Love Me Tendo.

Drove out to Yamagata yesterday in order to enjoy the changing leaves in the rain. (Not as enjoyable as you'd think.) En route, we stopped at HillSide Mall, which in the past has always been a lot of fun. BUT, the discount Toy Store has now become a trading card (mainly Pokemon) outlet. I did pick up a sticker and four cool postcards though.

Hey wait a sec! They're neither stickers nor postcards. Just printed off images on cardstock. I'm beginning to think that this kitsch store is not wholly legit. (Candy Land--still cool place though.)

Here are a few of the decorations around the joint.

Next stop, Otachi (Mandai-clone) in Tendo where I tried to sell some loot. They offered even less of a pittance than expected so I declined to give them a ton of items for peanuts. Therefore, they lost out on forcing me to spend my earnings on a chance to win this.

I did get a 9-tailed Kitsune* for my friend, Mr. Fox.

Normally, I would have picked up these Jumping Chinese Ghosts. But there were only three available, not the set.

Oh well, their loss. 

The next Mandai (Otachi) in Yamagata, had a pretty nice Halloween display. This gal is dispensing candies to little ones who won at UFO Catcher.

We decided to check out one more place, a Book-Off that we've never been to before. 

On the way there, it was slow going, so I had plenty of time to take photos of this Love Hotel.

The Hard-Off was very old school with lots of cheap and not so cheap items. On spec, I picked up this coffin for two bucks. No idea of its contents although its original retail price was close to 30 bucks.

 

It's a pair of Twisted Wonderland Towels.

At the Book-off across the street in an Aeon Mall, I found this Bat-Man.

Much to my surprise, they had a fairly inexpensive large pumpkin for sale. Details on that later...

I did pick up some nice Snoopy socks.

*Speaking of 9-tailed Kitsune, It just happens to be the Yokai of the day!

These powerful Yokai can be nasty or auspicious. It's best to stay on their good side.

Have I shown these already? I need to search through a few boxes for more Venoms.

Before bed, I just crashed and watched some Halloween specials I'd never seen. Such as Mad Mad Mad Monsters, fairly lame Rankin/Bass production.

Then The Flintstones New Neighbours (1980). Not bad, though I preferred the Gruesomes.

To top off the night, I watched a clip show of spooky Bugs toons. Bugs Bunny's Howl-een (1977). The clips were badly edited and the narrative between each clip was meh. Still, any Bugs is good Bugs.

Finally, I'll leave you with Garage Sale Finds, the kind of blog that showcases some eerie items one might find at a Garage Sale (or Mandai or Book-Off).

Later tonight, I'll show off the pumpkin I carved. Hopefully it'll photograph better in the dark, right now I'm not getting any correct guesses.

Batman's Shark Repellent.

I just finished watching Jurassic Shark 3: Seavenge and it's movies like this that make me wish I had some of Batman's Shark Repellent*.

Here are some positives and negatives for this cinematic messterpiece.

Plus: Runtime is only 74 minutes. 

Minus: Some of that runtime rehashes previous scenes in a dream sequence.

Plus: I kind of liked the score.

Minus: Everything else. Acting was atrocious. "Special" Effects were laughable. Sound Effects were equally dismal, the noise the shark makes is similar to what a growling dog utters when pulling on a squeaky toy.

Plus: That's a kick-ass poster!

Minus: The writing and plot were mind-numbingly bad. But...
Plus: There is a twist ending that is also bad but unexpected. Click here if you're brave enough to spoil the twist.

Did I waste 74 minutes watching this? Yes. Do I regret doing so? No.

Scroll up a bit and you'll see an * beside Batman's Shark Repellent. Today just happens to be Batman Day and it's my way of segueing into that. According to this article, the Shark Repellent from the 1966 movie has been made canon into the DC Universe!

The Effects in that movie are almost 60 years old and are still superior to those of Jurassic Shark.

So, speaking of Batman. What with it being the 100th Anniversary of Warner Bros., they've been mashing their properties together for a while now. Scroll down to the bottom of this post for some examples. (Okay, I'll save you the trouble of a click and show you one of the Clear Files.)

What "Bugs" me is that I paid over 3 bucks for a Clear File and now the supermarket is giving them away for free (with the purchase of 4 drinks).

Here are two Super-Files:

I may show these off again next month during the annual Countdown to Halloween 2023.

Yesterday, I just happened to drop into a UFO Catcher location and landed a couple of Eggs. 

These contain Jelly Beans and I'll save them to give to my students next month. I always preferred Tom over Jerry so it's good to see him as Batman and his nemesis the Jeroker. (Jerry-Joker)

In conclusion, HAPPY BATMAN DAY! Celebrate with Jerry Jelly Beans or go spray a Shark or something!

I'll Beach You Off!

If you're one of the multitude of attendees for the new Barbie movie (that finally opened here in Japan), then you'll know what the title of this post refers to. Or maybe you're one of those disgusted by its "wokeness" and just don't know how to have fun. Either way, click this YouTube to enlighten yourself!

That link above has lots of fun for it's the official Barbie page for Japan. Click around for several movie clips, BarbieLand, or a Selfie generator.

They had a couple of cheap Barbies for sale at the cinema. I think I'll just make do with my Captain Barbie and First officer Ken. (Or is it the other way around?)

No other merchandise that I really wanted though I did pick up some Tape for my collector friend.

Apart from the above Star Trek pair, I've never been a collector of Barbie. My sister had several over the years and with three older brothers, they definitely turned into Weird Barbies afterwards. 

My mom used to make bootleg Barbie clothes to sell at the Church bazaars, and they sold out every time. I didn't dress up for the cinematic experience (I don't own any pink) although I did bring this umbrella but didn't get to show it off cuz it stopped raining.

Just to show support for the lead actress, I did wear my Harley Quinn socks.

Speaking of Harley, I'm enjoying the new season of her cartoon and I just happened to photograph several of the figures I've collected since Suicide Squad.

And a few of her Bat-pals.

Since this is a Warner Bros. picture, here's the Barbified logo.

I recently purchased some Bugs Bunny Clear Files that celebrate the Bros. 100th Anniversary. Here are a few mash-ups.

I like that last one a lot. Here is Betty Boop in a similar tribute.

Speaking of Bugs, I almost gave away my Looney Tune stuffed characters at a recent Festival. I decided to hang on to them for a little longer.

So, bottom line. Go see Barbie! It's a ton of fun...