I have a bad habit of buying movie sets and then letting them sit unwatched for too long. I decided to make it my challenge this October to watch every film in the Universal Classic Monsters set. I had watched most of these films on previous DVD releases, but I didn’t want to just replace the DVDs with the blu rays on my shelf.

Four films in this set weren’t actually watched on blu ray, since I saw them in the theater. Does that break my challenge? Maybe. I don’t care. It was my challenge!

To decide what film to watch, I set up a wheel with all 31 films on it, spinning for a new one each day. I’m glad I did that, because otherwise I may have lost my mind a few films into the Mummy and Invisible Man box sets.

Oct: 1: “Ghost of Frankenstein.” It’s starts with an immediate castle storming, which is good. They also talk about a “Curse of Frankenstein” twice in the opening minutes. Could that have been the original title?

Oct: 3: “Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein.” I watched this with Jonas and spent some time trying to explain Abbott & Costello are to him. I feel like “Who’s on First” is the reference point for most people, but that means nothing to a 12-year old. I felt like Principal Skinner overexplaining it in that Simpsons bit. What stood out to me on this viewing was the emphasis on Dracula’s coffin containing the remains of “the original Count Dracula.” I assume that was a nod to this being Bela Lugosi’s first onscreen appearance as Dracula in 17 years.

Oct. 3: “The Mummy’s Tomb.” This jumps right into some good action, but that’s because it’s a recap of “The Mummy’s Hand,” complete with a different actor playing Kharis (more on that later). He’s taken out by fire in that opening bit, as was Frankenstein’s Monster in “Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein.” I’ll save my bigger Mummy thoughts for later on in the post.

Oct. 4: “Son of Frankenstein.” In this film there is discussion that the Monster can’t be killed, which made me wonder if The Bride can? Since this picks up after “Bride of Frankenstein,” it would have been nice to see that touched upon. There’s a recent Bride of Frankenstein comic series from Skybound, maybe that’s touched upon there. I appreciate that the upcoming Son of Frankenstein figure from NECA includes Inspector Krogh’s prosthetic arm, so the monster can wail on people with it.

Oct. 5: “The Mummy’s Ghost.” Both this and “The Mummy’s Tomb” largely take place in New England. Nothing says “Ancient Egyptian Ghoul” like the home of Dunkin’.

Oct. 6: “House of Dracula.” I appreciate that we got a female hunchback in Nina. Who knew things were so “woke” back in 1945? Anyway, John Carradine is a pretty terrible Dracula, but I enjoyed the attempt at science mixing with the supernatural, with both Dracula and the Wolf Man seeking a cure for their affliction. Or is Dracula faking it to be a dick? Dracula’s motivation seems unclear, and his heel turn on his would-be savior, Dr. Franz Edelmann, results in the doctor basically taking Dracula’s place for the finale. And Frankenstein’s Monster was briefly there, for some reason.

Oct. 7: “Revenge of the Creature.” Nothing much to say, other than I like Creach.

Oct. 8: “Dracula” (Spanish-language version). An interesting curiosity, but it has two big things going against it: Carlos Villarias is no Bela Lugosi, and at an hour and 44 minutes, it’s half an hour longer than the English version. You would think that might mean there’s some added scenes that differentiate the films. But no, things just kind of move a lot more slowly.

Oct. 9: “The Wolf Man.” I’d forgotten how much they made Lawrence Talbot a weirdo peeping tom in this. And not like the Wolf Man looking through windows, but human form Talbot using a telescope spy on a woman, then use what he saw to badger her into selling stuff to him. Lon Chaney Jr makes Talbot more sympathetic in future appearances, but he’s straight up just a terrible person in this film.

Oct. 10: “The Invisible Man Returns.” This film is mostly notable for its early starring role for Vincent Price as the titular character. Despite the title, he’s not playing Dr. Jack Griffin from the first Invisible Man series, though Griffin’s brother helps Price’s character become invisible in a convoluted plot to prove he is innocent of murder. Universal couldn’t have picked a better actor than Price for a role that is so dependent on the voice, though his signature Vincent Price voice wasn’t entirely developed at this point.

Oct. 12: “The Invisible Man,” “Dracula.” A double feature at Flix Brew House. It was my first time seeing “The Invisible Man” on the big screen. No real notes, both are pretty much perfect.

