Karl
Karl O'Malley
karl1.jpg
Portrayed By John Flansburgh
Gender Male
Species Half-Demon
Date of Birth Uncertain - June 6, 1971 on birth certificate
Age 30
Zodiac Sign Unknown - born in hell
Aliases Karlakakallax
Place of Birth The Eighth Hell of Dismemberment by Chariot
Current Location Los Angeles, CA, USA
Occupation B-Movie Mogul
Known Relatives Catherine O'Malley (mother; missing), Vorkkar the Mighty (father; plotting takeover of mortal dimension from hellish throne), Harriet O'Malley (aunt; in Burbank)
Significant Other None
Special Powers Retractable claws, resilience, not spending his own money
First Appearance 'Satan In Nebraska', 1998, rated R

Karl is a B-movie producer, director and writer whose half-demon heritage gets him involved in kooky situations and makes him a target of both good and badguys.

History

Karl - his full name Karlakakallax - was born the son of Vorkkar The Mighty, a lord of Hell, and a mortal woman, Catherine O'Malley, who really should have known better. After his christening in the Eighth Pit, Catherine feigned outrage at the orgy that followed and snuck out during the torture sessions. She and Karl moved to Burbank, and with a name change and some sly tactics, Catherine kept Vorkkar from finding out where they were for most of Karl's young life - though it did mean she had to mostly disappear when he was twelve, after revealing to him just enough of his heritage for him to know it would cause him problems for the rest of his existence. From there on he was raised by his aunt, who did as good a job as she could not quite understanding that the half-demon youth and his satanic consort mother were just doing the best they could.

Karl always wanted to be in movies. He did drama in high school but was not a very good actor (he was too hyperactive to sit down and learn the lines), so he did stage crew and lighting. In college, at UC-Santa Barbara, he continued his work in these areas, as well as picking up (quietly and on the side) a business degree. His student film "Marriage of Bonds" was a quiet success in art-film circles and he was widely considered to be one of the more talented young directors headed to Hollywood that year. This today causes him no end of amusement. An enthusiastic devotee of shlock, he never fit in quite right either with frat brothers or with the black-clad film-school types, but never, ever noticed.

Today, he is a financial success in Hollywood - by producing movies and made-for-TV films and straight-to-DVD exploitation productions as cheaply as he can, using stock footage where possible, using recycled soundtracks, washed-up actors, cheap sets, stock costumes, bad models, other people's money, and cheesy fx in order to keep expenses down. In fact, he actually films real demons (typically down on their luck and desperate for the money) as the bad guys, using their powers as special effects. (Often he has to sex them up using CGI so that they "look real".) There's no such thing as too many breasts, too much blood or too many kick-to-the-groin jokes in one of Karl's movies. Then after only a single airing, or a week of video rentals, the production is almost always in the black. Everything from there on in is profit - and Karl's movies tend to last a long time on the rental market, as they are inexpensive to put on shelves and will always appeal to someone. As a result, he has never lost money on a film…a feat rarely equaled in Hollywood.

Still, his demonic heritage and horrific father demand that he help conquer the world, not just make out with starlets and blow up cheap cars. This annoying duty he does his very best to avoid. Karl likes the world. It's where he keeps all his stuff. This keeps him running like mad through the grey zone between good and evil, playing one side against the other and constantly getting caught at it.

Timeline

  • 1971 (sometime) - Karl is born in hell.
  • August 1971 - Karl's mother absconds with him to Burbank.
  • 1978 - Karl's mother leaves him with her sister Harriet - they have periodic contact over the following years, but Harriet raises Karl.
  • 1991 - "Marriage of Bonds" is Karl's debut student film at UCSB.
  • 1993 - Karl graduates from UCSB with a fine arts degree. He immediately launches From Hell Productions.

From Hell Productions

1994

  • "Satan in Nebraska" released to limited run. Filmed in only five days. A typical review included the phrase "wooden acting and wooden sets".

