Halloween Mixtape

Okay, the title is a little misleading. But "mix DVD" doesn't have the same ring.

About 20 years ago, back when DVD burners were still standard computer hardware, I made my own two-disc compilation of some of my favorite Halloween TV episodes. Most of the episodes were ones my family had recorded off television onto VHS, and I converted them to digital video. I should add that this was probably a year or two before YouTube even existed.

The first disc contains full episodes while the second is a mix of full episodes with various Halloween-themed segments from other programs.

Disc 1 (menu music: Theme from Disney's Haunted Mansion)

1. Three Stooges: "If a Body Meets a Body"
2. Bewitched: "Safe and Sane Halloween"
3. Brady Bunch: "To Move or Not to Move"
4. Brady Bunch: "The Slumber Caper"
5. Brady Bunch: "Fright Night"
6. Happy Days: "Haunted"
7. Happy Days: "The Evil Eye"

Disc 2 (menu music: "The Skeleton Dance")

1. Little House on the Prairie: "The Monster of Walnut Grove"
2. That's Incredible: Haunted Castle in New Jersey
3. That's Incredible: Haunted Toys R Us
4. Eye on L.A.: "Halloween 3-D"
5. Jack White at the Old Margo Theater
6. Saturday Night Live: Halloween with Matt Foley
7. Our Gang: "Shivering Spooks"
8. Mickey Mouse: "Haunted House"
9. Silly Symphonies: "The Skeleton Dance"
10. 1984 McDonald's Commercial
11. 1985 Vincent Price Commercial
12. McDonald's Commercial: "Scared Silly"
13. Brady Bunch: "Out of This World"
14. Brady Bunch: "Two Petes in a Pod"

In its own way, my amateur DVD compilation helped inspire this blog, The Ghosts of Halloweens Past, which I initiated several years later with posts about many of these same programs. I appreciate the low-fi quality to the VHS transfer, and the fact that I can watch these programs on a TV screen and not have to be connected online. Makes the experience a little more old-school, like when mixtapes were a thing.

What would be on your Halloween DVD compilation?

The Three Stooges: We Want Our Mummy (1939)

When Professor Tuttle is kidnapped from the Museum of Ancient History, museum directors hire three detectives (Moe, Larry, and Curly) to track him down and retrieve a stolen mummy. While in Cairo, the detectives inadvertently stumble into the kidnappers' lair inside the tomb of King Rootin-Tootin. Despite encountering skeletons, mummies, and crocodiles, the detectives manage to outwit the thieves, rescue the professor, and find the valuable artifact. Originally released in February 1939.

The Three Stooges: The Ghost Talks (1949)

Originally released February 3, 1949.

The Three Stooges: Spooks (1953)

Originally released June 15, 1953.


Here is a version in anaglyph 3D:

The Three Stooges: Spook Louder (1943)

Originally released April 2, 1943.

The Three Stooges: If a Body Meets a Body (1945)

Originally released on August 30, 1945, this is one of the last Three Stooges shorts to feature Curly. It is basically a remake of "The Laurel-Hardy Murder Case" (1930). Laurel and Hardy's short and the Stooges' short both used Fred Kelsey in the role of the detective.