Sludge Central

The Demon of Mountainside and the KISS/Wrestling Crossover

Posted on September 25, 2013 by sexyarmpit

One my friends used to always pose a theory to me that he formulated about the crossover appeal of KISS and professional wrestling. He used to swear that every KISS fan was also a pro-wrestling fan and vice versa. I’d have to agree with him, but it’s not an absolute. Of course, they have many elements in common such as theatrics, both properties put on an entertaining spectacle, they both have legions of loyal fans, they both feature people in costumes, as well as incorporate colorful lights, loud music, and pyro. But, unbeknownst to him, only a couple of years before he hypothesized about KISS and wrestling fans, the two worlds merged for a brief moment in time.

When Gene Simmons from KISS struck a deal with then head of WCW, Eric Bischoff, to create a KISS inspired wrestler, it seemed like a such a logical mash-up at the time. For the crossover KISS/wrestling fans, this was literally a dream come true. After all, KISS was a band of four larger than life characters that translated seamlessly into comic books, but putting them in the squared circle was uncharted territory. It sounded good on paper.

It also sounded great to the crossover fans. In fact, just thinking back to when The Demon wrestled in WCW, as much as I didn’t enjoy WCW’s product, it was pretty thrilling for me to see a Gene Simmons gimmick in my other favorite universe, the world of professional wrestling. With all the lame gimmicks in wrestling through the years including a garbage man, a plumber, and a rooster, having a KISS Demon was actually far from lame. To those who weren’t familiar with KISS at the time, they probably thought the Demon was supposed to be some Satan worshipping fiend from beyond the gates of hell. Both are appealing in their own way.

Meanwhile, the Mountainside, NJ-born Dale Torborg’s wrestling career began after meeting Hulk Hogan and Macho Man Randy Savage on a flight to L.A. Early on, Torborg wrestled as the MVP (Most Violent Player) gimmick in the AWF, WWE and WCW. He played an evil baseball player inspired by the film The Warriors that also tied into his own baseball experience (his father Jeff managed several MLB teams and Dale’s own minor league baseball career ended with a fastball to the face.) Then, in 1999, during the first couple of Demon appearances in WCW, Brian Adams a.k.a Crush played the character, but he never actually wrestled as the gimmick. Soon Torborg was chosen to become the Demon character because Gene Simmons thought he looked most like him.

Visually, The Demon was badass. Torborg portrayed Gene Simmons in a more authentic way than Brian Adams. Torborg was such a KISS fanatic that he knew how to mimic all of Gene’s stage mannerisms. “I don’t think there was a Halloween that I didn’t dress up as one of the members of KISS” said Torborg in an interview with ESPN. For any member of the KISS Army, it had to be a real kick to be playing one of his rock and roll superheroes. Torborg mentioned that his choice to take on the Demon character wasn’t popular a one with his mother who “…hates two things, wrestling and KISS, and I’m doing both” he told ESPN. Regardless of what his mom thought, Torborg loved being The Demon .

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMx8lHUaeek]

The concept could’ve went far, but it was just the wrong time in the wrestling business. To help debut the Demon wrestler, KISS performed live on WCW Nitro . According to various wrestling sites and Wikipedia, the performance turned out to be a very low rated segment, which dispels my friends theory about the KISS/wrestling crossover. Fans of WCW, especially at the time, were bombarded by WWE Raw and WCW Nitro, and they wanted wrestling, not Mr. Simmons’ Wild Ride so to speak. WWE was coming very close to buying out WCW. Eric Bischoff lost his job and The Demon kept getting buried and losing most of his matches. WCW was contractually obligated to feature The Demon from then on, but they weren’t required to make him soar to new heights within the company though, so he wound up blacklisted.

From a personal standpoint, I really loved Torborg as The Demon. It was a cringe inducing moment for many wrestling fans at the time, but just the idea of two of my favorite things colliding nearly melted my brain, in a good way. Younger wrestling fans may not have been familiar with KISS at the time, but The Demon was still so imposing that it didn’t really matter if they knew KISS as a band or not.

Dale Torborg was a perfect choice to play The Demon. I appreciated how he was a lifelong fan of KISS. As far as wrestling ability goes, he’s a big athletic guy at 6’7″, had a good physique, and was better in the ring that many of the guys on the WCW roster at that time. My only complaint was his finishing move (Cobra Cluth Slam a.k.a The Love Gun) didn’t capture his power or match his look.

Torborg is proud of his days as The Demon as he told WWE.com in their column Where Are They Now? posted on August 3rd, 2011. After WWE bought out WCW, Dale Torborg went to work in the MLB. Since 2004, Torborg has worked as the conditioning coordinator for the Chicago White Sox, and he dabbled in wrestling again, making appearances in TNA for a couple of years starting in 2005.

