hans moleman productions presents…

MY SIMPSONS BLOG!!!

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As long as I could remember The Simpsons was one of those staple shows I would watch as a child. Even though the content was never really geared towards kids; if it was in cartoon form I was totally into it.

I even formed interesting friendships in middle school over the Simpsons. During the summer of eight grade my friends and I were really into three way calling and prank call people.

That summer my days away from school would consist of this: I would call my good friend at the time in the morning and we would pick  up our middle school phone directory and prank call everyone in it. We would spent countless hours everyday on the phone either talking to each other or prank calling others with our three way calling. However we kinda made a boo-boo with one person we called. We usually block our number when we would call people to prevent people from knowing who call them or to call one of us back but we forgot to block our number with this person. So the person called us back…. and needless to say they REALLY annoyed by our prank call.

However after we explained our summer boredom to that person and that is why we were doing the prank calls the person was really understandable and started to call us too. He also had an older brother which also joined our conversations and he really liked the Simpsons. So we would have mini phone dates when the Simpsons came on. We would also make sure that we would be on the phone at six pm (that was when the Simpsons reruns would show) and watch the show together. We would not say much during the show but once the commercials came on we would all discuss what happen or ask questions and as soon as the commercial break would end it would go back to silence and repeat for the rest of the hour.

 

Needless to say I have a deep admiration for this show and have been an avid viewer for the past eighteen years. I tend to prefer the older episodes or the classics shows more then the newer episodes. I feel like the are reusing the old ideas and formulas from the classics episodes and revamping them into the newer seasons.

I have so many favorite characters from the show that it is hard to keep a list in my head. I tend to like the lesser known or not as popular characters. I really like Bart Simpson because I feel like out of all of the central characters he is the one that has the most cult following. Bootleg Bart is very popular and a huge part of pop culture history.  A lot of artists in the 90’s used Bart as a character to express injustice or to poke fun as the world events that surrounded the masses at the time. Does anyone remember Bartmania or Bartman?

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They even make the DVD packing to their seasons fun and stand out from the crowds of other TV shows DVD’s.

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I also like to incorporate my interests in my wears so if I see any Simpsons related merch that has a fashionable flair to it I am all over it!

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I think my most favorite Simpsons item that I own is this keychain I got from Universal Studios. I find it totally relate-able because when I was little and used to go to theme parks that one thing I always wanted to get was something with my name on it. And the stores at the park never did….

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Until Next time!

Midnight Movie Icons

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One Friday morning in April of 2008 I remember I was waiting in line for the annual Public Library Book Sale. I am kinda of a dork and like to hit book sales when they first open so you have or at least get first dibs on what you are interested in buying.

So when the doors first opened it was no surprised that the first section I walked quickly too was the Movie section. I saw the usual suspects on the shelf ( five million copies of Titanic, cooking videos, instructional  videos on how to check out library books and how to knit) but I always like to look around for movies that you usually do not get to check out at the library.  For some reason I noticed every year that I have gone to this particular book sale that whoever is in charge of putting the movies in the stacks likes to put the interesting stuff at the bottom racks. I am not sure if this is just by chance or they are saving them for themselves. In any rate that’s where I start my search and that year I was lucky enough to find two gems. One movie was called “Killer Nun” starring Anita Ekberg and the other one was a documentary called “Midnight Movies.”

I remember hearing about this documentary  before from a friend (plus it got major points for cool ever art!) So it was the first thing I watched when I got home from the sale. It is directed by Stuart Samuels and it talks about a range of low budget movies in the 1970’s that gained a cult status. These showings were at midnight; they would play for months, sometimes years at the same time.

The following movies are Midnight Movie Icons:

El Topo

Night of the Living Dead

Pink Flamingos

The Harder They Come

Eraserhead

The Rocky Horror Picture Show

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A lot of these movies have huge followings. I have been to a lot of midnight movies over the years and I have seen a lot of hardcore fans at these screenings. Some people will dress up as their favorite character from the movie, sing to the soundtrack or recite every piece of dialogue from the movie. In many cases they will do all three.

