Archive for October, 2019

AWESOME-tober-fest 2019: Happy Halloween + Random Fango Ads

Posted in AWESOME-tober-fest, Blog Series, Fangoria, Halloween, holiday, magazine, nostalgia, pop culture with tags , , , , , , , on October 31, 2019 by Paxton

Awesometoberfest 2019

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!  This is it guys, we made it.  Another year.  Another Halloween AWESOME-tober-fest countdown.  Thank you so much for reading, I hope you have a safe and fun Halloween.

But, before you go, how about one more Fangoria article?  How about we look at some random ads that ran in Fangoria throughout the years?  Let’s do it!

Click the images to make them BIGGER!


From 1988, an ad for the Nightmare on Elm Street board game.  That’s right, I said BOARD game.  I totally thought this was a video game ad until I actually read it and saw that it comes with a rule book, gameboard, playing cards, and Freddy markers.  If you want to get a look at what all the goodness inside the box looks like, check out the entry at Board Game Geek.  It looks bizarre.  The game board gives me a headache if I look too long.


How about some more Freddy product? Here’s an ad for the 1-900 Freddy’s Dead telephone game. From 1992. The 90s were stuffed with all kinds of 1-900 pop culture telephone numbers. In the same issue of Fangoria as this Freddy ad was an ad for a 1-900 Terminator 2 telephone challenge. Careful, it’s yellow background will burn out your retinas.


Vintage Monster-y ad goodness coming your way! This ad is from 1981, and it’s for mail away Monster Miniatures!  All four of these pewter figures sold as a group for $79.95.  Postage included!  You could also get them in a white metal for about $7 each.


More monster-y goodness!  Here are two ads for Screamin’ Vinyl Model Kits!  The one on the left is from 1989.  It has four options; Jason, Freddy, Elvira, or the generic Werewolf.  Each model kid is about $60.  Honestly, they look pretty nice.  On the right is another Screamin’ models ad, this time from 1996.  They’ve greatly expanded their offerings with new product, but for some reason, Jason is missing.  You can’t even order him below.  However, amongst the new faces you see they added Leatherface, Ash, Lon Chaney from London After Midnight, Pinhead and the Cenobites, and one fantastic looking Crypt Keeper.  Different models have different prices, but this seems like a really nice model set.


From 1987, check out this ad for buy 2 books and get a FREE Dracula Pendant! Filled with soil from Dracula’s castle!! Wow. The ad makes sure to note these are the same pendants that were sold in Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine in the 70s.


Check out this ad for the rugged, compass survival watch.  Never get lost on freeways, mountains, deserts, jungles, or oceans!  I don’t know how many deserts, jungles, or oceans your average Fangoria reader would encounter in their lifetimes, but they now have the watch to get them out of that predicament if they ever do!

Thanks for another successful year!  And again, HAPPY HALLOWEEN!



Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.

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AWESOME-tober-fest 2019: Movie Magazine ads

Posted in AWESOME-tober-fest, Blog Series, Fangoria, Halloween, holiday, magazine, movies with tags , , , , , , , on October 30, 2019 by Paxton

Awesometoberfest 2019

If you know me at all you know I’m a huge fan of movie tie-in merchandise. Especially movie novelizations. Check out the I Read Movies podcast if you don’t believe me. Along with novelizations, I’m also a huge fan of movie souvenir magazines. I’ve talked about them before on this blog (see the Back to the Future movie magazine).  But instead of talking about one specific one, how about we take a look at ads for a group of these movie magazines?  They ran in Fangoria all through the 80s.


Here’s an ad from Fangoria 40 (1984).  Lots of good ones here.  Superman III.  Star Trek II and III!  Rocky II and III!  Sometimes these ads would also feature older magazines so clearing houses can clear out their stock to get new magazines.  Annie!  Not sure I’ve ever seen that one.  Conan the Barbarian.  The Best of Stallone mag shows up in TONS of ads I’ve seen.  I guess they never could sell it so it just kept showing up on all these ads.


Here’s a magazine ad from Fangoria 49 (1985).  One year later.  See, still trying to sell that Best of Stallone magazine.  We see a few similar mags like Rocky II and III, Star Trek II and IIIRambo is new as is that Explorers magazine.  I can’t believe these magazine cover prices top out around $3.95.  $3.95!!  That’s insane.


