One thing that really creeped me out as a kid was an episode of "Quincy" where a flood unearths an old cemetary and strews coffins all over the place. Most of the other "Quincy" episodes didn't bother me in the least, but that one seriously gave me the creeps.

Probably the thing that scarred me the most as a child, was an old movie I saw on the "3:30 Movie" back in the mid-70's when I was probably about 6 or so. This was pre-cable- they would show old movies, everything from Abbott and Costello films to "Frankenstein", after school each day. This particular story was about this group of archeologists or something that discover a lock box with a man's head in it- and the head's ALIVE. Freaked me out. Eventually they find his body and put the two back together and he turns into a harmless pile of dust. Anyone remember the name of this? It was black and white and probably from the early 60's. I had the serious creeps from this movie for YEARS. Even now, I don't think I could watch it.

Anything coming out of the toilet on TV is freaky but this happened in COPS. People had a snake in their toilet! If there's ever a reason for me to never go to the bathroom again, this episode was it....

But a year or so later I went to a friend's house and they admitted they had this problem too. They bought an old country farmhouse that had two bathrooms right next to each other on the ground floor and there was a harmless watersnake that would pop up in either toilet. Can't convince me a snake in the toilet is harmless.

PS, I never went to the bathroom in their house. Ever.

You might not have gotten this show in the US but we used to have a show called "Sapphire & Steel" in the UK with David McAllum and Joana Lumley. They were all elements (diamond/gold etc) who used to go round trying to restore world order, i think. To this day i'm still not sure what it was about as I was very young when it was on and I can't bring myself to watch it as it freaked me out so much. However, the last scene still freaks me out even now. As a punishment, they end up being trapped in this crystal shard thing (like in Superman 2) which is floating through space. We see that they are stuck in a small kitchen and when they go to open the door all you see is space outside, the stars etc. and they are doomed there for eternity. Apparently, I cried for ages. (Actually the more I think about this, either Superman or this was a direct rip off of one another as its the exact same scenario!)

As for clowns - they are the freakiest thing out. There's an episode of Star Trek Voyager with Tim Curry as a clown (like in IT) who has taken over these people's minds and they are all permanently in this freakshow carnival world and have to have fun all the time. If they don't like it they are put in the chair and it kills them, and they end up dying in real life. I was not happy.

The mention of Ray Bradbury's "I Sing the body electric" earlier - wasn't that the name of a song from the TV series Fame - now that was scary TV!

Oh my God! I used to watch those movies all the time too. Had to sneak it, because I was supposed to be asleep, but I loved them. I do remember watching that movie and it freaked me out too. Actually, that was the movie that I got busted on. It freaked me out so much, my folks found out what I was doing and took the TV. I can't remember the title, either, though. Sorry. Can't say that I want to watch it again, anyway.

It's a line from Walt Whitman, but I don't know if it was also used in a song on Fame. I used to love watching that series, though.

The film version of Fame, during the climactic senior talent night, features, as its centerpiece, the Walt Whitman poem set to music. It wasn't, to my knowledge, used in the tv series.

"I Sing the Body Electric" on TV? You might be thinking of the "Fame", the reality show. I remember all 12 singers doing that number on Finale Night, with Harlemm Lee & Shannon Bex taking the leads.

No, I was definitely recalling the film - thanks TudorQueen.

Now I have to live with the intellectual shame that I can recall song lyrics said in a naff 80's film better than the poem they were based upon!

Does being English, and therefore unlikely to have studied Walt Whitman, count as an excuse?

ETA Ok - my shame should really be that I knew it only as a song from Fame and not that it was actually a poem by Walt Whitman!

As an Anglophile, I'd say that being English means you don't need an excuse, but... IIRC, the lyrics to the song were, in fact, the poem, so you are, in fact, recalling both simultaneously!

If it's any consolation, vicky, I could sing the song myself. You're not alone. And so far as I know, I never saw the movie - maybe had to sing it in choir at some point?

