2020

There were 136 posts published in 2020 (this is page 5 of 20).

Shocktober Day 15: “Haunting of Taylor House”

Home Improvement – “Haunting of Taylor House”

Season 2, Episode 6
Airdate: October 28, 1992

I do not have a ton of nostalgia for Home Improvement or Tim “The Tool Man” Taylor, but this episode did bring me a comforting sense of nostalgia nonetheless. For as many hokey jokes you see here and there, there is something about this episode that feels very close to a kind of middle-class suburban version of Halloween that I remember as a kid. I wouldn’t say this is a great episode of television or anything, but it does capture the harmless fun of Halloween quite nicely. I’d say the low stakes comedy of Home Improvement feels pretty well-suited for a holiday where both kids and their parents get to embrace their inner trickster.

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Shocktober Day 14: “The Boogieman”

“The Boogieman” – Quantum Leap (1990)

Season 3 – Episode 5
Air Date: October 26th, 1990

When I was a kid Quantum Leap was the show I watched when I was sick. I never sought it out. I would just be there on the couch, flipping channels, only to stumble across another one of Sam Beckett’s time-traveling adventures. What’s great about Quantum Leap is every episode is an easy-in. You can watch basically any random episode and enjoy the show. You can just watch the opening credits and you’ll get it.

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Shocktober: Marc Summers’ Mystery Magical Tour

Marc Summers’ Mystery Magical Tour (1988)

Marc Summers’ Mystery Magical Tour, also known as the “Mystery Magical Special,” was a special aired by Nickelodeon in 1988 and then through the mid-nineties. Marc Summers’ popularity is difficult to explain by modern standards, but the important thing to know is that he hosted a game show called Double Dare that helped put Nickelodeon on the map. I guess he was sort of like the Eighties’ equivalent of Scott Rogowsky, if kids were actually interested in his post-HQ Trivia career. But if those kids tuned into Mystery Magical Tour hoping to get their usual dosage of green slime, they were in for a rude awakening.

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Shocktober: Mr. Boogedy

Mr. Boogedy (1986)

After watching the 45-minute Disney Sunday Movie Mr. Boogedy, I hopped online to do a bit of research for this post. One of my favorite resources, Wikipedia, describes the movie as “a 1986 made-for-television family film and failed pilot.” It’s that second part that stood out. I had to look elsewhere to find more details, but it turns out the spark that little the fire that screams boogedy, boogedy, boo was a failed horror parody starring Cheech & Chong. Like, Scary Movie way before Scary Movie. That film fell apart at Columbia but was resurrected by Disney in an attempt to get a series going. Which makes me think the accidental humor in Mr. Boogedy isn’t accidental at all.

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The Pick: The Dead Zone

The ice is gonna break on this episode of The Pick! As this episode makes clear, we’d really like it if this line from the 1983 adaptation of Stephen King’s The Dead Zone became a classic movie line. So what better way for that to happen than more people being aware of this movie? It may not be the flashiest movie in David Cronenberg’s filmography, but it’s certainly a solid one that we have a pretty good time talking about. Much like this film’s brand of horror, we try to keep our Christopher Walken impressions restrained, but sometimes the ice just has to break.

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Shocktober Day 9: “Halloween Candy” Tales from the Darkside

“Halloween Candy” – Tales from the Darkside (1985)

Season 2 Episode 5
Air Date: October 27, 1985

I’ve been watching a lot of Tales from the Crypt lately. So it was weird to take a break and revist its less celebrated predecessor. You see Crypt was a high budget HBO series with all star directors and A-list talent like Demi Moore, Brad Pitt, and Tom Hanks. While Darkside had guests like… Jerry Stiller, I guess? Darkside was never a big show. Nor a great show. But you can’t deny that it beat Crypt to the punch by six years and has surely earned its spot in horror TV history.

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