Tales From The Darkside - Hush

I miss the Friday nights of my youth.  Things were so much simpler then.  At 1:50, the school bell rang and I knew that the weekend was once again upon us.  My older sister and I would get home from school just as my Dad was getting ready to go to work.  We would watch our younger sister (Hi Katie!)  until my mother would get home about 4:30.  After Mom got home, she'd make us dinner and then Friday night was Mom's designated grocery shopping night.  Ah, Friday night grocery shopping.....that was a magical experience unto itself, but perhaps a story best left for another time.

The groceries would be put away by 7:30....then it was time to get into our PJ's and get ready for some TGIF action on ABC!  Man....I could go on and on about TGIF on ABC too...Family Matters, Full House, Step by Step, Just the Ten of Us, Dinosaurs (NOT THE MAMA!)), Perfect Strangers.....so many incredibly awesome sitcoms on Friday nights.  Mom would usually pick up a frozen pizza or (YUM) pizza rolls to snack on.  Oh....those delicious little nuggets of pizza goodness.  When I die, I want to be buried with a casket full of pizza rolls.  Or maybe in a casket made out of a giant pizza roll....yes, I love them THAT much!

After a good solid 2 hours of  sitcom comedy gold (at least as far as my 13 year old self was concerned), my Mom would head to bed at 10.  My younger sister would already be asleep and my older sister would sometimes be downstairs with me.....sometimes in her room doing whatever it is that 16 year old girls do in their rooms.  I dunno.  My Dad worked 2nd shift and didn't get home until 11:30. Anyway, at 10pm, on good ol' Channel 50 WNDS (The Winds of New England.....New Hampshire station that used to show awesome stuff) would show re-runs of Monsters and Tales From The Darkside at 10 and 10:30 respectively.  Also WNDS was home to Al Kaprielian....also known as Weird Al Kaprielian.....the awesome meteorologist who would start each weather segment saying "Good eeeeevnening everyone!"  This guy is so awesome his loyal fanbase is known as the Kult of Kaprielian!  Yeah, he's THAT awesome.

I was alone downstairs on this particular occasion.  There were still some cold pizza rolls left over from earlier in the evening, so I loaded up the rest of them, poured myself a big ol' glass of coke  and hunkered down for a little double dose of horror!  To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure what episode of Monsters was on before hand....but part of my wants to say that it was Pillow Talk.....which is about a guy who has a pet bed monster thing that likes to eat half naked women that the guy takes home for a one night snack...er...stand.  That was a cool episode......Here check it out for yourself:

See?  That was pretty awesome.  You can totally see the "twist" ending coming, but it's still pretty damn cool.  Monstsers was a perfect pairing with Tales From The Darkside.  You were guaranteed a Monster in each episde (though there were a few where the definitinon of "Monster" was stretched quite thin!) while TFTD could cover everything from monsters, to ghosts, voodoo and everything in between.

The Intro do Tales From The Darkside was simply the stuff of nightmares.  An insanely creepy piano riff played while the narrator informed us that there is a darkside that exists unknown to most....lurking just below the sunlight world of what we believe to be reality.  It completely set the tone for the show....even when it was a less than impressive episode, it always somehow seemed that much creepier....just because it was prefaced with that intro.  Seriously.  Watch THIS:

Spooky stuff, right?  I told ya!   That is pure terror to a kid, trust me.  What came next however kept me huddled to my spot on the couch.  The episode was of course, Hush.  A girl named Jennifer goes to babysit a young boy named Buddy.  Buddy is a bit of an inventor and shows Jennifer all of his little electronic Frankenstein creations, including a device he calls a noise eater....which basically looks like a vacuum cleaner with some extra doodads attached to it.  Well, wouldn't ya know it, the damn thing malfunctions and takes on a life of it's own., sucking the sound out everything.  Unfortunately if it is a living creature that is making the sound, it will aslo suck the life right out of it. 

What ensues next is a cat and mouse game with Jennifer and Buddy trying to hide from this monstrosity as it systematically hunts for any sounds to consume.  Oh yeah, Buddy's got some allergies too.....which make for some rather tense moments as they hide from the Noise Eater.  The acting is pretty good in the episode....thought the noise eater is a bit wonky looking.  Re-watching this episode years later, it still holds a creepy vibe, I think....though it is no where near as terrifying as I found it that Friday night so long ago.

Why don't ya go ahead and watch it and tell me what you think!

I was going to talk a bit about USA Up All Night, but that is best left for another time.
I hope that you enjoyed the episode, as well as the extra bonus episode of Monsters.  I also hope that you enjoyed the little stroll down memory lane with me...until next time.....try to stay in the light!