RJ Writing Ink

Jay’s Month of Screams, Day 31- Spongebob Squarepants

Alright, boys and ghouls, are you ready for Halloween? I know I am, thanks to my month of screams! I’ve had a blast talking about all the specials, movies, and scary web shows I’ve watched all October, and before it ends, I wanted to share one of my favorites. It’s a classic Halloween special from one of the greatest cartoons of all time. First, though, I need you guys to answer a question: who live nears a graveyard under the sea? SPONGEBOB SCAREDYPANTS!

Spongebob Scaredypants

Fed up with being the easiest person in to scare in Bikini Bottom, Spongebob decides to do the scaring on Halloween. So he dresses up as the Flying Dutchman, and after a quick shave courtesy of Patrick, he tries to get rid of his embarrassing nickname for good.

As kids, we could all sympathize with Spongebob’s desire to not be so scared on Halloween. Halloween’s about getting scared, yes, but it’s supposed to be in good fun. Therefore, not being able to enjoy it is the worst.

Unfortunately for him, Spongebob’s flimsy idea of a scary costume doesn’t scare anyone. At best, it confuses people to see someone run around with a sheet over him. That’s the joke, though, so it’s pretty funny.

Spongebob Scares Everyone

Taking said joke to its logical conclusion, Spongebob and Patrick try to crash the Halloween party at the Krusty Krab. However, thanks to a jellyfish sting, the operation goes belly up; or pants up. I know it may be a bit mean, but even I couldn’t help but laugh at Spongebob’s failure.

The first appearance of the Flying Dutchman was the perfect level of scary for me as a kid. He looked and sounded terrifying, but Brian Doyle-Murray knew how to ham it up so that kids could like him. However, that made his reaction to the sight of what’s underneath Spongebob’s costume even funnier.

While the sight of Spongebob’s brain was weird, I was too young to fully understand how weird it was. Besides, I liked everyone’s reactions.

Scaredypants Was An Instant Classic

It’s been twenty years since Spongebob premiered on Nickelodeon. Even two decades on, “Spongebob Scaredypants” remains one of my favorite Halloween specials. It’s got all the hallmarks of what would make Spongebob a legendary cartoon. The humor, the voice acting, even the music all blend perfectly to create a 90s classic. I watch it every Halloween, and I hope that it remains a classic for years to come.

Click here to see the FANDOM Article I did for Halloween last year.

Click here to see my other animation stuff. Or here to see all holiday related posts.

Jay’s Month of Screams, Day 30- The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy

For my penultimate pick for my first ever month of screams, I chose a show that’s perfect for Halloween. It’s Cartoon Network’s 2000’s classic, The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy. If you didn’t know, its about two kids, the idiotic Billy and the cynically terrifying Mandy, who win the friendship of the Grim Reaper in a game. The show followed the trio’s supernatural misadventures, and it was a mega-hit for the channel. Of course, it helped that Richard Horvitz and Grey DeLisle voiced the main characters. As a result of its themes, this show’s perfect for Halloween, and Billy and Mandy’s Jacked Up Halloween delivered! In fact, it’s one of the funniest Halloween episodes of the decade.

Jacked Up Halloween

When Billy, Mandy, and Grim are out trick-or-treating on Halloween, Billy asks why people pull pranks on Halloween. As it turns out, it all started centuries ago with Endsville’s resident prankster, Jack. The man got so obsessed with tricks, the townspeople got fed up and arranged for his execution. Unfortunately, Jack cheated death by forcing Grim to give him immortality. However, Grim still cut his head, leaving him with a pumpkin for a head. Now he comes out every Halloween to play pranks on Endsville.

In the present day, Billy makes the mistake of knocking on Jack’s door, and loses Grim’s scythe to the pumpkin-headed prankster. As a result, Jack frees the souls of the Underworld to destroy Endsville, get revenge on Grim, and have Halloween reign forever. In other words, Billy doomed the world for the umpteenth time.

Fear the Jack-O-Lantern

Billy and Mandy was no stranger to scary things like monsters and aliens and witches, so Halloween was a perfect fit. The scares come in the form of Jack’s army of pumpkin’s. Using the scythe and the souls of the dead, he creates an army of possessed pumpkin monsters, and they’re genuinely scary to look at. If you saw an army of grotesque, pumpkin shaped creatures tearing up your neighborhood, you’d be scared too.