Not every wrestling fan was as pleased with this KISS/Wrestling combo. Prorasslin.com took the stance of the non-KISS fan-wrestling fan by stating that “This gimmick was bad” and that Torborg was “rightfully condemned to jobbing for the rest of his professional career” in their column Ghastly Gimmicks. It’s unfortunate that The Demon gets lumped into the pile of failed gimmick wrestlers. Naturally, I question why he was written to face the guys that he did and lose. If he was around after the WWE takeover, it would’ve been cool to see him in feuds with guys like Goldust or Kane, both would make memorable programs for sure.

It would probably never happen, but if Gene Simmons were to allow his likeness to be used again, any number of up and coming wrestlers could take on The Demon gimmick. Vince McMahon would never bring him back though because he couldn’t make any money off a character that he didn’t own the rights to. It would have to be changed to something like The Shemon and she’d squash all the ladies in the Divas division.

*Dale’s father Jeff was born in Plainfield, NJ and went to Westfield High School, played baseball there, and then went on to play at Rutgers.

Pete and Pete, Pumpkin Eaters, and Pictures

Posted on September 24, 2013 by sexyarmpit

Captures from the The Adventures of Pete and Pete Season 2 episode “Halloweenie”

A good way to measure how much older you are than someone you meet is to calculate how many years ago the debut of Nickelodeon is from the year they were born. I grew up with the golden age of Nick and so many of my younger friends have a difficult time relating to that era because they weren’t born until later. They started watching Nick in the mid to late ’90s. Nowadays you can just dial up any show old or new on the Internet, but looking back at some ancient Pinwheel episode doesn’t do it justice. Comparing it to shows today is unfair. I’m not exaggerating when I say this, but when shows like Pinwheel and You Can’t Do That On Television were popular they were mind blowing to kids, and especially to stoned adults. I would never say Nick’s lineup throughout the ’90s was any less great, but it’s in a different way because times were a-changin’.

One of the many beloved shows that aired on Nick in the ’90s was The Adventures of Pete and Pete which premiered on Nick in November of 1993. I’d say by 1992 I was pretty much phased out of Nickelodeon for the sole reason that I stopped watching TV so often and getting more into activities that required actual movement rather than vegetating on the couch. Although the ’90s were definitely not my Nick time, I really wish I hadn’t missed out on The Adventures of Pete and Pete, a show that was set in Wellsville, NY, but predominantly filmed in New Jersey.

Recently I asked my friend Steve, resident Pete and Pete expert, if there was ever a Pete and Pete Halloween episode, and he rapidly replied “YES.” I was pretty excited to hear this because I was looking forward to checking out the old Nick show that I never got a chance to watch when I was younger. I recently got a hold of it and my first reaction to the episode “Halloweenie,” which aired in October 1994, was jackpot. Here’s the synopsis taken from Nickipedia:

“Younger Pete decides to enter the annals of history by breaking the record for most houses visited on Halloween and tries to enlist the help of Older Pete. Older Pete is torn between his loyalty to his brother and the coming of age and abandonment of the childhood ritual of Trick-Or-Treating. He must decide whether to face the ridicule of his peers and go Trick-Or-Treating or to join the notorious “Pumpkin Eaters”, a group of vandals who terrorize neighborhood “Halloweenies.”

I’m a kid at heart so little Pete’s love for Halloween and desire to break the trick or treating record appeals to me, but I can totally relate to big Pete’s fear of becoming a Halloweenie. As a fellow suburban kid, there was a definitive point where I stopped trick or treating because I felt that the ritual needed to be reserved exclusively for the kids and I never went back, but I remain a mega-fan of Halloween.

The amount of nostalgic Halloween images contained in this episode was an unexpected surprise. The story was fun, albeit not as horrific as I was hoping for, but it was on Nickelodeon after all. The Pumpkin Eaters looked cool, but they weren’t very formidable, they just made a mess of everything. The episode evokes an awesome Halloween vibe and as the credits rolled I sat wishing it lasted another half hour.

“Halloweenie” Facts:

*Production of the show was moved to Cranford after the show made such a mess of the town during the filming of “Halloweenie.” They did make quite a mess. There’s hundreds of smashed pumpkins and streamers, etc. It looked like a thousand kids who mainlined Ghoul-Aid were let loose on mischief night.

*Iggy Pop appears as, Mr. Mecklenberg, a recurring character who is little Pete’s best friend Nona’s (Michelle Trachtenberg) father. In this episode Iggy Pop calls someone a “Stooge.”

5 Failed Jersey Devil Projects on Kickstarter a.k.a “Kickin’ It With The Devil”

Posted on September 23, 2013 by sexyarmpit

Often here at The Sexy Armpit I refer to “J.D,” as if he was my pal. Of course, I’m not really friends with him in real life because he’s more of an introverted cryptid, a recluse. Trying to get him out of the Pine Barrens and into a bar or dance club to blow off some steam is futile. Maybe I can try to get him signed up for some Zumba or crossfit? I don’t know, but at some point he should relent, because he might be able to work out some of that pent up aggression he has. Chances are, you don’t know the Jersey Devil on a personal basis either, but the ridiculous scenario I just described would probably be a more entertaining angle than some of Kickstarter campaigns we’re about to look at. In this post we will look at five failed Kickstarter projects featuring The Jersey Devil.

