Welcome to the first day of 31 Days of Halloween here on Needless Things! We have all kinds of stuff in store for you guys this year, ranging from creepy to kooky to mysteriously spooky to gory and unforgettably disgusting. We’ll look at spooky toys, horror movies, and all manner of things that go bump in the night.
Halloween is one of my favorite times of year and I tend to dive into appropriate subject matter wholeheartedly. One of the cornerstones of the season has always been television. Once October rolled around, I would start making schedules of all of the creepy stuff that would be on – from the classic Halloween specials to horror movies to special Halloween episodes of shows like Knight Rider and Roseanne. If I missed the Halloween episode of one of my shows, it would haunt me the rest of the year (pun intended)!
As soon as I could get my hands on the Sunday paper, I
would pull out the TV listings (my dad wouldn’t spring for the actual TV Guide magazine and I don’t blame him
one bit) and plan out my week. I didn’t have my own VCR until I was twelve, so
there were sacrifices made. If The
Howling and Invaders from Mars
were coming on at the same time, I was going to miss one (Invaders from Mars, but mostly because that movie scared the crap
out of me).
Last year I replaced my thoughts on SyFy’s October
programming with some programming of my own. If I was going to complain about
SyFy all month long (though I do love the channel and admire the fact that they
program a full month of spooky stuff), I should be able to produce some television
schedules of my own. Thus, The Phantom Channel was born!
Once a week I will post a “page” from my own personal TV
Guide that will present twenty-four hours of Halloweeny movies, cartoons, and
TV shows. Rather than being goofy or providing my usual commentary, I have done
my best to mimic the dry style utilized in the TV listings magazine of my
youth. I’ve added an extra challenge in this year, as I am going to attempt to
work a theme into each day’s programming. Today’s theme:
INVASION
Morning
The US government
puts together a team of classically-inspired monsters to fight off an alien
invasion.(94 min.)
8:00 –Scooby-Doo,
Where Are You? “Spooky Space Kook” – Animated
Mystery Inc. encounter
a UFO at an abandoned airfield. (21 min.)
8:30 – Muppet Babies
“From A Galaxy Far, Far Away” – Family
An alien visitor
shows up in the nursery. (25 min.)
9:00 – Shirt Tales “The
Outer Space Connection/Brass Bogey” – Animated
Three of the gang are
launched into space and there is a mystery surrounding a statue. (22 min.)
9:30 – Courage the
Cowardly Dog “The Chicken from Outer Space" – Animated
Courage must foil an
alien invader. (22 min.)
10:00 – Courage the
Cowardly Dog “The Revenge of the Chicken from Outer Space" – Animated
The chicken is back –
now fried and headless. (22 min.)
10:30 – The Thing
from Another World – Horror – Margaret Sheridan, Kenneth Tobey
A US Air Force crew
finds terror when they discover a crashed flying saucer in the Arctic. (87
min.)
Afternoon
Murderous creatures
escape from an outer space prison and invade a small Kansas town. (82 min.)
1:30 – Duck Tales “The
Right Duck” – Animated
Launchpad causes a
Martian invasion. (22 min.)
2:00 – Darkwing Duck “When
Aliens Collide” – Animated
A seemingly harmless
extraterrestrial lands in St. Canard. (22 min.)
2:30 – Teenage Mutant
Ninja Turtles "Zach and the Alien Invaders" – Animated
The Turtles’ friend,
Zach, is sent to a military school where everything is not as it seems. (22
min.)
3:00 – Pinky and the
Brain “Plan Brain from Outer Space” – Animated
Brain contacts an
alien to help him take over the world, but the alien wants something else. (22
min.)
3:30 – The Real
Ghostbusters “Ain’t NASA-Sarily So” – Animated
The Ghostbusters
battle ghosts in outer space. (25 min.)
4:00 – GI Joe: A Real
American Hero “The Invaders” – Action
GI Joe must team up
with the Oktober Guard to stop COBRA from using UFOs to take over the world. (25
min.)
4:30 – The Tick “The
Tick vs. The Uncommon Cold” – Animated
The Tick must battle
the alien Thrakkorzog and also a cold. (22 min.)
5:00 – X-Men “The
Phalanx Covenant Parts 1 & 2”- Animated
The mutants must
fight off an alien race seeking to assimilate all life on Earth. (44 min.)
Evening
Cylons are loose on
Earth during Halloween. (90 min.)
7:30 – The Last
Halloween – Family
Aliens invade Earth
in search of candy. (25 min.)
8:00 – Monsters vs.
Aliens: Mutant Pumpkins from Outer Space – Animated
The monster team is
back to fight off a Halloween-themed invasion. (27 min.)
8:30 – The Simpsons “Treehouse
of Horror I” – Animated
Bart and Lisa
exchange scary stories on Halloween, including the introductions of Kang and Kodos.
(27 min.)
9:00 – Monsters “Parents
from Space” – Horror
Cindy’s abusive
foster parents have been replaced by aliens. But does she care? (22 min.)
9:30 – Monsters “Micro
Minds” – Horror
An astronomer and his
student make contact with an extraterrestrial being. (22 min.)
10:00 – Slither –
Horror – Nathan Fillion, Elizabeth Banks
Parasites from outer
space terrorize a small town. (95 min.)
12:00 – The Thing –
Horror – Kurt Russell, Wilford Brimley
A terrifying creature
is responsible for murder and paranoia amongst an isolated team in an Antarctic
research facility . (88 min.)
Late Night
The title says it
all. (88 min.)
3:00 – Invaders from Mars
– Sci-Fi – Karen Black, Hunter Carson
A boy must try to
save his town from a Martian invasion. (82 min.)
4:00 – Amazing
Stories “Fine Tuning” – Adventure
High school kids make
contact with aliens who turn out to be fans of 1950s television.(25 min.)
4:30 – Amazing
Stories “The Main Attraction” – Adventure
A high school student
gets caught in a meteor shower that makes him magnetic.(25 min.)
That’s my first day of
Halloweeny programming in the can! I hope you decide to watch a couple of these
selections and maybe even put together a viewing schedule of your own. Be
sure to join the Needless Things Podcast Facebook Group and
share your own awesome Halloween viewing schedules. We’d love to hear from you!
Also, follow Phantom Troublemaker on Instagram for the return of #monsteraday, where I feature a different
monster toy every day, all month long!
Until next time, stay creepy!
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