What Really Scared You As A Child?

mariaalice

Hammer horror Dracula seems laughable now.

JupiterKid

Doctor Who was another one that could really terrify me as a young child.

Invariably an episode would end with the invasion of low budget papier-mache monsters or the ever present evil daleks and the Doctor’s pretty young female assistant would scream her lungs out, and then the theme music would cut in....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDeh-jsxDko

The BBC and ITV produced a lot of frightening sci-fi drama in the 1970s and 1980s on a low budget in terms of special effects, but the storylines were often very very chilling. Blake’s 7 and Sapphire and Steel come to mind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Yhd8Uqs6cU

thejuggler

The fire safety adverts on tv “Did you put the cat out”. I became obsessed with unplugging appliances and locking all windows and doors before going to bed.

DEFTLEFTHAND

Fairly forts used to terrify me.

My mom was from Kinnitty, every Sunday as kids we'd be out visiting her parents. She used to do a thing where she'd pull in at the Leap Castle as we drove back home through Coolderry and turn off the engine, she'd then pretend that the car wouldn't start up again.


We'd all be screaming in terror in the back.


For the unintitated the Leap is considered one of the most haunted castles in the world.

Kylta

DEFTLEFTHAND wrote: »

Fairly forts used to terrify me.

My mom was from Kinnitty, every Sunday as kids we'd be out visiting her parents. She used to do a thing where she'd pull in at the Leap Castle as we drove back home through Coolderry and turn off the engine, she'd then pretend that the car wouldn't start up again.


We'd all be screaming in terror in the back.


For the unintitated the Leap is considered one of the most haunted castles in the world.

That is absolutely brilliant, now thats what I call a fun person with a wicked sense of humour

Consey

https://youtu.be/nZn-FaWeUZY

Hangdogroad

The TV Incredible Hulk, I was terrified of him especially when he started transforming and his eyes went all weird. Then there was a Paxo ad that spoofed the Hulk where this oul fella turns into the Hulk and smashes a table and that terrified me even more as I thought anyone can turn into the Hulk.

Mars Bar

Our attic.

The episode of the Simpsons where Bart has the evil twin in the attic scarred me for a long time.

I've moved on now. My bedroom was redone and now the entrance to the attic is now inside my bedroom as opposed to outside!

Jimbob1977

Zelda from Terrahawks. A hideous crone.

Some of the X-Files episodes.... like Eugene Tooms (could fit into the tightest of windows & vents) and Fluke Man... the hideous white creature in the sewer system.

The Others (Nicole Kidman) is very scary.

o1s1n

Bogwoppit wrote: »

I used to have these existential thoughts/daydreams of a white space filled with clay balls. They varied in size from fit in your hand to unimaginably huge, made me feel irrelevant, I don’t matter because these balls can exist at any size.

Terrifying.

That's actually a known thing that a lot of people experienced when kids. I read through a Reddit page on it a while ago, there was variance (for example, this is the first time I've heard of them being clay) but the general feeling and description is very similar. Kind of blew my mind!

I used to get this too. Didn't really think of it being ball shapes but looking back it kind of was. The main take from it was being with these massive objects, but then they could be tiny. There was a roaring sound most of the time too.

Used to have it happen along with experiencing Alice in Wonderland syndrome (which I still occasionally get) where you feel like you're in a tunnel/things are really far away, tends to happen to me when I'm staring at a screen for a long time - it suddenly starts to look really tiny.

https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/aaclee/til_about_alice_in_wonderland_syndrome_common_in/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share

Purple Mountain

The Munsters especially the father.

ExMachina1000

I had reoccurring nightmares for what I remember as being a few years where the doors of the wardrobe swing open in the middle of the night and try and suck me in. I'd run past the open doors with a blinding white light and try and run up the hallway. I'd only make it halfway and the sucking force would be dragging me back. I had no voice no matter how loud I shouted for my parents and could hear them talking in the kitchen.
Woke up in sweats every morning it happened.

Bastard wardrobe.