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The main point of going to midnight screenings (well at least from my point of view) is to have fun, let loose and be part of something special. You feel like a cool kid geeking out over things that you thought no one else was into.

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I feel like you haven’t live your life fully until you have gone to at least one midnight movie in your life. I kind of enjoy knowing the fact that someone shares my taste of seeing Pink Flamingos or Eraserheard a dozen or more times and does not get tired of it. These kind of movies are more than movies when you go to a midnight screening it becomes an experience.

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What is your favorite midnight movie?

 

Until Next Time!

Arrow Video arrows directly in my Film <3!

In early fall of 2013 I remember looking at my netflix’s saved queue and realizing that the titles from my saved queue section actually outnumbered my queue section. I decided to jot down a top ten list from my saved queue and look at other places like Amazon and Ebay to try and find physical copies of the movies.

I remember some of the movies on my list were: Possession, Phenomena, The Clowns

Possession was on the top of my list. I remember seeing stills from it and being really confused but intrigued. So I added it to my Netflix’s list earlier that year and it automatically went in the saved queue section. I waited and waited for months hoping one day that movie would pop into the queue section but no luck. I was getting bored with the movies I was receiving through Netflix’s so I decided if I found a copy of that movie just to buy it.

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I was so excited to have found a copy through Amazon and without hesitation I ordered it immediately. When I received it later that week I was so happy to have that movie in my hands that I literally dropped everything  else on the floor and ran to my blu ray player put and popped the movie in. I sat down….. andthen nothing happen except for a screen that popped up and say INVALIDED REGION CANNOT PLAY.

I was confused what does even mean??!?!? I went to google to find out. As much of a film lover that I am I had no knowledge about DVDs and BLU RAYS having different region codes: some had numbers and letters; some had a combination of both. In order to play these movies with different regions I had to get a region free player. So the more research I did about a month later I settle on a blu ray region free player that could be multiple regions and was so TRILLED to be able to watch this movie.

I told one of my Instagram friends about finally being able to watch this movie with the region free player and he was like ” You made a great investment…Now you can start getting Arrow Video movies!” I had no idea what Arrow was at the time so I looked it up. I went to their website and saw the roster of movies that they had on their label. Needless to say how impressed I was with their list!

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Arrow Video is one of the coolest movie labels ever! I am rarely disappointed with their blu rays and dvds. Everything from their cover art, to their the movies are release is every cult movie lover’s dream! It makes want to watch all of there supplements and display them as work of art rather than shoved them in a corner somewhere. This label has introduced me a lot of movies I have never heard before like Society, Spider Baby and Lifeforce.

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They also have brought out a lot of my favorite movies like Killer Klowns from Outer Space, Videodrome, and Black Sunday. They are the kind of label that by cover art alone it just makes you want to get the movie even if you never heard of it before. I feel fairly confident when I blind buy a movie from arrow video because I know I am getting something weird and unique that I probably will not regret seeing and having as part of my movie collection.

Future Releases from Arrow Video that I am looking forward to:

Return  of the Killer Tomatoes

Slugs

Microwave Massacre

Dead in Drive In

Matinee

Crimes of Passion

What future titles are you looking forward too?

 

Until Next Time!

 

 

 

I want my Old Mtv!

When I was growing up one of the main things that my dad was vocal about in having in our house was cable TV. Having that box hooked up to our TV brought us countless hours of pure entertainment. It brought my dad and mom all the sports, news, and Spanish channels, my brother could stay up all night and watch the late night movies (USA and TNT were his choice late night fare) and HBO or Cinemax and my sister would come rushing from school and turn on  MTV.

