Day 29: They Live (1988) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
They Live (1988)

It's John Carpenter's "They Live" (1988).  A fun, political satire which, sadly, came true.  Or, rather, was true the whole time, of course.  I'm sure the fact our current Techo-Bro Feudal Lords and their quislings are indistinguishable from the aliens in "They Live" is purely coincidental.  No sunglasses needed.

"I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick @$$.  And I'm all out of bubblegum."

Here's an Animated .GIF of a Tricky Dick style alien from "They Live".  Too bad they won:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 28: It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966)

It's the Halloween Tradition of "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown".  A fun bit of Halloween Trick-or-Treat animation.  Nostalgia is quite a drug!  I oft think "I got a rock!" when something goes wrong, which it seems to do more often than I like, come to think of it.

Side note: From everything I've ever read, composer and Jazz musician, Vince Guaraldi, was and extremely angry man, yet he created some of the happiest music on Earth with the various Charlie Brown shows.  I think of that way too much every time I hear any music from the "Peanuts" shows. 

Also, I'm sure many of you are asking if I did this one only to save time.  Well, I'm not NOT saying I did it 'cuz it would be theoretically easy to do, but it still seemed to take way too long.  Sigh...  And, yeah, that rock looks more like a gray muffin, but that's the way it looks in the show and it would be a travesty to change it!  Well, that may be a bit too far, but, y'know...  That's what it looked like.

Three more days to go, and you better believe I'm counting them down!

Here's an Animated .GIF of Charlie Brown, getting that rock:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 27: This Island Earth (1955) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
This Island Earth (1955)

It's the prototypical and quintessential Bug-Eyed Monster of 50's B-Movies, the Metaluna Mutant from "This Island Earth" (1955) (a brilliant title to an OK sci-fi movie, IMHO).  Just keep that bug spray away from him.

Here's an Animated .GIF of everyone's favorite Bug-Eyed Metalunaian:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 26: Little Shop of Horrors (1986) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
Little Shop of Horrors (1986)

It's "The Little Shop of Horrors" (1996), the musical version and remake of the 1960's Roger Corman original (which had Jack Nicholson in one of his first movie rolls.  A surprising number of big stars got their start with the B-Movie Schlockmeister, Corman, come to think of it).  A fun, colorful movie with a number of catch phrases I actually say out loud.  "Feed me!" being primary above them, and sometimes I will even spontaneously and apropos of nothing start to sing (poorly) about wanting to be a dentist.

Here's an Animated .GIF of our variegated friend, er, fiend, Audrey II.  Is Audrey II asking to be fed Mario, for fed by him?  The world may never know (although I have my suspicions):

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 25: It (1990) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
It (1990)

It's a belated tribute to the late, great Tim Curry with the 1990's TV Series, "It".  The series was mid-level, with a few good parts, and long, boring in between scenes.  Tim Curry as Pennywise the Clown (and eldritch horror from beyond the stars) was fun.  And, yeah, the special effects weren't the greatest, but they were for a TV Movie, so I always give that a little grace.  Not much, but a little...

Here's an Animated .GIF of Pennywise with his balloon:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 24: Videodrome (1983) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
Videodrome (1983)

It's another Cronenberg bit of body horror, "Videodrome" (1983).  A movie which seems more relevant and prescient today than it was when it was first released with the merging of human with media and machine. 

Actually, "Videodrome" was sort of the reason for this whole weird format for "31 Days of HELL-O-Ween" for 2026, where I thought it would be fun to do James Woods with his flesh gun saying "Long Live the New Flesh".  From there, I thought it would also be amusing to have speech balloons for all of them and hence the format change-up this year.  I'm not sure why I decided to have them all as full body digital paintings, but here we are.

And, as always, everything spun out of control where, for some dumb reason, I thought it was be fun to also have them be animated (albeit, very slightly).

One week to go!  Queue "The Final Countdown" by Europe...

Here's an Animated .GIF for Videodrome:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 23: The Exorcist (1973) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
The Exorcist (1973)

It's "The Exorcist" (1973), a classic of the horror genre.  Possession is nine-tenths of the law, so they say (an obvious joke I've made many times before).

Here's an Animated .GIF of Regan asking for pea soup.  Lots and lots of pea soup:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 22: Robot Monster (1953) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
Robot Monster (1953)

Here's another classically bad B-Movie, "Robot Monster" (1953), this one from the 50's.  The conquering alien menace was a diving bell style helmet with antenna on it, placed on top of a gorilla costume.  Y'know, super cool!  The poster featured a skull, as well, but in the movie itself, it was just a blank helmet.  Needless to say, the skull looked cooler, so I went with that, of course.

