May | 2015 | Cavalcade of Awesome

Archive for May, 2015

Cavalcade Comics #8 – Kool-Aid Man gets some NAHTZEE scalps!

Posted in comic books, Kool Aid, nostalgia, pop culture with tags Cavalcade Comics, comic covers, Kool Aid, vintage, Vintage Comic Throwdowns on May 26, 2015 by Paxton

I mentioned last issue that I had a few holiday issues coming up. This was the first one. This is the Memorial Day issue of Cavalcade Comics Vintage Comic Throwdown! And in honor of all the men fighting in our armed forces, I have created this cover featuring Kool-Aid Man doing all he can for the war effort by conquering all those damn NAH-tzees.

Back in the Golden Age, it seemed like EVERY super hero got into scraps with the bad guys. It’s time Kool-Aid Man got in a few shots of his own. Last issue with Magnus, I went for a more serious, hard sci-fi cover. This is a little bit more of a goofy, Golden Age cover. And I love it because of that.

Again, like my double Ghost Rider issue, I have a variant cover for you.

This was the original cover concept when I began. Kool-Aid Man jumping out of a time machine ready to kick some ass. And I do love this cover, but I decided to use more of the original Nazi cover from The Victor 1971 Summer Special. Going that route though was a lot more work because I had to take out the soldier from the window and recreate all the breaking window glass. I also had to recreate several sections of the wall due to logo coverage. But honestly, I think it was worth it.

Below are the covers I mashed up. On the left is the aforementioned The Victor Summer Special. On the right is The Adventures of Kool-Aid Man #2. You can see the time machine concept and Kool-Aid’s body came from the latter issue. Surprisingly, I didn’t create Kool-Aid’s frown in my Nazi cover. That actually comes from The Adventures of Kool-Aid Man #4 where he’s scowling at the villain, Scorch.

Victor Summer Special - 1971-0001 [RobotArchie] kool_aid_man_002-001

I do have one other “holiday issue”. It’ll be for the 4th of July. So that’s when you can expect the next issue. Happy Memorial Day week everyone!

Young Guns vintage trading cards are gonna shoot you in the face with AWESOME

Posted in movies, nostalgia, pop culture with tags movies, pop culture, Young Guns on May 12, 2015 by Paxton

If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you know that I’m a fan of Back to the Future, retro video gaming and the Young Guns movies. I’ve reviewed the movies on this blog for Billy the Kid Week and I’ve done a double episode of Cult Film Club where I talk about my complete thoughts on the Young Guns movies.

My good friend and CFC co-host, Shawn, is also a huge fan of the Young Guns movies. You can hear him talk all about them on that double CFC episode as well. We also take some time to wax regret that Young Guns wasn’t merchandised as well as it should have been. No toys. No movie novelizations. No photo magazines. NOTHING like that exists for this franchise.

So, Shawn has been busy making custom vintage trading cards for his favorite 80s movies (Adventures in Babysitting and Monster Squad) and they are AWESOME. He and I started talking and I talked him into joining me and creating a set of vintage trading cards for the Young Guns movies. BOTH Young Guns movies.

So, let’s start off with the first movie. Shawn and I made around 20 cards for the first series. We collaborated on the “look and feel” of the card as well as what characters should be included. Then we split them up into Odds/Evens and each completed our portion in Photoshop. It was an awesomely collaborative process that is fun to do with Shawn anyway because we are simpatico about many things, but especially about these movies.

To begin with, I’ll show you half of Series 1 here. Then jump on over to Branded to complete the full set.

Let’s ride!

Here are the two variant wax wrappers we made for this first series of Young Guns vintage trading cards.

Now, let’s take a look at the cards themselves. Like I said, I’m showing you the odd numbers of the set. Shawn will show all the even numbers.

Click the images to make them BIGGER! And head over to Branded in the 80s to complete this set of Young Guns trading cards!

Shawn and I also did a second series of this featuring images from Young Guns II. They will be revealed shortly. PLUS, we have a few other surprises in store including some chase and variant cards to this set. So stay tuned.