Oct. 13: “Abbott & Costello Meet The Invisible Man.” This is the second Invisible Man Bud and Lou have met, after Vincent Price’s short vocal cameo in “Meet Frankenstein.” This isn’t the same Invisible Man from that appearance, however. He’s a boxer who turns invisible to prove he’s innocent of murder (sound familiar?), and Abbott & Costello are detectives who get involved with boxing to… do some comedy bits? “Meet Frankenstein” still holds up, but by this point the Universal Monsters were on their last legs.

Oct. 14: “Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man.” I loved this film as a kid. This was probably the last memorable Frankenstein’s Monster performance of the classic era, with Lugosi under the make-up. And there’s a musical number that makes Lawrence Talbot crash out for no real reason, but he rides away in a horse-drawn wagon while the Monster throws barrels at villagers, Donkey Kong-style. I still love this film.

Oct. 15: “The Mummy’s Curse.” Musical numbers in consecutive films. Was this becoming a trend? Instead of New England, this film is set in a swamp, which seems like it would be bad for a dried-out mummy. There are bog mummies, did producers just get confused?

Oct. 16: “The Mummy’s Hand.” When I saw the name Tom Tyler in the credits, it occurred to me that the star of the “Captain Marvel” serials was the original actor playing the mummy Kharis. He doesn’t talk much in this film either, but he also gleefully mows down fewer people with a machine gun in this. He looks more like a mummy than the more stout Chaney Jr. would in the other Mummy films. The finale had the Mummy licking tea off the ground before being set on fire. That seems like a pretty undignified way to go out.

Oct. 17: “The Mummy.” Boris Karloff may have been the original Mummy, but the slow, toilet paper-wrapped shuffler you think of when it comes to mummies is Kharis from the many sequels. Karloff played Imhotep, who is much closer to a Dracula-style figure who passes for something much closer to human. The Mummy has never been my favorite monster, mostly because Kharis isn’t really a character. He’s essentially a silent henchman in his own movies. I don’t know why Universal created a new mummy, rather than just bringing back Imhotep for the later films. Maybe Karloff didn’t want to return, but I feel like Lugosi would have been a perfectly acceptable replacement. So, in conclusion: Watch “The Mummy.” Skip all the others. Mummies are boring bad guys.

Oct. 18: “The Invisible Woman.” This was surprisingly fun, but it is probably the most tenuously connected film in the set. There’s no connection to Griffin and his invisibility formula. It’s just a madcap comedy. This film does feature Margaret Hamilton (the Wicked Witch of the West) in a small role. If they wanted to cast a character with a distinctive voice as the Invisible Woman, Hamilton would have been a perfect choice.

Oct. 19: “She-Wolf of London.” Starring June Lockhart from “Lassie.” Is that something? Speaking of tenuous connections, this isn’t a bad little thriller, though it’s not really a monster movie. It has a nice atmosphere.

Oct. 20: “Abbott & Costello Meet The Mummy.” Abbott & Costello’s last film for Universal, and the last Mummy movie. But instead of Kharis, it’s Klaris. So is this a third Mummy? Klaris certainly has a terrible mummy costume, looking more like a guy in a onesie than an actual mummy. Not great, but I do want to check out “Abbott & Costello meet The Killer, Boris Karloff,” and “Abott & Costello Meet Dr. Jekyl & Mr. Hyde.”

Oct. 21: “The Invisible Man’s Revenge.” Starring John Hall, who was also the star of “The Invisible Agent,” but he’s a different Invisible Man in each. Dracula gets mentioned in this film, but it seems to be more about Dracula as a pop culture figure than a character in this universe. Are there Dracula movies and books in the Dark Universe?

Oct. 22: “The Creature Walks Among Us.” The Creature films kind of went out with a whimper, but at least we do get a seemingly definitive end. The Creature is hardly in the water in this film, and pretty much any time he is it’s alternate footage from one of the previous two films. It does feature Jeff Morrow and Rex Reason (Execter and Cal) from the previous year’s “This Island Earth.”

Oct. 24: “House of Frankenstein.” Boris Karloff is back! But not as the monster. He played Dr. Niemann, a mad scientist with his own hunchback assistant. There’s some good action here, though what intrigued me most was a fight between Lon Chaney Jr. as Larry Talbot and Niemann, essentially giving us a human version of the earlier Wolf-Man vs. Frankenstein fight. Also, John Carradine’s Dracula was there, before dying early and pointlessly.

