#Lyle Conway

[jimhenson-themuppetmaster]

Jim Henson and his Dark Crystal Team of Builder's

[lordsofthecrystal]

Aughra mugs created by designer Lyle Conway, given as gifts to the crew of The Dark Crystal (1982). ✧

[studiotriggerfan397]

Dreamchild by Gavin Millar.

Ian Holm is amazing as Lewis Carroll. But like Return to Oz, so are the Lyle Conway/Jim Henson Creature Shop characters.

Check it out, you won't be disappointed.

[talkstothemoonandstars]

I was alerted that today is Tim Conway's birthday. Dec. 15th, 1933.

If you haven't seen Tim on the Carol Burnett Show, his deadpan humor was the rock for many jokes and sketches.

This sketch was absolutely hijacked by Tim, with Carol, Vicki Lawrence, and Lyle Waggoner all reduced to tears and helpless to hide, in front of a live audience. Enjoy.

[cantsayidont]

February 1977. The general presumption in DC's pre-Crisis era was that at some unspecified point in the 1950s, the published adventures of Superman, Batman & Robin, and Wonder Woman had switched from the "Golden Age" Earth-2 characters to their modern Earth-1 counterparts. In a very unusual move in early 1977, the Golden Age Wonder Woman actually reclaimed her own title, which for a little over a year featured WW2 adventures of the Earth-2 Diana. The Golden Age Wonder Woman also got her own feature in WORLD'S FINEST COMICS, an oversize WONDER WOMAN SPECTACULAR, and a costarring role in the 1978 SUPERMAN VS. WONDER WOMAN tabloid edition (ALL-NEW COLLECTOR'S EDITION #C-54).

This was a surprisingly big push for an Earth-2 character — since their revival in the early 1960s, the JSA had become popular supporting characters, but only the Spectre had gotten his own series — but DC was trying very hard to cash in on the popularity of the WONDER WOMAN TV series with Lynda Carter and Lyle Waggoner, which was initially set during World War 2. The series had actually launched a year earlier with a pilot TV movie, followed by a couple of one-hour specials, but it was then picked up for a full-season order that premiered not long before WONDER WOMAN #228 (pictured above) appeared on stands.

Unfortunately for DC, when the series was renewed for a second season in 1977, ABC decided the period setting was too expensive and shifted the second and third seasons to the present, which the show rationalized by declaring that Wonder Woman hadn't aged in the interim and Waggoner was now the son of his first-season character. It took DC a little time to catch up, but the Earth-1 Wonder Woman got her title back in early 1978, in WONDER WOMAN #243. The Golden Age Wonder Woman was also summarily dismissed from WORLD'S FINEST after issue #250.

Even if you're a fan of the TV show (and who doesn't love Lynda Carter as Wonder Woman?), these '70s Earth-2 Wonder Woman comic book stories are generally disappointing. The art, mostly by José Delbo or Don Heck, usually inked by Vince Colletta, is lackluster, and the stories are largely uninspired: Unsurprisingly, the loopy utopian philosophy and BDSM themes of the Marston/Peter comics are almost wholly absent, but the stories also don't line up well with the plots or continuity of the Golden Age Wonder Woman stories, and take various liberties to align the series with the TV show (such as inexplicably making Diana Prince a naval yeoman rather than an Army officer). There's not much effort to ground the series in real-world history either, which often reduces the period setting to a rote backdrop for some very ordinary superhero adventures. Nonetheless, these issues are potentially of interest to JSA fans, as several Justice Society members guest-star, and this period spawned a number of new Golden Age supervillains (like Baron Blitzkrieg, first seen in WORLD'S FINEST COMICS #246) who later became staples of ALL-STAR SQUADRON and YOUNG ALL-STARS. After this, the Golden Age Wonder Woman went back to being a supporting character, popping up only once more in the WONDER WOMAN book (in the appearance that introduced her daughter, Lyta Trevor) before her exit at the end of the Crisis.

