Night of the Living... Stick Figures?
Once upon a time, like the best rock 'n roll, MTV was unafraid to experiment. Yes, before the days of Britney Spears and The Real World, there was still plenty of crap on the network, but there were also some crazy short films and series broadcast as part of its early '90s Liquid Television lineup. Paving the way for Adult Swim, MTV regularly ran stuff like Aeon Flux, Henry Selick's Slow Bob in the Lower Dimensions, Richard Sala's Invisible Hands, and Stick Figure Theatre. This last series consisted of sixty-second bits of animation drawn on 3x5 index cards that recreated classic films, using their original audio. And it included a few choice horror selections. After the jump, check out three of my favorite episodes of Stick Figure Theatre from the glory days of MTV.
Psycho
This one's not actually excerpted from Hitchcock's classic, but rather the nutty extended trailer for the film, in which 'ol Hitch took audiences on a tour of the Bates Motel...
The Terror
This infamous Roger Corman cheapie is somehow better when animated. God, how I wish they could have done the entire film this way, allowing us to be fully immersed in the voices of stars Boris Karloff and Jack Nicholson.
Night of the Living Dead
Ah, my favorite installment of Stick Figure Theatre. Like Romero's 1968 trendsetter, it was quite simply ahead of its time.
- HULK KILL FOR FRUIT PIES!
- Run for the Hills, It's... Birds with Arms!
- Looking Forward to 'Shark Night 3D'? Experience 'Shark Attack 3: Megalodon'
- For the Psychopath in All of Us, Now There's 'Soon...'
- Classic Monsters + Eighties Kitsch = Sheena Easton's "Telephone"
- Is Anything Creepier Than an Ewok?