My first interaction with the channel was when I was seven years old. I was home from morning kindergarten and was watching PBS ( for some reason I was really into British comedies when I was little) and I vividly remember watching “Are you being Served?” and just heard Mr. Humphries say: “I’m free!” when I noticed the channel have been changed on me to this image:

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My sister said to me “I’m taking over the remote! You can stay if you want or go outside.” I decided to stay since going outside and being with nature was not really my thing (nor was running or jumping) . My sister was really into this one show called “Remote Control” I remember it kind of reminded me of a pop culture version of “Jeopardy” but with comfier looking sofas and

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a way better set. This was her daily ritual after school was to torment me and then afterwards watch this show. After that show was done and the lack of motivation to move from my sofa I decided to continue watching MTV way after my sister left the room and started watching the music videos. That is where I was first introduce to early 90’s hip hop, alternative music and early grudge music. It was then and there that I started watching less PBS and more MTV.

It was not until I started getting older and becoming more of an impressionable youth. I did not fully get hooked onto this channel until I came across this show:

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I would often stay up late and watch a lot of grow up cartoons without realizing it was not meant for children. But these segments were different, short and most of all weird!

One cartoon in the series that really caught my eye was a big guy, he was a bit of a loner and purple all over….

No it was NOT Barney it was THE MAXX

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He was my favorite segment on Liquid Television and I thought he was as awesome as Swamp Thing!  A close second in my list of favorites in the Liquid Television world was Beavis and Butthead and Dangerous Puppets.

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Watching MTV opened up a a whole new world of weird but entertaining cartoons. The Head was also a huge show for me.

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After those shows were cancel I thought nothing would replace such awesomeness but then I found other series like Daria and Celebrity Deathmatch. Those two shows was a hot topic in middle school and early high school. It was hard to talk about anything else the morning after one of those  shows were on because it was just one of those things that made you cool. It became a middle school social status thing because you were allow to stay up late!

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Fast forward to today I do not watch a lot of MTV, I feel like it does not have the appeal of what it had when the channel first started out. Or maybe I am just out of touch with the new MTV generation.

 

 

 

Until next time!

My late nights with the CryptKeeper

When I was about 11 years old  I thought it was really cool to stay up late on school nights, and watch TV. I had a thought in my head that all the cool forbidden shows were shown after the ten ‘o’ clock news. The kind of shows that I thought were extra special that they could not fit into the regular evening time slots. One channel that always seemed to delivered that promised for me was FOX.  At first I was a huge fan of this show called “STUDS”. I am not really sure why my 11 year old self was fascinated by a dating game show with a bunch of cartoon hearts  but I was and was always pumped up to watch it. Until one night I turned on the TV and saw this:

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And then I was introduced to this guy:

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I was confused for a second because I was thinking what happen to STUDS?! I was about to  turn off the TV until I decided to give this show a chance. I mean I was up late anyways and gulped down two cans of cherry coke so sleeping at that point was not an option…

My first thoughts about the show was that the Cryptkeeper was no Mark DeCarlo (the host of STUDS) but after watching the first two minutes of the show I felt like he had the same wit and humor as him. By the end of the show I was hooked! This show had everything to offer a great host, scary elements, dark humor and most of all it gave me another reason to stay up later at night! Which I thought was super cool! I quickly forgot about STUDS after the first week of watching this show and started to looked forward to spending my nights with the Cryptkeeper instead.

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However I did not learn until years later that they had a short run cartoon series and most importantly that a line of toys from the cartoon was out in stores to buy.

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I am slowly in the process of collecting most of the action figures from the cartoon show because even though I never watched it when I was little I still had nostalgic feelings about the HBO series. I am not sure how many kids would say that they spend a chunk of their nights with a funny and witty skeleton but I did!

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Until next time!

 

 

A Robot’s Guide to the Video Nasty…

And it’s time for Ro-bert’s Corner:

Hello Everyone! Ro-bert M. Verbot here and today I am here to talk about one of my  favorite subjects: Movies from the Video Nasty Era. During the early half of the 1980’s in the United Kingdom there were a bunch of movies that were considered really offensive and violent by bunch of a uppity people and religious groups. So they made a list of 72 films that were in violation of a something call the Obscene Publications Act 1959. Which basically meant that any kind of  material that the government consider improper (ie… anything with boobs, naked butts, gore, violence, and/or sexual) went to a review board to see if it was ok for the public to have.  For movies it was something called the Video Recordings Act (1984) which meant movies had to go into certain categories after being heavily reviewed and approved by those boards and if those movies did not fit in to any of those categories then it was illegal to sell or own those movies. Which stinks because I think a lot of movies on the list are awesome!

