Not in July. There have been Halloween candy displays in stores since mid-summer. This is way too early.
Post your favorite Halloween topics here.
Save the holiday season.
We usually discuss our "31 Days of Halloween" movies.
shareI saw that post and like the idea. I don't know if I could come up with enough movies to fill 31 days. I usually watch The Shining, Psycho, Poltergeist, or some of the classics like Frankenstein and Dracula.
Save the holiday season.
I have a ton of DVDs and Blu-ray plus streaming. My wife and I just randomly pick horror movies for the month of October.
We watch many of the "standards" like the Shining and ones you mentioned. We have been doing this for the past 20 years.
A few thoughts about Halloween:
- People who hand out raisins don't deserve equal rights.
- Older siblings who take their younger sibling's candy should go get a job and pay for their own candy.
- Make Halloween scary again. Dressing up as Taylor Swift when you're a teenager isn't scary.
- Leaving your house on Halloween when the sun is still out to start your candy hunting is weird.
- If you have facial hair, you're too old to be going door-to-door.
- Respect that not every house wants to give out candy. Don't TP or throw eggs at their house.
- How about creating some actual Halloween carols? Other than Thriller and Monster Mash (which weren't even created for Halloween), there aren't any original songs written for Halloween.
- No double dipping houses. When you get candy from them, move on and don't come back until next year.
- Don't judge kids for not wearing a costume. You don't know their financial situation.
These are all valid points, especially the third and fourth ones.
Halloween was ruined when the U.S. Congress extended that pointless Daylight Savings Time into November, and Canada followed suit. Rumors were that the big candy manufacturers were pushing for this, believing it would increase sales of Halloween treats. They forgot a very important point: Halloween activities take place after dark. With the clocks set incorrectly, kids lost a whole hour of trick-or-treating time, especially when the holiday fell during the week with school the next day. This makes me wonder if this is why we now see Halloween candy displays in stores as early as July. Are they trying to make up for the sales they lost in October?
Another recent and idiotic trend is this event known as "Tailgate Trick-or-Treating" or "Trunk or Treat." This is where cars are lined up in a mall parking lot during daylight hours. The kids go from vehicle to vehicle collecting candy. I feel sorry for these kids who participate in these sanitized versions of the holiday. Halloween is supposed to take place in a dark, gloomy atmosphere; that's the fun and mystique of it all. The kids are missing the point and a lot of fun.
Save the holiday season.
"Tailgate Trick-or-Treating" or "Trunk or Treat." This is where cars are lined up in a mall parking lot during daylight hours. The kids go from vehicle to vehicle collecting candy.
"- Leaving your house on Halloween when the sun is still out to start your candy hunting is weird.
- If you have facial hair, you're too old to be going door-to-door."
I have to disagree with the two above. Majority of kids in my area trick or treat at stores after school. Stores close by nightfall. And I like clearly seeing their costumes as they flood the streets.
Also, some of the kids are toddlers or pre-schoolers so they're with mom and dad who are also dressed up. Or they're young teens just having some fun with their pals. A good costume deserves a treat.
"- No double dipping houses."
Wow! People do that?
Teens are evil on Halloween. The practice should be outlawed. One of the reasons is the double dipping of houses. I call them out every year. I tell them that I'm not stupid and I know they were here earlier and tell them to get lost.
shareI know! Last year they did this really stupid thing where they were selling Halloween stuff in AUGUST, Christmas stuff in SEPTEMBER, and then nothing for either holiday once October hit. It was really weird and annoying all at once.
I'm just glad this year I was able to buy some replacement ghosts for our front porch. They look like this https://s7.orientaltrading.com/is/image/OrientalTrading/14114130?$PDP_VIEWER_IMAGE$ except they don't light up. Don't ask me why, but for some reason they were not in the storage container in our garage where I thought I put them last year, so I had to get new ones.
Thank goodness for Walgreens, right?
Now one fun place to go for Halloween decorations is your local hardware store :D Last year, (despite selling all of it 2 months early), one of Home Depot's most epic decorations was the Marsh Monster. Not something I would decorate my own yard with, but if you really wanta scare the neighbors....
