Pajiba

E.T.

E motherfucking T

That little shit made me a PARANOID child. I was always checking behind me to see if E.T. was there. What an awful movie, the alien isn't "cute" he's goddamn terrifying!

Hands down #1: JAWS. That movie messed people up. Enough said.

#2: My mom took me to see some Raggedy Ann and Andy movie in 1975 and I (my 3 yr old self) flipped out. I couldn't handle the dark, the loud sound or the large movie screen. I didn't go back to movie for 3 yrs and then it was Star Wars! (Yes it came out in May 1977 but was in theaters for 2 yrs or so.)

#3 I remember bawling my eyes out when Charlotte died and her little babies fly away in the original Charlotte's Web. Good thing I never saw Old Yeller as a child.

I confess I was a little bugged out by the scene in Debbie Does Dallas when...

Wait.

Wrong site. My bad.

One of the first horror movies I ever saw was "And Now The Screaming Starts". Horrible movie, but I was scared of hands for years afterwards.

Also, I was scared of Frankenstein - in all incarnations. When we went to Universal Studios on a tour, a guy dressed as Frankenstein got on the tour bus and I freaked out so badly they had to pull over and let us off.

Jurassic Park - had many dreams where T-Rexes chased my family and I. Then I saw the sequel for some reason when it was first out and it wasn't as bad as I remembered.

Aliens - About the time Independence Day came out, I spent too much time watching those "Alien Abduction" shows on the Discovery Channel and History Channel. Scared the hell out of me so much that I didn't have a decent night's sleep for 6 months, thinking they were going to beam into my room and take me away.

Heh, I was quite the impressionable kid.

Jaws. MF-ing Jaws. I hate Jaws. I was 5. Some member of my family thought that it might be a good idea to watch Jaws. I developed an unhealthy and irrational fear of sharks. To make matters worse, my cousins had a wind-up shark that swam that they put in the tub one day. It was awful.

Arachnophobia. I am also irrationally afraid of spiders and that is not a good thing to watch this movie. I had nightmares for weeks afterward. I think I was 8 for this one.

Return to Oz. The scene where the lady with interchangeable heads (one of them was Vanessa Redgrave I think... she freaked me out something fierce due in no small part to here turn as the wicked stepmother in the Shelly Duvall Faerie Tale Theatre production of Snow White.)The woman with interchangeable heads starts screaming. And all the other heads in their separate cases start screaming. The jittery spasms of the Wheelers. The claymation rock faces. The creepy voice of the Goblin King... just so many freaky things about that movie.

Holy shittified seems an appropriate name for this: I believe it was the movie Trolls, where Sonny Bono's character slowly morphs into a pulsating mass of green moss. Ick.

Childhood freak-out: Episode of He-Man with Evilseed, when Evil Seed dies and rots away. Great, now I have to go change my shorts... again.

V
The tv show.
The lizard aliens (V is for visitors) were perfecting the fastest way to 'process' the humans, to eat them... Among very disturbing performances from the 'actors'.

In the UK they did a Halloween special that was billed as a documentary following a family in a house with a poltergeist - all these things were happening to the little children like scratches appearing on their arms out of nowhere etc. I was five and thought it was real. To be fair, a good few gullible people in the UK actually thought it was real too and there was a big stink about it afterwards.

Also Star Trek the Wrath of Kahn - my bro made me watch it - the thing with the bugs in their helmets - I still have nighmares about that ;-)

1. That scene in "What About Bob" where Bill Murray gets committed to the asylum. That really bothered me for some reason, although I love that movie now.

2. In "The Little Mermaid" when she loses her voice. Fuck you all.

3. The entirety of Robin Williams in "Toys" still bothers me to this day.

4. My dad rented "Papillon" for some crazy reason when I was 12. I wasn't freaked out, but I was pretty messed up for a while after that.

Nate, the Gmork from the Neverending Story wins, HANDS DOWN. Damn I hate CGI and miss puppetry.

1. Gremlins. I had recurring nightmares featuring these guys (and I was actually really uspet by the whole "I hate Christmas because my dad got stuck in the chimney and died while pretending to be Santa on year" thing).
2. Tanner - I second "Return to Oz" I was terrified of the wheelers when I was little, and those interchangeable heads were creeeeepy.
3. The Boogyman. there was some disney movie - I'm not sure what it was called, but it featured some green-skinned guy haunting some people's house. He scared the crap out of me.
4. Poltergeist - especially the clown doll and the tree

The movie "Magic" with Anthony Hopkins has forever ruined me for anything that resembles a puppet--Ventriloquist dummies, marrionnettes (ick! The only scene from Sound of Music that I CANNOT watch), and hand puppets. BLEH!

Now I will say that I don't feel that way about muppets. hmm...interesting. Maybe its because they aren't very humanoid and bring back happy childhood memories. But anything else gives me the super creeps.

And RichD -- I am with you on IT. I always had an irrational distaste for clowns and that movie just turned into a primal fear. I don't even like to think about clowns. (shudder)

Am I the only one that was creeped out as a child by Mr. Rogers? Gaaaahhh

"WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT?"

When Christopher Lloyd, a.k.a. Judge Doom, gets doused with the cartoon killing acid stuff, and his cartoon eyeballs pop out of his human head, I freaked. the fuck. out. That was the scariest thing ever. I remember not sleeping at all for two nights in a row. Every time I closed my lids those bug eyes would pop right into my head, and I'd die a little more inside. I haven't watched that movie since, and don't plan on it for some time, if ever again.

People always laugh at me when I tell them this but as a wee child I was TERRIFIED by a certain Bugs Bunny cartoon. The opera one. Anybody remember that one where it opens with Elmer Fudd decked out in a viking outfit, helmet and all, whilst repeatedly singing, "Kill Da Wabbit, Kill Da Wabbit" to the tune of "Flight Of The Valkyries"?!

He sings about how his helmet is magically and Bugs tricks him in regular Bugs' fashion and then all Hell breaks out (I think I can still smell the sulfur) and the next thing you see is Bugs Bunny lying prostrate on a rock looking all sorts of dead with Elmer Fudd being darkly lit from behind.

That damn cartoon gave me nightmares for a long time. Even thinking of it now I feel the strange urge to cry a little.

Almost forgot - the Banshee in Darby O'Gill and the Little People.

The Exorcist - couldn't sleep for months after seeing that movie -

Anything with a clown in it -

Left one out folks: The intro for the show "Tales From the Darkside". The creepy music, the slow pan across a creepy swamp, the ominous voice over...and the fact that it aired after midnight just...man, it still creeps me the fuck OUT.

Ok, this came up in last week's Diversion, Name that Movie. The mid-70s, made-for-TV movie Bug was the first horror movie that I ever saw and it left its indelible mark. (This is why I was able to identify it last week.) It was one of those "I can't sleep alone, so scoot over mom" type of experiences.

Smello: Your holiday special is Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey. It is on every Christmas season on ABC Family, along with the rest of the many, lesser-known Rankin-Bass Christmas specials. You can also check it out at IMDb.

I know this isn't a movie/TV scene, but is anyone else creeped (yes, I am making up my own words now) out by the music played by ice cream trucks?

1. The Dark Crystal scared the ever living piss out of me when I was a kid. Skeksis, freaky evil skeletal bird creatures, extracting "everlasting essence" from Gelflings and other woodland creatures? Instant freak out.

2. I second the Gmork from The Neverending Story, with his big yellow fangs and growling, fatalistic message delivered to Atreyu right before he pounced. Yikes.

3. Then there were those yellow and orange creepy puppet characters in The Labyrinth that started pulling their heads off and juggling them that I found profoundly disturbing.

I guess puppets and animatronic creatures really freaked me out as a kid, but in a good way, because all these films are endearing childhood memories now. Weird.

Tamatha- there is an ice cream truck that slowly cruises by my house every day, playing YMCA with the chipmunks singing, sped up to a frenzied beat over and over and over.
I feel you.

Michela -- Oh My God, Yes! I will never watch Wrath of Khan ever, ever again! I am still traumatized by the bugs in the helmet scene.

Flight of the Navigator scared the crap out of me as a kid. Everything was the same but different! How could that not scare you.

Carrie - I'm with you on Willy Wonka. I was totally freaked out by Augustus "drowning" in the chocolate river then getting sucked up that tube. My child brain thought he was really dead.

My older brother also let me watch the full video for Michael Jackson's Thriller when I was 6 years old. Gave me nightmares for months!

As soon as I saw the title of the post and the picture of Bert and Ernie I thought of EXACTLY that Sesame Street movie with the Egyptian prince. I believe, though my memory is vague, that there was another movie (or maybe it was the same one) that involved big bird at the great wall of china.

They both scared the SHIT out of me when I was little.

(1) The flying monkeys from The Wizard of Oz. Their faces in particular. Evil, evil, evil.

(2) The Swarm. Killer bees.

(1) The flying monkeys from The Wizard of Oz. Their faces in particular. Evil, evil, evil.

(2) The Swarm. Killer bees.

ET...

Specifically a man dressed like ET at our local video store. My dad left me in the kids section to go pick out a movie for him and my mom. Then this guy dressed as ET comes up to me and I FLIPPED. I went screaming and tearing through the store until I found my dad. In the end I probably freaked out the poor high school kid in the ET suit even more. (I see alot of ET, glad I'm not alone)

The Princess Bride also scared the shit out of me, those rat things in the forest especially. Then in junior high, X-Files left me with nightmares. Actually just recently I was watching the X-Files before I went to bed and had some freaky ass dreams that caused me to wake up screaming.

I saw someone said Fantasia, the last bit.....I don't think I've ever watched it to this day.

When I was 10 my babysitter decided it would be a good idea to watch Psycho with me and my (younger) brother. THAT was a good idea. As long as you never want to sleep again.

I also remember watching an animated movie by a famous anime director (still around the same age) and being freaked out by the fact that some unicorn sent all the parents into a factory and baked them into gingerbread people.

"The Devil and Daniel Mouse". It's an animated movie from the early 80s and features two little mice, a boy and a girl who want to be rock stars. The girl ends up selling her soul to become famous... there are ensuing and disturbingly dark scenes of said little mice being chased through a forest by the devil and/or his minions. For years afterward it drove my sister and I nuts remembering specific parts and not knowing what it had been! And for whatever reason, we would get it confused with episodes of "The Raccoons" and somehow underscored it in our imaginations with Bonnie Tyler's "Holding Out For a Hero", but nontheless I recently found it discussed online and realized we hadn't made it all up. Soooo weird. Pajiba parents, please don't ever show this crap to your kids.

I was terrified and traumatized by Child's Play. I used to fear an uprising of my Cabbage Patches and stuffed toys. The especially scary ones, I would sometimes stick pins in or stuff in the closet, but then I got scared that they would feel resentment because of that and strike back twice as hard. It got really bad with this stuffed raccoon I fell in love with, decked out in tea party dress and bonnet. No matter how I looked at it, it seemed evil.

I was also scared of Pee Wee's Big Adventure, when that convict describes pulling the tag off the mattress, and then with Large Marge the trucker.

Are You Afraid of the Dark?, especially the ones with clowns (The Tale of Laughing in the Dark) and vampires (Tale of the Nightly Neighbors, Midnight Madness, and especially Night Shift). I watch them on Youtube occasionally and it's still pretty freaky.

There's probably lots more, because I was a big wimp as a kid.

>>>>Also, The Wizard of Oz. Those flying monkeys gave me nightmares.

1) The scene in The Little Mermaid where Ursula sings "Poor Unfortunate Souls" in her cave-lair and the shrivelled human-plants writhe in agony. I used to hide behind the couch if I was left to watch it alone in my grandma's basement. Hands down one of the creepiest Disney moments.

2) In Ernest Scared Stupid there is a scene where the girl gets this uncanny feeling there is something evil under the bed, so she crawls over to one side and peeks under... nothing. Her bed isn't up against a wall, however, and when she rolls back up, the gnarly-looking troll has snuck up the other side and is lying next to her. Someone posted above about clowns releasing a primal fear? Well, I guess my own primal fear is of the monster under the bed. To this day, whenever I rearrange my bedroom, there sure as hell better be a wall butting up against one side of the bed!

And the last one I can think of right now...

3) The ending of the Ghostbusters movie where all the eggs crack. I know that the portal to hell is opening or some such supernatural madness, but when all those eggs start going ape-shit, I knew that something scary was about to burst forth and I was heading for the back of the couch.

Absolutely nothing scared me as a kid half so much as, well, The Nothing, from The Neverending Story. The simple idea that it was just nothing was enough to blow my fragile little mind, and gave me horrible nightmares about non-existence. Like a little Camus, I was. Also I was really scared of G'mork.

Oh, God, Tanner, you're so right about "Return to Oz". Those Wheelers are the creepiest fucking things EVER. And what's funny is I was watching that very movie when I read your comment.

I also really hated that scene in "Fantasia" where the dinosaurs die and the music is all like "dun dun dun DUN DUN DUN BWAAAAAAAAAAH!"

Absolutely nothing scared me as a kid half so much as, well, The Nothing, from The Neverending Story. The simple idea that it was just nothing was enough to blow my fragile little mind, and gave me horrible nightmares about non-existence. Like a little Camus, I was. Also I was really scared of G'mork.

princessweiner... Ghostbusters? Eggs cracking?

What?

The only thing I remember is that first horror movie I saw at a friends house (mentioned it in the "Name That Move" post) - still see snips of the stabing and blood every once in a while and just remember being very creeped out by it.

On an unrelated note, Vick pled guilty

The beginning scene of Ghostbusters where the ghost in the library freaked out. It was just awful.

Absolutely nothing scared me as a kid half so much as, well, The Nothing, from The Neverending Story. The simple idea that it was just nothing was enough to blow my fragile little mind, and gave me horrible nightmares about non-existence. Like a little Camus, I was. Also I was really scared of G'mork.

Oh, Buttercup, I thought I was alone.

I was a good kid who never fell asleep during naps, so after a few months my babysitter let me sit up and watch tv during naptime. By seven I had memorized every line of the Poltergeist movies, and the one where the toys come to life and threaten the kid (starts with a fake phone ringing) as if they were Disney films. Also, I decided I had wanted to be adopted into the Addams Family, and slept in pigtails with my hands folded over my heart like Wednesday.