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In June 1983 the first list of video nasties (39 titles) was made known to the masses. The movies on the list got in big trouble and were prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act; which resulted these movies to become heavily edited or just banned throughout the United Kingdom.  Which means it was impossible to buy or rent a copy ( I cannot imagine what my robot life would be like if I could not rent or buy movies like The Deadly Spawn!) It also caused some people to go to jail or go into debt because they were massively hit with fines for wanting to sell and/or rent horror movies!

The book I have next to me have really cool posters of the first 39 films that were on the list:

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(Look how badass that Blood Bath poster is!  Small side note: The Beyond is one of Clarissa’s favorite movies.)

I did not know much about the Video Nasty Era until Clarissa showed me these two documentaries:

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I recommend both of these documentaries because it taught me a lot about these movies. It is chalk full of information and the interviews on it are great. They even have trailers for all of the Video Nasty movies. After watching these two docs I have made a long list of  movies to watch.

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Here are some movies I have watched so far from the full 72 Video Nasties list. I want to try and watch all of the movies from the list this year. But the two movies pictured next to me below are probably my favorite so far from the list.

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What is your favorite movie from the Video Nasty Era?

What movie do you want to watch from the list?

My top five are:

The Love Butcher

Mardi Gras Massacre

The Werewolf and the Yeti

Midnight

Nightmares in a Damaged Brain

 

This is Ro-Bert M. Verbot saying until next time! (*Beep* Boop*)

 

 

 

 

Do you like Records?

Collecting soundtracks did not become a thing with me until about three years ago. I had collected so much horror and cult movies items over the years like posters, movies, books etc. that for some reason soundtracks did not enter my world until I saw this movie:

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Videodrome was weird, it was scary but I thought it was a wonderful movie. After watching this film it made me an instant Cronenberg fan. However I asked my horror/cult movie loving friends about getting this soundtrack and they more or less told me that it was nearly impossible to track down the vinyl soundtrack . I made it a life mission to track this down; the images as well as the music in this movie is very haunting and I could not get it out of my mind. Howard Shore truly made a score that gave me chills in the best possible way imaginable.

I went to every record store within a reasonable driving distance almost every week for about eight months and no luck. Until by chance I stopped by on a whim after work to my favorite record store: Record and Tape Exchange in Virginia. As usual I headed towards soundtrack section and no luck that had more copies of Barbara Streisand movies that I have ever seen in my life! Then I decided to look at the laserdisc section to shake off the Streisand vibes of the soundtrack section and that is where I SAW IT!…for $15 dollars. Both vinyl and sleeve was in EX shape that I thought I was dreaming! It was one of my best purchases ever!

That soundtrack was the starting board of me wanting to get more horror movie/cult soundtracks:

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I started compulsively going to local record stores afterwards. Websites like Ebay and Discogs became my best friends.  Even Amazon.com because a better acquaintance to me after I started purchasing vinyl. I had friends through social media help me a lot too, keeping an extra eye out for me or letting me know if any came on sale on the internet of the soundtracks I was looking for and could not find locally or at all. The condition of the sleeve and the grading of the vinyl become a top priority in my purchasing choices in terms of my horror/cult movie selection.

I made a wish list of the top soundtracks I really wanted and it felt like an achievement once I found it and had it in my hands. Every time I did a mental check off that list I gave myself a mental high five in return.

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I kind of prefer the older pressings rather than the new pressings that have recently come out unless if that particular soundtrack never had another pressing.

Although I am a huge fan of Waxwords records, deathwaltz records, Poisoned Mind Records and other indie record labels. I think it is amazing what they are doing; the cover art and work they put into making these are spectacular.