One of the reasons why films centering around The Jersey Devil rarely get greenlit is because the ones that do get released are notoriously shitty. It’s no different with these campaigns. There’s an element missing in each. Not so much an “It” factor, but often it’s indescribable. No, I’m not saying that each one of these projects should have a killer clown in it, but they would’ve benefited from an original angle that we haven’t seen before. A fresh perspective on the story is vital, but then again, there’s only so many ways you can tell the story of the 13th child. The look of the Jersey Devil is open for debate, but cheesy CGI doesn’t do him justice. I have a feeling someone will get it right someday, who knows, maybe it will be Tim Burton or James Wan, but what’s certain is that the following campaigns weren’t destined to become the definitive Jersey Devil movies.

THE JERSEY DEVIL – THE LEGEND LIVES

If there’s a solid screenplay that a writer believes in, it doesn’t always mean that there there’s a well orchestrated fundraising campaign to go along with it. Back in 2010, a writer/director named Lee Albright created a Kickstarter to merely fund the creation of a teaser for a movie based on his screenplay about the Jersey Devil. This dream project for Albright only wound up raising $500 dollars, a far cry from his $18,000 goal. 18Gs for an indie teaser? You’ve got to be f’n kidding me! Many full-length independent films can be made with less money than that.

When looking to the public to back a project that’s merely to make a teaser that will hopefully elicit more funding to make the actual film is convoluted. Instill some confidence in the public and, at the very least, show them that you’re up to the task of making an actual film by making the teaser yourself, otherwise why would we give him money?

Making things even worse was the fact that the only bait being dangled for us is a horrible sub-VHS quality teaser that teases a teaser. It’s hard to expect people to plunk down their hard earned money when none of these interest piquing assets are on display. Since the screenplay was complete and available to buy on Amazon, it would’ve been nice to have seen a few story boards of possible scenes, sketches of characters, or some photos of possible shooting locations. We got nothing except an absolutely horrible bit of video of what is supposedly intended to be video from the Jersey Devil’s perspective soaring through the Pine Barrens. The video actually works against Albright’s campaign.

A lot of bragging gets included in the summary of how the film will be made, a “proprietary aerial filming technique…will have audiences holding onto their seats as the teaser unfolds.” It’s anyone’s guess what all that jargon really indicates, but judging by the video that’s up at their page now, the films I made with my giant camcorder in 7th grade had way more lines of resolution. Are they planning on strapping a video camera to one of those Red Bull gliders and send it through the Pine Barrens? Maybe they should’ve told us that!

One of the lines that was intended to get us fired up to immediately Paypal them money described the plot as “an old fashioned, high energy story which stays true to the legend” ugh. There’s just so much awful in that sentence. Take a look for yourself at this link. Even the synopsis on the back of the book is so generic that it doesn’t inspire me to want to read it.

THE JERSEY DEVIL MOVIE

We’re left with a conundrum with this one. The Jersey Devil movie was on Kickstarter during the few days it took me to write and compile this article, but as I went to take some screen shots over at Kickstarter – the page was completely gone, vanished from the site. After that I went on a mission to make sure I didn’t have some type of Blair Witch 2 style delusion where I lost a few hours of my life, there seem to be signs of The Jersey Devil movie elsewhere on the Internet and I was thankful for that because I didn’t feel like I completely lost my mind.

The project, written and directed by Benjamin Jones and Scott Miller from Exit 7A Studios, was unsuccessful at Kickstarter. Their URL for their site at GoDaddy (thejerseydevilmovie.com) is vacant, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the film won’t ever see the light of day. Adding to the mystery is that their Facebook page hasn’t been updated since January 2013. Usually, even when a production runs out of money or something worse happens, someone will take the reigns and post a message stating that the film is no longer in production or something along those lines. In this case, the film was never announced as completed, but their Facebook page indicates that special effects were created and at least a chunk of it was filmed.

Although I can’t confirm at this point whether the project is officially dead in the water, I will commend them about changing my mind about their production. After only viewing their failed Kickstarter page, I was not impressed in the very least because two things got under my skin.

First, their YouTube trailer seemed OK, but the quality was extremely digitized and since the lighting was purposely very dark, it was insanely hard to make out what was going on in it. Upon more digging though, I found another YouTube user (Richard Plumeri) who had a much better quality non-digitized version on his page. Seeing this made me more interested in the film. Of course it’s still not a major motion picture, and probably as low budget as it gets, but its Kickstarter campaign was completely misguided.

Their pitch came off as generic and teetering on obnoxious. One of the lines in their Kickstarter went like this: “Instant bragging rights are given to the 8.5 million residents of New Jersey who can now say, ‘They’re finally gonna make a good movie about our Jersey Devil.'” That’s not a selling point. Tell me why this film will be any different than the other J.D films. And we are in New Jersey, we NEVER have bragging rights about anything. If you read the The Sexy Armpit, you know that New Jersey is the Rodney Dangerfield of the United States.

