Halloween is all about candy — candy corn, candied apples, free candy, and sometimes even candy girls. It’s wonderful! Provided the shady neighbors aren’t slipping crack cocaine into the trick-or-treat bags or luring children into their drug dens, the prospect of free candy is truly a beautiful thing.

But I feel the need to pause for a moment. I mean, I can’t go on eating candy forever! That’s kid stuff. I’m almost twenty-three goddamn years old. It might be time to grow up and start thinking about being an adult. That, of course, means doing adult things like wearing a tie during the work week and eating a well-balanced diet.

And in case you’ve been out of the loop for the last bajillion years or so, a well-balanced diet starts with a nutritious, complete breakfast. Typing this phrase into the patented PEPSIBONES-INTERNET SEARCH ENGINE, I found the perfect foodstuff to get my day going:

Boo Berry.

The flavor is roughly equivalent to what you would be left with if you dumped a pound of blueberries into a bowl of sugar and then took them right out. The mascot is a (mentally challenged?) ghost with a hat. And, as stated in the 1973 advertisement posted below, Boo Berry is both nutritious and part of a complete breakfast.

I mean, seriously, what’s not to love?

Effective immediately, Boo Berry is to be recognized as the official breakfast of OCTOBERFEAST!

Ben Bishop is a sick artist out of Portland, Maine that I met at a Boston comic convention last year. Although strapped for cash at the time, Ben cut me a deal and I walked away with a sketchbook. I was so impressed by the work within that I ended up ordering Nathan the Caveman, his self-published debut. If you ever get the chance, check it out because it is an extremely strong first-effort, a genuinely affective love story spanning across the history of humanity.

But even if  you’d rather do yourself a disservice and not read Nathan the Caveman, you can still help out Ben Bishop. Ben is submitting a t-shirt design (as seen above) to Threadless.com. However, he needs votes in order to stand any chance  of having it  printed. As he stated in an email to his mailing list:

hey everyone, PLEASE help me out and VOTE on my TSHIRT DESIGN! if it wins it gets printed and sold and   i could get $2,000 , which i could REALLY USE! haha. its very simple, all you have to do is follow the instructions after this link! please please please. if you know anyone please have them vote as well! thanks so much!
http://threadless.com/submission/234157/killagorilla

—
– Ben Bishop

So there you have it. Help the dude out – he’s a great artist who deserves support (and could use some cash). Also, in case you couldn’t tell – that shirt design is fucking rad.

And if this Bishop’s t-shirt gets printed, maybe we could convince this Bishop to loan us his shirt:

Looking ahead to some of my tentative choices, I realized the concoction known as OCTOBERFEAST was beginning to seem a bit unbalanced. Yes, by its very nature Halloween lends itself more to heavy metal and horror movies than anything else. However, I feel like part of my duty is to create a seasonal dish that satisfies the demands of a more well-rounded palate.

Therefore, today’s part of the 31-course meal takes us  to the world of hip-hop. I spent some time searching for a good lyrical anthem geared towards Halloween but didn’t manage to find anything too amazing. (Note: If you know of a solid rap song explicitly about the holiday, please let me know). Fortunately, I wracked my brain (almost to the point of mental instability) and managed to conjure up a candidate: Jay-Z’s Lucifer.

While groovier than any of the double-bass riddled songs I’m going to submit later this month, this Jay-Z track is definitely evil enough for OCTOBERFEAST. I mean, it’s titled Lucifer…as in Satan or the Devil. C’mon, you know what I’m talking about – the motherfucking Prince of Darkness! The antithesis of all that is holy and righteous! God’s arch-nemesis! If for nothing else, the title of this song warrants its inclusion.

With that being said, it is also worth mentioning that a bit of controversy erupted over the song. Being gullible and unwilling to do any critical thinking, there were some individuals who argued that if played backwards (as in, “Paul is Dead”) Lucifer contains satanic messages. This pastor tried to demonstrate that reversing the track reveals the subliminal messages “Murder Jesus” and “666.”

In reality, I wish that Jay-Z really took it upon himself to hide satanic messages in his music. That shit would be sick. Unfortunately, even the most cursory internet research unveils the fact that the audible “Murder Jesus” and “666″ is the product of DJ Dangermouse’s Jay-Z/Beatles remix known as the Grey Album.

Sorry to disappoint, Reverend Bunghole — Jay-Z isn’t in cahoots with the Devil.