But Mr. Rogers? Even with my back turned to the television and kids all around me, I could feel him staring right at me with that glassy smile, slowly tying one of his sneakers. shuddershuddershudershudder....

GW - I love the theme music for X Files, but only because my roommate, Sarah, made up really awesome lyrics

This is the X-Files show
With Scully and Mul-der
They make a somber pair
And they both have real nice hair

Perhaps singing that the next time you hear the theme will make it less creepy...

Also, those of you who have mentioned Tales from the Crypt, I have two, though since I was in my teens (or older?) they can't count as childhood freak outs. The first involved a scarecrow, a creepy farmer and his wife, and some poor teen-age girl. The second was about a ventriloquist's dummy (and I think starred Bobcat Goldthwaite), which turned out to be this weird mutant thing attached to his hand under the puppet--and even when he chopped it off, it was still alive (and either attached itself to someone else, or simply scampered away--I can't remember which). Ugh.

I kind of had the one-two punch for my freakout. I had a beloved book called Who's Who in the Zoo and it was an encylopedia of all types of animals. I loved it so much- except for one page. There was a picture of a frog with her babies coming out of the skin on its back. Even typing that makes my mouth get all spitty and my stomach cramps.

Then, I was told the story of The Frog Prince. It wasn't bad enough that this obsequious little frog follows the princess everywhere, wanting to be near her, eat near her plate and SLEEP ON HER PILLOW (shudder), but then (in the version I was told), she throws the frog against the wall. I was so grossed out by the thought of a frog being thrown against a wall that frogs now completely gross me out.

That's my story.

Two more occurred to me after I posted this diversion: 1) My entire view of relationships was horribly shaped and scarred by the ending of The Last American Virgin, when the girl (Diane Franklin) left the good guy who paid for her abortion for the guy who impregnated her. Far more frightening than any horror movie I'd ever seen. I was 8.

And, also, Stephen King's acting vignette in Creepshow, in which he falls prey to "meteor shit."

When I was a kid, I was there for a non-horror type movie and they showed the trailer for Phantasm and I didn't sleep for about a week after that. That little flying ball with the drill on it scared the shite out of me.

Escape from (fucking) Witch Mountain.

The orphan-ness of the lead characters. The creepy music. The flashbacks.

It still makes me nauseous thinking about it.

E.T. - It was sold as if all kids would love it. My dad is a fan of alien movies so he took me and I spent what felt like an eternity crying with my arms around his neck facing the audience in the theatre. Years later, an uncle tried to make my young cousin watch its TV premier & I stepped in!

Thiller - My favorite music video show was going to premier it, but once it began I had to hide behind the couch and was too scared to go near the TV to turn it off. I tried to plug my ears to keep from hearing Vincent Price's voice.

The Secret of Nymh - I went with some kind of afterschool group and found most of it to be very disturbing. I had vivid nightmares of going underground and being stuck there with the dusty owl and backstabbing rats.

Benji - I think this is the one where Benji wanders through a desert like a canine Moses. I bawled for days thinking about sweet dogs out there suffering. None of the adults seemed bothered, but I wanted to get out there and save Benji gawddammit!!!

does anyone also remember the thing from Sesame Street where Big Bird got sold to a circus or something where he was locked up and painted blue? Freeeaky. I honestly feared that they were going to kill Big Bird.

Yes! I remember that too. I had always thought that might be a bad dream I had. That was definitely freaky.

Swarm. A bad piece of B-movie horror from the 70's about a swarm of killer earthworms that take over a small town, yada yada.

I never actually saw this film. I just saw an ad for the film that was going to be shown on a Sunday afternoon creature feature on channel 11. And just that image of the killer earthworms, coming to eat you, in their own, unique, SQUISHY way, freaked me out.

A few days later I was at a swim meet. You may recall, if you did any sort of competative swimming, of the lane dividers, or lane lines, that broke the pool up into six or seven lanes. And there were small holes in each lane buoy, to let water through.

My race was the 50 yard freestyle, for boys 8 and under. I was never a fast swimmer. And, underwater, if you let your mind wander, it can go evil places. And I pictured killer worms coming THROUGH the holes in the lane lines, all after me.

I panicked, and almost drowned. My father had to save me.

I want to add myself to the list of people traumatized by "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" That bit when Christopher Lloyed peels himself off the floor and then starts shrieking terrifies me to this day, even though I love the movie.

The other thing that freaked me out was the 'Thriller' video. My parents (who were young MTV lovers at the time) used to make me leave the room when that video came on, but one time I sneaked back in and hid behind a chair to watch it. I firmly believe it caused my lifelong phobia of zombies.

I second the comments about Fantastia (the scene with the broomsticks) and Jumanji. Both of those movies really bothered me as a child.

What terrified me the most though was the Disney animated Pinocchio. I freaked the fuck out when those children turned into donkeys. To this day I don't think I've ever seen the conclusion of that movie.

Ghost Story. I used to sneak out of my room after bedtime to watch "grownup" programs. One time I peered around the corner right at the point in this movie where a woman lifts her bridal veil to reveal a rotted head. That freaked my shit out like nothing else. I slept with the hall light on for years afterwards.
To make matters worse, just when I was starting to get over Ghost Story, we watched Psycho. The mother's dessicated corpse triggered my fear all over again. I've watched Psycho since and gotten over it; Ghost Story I won't touch.

Constance,

I think the movie you're talking about is 'Lady in White' with Lukas Haas. IMDB tells me it was made in 1988.

I don't know why I knew that, but I did.

I fully agree with The Sorcerer's Apprentice, that totally freaked me out. And this one may have been just me, but the "Secwet weapon" in American Tail, that giant mechanical rat that sparked and shrieked that they used to run off the cats...completely holy shittified me.

Return to Oz-YES ME TOO! When she just pops her head, I pretty much lost my shit right then. Atreyu's horse dying really freaked me out as well. And this last one may not count, but I actually teared up when the horse went overboard in The Ring. I was 18. I like horses, so don't you judge me! Also saw A Clockwork Orange when I was about 10. Probably a bad choice.

I totally agree with The Dark Crystal and ET, I couldn't sit through either of those as a kid. However, I adored Labyrinth (even the orange guys who take their heads off!).

But seriously? Jacob's Ladder with Tim Robbins was on one day when I was little and he's having some sort of PTSD after Vietnam and hallucinating monsters and it scared the living crap out of me. I can safely say I will never EVER watch that movie.

-the opening sequence of Ghostbusters: I always had to ffwd the part where the ghost goes "boo" at Bill Murray and Dan Akroyd. that once moment always freaked me. saw it again recently, not so freaky.

-the only movie I had to stop the tape on when i was a kid was Shockwaves, and, watching it again (on youtube of course) I have no idea why. it is not a good movie, and not very creepy at all. I guess it was just the wrong moment for undead nazi supersoldiers....
the whole thing is on youtube:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwtbj7XrMZw



and I found Escape From New York a bit freaky as a youngster. my parents would let me rent anything! it was the 80s! VHS!

Siege: Yay! I'm so glad you knew that - I'll definitely have to go rent it and gauge the creepiness as an adult:)

Indiana Jones and the motherfucking Temple of Doom. I was never easily scared by scary movies, but this movie totally haunted me: the scene where they're at like the banquet, and there's eyeballs in the soup? The scene where they tear out that guy's still-beating heart? Plus they get stuck in a room full of spiders or giant bugs at one point. It didn't scare me, but it sure did disturb me.

That and Home Alone; I was always really disturbed at how the horrible violence was supposed to be funny.

This is actually a combination of the childhood-freak-me-out and last week's diversion on movies- you-don't-know-the-name-of. Here goes:

The movie (which I believe came out in the early 80's), as I recall, took place in a jungle type setting and there were these monkeys that were psychotic and had beady red eyes. I don't remember exactly what made them so scary but I'm sure it had something to do with attacking and killing people. At the end of the movie after the hero (and perhaps heroine) were saved and taken away via helicopter from the jungle, there was a shot of a monkey in the helicopter or hanging onto the landing platform underneath.

For some reason, I always associate that Toto song, "Africa" with this movie though I'm not sure if it is because the song was in the movie or if I associated the continent with jungles.

If you remember this movie, please help me out--I'm dying to know what it was and try to put it on my Netflix queue.

Also, the movie a couple people mentioned on last week's diversion, "Fortress" scared the crap out of me. Those guys in the creepy masks of "Father Christmas" and such was absolutely terrifying. I don't think I slept well for months after each viewing.

Jim posted: Without a doubt it has to be Gordon Jump as the pedophile on a very special episode of Different Strokes.

This is on top of my list. But along with it, the very special episode of Good Times that dealt with child abuse. Janet Jackson played the neighbor girl -- and the scene where her mom comes at her slowly with a curling iron to burn her, before the jump to commercial, sent me over the edge.

Ooh and I can't remember if it was in the movie, but the book Return to Oz starts with Dorothy having electroshock therapy to cure her of her fantasies about Oz. So I don't know if I ever saw the whole movie OR read the whole book. What a way to start a kids' story.

Oh Manny, no kidding about the Tales from the Darkside intro. As soon as it reversed the colors I would flip the hell out. I saw it the other day and it STILL scares the hell out of me. I'm 28.

Watcher in the Woods scared the living hell out of me. Bad. With the camera view of the watcher, and the weird music, and the broken glass. Ugh.

I didn't let go of my mother for a week after seeing Bambi in the theater.

And when I was a kid, I was taken to the mall to meet the Smurfs. There is a picture of me terrified and sobbing, clinging to my father's leg as a 6-foot-tall Papa Smurf looms over me. I remember looking up and thinking "that's way bigger than 2 apples tall" before completely losing my mind.

I can't believe I forgot!!! Large Marge in the Pee Wee Herman movie where he's looking for his bike. That ghost trucker bitch ripping her face off F$#@ED me up for YEARS and years. Oh. My. God. I watched it at the house where I went after school during 2nd grade and those horrible children laughed at me. So they kept rewinding it and making me watch it until I punched the ringleader. Christ.

I should have realized, every time I refused to watch a movie or television show that looked remotely scary or violent, that I was depriving myself of fun times like this. All I can offer is ... um ... Goosebumps. Man, those books freaked the hell out of me. Yep.

The one I remember most clearly is absolutly balling my eyes out during Seven. My mom took me to see it in the theater. I was ten. Her head showed up in a motherfucking box, people! That dude on the bed was supposed to be dead and then he started moving and shit! And I was ten! And when your ten you don't care that the movie is really well made and the acting is really good. It's fucking gross and terrifying!

I was also really disturbed by Sleeping Beauty when the prince kills the witch/dragon creature. That was freaky. And Flotsom and Jetsam (the eels) in Little Mermaid creeped me out.

And the part in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade when the guys face melts off. That scared the crap out of me. I think that might have been the moment I gave up religion...

I echo everyone who has mentioned The Little Mermaid. That movie scarred me so badly that I had to fast-forward through the Disney Castle logo at the beginning of other VHS tapes because I so closely associated it with that effing octopus lady.

My other nightmare was the Sesame Street episode where the apartment building catches on fire -- remember Gordon's little boy, woken up in the dark, surrounded by smoke, the pinging of the smoke detector in the background? I hid in the dining room after that one.

The scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, where the guy takes the wrong grail and dissolves. HOLY FUCK.

Someone told me about the Texas Chainsaw Massacre when I was ten, and I couldn't sleep for a week.

The new Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (note that I was sixteen when this movie came out) had me rushing out of the theater HYPERVENTILATING with the creepy dolls that catch on fire. I don't like animatronic dolls (got stuck on Small World at Disney World when I was three. For hours. Did some serious damage), and them burning was enough to send me over the edge.

Actually, that Sesame Street episode in the museum freaked me the hell out, too. Worst of all time, though? Neverending Story. That black warthog/boar thing just terrified me. I don't think I've ever seen the end of that flick.

Had no problem with Freddy, V, or Critters, though, oddly.

The scene in Disney's Alice in Wonderland where the cards are chasing Alice around to chop off her head, and the "Pink Elephants" scene in Dumbo.

So many memories:

1) Wrath of Khan: convinced myself that those ear things lived at the end of my bed and would enter my body through my toenails, so after I was sure my parents had gone to bed I would creep into the hallway with a blanket and a pillow to sleep wearing two pairs of socks for good measure. Kept that up for a few weeks until my mum found me one night.

2) Labyrinth: Toby bore an uncanny resemblence to my new baby brother and I became convinced the goblins were coming to get him, too. I was in hysterics throughout most of the movie.

I have ALWAYS been afraid of clowns but my head nearly explodes when I see Tim Curry as "It". He is so cool but his clown persona is so freaking scary. Ventriloquist dummies are almost as bad as clowns. I also have to admit that the flying monkeys in "Wizard of Oz" were very scary. I am mildly creeped out by monkeys to this day.

Smello--Sorry. I forgot that sometimes ignorance is bliss. :) I was going more for knowledge is power.

Maybe if you watch it again, it'll be less creepy? Hmm, though maybe not. As I know that seeing Wrath of Khan again will make it no less horrifying for me.

Don't know what to tell you about killing off moms in cartoons. Bambi was one of the first movies I ever saw, and I was so very sad when his mom died!

So I've thought of a couple more:

First, I remember seeing The Talented Mr. Ripley in theaters with my mom when I was 12 (what a misguided parenting decision... but it was all good; I didn't get half of it - Matt Damon was gay??!). But there's some scene transition where the end of the first scene is really quiet and the next scene starts with a really startling drop of a metal tray of ice cubes onto a tile floor followed by Gwyneth yelping in surprise and it scared the shit out of me.

There was also an episode of Are You Afraid of the Dark? about this dollhouse or... something. And the main girl managed to get into the dollhouse and it was real. And then she gets up to the attic and there's a real-life doll there, but she doesn't say anything, opting to just remove her (fucking) ARM, which turns out to be made of porcelain. The camera then sort of pans up to the girl who's horrified. As was I.

It's also been a long time, but I remember being terrified by Ursula in The Little Mermaid. I just remember her getting really big and dominating at the end and I was just so terribly sad for Ariel and what might happen to her. But like I said, it's been a while.

NEVERENDING STORY - although the wolfe was terrifying, the most disturbing part of the movie was that horrible flying dog - falcor. he still makes me uncomfortable and i belive my dislike for dogs is his fault.

