Horribly Delayed

So sorry for the long wait between posts. I've been working hard on both the third drawing book (this one about Robots), and the Secret Saturdays cartoon, which became much more stressful and problematic once the Department Of Homeland Security refused me entry to the U.S. to oversee the production in person. Despite the fact that I'm not an employee of either Cartoon Network or the production company Porchlight Entertainment, and I was paying my own way down, I was harrassed, fingerprinted, and photographed at the border and a 'flag' was put on my passport preventing me from "trying to enter the States illegally in the future". All this because they felt I needed a work visa. Well why not just say so? I'm still steamed about it, especially since the recent news that our joint 'border security' effort requiring all Canadians and Americans crossing the boarder to show their passports was recently relaxed for Americans. Only Canadians need the extra scutiny, it seems. Sigh... At least I'm not the only one. After my Gitmo experience, I was told a multitude of other stories by fellow Canadians like myself who had been travelling back and forth from the U.S. for many years suddenly finding their rights and livelyhood under attack since the inaugeration of the DHS. Looks like Canadians are no longer welcome in the land of Freedom, folks. Their loss, I say. Unfortunately, the travel ban caused me to miss my seat at the Daytime Emmy Awards where my show TUTENSTEIN won it's second Emmy for Outstanding Special Class Animated Program. My wife had a dress picked out and everything. Oh well, c'est la vie. The production for the Saturdays in full-speed ahead, and looking great. I'll try and make this a bit of a production blog for the show whenever I find the time. Until then, stay spooky!

Farewell to the Main Masher

The man, the myth, the legend that is Bobby 'Boris' Pickett has passed into the big black. Link "He does the "Monster Mash" no more.
Bobby "Boris" Pickett, whose dead-on Boris Karloff impression propelled the Halloween anthem "Monster Mash" to the top of the charts in 1962, making him one of pop music's most enduring one-hit wonders, has died of leukemia. He was 69. Pickett, dubbed "The Guy Lombardo of Halloween," died Wednesday night at the West Los Angeles Veterans Hospital, said his longtime manager, Stuart Hersh. His daughter, Nancy, and his sister, Lynda, were at Pickett's bedside. "Monster Mash" hit the Billboard chart three times: when it debuted in 1962, reaching No. 1 the week before Halloween; again in August 1970, and for a third time in May 1973. The resurrections were appropriate for a song where Pickett gravely intoned the forever-stuck-in-your-head chorus: "He did the monster mash. ... It was a graveyard smash." He will be forever remembered as the creator of the most famous Halloween song of all time.. and any mad monster creator is an eternal friend of us here at Monsterama. Don't rest too well, Mr. Pickett!

Ogoh Ogoh!

Check out this wicked photo gallery of Ogoh Ogoh Monsters! These creepy and colourful Balinese sculptures are made out of bamboo and paper mache. Most represent traditional creatures from the underworld known as buta-kala, but modern Ogohs may also take on pop culture forms, including media or government personalities.

Read 'Em And Creep

Hey, fiends! The aforementioned books I've been working on are finally available for preorder. MONSTERS! is slated to lurch onto bookshop shelves in June. I got my preview copy, and it looks pretty swell, if I do say so myself. HEROES! is due out the same time, and ROBOTS! and MANGA! are coming out in January 2008. That's a long way off, and I guess it's a little early to be posting about these, but what the heck... I'm excited!

Omni-monster! Aieeeee!!!

Mmmm, Kaiju! Geozilla has created what he calls Kaiju Utopia, and I gotta tell you, it was hard to leave the place! Omni-monster is overflowing with cute, creepy vinyl. Just the sort of site to help you kill off a dozy spring morning.

Real Spooky Estate

If you're anything like me, a weekly blog about all things Haunted Mansion is essential. For those unfaithful of you out there who don't believe the subject could possibly merit that much discussion, I point you to the year-old Ghost Relations Dept., devoted to new, obscure or just plain odd information about the Disney Haunted Mansion's. It's just plain awesome!

Happy Happy Dead Dead

Know what I like? Drazen's quiet little Happy Undertaker comic strips. Really beautiful work.

The Full Monster

At midnight tonight, the complete Milton The Monster Show will appear on DVD for the first time, thanks to the folks at Shout! Factory. Don't be scared... the only frightening thing about this collection is the ghastly cover art. This four-disc set comprises the entire catalog of 26 episodes, each running about 22 minutes each, presented in its original full frame format. As if a complete clean print of one of my very favourite cartoons wasn't enough, we get cool bonus stuff like home movies of creator Hal Seeger appearing at the N.Y.C. Toy Fair to promote his characters! Here's a nice review over at DVD Verdict...

Starting to Sizzle

If you scoot on over to the Cartoon Network 'Upfronts' page and click on New Shows, you'll get a bit more buzz on my new animated series 'The Secret Saturdays', including something called a Sizzle Reel. Just ignore the doofy dude in the hat...

Awwww! Hell!