THE SEARCH FOR THE JERSEY DEVIL

This one is way more easy to fathom. Breathe easy because it’s a documentary. I was thinking that if this was a doc that would be created in a style like Cropsey or even Lake Mungo, content producer Christoph Chaoss might have been successful. I can’t say there was too much wrong with this campaign other than the fact that their trailer should’ve included a few bits of interviews which would offer a better idea of what the documentary would be like. As it is, it’s just a bunch of shots around the Pine Barrens and a couple of sign posts. Pretty standard.

KEEP IT IN THE DARK: A SHORT HORROR FILM

Sometimes a project on Kickstarter isn’t influenced by money or fame. Occasionally you’ll find one that originates from the desire to bring a story to the public in a grander way rather than just throwing up a low budget, homemade film onto YouTube. JoBert Entertainment and The Cremer Brothers have shown that they deserve to make this film for a couple of solid reasons. First, to my knowledge, they gave it their best shot by correcting the flaws of their first Kickstarter campaign and giving it another go. Several months later they came back with a Twilight Zone-esque video introduction that was light years ahead of their original video where the two filmmakers spoke to the camera in their hoodies and knit hats. That just wasn’t effective.

The guys still didn’t arrive at their desired funding number, but that’s not because they didn’t put enough effort in. I appreciate that they came back to improve on their campaign because they believed in their story – which is an aspect of their campaign that they presented in a much better way than everyone else here. These guys actually gave us an actual synopsis of their story, and it wasn’t a generic “Jersey Devil story,” like the rest of these. A journalist is investigating her hometwon legend of the Jersey Devil, and embarks into the woods to find out more about a mysterious shed that’s deep within. To me, that’s a great setup for a short film or even a modern Twilight Zone episode. None of the full length films in this post described even a vague idea of what their movie would be about, aside from featuring J.D himself. Good try guys, I hope you come back for another campaign because I’d like to see this get made! And like Body By Jake used to say, “Don’t Quit!”

LET IT BE THE DEVIL

Our next project was also promising. It’s impossible to trash Let It Be The Devil because it had a cool name and the filmmakers created an entertaining video explaining why they needed an exorbitant $100,000 dollars. They told us where the funding would go, and what aspect of the film they would be accentuating. Unfortunately, merely boasting that you’ll be concentrating on the story unlike other horror films is encouraging, but it’s not really enough to warrant me reaching into my pockets to fund the film. I just needed a bit extra to show me that this was going to be a fresh take on the Jersey Devil.

Yes, a good story is a must, but it would’ve boosted my confidence in the project to know that their vision was something special. Obviously filmmakers can’t give too many secrets away about their story because they might get stolen before the project sinks or swims.

The guy responsible for the project is Pablo Macho Maysonet IV from Vineland, NJ. He has a decent record on Kickstarter creating 5 projects and having 3 of them backed. Maysonet and his crew have had made two independent films and one of them gained international distribution while the other involved Stephen King. Pablo and his production company obtained the rights to make a film based off of a Stephen King story called The Things They Left Behind which was presented at film festivals throughout the country. If Maysonet and his crew ever give it another shot at some point, they need to lower their funding goal by at least half.

—

I’m an avid Jersey Devil freak as documented here on the site, but if you’re curious if I’ve never held a Kickstarter of my own, I haven’t, but I have backed a handful of projects on the site in the past couple of years, none of them J.D related. Contributing to the funding of a Jersey Devil movie is risky because not all the filmmakers are bringing something original to the table.

These unsuccessful projects add to the plethora of reasons why we don’t see more movies about The Jersey Devil. Unfortunately, last year’s The Barrens wasn’t anything special and I had high hopes for it. For fans of the legend, it’s disappointing, but maybe one day a big budget Jersey Devil film will fall into the hands of the makers of Sinister and Insidious, and then we may have our definitive telling of The Jersey Devil legend. Better yet, I would love to eventually see an indie filmmaker shock the world the same way The Blair Witch Project did, but with a truly frightening Jersey Devil film. Right now, I’m not holding my breath.

The Misfits: Horror Punk Masters or Matinee Idols?

Posted on September 19, 2013 by sexyarmpit

The Misfits have been the main entity of the horror punk netherworld for 36 years. Like many of you reading this, I play the Misfits all year round, not just during Halloween, and it’s always a requisite for me to bring them up at least a couple of times during each Halloween countdown. In this post we’ll be showing you an aspect of their career that you may not have known about.

There’s always been some crossover between the icons of rock, punk, and metal into Hollywood. Lots of musicians and lead singers have appeared in multiple TV shows and films. Here’s a few rock stars who have dabbled in acting (and some who still do): Alice Cooper, Mick Jagger, David Bowie, Debbie Harry, Meatloaf, Henry Rollins, Courtney Love, you get the picture. The Misfits probably didn’t even come to your mind as I was rattling off that list. Well, I take that back. It probably did because it’s the subject of this whole post as indicated by the title and the introduction.