Furthermore, despite his reputation as a trickster who plays otherwise harmless pranks, Jack’s a good villain. Having been deprived of a normal life, the immortal prankster’s become bitter towards Endsville and the Grim Reaper. He still likes playing pranks and telling jokes, but you can feel the malice behind them. Once he gets Grim’s scythe once more, he’s a dangerous threat.

So Funny, You’ll Die of Laughter

Like the show, though, Billy and Mandy’s Jacked up Halloween plays on its humor. Richard Horvitz delivers a lot of it, too, simply by being the biggest ham he can possibly be in every scene. More to the point, Billy’s extremely delayed to how badly he screws up is a hilarious payoff. Then we get to see Billy do this:

Another big source of the special’s humor is a running gag involving Billy’s best friend, Irwin. He keeps trying to impress Mandy with his costumes. However, he can’t seem to get it into his head that he’s supposed to be scary. Instead, we get this:

And this

And these two:

Ironically, Irwin ends up being what saves the day. In a scene that would make master slapstick artists proud, Irwin inadvertedly sets off all the traps Mandy set to fight Jack’s army. As a result, the spirits laugh themselves to death, and it gets so contagious, I couldn’t but laugh along with them.

A Gut-Busting Good Time

Overall, this special’s as hilarious as the show itself. While mostly comedic in nature, it does know how to bring the scares with the pumpkin monsters and Jack’s evil schemes. If you’re interested, I reccommend going on YouTube and watching it for yourself. Fans of the show will love the nostalgia and humor, just in time for Halloween. Happy Halloween!

Click here to see the FANDOM Article I did for Halloween last year. Click here to see my other animation stuff.

Or here to see all holiday related posts.

Jay’s Month of Screams, Day 29- Regular Show

I made a promise to take a look at every one of the Regular Show Terror Tales of the Park episodes, and I meant it. After a month of specials, I’m at the final episode; the one when the park gang was in space. Not even going to space will stop the Park Gang from their tradition of telling scary stories, though. It’s Terror Tales in Space!

As the Park Gang prepares to travel to the Halloween Nebula to party, they decide to help their friend Recap Robot get pumped for Halloween. So, the gang takes turns telling scary stories.

Fear Planet

Skips starts off with a story about the Park Gang forced to get gas for their ship from the worst possible planet: Fear Planet. It’s a planet made of material that bring people’s fears to life. The only way for them to get fuel is get out of the ship and walk across the planet, with their worst fears.

This story had a really good premise behind it. It’s like if Pennywise was an entire planet that tried to kill you. Unfortunately, it’s ruined by Skips’ fear: flying disc free-stylers. I’d say its the weakest story of Terror Tales in Space.

King Sized Candy Bars

In Eileen’s story, the gang goes trick-or-treating on the Space Tree when they see a quarantined dome with king sized candy bars inside. They decide to take a risk and go inside the dome. Unfortunatley, the quarantine was due to Vampires!

I’ve seen ninja’s in space before, but vampires in space was new to me. I’m all for mashing up different types of horror, but this seemed a little silly for me. If I think something from a surreal show like Regular Show is silly, then that’s saying something. Also, if there were vampires in space, then they’d never be able to go anywhere since there would be stars everywhere.

Alien Roomate

The last story for Terror Tales in Space is about the Park Gang trying to find a new roommate for income reasons. They get this creepy alien called Shannon to move in, but she ends up being the worst roommate ever. When they finally can’t take her anymore, the gang has to band together to force her out of the dome.

This entire segment’s an obvious parody of the Alien Franchise. Shannon’s appearance alone resembles a Xenomorph, but the plot also seems to follow the basic plot of the movie. It even parodies the climax of the original film with Muscle Man sacrificing himself to push her out of the airlock.

The Tyson Zone

The special’s over, but it had one last surprise for us. While traveling to the Halloween Nebula, the Park gets caught in a black hole. In all honesty, that’s downright terrifying, but still nothing compared to what happens next. The Park Gang wakes up to find themselves turned into actual spaghetti and meatballs. They then realize they ended up on the plate of Neil DeGrasse Tyson, voiced by himself, as he proceeds to eat them.

I genuinely liked the fact the DeGrasse Tyson cameoed as himself in the last Halloween special. That said, I think this was the weakest of all the Terror Tales episodes. I simply wasn’t feeling the same hype that I once did from them. The show ended a few months later on a very high note, though, so I can at least say that they went out with a bang. Terror Tales in Space may not be as fun as the other specials, but it was a fitting finale to the specials. Happy Halloween, everyone!