Gah, I hate that song. Not scarring so much as it is depressing. They use it as the theme song for some local exercise show.

And there is no such thing as a "harmless watersnake." Not when it's in the toilet.

Three moments,

The Black Dahlia was mentioned earlier, but I don't think this particular show was mentioned. My partner and I were watching what seemed to be a reputable, non-lurid show about the case. However, that all changed when they got through talking about her life and got up to the point of the murder. At that point, they proceeded to show the pictures of her corpse cut in two pieces over and over and over again through the remainder of the program. We had trouble sleeping that night.

The other was a science-fiction show, the new Twilight Zone or something like that. These people crash (?) on a planet with horrible giant spiders. The spiders first inject you with venom that causes you to become paralyzed and hallucinate, and then of course they wrap you up for later eating. To raise the stakes, it was imperative that our crash surviors got off the planet because they were carrying vaccine (?) or something to deal with a plague on their home planet.

After various members of the party die in accidents or are incapacitated by the spider venom, one man finally manages to purge the ship of spiders, fix the ship, get all the injured/incapacitated people safely buckled in for the trip, and blast off into space. He's free of the planet's atmosphere, looks out at the sky full of stars and giddy with relief announces, "I saved them! I saved them!"

And then, the last shot is of the ship's bridge. Everyone, including the man who we thought saved everyone is wrapped in cocoons and either babbling or comatose. The man is wrapped in his web cocoon, eyes glazed, drooling, and mumbling "I saved them, I saved them." *shudder*

Last but not least is a moment from some of my father's science fiction show watching from my childhood. Some plague or something is making people "evaporate" in their sleep, and leaving nothing but little piles of sand behind. For years, I was afraid to go to sleep because there might be nothing left of me but a pile of sand.

I just thought of a few other moments courtesy of my father's taste for science fiction.

The jelly pancake things going after Spock. They were little and flappy and evil. I realize that is one of the cheesiest episodes ever of the TOS, but it scared me at the time.

The noise of the monitors in the Star Trek sick bay. It took me years to hear that noise without wanting to duck.

Oh God, I remember that! These alien people were trapped in a carnival world, and one by one the clown was excecuting them by cutting off their heads (causing their real bodies, outside the carnival, to die of fear). Then Harry and B'Elanna went into the carnival to rescue the survivors, and Harry was trapped there too... y'know, Voyager didn't often freak me out, but that one episode just made me shake. Evil carnivals are nothing to sniff at.

Heh, that sounds exactly like the fate of the entire United Nations staff in the cheesy Batman movie based on the even cheesier 60's series. The Penguin, Joker, Catwoman, and the Riddler are all in cahoots to get rid of the UN for some reason, so they turn them into little vials of dust, if I'm not mistaken, lol.

"I sing the Body Electric" was indeed the song from the movie Fame. I don't know if it was ever used in the TV show, tho.

That was actually the new Outer Limits. The actor who played the main character of the episode went on to play Will on Will and Grace.

That revival of Outer Limits was responsible for a major scarring in my life and almost ruined my ongoing worship of Jason Gedrick. In an episode called "Human Trials" he played a hotshot fighter pilot in a futuristic society who is one of several 'best of the best' summoned to try out for an important top secret mission. They are tested by being put in a highly sophisticated simulator and asked to react to different crisis situations. Some of the candidates wash out early. Gedrick is determined to succeed and focuses on doing the 'correct' thing each time, even when it is the less humane thing. Another candidate is cynical about Gedrick, calling him a glory hound and implying that he lacks true character. At the climax the other pilot refuses to do something he finds morally questionable and Gedrick, ranting about the importance of the mission and basically saying 'our planet, right or wrong', kills him rather than see him destroy the mission [which it is implied would happen]. Gedrick is then awakened and told that everything, including his confrontation with the other pilot, was part of the simulation. He is the only one who passed every test and the mission is his. Thrilled, he says he's ready to get into his plane. Not so fast, the examiner says. The mission is a long range study of how soldiers react to torture. He's to stay in the simulator, which can keep him alive indefinitely, and will test advanced forms of torture on him. The episode ends with the sound of Gedrick's terrified scream...