There may be no Golden Globe awards in their future, but that was never their mission. Once the mid-’90s rolled around, the public and Hollywood were realizing the impact that Misfits have had on music and pop culture. Their logo was everywhere, even nearly twenty years later at that point. Not only did their music still sound hard edged and haunting, but they were such a visual band that it just made sense to get them into films. It was about time to exploit them to the next generation of kids with their brand new, young lead singer Michale Graves. Their first appearance right around that time in 1995 was in the movie, Animal Room, about a former drug user (Nail Patrick Harris) in a drug rehab program at his high school gets tormented by a bully (Matthew Lillard).

Animal Room was the debut film of NJ-born and raised writer and director Craig Singer. If you’re a long time Sexy Armpit reader, you might remember when we talked about one of his later films, Dark Ride which, as I look back at it, I was probably way too harsh on that movie. Perhaps I’ll go back and watch it this Halloween season. Back to Animal Room – it was billed as a drama and science fiction film and according to Wikipedia, it was a “modernized version of A Clockwork Orange.” The movie was filmed in Asbury Park and Glen Rock, NJ. Here’s a pretty badass scene from Animal Room starring The Misfits which also winds up being surprisingly grisly:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqVjZSTx-_k?rel=0]

Next up for The Misfits was a quick scene in the Insane Clown Posse movie, Big Money Hustlas in 2000. It’s a pretty whimsical scene and not one you’d expect to see the ghoulish Misfits show up in, but that makes it even more surreal and memorable. The movie stars Harland Williams who appears in this scene which takes place in a Donut Hut, a diner situation whose logo combines Pizza Hut and Dunkin’ Donuts. Here The Misfits are seen enjoying a few cups of Joe and chucking a donut at a cop. Punk cred still in tact.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NNXoHL-6rFk?rel=0]

In, Bruiser, the 2000 DVD thriller directed by George A. Romero, a man always getting shit on by people awakens on day to find that his face is now a blank, white mask. Note that the bullying theme was also present in the previously mentioned, Animal Room. Maybe we need to call WWE and let their Be A Star campaign Superstars talk to these bullies.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60bL8921szw?rel=0]

The last film is one that I’ve had waiting patiently in my collection for me to discuss during a Halloween Countdown. It may very well have been one of the first DVD’s that I planned on featuring for a countdown, but for reasons such as occasional lack of motivation and then the inverse, when sometimes idea overload sets in and boggles my mind. 2001’s Campfire Tales will eventually get discussed in more depth, but for right now, let’s take a look at The Misfits appearance in the film. The performance footage used in the movie was shot at the legendary Gingerbread Castle in Hamburg, NJ, a fairly tale castle which was once like the Disney Cinderella Castle of northern New Jersey. For a while, the Castle turned into a night club in order to maintain some kind of cash flow. Jamie Lynn Sigler stars in Campfire Tales and in his first film role you’ll notice Always Sunny’s Charlie Day.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBTi407H8z0?rel=0]

The Misfits were always known for being punk outcasts, but I have no objections to seeing them sneakily appear in a few movie cameos. None of these were big movies by any stretch, so you can’t accuse them of selling out to do these films. If they appeared in Soul Plane, we might all think a little differently about their career decisions, wouldn’t we?

The Misfits’ history of kicking ass has far surpassed any punk grading system that people might hold them to, and their brand has risen above the divisive fan base including those who are Danzig loyalists and the true Fiend Club members who still appreciate the band today still as macabre looking and monster movie loving as ever.

New Monster High Dolls? They’re All Together Ooky…The Jersey Devil Family?

Posted on September 17, 2013 by sexyarmpit

Some days I just can’t take my attention off Deviant Art. It’s an addicting endeavor for me. I remember a while back when friends used to tell me they’d be on MySpace for hours, but I used to log in merely to check my messages, possibly update my status depending on how motivated I was, and then just log the f*ck out. Deviant Art is really the only site I will become mesmerized by. Some people are addicted to Reddit or Buzzfeed and I just can’t get into them. Maybe I like Deviant Art so much because I get to look at pictures? Well, who doesn’t? It’s no different than when I was a kid and loved looking at the pictures in a book when someone was reading me a story. And just the same way it was back then, every once in while you find something really cool as you’ll see when we pay a call on The Jersey Devil family.

The New Jersey artists, CelebiObsession, Ninapedia, and her little sister seem to be huge fans of Mattel’s Monster High line of dolls and cartoons, a trait I share and don’t make it much of a secret. The artists clearly have pride in the fact that they’re from Jersey because they decided to bring New Jersey into the world of Monster High. It seems like a no brainer for them to incorporate New Jersey’s most notorious urban legend with the popular doll series based off classic movie monsters.

Honestly, there hasn’t been a more logical character breeding like this since the original Monster High lineup. Frankie Stein, Draculaura and the other characters’ lineage makes sense. If there actually were Monster High characters from Jersey, there’s such a low chance that they’d be anything other than relatives of The Jersey Devil. Think about it, how perturbed would the Italian community be if dolls came out who were offspring of a long dead Jersey mob boss or since they are aimed at younger kids, a demon guido? That would cause problems so I’d definitely see the brain trust at Mattel taking the fastest route to the Pine Barrens on that one.