Good Ol' Devlie Thompson has been posting just the sort of stuff we here at Monsterama like to warm our cold hearts on-- juvenile horror drawings. You'll find Star Wars and Batman as well as more sketchy monsters on his blog.

Thimking about Dracenstein

THIMK was a rather awful 'MAD' rip-off that floundered for 6 issues in 1958-59. Following MAD's lead, they had a number of monster themed gags... convieniently located in a MAD-style 'Monster Section' (duplicated the following year by Archie's MAD HOUSE). The cool thing about THIMK is that their mascot, featured on nearly every cover, wasn't some doofy kid with a poop-eating grin-- he was a monster! Otis Dracenstein was actually pretty nifty. The humor centered on the fact that he was a horrible looking monster married to a normal wife with two normal kids-- and he was the kind-hearted one. The 'normal' folks were horrible freaks, and Otis had a gentle soul. It's really not so hilarious now (and probably wasn't then, either), but you must remember that these stories were published years before the Addams Family, Munsters and Bewitched TV shows made nice monsters as common as colds. This site has some cool background info on one of THIMK's contributors... clearly a horror movie fan! Bob Drews from THIMK's "Good Old Bob Drews Department" was also SIR RODGER, host of WTAE-TV's (Pittsburgh) 'Shock Theater' (1958-1962)! Here are some sample Otis pages...

Happy Monster!

So. I'm actually feeling pretty good for once (I'm sure it'll pass). And my pal Evan just made me even happier with this link to a wonderful tune called Clap Your Tentacles. I think I will, thanks.

More Saturdays for Monday

Here are some early impressions on the news of the new cartoon here and here. There's also been some negative blogging connected to the announcement concerning CN's live action experiments, and I want to reassure you all, this one's 100% cartoon!

THE SECRET IS OUT!!!

Yup, it's official. The show I've had in development for a year with the Cartoon Network (formerly known as 'CRYPTIDS') just got picked up for 26 half-hour episodes! You can read some early press here and here. The press release goes like this... "THE SECRET SATURDAYS: Jay Stephens has created a new comedy/action series, in which Doc, Drew and Zak Saturday are a family of world-saving adventure scientists called The Secret Saturdays. Living in a hidden base, they are part of a network of scientists who protect against all the hidden and terrifying things in this world. To The Saturdays, ordinary folktales aren’t just legends -- they are real-life mysteries and adventures. Traveling from the hot Gobi Desert to the icy Marianas Trench, they explore ancient temples and bottomless caves and tangle with twisted villains like the masked madman V.V. Argost and his half-human/half-giant spider." Here's hoping you'll dig it!

Casper collection

I'm sending you right back to Cartoon Brew to get the buzz on the new Casper The Friendly Ghost reprint collection. And I thought I was the only one who cared (now I know who's been outbidding me on ebay)! I'm really looking forward to this.

Farewell to Takamoto

Sad to report that the great Iwao Takamoto passed away a few days ago, leaving behind an incredible legacy of animated characters like Scooby Doo, Atom Ant, and the Gruesomes. Cute and creepy, just like we like 'em here at Monsterama, right ghouls? He'll be missed. Here's a link to a post from awhile back...

GeGeGe!!!

Thanks to Hino for pointing out that the long rumored and anticipated live action movie version of my beloved Gegege No Kitaro is due to debut this spring! Check out the two wicked trailers on the official Gegege no Kitarô site. The screenplay was written by Daisuke Habara, based on the super-awesome manga by Shigeru Mizuki, and it's directed by Katsuhide Motoki (Free & Easy series, Drugstore Girl). For those of you who need to catch up, Kitaro is a young half-yokai (goblin/spectre/monster) who lost his parents at birth. His father's soul lives in one of his eyeballs. Raised within the yokai clan, Kitaro keeps tabs on human society, and fights evil yokai monsters-- protecting virtuous human beings from these threats from the other world. For some reason, the filmakers have invented a human love interest for Kitaro. A high school girl named Mika is rescued by the uncanny Kitaro and gradually falls for him. Her character has been created specially for the film, although Kitaro did have a human girlfriend by the name of Yumeko-chan in the third animated TV series broadcast on the Fuji network from 1985 to 1988. Not that I'm complaining!

Bewitching Tricks

While on the subject of witches, here's a link to some fabulous Bewitched trivia, including altered Hanna-Barbera animation, lost theme music, and loads of bloopers.

Festival Hexe

What do you know? I guess sitting around on a runway in a crappy little airplane during a delay pays off sometimes. Otherwise I might have never read about Switzerland's Ski Witches. The The 25th Annual Belalp-Blatten Witches’ Race will be run January 21–27, 2007, and grew out of an old local legend of a drunken Witch from Blatten who turned into a raven and flew across the valley to hook up with some slutty sorcerer. Now bored of her nice, dull husband, she found him culling cherries from a tree when she returned and killed him by emptying her entrails into his eye. And now they have a fun all-ages ski to commemorate the story. Oh, and they get stinking drunk. I'm not making this up! The Witches’ Race ends in Blatten, exactly on the spot where the virtuous husband died-- apparently of accute entrail poisoning. More photos here.

