Let's Revisit Some Childhood Nightmare Fuel!

[The Fury]

Plenty of us have that one movie, cartoon or comic book that we encountered in our formative years that totally freaked us out. What I'd like to do is revisit some of those things, share out experiences with them and see if they're still as scary as we remember. Why? Catharsis maybe?

What I'd like to share is Unico and the Island of Magic, if anyone would like to see it you can check it out on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2D1-gvrt4MM). My younger sister and I would get this from the video store all the time back in the day, always at my sister's insistence, which was a little weird because I remember that there were parts that were too scary for her to watch, and she'd cover her ears and hide under a blanket until I'd tell her when it was safe. I guess she mostly liked the cute stuff in it, which there is plenty.

The main things in Unico that made it terrifying as kid's movies go were Living Puppets and Lord Kuruku.

Living Puppets sounds freaky enough, but what they actually are in context is what makes for a scary concept. Lord Kuruku gifts a young man named Toby with magical abilities in exchange for him turning all humans into what he describes as "Living Puppets," these flat, lifeless, Lego-looking brick-people. Seeing the transformation is actually pretty frightening, as people are hit with the transformation they go stiff momentarily before they change shape and fall over. I always wondered if they had some notion of what was happening to them. Yikes. Lord Kuruku then uses the Living Puppets to build his castle on an isolated island.

And Lord Kuruku... dear Satan, Lord Kuruku. Kudos to the English localization team for coming up with a vocal performance that was half silly, half menacing. Appropriate considering that his character design is half goofy, half creepy. When the movie goes into his nature and his origin, he gets even creepier. Long ago, Lord Kuruku was a marionette that was owned by some unpleasant people that treated him horribly and threw him away. Eventually he ended up washed up at the end of the earth, eventually coming to life from hatred of humanity. Also when he gets to his feet and lurches off to get revenge, I think he looks a little like a skeleton rising from its grave. Plenty of cartoon bad guys hate humanity, but not many are literally sustained by their hatred.

So how well have the scary bits aged? Still pretty danged freaky as kid's movies go. Though back when I was a little Fury it was probably the most terrifying thing I had ever seen. Now that I'm mostly an adult, I can't really say that truthfully.

So how about you guys? What was your childhood Nightmare Fuel? Is it still scary to you? Did you also watch Unico and The Magic Island when you were a little kid?

[Eldan]

There was a Baron Münchhausen movie. Probably Terry Gilliams, I've never tried to rewatch it. Anyway, I must have been... I don't know. Early primary school probably, or younger. But hey, Baron Münchhausen is a collection of utterly harmless basically fairy tales that I loved a lot when my father read one version to me.

And then there's the scenes where Death, as an incarnation, follows around the main character. Big threatening skeleton in a black cloak. At one point he burst through a wall, big as a house, with giant wings, dramatic orchestral beat and some kind of screeching.

I dreamt of that one for weeks.

[ben-zayb]

The original Starship Trooper scene with the Brain Bug where it just sucked out the grey smoothie out of those poor soldiers. I find the dismemberment and even bisection a bit cartoony or ridiculous to be truly frightened, but that Brain Bug scene haunted me for quite some time.


Also, any adaptation of the classic crucifixion scene. I just can't stomach the unnatural idea of a nail being driven through a hand or foot. IT'S JUST NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN! Probably why I wasn't too fond of using any handyman/power tools growing up.

[The Glyphstone]

There was a kid's show called Ghostwriter when i was growing up. Standard plucky preteens solve mysteries fare, but with a ghost who manipulated written letters instead of a Great Dane. One episode, i think it was a writing competition in school or something, had this pink-purple slime monster that engulfed and devoured people. That became the monster living in my bedroom closet for years.

[Tvtyrant]

There was a kid's show called Ghostwriter when i was growing up. Standard plucky preteens solve mysteries fare, but with a ghost who manipulated written letters instead of a Great Dane. One episode, i think it was a writing competition in school or something, had this pink-purple slime monster that engulfed and devoured people. That became the monster living in my bedroom closet for years.

Are You Afraid of the Dark had a really dumb episode where a cab driver turned out to be a ghost/zombie and was going to kill the people in the story if they couldn't answer a riddle. It wae very bland except the driver's head turns around in its socket, freaked me the heck out as a kid.

[GloatingSwine]

The health indicator in Knightmare.

Knightmare was a kids TV game show back in the olde dayes where a group of kids directed a berk with a bucket on his head around greenscreen environments.

There were various things which would cause "damage". The damage indicator was a face wearing a helmet and each point of damage caused a bit of the helmet, face, then skull to break off and float away.

The last thing was the eyeballs rolling off into the void.

I loved the show. I was not having that health indicator.


(Most teams lost.)

[DataNinja]

For me, it was probably the time when I was a kid and couldn't sleep, so I went to the kitchen to get water. And walked past my dad watching the 1995 Power Rangers movie on TV. Right at the scene where the ooze was coming under the door to get Zordon, and the rangers losing their powers. Campy as that may be to adult me, it terrified kid me (especially with zero context). That night was the first night that I ever recalled having nightmares. So, uh, oops. (Also, it's the reason that I didn't ever even touch anything Power Rangers.)

[Algeh]

The ghost pirates from Garfield's Halloween Adventure, for some reason. I guess it's just a jarring contrast with the low stakes real world problems in the other Garfield holiday specials and newspaper comic, so I wasn't expecting so much "ghost pirates out for revenge" as a plot element. (The camping one with the panther was kind of scary at the time, too, probably for similar reasons.)

[DataNinja]

The ghost pirates from Garfield's Halloween Adventure, for some reason. I guess it's just a jarring contrast with the low stakes real world problems in the other Garfield holiday specials and newspaper comic, so I wasn't expecting so much "ghost pirates out for revenge" as a plot element. (The camping one with the panther was kind of scary at the time, too, probably for similar reasons.)

Oh, yeah. The panther one. I'd forgotten about that... That was definitely one that was 'watch in broad daylight only'.

[The Fury]

Ha! It's sort of remarkable, apart from the Brain Bug in Starship Troopers, I'm not familiar with the examples y'all have come up with.


There was a Baron Münchhausen movie. Probably Terry Gilliams, I've never tried to rewatch it. Anyway, I must have been... I don't know. Early primary school probably, or younger. But hey, Baron Münchhausen is a collection of utterly harmless basically fairy tales that I loved a lot when my father read one version to me.

And then there's the scenes where Death, as an incarnation, follows around the main character. Big threatening skeleton in a black cloak. At one point he burst through a wall, big as a house, with giant wings, dramatic orchestral beat and some kind of screeching.

I dreamt of that one for weeks.

If it was Terry Gilliam, that would make sense. Dude's movies are pretty twisted.


The ghost pirates from Garfield's Halloween Adventure, for some reason. I guess it's just a jarring contrast with the low stakes real world problems in the other Garfield holiday specials and newspaper comic, so I wasn't expecting so much "ghost pirates out for revenge" as a plot element. (The camping one with the panther was kind of scary at the time, too, probably for similar reasons.)

I admit, this one had me intrigued for some reason. I actually looked up the Halloween special and watched it. Yeah, I'm seeing how the ghost pirates are pretty scary. They look like they're animated similarly to the ghosts in the Night on Bald Mountain segment from Fantasia, (there's some classic Nightmare Fuel for ya!)

[Fyraltari]

The Black smurfs also known as the comic that was ripped off by Night of the Living Dead, It took me a long time to open a Smurf comic again.
In the same kind of idea that one Code Lyoko episode were X.A.N.A. creates a zobie plague, the infectee don't even have the X.A.N.A. eyes his victims usually have, just blank eyes and pale skins.
Zombies and madmen (I, of course, had a very poor understanding ofmental illness) just terrified me as akid, the idea that someone could become evil independently of anything they do and attack their loved ones.

