scaring up some fun

Houston's 12 best Halloween happenings to scare up some fun this weekend

Nightmare on Washington Spooky Drag Show

Enjoy a spooky drag show at B.B. Lemon.

Photo courtesy of B.B. Lemon

Yes, Halloween is upon us and, even though the pandemic has made it somewhat impossible to roll up on people's houses and demand candy, there are still myriad Halloween-related events popping off all over town.

So, instead of doing the same ol' same ol' — heading to a haunted house, attending a Hocus Pocus screening — here are 12 intriguing events you can check out on All Hallows' Eve:

A'Bouzy will start Halloween early in the day with the Veuve Clicquot Yelloween Brunch. Enjoy Veuve Clicquot Yellow Label Brut NV for $49 a bottle. Costumes are strongly encouraged, and reservations are required. 10 am.

On Friday and Saturday, Space Center Houston will present Galaxy Frights. This family-friendly experience will include a costume parade around the new SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, special guest speakers like NASA astronauts, the premiere of a new space film and weird science activities. 10 am.

Lone Star Flight Museum presents its Halloween in the Hangar event. Guests can have a spooky good time among some incredible aircraft. Kids 12 and under in costumes get in free all day long. Also, from 10:30 am-12:30 pm, the museum has added a safe and fun twist to “trick or treating." 10:30 am.

Over in Humble, Balmoral will be a Haunted Lagoon on Friday and Saturday. A “spooktacular” adults-only party will be on Friday night, while Saturday will be for families to bring their own pumpkins for decorating, participate in safe trick-or-treating at holiday-themed candy stations and more. 11 am.

You know we had to throw in a Day of the Dead event in here, and Old Town Harrisburg will be throwing a two-day, Dia de los Muertos Fest. 25 vendors of jewelry, crafts, antiques, clothing and traditional Mexican pastries will be around, as well as music, dancing and a little girls' pageant. 11 am (Noon Sunday).

With its Halloween Trick-or-Treat event, CityCentre will be offering children and parents the opportunity to prowl the district for tasty treasures. Trick-or-treating will take place rain or shine and the event is BYOB (Bring Your Own Bucket/Bag). Noon.

East End Backyard will host a Halloween Dog Costume Contest. Prizes will include a private dog park party with a $200 gift card to East End Backyard for first place, a $100 gift card for second place and a $25 gift card to Three Dog Bakery for third place. Noon.

Over at M-K-T Heights, the Hike, Bike & Fright Fest will have a local market featuring artisans and collectors⁠. There will also be activities including Halloween T-shirt screenprinting, a zombie breakdance performance, a "Thriller" dance lesson and a pumpkin-patch photo opportunity.⁠ Noon.

Up in Sugar Land, Halloween Town will return over at Constellation Field. All the good stuff will be there: candy, a costume parade for kids, oversized games, balloon artists, face painting, etc. Plus, a beloved Halloween movie (probably Hocus Pocus) will be shown on the video board. 4 pm.

B.B. Lemon will have a Nightmare on Washington Spooky Drag Show, where guests can enjoy food and drink specials, music from veteran spinner DJ Melodic, and a costume contest with prizes. Space is limited, so reservations are recommended. 9 pm.

Ouzo Bay and Loch Bar will be the locations for the Fright Night double soiree. Drink specials, stilt walkers, a DJ, and Greek belly dancers will be over at Ouzo, while Loch will have a snake charmer, a costume contest, a live band and — you guessed it — drink specials. 9 pm.

Revelry on Richmond will have a late-night, Halloween costume contest. A $250 prize will be given for first place, and second place will receive a $50 gift card. $5 Halloween shot specials will also be available all night. 11 pm.

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Movie Review

New Pixar film Elio is fun but falls short of Disney's top tier

Photo courtesy of Pixar

Elio (Yonas Kibreab) and Glordon (Remy Edgerly) in Elio.

Pixar has done a ton of different things in the 28 feature films they’ve released over the past 30 years, but the one they’d never done is deal with aliens (and, no, the alien toys in Toy Story don’t count). Now they’re going where many storytellers have gone before, but in their own unique way, in the new film Elio.

Elio (voiced by Yonas Kibreab) is a space fanatic who has recently lost both of his parents in an unnamed event. His Aunt Olga (Zoe Saldaña) is now his guardian, and because she happens to be a member of the U.S. Space Force, Elio finds himself tantalizingly close to communications from space. With a desire to be abducted by aliens for both curiosity and sentimental reasons, Elio sends a message into space, hoping for some kind of response.

He gets that and more when a ship full of multiple types of beings takes him into space, believing him to be a leader instead of a child. An encounter with a hostile force led by Lord Grigon (Brad Garrett) gives Elio both a new friend, Grigon’s son Glordon (Remy Edgerly), and responsibility for maintaining peace during an unexpected galactic crisis.

Pixar has not typically followed the route of many Disney movies of giving their child protagonist the trauma of dead parents, and doing so here is the first of a few minor missteps. Having Olga be his mom instead of his aunt would have altered their dynamic, but only slightly. While Elio is shown to miss his parents, his major focus is on making contact with aliens. Since the film only briefly deals with his grief, it would have been better served by excising it altogether.

For the most part, the film is goofy, with Elio’s enthusiasm for aliens matched by the oddness of the creatures he meets in space. The filmmakers - there are three credited directors and three credited writers - seem to have taken inspiration from sea creatures and Pixar’s own history, as the main bad guy emulates Mike and Sully’s boss from Monsters, Inc. Almost every character in the film is heightened to a degree that makes for funny situations, but not as much sentimentality as other Pixar offerings.

Surprisingly, especially since the film ends with a voiceover from notable astronomer Carl Sagan, the filmmakers play fast and loose with real-life science. Elio’s journeys to and from the alien spaceship are treated as close-to-instantaneous trips, even involving portals directly to Earth. The idea of the story doesn’t allow them to delve into things like relativistic time dilation, but there still could have been other scientific references to keep the story aboveboard.

There are very few stars to be found among the film’s voice cast other than Saldaña and Garrett, who are each fine if unmemorable. Kibreab and Edgerly are given many more scenes than anyone else, and they each do a great job of bringing out both the joy and naivete of their characters. Some lesser-known actors like Jameela Jamil, Atsuko Okatsuka, and Brendan Hunt show up in minor roles, but they don’t stand out in any way.

The story and characters in Elio are sweet and fun, but the film as a whole falls well short of the top tier Pixar movies. The filmmakers could have gone many different directions with a story about a boy who wants to be abducted by aliens, and the way they chose ended up being innocuous and less than compelling.

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Elio opens in theaters on June 20.

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