I’ve had so much fun these last few weeks working with Shawn on this set of cards. I just wanted to thank him for indulging me and letting me join him in bringing these to life. So much fun that I’m sad it’s nearly over. Luckily, I still get to talk to him every month on Cult Film Club.

UPDATE! – 5/18

Want to see more of these? We just released two movie novelization book covers for Young Guns and Young Guns II. Plus, there are some alternate/chase cards on display. Check them out at Cult Film Club.

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Nerd Lunch Episode 178: Star Wars A New Hope Drilldown

Posted in movies, podcast, pop culture, Star Wars with tags movies, Nerd Lunch Podcast, podcasts, pop culture, Star Wars on May 11, 2015 by Paxton

This is it. Nearly 180 episodes in, the Nerd Lunch Podcast is finally tackling the Star Wars movies. And we are starting with the very first one.

Joining us again are the guests from the previous “setting the table on Star Wars” episode of Nerd Lunch back in #153; Geek Kay from Fangirl Blog and Michael May from Kill All Mosnters! and the Adventureblog.

We talk about our first time watching the movie, we talk about our favorite characters and scenes, we even discuss things we have issues with. Most of those reside in the Special Edition and other “versions” of the movie. It’s a good discussion that begins the Nerd Lunch Star Wars Drilldown trilogy. Join us.

Download this episode from iTunes, Stitcher or listen to it on Feedburner.

Or listen to it online right here.

Crashing the Galloping Ghost, The Largest Arcade in the United States

Posted in nostalgia, personal, pop culture, roadtrip, video games with tags arcades, Cavalcade Arcade, Nerd Lunch Podcast, nostalgia, The Atomic Geeks, video games on May 1, 2015 by Paxton

It’s not often I get to profile an actual arcade on Cavalcade Arcade, but that is my pleasure today. While you’ve probably seen and heard that both the Nerd Lunch and Atomic Geeks podcasts united in Chicago for C2E2, a few of us broke away from the convention nuttiness to live out a boyhood dream of playing in a dedicated video arcade. And one just happened to exist in the suburbs of Chicago. And it’s called the Galloping Ghost Arcade, reportedly the largest indoor video game arcade in America.

So, without further ado, here is a journal of my adventures with Jeeg and Christian traveling to outer Chicago to find the mythical Galloping Ghost Arcade.

The day started off with breakfast at McDonald’s, then Jeeg, Christian and I had to hightail it to Union Station to catch a train to Brookfield. We were cutting it close, but we made it. Here’s Jeeg running for the train.

Jeeg, Christian and me. Train buddies. Traveling to a mythical nirvana of pixels, CRT monitors and nostalgia.

Right off the train stop in Brookfield, there was this awesome little ice cream shop called Cock Robin. I was afraid to walk over to it because I didn’t want to ruin the illusion of a time warp to a 50s diner in perfect hibernation.

And after planes, trains and automobiles, we finally arrive. The Galloping Ghost Arcade in Brookfield, IL. HALL-LE-LU-JAH! HALLELUJAH! HALLELUJAH! HALLELUJAH!

Walking through the door for the first time, you literally have to stand back for 5 minutes to even process everything that you’re looking at.

Then expect another 10-15 minutes just walking around open mouthed looking at the games. You’ll literally say over and over again in your head, “They have THAT?!” or “I haven’t seen that in YEARS!”

So you shamble over to the counter, pay a $15 cover and begin your own personal spirit walk. Everything is set to free play. No quarters. No tokens. Just bliss.

After taking stock of the situation, it was really hard to decide which game would come first. What should start off this massive orgy of electrical consumption? The arcade made that decision for us. Or at least, for Jeeg and me.

We had literally just done our Krull episode for Nerd Lunch and I discussed how 100% of my knowledge of that movie comes from this game. We had to play it. And play it we did.

That game was a fun blast from the past. And with that, the seal had been broken. Before we split up after playing this game, Jeeg and I stated that our goal before we left the arcade was to play each other in Karate Champ, a very favorite of both of us growing up. Making that pact, we split up and explored the wonders that lay within The Galloping Ghost.

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