Here’s an ad from three years later in Fangoria 70 (1988).  More old stock like the Star Trek magazines.  But we get a bunch of new ones like more Stallone with Over the Top and Rocky IV.  We also get Superman IV, The Untouchables and a new Star Trek, Part IV.  And there’s a Spaceballs the Magazine over on the left.  I’ve never seen that one before.  And a nice Masters of the Universe magazine on the right side.  This is a really good grouping of movie magazines.  And their prices are still crazy.  Less than $4?!  YES, PLEASE!



Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.

AWESOME-tober-fest 2019: Win the Halloween 2 novelization from Fangoria!

Posted in AWESOME-tober-fest, Blog Series, Fangoria, Genres, Halloween, holiday, horror, magazine, movies, pop culture with tags , , , , , , , , on October 29, 2019 by Paxton

Awesometoberfest 2019

Edging ever closer to Halloween!  And speaking of Halloween, here’s an ad for a double contest that ran in Fangoria #15 from 1981 that let you win something VERY Halloween-y!

The first contest involves going to see the movie Halloween II in theaters and answering 10 questions. 50 winners will be drawn to win copies of the movie novelization by Jack Martin. Which, today, that Halloween 2 novelization is pretty rare.  I would have loved to have won that.

The second contest involves the semi-sequel to Rocky Horror Picture Show, Shock Treatment.  You have to explain in 30 words or less why you want a Shock Treatment t-shirt.



Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.

AWESOME-tober-fest 2019: Fangoria Scream Greats – Norman Bates

Posted in AWESOME-tober-fest, Blog Series, Fangoria, Halloween, holiday, magazine, movies, Norman Bates, pop culture, Psycho with tags , , , , , , on October 28, 2019 by Paxton

Awesometoberfest 2019

It’s Scream Greats Monday! And, it’s the final week of AWESOME-tober-fest 2019!  We did it again, this year guys.  The home stretch.  I really hope you’ve enjoyed yourself thus far, but the festivities are not over yet!  We’ve got four more days to go.  And today we are looking at another Fangoria Scream Greats poster!

This week’s Scream Greats entry is a good one of Anthony Perkins on the set of Psycho II.  It comes from Fangoria #78 (1988).  If you haven’t seen it, Psycho II is a pretty good followup to the first Psycho.  Not to be confused with Robert Bloch’s Psycho sequel novel, also confusingly called Psycho II.  Bloch’s Psycho II is a pretty great little thriller tale on its own that is surprisingly meta for having been written in 1982.  I’d recommend it.  But the movie Psycho II is a more traditional sequel and is also a pretty good movie sequel considering it’s the followup to one of the greatest thrillers of all time.



Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.

AWESOME-tober-fest 2019: Cavalcade Comics #16 – Jesse James Meets The Frankenstein Monster

Posted in AWESOME-tober-fest, Blog Series, comic books, Halloween, holiday, pop culture with tags , , , , , , , , on October 25, 2019 by Paxton

Awesometoberfest 2019

It’s Friday! The final Friday of AWESOME-tober-fest 2019, to be exact. I’m still going strong with some Fangoria, but I thought I’d break with the Fangoria coverage for today and do a new Vintage Comic Throwdown cover.  And today’s matchup features another gunfighter vs a classic monster like in the very first issue.  Take a look at Jesse James Meets The Frankenstein Monster!

This particular cover has an interesting history. It was actually the second cover I made when I started doing this feature, which means it was created back in 2016. There were a few things I didn’t love about the logo I was using so I sat on it. The very first original concept of these covers was to do all “gunfighters vs monsters” concepts. So Billy the Kid vs Dracula was first, then this one would have gone, then I’d do something with Wild Bill Hickock, and then eventually return to Billy the Kid.  But then other pop culture properties sort of caught my attention and then you get things like my Godzilla vs Shogun Warriors and A-Team Meets Chuck Norris covers.  I must love Frankenstein because I’ve used him a few times.  He also popped up fighting athletes in the Winter Olympics!

But I still enjoy doing these and I may get back to the roots of this concept and return to “gunfighters vs monsters” soon.  I definitely want to revisit Billy the Kid in these covers.  That’s it for this week, stay tuned, next week is Halloween and I’ll have several more Fangoria articles for you then!

If you want to see the previous 15 covers of Cavalcade Comics then check out the archive here.



Also, check out the blog Countdown to Halloween for more Halloween-y, bloggy AWESOMEness.