his snacks.
Our son was being outfitted just now for the costume he'll wear for Halloween. He's going as the Grim Reaper, and was holding up an almost weightless plastic skull, which was part of a lawn decoration we bought last year. I couldn't resist, and got him to repeat, "Alas, poor Yorick" .... and I misfed him the line "I knew him well," which I should have known instantly is not what Hamlet said next. (That would be, "I knew him, Horatio.") (And the words after that spawned one of the better novels of my generation.)
Thus was our son Nick's introduction to Hamlet. "What's with the Shakespeare stuff?" he asked. Good question. And I'm sure he'll have decades to think about how rich that answer can be.
For my son, who got quite a chuckle today from this, and before Halloween slips too far away:
I am a journalist with CBC News in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. I'm taller than I look. This blog has been running quietly since 2004.
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