Also that Pingoo jumpscare with the huge walrus-looking abomination.
Funny story :
I had orgotten about that until recently when watching one of the NMT videos by LinksTheSun (https://www.youtube.com/user/LinksTheSun) (can't remember which one) and at some point, a pingoo clip is shown triggering what I can only call hollywood-PTSD flashback in one of the characters showing that very sequence. The thing is as the sequence played I grew more and more uncomfortable remmebering that something scared be but not being sure why until it popped and scared me right again. Seriously what was that?!

[No brains]

There was a kid's show called Ghostwriter when i was growing up. Standard plucky preteens solve mysteries fare, but with a ghost who manipulated written letters instead of a Great Dane. One episode, i think it was a writing competition in school or something, had this pink-purple slime monster that engulfed and devoured people. That became the monster living in my bedroom closet for years.

Have you seen Your Movie Sucks' video on that? You might find that interesting.

[The Glyphstone]

Have you seen Your Movie Sucks' video on that? You might find that interesting.

Never heard of it.

[GAAD]

The Brave Little Toaster (Goes to Mars). Absolutely terrified me off animation period for about three years.

[Darth Ultron]

At 5 years old I had to have my tonsils removed and got an infliction. So suck at home, my grandma got me a box of Disney stuff to watch. And one was the Movie Dumbo, and one night after my medicine I remember watching it....and the Pink Elephants bit. And it totally freaked me out!

And Time Bandits a couple years later. Right at the end the Mom and Dad open the microwave and find a piece of Pure Evil inside. They both touch it and explode and die while the kid watches. Some how that stuck with me and gave me nightmares about my parents dying and exploding microwaves.

And one from my sister: Mom and Dad Save the World. The movie had cute little mushroom people...that where really people eating monsters. She freaked out so bad. For years afterwards you could always spook her with mushrooms...like the little Marao Brothers mushroom guy...

[Blackhawk748]

Raider's of the Lost Ark nuff said

[dps]

Parts of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (the Wilder version; haven't seen the Depp version or read the book) still freak me out a bit.

[jayem]

Grandma had a episodic Magic roundabout Video, and Dougal_and_the_Blue_Cat (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dougal_and_the_Blue_Cat)

[No brains]

Never heard of it.

I hope you find it worth your time. If you don't, watch it at 2x speed for a better deal!*
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRa0GdOwVzc

*I'm halfway serious- this works with a lot of videos where people talk a lot for a long time, even if you're legit interested.

[The Glyphstone]

I hope you find it worth your time. If you don't, watch it at 2x speed for a better deal!*
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRa0GdOwVzc

*I'm halfway serious- this works with a lot of videos where people talk a lot for a long time, even if you're legit interested.

Found it, and dang. No wonder that episode traumatized me, there's a whole bunch of stuff I didn't even remember was in there.

[No brains]

Found it, and dang. No wonder that episode traumatized me, there's a whole bunch of stuff I didn't even remember was in there.

I hope it helps you and doesn't just make you relapse into nightmares.:smallsmile:

[Zea mays]

Watership Down.

The Black Rabbit of Inle.

My dad tried to watch this with me and couldn’t understand why I was so terrified by a “cartoon”.

[Narkis]

Death Becomes Her. I saw it on TV when I was in elementary school. It was kinda spooky throughout, but nothing I couldn't handle. But that scene near the end when they tumble down the church's stairs and fall into pieces freaked me out. Couldn't sleep that night, had nightmares for days and was uncomfortable going down stairs for ages.

[blackstormy1804]

that great

[Telonius]

Watership Down (... so much blood ... though oddly the Black Rabbit was okay with me), The Secret of NIMH (that owl), The Rescuers (those evil crocodiles), The Black Cauldron (saw it in the theater - zombies and a main character depressive suicide), The Dark Crystal (basically the whole thing), and The Neverending Story (I was okay for the horse - the Rockbiter just sitting there and letting the Nothing come was what got me). It's amazing any kids from the early 80s turned out even slightly sane.

[The Glyphstone]

The crocodiles not so much, but I remember being freaked out by McLeach in Rescuers Down Under. That purely casual way in which he was totally okay with murdering a little kid, in a Disney movie...

[Cheesegear]

The Black Cauldron. The Disney film that Disney wants to forget. They can't even rebrand it like they've done with Snow White, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty. Because of the sheer amount of nightmare fuel in it.

[The Fury]

I hope you find it worth your time. If you don't, watch it at 2x speed for a better deal!*
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRa0GdOwVzc

*I'm halfway serious- this works with a lot of videos where people talk a lot for a long time, even if you're legit interested.

Yeeess! I occasionally watched Ghostwriter when I was in grade school, but I never saw this episode. Thank you so much for sharing this, sharing is caring after all! Especially when it comes to traumatizing children's TV, yeah?

Also, this video includes that infamous clip from The Adventure's Of Mark Twain Will Vinton cartoon. I never saw that until I was an adult, but I still found it scary. I was lucky to have met one of the animators that worked on that sequence. She said that when she went to the premier there were kids screaming, crying and covering their eyes when that part played. She said that it made her feel satisfied at having done a good job!

And yeah, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, Watership Down, Secret of NIMH, The Neverending Story... we're getting into some classic Nightmare Fuel now!

[Zea mays]

Watership Down (... so much blood ... though oddly the Black Rabbit was okay with me), The Secret of NIMH (that owl), The Rescuers (those evil crocodiles), The Black Cauldron (saw it in the theater - zombies and a main character depressive suicide), The Dark Crystal (basically the whole thing), and The Neverending Story (I was okay for the horse - the Rockbiter just sitting there and letting the Nothing come was what got me). It's amazing any kids from the early 80s turned out even slightly sane.


Gotta ask... The Last Unicorn? No nightmares from that one?

[Telonius]

Gotta ask... The Last Unicorn? No nightmares from that one?

Weirdly, no - though I think the fact that I saw "The Hobbit" first helped a lot. I think a lot of the nightmare stuff is because of how Uncanny Valley-weird the humans and scenery looked. Kid-me's brain just put Mama Fortuna and Rukh in the same box as Thorin and the rest of the dwarves. (I think I thought it was a little funny that a dwarf was speaking with Gollum's voice). The unicorn being so beautiful made me focus on that, too.

[Misereor]

An American Werewolf in London.
Saw it at a friends house when we were 11 and his parents were away for the weekend. I remember having to walk through the dark basement afterwards to get our sleeping bags. Not even a little bit funny.

On the positive side, after getting over it, I've loved werewolf movies and stories ever since.

[The Fury]

Weirdly, no - though I think the fact that I saw "The Hobbit" first helped a lot. I think a lot of the nightmare stuff is because of how Uncanny Valley-weird the humans and scenery looked. Kid-me's brain just put Mama Fortuna and Rukh in the same box as Thorin and the rest of the dwarves. (I think I thought it was a little funny that a dwarf was speaking with Gollum's voice). The unicorn being so beautiful made me focus on that, too.

I feel like The Last Unicorn's most notorious Nightmare Fuel Scene was the skeleton in King Haggard's castle. He starts out being silly, talking in a goofy voice as wacky music plays. After he tells the gang how to find the Red Bull he sees the unicorn in human disguise, the silly music stops, and his voice drops into a more threatening tone as his eyes start glowing red "Oh no... No you don't... Not that one!" Then he start's screaming "Unicorn!" like a demon... Creepy!

I know my sister was terrified of that scene when she was little.

[Telonius]

I feel like The Last Unicorn's most notorious Nightmare Fuel Scene was the skeleton in King Haggard's castle. He starts out being silly, talking in a goofy voice as wacky music plays. After he tells the gang how to find the Red Bull he sees the unicorn in human disguise, the silly music stops, and his voice drops into a more threatening tone as his eyes start glowing red "Oh no... No you don't... Not that one!" Then he start's screaming "Unicorn!" like a demon... Creepy!

