Jinkies! Velma and Cyclops hate it too! We, ahem, see, what cosplayers Matt Rogers (aka Humble Shield) and Zoe did in this clever lil skit.

Technically, these cupcakes by One Charming Party are based on the goofy comedy So I Married An Axe Murderer, but they would be perfect for any Halloween party as well -especially if you mix in a few tiny plastic butcher knives in with the axes.

Link

(Video Link)

Animator Paolo Cogliati recently sent us a message on the Neatorama Facebook page, hoping to share his newest solo project with all of you readers. When you watch this adorable, funny and slightly dark cartoon, you'll be glad he got in touch.

By the way, if you're not following us on Facebook, you're missing out on all kinds of fun

When was the last time you heard someone excited about eating hospital food? Probably never, right? But oddly, that hasn't stopped people from opening and others from enjoying successful hospital-themed restaurants. In fact, there are such restaurants and bars in Singapore, Taipei, Japan (with a prison hospital-theme sure to give you twice the nightmares), and Latvia. As gross as they are, they would be pretty awesome for a creepy Halloween meal.

You can check out more images of Hospitalis, the one in Latvia, at the link, but be warned, though it may be a restaurant, it may just make you lose your appetite.

Link Via Food Beast

Jason and Melissa are seriously dedicated fans of the Haunted Mansion. That's why they decided to make their wedding have a Haunted Mansion theme. The pictures are fantastic and certain to be appreciated by anyone else who happens to love the Haunted Mansion or just fun weddings in general.

Link Via BoingBoing

These two are putting the "play" back in cosplay with Indiana Jones and the boulder that chases him in the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark. They were seen with camera operators in Manhattan's Central Park, making a video we will probably see soon. Link -via reddit

If you’re the kind of person who finds commercial haunted houses boring and instead loves traveling to macabre places, then you’d better start booking your tickets because we’ve compiled some of the creepiest and scariest places on earth. Of course, if you’re squeamish and don’t like to read about death or look at pictures of long-dead bodies, then you should probably skip ahead because this article just isn’t for you.

Japan’s Suicide Forrest

At first glance, the Aokigahara Forest near Mount Fuji is an ideal nature destination, filled with stunning trees growing on hard volcanic rock, and icy, rocky caverns. But the forest has a much darker side, one that was popularized with the 1960 novel Nami no T?, where the main characters end up committing suicide in the area. While Aokigahara was always a destination for the forlorn to end their lives, Nami no T? made the idea much more popular and since the book was released, an average of 30 people kill themselves in the area every year, with a record-setting body count of 108 deaths in 2004.

The government has put out a number of signs in both Japanese and English urging people to reconsider their decision and seek psychiatric help. Once a year, a group of volunteers patrols the forest looking for bodies. These body hunters mark off the areas they are exploring with plastic tape that is never removed. Thus, even if you never see a dead body or ghost roaming the forest, you are still bound to see signs of the forest’s secrets wherever you happen to go.

Image Via Al Kaiser [Flickr]

Mexico’s Island of the Dolls

Unless you already have a doll phobia, the idea of an island filled with dolls doesn’t sound all that creepy at first. It’s once you learn that the dolls are mutilated and left hung in trees while they rot away, all in honor of a drowned little girl that you start to realize just how creepy this macabre tourist destination really is.

It all started over fifty years ago, when the island’s only resident, Don Julian Santana found the body of a dead little girl in the canal where the island sits. He was haunted by her memory and soon started hanging dolls in the trees to appease the girl’s spirits and to ward off evil spirits from entering the island. Doll heads, arms, legs, etc. are sprawled out across the island in a strange sacrifice to prevent further evil. Strangely though, in 2001, Don Julian suffered the same fate as the little girl, drowning in the canal beside his home. Some people believe this was the work of the dolls who have since become inhabited by evil spirits. These days, the dolls remain the sole occupants of one of Mexico’s darkest tourist attractions.

Image Via SkilliShots [Flickr]

Italy’s Catacomb of Mummies

The Capuchin Catacombs of Palermo started when the local monastery outgrew its original cemetery, so the monks decided to mummify one of their recently deceased brothers before placing him in their newly opened catacombs. The process seemed to work well, so the monks began mummifying all of their fallen comrades and placing them in the catacombs. After a few centuries, word spread about the monk’s unique burial methods and it soon began to be a status symbol for rich people to be entombed in the catacombs buried in their finest clothing. Some people even left wills requesting that their clothing be changed by their family members at regular intervals.

The last friar was buried in the catacombs in 1871, but famous people from the area continued to be interred up until the 1920s. There are now about 8000 mummies lining the walls of the many hallways, which have been organized into categories: men, women, virgins, children, priests, monks and professionals. Some of the bodies are even set in poses, including the bodies of two children who sit together in a rocking chair.

Austria’s Skull Ossuary

Looking for a perfect dinner party treat to terrorify your guests? Try your hand at making Instructable user caitlinsdad's creepy-looking Jalapeno "screamers" -essentially poppers with tails. Those who brave a taste test will be pleasantly surprised by the delicious results.

Link

When you watch The Ring, you're probably thinking, "gee, I'd love to try some of the water from that well." Well, you're in luck! Japanese burger chain Lotteria has introduced a new milkshake that they claim is flavored after the classic horror flick.

So what does it taste like? Oddly enough, blue lemonade with chocolate hair swirls on the top.