Oct. 25: “Frankenstein” & “Bride of Frankenstein.” Not much new to say about these, but it was nice to finally see “Bride” in the theater. Director James Whale found the perfect mix of horror and camp with the addition of Ernest Thesiger as Dr. Pretorious and Una O’Conner as Minnie. No other Universal film got the balance quite right after this. The films never really got the monster right after these two, either. He stops being a character and becomes more of a tool, henchman, or MacGuffin. But in these two films he has motivations, feelings, and character growth.

Oct. 26: “Invisible Agent.” This came before “The Invisible Man’s Revenge,” but if I could recast things, John Hall would have only played an Invisible Man in that film. The actor with the most distinctive voice in “Invisible Agent” was the great Peter Lorre, and he would have been a perfect Invisible Man. Also, these films seemed to get really lax with the rules of invisibility. In the first film, Griffin had to stay covered for a while after eating so that food and liquids could digest. Here the guy just can’t stop eating and drinking, with everything he consumes becoming instantly invisible. What are the rules? Anyway, I did enjoy seeing an Invisible Man beat up Nazis.

Also, this film might feature the only skydiving striptease in cinema. He’s invisible while doing it, of course, and I can’t imagine naked skydiving would be comfortable.

Oct. 27: “Phantom of the Opera.” I had never watched the 1943 remake of “Phantom” before this month. I’m a Lon Chaney guy. The mask removal in the 1925 version freaked me out as a kid, and is still perhaps the scariest moment in any classic Universal film. I loved this film, though it feels less like a classic Universal Monsters film and more like just a classic film. The color is beautiful, and the Phantom is a much more romantic and sympathetic characters. The face reveal is nowhere near as scary as the Chaney version, but I’ll stop avoiding this. But why wasn’t the classic version included in this set? Probably because it’s public domain and Universal doesn’t own it anymore, but it still would have been a nice extra.

Oct. 28: “Werewolf of London.” This is an interesting tangent in the Universal Monster series. Released in 1935, clearly they were hoping for a franchise starter, but then things were abandoned in favor of Lon Chaney Jr’s werewolf several years later. It makes me wonder if in the world of these monsters, are there different kinds of werewolves, like how in some fictions there are Dracula-type vampires co-existing with Nosferatu-types.

Oct. 29: “Son of Dracula.” I know I complained about John Carradine, but Lon Chaney Jr is the worst Dracula. He wasn’t a good Mummy, either, and just a passable Frankenstein’s Monster. It’s cool that he played most of the classic monsters (I’ll bet he was pissed he didn’t get cast to recreate his dad’s role in the “Phantom” remake), but the only one that really worked was the Wolf Man. At least attempt some kind of transatlantic accent, Lon! A Dracula with an American accent is not scary. There was one actor in this film who sounded a lot like Neil Hamilton, who played Commissioner Gordon in the Adam West Batman series. It was perplexing me as I watched. As you can tell, I had a lot to say about “Son of Dracula.”

Oct. 31: ‘Dracula’s Daughter” Clearly, Dracula favors his daughter more than his son, because “Dracula’s Daughter” is a much better film. Plus, it’s not just Dracula pretending to be his daughter like he did in “Son of Dracula.” This and “Bride of Frankenstein” stand out as the two most queer-coded of the classic monster films, with Gloria Holden’s Countess essentially seducing male and female victims in a libertine manner, before deciding that one man is the answer to all her problems. It’s pretty much “Chasing Amy” with vampires (does that count as a compliment?). As an added bonus, Edward Van Sloan is back as Van Helsing from the 1931 “Dracula.” And her assistant, Sandor, looks way too much like Shemp Howard.

Oct. 31: “Creature from the Black Lagoon.” I didn’t plan this, but it was fun to end the month with my favorite monster. Creach straddles the line between the classic films of the 40s and the more atomic age sci fi Universal films of the 50s and 60s. My thought is that Remco included him with the other Universal Monsters in the action figures I had as a kid (and still have) and a gil-man was present in “The Monster Squad.” So he deserves to be side by side with Dracula, Frankenstein’s Monster and the Wolf-Man, not shunted off to the side with Mole People and Metaluna Mutants. I watched the film with film historian Tom Weaver’s commentary. My big take aways? Director Jack Arnold also directed the “Chicken of Tomorrow” short featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000, and the idea for the film came from William Alland. Alland played the reporter investigating Kane in “Citizen Kane,” and the idea first came to him after hearing cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa talking about the myth of the Yacuruna at a party during the filming of “Citizen Kane.”