Zombie Babies Infect Spirit Halloween Product Lines

Being a horror fan, I naturally consider myself to be an aficionado of the Halloween holiday season. Nevertheless, my recent visit to a Spirit Halloween store revealed to me how far I am behind the times in recognizing Halloween awesomeness, an awesomeness that's so awesomely awesome that it's criminal for it to be limited to just one season. The awesomeness that I'm talking about is Spirit Halloween's line of "Zombie Baby" props and costumes.

Watch your back, Anne Geddes--they're coming to get you!

Sure, the fusion of horrific imagery and themes with children and things aimed at children has long been a staple of horror art, merchandising and storytelling. What Spirit Halloween has done is take this to a new level by providing a wide selection of props and costumes (some motorized, some not) that make little bundles of joy look like newborn nightmares. When I say "wide selection", I mean just that--it felt like all that was missing from Spirit Halloween's insane zombie infant inventory were replicas of the Crawler and Lurker Necromorphs from the Dead Space video game series. Click below to see a selection of Spirit Halloween Zombie Baby items that will add an extra layer of delirium to your Halloween festivities.

I suppose I could provide descriptions of each of these products, but I think that the products' pictures and names speak quite well for themselves. Obviously, Spirit Halloween put a lot of thought and effort into these, so much so that I'm surprised that they aren't being released as some kind of monster baby collectible figure line. They're like the spiritual successors to the Garbage Pail Kids card series from Topps, only gorier; you can even get "adoption certificates" for them. Here's a selection of the props:

 Snack Time Zombie Baby

Baby Fat Zombie Baby 

Stabby Zombie Baby (with battery-powered stabbing action)

Jugular Jimmy Zombie Baby

Evil Rag Doll (with bloody needle-gnawing action)

Hugh R. Tasty Zombie Baby

Thumb Sucker Zombie Baby (extra thumbs not included)

Brain Eata Zombie Baby

Isabella Zombie Baby

Agony Ann Shoulder Baby

For those of you who would prefer to get more interactive with the terrifying tykes, here are some of the "Baby Harness Spinner" costumes:

Go to the Spirit Halloween site to check out the full selection of Zombie Baby items. Some of the products have already sold out, so place your orders now while supplies last.

Dawn of the Dead Cupcakes

The Mrs. and I were visiting family over the weekend when one of the young geeks-in-training surprised us with a terrific Halloween treat: zombie cupcakes.

It's rare that a food item combines two things that I really love--zombies and pastry--but these cupcakes had it all. With pretzel sticks for arms, Tic Tacs for fingers, marshmallows for heads, and thick icing for skin, eyes, mouths and hair, these desserts of the damned can cause an epic sugar high that any horror fan would love. All that was missing were a few hapless gingerbread men (with sweet gumdrop brains) for these carnivorous confectionaries to terrorize.

Click below to see more pictures of this horde of undead delights.

What Every School Needs: A Zombie Survival Club

Last Halloween, I did a blog post about how Westlake Ace Hardware and the Center for Disease Control (CDC) were using zombies as part of their respective public outreach campaigns. Not wanting to be left out of the zombie apocalypse preparedness movement, John Deere Middle School in Moline, IL has created their own "Zombie Survival Club" in time for this year's Halloween.

According to the Quad-Cities Online news site, "Zombie Survival Club is made available through a partnership between Lights ON for Learning 21st Century Community Learning Centers and the Moline Public Library. ... The program was created by Jan Laroche, the teen services librarian who has an interest in Zombie movies and recognized the trends in teen literature about zombies. She says the club will focus on STEM lessons (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) in a fun setting. 'Zombie Survival Club is intended to be a lighthearted, activity based program that develops educational skills through a fun after school curriculum.'" Click here to read the full story, and you can see the video report about the club that aired on WTVR here.