Mostly, the movie is boring, like most of the bad movies out there--a nuclear family (ha!) is all that is left of humanity after being wiped out by the alien, Ro-Man Extension XJ-2.  There is lots of pointless wandering around, slow-moving walking chases, and the classic ending of "It was all just a dream... Or was it?"  GASP!

Here's an Animated .GIF of Ro-Man, with his dream of nuking the last of the human race out of existence so he can be done with his mission to Earth:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 21: Troll 2 (1990) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
Troll 2 (1990)

"Troll 2" (1990) is often in the running for "Worst Movie Ever Made".  There are so many classic bad lines: "They're eating her!  The then they're going to eat me!  Oh, my Goooooooodddd!"; "You can't piss on hospitality!  I won't allow it!"...  It really is a bad movie in the most unhinged, delirious way.  Watch it in a "Mystery Science Theater 3000" sort of way and imagine Crow T. Robot and Tom Servo are sitting next to you.

And here's the Animated .GIF for "Troll 2".  The Trolls are always Goblin their vegetables!

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 20: Return of the Living Dead (1985) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
Return of the Living Dead (1985)

"Return of the Living Dead" (1985) hits that sweet spot of humor, satire, and horror, IMHO, along with 1980's punk aesthetic.  In this case, it's Tarman, out from his barrel of 245 Trioxin.

Oh, you already know what Tarman from "Return of the Living Dead" would be asking for..

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 19: Alien (1979) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
Alien (1979)

It's the Xenomorph from the 1979 classic, "Alien", often called a "haunted house in space".  Which isn't wrong... There's a living area with a giant, hissing critter that jumps out and says "Boo!" every once in a while.  But, also has a strong sense of direction and tension wondering who will be next.  A movie filled with strange landscapes and designs that lent themselves to look like something, well, alien.  Although, to be honest, as the series and spin-offs propagated, there were probably some questions that were probably better left unanswered.

I'm also reasonably sure there's a joke here somewhere about asking for flowers before putting that thing in me; I supplied the ingredients, you all can finish that half-baked joke.

And, yeah, it was a bit of a cheat to put in a previous drawing of mine as part of the punchline, but I believe it worked, time is tight, and I still have... 10... 11... 12 days to go?  Hoo-boy...

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 18: Mars Attacks (1996) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
Mars Attacks (1996)

"Mars Attacks" (1996) is a gleefully fun, chaotic movie filled with little green men (and woman) who pants Humanity at every turn and laugh while the World burns.  The effects don't hold up very well, and didn't even when the movie first came out.  I know they were trying to do a fake stop-motion effect for the Martians with Industrial Light and Magic, but I didn't think it ever jelled.  I would like to see everything left the same, but the Martians and effects given another pass through a Cray Computer out there and see how it would come out today.

While I was never lucky enough to own the actual "Mars Attacks" cards from back in the day (I did have an ungodly amount of "Star Wars" cards, and other movie-based Topps cards), I have seen them published in books when I was younger, and now they can be found on the Internet.  But, they also went hard, were darkly funny. and delightfully gruesome.

Here's an Animated .GIF of... [Martians break in as the artist and his computers are set on fire and used to toast marshmallows, which are then also set on fire and used to toast even smaller marshmallows].  Ack! Ack! Ack!:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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Day 17: The Blob (1988) - 31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026

31 Days of HELL-O-Ween 2026:
The Blob (1988)

"The Blob" (1988) was a great remake, in the mold of "John Carpenter's The Thing" (1982)--it took a relatively well-known B-Movie and remade it into a Grand Guignol of paranoia and terror.  People you didn't expect to die would suddenly be half-digested on a wall, or someone is pulled into a sink in ways that are really horrifying.  The special effects and buckets of slime in "The Blob" still stand up today--another crowning achievement of 80's horror, IMHO!

Of course, I am slightly biased, as this is the stuff I grew up on, for better or worse.  Probably mostly worse, now that I think about it; but I stand by my decisions.

Here's an Animated .GIF of The Blob:

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STEP ONE: Here are the quick pencils done on a 2,000px x 3,000px canvas @ 300dpi in Rebelle 8 Pro.

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STEP TWO: Here is the finished digital painting.

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Done Digitally with Rebelle 8 Pro.

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