Long story short, that wacky red bastard J.D invited me over for a few brews and to meet the family, so here they are below and if you’d like to visit the artists who created them you can visit their pages listed here: http://ninapedia.deviantart.com and http://celebiobsession.deviantart.com

Lillith Leeds – JD’s eldest daughter

photo monster_high_lillith__celebiobsession01_zpsa03d0460.jpg

Trenton Leeds, Lillith’s older brother, digs disco fries, a popular late night snack at diners

The artists named each of The Jersey Devil’s family members appropriately. All their last names are Leeds which is based off the actual family that spawned the legend of The Leeds Devil. Their first names are all based off places in New Jersey, except for Lilith, JD’s eldest daughter, who would most likely be the first to get the Monster High treatment out of all of these characters. Or perhaps simultaneously released with Trenton Leeds, as a brother-sister two-pack? Oh, I’m so tremendously geeky. Now, let’s take a look at the younger siblings in the Leeds family.

Dover likes sandwiches from the Rutgers Grease Trucks and has a twin sister, Camden

photo doverleeds_celebiobsession_zps44984c6b.jpg

Camden likes Salt Water Taffy, a candy with a long history at The Jersey Shore

Harmony and Newton

I find all this extremely creative and it’s the exact type of mash up of pop culture and the state of New Jersey that I love to capture here. The only flaw I could dig up on these is that I can’t help but thinking the characters should be older so they can truly be in Monster High School rather than Monster Elementary or Monster Middle School. Or some sort Monster Home School. Mattel take note, this is a good idea. And give those ladies a kickback when these go into production.

Insidious II’s Patrick Wilson Discusses NJ

Posted on September 16, 2013 by sexyarmpit

photo patrickwilsonchelsea_zps76cad647.jpg

Patrick Wilson stars in both Insidious films as well as The Conjuring, and I enjoyed his performance in all of them. For some reason feedback on his performances seem to be mixed and I can’t seem to understand why. To me, he comes off as a very regular, likable guy and in terms of horror films that’s necessary in order for the audience to relate to characters. Plus, he lives in New Jersey so don’t knock him!

November 2009’s Garden State Playmate, Chelsea Handler, had Patrick Wilson on the show recently to promote The Conjuring and they had a funny conversation about him taking up residence in New Jersey.

CHELSEA: “I heard that you moved voluntarily to the state of New Jersey…”
PATRICK WILSON: “I did!”
CHELSEA HANDLER: “I’m from New Jersey and people don’t move there, they move out!”

Chelsea asked Wilson why he would you do such a thing and he went on to explain that he basically wanted a backyard. He had a tough time selling his wife on the idea though, since she’s a New Yorker, and she didn’t even want to step foot in Jersey, but eventually, they found a place that they both liked and he really “digs” living here. As if starring in Watchmen, The Conjuring, AND the Insidious films wasn’t enough, Patrick Wilson’s words about The Garden State boosted his position on the cool list even more.

An Insidious Double Feature

Posted on September 15, 2013 by sexyarmpit

On Thursday I went to the Red Door Double Feature of Insidious and Insidious Chapter 2. I have to say, it was a cool experience and I haven’t had such a blast watching a couple of horror movies. The Conjuring was, if I can sound Boston for a second, a wicked time, but the Insidious films contain just the kind of old school chills that make them so much fun and scary at the same time. Viewing the two films back to back is recommended.

There were two reasons why I jumped at the chance to go to the red door event. First, it was a double feature, which doesn’t happen too often in first run theaters and multiplexes, and secondly, I wanted to see if the movies tie together cohesively. I can honestly tell you that they fit together so well and Chapter 2 even maintains the cliffhanger from the end of the first one for the first several minutes of the movie, which suspends the suspense for even longer. My eyes were glued to the screen waiting to see how it resolved.

The imagery in the Insidious films is so damn insanely incredible. There were 10 eyes in that sentence, I mean i’s. It would look creepier if it was eyes though. And I don’t think I’ve ever written a sentence with ten i’s until this very day. Glad you could share the moment with me. But yeah, the use of the color red as a theme in both films is not only presented in an artistic way by making the color almost become a character of its own, but also adds an elegant quality to a genre film in what’s typically a realm of often cheaply made films featuring the bulk of the budget going into designing convincing death scenes. The ghostly makeup, lighting, and the set design were all superb and helped create an eerie atmosphere that spans both films.

So far the Insidious franchise has single handedly dictated where the next movement in horror should go. Even though many of us have been yearning for a film exactly like Insidious for years, because not everyone wants to see cheesy death scenes with eyeballs popping out of peoples heads, OK, well, that was a bad example, we all want to see that. All I’m saying is that it’s been a long ass time since I went to the theater and had this much fun watching a horror film. As I mentioned, The Conjuring, was a blast too, but in a different way. Not to spoil anything if you haven’t saw it, but it ultimately becomes an exorcism film, while Insidious is just full of plain old fashioned hauntings and outer body experiences featuring demons, creeps, and ghosts.