El Frankenstein Jr.

Here are three beautiful Mexican trading cards from 1971 featuring Frankenstein Jr. from a Hanna-Barbera series. The airbrushy artwork is slightly wonky, but not as weirdly off-model as the British art I posted before. Enjoy...

Merry Christmas From Monsterama

Monsters! are coming

Another thing I've been busy with lately is a new series of books for kids about creating your own characters. Due out next summer from Lark Books, MONSTERS! Draw Your Own Mutants, Freaks & Creeps will be the first of four books written and draw by me to help stir up youthful imagination and get kids making up their own little weirdos. Next in line are HEROES!, ROBOTS!, and MANGA! But I know you want to see more monsters, right?...

Enter... KLAUBAUF!!!

In some regions of the Christian world, Christmas and St. Nick are't all sugar and spice. Last year I discussed the meanacing Krampus, now it's time for the Bavarian horror known as Klaubauf. St. Nikolaus is followed around by this hideous Yeti-esque fiend, a shaggy monster with horns, bells and dragging chains. They go door to door scaring the sin right out of the little Bavarian children with threats of switchings, kidnappings, and eternal hellfire. Saint Nick is the 'good cop'. I don't know about you, but this would definately make me want to be nicer to my siblings. And if you thought seeing a crowd of Santas as a kid was disturbing...

Cryptids Update

Ok, so the blog has lain barren for several weeks now, and I feel just terrible about it. What, I ask you, is life without monsters? My good excuse is that I've been busy with a number of creeptacular projects. I'm still waiting with baited breath to get the official word from Cartoon Network regarding the previously blogged Cryptids project. I'm supossed to know by January. Anyway, I'm back at Monsterama now, so you can dry up those tears.

I Sure Do Dig Halowe'en

Well, tonight's the big, evil party. Hope you have a sugar-buzzed blast! I'm proud to say that both my kids chose to be vampires this year. No namby-pamby princesses or pirates for our house, no sir! Genuine undead only, if you please. My DRAWN! comrade and fellow weirdo Ward Jenkins seems to have had the right spirit from an early age. Chills the heart, it does. Ahhh. And I see young Ava is growing up nice and weirdly, too, just like my spawn. Know what else makes me happy? J. Deitrich and his Nouveau- Finko art. High octane heaven, man. Reminds me of ye old hotrods of yesteryear... One more all hallowed thought. I really think they made the movie about the wrong Ghost Rider. But that's maybe just me.

Monster Music

Dr. Mysterian not only offers to tell you the future, he also brings you a devilish collection of scarce and scary recordings.

The Golden Age Of Monsters

Fun reflection on the '60's monster craze."Monster Mania had such widespread cultural infiltration during that decade, even publications like Time and Life devoted articles to the phenomena. To many who experienced it first hand, it remains a defining moment of 1960s youth, along with the Beatles, the Batman television series and - much later in the decade - Woodstock, the Moonwalk , LSD and Free Love."

Mr. Addams

Here's a lovely review by cartoonist Edward Sorel of the new book Charles Addams: A Cartoonist’s Life, by Linda H. Davis. My favorite bit? "As anyone might easily have deduced from the way Addams drew children, he loathed the idea of having any. Although genuinely in love with his first wife, Barbara, he refused to have a child. “I am my own child,” he explained." I'm also impressed in regards to his encounter with Veronica Lake. She was the cat's pyjamas.

Full of Seeds

If you're looking for loads of spooky scans from old children's magazines, graveyard photos, McDonalds Halloween ephemera, and a picture of an old theater showing the Vault of Horror (and, really, who isn't?) Plastic Pumpkins is your next stop.

Two Weeks To Go!

How Groovie, Goolies!

Oh my lord, they're back. The campy, cute, and creeptacular Groovie Goolies are available on DVD! For those of you unaware of this 1970 Filmation cartoon and it's charms, the Goolies were a large group of hip, singing monsters, featuring pop-culture echoes of classic Universal Studios creatures, including Frankie, Wolfie, Mummy, Drac, Dr. Jekyll-Hyde, Bella La Ghostly, the kids Batzo and Ratzo (my favorites!), Bonapart, Hagatha, Broomhilda, and Hauntleroy. They originally debuted as co-stars alongside recently discussed Sabrina the Teenaged Witch, and, yes, they put out a few pop songs.
BCI has this to say in their press release... "They were the grooviest, most eclectic array of animated monsters ever to hit the small screen in the early ‘70s. Now, thanks to BCI, the latest series from the Filmation catalog will be available on DVD on October 24th with the release of “Groovie Goolies- The Saturday Mourning Collection”, featuring sixteen digitally remastered episodes."
Now, 16 episodes ain't bad, but I'm still waiting for a decent print of the the truely bizarre cartoon mash-up that was Daffy Duck and Porky Pig meet the Groovie Goolies. So bad you know you desperately want to see it as much as I do!