I know my sister was terrified of that scene when she was little.

I do remember being a little creeped out at that scene - but by the clock itself, not by the skeleton. (Yeah, I was a weird kid).

[JoshL]

Some of my favorite stuff here, both as a kid and as an adult! Sort of surprised no one has mentioned Return to Oz yet. That movie is wonderfully creepy!

Some non-film favorites, the Scary Stories to Tell In The Dark books are amazing, particularly with the original Stephen Gammell illustrations. Some of them are pretty horrific, even as a kid!

I also have memories of being absolutely terrified by some of the early 80s run of Secrets of Haunted House comics (horror anthology, extension of House of Secrets/Mysteries). I haven't gone back to them, but I absolutely should NOT have been reading that as a kid! My parents would buy me cheap stacks of comics with the covers torn off, but didn't really pay attention to what was in there. Definitely stoked my taste for horror!

As for the aforementioned Munchausen film, it was indeed Gilliam and is fantastic. Points to his Time Bandits as well. The end in particular was a weird sort of unsettling.

[Mokèlé-mbèmbé]

There are two pieces of media I can recall from my childhood that gave me the heebie jeebies.

The first was a particular scene near the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade which I won't go into for spoiler reasons. If you've seen it you can probably guess at which scene it is.

The other is the adventure game Return to Zork. When you die it quite suddenly cuts to a game over screen and the sound of evil laughter that's mixed very high and easily startles you because death is difficult to predict and can happen at any time. I remember playing that game in a constant state of terror for suddenly, inexplicably triggering a Game Over screen.

[Lacuna Caster]

About half the episodes in Ulysses 31 involve some degree of harrowing nightmare fuel. I was only about 3 years old when this episode (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbqAQcndkro&t=17m39s) aired, and I still remembered Sysyphus' wails of anguish decades later. (The series itself is hit-and-miss, but includes some of Shuky Levy's best work, along with the english-release soundtrack for Teknoman.)

Batman the Animated Series. Feat of Clay takes pride of place (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76-8xyGf7w0) for me, but who could forget the origins of Two-Face or Man-Bat, or a dozen other episodes? (Honourable mentions (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tixmIBFh40M&t=15m10s) also go to Phantom 2040 and perhaps Gargoyles.)

Oh- The Secret of NIMH! Has nobody else mentioned the laboratory escape (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OV3T6GWhIg) scene, or the scene with the great owl (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_dCogu4FL0&t=1m20s)? Cripes. All Dogs Go To Heaven had a pretty good hell sequence (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gr7khtV7GAs) too.

Yup, I'm not scarred at all. Carry on.

[DomaDoma]

Not Without My Handbag. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIvQZm8K-yU) Shoot, I didn't even remember the death and damnation aspects. The handbag itself is enough to sear on my mind forever.

[Chromascope3D]

Ernest: Scared Stupid singlehandedly made me afraid of the dark throughout my whole childhood. Those troll designs were horrifying, and the fact that they specifically targeted children only made it worse.

Like, there's one scene where a girl checks for the main troll under her bed. So after slowly looking down over the edge, lifting up the edge of the bedskirt to reveal... nothing!
Relieved, she lays back onto the bed, the camera panning over to reveal the troll laying next to her! And while I know that kind of bait-and-switch is blase today, it sure wasn't when I was five! Also, that scene might have been a contributing factor to my paranoia today, so that's fun. :p

[Telonius]

Oh- The Secret of NIMH! Has nobody else mentioned the laboratory escape (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OV3T6GWhIg) scene, or the scene with the great owl (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_dCogu4FL0&t=1m20s)?

Got it covered. :smallcool:


Watership Down (... so much blood ... though oddly the Black Rabbit was okay with me), The Secret of NIMH (that owl), The Rescuers (those evil crocodiles), The Black Cauldron (saw it in the theater - zombies and a main character depressive suicide), The Dark Crystal (basically the whole thing), and The Neverending Story (I was okay for the horse - the Rockbiter just sitting there and letting the Nothing come was what got me). It's amazing any kids from the early 80s turned out even slightly sane.

[TheGreyWolf1600]

That old Disney version of Alice in Wonderland. There's the scene with the walrus and the carpenter, there's the forest, really the whole thing was freaky.

[Wookieetank]

A lot of mine have already been stated up thread (Alice in Wonderland, All dogs go to Heaven, Alone in the Dark, Bald Mountain, NIMH, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark), but for the ones that haven't:
Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland was a big contender. When there's a whole Nightmare Land ruled by the Nightmare King done in rather exquisite detail, its not hard to see why.
Aliens3 caught bits and pieces of one of the chase scenes and then the ending when I was 9 or 10. Almost put me off the series for life, and gave me a terribly strong fear of my basement after dark.
ET From the time they find him ill in the stream till they escape from the house still bothers me today.

[Rodin]

Some non-film favorites, the Scary Stories to Tell In The Dark books are amazing, particularly with the original Stephen Gammell illustrations. Some of them are pretty horrific, even as a kid!


Came to mention this. Some of those illustrations are horrific even as an adult. The girl with the spider that lay eggs in her face was particularly horrific - I was terrified for years afterwards that it would happen to me in my sleep.

[Mikemical]

There was a kid's show called Ghostwriter when i was growing up. Standard plucky preteens solve mysteries fare, but with a ghost who manipulated written letters instead of a Great Dane. One episode, i think it was a writing competition in school or something, had this pink-purple slime monster that engulfed and devoured people. That became the monster living in my bedroom closet for years.

Jesus Christ I remember this, it was a two-part episode. Discovery Kids had no chill back then: One week they're solving a mystery related to a cockatoo, the next, Majin-Boo and Chuckie's unholy spawn that actually kills people. Worse of all, that thing crossed over into a Power Rangers movie. I wish I was joking.

As for films, I guess Nightmare on Elm Street is par for the course, with a killer that can come for you anywhere that specifically targets children. I had trouble falling asleep thinking Freddy was gonna kill me like in a Loony Tunes skit.

[The Fury]

Some of my favorite stuff here, both as a kid and as an adult! Sort of surprised no one has mentioned Return to Oz yet. That movie is wonderfully creepy!

Aw, man I completely forgot about that one! Little kid me and my sister both were scared of The Wheelers from that. And our dad made fun of us for it... Thanks Dad.

Then there's the parts that were scary to me as a kid that I still find 100% creepy. The whole bit with Princess Mombi, who has a bunch of spare heads that she keeps in glass cases, who calmly tells Dorothy that she might want to add her head to her collection too. Which was disturbing enough, then Dorothy tries to escape during the night and one of the heads wakes up and gets the whole hall of severed heads in glass cases screaming as Mombi's headless body chases Dorothy. Sweet dreams, everyone!


Some non-film favorites, the Scary Stories to Tell In The Dark books are amazing, particularly with the original Stephen Gammell illustrations. Some of them are pretty horrific, even as a kid!

Me, I always found those illustrations more cool than I did scary. I did date someone that was terrified of those illustrations and got really mad when I brought one of those books over.


I also have memories of being absolutely terrified by some of the early 80s run of Secrets of Haunted House comics (horror anthology, extension of House of Secrets/Mysteries). I haven't gone back to them, but I absolutely should NOT have been reading that as a kid! My parents would buy me cheap stacks of comics with the covers torn off, but didn't really pay attention to what was in there. Definitely stoked my taste for horror!


I didn't really feel this way until my 20s, but I'm a little put out that I didn't get to grow up with good horror comics. I recall reading about a horror author, (I think Stephen King?) recounting his experience with pre-Code EC horror comics and they sounded so cool! Having read some of them as an adult, I can say that they are pretty awesome and worth tracking down, though maybe they would've been a little much for little kid me.