[samasmith23]

Retconning the Retcon: How the High Evolutionary unnecessarily complicated the Spider-Man: Clone Saga

I honestly NEVER understood why Gerry Conway felt the need to retcon his own writing from the Original 1970s Clone Saga by stating in Spectacular Spider-Man (1976) Annual #8 (which was part of a crossover event from the late 80s called The Evolutionary War), wherein a supervillain called the High Evolutionary revealed that the Jackal (aka, Miles Warren) never actually created any clones of Peter Parker or Gwen Stacy, but instead that Professor Warren mutated his old assistant Anthony Serba and a student named Joyce Delayne into near-perfect replicas of Peter & Gwen with some sort of "DNA virus" that he created:

When I first read what the High Evolutionary said above, my immediate reaction was this:

"Nope! Nuh-Uh! I don't buy it for one minute! DNA does NOT work like that! DNA is NOT Lego Bricks! The idea that a literal college professor created a virus so advanced that can completely alter a person's genetic make-up to resemble a completely different person down to the smallest molecule is somehow even less scientifically plausible than human cloning!"

Needless to say, this retcon created a ton of problems for the writers & editors who worked on The Clone Saga of the 1990s when Ben Reilly was reintroduced into the Spider-Man mythos. Heck, the entire reason the Jackal was controversially resurrected during the Saga as well wasn't simply to provide more misdirections and red-herrings for the characters and readings (poorly I might add...), but also to try and undo Conway's retcons from the Evolutionary War crossover since it would have still been fresh in reader’s minds at the time. At least that's what editor Glenn Greenberg implied in "The Life of Reilly" essay:

However, both writers Howard Mackie & Terry Kavanagh were unable to satisfyingly address these continuity contradictions in either adjective-less Spider-Man (1990) #56 or Web of Spider-Man (1985) #125 respectively, other than quickly suggesting that the High Evolutionary simply just lied about the DNA virus bullcrap before quickly moving on.

It took an entire annual issue in the form of Scarlet Spider Unlimited #1 by writer Glenn Herdling to finally fully address and correct all the plot holes generated by the Evolutionary War crossover, essentially retconning the retcon. It was now revealed that the Jackal was a former assistant of the High Evolutionary who stole some of his superior's technology for his cloning experiments, but when the High Evolutionary discovered this he lied about the clone's existence by making up the DNA virus bullcrap through forged journals of Professor Warren's.

While Scarlet Spider Unlimited #1 did get pretty goofy in areas, such as revealing that there's an entire group of mutated animal people created by the High Evolutionary which secretly worships the Jackal like a god, the issue did at least finally acknowledge and put the High Evolutionary retcons to rest in a satisfactory manner. At least in my opinion as well as editor Glenn Greenberg's...

I still don't understand why Gerry Conway felt the need to go back and retcon the original 1970s Clone Saga in the first place though, especially since he himself wrote it?

[mueli77]

Ma-Co-Re-Mix (Vol. 110) [Venom: Tödlicher Beschützer & Marvel Exklusiv Nr. 119]

Im heutigen Ma-Co-Re-Mix möchte ich euch ein paar ältere Geschichten vorstellen. Mit „älter“ meine ich, einmal einen wahren Klassiker aus den frühen 90er Jahren, mit Spideys damals größten Widersacher, der gerade dabei war sich als Antiheld zu etablieren: Venom! Und zum anderen eine Storyline, die auch schon wieder über acht Jahre auf dem Buckel hat und von niemand geringerem als Gwen…

[eludin-realm]

Character Name Ideas (Male)

So I've been browsing through BehindTheName (great resource!) recently and have compiled several name lists. Here are some names, A-Z, that I like. NOTE: If you want to use any of these please verify sources, meanings etc, I just used BehindTheName to browse and find all of these. Under the cut:

A: Austin, Aiden, Adam, Alex, Angus, Anthony, Archie, Argo, Ari, Aric, Arno, Atlas, August, Aurelius, Alexei, Archer, Angelo, Adric, Acarius, Achilou, Alphard, Amelian, Archander B: Bodhi, Bastian, Baz, Beau, Beck, Buck, Basil, Benny, Bentley, Blake, Bowie, Brad, Brady, Brody, Brennan, Brent, Brett, Brycen C: Cab, Cal, Caden, Cáel, Caelan, Caleb, Cameron, Chase, Carlos, Cooper, Carter, Cas, Cash, Cassian, Castiel, Cedric, Cenric, Chance, Chandler, Chaz, Chad, Chester, Chet, Chip, Christian, Cillian, Claude, Cicero, Clint, Cody, Cory, Coy, Cole, Colt, Colton, Colin, Colorado, Colum, Conan, Conrad, Conway, Connor, Cornelius, Creed, Cyneric, Cynric, Cyrano, Cyril, Cyrus, Crestian, Ceric D: Dallas, Damien, Daniel, Darach, Dash, Dax, Dayton, Denver, Derek, Des, Desmond, Devin, Dewey, Dexter, Dietrich, Dion, Dmitri, Dominic, Dorian, Douglas, Draco, Drake, Drew, Dudley, Dustin, Dusty, Dylan, Danièu E: Eadric, Evan, Ethan, Easton, Eddie, Eddy, Einar, Eli, Eilas, Eiljah, Elliott, Elton, Emanuel, Emile, Emmett, Enzo, Erik, Evander, Everett, Ezio F: Faolán, Faron, Ferlin, Felix, Fenrir, Fergus, Finley, Finlay, Finn, Finnian, Finnegan, Flint, Flip, Flynn, Florian, Forrest, Fritz G: Gage, Gabe, Grady, Grant, Gray, Grayson, Gunnar, Gunther, Galahad H: Hale, Harley, Harper, Harvey, Harry, Huey, Hugh, Hunter, Huxley I: Ian, Ianto, Ike, Inigo, Isaac, Isaias, Ivan, Ísak J: Jack, Jacob, Jake, Jason, Jasper, Jax, Jay, Jensen, Jed, Jeremy, Jeremiah, Jesse, Jett, Jimmie, Jonas, Jonas, Jonathan, Jordan, Josh, Julien, Jovian, Jun, Justin, Joseph, Joni, K: Kaden, Kai, Kale, Kane, Kaz, Keane, Keaton, Keith, Kenji, Kenneth, Kent, Kevin, Kieran, Kip, Knox, Kris, Kristian, Kyle, Kay, Kristján, Kristófer L: Lamont, Lance, Landon, Lane, Lars, László, Laurent, Layton, Leander, Leif, Leo, Leonidas, Leopold, Levi, Lewis, Louie, Liam, Liberty, Lincoln, Linc, Linus, Lionel, Logan, Loki, Lucas, Lucian, Lucio, Lucky, Luke, Luther, Lyall, Lycus, Lykos, Lyle, Lyndon, Llewellyn, Landri, Laurian, Lionç M: Major, Manny, Manuel, Marcus, Mason, Matt, Matthew, Matthias, Maverick, Maxim, Memphis, Midas, Mikko, Miles, Mitch, Mordecai, Mordred, Morgan, Macari, Maïus, Maxenci, Micolau, Miro N: Nate, Nathan, Nathaniel, Niall, Nico, Niels, Nik, Noah, Nolan, Niilo, Nikander, Novak, O: Oakley, Octavian, Odin, Orlando, Orrick, Ǫrvar, Othello, Otis, Otto, Ovid, Owain, Owen, Øyvind, Ozzie, Ollie, Oliver, Onni P: Paisley, Palmer, Percival, Percy, Perry, Peyton, Phelan, Phineas, Phoenix, Piers, Pierce, Porter, Presley, Preston, Pacian Q: Quinn, Quincy, Quintin R: Ragnar, Raiden, Ren, Rain, Rainier, Ramos, Ramsey, Ransom, Raul, Ray, Roy, Reagan, Redd, Reese, Rhys, Rhett, Reginald, Remiel, Remy, Ridge, Ridley, Ripley, Rigby, Riggs, Riley, River, Robert, Rocky, Rokas, Roman, Ronan, Ronin, Romeo, Rory, Ross, Ruairí, Rufus, Rusty, Ryder, Ryker, Rylan, Riku, Roni S: Sammie, Sammy, Samuel, Samson, Sanford, Sawyer, Scout, Seán, Seth, Sebastian, Seymour, Shane, Shaun, Shawn, Sheldon, Shiloh, Shun, Sid, Sidney, Silas, Skip, Skipper, Skyler, Slade, Spencer, Spike, Stan, Stanford, Sterling, Stevie, Stijn, Suni, Sylvan, Sylvester T: Tab, Tad, Tanner, Tate, Tennessee, Tero, Terrance, Tevin, Thatcher, Tierno, Tino, Titus, Tobias, Tony, Torin, Trace, Trent, Trenton, Trev, Trevor, Trey, Troy, Tripp, Tristan, Tucker, Turner, Tyler, Ty, Teemu U: Ulric V: Valerius, Valor, Van, Vernon, Vespasian, Vic, Victor, Vico, Vince, Vinny, Vincent W: Wade, Walker, Wallis, Wally, Walt, Wardell, Warwick, Watson, Waylon, Wayne, Wes, Wesley, Weston, Whitley, Wilder, Wiley, William, Wolfe, Wolfgang, Woody, Wulfric, Wyatt, Wynn X: Xander, Xavier Z: Zachary, Zach, Zane, Zeb, Zebediah, Zed, Zeke, Zeph, Zaccai