And mine.

My first thoughts about this were Ewww.

Then i spent a long time thinking of all the things the guy could have done instead e.g

a. why didn't he just request to leave the airforce and not do the mission, but then i re-read the part about it being a futuristic society and I doubted whether they would let him.

b. Now that he knows its a simulator why didn't he just start breaking things inside it - these things always cost money and they'd rather jepoardise him than the equipment

c. etc

Then i remembered this was only a show, (which i'd never even seen!) and i needed to get out more. I'm going to lie down now.

The TV movie for IT was incredibly scary (as is the book). "We all float down here" and when he was in the street drain. *shivers*

Also I love Twilight Zone, but it's because of that show that I get freakout about mannequins and dummies. You can't tell me their not alive when people aren't around. Related to mannequins, I also get freaked out on elevators sometimes because in the mannequin episode she ended up on a floor that no one knew about but the mannequins.

TudorQueen, I am scarred just from reading that.

Scientific experiment plotlines freak me out in general.

I saw a t.v. movie years ago about another type of experiment. A bunch of people were placed in an ultra-advanced air-raid shelter and told they were going to have to live there for 30 days to test its habitability. In the meantime, a real nuclear war broke out and they had to stay in the shelter and watch on t.v. as the entire world blew up all around them and all these terrified victims were banging on the doors to the shelter trying to get in (they had a big argument as to whether or not they should let them in). Eventually one distraught participant killed herself, and then everybody found out there was no nuclear war -- it was all part of a big experiment to see how people would react in wartime conditions.

And then there was the classic one about the people who were told they were participating in a study that measured human reaction to electrical shock. They were instructed to press a button that delivered a mild electrical charge to another test subject, only the charges got gradually stronger and stronger. And the other subject was screaming in pain but the head scientist kept telling the participants to continue, and most of them did. It turned out it was all fake -- the scientists were testing how blindly people were willing to obey authority. The scary part is, pretty much everybody did what the head scientist said. I also think it was based on a true story.

That reminds me of a classic "Twilight Zone", in which a local doctor and model citizen is having a birthday party which much of the town attends. They lionize him but also tease him about the bomb shelter he built below his house, which is just big enough, and has just enough supplies, to get him and his family comfortably through a nuclear attack that none of the others think will happen. [The scientific impossibility of living through the aftermath of such an attack had not yet been established for the general public]. Then the unthinkable happens - the air raid sirens go off. The doctor brings his family down to the shelter. The other townspeople, none of whom have shelters, demand that he let them in. He says he can't. A riot ensues and the shelter - and much of the doctor's house - is trashed. Then they hear that it was all a false alarm. Abashed, the townspeople promise to 'repair the damage' - but they all know that some damage cannot be repaired.



It is indeed a true story. I believe the scientist who ran the study was named Stanley Milgrim or Milligan. It gives one pause, thinking about it. I mean, we ask how the Nazis rose to power and got some people to do such terrible things. I think this experiment gives one part of a possible answer. Truly chilling.

vickyc007

Pants Ninja

Are y'all talking about that episode 'The Thaw'? The Clown was played by Michael McKean- who is everybody from Lenny Koznoski to David St Hubbins.
http://pic9.picturetrail.com/VOL291/175537...51/41684081.jpg
My most scarring TV moment involving Tim Curry would have to be this

Yup, Stanley Milgram. Sigh. We can't do experiments like that anymore.

Thanks JedimasterElvis I knew it was somebody famous but couldn't remember who. I actually have all of Voyager on video so should have known that!

I never saw the show with Tim Curry and Gary Cole as they never showed it in the UK although everyone on the boards has said it was pants. Shame, as I really like both Gary Cole and Tim Curry - they're both very easy on the eye. Mind you, the plot synopsis sounds very much like "The Nanny".


ETA Oops my bad - additional comment deleted as it was about a film not a TV
programme.


2ND ETA



Nope, sorry no dirt here. It's a UK expression which means rubbish/useless/naff. Pants are underwear in the UK and not trousers as they are in the US.

Hence, our major amusement whenever we hear all of those American cops to tell people to "drop their pants". Hee hee. We all have the mentality of six year olds.

Glad I could help, vickyc007!


What does "pants" mean? Is it dirty? I hope it's dirty.


Heh. Actually, the Curry/Cole Family Affair is a remake of the 1966 TV show of the same name (starring Brian Keith as Uncle Bill & Sebastian Cabot as Mr French). I watched it in syndication as a kid in the 70s. Love the opening theme. And older sister Cissy was kinda hot (keeping in mind I was 6 or 7 at the time).

TOPIC: There was a PSA about AIDS wherein we are treated to desolate streets filled with sad, hungry, grimy, crying children- left behind to fend for themselves because all the adults are dead from AIDS! AAAHHHHH! It's like that ep of Old Skool Star Trek 'Miri' ("Bonk, bonk on the head") and, like, 28 Days w/o the cannibalism. Sad & scary.

Man this thread's long. But hey, now I know to always look into my toilet bowl befoe sitting. Thanks. OK, my scarred for life moments.

The Sopranos. Ralphie. Janice. In Bed. It was horrible. I tried to cover my eyes, but I could still hear it. "Who's Mama's Hoor?". Then I tried to cover my ears, and close my eyes and sing. Then I had to bleach my eyes. It was so much worse than Ralphie's head when he dies.

And yes, just to agree. Litle House on the Prairie. The mime. The morphine vomit. The episode when Carrie was in the whole thing as herself and her imaginary friend.

Any ep of SevHev I've seen.

And the SNL commercial spoof with the clear gravy. It makes me want to vomit. Does anyone remember this? It was a spoof on the crystal Pepsi ads, and it featured clear gravy being poured on meat. Yuck. Just yuck. It's way squickier than it sounds.

I think this was a Twilight Zone or other anthology horrorish show, but it could be a movie and in that case I apologize in advance. But it scared the hell out of me for YEARS.

It had Kim Darby and that's not even the scariest part. She kept seeing these little creatures around her house, but only she could see them. They'd pop up all over the place and pull horrible evil pranks. Everyone thought she was crazy, of course. The worst part was at the very end where they'd killed her and she'd become one of them.

Naw, that was a TV movie called "Don't Be Afraid of the Dark." I saw it when I was a kid myself, they were these horrible little gnome-like things and they were afraid of light, so she managed to evade them for a while with a flash camera, but of course the flash bulb eventually died and they dragged her off into the hole. I only saw it the one time, but never forgot it. /shiver

Wow. Big thread. Badness:

Watching my poor, sweet, favorite fictional human ever (with the exception of Giles) Xander suffer the one injury that freaks me out the most, bar none. Oh, my God, I was screaming and crying and then completely immobilized for a good five minutes.

I don't normally watch Animal Planet (I used to, but it's like they've gradually phased out all the wild animal stuff to focus on pets, which isn't half as interesting, and also I have problems with them running a spay/neuter commercial campaign while glorifying how great it is to have your pets give birth in the million daily episoded of "That's My Baby." *inhales*) so I've missed out on some of the more lovely moments of animal cruelty, but there is one that's stuck with me: A man comes home to see that his neighbor has left the gate to his backyard open, and his female Rottweiler is in the yard, whining and digging frantically. The man recognizes that the dog is completely freaked out about something, so he gets down on his knees and starts helping her dig. A few minutes later he finds somewhere between three and five Rottie puppies that the neighbor has buried alive. Thankfully, the guy and some friends got them to the vet and were able to save most of them.

I loved "Unsolved Mysteries" to death as a child, but the theme song scared the crap out of me. I always had to turn it on after the credits ended. I've never had the "ohmigod, I just know that guy is hiding in my neighborhood" fear, though, especially in the last few years. I've noticed that every time somebody gets found in my state on that show, he's been masquerading as either student or faculty at my alma mater's rival university several cities over. Amuses me to no end. :P

I am apparently the only X-Files addict in the world who wasn't skeeved out of my brain by "Home."

Aww, you guys were creeped out by "The Electric Gandmother"? It's one of my old favorites. Ihave it on tape somewhere, and I can actually pick out that little song she sings (melody only, no chords) on the piano. But I'll admit, I was freaked by the part where they first get to the warehouse, before they even start designing the grandmother. There's a closeup of the dad's gloved hand holding a handkerchief and wiping the snow off a wall so they can check the address, but for some reason it never focused properly in my head when I was a kid and it looked like some sort of giant worm puppet sneaking towards them. I never understood that and had to content myself with being mightily creeped. And it just got worse from there when the father reads the sign on the door that says the company's name and "specializes in the creation of lifelike androids, playmates, companions, and especially--" The door swings open on its own and creepy, distorted voices finish, "grrrrandmutherrs!" Augh! Scary!

Wonder if anyone can place this TV episode. I think it from either the Twilight Zone or Outer Limits.

A woman moves into a house and notices a stain on the wall. She tries and tries to clean off the stain with everything she has, but it keeps getting larger and larger. By the end of the show, the stain has become some kind of picture.

I saw this as a small child and can't remember much beyond that, but do remember it scared the hell out of me.

Alias' gratuitous overuse of needles bothers me. I'm severely traumatized by them anyways, and seeing them shoved into chests or necks or other sensitive areas gets me screaming and generally spazzing.

Two one-liners:

1 - "My name is Talky Tina, and I'm going to kill you."

2 - "Room for one more, honey."

nightmares, I tell you. nightmares.

Thanks, Ernos! I thought Don't Be Afraid of the Dark was that movie with a blind Audrey Hepburn and evil Alan Arkin. But that's Wait Until Dark.

Here's one that is definitely TV and still makes me shudder when I think of it--that woman on Springer or equivalent who could really bug out her eyes. Oh my god, it was horrifying.

Oooh...scared the shit out of me when I saw it as a little kid, but I use this quote often now for humorous situations (though none of my friends know where the hell it's from, that's fine with me!).

I have friends who find the "Night Gallery" episode 'Doll of Death' even more scarring than the 'Talky Tina' "Twilight Zone". Certainly the doll itself, with its sooty eyes and toothy 'smile', was a grisly little toy...

Sorry to disappoint you JedimasterElivis, but pants just means that it wasn't very good.

Look here...I found some choice Talky Tina quotes that will be sure to scare the crap outta you here, lol.

It reminds me of an episode of One Step Beyond. In the episode the woman was the owner's second wife and when the stain became full sized it was a picture of the husband and the second wife killing the first wife.

One Step Beyond had cheap production values, was in black and white and was creepy as could be.

Oh, yeah. I remember one with Elizabeth Montgomery as the spoiled, flirtatious daughter of the commander of a Civil War-era army base. She got engaged to one of the men and he was sent into action, swearing he'd come back for her. Well, he died in battle and she collapsed in grief for about five minutes before going back to her flirtatious ways. Her mother scolded her and she shrugged it off. At a dance on base, she was leading all the guys on and having a wonderful time, when her 'dead' fiance arrived, announcing in sepulchural tones that he had sworn, after all, to come back for her. She cowers in fear, but submits when he commands her to dance with him. She dies in his 'arms' and the ghostly figure disappears.

Of course, given that his promise was merely to come back for her, one must wonder if she would have had the same fate anyway, regardless of who she flirted with or how moral or proper her behavior had been. I'm not sure what the lesson really was here. Don't get engaged during a war?

I'm thinking too much about it.

A little boy won't turn the lights off in his room because he's convinced a monster is under his bed and will only come out in the dark. His parents don't believe him, of course, and, of course, as soon as his lights are turned off a shape starts to flow from under his bed. It's the Shadowman and he kills children but he can't hurt the child from under whose bed he emerges--he says this every time he appears. Little boy is the only one who can play outside at night safely--there's a curfew because someone has been killing kids. The last bit is that the boy is at a park and the Shadowman approaches, the boy is all cocky about being safe, until the Shadowman says he's the Shadowman from under someone else's bed.

Aaarrgghh!

The way the thing oozed and took shape, and then the twist I was too thick to see coming, very scary.

That was from the eighties era "Twilight Zone" which I heretically prefer to the original one.

Lindah: Thanks, I think that may be the episode though I don't remember a show called One Step Beyond. Was that from circa late 60's? I was fairly young when I saw it.

There was a local show here that had camera crews follow around reporters for the Miami Herald, and one time, they went to this house that was sliding off its foundation, causing all types of creepy crawlies to get into the house. The wife of the family said that one night, she found a snake in the bidet.

When I first heard it, I laughed hysterically, but now I can't look at bidets the same way again. I mean, it's not like I would use one, but still.

Thanks for the memories, ChinkyGirl!

That episode is classic!

My other quote, "Room for one more, honey" might be a little more obscure. It was still from the Twilight Zone. The episode started with a woman in a hospital having a nightmare where she went down a hall to the morgue. Before she could walk in, the morgue door opened and a woman said "room for one more, honey." The doctor appeased her fears by asking the morgue nurse to come into her room to show her that it was not the woman from her dream. She felt better. She was released from the hospital. She planned a vacation, but was running late when she got to the airport. As she ran to board the plane, she was greeted by a stewardess - the woman from her dream. The stewardess said "room for one more", trying to let her know she could still make her flight. The woman freaked out and didn't board the plane, but watched it take off from the window. The plane blew up.

The creepy factor was more than just the line. You had to see the woman who said it. Her eyebrows alone were scary even if she hadn't said anything.

Oh, I remember that one too! Do you know what season it's from? They might have it on that sound page I linked to. It could be a good sound for emptying your recycling bin in Windows, or something, lol.

Ahhhh! That song scared the holy hell out of me as a child! Our bathroom was way in the back of our house, and one had to cross a damn near pitch black hall to get to it. If I had just watched "Unsolved Mysteries" or even heard part of that creepy ass theme... forget about it! I needed a chaperon to go potty. And being that my room was so close to said dark hall, falling asleep that night just wasn't an option. Also the opening credits to Tales from the Darkside. Absolute horror!

Thanks for pinpointing that, TudorQueen!

Well, now that I have "Shadowman" in my head, I won't sleep for a week.

"I am the Shadowman, and I will never harm the person under whose bed I live . . . "

A trip made even scarier by the Unsolved Mystery being about a ghost in someone's house. I cannot watch any ghost/haunting special at all.

Getting off the horror track and onto the nature track, there are two I can think of that were totally scarring. The first was a shot of a lioness after her pride had taken down a large antelope. The antelope had crushed her jaws during its death kicks and her tounge was hanging out of her mouth which was gaping awkwardly. As they went to commercial the narrator intoned, "This lioness will not be able to eat anymore and will painfully starve to death. It could take up to two weeks." For Christ's sake, I still get upset thinking of that.


The second one was a documentary on rattlesnakes. I hate snakes, but they did an entire hour on how this snake had beaten the odds to grow up, blah blah blah venomcakes, they even named the thing [Crotalus, after it's Latin name].At the end of the show, I'm totally invested in this snake. So it's finally grown up enough to go back to its birthplace and mate. In the meantime, human encroachment on the area has caused interaction between the species and the humans dynamite the hole of the nest shut so that the snakes can't breed there anymore. So the last scenes are of the snake desperately trying to push its way through the rocks and it seemed really confused.

Nature programming is often scarring. And yet, I don't stop myself.