[Algeh]

I loved both Return to Oz and The Last Unicorn as a kid, and neither one freaked me out as much as those Garfield specials I mentioned earlier. I think it's because both show you up-front that they're going to be supernatural, and the further things got from the real world the less they tended to scare me.

I still haven't seen The Black Cauldron, but I loved those books when I was a kid. They weren't really...little kid books, though, so I can see why they'd be startling as a Disney kid movie rather than an older elementary/middle school kid movie. (I have no sense of what normal people read at various ages. I was already reading adult-aimed Tanith Lee novels sometime around age 11, speaking of things that I probably should have found more scary that Garfield specials, which to be fair, I saw at a much younger age than 11.)

[Knaight]

I was mildly freaked out, for extremely small values of mild, but when I was 13 or so my parents took my brother and I to go see a movie they'd liked when they were younger - or rather, that's what they thought they were doing. What actually was happening was that they were taking us to go see a new movie that happened to have a similar name.

The target movie in question was Labyrinth. The actual movie seen was Pan's Labyrinth.

For those not familiar Pan's Labyrinth has some fairly graphic imagery.

[DomaDoma]

That old Disney version of Alice in Wonderland. There's the scene with the walrus and the carpenter, there's the forest, really the whole thing was freaky.


Oh yes. And apparently considered a rollicking good time to the Victorian English. Fortunately I have since taken to having a Guy Fawkes Day tradition of dramatically reciting it up until "O OYSTERS, COME AND WALK WITH US!" It pays to diversify your Victorian interests.

[Jan Mattys]

Laugh at me all you want but the Gorn fighting Kirk in that Star Trek episode of the original series scared the hell out of 4 years old me.

[Telonius]

I was mildly freaked out, for extremely small values of mild, but when I was 13 or so my parents took my brother and I to go see a movie they'd liked when they were younger - or rather, that's what they thought they were doing. What actually was happening was that they were taking us to go see a new movie that happened to have a similar name.

The target movie in question was Labyrinth. The actual movie seen was Pan's Labyrinth.

For those not familiar Pan's Labyrinth has some fairly graphic imagery.

:smalleek:

I supplied my daughter with some nightmare fuel with Labyrinth (David Bowie is creepier than the rest of the goblins, from what she tells me), but I think it would be a "lesser of two evils" in that situation.

[Gnoman]

Laughable as it may seem, I had recurring nightmares for years after reading The Ghost Next Door, one of the better Goosebumps books. More for the concept than the story, but for some reason the idea of dying, then going about as a ghost without even knowing it, really unnerved me as a kid. Probably why a hack director stole it for one of his better films.

[Deadline]

The Adventures of Mark Twain, specifically the Mysterious Stranger bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhgLEkgO0yo

The 80's had a weird fascination with claymation. And it was terrifying.

[Talakeal]

I think I might have you all beat on stupidest thing to be afraid of.

In the early 80s when I was 2 or 3 there was a commercial for toilet bowl cleaner where a toilet went too long without cleaning and mutated into some sort of alligator monster that ate anyone who sat on it. I think that commercial alone de-potty trained me for a couple of years.



Also, the Muppet big bad wolf on Sesame Street (the one with blue fur) gave me more than few nightmares around the same time.

[The Fury]

I was mildly freaked out, for extremely small values of mild, but when I was 13 or so my parents took my brother and I to go see a movie they'd liked when they were younger - or rather, that's what they thought they were doing. What actually was happening was that they were taking us to go see a new movie that happened to have a similar name.

The target movie in question was Labyrinth. The actual movie seen was Pan's Labyrinth.

For those not familiar Pan's Labyrinth has some fairly graphic imagery.

Weirdly enough they have the escapist angle in common, (depending on how you want to interpret the story in Pan's Labyrinth.) Though they differ pretty sharply otherwise. In Labyrinth the fantasy was originally an escape from the mundane, In Pan's Labyrinth the fantasy is an escape from the horrific.


The Adventures of Mark Twain, specifically the Mysterious Stranger bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhgLEkgO0yo

The 80's had a weird fascination with claymation. And it was terrifying.

Though if the conversation I had with that animator was any indication The Mysterious Stranger wasn't terrifying because the 80s had a fascination with claymation, it was more that the studio wanted that segment to be as disturbing as possible! And hey, disturbing imagery, a villain with a scary voice, creepy ambient music, existential dread... yeah, this is ticking a lot of Nightmare Fuel boxes.

Though yeah, the 1980s was when Will Vinton Studios was in their heyday. Though oddly it was because of their success with The California Raisins commercials more than anything else. Evidently they were only able to get a producer to fund their Christmas special if it included a California Raisins segment. Which sort of puts me out because the studio managed some pretty impressive animation besides. I mean, I was always fascinated by how convincingly they could animate water using clay.

[Algeh]

Though yeah, the 1980s was when Will Vinton Studios was in their heyday. Though oddly it was because of their success with The California Raisins commercials more than anything else. Evidently they were only able to get a producer to fund their Christmas special if it included a California Raisins segment. Which sort of puts me out because the studio managed some pretty impressive animation besides. I mean, I was always fascinated by how convincingly they could animate water using clay.

My dad and I still watch that special every year when I come visit for Christmas. The California Raisins segment is always kind of a weird moment in it.

I like the Joy to the World segment the best, although it was probably a real pain to make.

[JoshL]

That Mysterious Stranger segment is amazing! I can't believe I've never seen that before.

The Fury, not sure if you caught this, but a gallery in Texas did a tribute show to Scary Stories last year, with some amazing art inspired by the original. They have a ton of photos of the art, and from the opening (with some visitors in fantastic makeup!)at: https://www.instagram.com/scarystories_art_exhibit/

And speaking of Alice in Wonderland, though not really a kids version, the stop-motion version done by Czech animator Jan Svankmajer is amazing, and creepy as all get out. Easily my favorite version!

Also not really a for-kids thing, but when I was young there were tv commercials for the movie Videodrome. The image of a gun pushing out of a blank screen television absolutely terrified me. I was 3 or 4 when it aired, so I had no idea what the movie was until college.

[The Fury]

That Mysterious Stranger segment is amazing! I can't believe I've never seen that before.

I heard that the segment was banned in TV broadcasts of that movie for being too scary. I've also heard plenty of people say that reputation is hyperbolic and mostly untrue. It still freaks me out though...


The Fury, not sure if you caught this, but a gallery in Texas did a tribute show to Scary Stories last year, with some amazing art inspired by the original. They have a ton of photos of the art, and from the opening (with some visitors in fantastic makeup!)at: https://www.instagram.com/scarystories_art_exhibit/

I didn't hear about that, thanks for sharing it!


My dad and I still watch that special every year when I come visit for Christmas. The California Raisins segment is always kind of a weird moment in it.

I like the Joy to the World segment the best, although it was probably a real pain to make.

I thought the California Raisins segment was weird too... Actually I'm not sure that's the right word, it was definitively the weakest part of the special in my opinion though.

The same animator that seemed really gleeful about having had a hand in making The Mysterious Stranger genuinely horrifying was the person that told me that the California Raisins segment was included as a mandate from the television production company. I can't confirm that it's actually true, but judging from the overall quality of the special and the phoned-in feel of the California Raisins Segment I'm inclined to believe her. But hey, if a bland segment in an otherwise memorable special is the cost for admission I'd pay that.

[Knaight]

:smalleek:

I supplied my daughter with some nightmare fuel with Labyrinth (David Bowie is creepier than the rest of the goblins, from what she tells me), but I think it would be a "lesser of two evils" in that situation.