From what I've read and seeing the video report, the Zombie Survival Club is a variation on the CDC's zombie apocalypse campaign that I wrote about last year that's aimed at a younger audience. While practical, real-life emergency survival information is incorporated into the club's teaching materials, you can't go wrong with an educational program where kids can proudly say, "We learned what weapons to use to kill some zombies."

Star Wars Flashback: Happy Halloween, Ben Cooper

This Halloween is going to be a damp, soggy one for me with Hurricane Sandy beating up the east coast, so I thought that I would warm my geeky heart with a trip down Halloween memory lane to a much simpler time. A time when Halloween costumes were easy to find and cheap to purchase. A time when a flimsy piece of molded plastic, a thin elastic strap, and an easy-to-tear vinyl suit bearing a copyrightable logo could pass for a Halloween costume. A time when Halloween itself was all but owned by Ben Cooper, Inc.

I don't know much about Ben Cooper, Inc. as a company, other than that it had the licensing rights to produce cheap Halloween costumes of just about any character you could think of during the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s. These costumes were everywhere when Halloween season rolled around, so much so that it became synonymous with Halloween itself when I was growing up. Talk to anyone around my age or older (or even slightly younger) and I'll guarantee that they've worn at least one Ben Cooper costume for Halloween during their lifetimes. Of course, I'm being modest--they probably wore several Ben Cooper costumes, since they were so easy to find and purchase. Thanks to Ben Cooper, Inc., even the most negligent and emotionally distant parents could provide their kids with a passable Halloween experience.

Looking back, I'm amazed at how much chutzpah Ben Cooper, Inc. had in its selection of characters to market as Halloween costumes. It even produced costumes based on the Rubik's Cube toy and Atari's Asteroids video game. (Click here to see RetroCrush's list of the worst costumes produced by Ben Cooper, Inc. and its competitors.) I kept my costume Ben Cooper selections limited to Star Wars--I had the costumes for Darth Vader and a Stormtrooper, in that order--and in honor of that, I've assembled a picture gallery of Ben Cooper Star Wars costumes based on pictures that I've found around the net. Not all of them are here--I couldn't find a decent picture of a Ben Cooper Yoda costume--but I found enough to let you know that we've certainly come a long, long way in terms of license Halloween costumes. Click below to see the gallery, including the Ben Cooper R2-D2 costume. (Yes, there really was a Ben Cooper R2-D2 costume. That's chutzpah for you.)

Darth Vader:

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Stormtrooper:

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Luke and Leia:

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C-3PO and R2-D2:

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Boba Fett:

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Chewbacca and other Star Wars aliens:

Check out other Ben Cooper, Inc. retrospectives at the Shroud of Thoughts blog, Retroland, PlaidStallions, and the Official Star Wars Blog.

Homemade, Life-Sized Monsters for Sale

As the saying goes, all good things must come to an end, even for a Virginia Beach area monster maker such as Georgette Gaynor. I’ve covered Gaynor’s previous monster mashes for charitable causes (see here and here) but after seven years of Halloween fundraisers, she’s turning in her mad monster making license and selling her horrific horde to anyone monster fan who is interested.

Gaynor’s collection consists of over 70 life-sized monsters and other Halloween props. All monsters are self-standing on a ten pound weighted base, and individual monster prices range from $45 to $100. The monsters are durable and have been crafted from quality materials, with a wooden base and an iron pole that supports the PVC-molded monster body. Both the heads and the upper chest are hard foamed, and most monsters have arms that can be posed to hold other objects. These monsters have been used in Halloween events such as the Foodbank Monster Walk in 2008 Seton House Masquerade Ball in 2009, and they’d be ideal for display in local haunted house events and in shops that specialize in horror-friendly merchandise (such as comic books and costumes).

Gaynor is selling the monsters individually, but discounts can be applied to the purchase of multiple monsters or the entire inventory. If you are interested, you can contact Georgette Gaynor at 757 467-5684 or at jgynr@aol.com. Click below to see a picture gallery of some of the monsters that you can add to your own collection.