I was just at Home Depot on October 1, and they were already starting to clear the Halloween decor off the shelves to make room for "Christmas" decorations. Half of the shelves in the seasonal section still had the Halloween stuff, but there were boxes of "Christmas" items waiting to be opened and an employee was assembling one of the displays.
Can't they wait until one holiday is over before they start pushing the next one? The next one in the U.S. is Thanksgiving Day, but that gets little mention. Right now it's becoming all about "Christmas," which I put in quotes because they are promoting materialism, greed and money, not the holiday.
Save the holiday season.
It's better if they don't light up. You can't see the string holding them up.
shareI agree.
The ‘BACK TO SCHOOL’ ads are a bit jarring on the fifth of July as well.
Can we just pump the brake and enjoy the season, sheesh!
I haven't gone all-out for Halloween in years, mainly because I'm single with no kids and I quit watching most horror films years ago. But I do like some films with a supernatural twist, like "The Crow" and "Beetlejuice" (still haven't seen the sequel yet). My local church gives out candy to the neighborhood kids every year, in a tradition they've dubbed "Trunk or Treat".
shareBeen watching a lot of scary movies lately. Evil Dead 2013 and the new Evil Dead Rising
I want to rewatch Ash vs Evil Dead but only the first episode is free!
Also, 'The Thing' and 'House on Haunted Hill' 1999 are a yearly must-watch
The Evil Dead 2013 remake was truly great. Phooey to the self important critics and I DO get people who bag on remakes but damn this was a really fine one.
Blood soaked and nasty!
Great stuff.
Ash Vs. Evil Dead is terrific too.
Maybe sign up for 6 bucks a month on Stars and bounce after a month?
It’s only about 30 eps👍
We went from having probably 200 trick-or-treaters when we first moved into our neighborhood over 25 years ago to being lucky to get 20 these days. I don't know if it's just our neighborhood or if there is a decline in trick or treating in general with things like Trunk or Treats in existence now. It makes me sad because trick or treating was the highlight of my childhood Halloween experience.
share“trick or treating was the highlight of my childhood Halloween experience”
Me too, but I was always scared I was going to get a razor blade in a candied apple after seeing Halloween 2. I also remember my parents wanting to go though my candy before I ate any.
I'm surprised my parents did not want to go through my candy as protective as my mom was, but I think she was equal parts protective and naive. Luckily I never had any problems with my candy.
shareI think it was right after the Tylenol murders of 1982 and lots parents were in hyper vigilance mode. 😳
shareYes!
I remember this. I don’t think they ever caught this loonie.
Same with that Anthrax letter guy back in 2001. The Feds had a suspect but the dude offed himself before the investigation concluded.
Back in the 90s there was a poisoner in Japan that left fatally spiked soft drinks in vending machines.
WTH is wrong with these kooks?!?
I'm glad I had a normal childhood experience growing up in the 90s
So many fricking toys too that we got sick of them and had a "toys aren't cool, music and video games are now" phase,
A tough upbringing is a good lesson…teaches you how to walk shit off👍
Teaches you how to be a proper parent and husband too.
We all get a good beating, best to learn from it.
And to think that they never caught the guy. That sick fuck might still be out there.
shareHalloween was ruined in 2007 when the U.S. Congress extended that pointless Daylight Savings Time into November, and Canada followed suit. Kids lost a whole hour of trick-or-treating time because of this.
There used to be a lot of houses decorated for Halloween in my area, and lots of kids out that night. This has gradually diminished since the early 2000s. Like you, I had only about twenty trick-or-treaters last year.
"Trunk or Treat" is one of the stupidest concepts I've seen in recent years. What is the appeal of going from car to car in a mall parking lot during daylight hours? I feel sorry for kids who participate in these sanitized versions of the holiday. Halloween is supposed to take place after dark... that's part of the mystique of it all. These kids are missing out on a lot of fun.
Save the holiday season.
I guess the kids of today don't know what they're missing though. And things do tend to cycle back around. Maybe someday their kids will go trick or treating again.
shareI'm currently popping in HALLOWEEN(2018) on Blu Ray and I also purchased HALLOWEEN KILLS, but refuse to purchase the ever so awful HALLOWEEN ENDS and I never even saw the movie, but felt after reading the reviews on it here as well as elsewhere when it came out, I passed on it and from the sound of it, they made Michael Myers a complete puss in that final movie. Is this true??
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