October 5, 2006:
With Halloween candy, there's good years and bad years. Sometimes, there aren't enough cool new sweets to make a particular calendar year worth writing about. Other times, there are enough cool new sweets to make a year worth writing about not once, not twice, but three times. So, yes, here's Part 3 of my never-ending tribute to the greatest Halloween candy of 2006. Like I've said, nothing will ever beat the classics, but it's still nice to see companies with the balls to try to take down the kingdom of fun-sized Snickers bars. Watch your mouth do tricks as you read about six more of this year's best...
Life Savers Spooky Treats Gummies: The Life Savers people have finally smartened up. I've watched them try to peddle their regular "O"-shaped gummy treats every Halloween, year after year, confident that regular "O"-shaped gummy Life Savers will sell in October so long as they're in black-and-orange bags. That's not good enough, and this year, they've finally penanced with Life Savers Gummies in tried and true spooky shapes!
Cats, ghosts, pumpkins and more, dolled up in scary shapes and crazy colors with equivalently macabre flavor names such as "Freaky Fruit Punch," "Eerie Orange" and "Wacky Watermelon." Removing the familiar Lifesaver shape also removes the psychosomatic insinuation that gummy Life Savers taste like hard Life Savers. They don't. They taste better. The candies have a consistency just a notch away from a Fun Fruit revival, and come packaged in ultra tiny bags that only offer a few gummies in each. That makes 'em good for trick-or-treaters, but bad for homebodies who don't want to feel gluttonous eating six or seven bags of Life Savers Spooky Treats in a sitting.
Pop Rocks Halloween Dips: In a previous installment of This Very Feature, I proclaimed Halloween Pop Rocks as the new best thing in the universe. Later, I found out that these existed, and now I have to take back everything I said. Regular Halloween Pop Rocks, that's one thing, but Halloween Pop Rocks that come with a lollipop dipper in a bigger bag? Not kidding when I say that I'd kill your family to get more packages of this. I'll torture them first if I have to.
For whatever reason, the grape lollipop magnifies the Pop Rocks' popping intensity by miles. I've never had louder Pop Rocks on my tongue. It felt almost...dangerous. I've also come to realize that while orange Pop Rocks kind of taste like ass on their own, they're A-OK when combined with a lollipop. Halloween being what it is, a lot of candy companies make the mistake of giving their seasonal offerings an orange flavor. Orange candy isn't the worst thing in the world, but it tops no charts. The lollipop dipper turns Halloween Pop Rocks into something that is beloved both in concept and in stomach, and I couldn't be happier to have a lollipop that crackles at me when I'm giving it a blowjob.
Wrigley's Halloween Haul: I've already spoken at length about two of the three inclusions in these Wrigley's Halloween Haul bags last year. The "Monster Sticks" are still just doublewide pieces of Juicyfruit, and the Hubba Bubba "Scary Shapes" still don't actually look like bats or skulls or anything more than black blobs inside of orange gum. Those two are sold separately and in another bag that offers 'em together, but the Halloween Haul -- all eight freakin dollars of it -- is the only way to get the magical third variety of ghastly gum.
Among the familiar suspects is a new chewy thing -- a series of pink-and-white striped gum wads (like Bazooka, only softer) that come with a FREE scary sticker inside each wrapper. On my first piece, I got the Wolfman. On my second piece, I got the Wolfman. On my third piece...Wolfman. Coincidence? NO, THEY'RE ALL WOLFMEN!
...which is pretty lame. It's not even a good Wolfman. Look at him. It's the kind of Wolfman who runs into rooms, arms outstretched, screaming "DON'T BE ALARMED, I'm a cartoony Wolfman who WILL NOT HURT YOU!" From the right angle, his crooked smile looks like a steak.
Orange Pumpkin Pops: I'm not sure I'd be so into these if they weren't made by Charms. Alone, they're kind of whatever, but with the theory that these Orange Pumpkin Pops are actually the distant cousins of Blow Pops driving my head around in circles, they're pretty neat. Not as neat as those Dead Heads lollipops also cooked by Charms' chefs, but few things could be neater than lollipops shaped like skulls that appear progressively more bloody as you lick them.
The white pumpkin faces on each lollipop are well-defined. Actually, they're over-defined, with curious lines under their eyes that make 'em look like baseball catcher pumpkins, or jack o' lanterns carved by someone who refused to stop carving even when he was clearly done.
They taste less "orangey" and more "generic lollipoppy" to me, which isn't a bad thing. The longer you suck, the more the pumpkin face disappears. Whereas Tootsie Pops encourage you to keep sucking with the promise of a candy center, Pumpkin Pops want you to slow it down. Why? To keep us preoccupied while Charms sets up all the bombs.
Spooky Nerds Rope: For the uninformed, Nerds Ropes are gooey candy strands (think of a Sour Straw, only longer, and already licked) topped with copious amounts of Nerds rocks. It's almost too much candy to look at, but they taste pretty good. They're also incredibly messy. If you ever buy a Nerds Rope, there's no way you'll be able to resist whipping it at something, and the candy rocks fly everywhere.
The Spooky Nerds Rope blends eerie colors to create a candy whip worthy of Halloween party loot bags, but it's the packaging that really seals the deal. Saturated with Nerds creatures wearing capes and bat costumes, the wrappers invite you on a strange journey and promise to deliver a candy that looks like gravel in a Halloween-themed fish tank.
Marshmallow Ghosts & Pumpkins: I like these, I really do. Not to eat, though. They're perfectly harmless and flavored almost like the standard jet-puffed marshmallow, but they're a bit harder around the edges, and frankly, marshmallows aren't marshmallows when they're not white. Marshmallows of a different color are for entertainment value only. As such, my bag of Marshmallow Ghosts & Pumpkins serves the same purpose as a package of green army men. I'm meant to line the marshmallow ghosts up on one side and the marshmallow pumpkins on the other side before putting a pile of guns in the middle and yelling "GO!"
All of the marshmallows are misshapen, but that adds to their charm. To make the pumpkins sized similarly to the fairly large ghostmallows, they've been purposely stretched out to the point where sticking one ghostmallow on top of one pumpkinmallow brings you a very filthy and naughty surprise. I've seen bags of these everywhere, which is interesting, because one look at that generic package and completely unheard of company name would normally mean that you could only get bags of Marshmallow Ghosts & Pumpkins at the Tiger Mart downtown that's connected to a gas station that hasn't sold gas in ten years.
Can the 2006 Halloween season deliver even more candy? I think it can. We'll see.