Jason Voorhees Is In My Window…

Posted on September 13, 2013 by sexyarmpit

http://thehbt.com

While your Friday the 13th celebration might be winding down, mine is just beginning. Tonight at 8pm, the original Friday the 13th is playing in Blairstown, where part of the movie was originally filmed. Before heading to the theater, let me bring you back in time for a minute.

The best memories of my youth don’t include football games with kids in the neighborhood, hanging out with friends trying to get girls phone numbers at the mall, or rattling off sports statistics in a heated debate on fantasy football. My youth consisted of horror movies, comic books, and cartoons.

I don’t care if it makes me sound like a couch potato, but I grew up basically studying movies and TV shows. Heck, I still remember the dialogue to half the commercials that played on WPIX from 1985 through 1993. The moments that stick in my head the most are from WPIX’s Shocktober. When that Halloween tradition rolled around I couldn’t wait to watch whichever Friday the 13th films that were scheduled to air.

Since Jason and his legend took up such a major part of my imagination as a kid, it’s no wonder why I’m still obsessed with the franchise today. Since the real Camp Blood is in Northern New Jersey, the story of Friday the 13th always held a prominent place with kids at school. Every kid seemed to have their Jason stories. Personally, I never made up an anecdote of a run-in I had with him in the woods, but most of my friends considered me the go-to Jason Voorhees nut. On Halloween and otherwise, I used to dress up as the man behind the mask, sometimes just to scare people. Being that my name is Jay, it enhanced the gimmick a bit, since a ton of people have always taken the liberty of calling me Jason, even though that’s not my actual name.

Jeez, I almost forgot, there was a point to this post! On our recent trip to the Halloween Mart in Las Vegas, I picked up the Jason Voorhees “light up” poster by WOWindow. It’s a poster that hangs in the window giving the impression to people who drive by that Jason Voorhees is staring at them from my living room. They actually come in a ton of different options such as Freddy Krueger, Frankenstein’s Monster, the Wicked Witch of the West, Casper the Friendly Ghost, skulls, zombies, a mummy, and a badass looking vampire, but I opted for my pal J.V. WOWindows makes these posters for other holidays such as Christmas and Hanukkah as well. Check out their site to see their entire selection. The WOWindow company is based out of Cranford, New Jersey and depending on your age, you may know this town as one of the filming locations from Nickelodeon’s The Adventures of Pete & Pete.

You can also follow their blog: http://wowindowposters.blogspot.com

The Sexy Armpit’s Vegas Vacation: Drunken Santa, The Goretorium, and a Bogus Blade

Posted on September 12, 2013 by sexyarmpit

ENERGIZED is not a word that usually describes someone who just landed in Newark Airport. Or Newark Liberty International if you like verbose airport euphemisms, and yes that IS a euphemism. For The Sexy Armpit though, once I landed back in my angry, traffic-jammed state, I breathed the toxin-filled air in deeply and the gross atmosphere immediately began powering me up as if I was Mario after getting a fire flower. You’d think it would be the opposite, but no, while in Vegas, I didn’t feel like I had that extra kick. The city might be sinful, but it’s missing that special mutagenic compound found in New Jersey’s air, water, and judging by their extreme attitudes, our people. That’s not to say it wasn’t fun, so here’s a run down of our Vegas trip.

Miss Sexy Armpit and I have been to Vegas more times than you’ve been to your Great Aunt Esther’s house. And that’s just not right – you need to visit her more often you ungrateful prick. Who else will eat her 8 year old Lorna Doone cookies?

Read the article at Dinosaur Dracula that tipped me off to Halloween Mart

Since we’ve had many Vegas vacations in the past, and we’ve taken part in so much of what Vegas has to offer, we’re always looking for some shlocky and offbeat stuff to do. One of the first orders of business was finding the costume and decoration store, Halloween Mart, which I first read about in Dinosaur Dracula’s column Deadsites. It bills itself as the first online Halloween store. I felt it was too much of a coincidence that Matt wrote about this store recently and I was heading to Vegas, so I couldn’t be in Vegas and not drop in. The potential for this to be a wasted trip to a store was huge because Halloween shops often range from average, to exactly the same as every other Halloween store you’ve ever walked into. I’m happy to report this place does indeed rank in the top tier of Halloween stores, if not the best I’ve personally shopped at.

Why was it such a good place? First, it’s huge. Their selection of costumes and masks is as extensive as they tout on their site. They had a pretty typical selection of interior decorations in the back aisle, but when it comes to giant, over sized Halloween decorations and animatronics, they have it all locked up. Hung high up on the walls are several giant crazy looking ghouls and witches, but the real magic happens as you make your way to the back room. The back room is a showplace, but in effect it becomes its own little walk though dark ride. The space is dimly lit and filled with every moving skeleton, reanimating corpse, conjuring witch, and regurgitating demon child that you can imagine. It was so much fun walking through there. They even had a life size Captain Spaulding from House of 1,000 Corpses, as well as the most monstrous Freddy Krueger mask and glove that exists on earth, unless King Kong likes to do Freddy cosplay, then these would look like cute little fashionable earrings that he picked up at Claire’s in the mall.