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I do not have a favorite in my vinyl soundtrack in my collection because each one has a different story and reason as to why I have it. I just know that I having these soundtracks make me appreciate the horror and cult movie genre even more.

 

 

Until Next time!!

Ro-bert M. Verbot: The coolest bot in town

Hello my name is Ro-bert M. Verbot I am a cousin of Omnibot by Tomy and I was born in 1984.

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I am also co-author of this blog and friend of Clarissa (aka Lady.Cult). I wanted to introduce myself and tell you a bit about myself:

I LOVE horror, sci fi & cult movies. These are some of my favorite movies in the pile next to me. These have been watch over and over again to death!

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My favorite TV show is Twin Peaks mostly because David Lynch is my favorite director. I like to kick back and dig into a bag of chips:Cool Ranch Doritos is my chip of choice. Yum!

Who else gets chills when they heard the opening theme song? It ends up getting stuck in my Verbot brain for days! My favorite character on the show is Special Agent Dale Cooper; I think he is a total badass and loves to eat doughnuts and pie as much as I do!

I am probably the only Verbot who is very excited about the return of the show in 2016 or 2017 but I know many humans (especially Lady.Cult) are very excited about it as well.

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I enjoy talking and showing my friends about anything horror movie related that I come across in Clarissa’s collection. Yesterday I showed them this cool book I found about  The Video Nasty Era. It has tons of rad pictures of video covers from movies that were banned in the United Kingdom in the 1980’s

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In my spare time when I am not watching movies or doing Verbot things I like to listen to horror movie soundtracks on cassettes and reading about Giallo movie history. I guess the good thing about being the Verbot is that I don’t need a cassette player to play is just use myself to listen to the music!

I also like reading horror classics! This is my favorite book ever because vampires are one of my favorite subjects to read. I also enjoy reading the Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice.

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This is one of my top ten favorite horror movie ever and I  watch this one at least once every month. Do you have a favorite movie that you watch all the time?

I cannot give away the next post I will be helping Lady.Cult with however here is a clue:

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Until Next time!!!

 

 

 

 

 

For the Love of Swamp Thing!

When I was about nine years old my parents decided to get cable TV. Thanks to this new addition to my household it exposed me to a lot of new channels; especially HBO. ” The Return of Swamp Thing” was the first movie I ever saw on that channel. That movie left me in awe of Swamp Thing. He was big….he was green. he had flowers and other things growing out of his body..he lived in a swamp… he kicked butt and he looked different from any other superhero that I had seen at the time. To me he was awesome!!! Every time I saw this movie on TV I would just stop what I was doing and watch it I think I must of watched this movie at least two hundred times. I felt like like I was getting a million pieces of my favorite candy at once once I saw Swamp Thing on the TV screen.

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It wasn’t until years later that I found out there was a movie that was made before”The Return of Swamp Thing” called “Swamp Thing”. (I know, I know I am little bit backwards in finding things like this out but I just took it as a learning experience.) And a short lived cartoon series  and the most important thing of all to me was…. SWAMP THING TOYS!!

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I had some Swamp Thing toys when I was little but my parents donated a lot of them so I spent my adulthood trying to find and buy the items I had when I was little. When I would get these packages in the mail I would opened them up and it instantly brought back warm Swamp Thing feelings  and memories from my youth.

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Even my robot: Ro-Bert M. Verbot is a fan of Swamp Thing! Here he is working on a Swamp Thing puzzle.

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The Swap Trap Playset and the soundtrack of Swamp Thing is probably my two most favorite things in my collection. I never had the Swamp Trap Play set or the soundtrack to the first movie growing up but  as I got older my adoration for Swamp Thing grew and it expand my palette in Swamp Thing merchandise.

Every time someone asks me who my favorite Super Hero is, I always say it’s Swamp Thing because he is a different and unique kind of personality. Kinda like me.

I have more Swamp Thing items in my collection (this is just a small portion). I do not thing I will ever stop collecting Swamp Thing items. You could say that I am Swamp Thing obsessed but we all have our vices when it comes to certain things mine just lives in a swamp.

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Until next time!