Funny Groom's Cake - 'Facehugger' from Alien Movie

I have had many different requests for cakes, but the most fun one by far has been for a Groom's Cake with a 'Facehugger' theme.  According to the Alien movie (and Wikipedia) a Facehugger is the second stage of the Alien's lifecycle and its purpose is to "make contact" with the host's (a person's) mouth and implant an embryo. Once implanted, it detaches from the face and dies. To describe it best: it looks crab-like, but also like a skin-coloured giant spider from your worst nightmares. Mmmm....delectable, no?

How did I make this cake?

I started with a face cake, because every good Facehugger needs a victim.  At first I wanted to stand the head upright, but the Facehugger would have weighed too much and flopped forward, so I went with a person who was lying flat, much like in the picture on Wikipedia.

I baked the head cake in 9" cake pan, making 5 layers of chocolate cake, and layered it with peanut butter buttercream icing and chunks of milk chocolate. After carving the general shape of the head, eyes, and nose, I put a thin layer of vanilla buttercream on the cake for a crumb coat (it is always important to contain the crumbs on carved chocolate cake) and refrigerated it until the icing was hardened.

Once the crumb coat was set, I covered the head with more vanilla buttercream and then a layer of skin-coloured rolled fondant icing. I did not need to worry about eyes and mouth colour because the Facehugger would cover it, but I did need to make sure the head had ears and hair.  So I cut many pieces of brown fondant and layered them on the head for hair. I also added a piece of blue with ribbing to make a shirt for the lower neck and shoulders, and brushed on a little edible glitter to make it more realistic.

Then I began to make the 'Facehugger' from Rice Krispie treats. I shaped them and cut long pieces for the Facehugger's legs and tail. I covered those in skin-coloured fondant with a bit of pink food colouring added for a salmon colour, and used a variety of round utensils to form the details of the alien. I darkened the indents with a little cocoa powder for texture and shined it up with some gold edible food spray. Then I attached the alien to the face with a little water brushed on, which dried quite nicely overnight.

Overall, it turned out great (which means it was just as ugly as it was intended to be!), however, I am not sure who ate it besides the groom.

So what was the best part about this cake? It sat right next to the super-sweet bride's cake covered in pink and blue flowers.