Last but not least, the tune is damn catchy. The Black Album is one of my favorite rap albums and this is one of the standout tracks. I was unable to find a live video of the song, but found yet another ridiculous slideshow; this time, the song is set to an array of renderings of Lucifer himself.

So even if you don’t usually dabble in hip-hop, give this video a peek. And rest assured – there is plenty of heavy metal on the way.

I consider myself a fan of movies. Granted, I’m no expert and I never went to film school, but I consider myself to be a step above the slack-jawed assholes who eat up any mindless drivel the studios produce. I think that I’m somewhere in between — not quite a cinematic snob, but certainly not a mere casual viewer.

With that being said, it is with a hint of embarrassment that I make my confession. Up until last fall, when it was required for a class, I had never seen Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho. I suppose part of my disinterest was rooted in the fact that I had (through top-ten lists and pop-cultural ubiquity) already viewed the shower scene and knew of the twist-ending. My justification for not watching Psycho was the assumption that although it was probably a decent movie, its reputation had probably been inflated over time.

I was wrong — way wrong. As I learned last autumn, Psycho is a truly terrifying film. Watching it in the darkened basement viewing room of my college, I frequently found myself looking over my shoulder, making sure no one was coming for me.

Unlike most modern horror flicks, Psycho is deftly built on suspense and an embracing of the unknown. The creepiness of the movie is not in masturbatory gore, but in waiting for an act of violence you just know is coming. And when it  comes it is fast, brutal, unrelenting, and unfocused — just as I imagine being stabbed to death would be.

Additionally, I also find Bernard Hermann’s score to be an integral part of Psycho. Lifting a paragraph from a presentation I gave, I like to make the argument that Psycho’s music represents the dueling components of Norman Bateman’s unstable conscious:

Another choice of the director that facilitates Psycho’s examination of conflicting mental subdivisions is the use of Bernard Herrman’s score. As evidenced in opening credits, Herrman’s score simultaneously makes use of beautiful, sweeping melodies and hauntingly harsh, accented, staccato notes. The two distinct musical accompaniments form Psycho’s theme as a whole, just as the conscious and unconscious are two parts of the same mind. With this in mind, it seems reasonable to suggest that a lack of melody from the film’s score signifies the absence of the conscious, and therefore an ascendancy of the unconscious. In essence, it is no coincidence that short, dissonant quarter notes with no melody complement the instances in which the conscious is most obviously overwhelmed by the unconscious.

Psycho is a rad movie. And even if you know the truth about Mrs. Bates or have seen the shower scene, you should check it out.

Now for your viewing pleasure — a decent fan-made trailer:

I didn’t give a shit about the Clash of the Titans remake coming out next year. And then I saw Liam Neeson rocking the fuck out as Zeus in this picture. Can you you say god damn awesome? Liam Neeson is the man. He was the shining spot of the shit-bomb prequels. Qui-Gon Jin was radical, even if he had to put up with snotty little kids and barren women named Shmi. Shmi. Then he kicked the crap out of everyone in Taken.

Now he’s rocking the hell out of ornate armor as my God of choice. You can have your pathetic Jesus, I’ll take my lightning bolt throwing Zeus, god of sky and thunder.

For this helping of OCTOBERFEAST, let’s play a round of Six Degrees of Separation:

1) Halloween is a night when kids and teens reign supreme.

2) Making the most of this single-night supremacy, many youths enjoy vandalism.

3) Perhaps the most popular act of Hallow’s Eve vandalism is that of smashing pumpkins.

4) The Smashing Pumpkins are an alt-rock group whose popularity peaked in the 1990’s.

5) The lead guitarist and singer for The Smashing Pumpkins is Billy Corgan.

6) In the mid 1980’s, Billy Corgan filmed himself trying to shred.

There we have it. I now present (mullet and all) a Billy Corgan guitar solo from nearly twenty five years ago.

Monsters are awesome.

Whether reading about them being chopped down in classics like Beowulf or watching them wreak havoc in new forays such as Cloverfield, there seems to be a timeless love affair with monsters. And my (admittedly limited) knowledge of world culture tells me this isn’t just an American lust — Puerto Rico houses the chupacabra, Egypt touts the mummy, and Japan…well, everyone knows about Japan’s contribution.