Somewhat, yes. Pan's Labyrinth has and earns its R rating, and it earns it mostly by being almost unrelentingly bleak in almost every scene that isn't in the fantasy world, while occasionally having the sort of graphic violence that fits that. Then there's the fantasy world, where your introduction is this guy:
https://pm1.narvii.com/5754/d3171a02ef5d523d4ec7b344c6e30abc2d2c1f36_hq.jpg

Said creature is supposed to be the super memorable part of the movie, and to be fair said creature was memorable. The part that stuck with me and provided proper nightmare fuel was a bit later though involves a character in the real world getting knifed.

[Deadline]

Though yeah, the 1980s was when Will Vinton Studios was in their heyday. Though oddly it was because of their success with The California Raisins commercials more than anything else. Evidently they were only able to get a producer to fund their Christmas special if it included a California Raisins segment. Which sort of puts me out because the studio managed some pretty impressive animation besides. I mean, I was always fascinated by how convincingly they could animate water using clay.

Were they also the group who did the claymation in the Michael Jackson Moonwalker special?

[Draconi Redfir]

the opening sequence of Jurassic park ("Shoot her! Shoooot herrrr!!!") always freaked me out as a kid, essentially watching a man die horribly with nobody able to do anything about it.

what probably stuck with me though was i THINK the "Monster hiding under your bed" from Nightmare before Christmas. the scene in the opening itself isn't all that scary, but ever since seeing that scene (i think, might have been something else) i've been terrified of eyes looking (https://i.imgur.com/UrYBfqU.jpg) at me / you (https://i.imgur.com/S5uVFsr.jpg)/ whatever from (https://i.imgur.com/ACQnYi5.jpg) behind a veil of darkness (https://i.imgur.com/qun4j2j.jpg).

[Some Android]

Mr. Toilet Man from Look Who's Talking Too:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7o8KuJKizs

I think it's the fangs that really creeped me out. Looking back now it's not even intentionally funny. Just really bizarre.

Apparently it's Bruce Willis and Mel Brooks in that clip which I didn't know when I was a child

[The Fury]

Somewhat, yes. Pan's Labyrinth has and earns its R rating, and it earns it mostly by being almost unrelentingly bleak in almost every scene that isn't in the fantasy world, while occasionally having the sort of graphic violence that fits that. Then there's the fantasy world, where your introduction is this guy:
https://pm1.narvii.com/5754/d3171a02ef5d523d4ec7b344c6e30abc2d2c1f36_hq.jpg

Said creature is supposed to be the super memorable part of the movie, and to be fair said creature was memorable. The part that stuck with me and provided proper nightmare fuel was a bit later though involves a character in the real world getting knifed.

Heh, the part that always disturbed me in that movie was seeing someone get bludgeoned to death with a wine bottle. But yeah, I've met more than a few people that were terrified of The Pale Man, and he is scary as all get out. Though he never scared me as much as Captain Videl. I guess the reason why is that as horrifying as The Pale Man is, he's a thing that you can escape from by drawing a door with magic chalk. Captain Videl... he's a more real kind of monster. The kind of person that will act on anger and have people make excuses for his violent behavior. Unlike The Pale Man, even if you have magic chalk, you won't escape Captain Videl if you're the chosen target of his rage.


Were they also the group who did the claymation in the Michael Jackson Moonwalker special?

I think they might have been. It did look like their style, I'm not sure though.

(I looked it up, evidently it was them.)

[Braininthejar2]

Heh, the part that always disturbed me in that movie was seeing someone get bludgeoned to death with a wine bottle.

Heh, was about to mention that.


But yeah, I've met more than a few people that were terrified of The Pale Man, and he is scary as all get out. Though he never scared me as much as Captain Videl. I guess the reason why is that as horrifying as The Pale Man is, he's a thing that you can escape from by drawing a door with magic chalk. Captain Videl... he's a more real kind of monster. The kind of person that will act on anger and have people make excuses for his violent behavior. Unlike The Pale Man, even if you have magic chalk, you won't escape Captain Videl if you're the chosen target of his rage.

It's the same with Harry Potter - people are indifrent about Voldemort, but loathe Umbridge.

It has been two pages, and noone has mentioned Neverending Story?

I watched it as a kid, too small I think to understand the plot. I didn't remember the wolf or the swamp...

But the Nothing, a thing that couldn't be fought, and just made you cease to be...

And then the sphinxes, who just stared at you, and made you drop dead...

I had lost a grandmother before then, but it was the movie that really introduced me to the idea of mortality.

[Kitten Champion]

You know the movie The Indian in the Cupboard where the miniature statues come to life? We watched it in school because, well, there's very little to do in elementary school for the last week before summer vacation. The movie itself isn't that bad, but there's this bit during the climax with a giant rat that comes out of nowhere for this jump-scare that freaked me the hell out. One of the main reasons I hate jump-scares in general to this day, feel so cheap.

Though, most of my nightmare fuel was watching movies I shouldn't have because of weird circumstances. I specifically remember having serious nightmares because of Carnosaur, which is objectively a pretty cheesy Roger Corman horror movie that does some variation on the creature rips its way out from the inside scene from Alien - which I hadn't seen yet - that stuck with me. I watched it while my family were on an extended vacation so I didn't have my usual comforts there - my litany of plushies and relaxing music - and while I inevitably slept because you can only stay awake so long when you're little, it was tough going for a while.

[The Fury]

It's the same with Harry Potter - people are indifrent about Voldemort, but loathe Umbridge.

It's a similar idea I think. Voldemort is the archetypal villain that it ultimately defeated, Umbridge is more like that sadistic administrator or manager that might receive some punishment but largely gets off light. Though you also get to see Umbridge do more heinous stuff-- like how in the movie she punishes students by having them write out "I mustn't tell lies" several times... with a magic quill that painfully carves the words into their skin!


It has been two pages, and noone has mentioned Neverending Story?

No, I think Telonius mentioned The Neverending Story. Not that it doesn't warrant further discussion.


I watched it as a kid, too small I think to understand the plot. I didn't remember the wolf or the swamp...

But the Nothing, a thing that couldn't be fought, and just made you cease to be...

And then the sphinxes, who just stared at you, and made you drop dead...

The Nothing was a pretty horrific concept. There was that description from Rockbiter: "Near my home there used to be a lake, but then it was gone." When someone asks if the lake dried up he adds, "There wasn't a dried up lake, there was Nothing." The some asks if there was a hole he adds, "A hole would be something, but it was Nothing... and it got bigger, and bigger."

The sphinxes had that other little Nightmare Fuel tidbit. After they kill the knight with their stare, Atreyu makes a try at getting past them. He cautiously approaches the sphinxes, spots the knight's corpse with sand blowing over it. Then a sudden gale picks up and flips open the knight's visor revealing his mangled face. That freaked me out when I was a kid!

Though most of the really memorable scenes in Neverending Story for me were memorable because I found them less scary and more incredibly sad. There was the notorious Artax drowning in the swamp, and then Rockbiter's "Big, good, strong hands" scene where he goes into how The Nothing took his friends and he wasn't strong enough to save them. Then he tells Atreyu, "Listen, the Nothing will be here any minute. I will just sit here and let it take me away too."

AAAAAAH!


I had lost a grandmother before then, but it was the movie that really introduced me to the idea of mortality.

I realize that it was probably a long time ago and you might have even been too young to understand what was going on, but I feel like I should say that I'm sorry for your loss.


You know the movie The Indian in the Cupboard where the miniature statues come to life? We watched it in school because, well, there's very little to do in elementary school for the last week before summer vacation. The movie itself isn't that bad, but there's this bit during the climax with a giant rat that comes out of nowhere for this jump-scare that freaked me the hell out. One of the main reasons I hate jump-scares in general to this day, feel so cheap.

In general jump scares are pretty cheap, though I've seen a few that were actually done well. Like that one notorious example from the video game Eternal Darkness.