RETURN TO OZ - aside from the obvious, fairuza balk scares the ever loving shit out of me, anytime i see her- no matter what. those wheeler guys are still so unbelievably creepy, i still cant watch.


PET SEMETARY - this is the movie that I still, to this day, cannot watch parts of and i am far too old for that. I am surprised that Zelda and Paskgow have not made this list thus far. Seriously? Zelda is so completely terrifying, just THINKING about her croaking Rachel's name gives me a chill and makes me want to shut my eyes. Pasgow, although he becomes tolerable towards the end, gives me a heartattack when we first meet him. This movie hands down was the scariest shit i had ever seen. it's sequel starring eddie furlong was also scary...for very different reasons.

Umm. I'm kinda worried about the parents in this country. You should not be seeing some of these movies under 12 (ahem SEVEN). I get that babysitters are sadistic teenagers with boyfriends to talk to but seriously...parents.

I can count the number of times I have been freaked out by something on film or TV on 1 hand.

1. CREEPSHOW!!! - The segment where the dude is a germophobe and end up infested internally with cockroaches...especially the scene where they burst out of his body.

2. Poltergeist 2 - When Craig T Nelson spits up that thing that crawls under the bed. And the priest dude was a little freaky too. I watch Parts 1 and 2 now and Pt. 1 is much better now that i know better.

3. Nightmare on Elm...3 or 4 - Dream Master. i am too lazy for IMDB right now. But my dad and i went to see it in the theater. I was 8. I made it about 15 mins into it. We had to leave the theater and go see Young Guns instead. But that solidified my love of all things horror movie and scare related. i will never forget that feeling of exhileration that followed the scare.

My babysitter let me watch Fantasy Island once. It was a Jack the Ripper episode and I had nightmares for months. That show was out there!

When I was 6 years old, my 19-year-old aunt made me watch Poltergeist with her while she was "babysitting" me. I had to check under my bed for clowns each night for a whole year. I think that movie still affects me - to this day, I have a wild imagination, and tend to scare myself silly whenever my husband is away and I have to spend nights alone.

I am also freaked out by anything that has anything to do with stigmata. I read a small book about it while visiting my great-grandmother when I was 11 or 12. Then I happened upon a show about it on the Discovery Channel or something...scared the shit out of me. I think it was shortly after that when I began questioning the Church. Seriously.

When I was about 8 I watched The Trilogy of Terror. Karen Black was the star in all 3 stories but one of them was about an evil tribal doll who came to life after it dropped it's spear. 30 years later I still get freaked out when I think of it, especially when the doll is stabbing her in the ankles from under the couch....AHHHHHH!

OMG, Paddydog. My sister and I watched Night of the Lepus one Easter Sunday while our parents were at the grandparents'. We nearly shat ourselves laughing so hard at that movie. I loved the thumping from miles away!
My own personal freak out: I saw the first Nightmare on Elm Street when I was about 6 and when Johnny Depp (I think it was him...) gets turned into a geyser of blood erupting out of his bed...wow. Still can't watch the NOES movies to this day, though I am a fan of horror flicks in general.

Before today, I had never run into anyone else who was frightened of The Dark Crystal. I don't even remember what the movie was really about (since I refuse to re-watch it, or even read or look at anything related to it). All I know is that those damned Muppets have haunted my dreams for the last two decades...

I was freaked from a lot of the stuff on the list 1.I loved (and still do)Pee Wee's Big Adventure, but that Large Marge scene where she turned into a claymation head scared the crap out of me!
2. Willy Wonka- Charlie's house and family and the boat ride through the tunnel. What the hell?
3. Gremlins- I've never seen the movies, but my dad had a big Spike doll that scared me so bad, they had to keep it hidden in the closet. If I went into my parent's room and the closet door was open, I was SO afraid I'd catch a glimpse of it.
MJune-I think I remember seeing a few seconds of that doll movie on TV. That was enough.
And I would have added The Exorcist, but I was 16 or 17 when I watched it. Still the scariest thing I've seen, aside from David Lynch movies!

The Nickelodean series "Are You Afraid of the Dark" spefically the episode about a blue and yellow clown that lived in an arcade... I think blue goop was involved somehow. It was pretty disturbing to my six-year-old mind.

Also, the Count on Sesame Street. When I was 4 my asshole 14 year old cousin explained to me that the Count was a vampire and what exactly that meant. I had nightmares about the Count sucking out Big Bird's blood... talk about weird. This cousin also told me that doll hair came from little boys and girls who had died from cancer. I made my dad put all my dolls in the attic and didn't touch them for two years.

The t-rex & stegosaurus fight in Fantasia. That old live action Alice in Wonderland movie, that I can't remember anything of except that it scared the SHIT out of me. Jurassic park in its entirety. Ursula in the live action Little Mermaid play I saw at Disney World.

Oh lord, so very many things freaked me out as a child...

The 1931 Bela Lugosi version of "Dracula" I saw at the age of 5. That and the banshee from Darby O'Gill (you called it, S. pisaster). I still have nightmares about them both.

I still stand firmly behind The Changeling as the most terrifying movie of all time, though. when the little boy's voice comes through on the recording of the seance? And when his ghost comes up through the floor? AAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!! I totally cried for my mommy.

I'm pleased to see that I'm not the only who was scarred for life by Return to Oz. Even more than the creepy-ass Wheelers or the Hallway of Severed Heads, I was freaked the fuck out by the girl stuck in the mirror.

Another noteably freaky movie I saw when I was a kid:

The Elm Chanted Forest.

There are so many, many things about this made-for-kids movie that are terrifying. The Catcus King and his army of setient medieval weapons, the bizzare underground mushroom kingdom that torture the main character through song and dance, the forest catching on fire! But the thing that freaked me out the most was one of the main characters was this beaver that could talk (of course) and he would clack his teeth together when he was talking and the noise that it made...I flinched every. single. time. he did it.

The Dark Crystal freaked me out the most. All of that esssence drinking shit gave me nightmares. They had these puppets for the kids at a church I went to that looked like the Dark Crystal muppet/puppet things and every time I saw them I'd still get a little edgy.

I was also terrified by the life-size cardboard cutout of the Toxic Avenger (I think-the guy with a mop? and like one eye or something?) that was in our local video store. Ah!

1) When I was seven my mother let me stay up and watch "Helter Skelter" when it was on television in the seventies. I became convinced that Charlie Manson was in the attic and had a knife with my name on it.

2) H.R. Puffenstuff. 'Nuff said.

3) The movie trailer for that Anthony Hopkins movie "Magic." Oh. My. God.

4) Finally, those damn flying monkeys. Am I the only person who utterly despises "The Wizard of Oz?" The tornado at the beginning made me wet my pants too.

Oh, and I'd like to second The Watcher in the Woods. I'm ashamed to say that I couldn't sleep for three days after watching this live-action Disney movie, and would burst into irritable tears whenever anyone spoke to me or touched me.

Okay here goes.

1. A fucking DISNEY movie called Something Wicked This Way Comes had this tarantula scene that freaked my shit out when I was a kid. Anyone that knows me knows about my arachnophobia as it is truly legendary. Erica O. from up above can testify to that. Oddly enough while giving me the willys, Arachnophobia didn't get me as bad as this movie. Probably cuz I was older when I saw Arachnophobia.

2. Terror Train - I saw this movie when I was about 7 or 8 visiting some family friends in Spain and holy fuck did it freak my shit out. I'm going to have to rent it again because I bet it will be absolutely hilarious now at my age. It's got Jamie Lee Curtis and it's about this graduatiing med school class that's celebrating their graduation on this train but little do they know that this guy who they pulled a mean prank on years earlier is on the train killing them one by one. Muahahahahahah! It's got David Copperfield, that's fucking right, David Fucking Copperfield doing magic tricks on the train until he gets chopped up into little pieces. Nuff sed!

3. This last one isn't really a childhood freakout but it gets an honorable mention cuz it disturbed my shit for a few days after seeing it. Anything that can do that to a fully grown adult deserves to be mentioned. Its a French flick called Irreversible. After watching this you won't let your girlfriend/wife walk to the damn kitchen much less to the damned car without an armed escort.

Ohhh, the bugs in the ears in Wrath of Khan. And the clown in Poltergeist. And I STILL (at age 30) check the deep end of the pool for sharks before I'll get in, thanks to Jaws.

There was an old B&W episode of Twilight Zone, where a kid visits his friend's house, and his sister doesn't have a mouth. That was the freakiest thing I've ever seen.

And I read The Monkey's Paw when I was about 7. I had to throw the book away, because I couldn't handle seeing the cover on my bookshelf. When the dead guy comes back to life, but he still looks dead - it was awful. Why would they make a children's book version of that story????

And did anyone read the version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with the illustrations that were B&W pencil sketches? Oh, those still give me the creeps.

Okay here goes.

1. A fucking DISNEY movie called Something Wicked This Way Comes had this tarantula scene that freaked my shit out when I was a kid. Anyone that knows me knows about my arachnophobia as it is truly legendary. Erica O. from up above can testify to that. Oddly enough while giving me the willys, Arachnophobia didn't get me as bad as this movie. Probably cuz I was older when I saw Arachnophobia.

2. Terror Train - I saw this movie when I was about 7 or 8 visiting some family friends in Spain and holy fuck did it freak my shit out. I'm going to have to rent it again because I bet it will be absolutely hilarious now at my age. It's got Jamie Lee Curtis and it's about this graduatiing med school class that's celebrating their graduation on this train but little do they know that this guy who they pulled a mean prank on years earlier is on the train killing them one by one. Muahahahahahah! It's got David Copperfield, that's fucking right, David Fucking Copperfield doing magic tricks on the train until he gets chopped up into little pieces. Nuff sed!

3. This last one isn't really a childhood freakout but it gets an honorable mention cuz it disturbed my shit for a few days after seeing it. Anything that can do that to a fully grown adult deserves to be mentioned. Its a French flick called Irreversible. After watching this you won't let your girlfriend/wife walk to the damn kitchen much less to the damned car without an armed escort.

My list-
1. I too hated The Dark Crystal. I still avoid walking by the VHS cover of this movie, in our local video store. The sound those evil puppets made when they talked (do you know what I'm referring to?) SCARED the SHIT out of me.
2. Twilight Zone movie, where Dan Akroyd shows his passenger "something really scary"...the chick with no mouth...and of course the creepy thing outside the airplane!
3. Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Night of the Living Dead- in my house, there was no such thing as "too young to watch a freaky horror movie". It's my favorite genre now, minus these two movies, still can't watch them to this day.
Great...now I won't be able to sleep tonight!

Thanks Jen Abrams! I couldn't remember the name of that crazy doll movie. It was pretty scary but I liked the ending.

David Bowie's cod piece in "Labyrinth."

That's right.

Yazikus & Melody--So glad it isn't just me. I heard a story on NPR (Fresh Air, maybe?) not that long about about this guy who has come out with a CD of new songs for ice cream trucks, and they didn't freak me out. I think all ice cream trucks should adopt one or more of these songs for their theme music.

The ice cream truck that used to drive around my mom's neighborhood played Home on the Range--sooo creepy!

*shiver shiver*

When Steve Austin sang that song "Jaimie" in The Six Million Dollar Man. I still have nightmares.

Jaws. I'm 41 years old and still afraid to go swimming in my pool at night.

Alien. When Ripley gets ready to crawl into bed at the "end" of the movie. I wasn't ready yet for those type of endings. I remember seeing that damn alien backlit on the door to my room for the longest time.

1. Clowns. Any clowns. I hated those asshats.

2. Too many stories of the end of the world at church.

3. A movie that I think was called Don't Go to Sleep--no idea who let me watch that one. Some little girl dies in a car crash (I think because her siblings had tied her laces together while she slept so she couldn't move fast enough to get out of a burning car or something). Then she comes back and kills the whole family using her little sister or something like that. Very creepy. She gets someone to walk off the roof, electrocutes someone else in the bathtub, etc. I seem to remember specifically a scene of a scary little girl climbing the stairs and rolling a sharp-looking pizza cutter along the banister. Now I can't think how you could really kill someone effectively with one of those.

Scarred for life, by watching Cubs baseball in the mid to late 70s.

Movie was War Games, because I thought my one computer genius friend was whacked enough to start a war via the WHOPPER.

TV show, was Soap and my first run in with the gay topic. Took me awhile to get over my homophobia from this but now I can say a good friend of mine is gay, so I am cured of this close-minded phobia.

Watership Down - I don't even remember why (I was five or so), but the cartoon movie freaked me the FUCK out.
I also second All Dogs Go To Heaven - my mom had to take me out of the theatre I was so scared, as well as the last sequence in Fantasia (Night on Bald Mountain) and this one episode of X-Files some silly person let me watch around the age of seven with the mutated fluke-worm-thing that sat at the bottom of an outhouse and looked creepy.

There are two that I can remember right off the bat:
1) Watership Down-my family rented it thinking it was going to be a cute movie about a bunch of cute bunnies. But in the first five minutes or so one of the rabbits has a freakout and starts screaming about blood. It goes downhill from there-disturbed me for years.
2)The Incredible Hulk-while I love the cheesiness now, when I was young I was terrified of the Incredible Hulk. Whenever I even saw the opening credits I would run screaming from the room, down the hallway. My brothers and sisters used to fool me into thinking it was another show and have me hang out, then Bill Bixby would turn into the Hulk and I would freak out all over again. One time I even wanted to get the heck away from my Aunt's cottage we were visiting when I thought a neighbor looked a little too much like Bill Bixby. Weird, I know.

Clan of the Cave Bear. I think I was 8 or 9 and all my older cousins wanted to see it, so we're watching it at my grandma's house, and there are boobs, and weird hand signals for "I'm gonna fuck you now", and then they go to the Clan gathering and Ayla finally finds another person with blue eyes,

AND THEN A GIANT BEAR RIPS HIS HEAD OFF!

Later his head was displayed for everyone to see. Fucking freaked me out. But the book is great.

Also, the face meltings at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, especially the Asian guy.

I'm a big wimp, as a child and even now, nearly 21. Though I love reading Stephen King, a lot of his stuff scares the shit out of me. IT especially (I haven't seen the movie, thanks) and a short story called The Boogeyman.

Anyway, onto childhood movie freakouts:

Gremlins. I know I saw it as a little kid, then when I was 10 or so, one night I went into my parents room and they were watching it on TV! I screamed, turned around, and ran back to my room.

