Category: Traumafessions

I have wanted to add something to your pages for some time now, but every time I think I have something not yet covered, someone else has already unearthed it as their Traumafession. So in place of my own kindertrauma I offer one for my 4-year-old daughter…

A few weeks back my daughter was watching TV in the upstairs room and we could hear her talking to the TV and interacting with the preschool type shows as she does, yelling out letters and numbers and colors and the like. About 5 minutes later I noticed it was quite quiet and went upstairs to find her backed against the wall in terror. I turned to see what she was watching, thinking she had wandered off the pre-programmed favorites somehow and saw this….

"TIPI TALES – are adventures in story and song, where Elizabeth, Junior, Russel and Sam play, laugh and grow together in the forest." – from the tipitales.com website.

Not sure if they have it in your neck of the woods, but here in Canada it runs on one of the kids channels. It looks harmless enough but when I went to look up TIPI TALES on YouTube the preview picture for the above clip perhaps sheds some light. Maybe it's just me but that face gives me the creeps…….

AUNT JOHN SEZ: Sonny, first of all, thanks for bringing this future TRAUMAFESSION catalyst to our attention. While I don't think it has crossed the border onto American airwaves, I could be wrong. Have any of you readers seen this program? If so, feel free to sound off in the comments or, better yet, report it to your local office of Homeland Security. Clearly, the last thing America needs is more childhood nightmares caused by children's television puppets. I'm looking at you LADY ELAINE FAIRCHILDE and SESAME STREET EGGMAN!

Since we're on the topic of frightening puppets, I'd be remiss not to mention the original, old school terror LITTLE MARCY who has agreed to demonstrate her unmatched powers of creepiness in a song. Hit it LITTLE MARCY:

Growing up in Australia in the eighties I was subjected to an AIDS awareness commercial at a young age that featured a robed Grim Reaper bowling for victims. I was not really old enough to understand much of what was going on but it used to strike real fear in my heart. It's not quite as humorous as the stuff you guys usually show, but I think you'll agree it's pretty terrifying.

UNK SEZ: Geez, you Aussies actually went there with the spinning baby!!! Between this, the BUNYIP SONG from DOT AND THE KANGAROO and PRISONER CELL BLOCK H, I'm beginning to think Australia is the new Transylvania!

I had a cousin who was really into hip-hop and he got me into the music too when I was about 11 or 12. He had this one CD, Busta Rhymes' When Disaster Strikes (1997), and I was really into it. I would claim to my friends that Busta was my favorite artist and I would watch MuchMusic when I could to see if any of his videos were on, (this was before YouTube).

One day we were watching MuchMusic, (RapCity or something), and then one of the videos from the album E.N.E., The Final Frontier (1998), came on called "Gimme Some Mo." I was totally focused in on it.

The video is a parody of LOONEY TUNES and really weird. It starts off with Busta as a kid talking about how "he bumped his head." From there his eyes start to dilate…and then start to swirl. Busta, as a kid, turns into this blue monster with yellow eyes and long teeth. Almost like a Japanese Hannya or something…but with these long dreads. This is when I started to get freaked out. It was the scene where he is chasing after his mom down a hallway and grabbing at her from behind a door…  that image gave me "the fear" before bed and a few nightmares.

I suggest you check it out, maybe you can relate to how this scared me as a kid.

UNK SEZ: Mark, at first I had no idea how a BUSTA RHYMES video could be scary but after viewing it, I see your point. Not only is the Busta gremlin-beastie a freakish image to behold, but the song samples the immortal BERNARD HERRMAN's opening theme for PSYCHO! I'm sold; this freaky video brings the trauma!

The one film that scared me was a film by GARY GRAVER(1982's TRICK OR TREATS). I saw my dad watching it in the family room and I wanted to watch it. He told me okay. And it was all fine until the crazy man started chasing after the babysitter. That seriously traumatized me and I had always pictured the murderer outside my window. And that is why I avoided slashers for a bit of time.