[Lacuna Caster]

Though most of the really memorable scenes in Neverending Story for me were memorable because I found them less scary and more incredibly sad. There was the notorious Artax drowning in the swamp, and then Rockbiter's "Big, good, strong hands" scene where he goes into how The Nothing took his friends and he wasn't strong enough to save them. Then he tells Atreyu, "Listen, the Nothing will be here any minute. I will just sit here and let it take me away too."

AAAAAAH!
See, I worry that impressionable youngsters today aren't being given these kinds of high-quality formative experiences to look back on. Modern children's television is leaps and bounds beyond the 80s-90s in terms of general writing quality and production values, but it's the darkness and the horror that really leaves an indelible mark on the soul. I can say, with zero irony, that that is the good stuff.

[The Fury]

See, I worry that impressionable youngsters today aren't being given these kinds of high-quality formative experiences to look back on. Modern children's television is leaps and bounds beyond the 80s-90s in terms of general writing quality and production values, but it's the darkness and the horror that really leaves an indelible mark on the soul. I can say, with zero irony, that that is the good stuff.

I don't know about that. At this point I'm too old to say how affecting modern children's television is to actual children, but I feel like horror elements have always been a part of kids' programing, (I mean, Night On Bald Mountain was animated in the 1940s and it holds up,) because kids actually need to learn that it's OK to feel afraid. Or at least I think so, because I've met a few adults that apparently haven't learned that lesson.

Again, I can only speculate but I imagine that the darker elements of shows like Steven Universe, Avatar The Last Airbender, Legend of Korra, etc. can affect kids today in the same way that Unico did when I was their age.

And even if they don't, it's not like their parents can't show them Secret of NIMH and give them a real scare.

[Lacuna Caster]

Again, I can only speculate but I imagine that the darker elements of shows like Steven Universe, Avatar The Last Airbender, Legend of Korra, etc. can affect kids today in the same way that Unico did when I was their age.

And even if they don't, it's not like their parents can't show them Secret of NIMH and give them a real scare.
As fond as I am of Avatar and Steven Universe- and maybe the comparison to Unico holds up- I don't think you get quite the same sense of nihilistic despair or existential dread that you were alluding to before in any particular episode of those shows. There's a sense of grief and loss, certainly, but nothing that would traumatise them.

[Braininthejar2]

For existential dread, try Brave Little Toaster "Worthless" song.

And it just gets wors as you get older.

[ArlEammon]

I saw Aliens when I was three years old.

[The Fury]

As fond as I am of Avatar and Steven Universe- and maybe the comparison to Unico holds up- I don't think you get quite the same sense of nihilistic despair or existential dread that you were alluding to before in any particular episode of those shows. There's a sense of grief and loss, certainly, but nothing that would traumatise them.

That kind of dread and despair, like what was in Neverending Story, is kind of rare in really any era of television or film. There have been parts of Steven Universe that touch on similar kind of dread, that being some of the most disturbing images to come from the show are due to Steven's imagination using his feelings of guilt to come up with some frightening stuff, (like Lapis Lazuli standing silently in a doorway as water gushes from her mouth and eyesockets,) is almost Silent Hill scary.

The specific scene with Rockbiter giving in to his own despair, and the fact that he's not rescued from his fate is one of the things that made Neverending Story something memorable and special, and in fairness I can't really think of another thing to compare it to.


For existential dread, try Brave Little Toaster "Worthless" song.

...Except for that. I remember being more than a little disturbed by the fact that nobody around me seemed to acknowledge how dark the scene actually was. There's these junked cars that are resigned to the fact that they're going to be crushed into scrap metal. Credit to the character designs for this scene, I remember at least a few of those cars looking salvageable, which makes the scene even more morose-- They could have another shot at life, but they were too resigned to the idea that it ends there for them.


And it just gets wors as you get older.

To admit to something embarrassing, I have an old Camaro and I sometimes wonder if I'm the right kind of owner for a car like that. I'm not super great at mechanic-stuff and I don't drive often. There have even been a few times that someone has told me that the car just doesn't suit me. My favorite remark was, "Your car looks like it comes to life at night and kills people."

At times I consider selling the Camaro so I can get something more practical, then among other things I recall the "Worthless" sequence and get really upset at the idea of her going to the crusher.

[Some Android]

I saw Aliens when I was three years old.

I saw Troll 2 when I was like five.

[Knaight]

Heh, the part that always disturbed me in that movie was seeing someone get bludgeoned to death with a wine bottle. But yeah, I've met more than a few people that were terrified of The Pale Man, and he is scary as all get out. Though he never scared me as much as Captain Videl. I guess the reason why is that as horrifying as The Pale Man is, he's a thing that you can escape from by drawing a door with magic chalk. Captain Videl... he's a more real kind of monster. The kind of person that will act on anger and have people make excuses for his violent behavior. Unlike The Pale Man, even if you have magic chalk, you won't escape Captain Videl if you're the chosen target of his rage.

I shrugged of the pale man just fine as a kid, but I still feel like said character works very well as an illustration of the kind of movie Pan's Labyrinth is. The wine bottle scene I don't even remember, overshadowed as it was by the fish hooking with a knife and subsequent self-stitching.

Captain Videl is also a horrifying character in a lot of ways.

[Braininthejar2]

Thorgal comics.

In one issue, Thorgal falls into a ravine while crossing a glacier, and finds a hidden valley inside, where three young woman live. They claim to be forever young while in the valley, and want to persuade him to stay with them forever. When he is determined to leave, the youngest woman decides to run with him, despite her sisters' warnings. They brave the ice labirynth guarding the way out and camp on top of the hill, planning to go to the nearest village in the morning. When Thorgal gets up, he tries to wake the girl up, and finds her a shrivelled corpse, with white hair and long nails - it turns out the story was true, and time caught up with her while she was sleeping.


In another story, Thorgal's son, who has some supernatural powers he can't fully control, makes himself an imaginary friend, Alinoe, while his father is away from the island. The kid is weird, green haired and mute, but friendly - until Iolan gets into an argument with his mother, and Alinoe attacks her with a whip. Soon it turns out that Alinoe can no longer be controlled - he's hostile, mute and expressionless, with blank white eyes; when killed, he disappears, and comes back, later cloning into multiple copies, and living creatures he touches fall under his control, with the same blank white eyes.

http://www.thorgal.pl/img/_artykuly/_10_img_01.jpg

Oh, and Death in this series is a shrivelled old man with a wicked smile, served by a bunch of blind angels with scythe blades for wings, who constantly fly through a void filled with people's life threads.

[The Fury]

I shrugged of the pale man just fine as a kid, but I still feel like said character works very well as an illustration of the kind of movie Pan's Labyrinth is. The wine bottle scene I don't even remember, overshadowed as it was by the fish hooking with a knife and subsequent self-stitching.

Captain Videl is also a horrifying character in a lot of ways.

The wine bottle scene, the fish-hooking of Captain Videl, his shouting at his subordinates through his brand new half-Glasgow grin, and stitching up his own face I feel were all emblematic of how the film wanted to show violence. Not exciting, but brutal, ugly, and even horrific.

In case you're curious, the wine bottle scene actually is shot with a lot of discretion, and you don't get a very good look at the poor man's face as it's being caved-in. Just the sound of it happening, the stone-faced silence of Videl as he's bludgeoning the man to death as the man's father looks on in horror... It all adds up to a pretty terrifying sequence. I can't actually watch the scene. I can take my share of scary stuff, but that scene is too disturbing for me.


Thorgal comics.