Click here to see the FANDOM Article I did for Halloween last year. Click here to see my other animation stuff. Or here to see all holiday related posts.

Jay’s Month of Screams, Day 28- Hazbin Hotel Review/Recap

For today’s choice pick for my month of screams, I’m doing something entirely different. It’s a new show that just came out on YouTube today, and people have been waiting for it for years. Also, it takes place in Hell and has demons beating the snot out of each other, so I thought it’s perfect for Halloween. Come with me to Hell as we check in to the Hazbin Hotel.

By the way, this post is doubling as a review of the show’s pilot.

Welcome to Hell, Pop.: Too Many

Created by Vivienne Medrano, AKA “Viziepop,” Hazbin Hotel gives the phrase “when there’s no more room in Hell,” a new meaning. In Hell’s case, they have annual purges that wipe out excess sinners. It’s a cruel method, but no one has a better idea. Until now, that is.

Enter Charlie Magne, the Princess of Hell whose ironically one of the sweetest people in the place. Her dream is to open a hotel to reform sinners and send them to Heaven. However, since this is Hell and everyone’s a jerk, everyone laughs at her idea. Yet with the help of her girlfriend Vaggie, their first client Angel Dust, and a powerful entity dubbed the “Radio Demon,” Charlie’s dream may come true. Or it could end up crashing and burning.

Hilarious as Hell (No Pun Intended)

I will get straight to the point: Hazbin Hotel is one of the funniest things I’ve seen on YouTube in years. If I weren’t watching it in public, I would have been laughing my butt off to it. The humor is virtually flawless: the jokes and one-liners have perfect timing and contain enough foul language to rival South Park. That’s right, I said it rivals South Park, and those guys are the kings of foul language. 

In addition to the humor, the animation and artwork are gorgeous. The residents of Hell come in every shape imaginable, and the way they move around is fluid and satisfying. On top of everything, the background art is every bit as gorgeous. Between all this and the voice acting, it’s clear that Viziepop and her team put their heart and soul into Hazbin Hotel.

Now for a brief overview of the characters. To put it simply, I couldn’t decide who’s my favorite in this show, because the entire cast is just so much fun!

Charlie Magne

Daughter of the Devil and Princess of Hell, though given her personality, you wouldn’t know it. She’s as bubbly, energetic, and optimistic as the heroines in this decade’s Disney cartoons. She genuinely wants to make Hell a better place and thinks her Hotel is the best chance to do so. Even if almost everyone else thinks she’s a joke.

Vaggie

Charlie’s girlfriend and the one who keeps her grounded. The two are as close as lovers can be, and its clear Vaggie wants what’s best for Charlie. She’s also got a very low tolerance for other people’s nonsense, and she’ll go berserk if anyone tries to hurt Charlie. She’s skeptical about the Hazbin Hotel, but she supports Charlie as best she can. Plus, she’s fun with knives.

Angel Dust

A crass, sarcastic drag queen/porn star/crime lord/spider thing. He’s the first person to volunteer for Charlie’s Hotel, but he doesn’t seem to take it seriously. I think his main reason for staying at the Hotel is that it’s free as long as he behaves.

I love Angel Dust! He’s got some of the most badass scenes in the pilot for Hazbin Hotel, and he’s got all the one-liners. He brings most of the laughs in the show, and I look forward to seeing more of him.

Alastor

What happens when you take the charisma of Bill Cipher, the Joker’s wicked smile, and all the demonic power of the Devil? You get something like Alastor, the Radio Demon. He was a murderous radio host in life, and the first thing he did in Hell was overthrow most of the old guard. After that, he broadcasted it for everyone to watch for the fun of it.

He doesn’t believe that a demon can be redeemed, so why help with the Hotel? In his own words:

Sheer, absolute boredom!

In other words, he’s backing the Hotel so he can watch it crash and burn for his amusement. At least he’s honest about it, though I still think he’s hiding something.

Hazbin Hotel is Perfect for Halloween

Hazbin Hotel may be one of the most original web shows that I’ve ever seen. It’s got the humor, drama, and all sorts of foul language. It’s excellent, and the people behind it are amazing. I’m looking forward to seeing more episodes, and I think its the perfect thing to watch for Halloween. So, what are you waiting for? Get ready to go to Hell and check into the Hazbin Hotel! Happy Halloween!

Click here to see the FANDOM Article I did for Halloween last year.

Click here to see my other animation stuff. Or here to see all holiday related posts.