You could always tell a Blaisdell monster by the built-in sneer on its face.
It’s surprising, considering all the iconic AIP monsters he came up with, that Blaisdell’s effective career was only a few short years. It’s too bad that the AIP films were all black and white, too, because they look pretty impressive in color. His umbrella monster from the original version of Not of This Earth game me nightmares (It flew through the air and dropped down on the heads of its victims, then crushed them.)
His name wasn’t as well known as it should have been, because he somehow managed to piss off Warren, the guy who published Famous Monster of Filmland magazine. So even though editor Forrest J. Ackerman frequently published pictures of Blaisdell’s creations, he couldn’t publish Blaisdell’s name.
Invasion of the Saucermen, by the way, was inspired by the Paul W. Fairman short story The Cosmic Frame, which was actually pretty damned good. And the essence of the story was properly conveyed in the movie, too. It was just buried under a lot of stupidity about disembodied hands, alcohol from blood, and creatures that evaporate under bright light.
I once confirmed my geekiness, even among my geeky friends, by dropping Blaisdell’s name when we were watching It Conquered the World.
“You know the name of the guy who built the pickle monster?”
“You better believe I do!”
If I recall right, I learned his name from the first edition of Bill Warren’s Keep Watching The Skies!
As every good fan of MST3K can tell you, the title is actually “Attack of the the Eye Creatures”. Apparently the title was originally “The Eye Creatures”, somebody decided to add “Attack of the” to make it punchier, and the two got pasted together – and made it to the final print without anyone noticing.
I just recently watched it, and they pointed that out.
And you’ll notice that I wrote it that way in my post, four above yours.
I did—let us now exchange the secret handshake. 
“Are you of The Body?”
Aw, Killer Shrews was what I came to post.
I LOL’d for the entire last five minutes of that movie.
Well, I did say “oversize cigarette lighter” in a moment of intentional understatement. As you can tell, I haven’t actually watched the film all the way through since around 1960, except for a quick look for Zappa’s two-by-four in the late 70’s. I gladly accept your correction.
But that was intentionally cheesy. I was impressed by how accurately that movie represented the feel of those movies of 30 or 40 years earlier.
Off-topic: when we were looking to adopt a pair of dachshunds, we said that if we got a black pair, we’d name them Kro-Bar and Lattis.
“Oh well.”
The Giant Gila Monster
First of all is anyone afraid of Gila monsters? Few even know what they look like: they’re chubby and look like they’re made of beadwork. Not terrifying to anyone.
It didn’t help that the effects was having them walk slowly around some toy cars and obvious models.
I have to admit, I thought that the effects work – putting furry demi-costumes on dogs, and using a puppet head for close-ups – was pretty clever and effective, considering their low budget. I think the MST3K Episode Guide points out how you can identify the different breeds of dogs used in the long shots.
Did you know that James Best, the star of the original, also appeared in the much-later sequel, Return of the Killer Shrews, which used CGI and came out in 2012
Here’s the trailer
There was also evidently a deliberately bad and campy remake in 2016, which I haven’t seen
Great thread, with one objection: Ultraman monsters are cool as fuck and don’t really belong here.
They rarely kill humans, but technically, they are venomous. Oddly enough, folklore (some of it dating back to Native American legends) depicts them as quite dangerous. As with sharks, the misinformation leads to humans killing them far more often than they kill humans.
By the way, the movie did not actually use a Gila Monster. It used a Mexican Beaded Lizard. (Whose venom is slightly more dangerous, but still rarely fatal.)
I’ve heard of it, but I didn’t see it.
I didn’t want to spoil my memories of the original.
Sure, people learn in grade school that they’re venomous, but outside of folklore, no one else knows anything else about them (probably not even what they look like). And they don’t look particularly fearsome.
To show how truly awful even CGI can get, consider the incredibly lame Birdemic, a low-budget awful remake of Hitchcock’s The Birds 9which actually shoehorns in footage of Tippi Hedren):
I love the way the birds hover by only moving the wingtips. Or in some case simply rotating in place!