Link Via Foodbeast

Spooktacular...History of Horror Hosts is a blog dedicated to the phenomena of the TV horror hosts. These are the local characters who introduced and and led us through old horror films and gave us a feeling of community in watching. They were knowledgable about their subject, funny, scary, and sometimes became famous outside their broadcast area, or even syndicated. In addition to profiles of specific hosts, the site contains articles about horror films and plenty of videos. Is your favorite horror host in there? If not, they will be soon! Link -via Metafilter

Not only is The Queen of Chibilabd's cosplay of Velma and a reall-life version Scooby post-apocalypse style impressive, it's even a dead ringer for the Threadless shirt that inspired it (it's called We've Got Some Work to Do Now if you're interested). I'm particularly impressed with her great Dane munching on the zombie arm just for the sake of the cosplay.

Link Via Fashionably Geek

This may look like a makeup appliance , but it is actually a necklace, which makes it easier to put on and wear around town on a regular basis -perfect for any wannabe zombie gal on the go. Etsy seller VonErickson has quite a few other excellent horror-inspired jewelry pieces, including rings and bracelets.

Link

PS: VonEreickson is offering a 20% discount to Neatorama readers if you want to buy this, or any item in his Etsy store. The code is NEATORAMASAVINGS (for a limited time).

Mmmmmmm...brains. Even if they aren't the real thing, any zombie gal would be flattered to see these candy versions in a lovely heart-shaped box. You can learn to make these yourself thanks to Instructables user kristylynn84.

Link

Are coloring books always for kids? Not according to publisher I Love Mel. The publisher released a humorous coloring book designed for adults called Colour Me Good Arrggghhhh!! and filled with images from classic horror flicks. Ordinarily, this wouldn't be controversial, as adults interested in horror and humor titles would be happy to buy the book.

The issue arrived when UK retailer Tesco put the book up for sale on their website, categorizing it as a title designed for 5 to 8 year olds. Needless to say, parents weren't pleased with the rated R publication being sold to kids.

The publisher defended his creation noting, "The front cover ... features a drawing from the horror movie ‘Psycho’ in which a woman is stabbed to death in the shower," said Elliott. "I believe this one image is a fairly large clue this is not a book aimed at children."

Link

The following article is reprinted from The Best of Uncle John' Bathroom Reader.

The original Frankenstein's monster wasn't Boris Karloff -it was (believe it or not) a character created by a 19-year-old author named Mary Shelley ...more than 190 years ago.

BACKGROUND

In the summer of 1816, 19-year-old Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and her 24-year-old husband, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, visited Switzerland "It proved a wet, uncongenial summer," she wrote some 15 years later, "and incessant rain often confined us for days to the house."

To pass the time, the Shelleys and their neighbors -28-year-old Lord Byron, his 23-year-old personal physician, and his 18-year-old lover- read German ghost stories aloud. They enjoyed it so much that one day, Byron announced, "We will each write a ghost story." Everyone agreed, but apparently the poets, unaccustomed to prose writing, couldn't come up with anything very scary.

Mary was determined to do better. "I busied myself to think of a story," she recalled, "One which would speak to the mysterious fears of our nature and awaken thrilling horror." Yet she couldn't come up with anything. Every morning, her companions asked: "Have you thought of a story?" "And each morning," she wrote later, "I was forced to reply with a mortifying negative."

A FLASH OF INSPIRATION

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

One evening, Mary sat by the fireplace, listening to her husband and Byron discuss the possibility of reanimating a corpse with electricity, giving it what they called "vital warmth."

The discussion finally ended well after midnight, and Shelley retired. But Mary, "transfixed in speculation," couldn't sleep.

"When I placed my head on the pillow," she recalled, "I did not sleep, nor could I be said to think. My imagination, unbidden, possessed and guided me, gifting the successive images that arouse in my mind with a vividness far beyond the usual bounds of reverie. I saw -with shut eyes but acute mental vision- I saw the pale student of unhallowed arts kneeling beside the thing he had put together ...I saw the hideous phantasm of a man stretched out, and then, on the working of some powerful engine, show signs of life and stir with an uneasy half-vital motion.

"Frightful must it be; for supremely frightful would be the effect of any human endeavor to mock the stupendous mechanism of the Creator of the world. His success would terrify the artist; he would rush away from his odious handiwork, horror-stricken. He would hope that, left to itself, the slight spark of light which he had communicated would fade; that this thing would subside into dead matter; and he might sleep in the belief that the silence of the grave would quench forever the transient existence of the hideous corpse which he had looked upon as the cradle of life. He sleeps; but he is awakened; the horrid thing stands at his bedside, opening his curtains, and looking on him with yellow, watery eyes..."

THE PERFECT HORROR STORY

At this point, Mary opened her eyes in terror -so frightened that she needed reassurance it had all just been her imagination. She gazed around the room, but just couldn't shake the image of "my hideous phantom." Finally, to take her mind off the creature, she went back to the ghost story she'd been trying to compose all week. "If only I could contrive one," she thought, "that would frighten people as I myself had been frightened that night!" Then she realized that her vision was, in fact, the story she'd been reaching for.

As she recounted: "Swift as light and as cheering was the idea that broke in upon me. 'I have found it! What terrified me will terrify others; and I need only describe the spectre which had haunted my midnight pillow.' On the morrow I announced that I had thought of a story. I began the day with the words, 'It was on a dreary night in November,' making only a transcript of the grim terrors of my waking dream."

THE NOVEL

The first version of Frankenstein was a short story. But Mary's husband encouraged her to develop it further, and she eventually turned it into a novel. It was published anonymously in three parts in 1818. "Mary," notes one critic, "did not think it important enough to sign her name to the book... And since her husband wrote the book's preface, people assumed he had written the rest of the book as well... It was not until a later edition of Frankenstein that the book was revealed as the work of a young girl."

________________________________

The article above is reprinted with permission from The Best of Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

Since 1988, the Bathroom Reader Institute had published a series of popular books containing irresistible bits of trivia and obscure yet fascinating facts.

If you like Neatorama, you'll love the Bathroom Reader Institute's books - go ahead and check 'em out!