St. Nick is the forerunner of Father Christmas and Santa Claus.
He was a Greek Bishop of Myra in what is now modern day Turkey. Associated with his generosity to children, he is the archetypal gift-bringer of Old Europe.
Missus Moonbase comes from the Continent and along with millions of European children celebrated St. Nikolaus as a kid on the Sixties and as they still do now. In many ways it is an early Christmas Day.
My Wife recalls leaving her shoes outside the house door. These would be filled with sweets.
Inside the candle-lit kitchen would be a Bunte Teller or colouful platter of sweets, nuts and fruit like this:
The whole family would dress for the winter cold and join many others to witness the St. Nikolaus procession proceeding through the town centre. St. Nick was escorted by 'bad monk' Knect Ruprect and others handing out sweets to the enchanted kids.
Largely if not completely absent from Great Britain, if you are celebrating St. Nikolaus's day then I hope your shoes were stuffed with goodies and your candles burn bright.
As season 9 of the current Doctor Who series draws to a close, part of the story arc hinted at by Davros in 'The Witches Familiar' was the coming of a warrior hybrid. Davros considered that it would be a Dalek/Timelord mix, however the climax of last week's episode, 'Heaven Sent', was the Doctor finding himself on his lost home world of Gallifrey, and coming to speculate that he is the hybrid.
Intriguing stuff, and some have also speculated that this might be harking back to the Doctor Who movie from 1996, where it's revealed that the Doctor is in fact half human on his mother's side. The reason for this in the film is his human aspects enable him to open the Eye of Harmony, the power source of the TARDIS.. It might also explain the Doctor's predilection with Earth.
Paul McGann played the Eighth Doctor in the movie taking over from the incumbent Sylvester McCoy. He started the' Doctor kissing his companions thing', which I've never liked. He's an alien isn't he!
Although, he continued to portray the Doctor in many audio adventures, he did return to TV screens in the prequel mini-sode, The Night of The Doctor, which aired prior to the fiftieth anniversary episode, Day of The Doctor.
The Night of The Doctor served to tell the audience that the Timelords, following the Timewar were as much hated as the dreaded Daleks. We also see the Doctor's regeneration into the War Doctor, with some help from The Sisterhood of Karn.
Is this reminder that the Eighth Doctor's half human aspect is a hint of what's to be revealed at the climax of this season? (most fans chose to ignore this part of the Doctor's personality, believing it to be simply a mistake in the writing).
Coincidently, this is the latest Eaglemoss figure of Paul McGann as The Eighth Doctor.
Later on tonight, when the latest episode Hell Bent airs we should know for sure, or not depending on how convoluted the story gets.
Its funny how small things coalesce into a huge horned devil. This is basically what's happened this week for me.
It began with my post-hospital stomach cramping on the sofa whilst forming an old memory of a film I saw as a teenager. All I could recall where certain images so I googled 'witch, sickle, snow'. Lo and behold, it churned out a name, a film called Curtains! Curtains I thought. I have that in the attic!
Yes, Curtains had been languishing for at least 10 years in my sizable big box video collection salvaged from countless car boots for posterity. I had no idea it was the film I had been searching for. Despite thinking it was much older than 1983 [ I recall seeing it with an old girlfriend in Preston in the Seventies!] this is the key image I remember:
Oddly enough I had thought that the 'witch' was much scarier, replete with white hair and horns in the style of the Unnamable from 1988 below:
And so, chronologically challenged, I began to watch Curtains. As is my want I sometimes surf the net whilst watching TV when BOOM! Up pops THE hairy horned devil to end them all! Krampus!
Krampus is an ancient Christmas spirit as old as the season itself and celebrated across most of continental Europe. One of St. Nikolas's many helpers Krampus is his opposite. This festive beast is responsible for the Naughty List and he takes his job very seriously!
Armed with a sack, chains, a birch, horns, cloven hooves and lumps of coal, old K could be Satan himself. He often turned up on old creepy December postcards sent throughout Europe like this one:
When I think of Krampus I can't help thinking of the Fire-Beast in Night or Curse of the Demon. I wonder if the studio were aware of the seasonal creature? I suppose its the horns that do it.
I have been aware of these Darth Vaders of Yuletide for some time. Missus Moonbase is European and has often spoke of her childhood staring at dark characters in procession such as Knecht Ruprecht the "bad monk" as she describes him, complete with child-sized sack and Rute or birch!