One of the Dracula movies. Dracula gets staked on a table leg at the end? Anyway, despite my terror of vampires, I forced myself to watch it. But now I actually write about vampires, so hey.

An animated version of The Nutcracker. The rat king bit the princess on the toes while she slept and she turned green and had warts and stuff and it terrified me. I was probably around 5, maybe a bit older. I slept with socks on for ages. I still dislike sleeping with my feet uncovered.

When I was 7, I was over at a friend's house and she and her family were really irresponsible people, so they decided we would watch The Terminator 2. The scene where somebody's talking on the phone, I think to the kid, and then it pans back to show T2 had STABBED someone through the throat and stuck them to the wall and there was spilled milk and and... Anyway, that was the point where I went home and didn't sleep for 2 weeks.

Funnily enough, I've never had a problem with Roger Rabbit, ET, Dark Crystal, Labyrinth, or The Neverending Story; though I think I cried at Atreyu's horse in the quicksand, I wasn't scared, as far as I can remember.

A lot of stories scared the everloving shit out of me as a kid, more than movies, maybe because I've always been a voracious reader. The two big ones from my childhood:

1) Short story about these kids who went swimming in a lake and swam down to an underwater cave, only there was some invisible water-thing there and it grabbed one of the kids and snapped his (?) ribs like matchsticks... So then the other two run away home but the thing follows them and comes up through the water pipes, killing one in the shower, then I think it ends with it grabbing the kid's mother and pulling her down the sink or something. Scared. The. Shit. Out of me. I washed my hands by putting my lower body as far away as possible and leaning over while craning my head back. Also, I was afraid of the shower drain. That only got worse when I read IT (but I was 15 or so then).

2) This one still makes me nervous. These guys get stranded in a snowstorm and stumble on a cabin. They go to sleep, and when they wake up in the morning, one of them is dead. But they can't leave because of the snowstorm. So they sleep again, and now another one is dead. Snowstorm still. So one guy stays up to watch, and sees this skeleton hand come out from a bundle of rags on a shelf above their sleeping place. It reaches down and one finger stabs into the other guy's neck, just under his skull and pulls his brain out or something. The last guy burns the place down and the snowstorm ends. I swear to you, I slept on my back for YEARS. I had shelves above my bed, and I was convinced one of my porcelain dolls would do the same to me. Ah, childhood.

One last thing, so you all can laugh at me. I was watching Wheel of Fortune with my dad one night and they solved the puzzle as Vampires. I think I started crying and left the room.

It was the big plastic tunnels in ET that scared the shit out of me- and the frustration of no one telling him what was really going on. God I hated that movie.

Also, Sarah, Plain and Tall

wow I TOTALLY forget about Creepshow. Every segment of that freaked me the. fuck. out.

1) Chucky--I was such a whimp as a kid I didn't even see the movie...I just saw the front cover of the video at the video store and had nightmares for about a year. I still don't like dolls much.

2) Flowers in the Attic-- I don't know why but after seeing that movie for a long time afterwards I was petrified my parents would abandon me and leave me at home alone. It's still jarring to see it on TV.

3) And Kudos to everyone who mentioned either labyrinth, Return to Oz, Neverending Story...all gave me terrible terrible nightmares

Although this wasn't a childhood freakout, I'm going to second Irreversible as one of the most profoundly fucked up movies I have ever witnessed. It will haunt your dreams regardless of your age.

I saw "The Blob" (Original)when I was like 4. I refused to eat jelly for months afterward. The scene when the blob comes through the vent at the movie theater was so horrifying. My dad also edited out the last segment in Creepshow when the bugs came out of the guy's body because it freaked me out so bad.

I forgot to mention re: Big Bird. I never had a problem with him as a child, but I had a very scary dream in college that involved Big Bird and I doing a job for the mob and busting some guys kneecaps with baseball bats. Ever since I've been kind of creeped out by the BB.

I'm not really gonna get any points for these, but when I was in 1st grade, we had "educational programs" they showed which freaked my shit OUT.

The first one I can't even remember the name of because my conciousness blocked it solidly from my mind. It was a librarian who was kidnapped by a space alien (who was the same actress only painted green in crap alien drag) and forced to tell stories with the constant promise of freedom that never happened. First time I saw it, I panicked and freaked and ran out of the room.

The second was the freakin' Letter People, which, while not terrifying, made me squirm uncomfortably. But that mostly because I could read and didn't need a bunch of personified letters telling me how to pronounce themselves. Or a Q who was conspicuously silent, possibly plotting to murder all the other letters with the help of a WAY too friendly U. (I was a disturbed child.)

1. As has been mentioned, Poltergeist...more or less all of it, but especially the swimming pool scene, and the scene where the TREE tries to EAT the LITTLE BOY. Is nothing sacred? Trees? Really? I made my sister switch bedrooms with me after that because there was a tiny little tree outside mine.

(and what kind of fucked up babysitter lets a five year old watch poltergeist? What the fuck, babysitter?)

2. It was either the Twilight Zone or the (old version) of the Outer Limits. There's a guy and an earwig, and he's convinced that the earwig has crawled in his ear, and then he starts to fucking lose it, but you don't know if he's paranoid about the earwig because he's crazy, or if he's crazy because he's got a motherfucking EARWIG eating through his BRAIN. Saw that when I was visiting Grams in Wyoming, and was responsible for shucking the corn, which was fully infested with earwigs. That is the stuff adult neuroses are made of, ya'll....

To this day, fuck E.T. fuck Gremlins and FUCK that wolf from The Neverending Story. But none of those are the kicker...in the early eighties there was a show called "Steven Spielberg's Amazing Stores". As a five year old, I was FUCKING TERRORIZED by a story about these human eating creatures that lived underground near a farm house. The family in the house was poor, so they would kill people and drop them down in the hole for the creatures to eat. The creatures started sending back gold and jewels in exchange for the bodies and so begins a life of persistant murder for the family. Damn you Steven Spielberg!!!

Ah, my 1980s/early 90s childhood. In no uncertain order, and this is all I can think of right now (many of these have already been mentioned):

- The "Night on Bald Mountain" scene in Fantasia
- the opening of Labyrinth when the goblins are all in the room trying to figure out if she's serious about giving up her baby brother (I was *very* into Gareth, however...mmmm....)
- the wolf-monster (Gmork?) in The Never-Ending Story
- the wolf in the cartoon version of Peter and the Wolf
- the scary cats in An American Tail
- certain episodes of Are you Afraid of the Dark? on Nickelodeon
- anything vampires, including but not limited to Salem's Lot and Bram Stoker's Dracula. I actually snuck down and stood outside the den while my parents watched and managed to see the scene when Dracula is that giant bat thing in the corner of the ceiling...I couldn't sleep for nights. (Love the movie now, though.)
- John Waters' Serial Mom. I watched it when I was eleven and I was terrified that one of my friends' moms was secretly going to go crazy with a fireplace rod.

I love being scared, even now!

God I'm such a wuss

1) Jurassic Park. I was about nine - I think - and utterly terrified. The scene with the Raptors in the kitchen still freaks me the fuck out.

2) Jaws (and Jaws 2). I was terrified of swimming in the sea for years because of this film.

3) Alien. They showed it to us in school - we were ten - which meant I couldn't look away or close my eyes, for fear of mockery. And the weirdest part? Apparently, they thought that 'Stand By Me' was too mature/violent in theme, but Alien was just fine to show to little kids. To this day that film (and all of its sequels) still terrifies me.

4) Childsplay. Yeah, this film should not be shown to seven year olds. Chucky scared the shit out of me for about three years after seeing the film, not helped by the fact that my younger sister had one of those 'talking' dolls that would randomly start talking in the middle of the night. I was convinced it was going to murder me in my sleep.

5) The X Files. That one episode with the serial killer who mutilates women, and kidnaps Scully. I seem to remember that my mother and I had a 'talk' about whether I should be watching it after that episode.

1. Gremlins. I was afraid to pee because I thought they'd jump out of the back of the toilet.

2. Secret of Nimh. That part with the owl in the dark place totally creeped me out.

No time to read posts right now so it's probably been said, but here they are:

1. Jaws. I saw it in Hawaii, for pete's sake! My stepmother took me (I was 10) and my two younger brothers. Bitch.

2. Darby O'Gill and the Little People. That banshee...egads!

3. Any and all vampire movies. For years I had to sleep with covers up over my neck, no matter how hot the weather was.

4. Friday the 13th(the first one). I saw it at a slumber party and when I got home I had to sleep sitting up with the light on. I was convinced that Jason was under my bed and was going to reach around and grab me by the forehead and jab a spear through my chest. Shudder...

Oh man, I seriously thought I was the only one who was terrified of the Incredible Hulk. I remember when I was about 5 the Hulk was on Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, of all shows, and I just couldn't watch it. I hid behind the couch and prayed for it to be over. I thought that Fred had betrayed me by featuring something so scary.

I hated Wrath of Khan. I still can't watch it.

And the tv show V? Totally disturbing. I remember one episode where one of the humans gave birth to twins--the father was an alien--and one of the babies looked human but had a lizard tongue just like the aliens. I shudder to think about it.

The Wizard of Oz: Not only the flying monkeys, but the tornado! I had recurring nightmares about torandoes until my mid twenties. But I'm fine now, seriously.

Poltergeist: This came out in 1982 which means I was 14 when I saw this in the theater. I didn't go mental the day I saw it until I had to go to sleep that night. I kept looking at the closet door thinking it would open up and I would get sucked in. That caused me a few sleepless nights. And that stupid clown? Has anyone ever heard anyone say, gee I love clowns. No. Everybody hates clowns. Why are they still in parades? The only place a clown belongs is in a horror movie. Because they're fucking scary.

The Twlight Zone: Don't know the name of the episode, didn't even finish watching it. Was William Shatner in it? Probably, all Twilight Zone episodes contained either William Shatner or Burgess Meredith. Some guy was driving at night and looked in the rearview mirror, and saw a person! Of course when he looked in the backseat, there wasn't anyone there! My younger brother and I were watching this on one of the first nights that our parents let us stay home alone with no babysitter. Wow, great idea on our part. We immediately changed the channel.

1. The heart-ripping-out scene in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, which I saw when I was 5. I still have trouble watching this movie. Even looking at the poster makes me shudder.

2. Gremlins, at the end when they say they're coming to your town. I took that literally. Also age 5 (My parents were apparently distracted this year)

3. The Count on Sesame Street. I hated math and vampires. Enough said.

Forgot 3.... The Dual. Evil evil killer semi man. I hate semis. Even now. But when I was little, I didn't want to go anywhere near one. I would walk like 100 yards around so as not to get too close to one.

Holy cow, Julie---good one with "Young Sherlock Holmes". I think I completely blocked that movie from my memory until now. When the stained glass window comes to life and the guy goes crazy and runs out into the street only to get mowed down by a horse-drawn carriage? I think that whole movie is disturbing. Also when the cult mummified Sherlock's girlfriend. Ugh.

Death Becomes Her!

When those two ladies had holes in their bodies and heads and still didnt die....well, I had nightmares for months. I can't imagine how that movie got past my sex-and-violence-phobic parents, unless I saw it at one of my less-disciplined friends' house.

Oh, and the first Scream movie was filmed in my totally-cooler-than-me friends' house, so we decided that it would be a fabulous idea to watch the movie on her couch. Well, it was far from fabulous. It was horrifying to watch the masked killer run up the staircase down the hall as we sat there. I had to call my mom to pick me up because I couldn't sleep there that night!!!

The Babar movie scared the fuck out of me, my mom had to console me for ages.

The Green Giant!!!

In the mid 60s (when I was in my wee years), there was a black and white commercial featuring an actor playing the Green Giant and standing in the fields screaming "ho, ho, ho." For some unknown reason, I would freak out (to the dismay of my mom and amusement to my dad), scream and hide under the bed. To this day, I have not tasted a stringbean, am repulsed by peas, and won't go near a sprout. I also don't buy Green Giant brand foods, even when on sale.

And yet, I along with my therapists (yes, plural as I am multi-faceted) cannot understand why I love every other veggie including broccoli. Go figure.

I cant believe NOONE has said HALLOWEEN (from 1978). I was WAY too young to watch that shit on HBO (remember turning the volume down when they would say "This film has been RATED R!!!!" I am not the same person because of the trauma of that movie. Totally ruined the suburbs for me. STILL, I will have occasional Michael Meyers dreams (Im 38 for crissake)

Sooooo funny that Sesame Street was used as an example, because I was freaked the hell out by this little Sesame Street sketch with Burt and Ernie. They were explorers in Egypt and there was this mummy who looked just like Ernie who would move and dance every time Burt wasn't looking. Of course Ernie was getting really scared. It used to scare me sooooo much!!!

Also, some old Disney movie, I think it was called Watcher in the Woods. I don't remember much about it except that it haunted my very existence.

1. ED-209 from "Robocop". Also, the toxic waste death scene. Gave me nightmares for years.

2. Tina's death in "A Nightmare On Elm Street." For years that was the only part of the movie I'd seen, and it terrified me.

3. Most of the opening 30-40 minutes of "Red Dawn". Nowadays I enjoy this is a campy-nostalgic-so-bad-it's-good flick, but at the tender age of 6 or 7 this movie terrified me. Damn cold war, scaring kids like that.

Man, I was really watching wholly inappropriate movies as a child.

there was this one cartoon about a young bumble bee looking for his mother called "Hutch the Honey bee". in the prelude to the actual cartoon, they always ran this scene where he was gettig attacked by a grass hopper, that was very frightening to me.

i was also really scared of the red bull in "the last unicorn"

bubt something really funny was my brother who was afraid of th witch in "snow white", and "No-Love" in CARE BEARS--- yea...

I think this thread was made for me. My boyfriend will testify that I can be scared by just about anyone or anything. The top two from childhood would be...

*The Little Mermaid. I remember being at the movies when I was about four or five and hiding behind the chair in front every time the big crazy octopus lady came out.

*I also spent at least half an hour of Jurasic Park hiding in the cinema bathroom after seeing the kitchen scene with the kids. The worst part was that the bathroom was right beside the cinema and I could still hear every roar and scream.