Also the guy who presented the program "unsolved mysteries " on sky 1 used scare me.

bottlebrush

To get to our 2 local towns we have to drive under railway bridges. Used to absolutely terrify me when I was a child. Used to crouch down in the back of the car until the car had gone under and out the other side. Same again in the way home.

screamer

I just remembered as a really small kid I used to watch the original battlestar galactica on tv. The cylons were terrifying to me and later and still I hate the transformer movies, those things creep me out.

picturehangup

Thunder and lightning, and the shark in Jaws.

Was terrified Jaws was under my bed!

With the exception of spiders and the dark things didn't scare me. Instead I was filled with anxiety about stuff happening. My mam going to the shops and not coming home because she had an accident or was taken. Right in to adulthood I dreamt of not being able to find her. I I was scared of getting sick and dying.
These weren't regular childhood fears. To this day I remember how they felt.

fleet_admiral

The wrong answer jingle on Family Fortunes. That and fairground music which still freaks me out and I'm nearly 40

raclle

Porcelain dolls

My mother got my sister a few and they still scare me. Seriously they're creepy AF

Lockheed

I used to be terrified of light fittings. Not the dark or dark places, just purely terrified of light fittings and fixtures. All kinds, mostly the bulbs from the ceilings but also lampshades and the fluorescent tubes too. It was to do with how in the corner of your eye things can appear distorted and as if they were moving, this is, as i know now due to the rapid movement of the eye muscles. So out of the corner of my eye I would see the light and lightshade just spasming and violently moving. As a young impressionable child I thought they were angry because they were switched off, and that they were free to move around the room and the house when I wasn't looking. I had recurring nightmares about being attacked by light fittings, being kidnapped by light fittings, sometimes they killed me or trapped me under the floor, anyway it is crazy how the imagination of a child can create, and believe in an entire fiction which only arose due to the nature of the eye and how the eye muscles work. Still was paranoid about lights turned off through my teen years.

quickbeam

Mary Poppins actually:

- Michael Banks getting stuck in the closet during tidy up
- The infiinite carpet bag of unfathonable depths
- the nannies getting blown away
- the talking umbrella
- the old lady with the birds
- the old bankers trying to get the kids' pocket money
- floating up to the ceiling when the started to laugh and only being able to come down when you think sad thoughts

Especially the closet one though.

quickbeam

Nesta99 wrote: »

That was actually excellent and chilling. I remember it well.

PsychoPete

raclle wrote: »

Porcelain dolls

My mother got my sister a few and they still scare me. Seriously they're creepy AF

My mother has some, their eyes are very creepy

Hangdogroad

Ko Chow wrote: »

If it was around 1993 it could have been this fella en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Angl%C3%A9s . Had a memory of a very scary news report about him possibly landing here, after escaping Spain on a ship. Thought I somehow made it up until I saw 'The Alcasser Murders' on Netflix. Whereabouts still unknown you will be glad to hear.

Yes I remember that they reported at the time that they thought he might be hiding out in Ireland.

PsychoPete

PsychoPete wrote: »

My mother has some, their eyes are very creepy

I have about 30 of them

Capt'n Midnight

mistersifter wrote: »

Ready Brek ad with the fella with the lights around him doing break dancing. Freaked the shít outta me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wk0WzCtF0yY

From the Not The Nine O'Clock News team.

Windscale AKA Calder Hall, Sellafield, Moorside

Capt'n Midnight

partyguinness wrote: »

One of the old Star Trek films- this creature went into this guys ear. I have never looked at woodlouse the same.

Don't google Giant Isopod

Rockbeast2

Big Bird from Sesame Street scared the bejaysus out of me from the age of about 2 to 5.

I loved Sesame Street but hid behind the couch and cried every time that flightless feathered freak appeared on screen. I still don't trust the yellow ba$tard.

corner of hells

A friend of mine has twin 7 year old boys , last year he let them watch Saving Private Ryan .
The blood and guts was bad enough for the kids but my friend went further to explain that it was based around a search for a missing brother , that the war was still ongoing and that the twins would have to fight.
He slept on the couch for week after his wife found out what he did.

quickbeam

What a prick. She should have done more than make him sleep on the couch.

JupiterKid

Did anyone else find the original Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory pretty scary as a young child?

Especially the part when they all went through that tunnel full of very nasty things?

Boy...they really did make disturbing and frightening material for children in the days of yore...