Batman Party Invitation

It’s July 13th which means The Dark Knight is only a short 5 days away! It will actually be shorter for those of you seeing sneak previews on Wednesday and Thursday. You lucky bastards! I’m trying to torture myself even more by waiting until noon on Friday, but that’s how I’ve done it since Batman Returns. For the Batman premiere in ’89 I had to wait until my parents could bring me so I couldn’t go until a packed evening showing. I’ll never forget that night because it was so unbelievable to me. Even before the movie started there was this feeling of excitement going through the theater. The theater we went to in town had lines wrapped around the building to buy tickets and each showing was sold out. Several years later the the theater turned into an Office Max. Apparently now it’s going to become an Irish Pub. Damn real estate! That building should be listed on the historic registry as “THE BUILDING WHERE JAY SAW BATMAN ON OPENING NIGHT IN 1989.”

As Casey Kasem used to say….”And now…On with the Countdown…”

I already covered Batman birthday cakes so far in the Dark Knight Countdown so now let me backtrack to the invitation. This is a Batman party invitation from 1989 which I kept as part of my collection. This is the comic book version of Batman who I grew up with. I always loved this version of Batman the best especially since I was introduced to him way before the Tim Burton version was even thought of. All throughout Batmania of the late ’80s and early ’90s this was still the “go-to” Batman who appeared on everything from t-shirts to party plates to puffy stickers. Forget about continuity, Batman wore gray and blue in the comics and black whenever he was on the big screen.


Garfield and Odie as Batman and Robin

Although I had several Garfield books and watched his specials on TV, I considered myself more of a Heathcliff fan at least when he was with The Catillac Cats. Garfield always seemed way more iconic and popular than Heathcliff but Garfield was hit or miss. Recently, I’ve come to realize that I have two things in common with Garfield, our love of lasagna and dressing up as Batman.

Transformation Fascination

The other day I had a revelation. I realized that since I was a kid I always enjoyed watching the transformation of a character in TV or movies. I can’t say for sure which transformation I witnessed the earliest but I know that it’s all derived from the Jekyll & Hyde theme. There’s always been cartoons like Looney Tunes, O.G Readmore, and others that have featured characters transforming into and evil one. In other instances a hero would transform from a normal everyday person into a Superhero like Clark Kent running into a phone booth to come out as Superman. Those montages always had great appeal to me so I searched You Tube to feature some of the best transformations right here. There’s many more so feel free to leave a comment with some of your favorites!

Probably one of the most memorable transformations belongs to the Incredible Hulk:

Here’s what happens when Barbara Gordon opens her secret revolving wall…

I can’t leave out Michael J. Fox’s “changes” in Teen Wolf. Also, Michael Jackson’s transformation into the werewolf in Thriller is classic.

The forming of Voltron!

Prince Adam becomes He-Man:

Mumm-Ra, The EVER LIVING!

Halloween 1981

Last weekend I was looking through a box of old photos from Halloween’s past. These pictures become time machines for me. I came across quite a few that were taken at school during Halloween parades or just in the classroom. The one I’m posting today actually has nothing to do with me at all. This is Halloween 1981 and my sister dressed up as one of her favorite characters Holly Hobbie. The Wikipedia entry mentions that Hobbie was popular throughout the ‘70s, although I know for a fact she still held her own through the early ‘80s as well. Even though I was a little kid during that time I remember my sis loving Holly Hobbie.

In this photo my sister was one of the Holly Hobbies way in the back row. The Holly Hobbie closer to the front was actually “Evil Holly Hobby.” You can tell because she’s the one looking pissed off with her arms folded grumbling some crap about another girl dressing up as the same character. With more scrutiny we can see a lot of superhero representation here. There’s a possible Wonder Woman to the right of my sister in the back whose head is behind the kid with the red cloak. There’s a roaring Incredible Hulk in the front and then another poor Hulk stuck in the back biting his nails. He seems worried that he’s not as good as the proud ferocious Hulk who demands the spotlight. We can also pick out a few Spider Man costumes, a Superman, a kickass vintage Yoda costume, and finally an awesome Darth Vader with his mask up…dammit!
Leaving out the kids that make me giggle would be a crime. How about the little Asian boy with a cowboy hat on? (WWE fans: Is that Jimmy Wang Yang? was he foreseeing the future?) Is it even a cowboy hat? I totally don’t want to sound wrong but who are the kids in the front with the sheet over their head with their hats on supposed to be? The one in the front row’s face is being obstructed by the Incredible Ham Hulk who is raping the camera. You also can’t miss the innocent, friendly looking Snoopy. He doesn’t seem like that sarcastic, mischievous Snoopy we know from the cartoon. The ever-living Strawberry Shortcake makes an appearance as well as a nurse (yay).

Perhaps the winner for most enigmatic costume is the young New York Giant on the bottom left who is donning a #33. I have no idea who #33 was on the Giants back in the late ‘70s or early ‘80s. I’m going to assume that it was a generic N.Y Giants children’s costume with a random number on it unless one of the awesome Sexy Armpit readers can provide me with some answers! Lol. Oh, I saved the very best for last. On the right side, attached to the railing… is that a clown with an enormous fro, or is this supposed to be a character of some type?
I hope you enjoyed looking at some of these old-school costumes. Do you have any memories of these? If so, drop a comment! Especially if you know who the blonde guy is with the stars on his shirt. Evil Knievel? One of the Duke boys? I have a lot more Halloween related material coming your way here at TheSexyArmpit.com so stay tuned and as always, I appreciate you stopping by!