GASPER

CASPER (1995)
dir: Brad Silberling

GASPER
MAD #340, October 1995
w: Stan Hart
a: Paul Coker, Jr.

Casper started out as a children's book (co-written by early-60s MAD writer Sy Reit) then it became an animated series...

...then it was solely a comic for years. It along with other Harvey Comics characters such as Richie Rich and Hot Stuff existed as licensing properties so it was inevitable it would become a movie, which is what is being parodied here.

The parody is narrated by Elvis Presley since he was a ghost too.

Carrigan, a rich widow (Cathy Moriarty) has inherited a dilapidated mansion, discovers it is haunted by ghosts, and hires a doctor who's an expert on ghosts (Bill Pullman) who comes with his thirteen-year-old daughter Kat (Christina Ricci). Once the doctor is settled in, he finds the mansion is also haunted by three other ghosts, the Ghostly Trio of Stinky, Stretch, and Fatso, who torment him.

The teenage daughter meets Casper and realizes he isn't as scary. He just wants a friend. She admits she doesn't really have too many friends either since they're always moving around.

He watches her go to sleep. The doctor and his daughter wake up to a big breakfast which is immediately taken over by the Ghostly Trio, who are sort of like Cinderella's wicked stepsisters.

At the daughter's first day of school, she tells everybody she lives at the old mansion. The class is planning a Halloween dance, so they decide it should be held there.

That night when she's home Casper reveals that he was once a little boy.

Casper could become a real boy but needs the help of Kat to find an elixir that can change him back, but it must be done carefully because there is only one dose. Carrigan overhears this and with her lawyer (Eric Idle) plans to steal the elixir to make herself immortal.

The scientist father goes out drinking with the ghosts and while the Halloween party's going on, the Trio turns him into one of them. When he sobers up, he regrets what he's done. Casper selflessly gives up changing back so the father can be changed back.

< For this act of selflessness the wife of the scientist (Amy Brenneman) returns as an angel and gives Casper his wish, and makes him a real boy temporarily.

KASPAR THE DEAD BABY
Crazy #8, December 1974
w: Marv Wolfman
a: Marie Severin

Crazy parodied Casper back in the seventies when it was still just a comic book, showing the origin where he was killed by an alcoholic father. Probably something that needs a trigger warning to introduce. It seems everybody who read these magazines remembers this article because it was reprinted at least twice.

Rumor has it that it was originally pitched to National Lampoon and turned down. Maybe they would have taken it in the late 80s when they had less strict editorial standards.

UPDATE:
MAD's Casper wasn't on the cover for the U.S. Edition, but it was in Mexico.

UPDATE 2:
CORPSER
Cracked Monster Party #29, Fall 1993
w: Andy Simmons
a: Don Orehek