In one issue, Thorgal falls into a ravine while crossing a glacier, and finds a hidden valley inside, where three young woman live. They claim to be forever young while in the valley, and want to persuade him to stay with them forever. When he is determined to leave, the youngest woman decides to run with him, despite her sisters' warnings. They brave the ice labirynth guarding the way out and camp on top of the hill, planning to go to the nearest village in the morning. When Thorgal gets up, he tries to wake the girl up, and finds her a shrivelled corpse, with white hair and long nails - it turns out the story was true, and time caught up with her while she was sleeping.


In another story, Thorgal's son, who has some supernatural powers he can't fully control, makes himself an imaginary friend, Alinoe, while his father is away from the island. The kid is weird, green haired and mute, but friendly - until Iolan gets into an argument with his mother, and Alinoe attacks her with a whip. Soon it turns out that Alinoe can no longer be controlled - he's hostile, mute and expressionless, with blank white eyes; when killed, he disappears, and comes back, later cloning into multiple copies, and living creatures he touches fall under his control, with the same blank white eyes.

http://www.thorgal.pl/img/_artykuly/_10_img_01.jpg

Oh, and Death in this series is a shrivelled old man with a wicked smile, served by a bunch of blind angels with scythe blades for wings, who constantly fly through a void filled with people's life threads.

Never heard of Thorgal and I needed to look it up, I was thinking that it was probably a Franco-Belgian comic of some kind due to that image looking a little like something by Hugo Pratt. Evidently that's sort of correct in that it's a Belgian series drawn by a Polish artist?

Anyway, thanks for telling me about it. I can definitely appreciate learning about a new comic!

[Elanasaurus]

As fond as I am of Avatar and Steven Universe- and maybe the comparison to Unico holds up- I don't think you get quite the same sense of nihilistic despair or existential dread that you were alluding to before in any particular episode of those shows. There's a sense of grief and loss, certainly, but nothing that would traumatise them.Haha yeah! Why doesn't modern entertainment aim to traumatise kids?
:elan:

[Lacuna Caster]

Haha yeah! Why doesn't modern entertainment aim to traumatise kids?
:elan:
I know, right? I remember an episode of Phantom 2040 where the plucky sidekick had to erase his parents' tormented consciousness from a nanotech security system. That feels more like the premise for an episode of Black Mirror than anything PG-13. Good times.

Still can't get that show on DVD, by the way.

[Fyraltari]

Thorgal

Oh boy. Alinoë scared me so much. And The Moutains' Master too. A guy shoots his future self at one point.

Oh and talking comics: Les Potamoks I was not ready for that one bad guy cannibal larder or the "good guy" raping a random girl.

[The Fury]

Oh and talking comics: Les Potamoks I was not ready for that one bad guy cannibal larder or the "good guy" raping a random girl.

Les Potamoks looks cool, though I say that about a lot of French graphic novels. Though considering what passes for a "good guy" in this series... I'm not so sure I'd be on board. Hard to know for sure, as there doesn't appear to be an English translation.

[DomaDoma]

As fond as I am of Avatar and Steven Universe- and maybe the comparison to Unico holds up- I don't think you get quite the same sense of nihilistic despair or existential dread that you were alluding to before in any particular episode of those shows. There's a sense of grief and loss, certainly, but nothing that would traumatise them.

Okay, for you freaks who apparently think that all children need a Recommended Lifetime Dose of existential dread? Four words: "Steven and the Stevens."

(I haven't seen Adventure Time, but I gather it has its moments.)

[The Fury]

(I haven't seen Adventure Time, but I gather it has its moments.)

Well, yeah. There's the Ice Crown and the notion that it destroys the personality of anyone that wears it too long, and then there's pretty much everything about The Lich.

[Braininthejar2]

Well, yeah. There's the Ice Crown and the notion that it destroys the personality of anyone that wears it too long, and then there's pretty much everything about The Lich.

And a guy using magic to polymorph a bird inside out for ****s and giggles.

[Lacuna Caster]

Well, yeah. There's the Ice Crown and the notion that it destroys the personality of anyone that wears it too long, and then there's pretty much everything about The Lich.
The Lich, to be fair, does get fairly creepy, though I think the effect is more visual than narrative. A lot of the deeper lore is deeply sad, sure.

[Lacuna Caster]

Heh, the part that always disturbed me in that movie was seeing someone get bludgeoned to death with a wine bottle. But yeah, I've met more than a few people that were terrified of The Pale Man, and he is scary as all get out. Though he never scared me as much as Captain Videl.
Oh yeah. The Pale Man is... off-putting, in an ultimately largely inconsequential way (since the fairies come back to life), but Videl is legit terrifying.

[Fyraltari]

Les Potamoks looks cool, though I say that about a lot of French graphic novels. Though considering what passes for a "good guy" in this series... I'm not so sure I'd be on board. Hard to know for sure, as there doesn't appear to be an English translation.

World's Third Biggest Producers (counting Belgium in) for a reason!

Oh I wrote "good guy" in quotes because, at the time I was too young to understand a story where the main characters are not heroes and the ending isn't a unilateraly happy one.

So seeing a main character act horribly (and be called out by the narrative) created some cognitive dissonance.

So really don't judge that comic on my hazy memory of the parts that shocked me. I should probably pick it back up to see wether it actually is good (and exorcize some demons).


Really it is kind of my fault for reading comics in the "adult" section of the library.
But really the divide was kid of arbitrary: left to that batch there was Sillage (Wake in english), right there was XIII and Thorgal and in the same batch Dungeon and The Rabbi's Cat (I strongly recommend all of these by the way).
Meanwhile in the children section there's Percevan a comic book that starts about a knight in shining armor foiling saturday-morning cartoon villains and end with a good-old rivers-filled-with-blood end of days.

Les Potamoks did something similar, fooled me into thinking it was a simple adventure story with some dark humor and *BOUM* slavery and cannibalism in yo face!

[Braininthejar2]

And now for something completely unexpected:

"So, now the army of sapient wolves should invade the kingdom and raze it to the ground."

"We can't film that. We're in Central Europe, and it's early 80ties. Even if we had the technology, we don't have the budget."

"So... dress a bunch of extras in black leather, with wolf head helmets, and have them walk in lines with torches, to make it look like there's a lot of them."

"That won't be scary at all."

***

For a little kid, that's a lot of weird looking people in black, singing about hurting you.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oX-qDh5opAM

[The Fury]

The Lich, to be fair, does get fairly creepy, though I think the effect is more visual than narrative. A lot of the deeper lore is deeply sad, sure.

Not so much when implications about The Lich's nature are made. There were some episode that suggest that he's a manifestation of some cosmic, omnipresent nature of destruction. The end of all things made manifest. That's borderline Lovecraftian!


World's Third Biggest Producers (counting Belgium in) for a reason!

Oh I wrote "good guy" in quotes because, at the time I was too young to understand a story where the main characters are not heroes and the ending isn't a unilateraly happy one.

So seeing a main character act horribly (and be called out by the narrative) created some cognitive dissonance.

So really don't judge that comic on my hazy memory of the parts that shocked me. I should probably pick it back up to see wether it actually is good (and exorcize some demons).


Really it is kind of my fault for reading comics in the "adult" section of the library.
But really the divide was kid of arbitrary: left to that batch there was Sillage (Wake in english), right there was XIII and Thorgal and in the same batch Dungeon and The Rabbit's Cat (I strongly recommend all of these by the way).
Meanwhile in the children section there's Percevan a comic book that starts about a knight in shining armor foiling saturday-morning cartoon villains and end with a good-old rivers-filled-with-blood end of days.

Les Potamoks did something similar, fooled me into thinking it was a simple adventure story with some dark humor and *BOUM* slavery and cannibalism in yo face!

Oh yeah. Love some Franco-Belgian comics. To digress a little from Nightmare Fuel, I was lucky to have a mentor that introduced me to some of the classics like Corto Maltese, the works of Jean Giraud, I think even Sillage, and some stuff by Alberto Breccia, (though he was Argentinian.) He had a pretty impressive collection which included some original boards, (mainly from Breccia,) and he was generous enough to let me look through them. I've never been quite the same since!