Ruprecht sounds a lot like Krampus to me so consulting Wiki I see that St. Nick had a lot of mates and just like everyone's some were good, some were bad and some in between. Depending on where you lived in Europe children would be threatened with birchings and worse from Knect Ruprecht, Schwarze Peit, Belsnickel, Krampus, Befana, Hans Muff, Joulupukki [see below - for Arto!] and many other winter rogues.
In North West England, certainly in Preston, we had Father Christmas and his Reindeer and that was it in the Sixties. Jack Frost nipped their ears a bit. No proper monsters, worst luck!
"Joulupukki" by Lauri Rantala from Espoo, Finland: Santaclaus at Helsinki Cathedral
As popular culture searches for new legends beyond the Marvel universe creatures of European myth are rising. Foreshadowed by Tim Burton's Jack Skellington in 1993's The Night Before Christmas, in 2010 we had the horned Finnish Santa in Rare Exports. This year we had the spellbinding Scandinavian modern fairy-tale Jordskott on TV and this Christmas, after being introduced to it in October's Christmas Horror Story with William Shatner, we are treated to the festive fiend in his own full film, Krampus - playing at cinemas now:
And so we come full circle. A film. A December devil. A winter's day. Today in many parts of old Europe is Nikolausabend or Krampusnacht. Tonight IS Krampus Night! I just hope you've not been naughty!
The latest Thunderbirds are Go episode, Extraction, written by Matt Wayne appears to be a little Anti-Fracking propaganda , as it speculates on the' pitfalls' of searching for gases underground.
Robert Williams and his son, Aiden chance upon an automated illegal Sonic Injection Platform used by Energy Poachers to steal hydro -methane from deep beneath the Earth's surface.
As Robert is a warden for the area, Dunsley Field, he takes no time in boarding the platform with Aiden with the intension of shutting it down. However, after he's duped into thinking he's called the Dept. of Energy, the platform begins to start piledriving, causing a massive Earthquake. Time to send for International Rescue.
Fans of the original Thunderbirds will no doubt pick up on the obvious reference to the episode Cry Wolf which takes place in the Australian outback. One of the young boys in the story who 'cried wolf ' is Bob Williams, and his father works at a satellite moniting station, Dunsley Tracker!
This is Virgil and Gordon story, with some nice animation of Thunderbird 4 underwater. Like the original Cry Wolf episode the tension is provided by precarious rock falls.
There's quite a few interesting points in this story. The fact that details of the Thunderbird craft appear on the internet ("so much for keeping that secret") which, again draws similarities to Cry Wolf, as, like Aiden, Bob and his friend Tony have plenty of information about International Rescue. During this rescue,Gordon is also reminded of dad, Jeff. The missing father has been getting a few mentions lately. Could this be a prelude to an answer to his absence - your guess is as good as mine.
I've taken some photos of Dinky aircraft. These were all ones I had as a kid and have re-collected. Not my usual TVSF stuff but I liked them. They are the Phantom, Harrier, Spitfire, Stuka, HS125 jet and SeaKing helicopter. Don't know why I had these particular ones, I just did!
These box art illustrations of Ideal's Astro Base astronaut from 1960 - above dangling and below seated - maybe the earliest illustrations of a toy part which went on to form part of the Project SWORD toy range in 1967 [this is more attractive blue box version by Ideal].
The astronaut was re-used by Century 21 Toys in their Moon Ranger as I blogged the other day.
I found this old clip of McHales Navy on You Tube. It stars the great Ernest Borgnine. Not one I know, what really grabbed me though where the old Don Post Monster Masks I oggled over as a kid at the back of Creepy and Eerie comics. All the classic Universals are here and wait for the last one a little later in the clip!
This is the colour advert that I remember on the 1960's.
Looking at these masks again and I realise that they are very similar to the cover art of Famous Monsters and Monster World, where they appeared as adverts. Here are a fearful few:
There was a TV movie made about Don Post masks in 2004 called Monsterama: History of Don Post Masks and presented by Elvira, the rather voluptuous Mistress of the Dark which I've yet to see. There's a few clips on You Tube like this:
I've never really collected masks. I had a few as a kid including a hard plastic wolfman and about 10 years ago I bought a hard plastic Dracula, which was rather neat. These plastic masks are more the type I had, which I assume Ben Cooper masks are like too - hard plastic with an elastic band for around the head. Does anyone know if Ben Cooper and Don Posts masks are equally as collectable now?
Don Post was known as the Godfather of Halloween and Ben Cooper the Halston of Halloween [I had to look up Halston] according to Wiki. Alas Ben Cooper filed for bankruptcy in 1991 and Don Post Studios sadly closed its doors in September 2012.
Do you have a favourite mask readers? Maybe one from Xmases past?
