Monsters

[Fausto]

"Oh wow, candied crittters..."

Anyone who can recall that line, spoken by a cycloptic girl as her equally cycloptc mom and potato dad sit down to watch an episode of their favorite show, probably remember Tales from the Darkside's equally sinister spinoff series, Monsters. An early 90's anthology series, the show featured various bizzare and messed up tales, each involving some sort of inhuman (and often very cheezy-looking) creature, such as:

Mr. Swlabr (and no, that's not misspelled)-what appears to be a gigantic green turd, who acts as an imaginary friend to a mistreated child, and can get revenge on the child's enemies

Barbershop Vampires -take a little off the top and a lot out of the veins, much of which gets fed to a gigantic leechlike creature, who serves as the vampire queen

Mannikins -tiny clay figures carved with such anatomical detail that they quite literally come to life

La Strega -rather attractive witch who can transform into a not so attractive hag; can be dangerous but is always willing to negotiate

Pickle Jar Monster -open what you think is a jar of dill spears, but what you get is a sort of green face hugger that can suck you dry from the inside out

Holly -robotic puppet and star of a children's tv program; much like Barney the dinosaur, only with more homicidal tendancies

Sin-o-matic -once the most evil man in the world, he has been reduced to little more than a corpse attached to a machine; hold his hand, and he sucks the sin straight from your body

Mandrake root -hunk of dried plant matter that, with the addition of blood, transforms into a hunky African sex slave

Wolf Pack -family of werewolves who have their roots in the old country, the patriarch seems to have a predjudice against 'werehyenas', but guess who's coming to dinner...

I could go on, but this should be enough to wake a few memories. The best part of watching after all this time is finding recognizeable celebrities, many who were either on their way up or down in their career (Jerry Stiller, Deborah Harry, Leif Garret, David Spade, Pam Grier, Steve Buscemi, Lili Taylor, Kevin Nealon, etc.) The overall quality (acting, story, special effects, and all) can vary from episode to episode, but still a fun watch. 

[Andrew]

Fond memories of this series too.  I always liked the monster episodes of any science fiction or horror series, so this was like candy to me.  I have five of the original VHS tapes, gotten from a place going out of business a few years back.  Each has two episodes.  Haven't watched them since I first picked them up, so it could well be time to do so.

[JaseSF]

I really wish I could find some copies of this series to cover in my own TV Files. 

[Joe the Destroyer]

I really wish they'd do a DVD release of these.  I'm sure they'd do some stupid volume set rather than seasons. 

I always liked the one with bed that ate people, or the one with the people trapped in the apartment building and the little girl sneaks into an apartment and plays with some alien.  That one was kind of sad, though.

[Jim H]

Solid series.  I'd like to see a better release of it.  I am also one of the people who thinks the best episodes of series like the X-Files are the monster ones.  So yeah, I liked Monsters.  Don't remember it too well though.

[Yaddo 42]

Posted some of my memories of this show in another thread not to long ago.

Wasn't there an episode where a woman could hear her food talk? It all had little faces or mouths on it, and would scream in terror when she would try to eat (or even prepare it maybe) so she was filled with guilt and starving to death.

I thought of another one, but I think it was a Tales of the Unexpected based on a Robert Bloch story. It had an old man in a religious country family who had died. But he kept coming down to eat with his family and refused to believe he deceased.His body began to rot and he even began to complain that the daughter was keeping a poor kitchen by letting in so many flies. And he could figure out why no one else would eat around him. Finally he sneezes, looks down into the handkerchief, tells the family he loves them and goes upstairs to meet his maker. The family checks the handkerchief after he's gone and sees his nose.

[Texdar]

I thought of another one, but I think it was a Tales of the Unexpected based on a Robert Bloch story. It had an old man in a religious country family who had died. But he kept coming down to eat with his family and refused to believe he deceased.His body began to rot and he even began to complain that the daughter was keeping a poor kitchen by letting in so many flies. And he could figure out why no one else would eat around him. Finally he sneezes, looks down into the handkerchief, tells the family he loves them and goes upstairs to meet his maker. The family checks the handkerchief after he's gone and sees his nose.

This episode was called "A Case of the Stubborns" and was from Tales from the Darkside.  It was from a Robert Bloch short story.   I really liked it.

[Yaddo 42]

Well, I had Robert Bloch right anyway. Thanks for the correction.

It's not from Monsters, but I'd like to see the episode again.

[Joe]

dude i watched this show on sci-fi everyday, im pretty sure they were reruns but they are awsome. definetly needs a dvd release, how many seasons were there?

[Jim H]

Wasn't there an episode where a woman could hear her food talk? It all had little faces or mouths on it, and would scream in terror when she would try to eat (or even prepare it maybe) so she was filled with guilt and starving to death.

Tales from the Darkside, that's from.  The funniest part was when she is in a restaraunt and she hears screams whenever a steak gets cut. 

Understandable you'd get confused with Monsters, as I believe it is a semi-spinoff, and the tone was often quite similar and they were on in a similar timeframe.

[Fausto]

how many seasons were there?

At least three, I think.

[Dave]

Was there one where this green, tentacled, conical alien's ship crashed and wiped out some town, then a forcefield from what was left of the ship trapped the survivors? It was Christmas, and the alien was trying to warn the people about something, but he couldn't communicate and they thought he was invading?

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[Deathfeast]

I used to love tales from the darkside and monsters!!!
I have some of the episodes from each show on vhs and really would like to have them all on dvd.
Very few of the best shows where on any of the vhs tapes so they really need to do the dvd's soon.

There is an episode of monsters that I really want to watch again about some guy killing some woman and she bites him on the hand, I think she was a witch, and then her face appears on his hand where she bit him and she torments him.

There are a lot of tales from the darkside episodes that i really want to see again.

[CoreyHeldpen]

Movies and Shows That Need a DVD Release:
Burmuda Depths
Monsters

Someone get these a DVD transfer ASAP!