As you can tell I have a very low threshold for fear.

s. pisaster I think that we are kindred spirits. Because the banshee scene from Darby O'Gill freaked me out really bad as a wee tyke.

And I believe that Disney movie you are talking about is call Mr. Boogitty and he would say boogitty boogitty BOO! Scared the shit out of me.

Also, another movie that left an indelible mark on my psyche was the Rankin-Bass animated version of The Hobbit. It is a really great movie. But, the scene with the Goblins when they hunt down the dwarves while singing a rousing drinking song ("Sixteen birds! What funny little things!"). But, the most disturbing part was when Gollum realized that the precious was gone and he flips the fuck out. Starts screaming after his "precious." Absolutely terrifying. It still gives me chills. The voice actor was perfect... I still think that Gollum was better than the Andy Serkis Gollum.

The Nothing in "Neverending Story"

The scene in "Terminator" when everything is burning in an apocolyptic future

The witch in "Sleeping Beauty"

Anna - I had absolutely no idea that the horse that played Artax actually did die in the Swamp of Sadness. I had to look it up because I refused to believe it. Now I am depressed.

I am with you all on Poltergeist--the clown, the tree, the "one one-thousand, two one-thousand"--ugh.

I was only two or three years old when my mom took me to see "Snow White," and I was really freaked out by the evil stepmother. Esp. when she dressed like a hag to give Snow White the poison apple. I couldn't sleep without nightmares for days.

Yoda, E.T., Short Circuit, the dragon from Neverending Story...if it was not human and in a 1980's movie, chances are I was terrified.

Also, that bit in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom where the man's heart was ripped out horribly scarred by brain for years.

I was also apparently really freaked out by Gary Coleman but I dont remember that one.

When I was six, I stumbled upon my brother watching the mutation scene from Akira. The extended spectacle of a skinny teenager exploding into an oozing flesh bomb the size of a city block (set to ominous chanting) neatly swiss-cheesed my kiddie psyche. I think the worst part was when the mutation victim inadvertently crushed his girlfriend -- sausage-wrapped in distended flesh, the girl screams and screams until she dies in a splurt of blood. Ummm.

1. Animated Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. The fucking cobra. Terrifying.

2. My parents bought me one of those little plastic Hamburglar puppets from McDonalds that are undoubtedly prohibited now when I was about 2. Apparently, I flipped out completely.

3. The Count. I'm sorry, but what is NOT scary about some Eastern European dude with a purple face in a broken-down castle with a bunch of bats flying around? I remember fearing him, but family members tell me that I'd get up and leave the room when he was on the screen or if anybody imitated him.

4. Anything where a baby was harmed or could've been harmed, i.e. the scene in "Lady and the Tramp" where the Siamese cats jump in the baby's cradle. I was also freaked out by the line "...and down will come baby, cradle and all" from "Rock A Bye, Baby."

5. The ghosts of Christmas past/future in "A Christmas Carol." Any version.

6. Animated "The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe." The British accents scared me.

Poltergeist destroyed any sane ability to handle horror movies for me. The part where all the ghosts are floating down the stairs? the steak that exploded maggots? Man ripping his face off?

The graphics are totally cheesy (I actually watched it again currently and laughed) but MAN did that ever freak me out when I was little.

I still have issues with watching horror movies to this day because of it.

I saw 2 more up there that freaked the shit out of me.

WATERSHIP DOWN - My mother rented it for us, and the second the blood was coming down the hill, which is what the first 2 minutes? It was turned off because my sister and I were screaming bloody murder

UNSOLVED MYSTERIES - I've never understood why my parents let me, a natrually anxious, worried child, watch that show. I used to stare out the windows in our house waiting for someone to come kill me.

I heart this comment diversion.

I'm a little surprised that HR Puffenstuf was only mentioned once. That huge head and mouth, those enormous rolling eyes...brrrr.

And the Twilight Zone movie, when someone is put into a violent, old-fashioned cartoon and is screaming and running through it until she's killed.

Oh, and Eraserhead. The first time I saw it it just made me so jumpy that by the time he kills the baby at the end, and the light is flashing and the baby's neck stretches and swings the head from side to side...I had to change the channel.

And was it The Hitcher where Jennifer Jason Leigh is tied between two trucks that are about to drive in opposite directions? Ick.

I don't know why, but for some reason I developed an irrational fear of my Sylvester the Cat stuffed animal. It progressed to where I was having recurring nightmares about the Looney Tunes characters (namely Sylvester and Bugs Bunny). In my dream, they were people-sized and were just creepily hanging out in this Episcopalian church in my town that had red carpet. For some reason the red carpet was the scariest part. Anyway, it got the the point where most nights I would have to take Sylvester and move him to another room or hide him before I went to sleep.

I second E motherfucking T, The Wizard of Oz's flying monkeys, the "my dad died in the chimney" scene in Gremlins, and of course Poltergeist and The Exorcist. It's weird, it seems that in the 80's parents were a lot more lax about letting small children see horror films. I remember watching all the classics right in my living room, all between the ages of like, six and twelve.

And I haven't read the whole thread yet, but I seriously doubt anyone's fear of Pinhead could surpass mine. I still can't quite look him full in the face.

OMG Samantha T-your #4 is right on with me; I hated those cats, and I used to cry at that one line...why write a song about a baby falling out of a tree?? Not cool.
Cait-I was also afraid of anamatronic dinosaurs, and maybe still am a little bit.
Also, I have an irrational fear of vomit, which started with Home Alone. I couldn't beleive that there was barf in movies, and it pretty much ruined the theater for me as a kid.

Oh my God, champ, I just realized I had blocked out my scariest freak-out ever! Motherfucking ZELDA!!! Oh my god. To this day, I refuse to watch. When her sister is recounting the story and they tell it in flashbacks, and you see her in that bed with her back all twisted and her skin stretched over her skeletal face that looks like wax...holy shit! I just remembered a time in 9th grade when boys were still immmature enough to use the torture method of flirting. That movie came on tv and I was like, oh I can't watch this scene, change it, it's the only thing I'll refuse to watch...well, one of the boys held me down and the other turned up the volume so I had to hear her terrible, terrible croaking voice. I thought I would never forgive those boys! I can't believe I forgot about that one.

Holy hell! Does anyone remember a Porky Pig cartoon where these two evil leprechauns tricked him into wearing magic shoes that would force him to dance FOREVER? I think it was called "The Wearin' O' the Green" and it is seriously the scariest thing ever. The stuff I listed before? I would watch those now, but I would not go near that damn Porky Pig cartoon again for anything. SERIOUSLY.

Kt- You mean someone else out there had an irrational fear of vomit as a child? There was a kid in my 4th grade class who puked once a month on a Monday. Nearly caused me to have a nervous breakdown.

Frat parties in college pretty much cured me, but I do try and avoid seeing live barf as much as possible.

Emily:

I think the book you're asking about may be called "Wait 'til Helen Comes." It was one of my favorites as a kid.

oh, right, i forgot about Artax from the neverending story. i was inconsolable for days and i still can't watch that scene without muting it or changing the channel until it's over.

it wasn't just the idea of it, but the fact that they had to train some poor horse to be face deep in mud and get yanked around by its halter that really upset me, then and now.

Oh yeah, and MONKEY SHINES.

emily, the childrens' book was "wait 'til helen comes."

also, the "beauty and the beast" television series from the late 80s terrified me as a child, but i cannot remember a single scene.

I can't believe I forgot about this one, but the thing that freaked me out as a kid was a Very Special Episode of "All in the Family" where Edith almost got raped. A guy talked his way into the house while Edith was alone, tied her up, and was about to rape her when they smelled something burning in the kitchen. They went into the kitchen where Edith pulled a cake out of the oven and shoved it in they guy's face, burning him and allowing her to run over to the neighbor's house. It was a two-part episode but I was so freaked out I never watched the show again.

I was not allowed scary movies or TV as a child. Consequently, horror flicks freak me out pretty badly now. No tolerance. So most of my childhood traumas came from books. Sixth grade was particularly bad. I managed to get my hands on a lot of 'adult' novels that year - trashy ones, mostly without redeeming value. My first exposure to Stephen King happened that year, I'm pretty sure. But the one I really remember scaring me was by some hack writer with scads of novels to her name, a formulaic thriller that even at that age I was dimly aware was NO GOOD, entitled "Where the Girls Are" or "Where are the Girls?" I thankfully can't remember title or author at this point. Story revolved around the kidnap/rape/murder of a young girl. I remember being terrified because she was younger than I was, and this at an age when I still truly considered boys to be 'icky.' And to make it worse, I couldn't talk to my mom about it because I'd borrowed the book from someone at school and KNEW it wasn't something I should be reading, and had diligently hidden it from my parents. I was physically ill for awhile afterwards. To this day, movies/books that disturb me to that extent will make me sick.

I was a puss as a young girl as well. Lessee here,
1. Poltergeist. That's the one where Craig T. Nelson drinks down the worm that comes back up, right? That was back in the day when the pop bottles were glass and we returned them for the money when we bought more. Anyway, I couldn't drink anything that I couldn't see through for a loooong time. Also, the whole clown doll choking the kid thing. Jebus.

2. Killer Klowns from Outer Space. Thanks HBO, thanks so much for showing this movie forty times a day everyday when I was younger. I was already terrified of clowns, but I watched it anyway. I was so afraid that the next knock on the door would be one of those asshat clowns and I would be a cotton candy corpse beverage.

3. Previews for Hellraiser movies, not an actual movie, just the previews.

4. Okay, this is reaaaalllly stupid, but I was afraid that Sloth from The Goonies would emerge from under my bed and put his deformed face really close to mine and yell "Heeeyyyy yooooouuuu guuuuuuyyyys!". Does that make me a jerk?

Does anyone remember the show Ghostwriter? I think it was on pbs.

Anyway. The month-long series of Ghostwriter episodes about the "bubblegum monster" where the kids were inspired by a creepy-ass puppet and started writing a story about it and then the puppet came to life in real life and did the things in the story.

The bubblegum monster would cover you in bubblegum and you'd get stuck and presumably die.

It gave me nightmares for two months

Indiana Jones in the Temple of Doom -- STILL too terrified to watch Kate Capshaw try to act -- I mean the volcano sacrifice/heart-ripping scene!

And all of that fantasy shit: Never Ending Story, The Dark Crystal, fucking Krull. Oh yeah, can't wait to go to sleep now.....thanks Pajiba.

Alright. I adore Kubrick as a director, but I'll be honest in saying that I had the unfortunate experience of witnessing The Shining at a rather early age.

And, if it isn't the rushing torrents worth of blood flooding hotel hallways, the scene I am most horrified by (to this day) is the scene wherein Nicholson hallucinates a woman in the shower, who then turns out to be an old and equally decrepit hag, her flesh boiled and seemingly rotting.

Nightmares for years, I'm telling you, of old women hiding in my shower.

RebeccaD: WHAT were you doing at Rocky Horror at age 8?!!!! Don't get me wrong-I loves me some Tim Curry, but that's a wee bit young. As for my freakouts:
Creature Feature's opening theme
The '70's American Heart Association commercials (whoever orchestrated the music for those commercials was in the wrong profession-they were seriously creepy!)
and lastly:
Trilogy of Terror (particularly the episode with Karen Black battling an African witch doll).

Thanks for the memories-I think?

RebeccaD: WHAT were you doing at Rocky Horror at age 8?!!!! Don't get me wrong-I loves me some Tim Curry, but that's a wee bit young. As for my freakouts:
Creature Feature's opening theme,
The '70's American Heart Association commercials (whoever orchestrated the music for those commercials was in the wrong profession-they were seriously creepy!)
and lastly:
Trilogy of Terror (particularly the episode with Karen Black battling an African witch doll).

Thanks for the memories-I think?

I've been meaning to delurk for some time now. Leave it to childhood fears to get me talking.

Word on The Unsolved Mystery fear, but that fear seems much more rational, even if the compulsion to watch the show despite the fact that I knew it was going to scare the crap out of me was not.

Also, word on Return to Oz. I was older elementary school when I watched that, and I happily don't remember many details of the plot, but it severely wigged me out.

My young childhood memories are few and far between, but I have a distinct recollection of needing to hide behind my parents during some portion of a Care Bears movie involving a carnival. Irrational, but I like to think I was perceptive enough to be scared of carnies before I really knew what one was. Then again, maybe that is what led to my carnyphobia.

I both loved and feared The Dark Crystal. The Skeksis were about the scariest thing I could imagine, and the entire movie was scary to me inasmuch as live action puppets are freaktastic. Cue fear of marionettes and see also: Gremlins, Labyrinth, The Never Ending Story.

What else? Polydactylism is forever evil in my mind thanks to the six-fingered man in The Princess Bride, David Bowie and his excessive eye makeup freaked me out in Labyrinth, and Queen Bavmorda in Willow scared the shit out of me.

I vividly remember the day the action figure of Emperor Palpatine arrived in the mailbox. That dude scared the crap out of me, and it was some time before I was brave enough to actually touch him, even in inanimate plasticized form. In related news, although I loved Yoda in the movie and as an action figure, it was only on days when I summoned all of my bravery that I was able to put the plastic orange snake around his neck while playing with him.

The Fox and the Hound, The LIttle Princess, and The Neverending Story both caused childhood freakouts of the emotional variety. Even though all had parts that were scary to me, the emotional torture therein superceded any fear.

i can't believe i forgot to mention mr. tumnus from the animated the lion, the witch and the wardrobe. i was conviced he would be waiting for me under every lamp post with that damnable flute.

and the goons from popeye. what the hell were those things?

I'm finally delurking to post this. My mom took me with her on one of her dates to the drive-in when I was just a kid to see Carrie. I don't know if she didn't have a sitter and thought I would sleep through it, or if she was just stoned, or tripping- it was the 70's and she was really flaky then. I cannot stand any type of scary movie to this day. I don't think I was even in kindergarten yet, but that hand reaching out at the end scared the beejeesus out of me.

The Creepshow episode that several people have mentioned, where a group of people get stuck on a pontoon in the middle of a lake, is based on a short story by Stephen King FYI

It's been fun reading what scares others as kids, I totally forgot about Tales from the Darkside (thought I was the only sick and twisted 6 year old to watch that show late at night!)

Last one, I promise.

