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Barbara Jo

Barbara Jo's interest in monsters and robots began at a young age. When she's not watching horror movies with Barbara May, she designs scenery and lighting for various theatres in New York and Colorado. Her obsessive hobbies include carving award-winning pumpkins (see the Pumpkin Masters 'Creepy Crawlers' pattern book), sculpting unwholesome 'Tragic Moments' figurines, and baking cakes that bleed, explode, or grow flowers while still tasting good, to name just a few.

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Barbara May

Barbara May loved being the first girl on her block with a brand-new Apple IIe. Eventually, however, programming the cute little LOGO turtle lost its charm, so naturally she became a web developer. She is charged with keeping Barbara Jo's computer running and with building theyrecoming.com.

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FAQ

About Us

- Are you crazy?
No.

- Seriously, what is wrong with you people?
Seriously, nothing. We have normal lives and normal jobs and normal friends, some of whom will even watch our movies with us, all of whom willingly and cheerfully eat whatever cake we serve them.

- Are you really sisters?
Yes.

-Are both of you really named Barbara?
No, our parents aren't that bizarre. Barbara May and Barbara Jo are pseudonyms we got from the same line in Night of the Living Dead from which we got our domain name - "They're coming to get you, Barbra!"

- How do you find time to watch all these movies and write reviews and make crazy cakes and carve all those pumpkins and . . . ?
Like everyone else, we make time for the things that are important to us. And yes, we do have jobs, though Barbara Jo's is a bit flexible and sporadic.

About Movies

- Why haven't you reviewed (Child's Play, The Exorcist, The Omen, Friday the 13th, insert well-known horror movie here)? I can't believe you haven't seen it!
And for good reason. We have seen all those movies and many, many more. The movies reviewed on our site are only a small fraction of the movies we have actually seen. We will try to get around to reviewing those movies as soon as possible, but we've got a lot of movie to get through. You wouldn't believe just how many horror movies there are in the world!

- Have you seen (Attack of the Mushroom People, insert relatively obscure horror movie here)? You should!
We may have seen it, we may not have. In any case, we always welcome suggestions; please e-mail us any that you may have. We do keep a list of movies that have been recommended by our readers and periodically scan local video stores and movie expos for them. We've already been pointed towards several great movies this way, including Donnie Darko and May. Thanks!

-Why are you so down on independent movies? They're just trying to get their stuff out there!
We're not down on independent movies. We rate them on the same scale we rate big budget Hollywood movies and they do just about as well, which means that for every great movie, there are ten mediocre ones and twenty crappy ones.

- Would you review my movie on your site?
With pleasure, assuming it can remotely be considered a horror movie. If you send us a DVD, we promise to watch it and post a review of it.

- Have you ever thought about making a movie yourselves?
No, neither one of us knows the first thing about filmmaking and we freely admit it. We both agree, however, that playing an extra zombie in a horror movie would be great fun, so if anyone needs a couple people to shamble around and look gross, let us know!

About Cakes

- Are those cakes real?
Of course they are. Making a cake shaped like a thoracic cavity may be a weird thing to do, but faking pictures of a cake shaped like a thoracic cavity (We have been accused of that!) would be a hundred times weirder.

- Do people actually eat the cakes you make?
Yes, our friends willingly eat our cakes, which, all modesty aside, are delicious.

- Are all of your cakes gross and evil?
No, but we only post the horror related ones on theyrecoming.com. If you'd like to see some of our other, nicer cakes, please visit our other website, at www.doitmyself.org, where you can also see pictures of some of our gingerbread houses, which are also not evil or gross in any way.

-Do you think I could make one of your cakes?
Definitely! Write to us if you have any questions and please send a picture of the finished product!

- I'm thinking of making a cake of (a pumpkin, a werewolf head, kidneys and a bladder which pees lemonade) for (Halloween, a horror fan's birthday, a urologist convention.) Do you have any advice?
We're always flattered to be asked and we'll do our best to give helpful suggestions if you write to us with details. We also love to see pictures of the finished cakes!

About Pumpkins

- How do you carve such detailed pumpkins?
Pumpkinmasters carving saws! They may be the greatest boon to pumpkin carvers since the pumpkin itself. They also run a really fun pumpkin carving contest, which we enter every year. And, no, we're not paid to endorse them, we just really, really like these saws.

- Do you have any advice for aspiring pumpkin carvers?
We have more advice than any of you possibly want. Every year we host a big pumpkin carving party we call Pumpkinfest and inflict our advice on all of our friends. Here's a sample of it, but if you have any more specific questions please feel free to email us.

1. Draw your pattern out first on a piece of paper. Then you can photocopy it to the correct size for your pumpkin.
2. Selecting the right pumpkin is very important. A smooth surface to carve on is critical and a flatter pumpkin will result in less distortion of your pattern. We also find that in general a lighter colored pumpkin will have a softer skin, which makes it easier to carve. However, if your pattern is complex, a darker colored pumpkin may be better for you, as the skin tends to be tougher and therefore can support a more detailed or fragile design.
3. Preparing the pumpkin properly is also important. We like to scrape the inner walls of the pumpkin until they are about 1/2" thick. Pumpkinmasters makes a little orange scoop, which is ideally suited for this purpose. We highly recommend it. How do we know when the wall is 1/2" thick? Well, that takes a little practice. The first year we got our pumpkin saws Barbara Jo scraped one of the pumpkins to within an inch of its life, or more accurately, to within an eight of an inch of its outer surface. It basically fell apart when she started carving it.
4. Tape the pattern to the pumpkin securely and carefully. Make sure the pattern is lying as flat as possible on the pumpkin to prevent confusion and distortion.
5. Carve slowly and carefully, especially with an intricate design.
6. Carve small, detailed areas first, before taking out any major chunks that will weaken the pumpkin.
7. Clear the cut away chunks of pumpkin as you go. Don't wait until the whole pumpkin is carved because it will break more easily then.
8. Small, detailed designs or sculpted designs (in which only the dark outer skin is peeled away, rather than carving all the way through the pumpkin) sometimes show up better when lit with a low wattage light bulb than with a candle, which may not be bright enough.
9. Salted, roasted pumpkin seeds are delicious.

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