1995

  • "Prom Night Ninjas" released. Tagline: "Prom Gowns And Furious Fists!" Came in second in Fangoria's Best Poster Of The Year.
  • "Prom Night Ninjas 2: Homecoming" released, mostly made up of leftover footage from the first movie. Typical imdb.com comment: "i cant believe i like this movie as much as i do. the fights are too fun!!! rofl!!! espec. the one in and out of the janitors closet where laurie is trying to make out with her wimpy boyfriend while kicking the ass of the ninjas who are coming down the hallway. hilarious!!!"
  • "Boozehound" released straight-to-video in America, wide release (dubbed) in Mexico. Translated review conclusion: "Tremendously unfunny except at about the fourth-grade level, with drunk-jokes and groin-shots abounding. Miss it in a hurry."

1996

  • "Shao-Lin Sheba" released. Tagline: "She's Black, She's Bad, She Can't Be Stopped!" Caboose Kendricks, high-kicking soul dancer, fights gangster named Whitey to find her little brother.
  • "Watchdog" released. Starring an actual werewolf, the werewolf fx were nonetheless faked in order to make it look "more real". The "plot" is that a genetically engineered dog fights a monster apparently made of carpet remnants and garbage sacks.
  • "Apache Heat" released straight to video. Enthusiastic Western softporn. Cinemax aired it one thousand times.

1997

  • "Carnality" released. Beautiful police officer struggles - but not too hard - with nymphomania while tracking a serial killer. Made headlines and a fortune as it was A) made for a few thousand dollars over the course of about a week, and B) loudly protested in every possible media channel by morality-in-Hollywood groups.
  • "The Sunless Day" released straight to video. Rubber tree monsters fight commandos in the Arctic. Yeah.
  • "Fang" released. A gloomy vampire with a soul fights his urges, and also ninja. From Hell website trivia: "Hard as it may be to believe, the actor that plays Fang is NOT British! He is simply an expert mimic of the accent."

1998

  • "Fat Guy At Mardi Gras" released. With the premise basically spelled out in the title, nobody who intentionally bought a ticket to this one could possibly have been disappointed. Right?
  • "Inseminoid" released. Sci-fi horror porno. A lot of Playboy Playmates in roles that start with "Doctor", "Professor" or "Major".
  • "Galigator!" released. Tagline: Genetic experimentation created a monster, but can science stop her? Spoiler: Yes. Currently aired on Sci-Fi channel whenever they have two hours to fill.
  • "Fang 2" released. Fang goes to London. London in this case looking a lot like Burbank. The bad guy's ending speech is a good time to go get popcorn. And go to the bathroom. And go home. And shoot yourself. And be buried.

1999

  • "Mr. Zombie" released. The cleavage-and-blood poster: "The voodoo priestess made him a zombie - his undead hungers made him CEO!! Fun for the whole family!" Assuming you cover Junior's eyes during the topless voodoo ritual, depicted without reference material.
  • "Headhunter" released. Can a high-priced lawyer stranded in the jungle team up with a beautiful tribe of female warriors to beat the drug dealers and cannibals and get back home? Spoiler: Yes.
  • "Sorority Voodoo Girls: The Rush" released. Actual magical practitioners were used to make the effects in this movie, though naturally they were edited out and bouncy co-eds were put in their place. This instigated a yearlong feud between the cabal and From Hell, culminating in forty-three lawsuits, nine near-fatal injuries, seventeen arrests, the still-unsolved disappearance of a polar bear from the Los Angeles Zoo and a snake-god from beyond space and time nearly taking over the city before it was all resolved.
  • "Fang 3" released straight to video. Fang has a motorcycle in this one.

2000

  • "Sorority Voodoo Girls II: Hell Week" released straight to video and DVD. You'd think he would have learned from what happened after the first one. Spoiler: He didn't.
  • "Mean People Suck" released. Tagline: The vampire comedy hit! Too in-jokey for mortals, though.
  • "High Tide" released. College kids on spring break run into modern-day scam artists and a pirate's ghost. Pretty much an excuse for a bikini movie. The ghost makeup is fairly impressive considering it's on a real ghost.
  • "Chasedown" released. Accused of a murder he didn't commit, the protagonist is somehow stalked by both the police and the murderer, who for some reason won't leave well enough alone.

Quotes

  • "Let's be realistic, my movies don't kill people. People that kill people, kill people. I mean I saw a movie about curing cancer. No one's gone out and done that. Wait, have they?"

Trivia

  • In "12 Angry Men", only 2 jurors are ever identified by name. The rest just have a number.

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