I used to watch Wings when I was in elementary school every night (syndication) and I loved that show. But there was one episode where Helen hides in a bathtub for some reason and in the process overhears some business deal affecting Joe and Brian and as a result, they're able to triumph over the evil guys. To this day I always either a) make sure the shower curtain is open or b) check behind to make sure no one's hiding in there.

My parents tried to keep me away from things they thought would be scary, and instead subjected me to "children's" entertainment that was much more terrifying.

1. Thank you so much to the first commenter for saying E.T. I still can't comfortably watch it. That one scene with E.T. all white and dying ::shudder:: Also, it didn't help that I had all of my stuffed animals arranged like the ones in the movie and for years I was so afraid one day he'd be sitting in their midst.

2. Ferngully freaked the daylights out of me. I was super nature concious as a child and the pollution monster was either too abstract or too literal, I'm not really sure. But all I know was that I was positive he was going to destroy the world and take me with it.

3. This last one is a video game that I don't remember the name of, but my cousins had it and I remember watching someone play it on Nintendo when I was 5. The point was to get from room to room by finding hidden doors. But the rooms would be filling with either water or blood. I don't remember if my mind has warped it to be body fluids. For months I had nightmares that I was trapped in a room while that was happening with no escape. Talking about it is even getting me freaked out.

I am so with those who said Unsolved Mysteries. I used to love that show as a kid, for whatever reason, but this one episode about a poisoning case absolutely freaked me out. I didn't want to eat or drink anything for a little while because I was afraid it would be poisoned.

First freakout - The Exorcist. Not the movie but the commercials. Must have been about five years old. Could not look at the posters, the TV ads, or listen to the radio ads. Even as a five year old, I knew it was pure evil. The theme music scares the shit out of me. Never seen the movie, never will.

Second and third and most horrifying freakouts - Benji and some random TV movie about pioneers. Saw Benji at the movies with my sister when I was four. Little dog tries to save kids and his little bitch girlfriend Tiffany from bad guys. Bad guys kick little Tiffany across the room and she slams into a brick wall. I thought she was dead (she was unconscious) and I cried and cried and cried. My evil sister and her friend were so embarrassed they stuck a straw in my mouth to shut me up. I gagged on it and cried some more. Later, I saw a pioneer movie where the family got caught in a blizzard in their covered wagon; the man left to get help and the pregnant mother got under the wagon with the children to keep them warm. They all froze to death. I cried and cried and cried. The imps of satan, a.k.a my two older brothers and sister, all laughed at me for crying at this heartbreaking tragedy. It would take about 20 years before I could cry at a movie again. Damn you, The Color Purple.

Fourth freakout - Gene Simmons from KISS in full make-up with fake blood dripping from his mouth(didn't know it was fake then - I was six). Not scary now but then it scared the shit out of me.

Fifth freakout - Twisted Sister video for "Were Not Gonna Take It". Fell asleep on sofa. Woke up to MTV (when they played videos) showing Dee Snider in full-on evil clown make-up and blond spiral curls. Scared the shit out of me. Still does.

Wow, that was fun and cathartic. I don't have to pay for therapy now. Thanks, Pajiba

I was scared of almost everything I saw when I was little, but a there are three things that stick out in my mind as the most scarring viewing experiences I've ever had:

1. Firestarter. My friend and I rented it when we were about 10 because we loved Drew Barrymore and spent the whole movie absolutely freaking out. There was one scene describing killing someone by breaking their nose and then the bone fragments would float up into their brain or something and I couldn't get it out of my mind for years.

2. An episode of "Are You Afraid of the Dark" where there was a haunted swimming pool. A little boy swam to the end and smelled something funny and got drowned by a ghost. And after seeing it, I didn't go swimming by myself in my pool for like six years.

3. The Brave Little Toaster. The suicidal airconditioner and evil mutant appliances and the sadist guy who worked in the store and the TERRIFYING clown in the toaster's dream have seriously freaked me out for my whole life. It's the scariest movie I've ever seen.

I want to add IT and the X-files (episode "Home" especially) as these really really made me lose my shit, except that I was not a child when I saw them.

As a kid, for some reason, Hulk Hogan terrified me more then anything else I could ever imagine. This was when he was probably the most famous wrestler in the world too, and he was absolutely everywhere, even on my bed sheets. Some nights the image of him would scare the hell out of me, and whenever he would come on TV I would retreat into some secluded place and curl up into a ball.

Something by Ray Bradbury, made for TV. I can't even remember exactly what it was, but I've had a total fear of all things Ray Bradbury since.

That and the part of Fantasia where the dinosaurs start dying. Apparently I saw it very, very young, and screamed so much at that part mum had to take me out of the theater - it still makes me quesy to think about, and I'm not sure I've ever seen the whole thing.

Scary things, huh?

1) The Cybermen from Dr Who.

2) Gmork from the Neverending Story

3) The Gremlins. Scarred me for years.

4) ET. Holy God, ET the EVIL TERRESTRIAL!! I still can't watch it.

I was ten when I first saw The Princess Bride, and have yet to be able to watch it with the lights out.

1. The Sicilian's crazy laughter and then abrupt death

2. Andre the Giant was a freak of nature that no child should have to try to relate to

3. Billy Crystal and his scary wife. Jews can be quite frightening to young girls

4. The rats, obviously

5. The torture

But the thing that gave me nightmares was the old lady who screams at Buttercup during her dream about the wedding announcement.

As well as many of the already mentioned things - Gremlins! Many Dr Who Villains.

Much of Ulysses 31 and The Mysterious Cities of Gold had scary moments that freaked me out. The gods were really really creepy in Ulysses.

Cosby Show. Rudy gets her period. Nuff said.

Boogedy, or whatever it was called... Maybe 'Bride of Boogedy'... it freaked me out... BIG time. Twenty years later, and I'm still feeling a bit creeped out just thinking about it...

can't believe the ages kids were seeing the exorcist, seven, carrie etc!

HR Puff'n'Stuff - especially the forest

Wizard of Oz - the whole thing but esp when the house falls on the Witch (of the west?) and her stripey leg and witchy foot is sticking out

DISNEY everything
- was 4 when i saw Peter Pan (1953 animation) the crocodile terrified me - tick, tock - it was kind of first realisation that sooner or later death comes for us all
- a tv movie maybe called Child of Glass (1978) where some kids are trying to help a young ghost with long hair, mainly remember a lit crystal ball floating through the air
- nearly all their villains, Cruella de Ville, the ones in even The Rescuers... Disney stuff scared me to death from earliest memories until maybe 11. The Exorcist you say?

1) The Secret of Nimh - I second the poster above who mentioned the owl's cave of bones, and then there's the scene where the mice are frantically trying to escape from the thresher - very scary.

2) Arachnaphobia and Jaws - not a good choice for a little girls' sleepover party, parents.

3) I had to leave the room during the Princess Bride when Westley is on the Machine.

4) Some horror movie we watched in grade school (!) that had a deranged woman baking a Father's Day cake, and when her father wouldn't eat it, she smashed his head in with an ashtray screaming "Happy Father's Day." Nightmares for a loooong time.

This is a great thread - very cathartic!

1. The Garbage Pail Kids. I have no idea why. I watched Aliens at age three without batting an eyelash but the Garbage Pail Kids just freaked me the fuck out.

2. It. Clowns are horrifying.

For some reason my grandparents thought it would be a fine idea to show me The Exorcist when I was 11. I left the room after about 30 minutes and retreated to a world of Care Bears. I couldn't sleep for about 3 nights.

Also, I vividly remember some sort of anti-fur commercial where models were wearing fur on the runway, and blood starting spurting out of the fur. It was awful.

Sleeping Beauty with the witch turning into the dragon. yikes! That and there was this movie that came on HBO sometimes Killer Clowns From Outer Space...I suppose my mom might have monitored us more...sheesh!

I was born and raised in Poland. When I was 7 I saw the very beggining of Ghostbusters (the only thing I remember was a ghost face coming out of a painting and lava flowing through the sewer.) This was all in English of course and I didn't understand a thing. I only saw the beggining before I was called to go to bed and I was freaked out by that scene for years- I was never told that the movie was FUNNY. I still haven't seen the movie because just thinking about it creeps me out.

You people are killing me! I totally repressed that H R Puffenstuff horror. I WISH I could repress the revulsion and terror I still feel when I think of the empty eyesockets scene from Hitchcock's "The Birds". I gotta stop reading or I am going to need a xanex or something.

CWro--ewww, Garbage Pail Kids! I hated those too. They were disgusting!

I'm just saying right now, but I was completely bizarre when I was a kid. I watched the Sixth Sense and Saving Private Ryan with disturbing enthusiasm, as well as other blatantly gory and/or horror movies that would have sent any other grade-schooler quivering into the corner.
But my weakness... was and still is extraterrestrials. I got so freaked out by the cover of E.T. that I never watched the entire film, though he, um, still haunts my nightmares. When I watched Signs at a sleepover, I freaked the shit out. I had nightmares for a whole year. Of course, whenever my friends got bored of watching the Disney Channel, they entertained themselves with me because I'd practically painted a bullseye on myself since the day I ran out of that sleepover. It was terrible--they fashioned and told me even more terrible scenes than even Shyamalan ever made. I knew they were all assholes, but my manic imagination tortured me whenever I was left home alone. Goddamn aliens...
And would you believe? Titanic scared me. I laugh whenever I think about it now, but watching people slide up and down a sinking cruiseliner was just too much for me as a little kid. Good god... The Exorcist wouldn't have scared me at ALL when I was five, but an iceberg nearly made me shit my pants.

That episode of Davey & Goliath in which Davey and his "gang" get in a big fight with another "gang." Watching clay Lutherans beat the shit out of one another freaked me out.

i'm with ranylt, agnes of god is a GOOD one to be freaked out about, what with the angel rape and all.

this probably doesn't count, but i actually peed my bed after i saw it that evening: michael jackson's thriller video. just the thought of a zombified MJ coming at me made me tinkle. ARGH!

I never saw Hellraiser, but I saw the box in the rental section of regional-grocery-chain pretty much every week when I was a kid (whose idea was it to shelve the horror right next to the kids' movies?), and had dreams of spiky-faced men coming to kill me for years.
Also? I was somewhat freaked out (though also inexplicably drawn to) David Bowie's gray-tights-wrapped package in Labyrinth. A friend of mine said the moment she knew she was a lesbian, at age six, the moment she saw the first hint of Ziggy Stardust's "Spider from mars"

Definitely for me it would have to be the clown from It. But more than that(way more) it is Watership Down. Everyone else that said it has it absolutely right, watching it when I was four years old(which happens to be my first memory) freaked me out so bad. Why would anyone make a cartoon based on that book. Obviously little kids are going to want to see it. and how the HELL is it only rated PG!

lainie! i was completely freaked out by that posessed pizza-cutter girl...the edge of the cutter biting into the wood as she rolled it along the banister and when it runs over and severs the phone line...i've never met anyone else who had ever seen it. creepy.

more lacksadaisical parenting: letting me read whatever the hell i wanted at 11, 12...like John Saul novels about crazy women who torture teenagers who are trapped in an abandoned coal mine cos she goes into a walking blackout when the colorado wind whipped up or the one where crazy girl lures her friends into cave near the ocean where they are trapped for eons and she teases them by offering them sandwiches made of seaweed and sand...those books where just sick as fuck...but I devored them nonetheless and those images are with me now, 20 someodd years later. certain songs from that period (noteably "Endless Love") will totally trigger flashbacks of images from those messed up books like if I hear them in a grocery store or something. ick.

also: the myriad of 70's out of control animal movies..the swarm, yes, and there was one i saw at a drive-in about giant chickens...but mostly i recal a scene from one where the normal size ants start multiplying and smothering everything and the last survivors are holed up in a hotel room, stuffing towels along the doors (alas, to no avail) and they end up sitting together breathing through straws while the ants start to engulf them. shortly after seeing that gem ran running from a game of duck, duck, goose screaming cos there was an any crawling on my leg.

1. Oh my goodness...yes, the Sesame Street Sleeps Over at the Museum thing with the Egyptian kid who wants to become a star.

2. That 1985 made-for-TV version of Alice in Wonderland brought to you by Irwin Allen that trotted out stars of yesteryear (Red Buttons! Karl Malden!) and made them dance and sing in kind of scary costumes.

3. There was some movie called The Peanut Butter Solution - I think there were ghosts in it...question mark?

4. Unsolved Mysteries

5. Pinnochio...the part when they all turn into donkeys/anything having do with anyone being swallowed by the whale

Ok, yes, the Wrath of Kahn, and that scene in Indian Jones when the Nazis' faces melt, and dozens of other scenes from my childhood, but what really freaked me out wasn't a movie at all! It was a BOOK ON TAPE!
Ok, I was scared of the dark, see? And my parents got me this book on tape to listen to as I fell asleep, about a girl who was scared of the dark. And her parents tucked her in and kissed her goodnight and turned out the light and OH NO! A witch! And so she screamed, and her parents came and turned the lights on, and the witch was just a chair with some clothes thrown over it. So they tucked her in and kissed her goodnight and turned out the light, and OH NO! A skeleton! But the skeleton was just a lamp, and so on and so on. A few screaming/soothing incidences later, she sees tigers in the corners of her room. She screams, her parents come and turn on the light, and there are no tigers. But they never EXPLIANED the tigers in the corners. They weren't just a trick of the eye. THEREfore, tigers only come out of your corners when the lights are turned off. DO YOU SEE WHERE I'M COMING FROM??? This was the scariest thing, and for YEARS I was convinced that tigers would come out of my corners in the dark, and my bed had to be placed in the center of the room.

Besides the obvious Jaws, which was not so much a movie as a life-changing event...

1. Watership Down. I can't believe more people haven't mentioned this trauma-fest. Years later I read the book and loved it, but I will never watch that movie again.

2. Twilight Zone, The Movie. The airplane scene terrified me.

3. Poltergeist 2. Obviously not the movie the first one was, but that preacher was a nightmare come to life. The tequila worm scene was awful, but the flashback to the people underground, with the preacher keeping them there, tore me apart.

4. I can't remember the name of it, but my teacher read a book to us about these carrots that had been contaminated by nuclear waste. I know this sounds stupid, but the carrots, when eaten, turned kids into these sort of zombies, and it was contagious. They were afraid of the light, so they only came out at night to try to corrupt the remaining children in the area. That book put the whack on me like no other. I woke up one night and saw what I thought was someone standing next to my bunkbed. I swear, I was so scared I couldn't even scream. Turns out it was just one of my stuffed animals. (Hey, it was dark.)