While I love watching monsters do their whole loathe/kill/destroy humanity thing, I find it a bit more enjoyable to watch them on their downtime. It’s like being a fan of a band — at a certain point, your respect for their work drives you  to become curious about their personal lives. This is nothing to be ashamed about.

Fortunately, with the 1960’s came The Munsters — a sitcom devoted to showing how monsters really behave.

In case you’ve never seen the show, the basic premise is as follows: a Frankenstein named Herman is in an interspecies marriage with a vampire named Lily. Somehow, these two have managed to procreate — resulting in their son Eddie, a werewolf. To appease his father-in-law’s racist skepticism of Frankensteins, Herman supports Grandpa by allowing him to shack up with them at the 1313 Mockingbird Lane residence. To top it all off, Lily’s superhot (somehow human) niece Marilyn lives with them too.

The Munsters helps us learn that monsters just regular people, uh, well, regular things like  you  and me.  Also, the show utilizes laugh-tracks and fast-motion, both of which are plus-signs in my rank book.

Oh, and don’t even bother waltzing in here with any arguments about The Addams Family even being a contender against The Munsters. One is a show about mythical beings living together and the other is about a bunch of damn freaks and perverts.

If I wanted to see that, I’d just eat dinner with my family.

I may be finally starting to lose my mind. For real. I’ve spent the early evening inside of a slightly metrosexual argyle sweater, listening to Led Zeppelin II and drinking beer. While I’m enjoying bathing in the autumn air pouring in from my open window, I’m starting to worry that I may start shouting out of it.

Luckily, I’ve made a promise to both Caffeine-Powered and myself to delivery a weekly beverage review, so any open condemnations of society will have to wait. It is time to talk about beer and nothing is more important than that!

This week, I repealed my declaration against seasonal brews. Still leaving the hay-themed pumpkin-flavored whatnots to others, I picked up a six pack of Gritty McDuff’s Halloween Ale. Yes — I am a sucker and the label with a decapitated head is what initially sold me. Fuck, we’re in the beginning of the goddamn OCTOBERFEAST and I can’t help but get excited by horror-themed promotions.

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You have to appreciate the sort of shitty, douchebag business model that Capcom pushes. There was already a total uproar over Resident Evil 5’s multiplayer modes being sold as DLC instead of being packaged on the disc. And now? Grease up your butts, they’re releasing Super Street Fighter IV as a full retail release. What does SSFIV bring to us gamers?

Via Kotaku:

Capcom today have announced Super Street Fighter IV, a new, standalone title which is Street Fighter IV with eight new characters added and some tweaks made based on community feedback.

A full retail release? For eight new characters? You have to be fucking kidding me. I find it mind boggling that they need a full retail release for eight new characters and some “tweaks” – a beautifully nebulous and indistinct term – while companies like Bethesda offer new episodic content for $12.50. Don’t fucking fret, Capcom has their asses covered. Tell us Capcom, why can’t you release this as DLC?

Ono says the changes are so extensive that they couldn’t just be tacked on, so a disc release was necessary.

Really? Really? Really? I’d like to spin kick whoever believes that shit. Anyone who has played WoW knows the sort of stuff they can do via downloads and patches. The entire game can be remade for Christ’s sake. But these nebulous tweaks can’t be sold through Live! or PSN?

But don’t worry, it probably, maybe, certainly wouldn’t be full price. Apparently it’ll come with some sort of reduced price, and get this, an as-of-yet unannounced, special treat for people who own both the original SFIV and SSFIV.

Here’s hoping it’s some salve, for the bruised ass Capcom is going to leave you with.

Ghostbusters II is an absolute cinematic masterpiece. No other film provides quite a perfect blend of humor, science fiction, horror and (of course) Ernie Hudson. Thinking about it now, I realize that I have probably watched this movie from start to finish more than any other. The sequel to Ghostbusters is an important part of my life and I hope that it is for you as well.

But just in case it isn’t, I’ve decided to use OCTOBERFEAST to persuade you. A little known fact is Ghostbusters II features Bobby Brown’s On Our Own, known to critics and thespians everywhere as the all-time greatest song in a soundtrack. Yes, even before marrying & ruining Whitney Houston, Bobby Brown was doing fantastic things.

For your viewing pleasure…And to help you prepare for the impending invasion of ghouls and ghosts…

Bobby Brown’s On Our Own — set to a terrible slide show of still shots from Ghostbusters II: