The Creepiest Thing: FRIDAY THE 13TH EDITION!

Happy Jason Vorhees day y'all! I thought, what with it being Friday the 13th and what have you that this week called for an extra-special "The Creepiest Thing". Okay, so At first I thought that I should do a Jason themed thing. But I'm not gonna lie, boy doesn't creep me out, and this is a day for creepiness.

So without further ado, my dears and darlings I give you...

The Top 5

Creepiest Clowns

from

non-horror

mediums!

#5: Mr. Mime

Okay, so I'm sure not all of you are as closely acquainted with Powerpuff Girls as this girl is, so here, let me give you the basic rundown on why this guy is here. He starts out the episode, freakishly entitled "Mime for a change" as a clown that performs at children's birthday parties.

Which is, you know, already pretty creepy.

But then, later in the episode, he is crossing the street and gets involved in a car accident involving a semi full of bleach. Which turns him from "Rainbow the Clown" to "Mr.Mime".



He then proceeds to spend the episode draining all of the color and sound out of Townsville with a really freakishly twisted grin on his face. This results in Bubbles, the blond one, in case you didn't know, having a full scale meltdown. Pretty rightly too, after the guy takes the color and voices of her sisters and she's left alone and not even her box of crayolas can fix it.

I wasn't even a kid when I saw this episode. But really, really, so messed up.

#4: Krusty the Clown

I'm not going to lie, I've always been a little bit freaked by Krusty the Clown. Don't get me wrong, this girl totally watched the Simpsons as a child, however, I was always pretty unhappy when it would come to Bart and Lisa watching "The Krusty the Clown" show. Sure a big part of that was "The Itchy and Scratchy Show", which was traumatized the bejesus out of me as a kid.



Putting aside the uber violent Cat and Mouse show within a show within a show. Krusty was pretty disturbing to a child. Foul mouthed, alcoholic, and cigar smoking, not to mention all the really uncomfortable things associated with his restaurant and breakfast cereal.

But what really bothered me as a kid was the fact that he was always wearing the clown makeup.

You'd seem him away from the show, sleeping, whatever, and he would always have the painted face. Even a kid can tell you that isn't right, that with the fact that he is street rat crazy, he kind of reminds me of John Wayne Gacy, I'm just saying.

#3: The Clown Doctors from Pee Wee's Big Adventure

As a kid there were few things that I loved more than Pee Wee Herman. I would get ridiculously happy to see the show whenever it was on. I won't lie, the episode of Family guy where Peter Griffin gets rich and recreates Pee Wee's Playhouse in his living room, that's totally what I would do if I was an eccentric billionaire.

So of course it stand to reason that little Spooky Pie loved the movies as well. And I did, I really did, you know, except for that one part....



Really! Really! It's traumatizing enough the whole deal with him having to schlep all over Hell and back to find his bike. Not to mention the whole thing with "Large Marge", which is, you know, hilarious as an adult, not so much as a child. But then poor Pee Wee's dream about the clown Doctors! You guys, you guys, I don't even...

To a kid having to even think about going to the Doctor's is bad enough... but then having all the doctors and nurses be clowns? Lord, even as an adult I can't deal with it. Goddamit Tim Burton, I love you, but really now, what the Hell is your problem? No more clowns or I'll be forced to kick you in the knees. I'm sorry, but it's true. Oh, and tell Helena 'hi' for me, and that I'm sorry I couldn't make it to Thanksgiving.

#2: The Fireman Clown from the Brave Little Toaster

Oh 'The Brave Little Toaster', I'm pretty sure many people can point to that movie as something that really just scared the crap out of them as a kid. It's pretty much jam-packed with trauma-sponge fodder. To begin with, the whole idea that your appliances are sentient, and experience sorrow when cast aside by their owners is something pretty hard for a small child to get their head around. In some of us it instilled latent pack-rat tendencies, because they we felt an overwhelming sense of guilt for any fried lamp or broken clock that we were going to throw out. Okay, so maybe it was a huge piece of crap, and it hadn't worked in years. Beside the point! Think about this poor busted alarm clock all by itself Mom! I can't throw it away! Yeah, my mother was psyched.

Beside that, the journey of said brave little toaster is harrowing at best. And then there's that horrible scene where the air conditioner starts freaking out about the man being out to get him and then just freaking blows himself the Hell up. That was hard to watch without a stuffed animal and a blanket to hide behind. And then there's the scene where the Toaster has the nightmare about the Fireman Clown.



Okay Disney, where the Hell did that even come from? Clowns? This movie is not about clowns!!! And clowns throwing animate toasters into baths where they will have horrible electric deaths.... WHAT???? And I mean, it's not *JUST* a clown, look at the leering mug on that thing. Where is it from? Hell? I think it must be from Hell. I see no other option here.

#1: Ronald McDonald

Oh yes ladies and gentlemen, before there was Pennywise, there was Ronald McDonald. The original creepy, child snatching Clown waiting in the storm drain. Okay, maybe he didn't actually lie in wait in the sewer, but I challenge you to think of what clown makes you think the most of childhood trauma and, dare I say, pedophilia, who comes to mind first?
I do believe that will be our good friend Ronald each and every time.

Here's the interesting, though not entirely surprising thing; the Japanese have managed to make him even MORE freakish.



Oh Japan... each and every time I think you can't get any weirder you make me eat my words. This isn't even the worst one I've seen of the Japanese Ronald McDonald commercials, it is, actually, one of the least pedo-ish ones I've seen. If you feel like being creeped out, look it up on youtube. Only, you know, don't.


Well, thanks for tuning in for a very special edition of 'The Creepiest Thing', I am hopefully going to be more attentive to this blog again now that things are starting to settle down. Have a whole group of movies all lined up to watch, and a blog award that needs recognition. So Until then, love and kisses, and look out for razor blades in your candy.

The Creepiest Thing: 4th Edition

This week The Creepiest Thing is...

The Kia Soul 'Rapping Hamster' Commercial

Yeah, all right, it's a bit weird this week. I know, I know, it's a commercial. Seriously though, it is well creepy. I have had to see this thing over, and over, and over for the past few weeks and every single time it comes on I feel like I've just been assaulted.

Anthropomorphic RAPPING hamsters.

WHAT?!

WHAT?!

WHY DOES THIS EXIST? AM I BEING PUNISHED FOR SOMETHING?



Horror movies I can do. But this is just beyond creepy.

I do not understand the recent trend to make CGI animals that sing and dance, it's frightening, and then some. It's unnatural, it's freakish, and it is DOWN RIGHT SCARY.

I freely admit that I have come to fear anthropomorphic animals. And I'm looking at you for this Internets. If it weren't for you I could still watch Disney's Robin Hood without feeling the urge to openly weep. But what's done is done, and the fact remains that I will never be able to look at movies from my childhood the same way again. But at least that's easy enough, just don't put the DVD in, however at any given time that horrible thing might just pop out of nowhere and make feel all shell shocked.

Now, please don't think that I hate hamsters. This girl doesn't hate any animals...
except for monkeys. Sorry if that offends you kid, this girl hates monkeys.

I like real hamsters, real hamsters are cute.

See:


cute! Cuddly! Don't you want to take it home?

But wait ... what's this thing?

OHMIGOD WHAT THE FUCK EVEN JUST HAPPENED?!?!?!?!?!

Hamsters should be doing cute snuffly things. Hamsters should be snuggled and adored.

THEY SHOULD NOT BE ROLLING WITH THEIR HOMIES IN A KIA

I don't know you guys, I just don't know. How can I be scared by horror films when there's normal everyday things that are way freakier then anything in the movie theater ... well, with the exception of that horrifying "Cats Vs. Dogs" movie coming out.

Seriously you guys, if this is the turn that popular media is going to take this girl might have to go live in the forest next to a log.

The Creepiest Thing: 3rd edition

This week The Creepiest thing is...

Angler Fish

Okay, okay, I know that some of you out there might be going "Umm... wow, a fish huh?". Sure the 1st edition was about satanic audioanimatronics, and the second about flesh eating dolls, so it's a deviation that I have gone into the natural world for this week's installment. But let's be reasonable here people;

HAVE YOU LOOKED AT THESE ASSHOLES?

Angler Fish are pretty much one of the most horrible things in existence. Yes, I know, they live at the bottom of the ocean. Again, I also know that the chances me every crossing paths with one of them is slim to none.

Doesn't matter, I know that they're out there.

Lurking.

Waiting.

Sure, most of the things that have to be able to survive that deep under the water are pretty damn creepy, but the Angler Fish seriously take the cake. What's that? Still don't think that they deserve this week's slot? Okay then, let me explain to you EXACTLY why they do.

Their horrible mouths, filled with razor sharp teeth, wrap ALL THE WAY around their heads. In addition to this, they can also completely distend their jaws, and their friggin STOMACHS, so that they can swallow something that is over twice as big as they are. So, you know, if they adapted to being able to come into shallow water that would mean that they could swallow like, your baby.

Yeah. Top that "Dingo ate my baby" lady! Try competing with someone whose offspring was ingested by an Angler Fish! I bet you can't! HA!



Also, they're pretty much the biggest assholes ever.

That little dangly thing on their heads? They light it up and wave it around, which makes other fish think that it either

A) is something to eat
or
B) something that wants to play with them.

So the little fishes, feeling all safe and happy and lured into a sense of false security wiggle on up and get gnashed to death.

Do you remember that part in Finding Nemo? Where Marlin and Dori are tempted in thee deep, dark scary part of the ocean? Then suddenly, out of nowhere there is this light.

Ooooh, they're so happy, look at the light, it's so pretty. I makes them so happy, they float towards it and try to play with it. And then what happens?

BAM! I'M AN ANGLER FISH!

And the mildly adorable cartoon fish flee make like a banana and split before they get to see the wonder that is the freak's distending jaw and stomach.

Don't remember that part? Well, the fine folks at Pixar weren't exaggerating. At least not by much.



But here's the thing kids, I haven't even gotten to the freakiest thing about them.

Freakier than the fact that they look like something Tim Burton once had a nightmare about, or even that they have acquired the Vampiric skill of glamoring.

Freakier that all that are their Goddam mating habits.

Seriously, they make a female Praying Mantis look like June Cleaver.

The horror show that has been featured in the above pictures is only what the female Angeler Fish looks like. The male is like 1/10 of the female's size and exists solely to be a sperm-filled parasite.

Seriously.

Male Angler Fish are born basically useless, only equipped with a strong sense of smell. Their only purpose is to use their sense of smell to find the a female Angler Fish to latch onto. If they don't find one, they'll starve, because they don't have their own functioning gastrointestinal tract.

If they do find one, it's not any better.

Once he finds the female, who the poor jackass believes is going to save him, he bits down onto her side for dear life.

And then she proceeds to excrete an enzyme that melts its mouth off, and then actually completely envelopes the male, killing it and digesting it into herself. Yes, breaking down nearly all of it, brain, internal organs, the works.



The only part of the male the female actually uses is its testes so that she can impregnate herself with them whenever she wants to.

Way to go dude Angler Fish. You're pretty much an over-glorified Sperm bank.

Except, you know, when you donate to a sperm bank they pay you for your time. They don't immediately jump on you wearing bibs and toting a fork and knife.

Oh Cannibalism, such fun times. Except, you know, not at all.

And the female can do this a lot, basically, she can carry around her own handy dandy sperm bank, full of multiple male angler fish testes for whenever she wants one. Like they're trophies.

Gross.

Sure, the whole freaky Angler Fish scenario is a lot funnier when retold over at The Oatmeal, but even then its still ... guh.

It was long before my time, but I have heard in rumour and legend that 'Jaws' instilled a fear of the Ocean in a great number of those who saw it.

That on account of the film people refused to go into the water because, Jesus tap-dancing Christ, there might be some sharks in there.

I say:

Sharks? Ha!

I'll take sharks any day, just for the love of God and all that is holy, don't make me go anywhere near those damn Angler Fish.



Be sure to tune in next week for another edition of "The Creepiest Thing"!

The Creepiest Thing: 2nd edition

This week The Creepiest Thing is …

Cabbage Patch Kids

“Snacktime” dolls

Anyone who was a child in the nineties, or above the age of two probably remembers these freaky little bastards.

If you don’t, chances are you forcibly blocked the memory out, as many of us are like to do with overly traumatic events. And if this is the case, I quite honestly can’t say that I blame you.

Dolls are, to begin with, already one of the most heinously freaky things on the planet. Since I was just a wee bit I’ve gotten the willies from dolls. Cabbage Patch Kid dolls are no exception, actually, they’re probably worse. I’m not sure if it’s their vacant, soulless eyes, their arms that are constantly outstretched as if to strangle you, or the fact that my aunt used to collect these horrible things and I had to, on multiple occasions, sleep in a room filled with them.

Whatever it is, they aren’t right.

Like really not right.

As if these satanic lumps of plastic weren’t already full of malice and God only knows what else, in the Fall of 1996 the brain trusts over at Mattel decided they needed to be even more evil. And so along came the Snacktime doll.



Apparently the idea of enabling a doll to chew was, for some reason, a good idea. And the greedy assholes over at Mattel responsible for this weren’t the only ones who thought so. Nay-nay dear Spooky-dos. Children all over the country saw these commercials and proceeded to browbeat their parents into buying them these Chucky”Snacktime” dolls for Christmas.

They were, in fact, the #5 best selling toy in the Christmas of 1996. Not in the Spooky Pie household, mind, this girl wanted an Easy Bake Oven.

So Christmas ’96 over 700,000 shrieking (with glee … for now) children opened up their Snacktime dolls. And for a short while, things were good. They catered to the bizarre need for kids to have dolls with bodily functions (I seem to remember there being a doll that also made bodily waste, how adorable.). Snacktime kids came with plastic stick shaped foods that were supposed to be carrot sticks and what have you, when said plastic foods were inserted into the dolls mouth it would “munch” on them and pull it into itself, to come out in its backpack.

That was all well and good.

But then, dear readers, things went TERRIBLY wrong.

THE DOLLS DEVELOPED A TASTE FOR HUMAN FLESH

I wish I was over exaggerating, which I guess, to a small extent I am, but not by much.

About a month after their release Mattel issued a massive recall of the dolls. Why?

Because 35 different isolated incidents were reported of children being MAULED by their Snacktime doll. Yeah, no kidding, and you thought Child’s play was just a movie. The doll’s chewing mechanism had no off switch, so once it started to devour something the only way to stop it was to practically destroy it. And the hair and fingers of little children seemed to be the Snacktime dolls preferred “snack time” food.



Multiple parents found themselves having to fend the attacking dolls off of their children. Since the mechanism didn’t have that pesky on/off switch, multiple children had chunks of their hair literally ripped for their heads as their parents tried to save them in true blue B-grade horror fashion.

One poor distraught mother found her child’s finger locked in the death grip of one dolls’ mouth, she tore the backpack of the doll off, she tried to beat it down, she couldn’t get the doll off of her kid. It wasn’t until a FRICKING POLICE OFFICER came down and “had to slash the doll's face open and then remove 15 screws" did they get the kid free.

Sweet Jesus, traumatic much?

But here’s the thing Dears and Darlings. The packaging on these terrible things was emblazoned with the a label reading “Feed me”, why in the name of God’s Ass did this set off no warning bells for anyone?

Forget the fact that none of these parents, obviously, must not have seen any of the ‘Child’s Play’ movies or even the ‘Talking Tina’ episode of The Twilight Zone. Had none of them seen, or at least heard of, Little Shop of Horrors?
If something that should not be able speak asks you to feed it

DON’T DO IT.

Unless, of course, you like the idea of spending your days feeding dentists and salesmen to the giant Venus Flytrap you named after your girlfriend.

Or, you know, something like that.



Be sure to tune in next week for another edition of "The Creepiest Thing"!

The Creepiest Thing: 1st edition

So I have decided that on this blog I am going to do a weekly feature called "The Creepiest thing". I will try to have a new edition up every Friday, and it will be just whatever random thing that creeps me out I feel like ranting about. So brace yourself for the first ever TCT!

This week The Creepiest Thing is:

Disneyland's "Dark Rides"

For those of you not clued into "amusement park lingo", a dark ride is:

"an indoor amusement ride where riders in guided vehicles travel through specially lit scenes that typically contain animation, sound, music, and special effects." Quoth Wikipedia.

I am native California girl, I grew up in Southern California. Like a good many other middle class, southern California based families, mine had annual passes to Disneyland for the majority of my childhood.

This, of course, meant many many many trips to Disneyland. And when your humble narrator, Spooky Pie, was but a Spooky Cupcake, I had a nearly masochistic relationship with said dark rides. They were fun and exciting to a child, most things that have happy music, bright colors, and things that move are. But as much I loved to go on the rides, they also pretty much scared the crap out of me.

Specifically the ride called "Snow White's scary adventure".

If you aren't from California, or have never been to Disneyland, or, whatever, here's a ride through someone on Ye Olde Tube of the Yew taped for your benefit. Yes, just yours, no one else's.



As a little girl I loved the opening with the woodland animals and the dwarfs celebrating, but when it degenerated into the haunted forest I was gripping onto the cart with white knuckles and trying hard not to scream, cry, pass out, or do all three. And that's the sort of thing that sticks with you. Even returning to Disneyland in my adult life, I still freely admit that I get heart palpitations riding that thing, because you just can't let go all together of something that scared you that badly as a child.

Also, like most children, I had a horrifically over-active imagination. And the moving audio-animatronics in the dark rides were just the kind of fuel I needed to get all worked into a tizzy. Young me was 100% positive that not only were those things alive, but that they were might want to come down from their displays and get me.



And let's face it, it isn't like the stories in these rides were all together pleasant. Hell, most of the Disney movie I've re-watched as adult have made me go
"wow... this is really messed up... I can't believe I watched this as a kid.

Oh Disney, way to go around traumatizing children.

Unfortunately, for me anyway, my latent phobia of these rides was made worse a few years back. My arch nemesis/love "Snow White's scary adventures" broke down. And I don't mean in the way that rides occasionally break down and a pleasant voice comes on over the music telling you that "The ride is experiencing technical difficulties and we will have you back on track momentarily".

No, no, it REALLY broke down. The had to turn the lights on and have everyone get out of their carts and walk through the ride to get to the exit. You don't fully realize just how nightmarish those rides really are until you see them "behind the scenes". They might be scary in the dark, but this is one case in which it is actually scarier in the light.

That traumatic experience coupled with my childhood issues with audio-animatronics made me start to really, really fear having the ride break down whilst I was still in it. Yes, I've been on the rides when they went down, The Haunted Mansion has "technical difficulties" all the times, and I have gotten stuck sitting in one section of it for a reeeeeeally long time. Long time in the sense that not only did I learn ALL the words to the Haunted Mansion graveyard song, but I thought I might weep openly if I ever had to hear it again.
(In case you might be wondering, I got over it really fast, and every time I go to Disneyland I still end up riding the Haunted Mansion at least twice in a day)

You see, it wasn't so much the stopping that bothered. Sitting in a faux graveyard full of unrealistic ghouls was not something that phased me at all (repetitive ghost song aside). It was the idea of being stuck next to one of those creepy doll/robot/things that made my blood go cold. If you're moving past them it's all well and good, it's when you are potentially trapped in with those nightmarish looking things that the phobia part starts to kick in.

Case in point, your humble narrator once in the not too distant past was on "Alice's adventures in Wonderland" when it broke down. My little pink caterpillar buggy, of course stopped right in front of the Mad Tea Party scene.



That was the point, gentle readers, in which yours truly (in true 'Fear and loathing in Las Vegas'/Hunter S. Thompson style) yelled:

"WE CAN'T STOP HERE!!!!!"

And then, of course, I proceeded to attempt to vault over the safety railing of my bug vehicle to run for glory. However, as I was starting to wiggle my way out the ride started back up. It was really for the best, I doubt the Disneyland employees would have looked fondly on my running out of the ride on foot, screaming like a madman.

Of course, for the rest of the day (and basically the whole time up to the present since the horrible 'mad tea party incident) my friends who were on the ride with me took great pleasure in making fun of me for my barely avoided hysterical melt down. There were/still are numerous "We can't stop here? Why? Is it bat country?" comments directed at me.

I stick to my guns though y'all. In the same situation all over again, I probably would have acted the same. Throw any horror movie you like at me, I'll be fine, they don't scare me. Those are things happening on a screen nowhere near me. Just don't make me sit next to one of those audio-animatronic nightmares.

And before you judge me on this one guy, think about how much you would like being stuck next to one of these horror-shows.



Be sure to tune in next week for another edition of "The Creepiest Thing"!
All images in this entry from Daveland Web