5. Another one I don't remember the name of. It was a TV movie, mid-80s, about a female therapist. One of her cases was a young man - quite possibly Kiefer Sutherland - who had been severely abused. At one point he tells the story of how his step-father bashed his little sister's head open with a pan. To this day I can still hear him gasping, "I could see Carol's brains!" I dislike the word "brains" just because of that.

There was this claymation version of what must have been The Nutcracker and the beginning explained how the Rat King and all his rat followers came to be. It showed some guy (evil, of course) flying around villages after midnight looking in windows and he passed over the ones with *sleeping* children...but the children who were out of bed he turned into rats!!!! Holy jeezum, I'm still not right.

To this day I still sleep completely under the blankets (even in the summer sans A/C), figuring if this evil flying man can't see any part of me, if I LOOK like I'm sleeping, then he won't turn me into a rat.

1. Judge Doom definitely in WFRR. That part when he says "Just like THIIIIISSSS!!!" and his voice goes up about a thousand octaves...
2. Large Marge. I don't even care. I couldn't watch the Large Marge seen in Pee Wee's Big Adventure for YEARS.
3. Witchboard. Yes, the entire movie.
4. Thanks to the movie "Lady in White" I spent years afraid of the song "Have You Ever Seen a Dream" (sung or whistled) That movie also made me scared of closets.

*scene
yeesh.

Does anyone remember an episode of The Twilight Zone in which the apocalypse has come and only a few survivors remain from the radiation? And their only source of food is canned food - some of it has radiation poisoning and some of it doesn't. And to tell the difference one of the survivors takes each can to the "Old Man in the Cave" who tells them if it's safe to eat. And eventually all the people revolt and want to know who the Old Man in the Cave is...and so they go to the top of the cave....................................

...and it's a fucking COMPUTER! AAAAAAAAAUUUGGHHH!

I'm no luddite, but that freaked me out for YEARS.

Salem's Lot, the movie. My brother and I were scarred for life and he wouldn't even sleep anywhere near a window ever again.

The weird alien puppets on Sesame Street that just went "beep beep beep beep." There was always creepy music when they came on and they scared me.

My husband somehow saw The Exorcist when he was about 8 or 9. To this DAY, he won't watch it and freaks if he even hears the theme music. Yes, he knows it's just a movie. Yes, he knows his fear is irrational. He still won't watch that mofo.

Cat/Dog scared the hell out of me as a child.
I think it had something to do with the lack of sky, or mabey just that it was a cat and a dog attached at the ass. I mean WTF?

yeeesh! so many childhood traumas. I'm just going to raise my children in a cabin in the woods somewhere. Let them be afraid of bears and random tree branches like God intended!

As for myself, though I'm a fan of Trek now, the first time I saw Worf's Klingon forehead on-screen, I screamed and hid behind the couch. My tiny, child brain was convinced someone had molded his skin like clay and he was horribly disfigured.

In the same vein, that episode of Next Gen, where Riker gets sucked into a big pool of black alien goo, and he's clawing the ground and screaming for help but no-one can help him cause if they get too close they'll die...and he's just begging and being sucked under...GAH! just thinking about it gives me the heebeejeebees.

When I was 12 my mom let my older brother and I rent IT at the video store. He made me watch it in our basement rec room with the lights off. I don't think I slept for a week after that.

"We all float down here -- you'll float too." That whole balloon in the sink thing as well as the clown's face showing up on the m-fing moon! I tried to watch the movie recently as an adult and it still scared the hell out of me. Stephen King is one sick individual.

1.Who Framed Roger Rabbit? I can't believe how many people here shared this childhood fear!
I saw this movie in theaters when I was about 8, and I remember loving it until the ending sequence where Judge Doom starts to transform or whatever. After seeing the movie, I begged my parents to buy me a storybook that had screenshots from the movie. When we got home, I had my mom tear out the pages that contained pictures of Doom in that final scene. I still can't believe I convinced my mom deface a book.

2.Monty Python's Meaning of Life- this is one seriously fucked up movie anyway. When I was a kid, I was flipping through channels on the TV, when I happened to turn this movie on- the part where the men are coming to this guy's house with the intention of taking out his liver. Good lord, I watched until I just couldn't take anymore, changed the channel, and refused to watch any more of it. For years I had this memory of this terrifying movie where some guy's liver gets removed, and it wasn't till later that I discovered what it was. Thank god I didn't watch the rest of that movie as a kid. I saw it recently on DVD with a friend...and it's still one very very disturbing movie. I can watch any horror film...but this movie..i don't know.

3.Twilight zone movie- the girl without the mouth really got to me, as did Dan Akroyd transforming into some kind of monster at the end.

4. ALso- it's been said again and again, but Willy Wonka was terrifying to me as a child- I was convinced that these children had just been killed- especially Augustus in the chocolate pipe...yuck. And when Charlie and the granpa are nearly chopped up by the ceiling fans...that was disturbing.

I'm sure there were some others. Definitely "Tales from the Darkside" and "Unsolved Mysteries."

Smark - You're "Father's Day" segment is also from "Creepshow". The part where the boyfriend is in the graveyard and the giant headstone falls and crushes his face is just one of the great terrifying moments.

I just remembered this one too---there's a halloween episode of "Facts of Life" that is a Twilight Zone parody. Toody (sp?) keeps finding everyone dead one by one. The worst is that she goes into Blair's room and Blair is sitting in a chair. They whip the chair around and Blair had been "Moussed to Death". I fucking freaked. Thanks "Facts of Life" for leaving me permanently damaged.

Don't Look Now scared me silly. Was only 8 when I first saw it though.

I feel kind of old but...
1. Puppetmaster. Those creepy little dolls.
2. Hellraiser. Saw it at a sleepover in grade school- terrified me for years.
3. Carrie. Made me scared to go to high school.
And may the Little Mermaid rot in hell- just scared that Disney comes up with that shit.

-the opening to "tales from the darkside" (i STILL can't watch it)

-the Gmork from "Neverending Story" (I would not sleep at night because i thought there were wolves downstairs, in the dark)

-"Poltergeist", in it's entirety. i saw it when i was 5. let's just say i was a very convincing kid.

AND i just want to extend a big thank-you to everyone for bringing back all of these barely-repressed childhood nightmares! My therapist thanks you as well!
*goes off to shake in a corner*

1. Secret of NIMH, as mentioned above. I haven't been able to watch it since.
2. The oil monster/creature in Fern Gully
3. The Brave Little Toaster. Something about appliances coming to life didn't sit well with me.
4. There was also some My Little Pony movie involving the valley being flooded with some purple goo.
5. I similar theme to #4 but in a Raggedy Ann animated movie with some sort of monstrous female creature made out of candy/toffee/flood of ooze.

I have been afraid my whole life of a movie that I saw in 1989 abut a group of settlers who find a child in the woods and invite her into the camp so they can raise her. The other children see the woods-child for what she really is: a monster child with burned-black skin and yellow eyes. She pulls the children away from the camp and kills then one at a time, putting their souls into trees. Eventually, one of the adults figures it out and cuts down one of the trees with a dead child's face etched into it. When he does this the child magically awakens and is alive again. When the rest of the burned-black monster people come and kill the settlers, two children escape by hiding in a coffin that floats down the river. Seriously, I need to see this movie again so I am not haunted by the monster-child's yellow eyes. There was a foley of screeching everytime there was a shot of the girl that still gives me goosebumps. Has anyone else seen this movie? What is it called? I thought maybe it was "Watcher in the Woods, but I was wrong.

The Labyrinth scared the crap out of me. I saw it for the first time at my cousin's birthday party when I was about 8 or 9. I was so scared I actually threw up in front of all our friends. To this day I cannot watch and now I'm 26. Wow.

Remember the "bore worms" in the Flash Gordon movie? Even though they never showed them--likely because they never showed them--the potential for what they might be or do to Princess Aura had me obsessing and losing my business.

Similarly, whatever ear thing Khan put in that guy's ear caused me (and my moms) serious lost sleep.

When I watched Jane Eyre all the scenes with the crazy wife creeped the poop out of me. I had nightmares about padded rooms and fire for a long time after that.

Oh ya, and a Donald Duck cartoon designed to teach kids about fire safety.....For about two years I constantly freaked out about burning to death.

that egyptian sesame st. clip is my favorite vignette from the show!!!

i had a very overactive imagination when i was younger so my parents monitered what i watched VERY closely. i wasn't that i would just get scared - when people were hurt or sad or died or life was unfair on screen i would be INCONSOLABLE for hours, sometimes days. here are the top offenders.

1. the news - a protestor who wrapped himself in chicken wire made me so upset i couldn't eat for 2 days.

2. trading places - i watched this at age 4 with my older cousins and didn't understand that eddie murphy was only pretending to be blind and crippled and so i cried and cried about how mean people were being to him.

3. watcher in the woods - the trailer. i was 20 before i could bring myself to watch the movie.

4. e.t. - the audio cassette version. i thought et had died and could not be calmed down enough to finish the story. i was 18 before i watched the movie.

5. large marg from pee wee's big adventure - nightmares...

i was so scared of Alf that every time it came on tv i ran screaming

1. "Poltergeist". I was about five years old, watching a movie on HBO with my dad one twilight in about 1985, and he fell asleep. When the next movie came on, I was too afraid to go near the tv and turn it off, or even to wake up my snoring father. So I just sat there and watched the entirety of "Poltergeist". Alone. In the dark. Not good.

2. The alien muppet things on "Sesame Street", the things that went "yup, yup, yup". Fucking hated them. They still give me the cold chills, and I avoid them even at 29.

3. When the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man dies in "Ghostbusters".

4. The salt vampire in "Star Trek".

Man, there was some fucked-up stuff on TV in the late '70's-early '80's. Is it still like that? Are kids these days freaked out by their own stuff? Or was it just that coming-down-off-too-much-acid moment in our culture about 30 years ago?

"similar theme to #4 but in a Raggedy Ann animated movie with some sort of monstrous female creature made out of candy/toffee/flood of ooze."

Oh yeah, I remember that thing. It was all smothering and gooshy and "I'm gonna just EAT YOU UP" or something. Horrors.

"The Last Unicorn" was one of my favorite movies as a kid, despite the fact that the ending would make me bawl and, inexplicably, need to see the sunset that day. I just would not be able to stand missing seeing the sun go down after watching that movie. Had something to do with loss, I think.

I remember seeing previews for "Watcher in the Woods" and thinking it looked creepy. But there was another program that freaked me out, too. It involved a boy and a girl searching for something, and giant brown spaghetti-like monsters, and people turned into them. I have no idea what this movie was, but it was like a TV movie, and it was aimed (I think) at kids--like on Nickelodeon arounf '85 or '86. There was one shot of the boy and the girl paddling a canoe through what appeared to be a brightly lit white tunnel. What the hell am I thinking of??

I also hated the Fry Guys. They didn't even LOOK like fries.

...and then I read more of the comments, and saw people were already talking about frightening books.

When I was seven or eight, I got a hold of a huge anthology of Edward Gorey stories my parents had left lying around. Holy shit, son. From the alphabet of slaughtered children to the curious sofa that did...something to people, I was seriously freaked out. I didn't tell my parents until I was about eighteen, and then made them feel really guilty about letting me read it. I still can't read the whole thing without feeling uneasy afterwards. Damn.

Besides those damn Flying Monkeys I forgot to mention the WW2 Bugs Bunny cartoon with the freaky gremlin thing that was fucking with the plane.
I'm probably dating myself, I'm sure it has not been on TV for probably 20 years at least....I can remember watching it when I was itty bitty and I'm 42 now.

I also forgot that the original Hell House with the fucking breathing door and the loud booms freaked the hell out of me when I was 11 or so....the remake sucked balls even with Liam Neeson.

Oh my god, in my last post I forgot to include this wierd animated movie about an Elvis-impersonating rooster called "Rock-a-Doodle-Do." Does anyone else remember that movie? Because there was a truly frightening evil black cloud/ghost rooster that scared me silly as a kid. Although I suppose the premise of an "animated movie about an Elvis-impersonating rooster" is scary enough.

The Fox & the Hound screwed me up, and so did Nightmare on Elm Street #3 (I think it was called Dream Warriors), Ghostbusters, and Beetlejuice.

I hated Fox & the Hound and I cried for hours. Oh, to be 6 years old and so very naive again.

There was this Muppets show (can't remember the name) I watched when I was really young where Miss Piggy got thrown onto a wall and crashed the whole thing... Yea it was so violent for a kid, I was in horror... Up til now (15+ yrs later?), I can remember it in my head.



The villain out of The Little Mermaid was scary too especially when she tricked Ariel into losing her voice and then turned human herself to steal the prince's heart, that bitch!



Whoever mentioned The Langoliers up there, yea those mouth-and-teeth monster thingies scared the hell out of me too.

1) jurassic park. all of them. still wake up in a cold sweat at night convinced that there are raptors in my room.

2) et. the creepy alien. the men in white suits. drew barrymore (all those dolls in her closet and one of them being et oh god the flashbacks he could be in my closet RIGHT NOW!).

3) neverending story. when the wolf thing comes through the wall. i'd give you more specifics (like names), but i only saw it once as a child (of 9 or so) and have tried to repress all memory of it since.

4) first horror movie i ever saw bits of, and i just don't know what it's called. all i remember is a boy and his father going up a mountain (perhaps to cut down a tree?), there's a scene with a woman dressed all in white in a house full of candles, the house eventually goes up in a flames, and someone is dangled off of a very, very high cliff. there may have been fog. i was 4. i still get freaked out by fire.

The Large Marge in "Pee-wee's Big Adventure." Scared the bejeezus out of me as a kid. I couldn't watch that film again for something like 10 years or so, until I was in college.

Addendum:
WHITE FANG.
I was in an after school daycare thing when I was like 8 and the counselors took us to see White fang in theaters. I can't even remember what was going on on the screen..just a lot of teeth and blood and loud barking. But I was too scared to leave the theater and be by myself so I crouched behind the back row for the rest of the movie.