[calypsoscyclone]

Pastel Blue && Ocean Themed Names

Grayson, Samson, Seeley, Arlo, Ryder, Mavi, Neptune, Morgan, Tristan, Fisher, Calder, Conway, Murphy, Hartford, Wells, Lyle

[docrotten]

THE BLOB (1988) – Episode 270 – Decades of Horror 1980s

“All I saw was an old man with a funky hand, … that’s all I saw.” Well, there’s a lot more to see than a funky hand! Join your faithful Grue Crew – Crystal Cleveland, Bill Mulligan, and Jeff Mohr, along with special guests Jeff Farley and Ralph Miller – as they get down and dirty and gloppy with The Blob (1988) and its special effects. [NOTE: Technical issues forced Jeff Farley to drop out early in the recording. Bill and Jeff rescheduled a later discussion with Jeff, which was spliced near the end of the original recording.]

Decades of Horror 1980s Episode 270 – The Blob (1988)

Join the Crew on the Gruesome Magazine YouTube channel! Subscribe today! Click the alert to get notified of new content! https://youtube.com/gruesomemagazine

Gruesome Magazine is partnering with the WICKED HORROR TV CHANNEL (https://wickedhorrortv.com/) which now includes video episodes of Decades of Horror 1980s and is available on Roku, AppleTV, Amazon FireTV, AndroidTV, and its online website across all OTT platforms, as well as mobile, tablet, and desktop.

Synopsis: A deadly entity from space crash-lands near a small town and begins consuming everyone in its path. Panic ensues as shady government scientists try to contain the horrific creature.

Directed by: Chuck Russell

Writing Credits:Chuck Russell & Frank Darabont (screenplay)

1958 Version: Theodore Simonson and Kay Linaker (as Kate Phillips) (screenplay); Irvine H. Millgate (story)

Produced by: Jack H. Harris & Elliott Kastner

Cinematography by: Mark Irwin

Make up effects designed and created by: Tony Gardner

Creature effects designed and created by:Lyle Conway

Selected crew members:

Jeffrey S. Farley (creature effects crew)

Ralph Miller III (blob mechanic: blob effects crew)

Special visual effects by: Dream Quest Images

Visual effects supervisor: Hoyt Yeatman

Selected Cast:

Kevin Dillon as Brian Flagg

Shawnee Smith as Meg Penny

Donovan Leitch Jr. as Paul Taylor (as Donovan Leitch)

Jeffrey DeMunn as Sheriff Herb Geller

Candy Clark as Fran Hewitt

Joe Seneca as Dr. Meddows

Del Close as Reverend Meeker

Paul McCrane as Deputy Bill Briggs

Sharon Spelman as Mrs. Penny

Beau Billingslea as Moss Woodley

Art LaFleur as Pharmacist / Mr. Penny

Ricky Paull Goldin as Scott Jeske

Robert Axelrod as Jennings

Bill Moseley as Soldier #2 (in sewer)

Frank Collison as Hobbe

Michael Kenworthy as Kevin Penny

Jack Rader as Col. Hargis

Billy Beck as Can Man

Jack Nance as Doctor

Erika Eleniak as Vicki De Soto

Jacquelyn Masche as White Suit #2

Julie McCullough as Susie

Daryl Sandy Marsh as Lance (as Daryl Marsh)

Richard Anthony Crenna as Soldier Outside Town Hall (as Richard Crenna Jr.)