Click here for my Instagram where I have many more creepy photos from Halloween Mart!

Last year’s trip to Vegas didn’t afford me time to walk through Eli Roth’s Goretorium, so I made it a point to go there this year. I really wasn’t expecting this to be an overly impressive attraction and I was right. There’s two options: walk through with a “tour guide” during the day, or go through at night with actors. I was there during the day so I only had one choice, and I was fine with that because I was just curious to see how it compared to Times Scare in New York City. Even with Eli Roth’s name on the establishment, it was still just OK for me. The gory special effects in the scenery of each area you walk through were all intricate and well done, but the storyline was a bit lacking. This is definitely an attraction for the fans of torture porn rather than for someone seeking a good old fashioned haunted walk through and that’s exactly what I thought it would be. It was $10 bucks to get in because the girl at the entrance handed me a $5 dollar coupon, which was reasonable either way, but I would’ve went in regardless just to experience it. There’s not much to do for horror genre fans in the area so if you’re into haunted attractions and you’re planning on going to Vegas, give it a shot.

So your alien had a room at the Bellagio in Las Vegas?

Oh, just a typical day in Vegas walking down the strip.

Speaking of Bellagio, we decided to take a look at their plants. No I haven’t become a horticulturist or anything like that, it’s just that the Bellagio always has an elaborate setup in their conservatory and botanical gardens to reflect the flavor of each season. Unfortunately their Fall scene wasn’t setup yet, but they did have teaser art displayed on easels which looked really cool.

In between all this, we enjoyed a lot of good food, stopped into KISS Monster Mini Golf (again), and relaxed for a drink in Frankie’s Tiki Room. We also decided to head down to Freemont street late one night. A cover band, Arena, was playing hair band tunes and you guessed it, arena rock! We walked by just as they were playing “Rock and Roll All Night,” from KISS and Poison’s “Talk Dirty To Me.” It was here that I truly noticed that downtown Vegas is crawling with umm…unique people. These characters included a drunken Santa who meandered into the crowd to watch Arena. He and his drunken buddies created their own mosh pit of sorts. One guy was just way too into dancing around to Poison that there was no way possible that he wasn’t insanely super high on very strong, illegal narcotics.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyySAYWlp-0?rel=0]

The centerpiece of our trip was, Pinup, a show at the Stratosphere starring Playboy Playmate Claire Sinclar. We had to waste some time before the show so Miss Sexy Armpit played a few slots. From far away I noticed a game that reminded me of one of the thousands of versions of Wheel of Fortune that every casino seems to have, but as we walked closer I realized it was a cool looking Twilight Zone video slot machine that I had never seen before. The machine was pretty damn flashy and although it’s usually forbidden to take photos on the casino floor, I snapped a couple nonchalantly because I thought it was too cool to pass up.

I asked Miss Armpit if she would mind playing it so I could see how the bonuses looked and what episodes they referenced. As she sat down I noticed that the guy sitting to the left of her on the 2-person machine reminded me of someone. It came to me rather quickly too, which convinced me that it had to be him. It was Richard Blade. Right now, you’re probably saying to yourself internally “Who the f*ck is Richard Blade?” He was only the charismatic HOST OF DANCE TV in Girls Just Want to Have Fun. Blade was also a popular radio DJ in L.A in the ’80s as well as a host of a couple of music themed TV shows. Shame on you if you don’t know him or teach a Learning Annex class on the study of his career like I do.

I hadn’t drank any liquor since lunch that day which was a dessert version of a White Russian at Max Brenner’s, so I knew I wasn’t having some sort of alcohol infused ’80s delusion. Blade wore a blue blazer and Ugg boots with his jeans tucked into them. He was chain smoking and had fairly more voluminous hair than I remembered him having. Bastard kept getting bonuses too. Then I started to wonder why the real Richard Blade, a classy man of refined taste, would even be playing a Twilight Zone slot machine so intensely at 9:45 PM on Monday night. Maybe I DID enter the Twilight Zone? My brain was split on this, forget gray matter, it was all patches of red and blue as if my mind was voting on if this was really Richard Blade or not.

Finally, I began to lean toward the fact that this guy was either really the best Richard Blade cosplayer of all time or a total impostor. I was tipped off by one major component that Richard Blade assuredly has: an accent. As much as I sooo wanted to believe that it was the real Richard Blade, this dude was just a regular schmo with a terrible fashion sense. Damn you, Richard Blade impostor, you would’ve been the highlight of our trip.

AD JERSEUM 16: Girls Costume Warehouse!

Posted on September 9, 2013 by sexyarmpit

This video was featured on College Humor several years back, but it’s definitely worth a watch if you are A) a girl in the market for a Halloween costume or B) a person who has never seen this video. I never said I couldn’t feature a commercial parody for the Ad Jerseum column! This one is hysterical and extra points for creating the little nuances to make the video look as if it was ripped from an old VHS recording. Look at all these f*cking costumes!!

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4rUiV_Hh74?rel=0]