Squid Lid

Saw my pal James play with his electronic circus outfit Squid Lid Friday night, and it was an awesome display. Several changes of glowing masks, and an onslaught of danceable tunes with samples from the likes of Tod Brownings Freaks. Check them out if you dare.

Field Guide

Coming soon to a booksellers near you, The Secret Saturdays Official Cryptid Field Guide, loaded to the gills with art and info! I gotta tell you, I'm flattered as all heck to be referred to as a 'cryptozoologist' in the credits. Hope it doesn't tick off any of my honest-to-gosh Cryptozoologist pals.

Bosco dei Mostri

The town of Bomarzo in central Italy is another place I need to visit someday. Famous for it's so-called "Bosco dei Mostri" ("Monsters' Grove"), named after the large scale stone sculptures built into the landscape, it's got quite the creepy appeal. Prince Pier Francesco Orsini commissioned Pirro Ligorio to build this "Villa of Wonders" in homage to his deceased wife in 1552. Why it's full of monsters, I guess only the Prince knows.

Saturdays Are Back!

The Secret Saturdays return to Cartoon Network with new episodes beginning this Friday, April 10th at 8:00 PM. Because of where CN decided to break the season up, we come back with two irregular episodes, neither of which feature a cryptid of further the Kur Stone plotline. They are both pretty cool stand-alone stories, though! Because what would've been the next episode, "Eterno", is so particularly unusual, we decided to air it the following week, so this Friday will premiere "Black Monday" instead. They will revert back to the original sequence for future rebroadcasts and DVD collections. Can't wait to see what you all think of the rest of the original run!

Little Monster Factory

Check out this wonderful Art Journal of Sruti and Abhishek Akula, two very creative kids. Abhishek has a penchant for weird monsters, and you'll find lots of exciting, inventive creatures by scrolling down the page.

Monster Rain

Man! Is it ever coming down in my neck of the woods! I think I'd better start collecting up two of each cryptid. (Nice umbrella from Kinderkaboodle, huh?) The CBC is calling the never-ending rain a "Soaker Storm", whatever that is. This is the kind of weather that brings out the Kasa-Obake, or Japanese umbrella Yokai. The gorgeous fiberglass sculpture below is by Colin Christian

Secret Saturdays DVD

Volume One of the Secret Saturdays DVD collection is coming this summer, featuring the first 5 episodes, and tons of bonus features, including early development artwork and rough animatics.

Ancient Evil

Another year older today. Happy Birthday to me. Unfortunately I'm ill with fever and cough, which just heightens the effect of creakier bones and general weakness.

Heads Will Roll

My kind of wheels, from JH Design. James tells me a Creature From The Black Lagoon board is next on the list. Amen.

Eyes On Monster Watch

Here's a nice antidote to the heavy (and hopefully fun!) dose of fantasy The Secret Saturdays injects into the realm of cryptozoology. Monster Watch promises to keep the public updated on monster news, "from microscopic space bacteria to giant woolly mammoths", but only working off of hard, scientific facts. If you ever doubted the world is filled with real monsters, click the link and be amazed. And while on the subject of 'real' monsters, the always awesome Pink Tentacle has posted a stunning piece on mummified demons! Click through and read for yourself... many photos are of obvious taxidermy 'gaffs', but what to make of this demon head (above) from Zengyōji temple? From the site, "Nobody knows where the demon head came from, nor how or why it ended up in storage. Legend has it that a resident priest discovered the mummy in a temple storage chamber in the early 18th century. Imagine his surprise." Oh, and did I mention it has a third face on the back of the head? Eeeek!

Secret Update

Blogging from LAX on the way home from 10 days of Secret Saturdays work. First, some good news... CN will finally start airing the rest of the first 26 episodes next month. A Saturdays marathon of the first 10 is set for April 5th, with the first new one premiering April 10th. From that point on, a new Saturdays episode will air every week until the big finale at #26. I really think the stories get bigger and better as we progress, so I'm hoping you'll dig what you see. And wait'll you get a peek at the new 10! Lots of surprises to come. It was great to see the cast and crew again. The actors were in fine form with the new material and easily slipped back into character (and into cracking everyone up with off-mic hilarity). We had a blast, as usual. On a related note, I don't think there's anything more flattering than finding out you've made a good first impression on a total stranger. Thanks Joel, and all the best in New Zealand!

Toyfair Pics

More pics of Secret Saturdays toys (from Toyfair) by the wonderful folks over at Cryptid Saturdays...

De Monsters

These short films featuring cute monsters interacting with real people in real settings are pretty awesome. The animators at Volstock Telefunken work on all sorts of other cool commercial animations in a variety of styles, too. Enjoy!

Tut-Update

Nothing going on as far as I know in regards to my old cartoon show Tutenstein. The Discovery Network is in the midst of a major rebranding, and there's no way to predict where the Tutenstein cartoon will fit into the mix. In the meantime, here's a German site with a huge slew of images for those of you who liked the little Mummy Boy.

Beating Hearts

Seems like a good time to point out to all you broken-hearted creeps like me that St. Valentine wasn't only the Patron Saint of love, but also of bee keepers, epilepsy, fainting, and plague. I plan to celebrate St. Valentine's day tomorrow by eating honey until I pass out. Since tomorrow is also about the mating of birds... a la Chaucer's lines, "For this was sent on Seynt Valentyne's day, Whan every foul cometh ther to choose his mate."... I also recommend a viewing of Hitchcock's The Birds. Bah Humbug.

Saturdays Action Figures!!!

A nice photo gallery of Mattel's Secret Saturdays toys on display at the NY Comic Con. I notice some broken bits and paint errors on a few of these promo models... but the firesword looks perfect! More toys to come soon, including large figs of the main cast and the Cryptipedia. Thanks to Dex and Actionfigure.com!

Lux Interior R.I.P.

The news appears to be true that Lux Interior, lead singer for The Cramps, has died. He was a truly 'cute creep', and I've been a huge fan for decades. When I was a rotten punk of a teenager my band The Stiffs were trying hard to bottle some of that amazing Cramps magic, but we should've known that nobody could touch the Cramps. Lux rocked it long and hard.

People I Like

Just found out that People Magazine named The Secret Saturdays one of "The Best Of The New Kids' Shows"!

Props To Geno!

Shout out to our lovable prop and FX wizard, Eugene Mattos, who handles a HUGE workload of Secret Saturdays stuff with unflagging enthusiasm. Love ya, Geno.

The Invasion Begins!

Welcome news from BoingBoing about a new art book devoted to the great Norman Saunders, a big favourite of mine as demonstrated by my old posts about his tranding card and pulp magazine paintings. This is a long-overdue celebration of a great, ghoulish, American artist, and I, for one, highly recommend it. Compiled by his son, David Saunders, the new 368-page book promises to be "The definitive hard-bound coffee table art book on the artist who created Mars Attacks, Wacky Packs, Batman Cards, Pre-Code Comics, Men's Adventure Magazines, Paperbacks, Pulps and countless icons of Pin-Ups, Monsters, Robots, Mayhem, Nazis, Aliens and Space Ships." Ahhh... how wonderful!