Pons Maar as Theatre Manager

Portia Griffin as Gospel Singer

First, there was the original The Blob (1958), covered by Decades of Horror: The Classic Era #123. After that, there was the sequel, Beware! The Blob (1972), braved by the Grue Crew in Decades of Horror 1970s #63. Then came The Blob (1988), an updated retelling of the original as imagined by Frank Darabont and Chuck Russell and discussed by a previous 80s Grue Crew in Decades of Horror 1980s #126. 

Finally, the current 80s Grue Crew, having some contacts in the effects community, decided to do a deeper dive into The Blob (1988) with a focus on the film’s effects work and enlisted the aid of effects artists Jeffrey S. Farley and Ralph Miller III who worked on Lyle Conway’s blob crew. Ralph shares several mechanical devices used for blob manipulation and stories of the hard work put into the film. Jeff focuses on his work on The Blob, occasionally wandering to other aspects of his career, including Abruptio, his current release.

At the time of this writing, The Blob (1988) is available to stream from Peacock, Paramount+, PlutoTV, and multiple PPV sources. It is also available on physical media as a Limited Edition Steelbook 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray and as a Collector’s Edition [4K UHD] from Scream Factory. 

Every two weeks, Gruesome Magazine’s Decades of Horror 1980s podcast will cover another horror film from the 1980s. The next episode’s film, chosen by Bill, will be Cannibal Ferox (1981), directed by Umberto Lenzi with special effects by Gino De Rossi. Yup. It must be time for a film initially banned in 31 countries.

Please let them know how they’re doing! They want to hear from you – the coolest, grooviest fans – so leave them a message or comment on the Gruesome Magazine Youtube channel, on the Gruesome Magazine website, or email the Decades of Horror 1980s podcast hosts at feedback@gruesomemagazine.com.

Check out this episode!

[calliemity]

it is, in fact, a puppet! i cant find like, any information on this shot or its puppet specifically, but im very confident it was created by the same person who created all of the audrey ii's, that being Lyle Conway

my educated guess on how this was filmed is that the mouth puppet is completely open in the back, allowing a camera to be placed inside of it for the perspective shot. a comically large dental drill prop is used to make the perspective consistent. the puppet was operated out-of-shot while the actors lip-synced

im not sure if they used to same method they used to make twoey look more animated (they had the puppet maneuvered slower and then the footage was sped up) because martin and the girls dont seem to have any aftereffects of the sped-up footage. im leaning on the side of no, that they just filmed it normally, but i cant say for certain

ill also like to add that this couldnt have been cgi, as cgi as we know it today didnt really exist. that same year had the first use of 3d animation in a movie (labyrinth 1986, which actually shares a lot of its puppet production team with little shop of horrors) and its far from being as realistic as we see the mouth puppet is

Ok I’m very curious as to how they did this shot during Dentist but I’ve never been able to find any information on it. Is it a puppet? Is it someone’s actual mouth? (I genuinely hope not lol)

It just looks so cool and I’m hoping someone has at least some information cause I’d love to find out more about it

[astronoglow]

A rare photo of Jim Henson and some of his building team for the Dark Crystal

[jimhenson-themuppetmaster]

A rare photo of Jim Henson and some of his building team for the Dark Crystal

[somewherethatsellengreene]

Ellen Greene on the cover of Cinefantastique Magazine, September, 1987

[allurared]

these are the same type of guy but opposite

[sesiondemadrugada]

A Star is Born (William A. Wellman, Jack Conway & Victor Fleming, 1937).