OMG how could I forget "Snoopy Come Home" where Snoopy gets a letter from his former owner Lila who is in the hospital telling him she missed him so much....he runs away from Charlie Brown (after Charlie Brown cuts his finger on a dog food can and blames Snoopy...)...and all the kids throw Snoopy a going away party and everyone's crying...That "No Dogs Allowed" song alone made me cry...and the only reason Snoopy went back to Charlie Brown was that Lila's apartment bldg said "No Dogs Allowed".....So sad for a 5yr old!

Oh my god, yes. Wait Till Helen Comes. Thank you. That book almost ruined my life. I was terrified, but I couldn't stop reading it. So I would have nightmares, and then climb into my older sister's bed in the middle of the night. And the next day she made fun of my in front of all her friends and my friends. That bitch. Fuck Helen too.

Where to start. I was quite a fearful child, but here are my top three:
1. IT. Fucking IT. Enough said.
2. There was an episode of America's Most Wanted where they were trying to track down some arsonists. Shortly after viewing the segment my beloved uncle - on purpose - tripped the smoke detector. From then on I seriously contemplated stashing all my favorite toys in a bag so I could grab them on my dash out of the house when it caught fire which I was sure would happen any day.
3. Jaws. Yes, I was even afraid of giant man-eating sharks in swimming pools...Like I said, fearful child...

Greg P...

I am with you!!!

"A fucking DISNEY movie called Something Wicked This Way Comes had this tarantula scene that freaked my shit out when I was a kid."

That scene scared the hell out of me. When the spiders started crawling up his sheets, that was AWFUL!!!

I also was terrified of looking under my bed because of that damn clown in poltergiest.

I had nightmares for weeks after I watched "The Nightmare Before Christmas." Something about the boogie man's nasty bug innards disturbed me greatly as a child. And I'm not even getting started on the clown with the tear away face.

1. when i was 4 in the mid-70s, my parents left me in the house alone for a few minutes to go talk to the neighbors. i was watching tv - what could possibly go wrong?

darkness was falling and quickly the tv was supplying the only light in the house.

that's when the teaser for larry cohen's "it's alive" came on - one of the creepiest teasers ever, maybe? if you saw it, you remember it - slow dolly in on a covered basinette from the back. music box lullaby. darkness couched all around the cradle.

then the clawed hand appears.

2. around the same time, i developed a keen fear of werewolves, thanks to an issue of spider-man. i recall exactly my first exposure to star wars, when on one sunny afternoon i saw a tv commercial for it. i was mildly interested until it cut to a shot of chewbacca, which hit me so hard i physically backed up from the tv - while sitting on my butt.

my mother, sadly trying to encourage my disinterest, said infamously, "that's right, matt. that's yucky."

Hmmmm:
1. the scene in "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" with the "child-catcher" searching for kids, with the big nose

2. The Legend of Boggy Creek,,,creeped me the fudge out about Bigfoot

3. Saturday morning movies from ABC, usually about magic, or creepy shit in basements

4. the werewolf/Halloween episode of "Highway to Heaven"--the mofo was supposed to be an angel

5. the person in the mirror that Jonathan (don't know his last name, I think Pryce)(but was a fat Dom Deluise like comedian) talked to, on Disney's Magic Kingdom Halloween specials

6. the creepy episode of "Twilight Zone," where William Shatner sees that monster on the wing of his plane

7. "Werewolf" the series

8. "Sleepy Hollow" movie with Jeff Goldbloom

9. the plague scenes in "The Ten Commandments"

10. kudos on that Sesame Street movie, unnerving to say the least, scared the shit out of me about ancient Egypt

11. Andre the giant in "Princess Bride"

12. the money grubbing anteater thing in the "Raccoons" cartoon (a Canadian cartoon)

13. the pods in the pools in "Cocoon"

THANKS for ruining 20 years of therapy,,,i'm a giant pussy!

when i was 4 or 5, there was a 3D "through the body" movie/exhibit at disney world. It starts with a close up of a woman, gets closer, and then goes into her body. for whatever reason, it terrified me, i kept my eyes shut for the rest of the movie after that

ok so for me it would have to be as a little kid i was 6 years old and we moved into this house. Now here is the freaky part we decided to watch the first children of the corn now as a kid i wasnt scared that much by horror movies but this one i dont care who you are would scare the shit out of you too. There is a scene where they are in a church and a guy starts bleeding through his nose and dies at the same time he started bleeding through his nose i started and obviously at 6 a nose bleed at the same time as in a horror movie and a guy dies of it did not make me a happy camper i havent seen that movie since and now i kinda want to see it again cuz im curious.

Oh,
forgot to add:

1. the episode of "Buck Rogers" with Gil Gerard, where they have to go through caves to escort a diplomat (who can remove his head) to get to a city

2. "Piranha", the movie

3. any scene with Newt from "Aliens"

4. the witch/sorceress from "Sleeping Beauty", the one with the horns

5. the Alice Cooper episode of the"The Muppet Show"

6. the fucking synthesizer shit in "close encounters of the third kind"

7. the Purple Pie Man in the original "Strawberry Shortcake" cartoons

8. any Chuck e Cheese animitronic moving shit from the 80's

9. Sloth from "Goonies"

10. Original "Care Bears" movie, the evil that turns everyone uncaring!

Oh yeah, and that show that was on in the 80's, it had a guy with curly hair in a body suit with pics of his internal organs on it. I hated that shit, and they made us watch it in school.

Also added to my now 20+ list:

1. Brady Bunch episode where they think the house is haunted.

2. Someone mentioned the "Mr. Boogity" movies

3. old cartoon, bugs bunny, where a guy robs something, then hides in an old house where Bugs is living, Bugs makes it out that it's haunted

4. Bugs Bunny episode, with the "Thing", a giant hairy monster after him

5. Disney Halloween cartoon, with Donald Duck, they're trick or treating, the memory of the song in it creeps me the fudge out

6. the Burger King in modern day commercials, mostly for blatant homoerotic reasons

7. "Dark Shadows", the T.V. remake with Ben Cross

8. "Interview with a Vampire" where the Paris vampires are feasting on the naked victim

9. made for t.v. movie about an alligator in the sewar systems, remember the scene where it's prowling through the backyards, and the mother comes across her kid who flipped the clothes basket over itself

10. the "Creature under the Black Lagoon" when they did that fucking 3-D promotional shit in the 80's,,,,,

and the topper,,,,any love scene with Woody Allen in it....

I truly am a total pussy!

'Annabel Lee' - a film short they used to play at the drive-in before the movie (1970's). Deep voiced narrator recites EAP's poem, woman is in a coffin which is being nailed shut. She is still alive and it shows the nails pounding into her skin as she struggles... and the subsequent bleeding. Then the coffin is set afloat on the ocean.

'Tommy' at age four.

My dad used to watch old movies on Sunday afternoons and when I was about ten I happened to walk in during a scene in this old black-and-white Bette Davis movie called "Hush Hush, Sweet Charlotte" where this guy gets his HAND CHOPPED OFF in this lovely little garden gazebo!!! I walked in with him screaming and holding the bloody stump. Aaaahhh!!! I was horrified by that for weeks!

My mom let me see a horror movie called "Burnt Offerings", when I was about 5 or 6. There was a crazy undertaker/chauffeur. I had nightmare about this guy for years-refusing to be upstairs or downstairs by myself for several months. The thought of him still freaks me out.

The ice cream ghosts in Scooby-VERY FREAKY.

Cried my eyes out when Snoopy didn't go home...

I was a very sensitive child...

everybody i know who went to disney world as a child 10-11 years ago has a story about that alien encounter ride.
i was about seven and at first they use a cute alien and its all fun. but then they take you into a room and they strap you into a chair and all hell breaks loose. there was a giant alien and someone was eaten . My brother thought it was eating our mom, and i was crying so hard my uncle had to carry me out.

Oh, and I forgot to mention my 7th grade History teacher. My god that woman actually made me make up a story that I had food poisoning just so I didn't have to come to her class. If you don't like children, why the hell would you become a teacher. I'm pretty certain she's a sadist.

During my 8th grade year one of my teachers asked me to send something over to another teacher. I walked by her class and the door was open and she was screaming at her students for not knowing who Venus and Serena Williams were. They were dead silent. I felt so sorry for them.

Cmon Pajiba readers, you guys missed the single most terrifying 5 minutes ever put to celluloid, yes I'm talking about the scene in 'Superman 3' where that lady gets snatched by the supercomputer and turned into a robot, horrifying back then, horrifying today........holy shit!!!

Damn, I completely forgot Pulse. Have you seen that? The two boys move into a new house (I think with their dad and new stepmom) and the house goes crazy, trying to kill them with electricity. The mom person gets trapped in the shower and the water goes to scalding, and she gets freakishly burned. That movie is the reason my sister refuses to use a garbage disposal. She stands across the room.

My freakout dates from the late 70's Electric Company where one of the skits was a serial Spiderman feature. Spiderman had a somewhat consistent nemesis named Dr. Spock (whom I always confused with both the Star Trek character and child-rearing guru of the time). This Dr Spock often used measels as a dastardly bioweapon. I watched through splayed fingers from behind the wing chair in our family room because the cure for measles was being kept in a dark room. Darkness..a fate worse than death for a preschooler.

Also, does anyone remember seeing the Muppet Show on which Alice Cooper was the guest star? I promise it exists. The skit I remember involved Alice communicating with Satan via a diabolical looking telephone...flames, smoke, ominous music and whatnot. I'd love corroboration on that one.

S.A.M. the Super Automated Machine (robot) from Sesame Street! Does anyone else remember him? I think he had a washing machine for a torso and the door would open or something? I remember SCREAMING IN TERROR back in the mid-70s when this thing graced our TV set.

Also, Louise, you're totally not making up the Alice Cooper Muppet Show. I own it, and now love it. I was almost as scared by the "School's Out" musical number with Alice Cooper and ALL the muppet monsters as I was by the scene with the devil. That Satan muppet was horrifying. Scarier than Alice Cooper, even.

And The Omega Man. I had to ask permission to drag my sleeping bag into my brother's room after that one. But he wouldn't let me close the door and I could see all the way down the long hallway, and I kept imagining the freaks with the white eyes and capes, shambling towards me.

I love that days later, everyone is still re-living their freakouts. Cheaper than therapy.

1) Jaws - I was 7 and on vacation at the beach. My dad let me see this, and I refused to place a toe off the blanket the next day. My mom was going to kill him. I got over it, and now love the ocean, but when I went to Universal Studios in college, I was the official "bag-holder" for the studio lot tour, b/c I knew I couldn't handle the Jaws part. My friends still mock me for this.

2) ET - age 7 or 8. I was too young to understand the movie. I was cool with the alien and freaky pigtails Drew, but the scene with the guys in the hazmat suits had me screaming my head off.

3) Halloween - In 6th grade, our token cool teacher (music of course) decided to show us this flick during class. I remember staring at the VCR so none of the cool kids saw me being scared. So all I experienced was the slasher noises, Jamie Lee's shrieks, and the music. The teacher got fired for it, but I CANNOT hear that theme music without turning pale. The fact that there is a remake coming out is driving me mad. Damn commerials are everywhere!!!

And whoever remembered Nestor the Christmas Donkey and Follow that Bird, I LOVED those and am totally tracking them down!

1. I was terrified of the main "girl"character in the Dark Crystal. I still can't watch it.

2. In the early 80's there was a segment on Sesame Street where children chased after balls with a camara effect that made trails of ghostly children-chasing-balls appear behind them. I couldn't sit through it, every single time I had to jump up and run out of the room. Totally freaked me out.

3. An episode of Dr. Who where Stonehenge-like rocks wander around and suck the blood out of unsuspecting campers. The campers turned into dead rubbery things. I had nightmares for weeks.

My first freak out was when I was five and my Dad let me watch Amityville horror. He was a good parent.

And The Hobbit that came out in the 70's, the orcs grabbed the horses through the cave wall, and they were screaming. Jesus Christ I pissed myself.

And Watership Downs, mf-ing bunnies. Especially when Bigwig was being strangled by the snare. I now love the book though.

The "Chainsaw Scene" from Scarface. To this day I have to look away from the screen when the camera starts it's slow, methodical, diabolical crawl from Manny's car to the shower room of horror. Nice work Mr. DePalma...;-)

The "Chainsaw Scene" from Scarface. To this day I have to look away from the screen when the camera starts it's slow, methodical, diabolical crawl from Manny's car to the shower room of horror. Nice work Mr. DePalma...;-)

I'm hoping someone will remember an episode from an old horror series from the sixties...
A scarecrow thing. A married woman and her lover conspire to kill the woman's husband...she's concealed the corpse of her first husband in a scarecrow. The scarecrow comes back to life and kills almost everybody.
This was truly scary for me as a kid...any ideas?

OK - Where to begin?
I think the earliest thing that I remember freaking the living hell out of me (my hair stands on end every time I think of it) was a cartoon that was carried on the local kid's show, the Magic Toyshop (Syracuse, NY; '60s - late '70s, I think). This particular short featured a family upstairs in bed for the night, when all of a sudden, there's a noise downstairs. What might be down there is being imagined by the family members, if I recall correctly. There's odd zither/plucked piano music being played throughout. Finally, the father goes running down the stairs to find out; the chromatic scrape of strings following his descent. To this day, some 32 years later, I don't know what was at the bottom of the stairs, as I'm sure I tore ass to get away from the TV set at this point. If I ever did find out, I'm sure a great many issues would be rectified.
Considering that most illustrators, designers and cartoonists from my youth (the '70s) were most likely high as kites, I was exposed to such a wealth of phantasm. Anyone?anyone?:
1)The sharks in "Hugo the Hippo"
2) The sneezing man upstairs/the snoring man downstairs from "Electric Company"
3) The man turning into a flying saucer from "Sesame St."
4) The orange singing "La Habanera" (Sesame St.)
5) Just about anything (Talons of Wang Chiang, The Crinoid) from "Dr. Who", as cheap is always scarier - to hell with CG.
Oh man! I almost forgot! CLASSIC FREAKOUT! "Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte" and "The Picture of Dorian Grey" AAAAAGGGHHH!!!!

when i got home from school my brother was looking at a spider in a container with water in it. my brother thinks its poisonous and so do i.it has a pointy white back, a black head and black and white stripey legs.it probly wanted a drink but drowned in it.i looked all over the internet but couldnt find the name. has anyone seen a spider like this or know its name.