Just wanted to say, I adore your site. Anyway, my personal childhood trauma occurred in 1995 (I was 6-years-old then) during the Superbowl. I'm there with my family, eating some chips, enjoying the game and commercials, until I saw something that screwed me up but good—Pepsi's 1995 "Sucked In" commercial.

It's the one where the kid (wearing a sailor hat, no less) is slurping his Pepsi on the beach. He's slurping and slurping, and finally overdoes it and gets sucked into the bottle from his straw, leaving him trapped inside.

Alone.

I was scared to watch another commercial for the next two or three years, and although I'm a huge horror fan now, I refuse to give that commercial another viewing.

I saw this anti-drunk-driving P.S.A. when I was about five and spent a long sleepless night vowing that when I grew up, I would never so much as look at beer…

I found it on youtube a while back and decided to face my childhood fears, and discovered that between the MICHAEL JACKSON, the eighties hair, the ominous voiceover, and the rather regrettable acting, it was actually incredibly silly, but of course one does not notice these things when one is five. Perversely, this spot and the many other P.S.A.s that turned TV-watching into an unsettling adventure for me and no doubt many of my contemporaries also left me with a lifelong interest in public service and cause marketing, so that I can say for certain that it is a very lucky thing I didn't grow up in the U.K.; since their public-service ads make the drunk-driving skeletons look like Winnie-the-Pooh, and not even the creepy live-action Winnie-the-Pooh who talks about "not-okay touching", but the regular cute kind.

(It turns out, too, that Matt from X-Entertainment, who is about the same age as me, had a similar reaction to this classic. (Check that out HERE).

Anyway, I love your site; I was a pretty easily traumatized child and am now fascinated by the childhood nightmare-fuel phenomenon. Keep up the great work!

UNK SEZ: Our pal Mickster left this in the comments section of the last post, but I think it's front page material and I wanted to make sure that nobody missed it:

What about the use of numerous wonderful cartoon characters in 1990's Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue? My niece and nephew viewed this several times when they were little. I'm surprised that no one has had a traumafession related to this cartoon. Read about it HERE

WELCOME TO POOH CORNER. You know, the Winnie-the-Pooh live action people-in-suits show? They had this government sponsored special called "Say No to Strangers," which I would rent from our local video store time and time again, because I was horror struck…oh yes, it's on YouTube.

I remember an animated short that was shown on an episode of THE GREAT SPACE COASTER back in the early '80s. It started off showing the history of fire or something like that. Now it's the present day and we see an older couple getting ready for dinner. I think the wife is having problems with the oven and the husband's getting frustrated with the toaster not working and jams a fork in it. Fire pops out of the oven with an evil face at the wife. More living fire comes out and engulfs the whole apartment building and then move on to the neighboring buildings and homes. Eventually they set the Earth ablaze and then jump to the other planets. I remember the end narration stating that the gods were angry and that they would give fire to woman instead of man next time.

I would see this short again no long after on late night pay-T.V. in between movies. I was either 9 or 10 at the time so that really screwed with my head.

Anyone else ever seen this?

Note: Toaster image swiped from HERE.

I suppose this was a good program, but I wasn't old enough to watch it. But the ACRI CREATURE FEATURE commercials scared the living sh&t out of me! I was all of 8 or so, I think. When the commercial came on the screen would go black, and then a small dot in the middle would start to grow. This disembodied, creepy looking head would smile and laugh his evil cackle (HA HA HA). Watch the ACRI CREATURE FEATURE! Eventually when the commercial started I'd run to my mom, close my eyes, and cover my ears.

I have to admit that now this is a funny memory of growing up in the Mid-West. But I would like the shows creators, producers, and sponsor (who is still in business) to know that they certainly did their job well!

UNK SEZ: Toni, I wish I could have located the television spot you are speaking of, but no luck! Here's a sample of the opening of the show though, which will hopefully bring back some memories for those who were old enough to check it out. Y'all can learn more about the ACRI CREATURE FREATURE HERE