Happy Holidays

December 27th, 2016 by Max Allan Collins
XMas 2016

We had Nate, his missus Abby and their cute offspring Sam as guests over the long Christmas weekend. Zero work got done, but much eating heralded a January ahead as a wasteland of dieting.

I believe that the gifts I received from Barb – carefully pre-selected by me – would make excellent evidence at my commitment hearing. Batman, Mickey Mouse, Herschell Gordon Lewis and Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion would be among the witnesses.

The latter, a four-Blu-Ray boxed set, Nate and I blew through starting Christmas Eve (that’s when we do our gift exchange). Remarkable early ‘70s Japanese exploitation fare with feminism bait-and-switching its male audience with their own misogyny. I would swear the female protagonist was a model for Ms. Tree, only I never saw these films before.

The Herschell Gordon Lewis boxed set – festive in its green and red coloration – will enliven the food-deprived days ahead.

Christmas Day evening was given over to RiffTrax shorts. This, sadly, marks the first Christmas since my early childhood that did not include the films Scrooge (Alistair Sim) and Miracle on 34th Street. Barb and I may cheat and watch them this week. But movie-watching is haphazard with a sixteen-month-old Sam in play – lots of vintage Warner Bros cartoons and the new Peanuts movie owned the living room. Sam is almost walking and sort of talking – “Baby!” is his favorite word.

Mine, too.

* * *

Here’s a lovely write-up about my Grand Master award.

At the Rap Sheet, J. Kingston Pierce lists Better Dead with Nate Heller as among his short list of favorites of 2016.

Read about Quarry being one of the best 11 TV shows of 2016 (number 7 to be exact).

Scroll down a ways to get some cool Mike Hammer/Spillane stuff as it relates to the Japanese tribute films.

Then scroll down to number 8 on a Batman list for some rare love for a Collins Batman story.

See you next year!

M.A.C.

One Response to “Happy Holidays”

  1. Paul.Griffith says:

    Max, It is good to hear you are enjoying the holidays with family! A well deserved time away from the “office”, so to speak. I was wondering if you had seen the Japanese noir THE MOST TERRIBLE TIME IN MY LIFE about Maiku Hama (Michael Hammer). I read about it on your blog and was wondering if it was worth picking up from Amazon. Enjoy your time with the family my friend!