A little more on the topic of Nightmare Fuel, I'm not sure Tintin in Tibet is scary or sad, though it's pretty morose as Tintin albums go. I'm told Hergé was going through a very rough time in his life and had frequent nightmares when he drew it. The really memorable part for me was when Captain Haddock decides that he'll cut his line, fall to his death so Tintin and Snowy, (or Milou if you prefer,) will be saved from freezing on the mountain.

...Man...

Though like Les Potamoks with you, there's been some graphic novels with some gorgeous artwork that tricked me into thinking they're something much more innocent than they actually were. Around Christmas I found a graphic novel called Beautiful Darkness, which seemed to be about fairies and probably had some minor dark themes. I considered buying it for my cousin's daughter who was about... 9 years old at the time, I think? Let's just say that my policy never giving a book I haven't read probably saved her a few mental scars.

[Rockphed]

The Black Cauldron. The Disney film that Disney wants to forget. They can't even rebrand it like they've done with Snow White, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty. Because of the sheer amount of nightmare fuel in it.

To be fair, The Black Cauldron is an adaptation of The Book of Three. The books, though I read and was read them as a child are pretty horrific. There are armies of undead walking around, there is a giant at one point who likes to eat people, and the whole series is filled with existential dread. I remember being unable to read the 5th book in the series because the cover had a horde of walking rotting corpses surrounding the hero and it freaked me out.

[Lector87]

The Princess Bride. I always loved it intensely, but I was terrified by the lightning sand, the ROUS's, and the Pit of Despair. I always had to flee the room after "NOT UP TO 50!"

[DomaDoma]

To be fair, The Black Cauldron is an adaptation of The Book of Three. The books, though I read and was read them as a child are pretty horrific. There are armies of undead walking around, there is a giant at one point who likes to eat people, and the whole series is filled with existential dread. I remember being unable to read the 5th book in the series because the cover had a horde of walking rotting corpses surrounding the hero and it freaked me out.

Prydain can be scary as anything, but "existential dread" is a terrible way to put it. If that series isn't infused with a deep sense of right and purpose, then the pages might as well be blank for all that's left. It's just that said ideals are set off by a vast backdrop of senseless murder and destruction. (The dilemma at the end of the book The Black Cauldron being the perfect example of high ideals and high nightmare fuel in harmonic tandem.)

[Telonius]

Existential dread ... and that reminds me of another bit of nightmare fuel from none other than G.I. Joe. "There's No Place Like Springfield." This site (https://www.therobotsvoice.com/2009/12/the_10_most_bizarre_gi_joe_a_real_american_hero_ep .php) gives a rundown of it:


G.I. Joe ventures into psychological torture as Shipwreck doubts his own sanity in this genuinely disturbing episode. You see, to get an explosives formula out of Shipwrecks’s mind, the Cobras make him think he’s lost his memory and living in the future town of Springfield with a bunch of tubby, over-the-hill Joes, who are actually easily melted synthoid clones. They even give him a wife, a clone of his mermaid girlfriend Mara (her episode didn’t make this list, which really says something about how weird this series is). In the end, Shipwreck tries to save his wife and daughter from a fire, only to have them try and kill him before being melted by Polly with a synthoid-dissolving ray. Man, that swabby can’t catch a break.

Those synthoids dissolving into melty goop ... seriously creepy.

[Rockphed]

Prydain can be scary as anything, but "existential dread" is a terrible way to put it. If that series isn't infused with a deep sense of right and purpose, then the pages might as well be blank for all that's left. It's just that said ideals are set off by a vast backdrop of senseless murder and destruction. (The dilemma at the end of the book The Black Cauldron being the perfect example of high ideals and high nightmare fuel in harmonic tandem.)

On reflection, I suppose you are right. What I meant was that for much of the books simply surviving against the armies of Arawn is seen as a great victory. The world is steadily falling apart and is not overrun by the evil guy because he is sitting on his throne cackling about how much he is going to destroy the free peoples of Prydain. Whereas Middle Earth is a world that has lost much of its glory, but nevertheless has a few sparks, Prydain is in the process of losing the last few sparks of goodness.

[Gnoman]

Remembered another one.


Mickey's Christmas Carol is one of my favorite versions of the venerable tale, but there is one scene that really scared me as a kid. When the Ghost Of Christmas Future (played by Pete) reveals that they are looking at Ebenezer Scrooge's (Played by Scrooge McDuck) grave, Scrooge falls into it and starts flailing around in fire before waking up in his bed, still flailing. When I first saw it, I was about 4 and took it literally - thinking that there were actually places where you could fall into a hole and be in a pit of flame. Once I got a little older, I got the direction they were probably going with it, but it took a while to lose that first impression.

[DomaDoma]

thinking that there were actually places where you could fall into a hole and be in a pit of flame.

Oh there's a well of repressed memory that just now resurfaced.

In kindergarten, I read a nonfiction children's book on volcanoes. I don't remember the exact words and I don't know how there could have been room for this wild misinterpretation, but both my sister and I recall the last page casually tossing off that there might very well be a volcano in your back yard. The single most recurrent nightmare of my life was of waking up to find that that the volcano in my (completely flat) back yard was now seeping lava.

[Algeh]

I just remembered Don't Eat the Pictures, which I'm sure is not terribly scary on the scale of "things that are actually scary" but was pretty scary to me at the time, since Sesame Street was one of the very few things I was allowed to watch on television when I was about 2 years old, and, outside of this particular special, did not generally feature plots in which cursed and possibly dead children had to solve riddles or roam the earth separated from their parents until they managed to, mixed up with a bunch of stuff from Egyptian myths (it's where I first saw the whole heart weighted against a feather" thing).

How did that seem like a good plot for something targeted at pre-schoolers? To be fair, I haven't watched it again in a very long time and it's possible that I'm not remembering it very clearly.

[Xondoure]

I've been told my parents had to sweep my brother and I out of the theater during Toy Story because Cid's house was just too much to bear. Frigging baby headed spider bot is still creepy.

Almost every disney movie was too scary for me at one point or another, and while I loved Sesame Street, the Muppets Show freaked me out too much (in particular Animal, Gonzo, and Sweetums.)

I walked in on the part of Princess Mononoke where the Boar transforms into a demon when I was five. That was unpleasant.

Finally, the worst nightmare I ever had started with me and my friends playing at my favorite playground. I run off into the trees, and when I turn around, the playstructure along with all of my friends are being taken away by a gigantic demon, who tosses them into his cauldron and cooks them. His laughter merges with the sound of the flames as the scene is engulfed by fire. Out of this madness a deep baritone voice begins to narrate the events of my nightmare to me. As the shot zooms out from the fire a kitchy cottage full of christmas knickknacks is revealed. Jack Skellington is sitting on a rocking chair in his Sandy Claws Outfit, reading my nightmare to me as a bedtime story. And if that doesn't illustrate just how horrified I was by The Nightmare Before Christmas I don't know what does.

[McStabbington]

Nightmare Fuel, you say.

I can reduce Nightmare Fuel to three lines of dialogue:

"Remember me, Eddie?"

"When I killed your brother?"

"I talked . . .

JUST . . .

LIKE . . .

THIS!"

[Braininthejar2]

Nightmare Fuel, you say.

I can reduce Nightmare Fuel to three lines of dialogue:

"Remember me, Eddie?"

"When I killed your brother?"

"I talked . . .

JUST . . .

LIKE . . .

THIS!"

I was too old to be scared when I saw this. What I found disturbing was that I couldn't keep a straight face at "he dropped a piano on him", and kept thinking how it would make Eddie feel.