Two of your previous Traumafessions have conspired to remind me of a fleeting terror of my own.

Sean of the Dead's HAPPY DAYS story was terrifying to me as well.  As Mickster points out in her comment, I DID hide behind the couch every time I thought that headless figure in the rocker was about to appear.

Also I think Kurt tapped my brain with his memories of ancient weather alerts.  The 1974 Superoutbreak that Mickster mentions took the roof off of several houses in my neighborhood.  I wasn't living there yet, but I saw pictures of the damage as a child.  Then the 1989 F4 Tornado touched down about a mile from my house.

But there was ANOTHER HAPPY DAYS episode (season 6, "Fearless Malph") that stuck in my brain like an echo ever since.

That episode involved Ralph Malph's pantophobia and a professor who hypnotized him into being (you guessed it) fearless.  Richie and Malph (and possibly Potsie) visited the Professor because Richie was working on some dumb article for his school newspaper.  While they were there, the Professor's lab rats began to act all jittery, which Prof reads as a prediction for a Tornado to hit Milwaukee at PRECISELY 6:22 that evening.  What the hell??? How has the science of meteorology regressed so much since the ‘50s?  Anyway, this is the point when Malph is hypnotized, everyone runs off to Arnold's to warn the gang of their impending doom, and then the tornado strikes and mayhem reigns supreme.  Everyone dies, the end.

But what really got me about this episode and what really made it resonate in my mind for all these years is that I watched it at home on a sunny summer day.  The kind of summer day that anyone from Alabama knows will turn black as pitch not long after lunch and then rain destruction down on you while you huddle in the bathtub or under the stairs.  And what do you know, not 30 minutes before this very episode of HAPPY DAYS aired, the weather alert sirens went off, the radio upstairs and the one on the T.V.  I'm pretty sure it was just a warning, because my father remained in his office upstairs working. However, seeing the names of surrounding counties scrolling at the bottom of the screen, and seeing the sky turn black outside my window while the kids from Milwaukee are pelted by debris on screen…well… I wasn't familiar with the term "surreal" at the time, but I knew what it felt like.

I'm not scared of tornadoes like I was as a child anymore, and I'll never think of them the same way.  They have passed beyond reality for me, into the realm of myth.  Now, a tornado watch/warning is something that piques my interest, like a good ghost story or stumbling across an old T.V. show on cable late at night.  I can't not watch.

Another terrifying childhood memory just came to me. (I say "just" with the implication that it came to me hours ago, and I've just now crawled back out from under my desk). It's from… (wait for it)… JAWS 3.   I'm sure everyone has their traumatic JAWS moments, and I hope I find I'm not alone in being affected by the third chapter in the saga. Especially considering that the scene in question is one of the most laughable scenes ever filmed. Maybe it's like SUPERMAN III: JAWS 3(D) is the cinematic equivalent of a steaming cup of liquid poo, but it came out at the right time for many of our generation, and was played frequently enough on cable as to be caught out of context and to stick in our stupid little minds. 'Cause looking at it now, this movie is b-a-d, craptastic, but when I was young and impressionable, this following scene was responsible for many moments of terror. Any time I was in the pool, this is what would flash in my mind:

Awful, right? But, there's something so eerie and unsettling about it, too. The way the shark just kinda glides towards you–not moving, just approaching. Almost like the gentlemen in that BUFFY episode, "Hush." It's so calm and malevolent and unnatural that it almost approaches the level of high art: an animal behaving in a very mechanical, false, alien way. (And I'm sure that's what the filmmakers were going for. I mean, they had LOU GOSSETT, JR., after all, so it's already practically an art flick.) Every time I was in a body of water, I would picture that shark slowly getting closer, and I could struggle and swim as fast as I could, but it would just. Eventually. Get. There.

Earlier: Nat's not-so-fond memories of the VHS Cover of Fright Night and "Maneater" by Hall & Oates.

When I was about six or so, I was playing in the living room and my brother started watching STEPHEN KING's IT– the miniseries starring TIM CURRY. I asked my brother if I should leave, and he said, "If you want to." I decided to stay, and watched through the opening bit alright, and then it showed a little girl playing while her mom goes inside the house. She then hears goofy laughter and sees a clown appearing behind flapping sheets while spooky music plays. The next scene showed her being loaded into an ambulance with a white sheet over her face. If you want more than a description, here's the scene:

I don't know if the rest of the movie would have traumatized me, because I ran away. What I did afterwards or where I went escapes me. I'm not afraid of clowns, although to this day I still get a bit anxious every time I see TIM CURRY.

The year was 1979, my Dad was working in Atlanta, so my Mom and I spent the summer with him. A great time. One of the best summers I ever had. Lots of cartoons (first time I ever saw the RANKIN & BASS "King Kong" toon), Space Giants, 6 Flags, that DC Comics live action thing with the Justice League. I made friends with a kid in the next apartment, a friendship that ended abruptly when we argued over which was cooler, X Wings or Y Wings (I preferred the more rugged Y Wing). A great summer all told. Except for one thing…

1979 was the year of PROPHECY.

I was a Famous Monsters kid, I loved monsters. I grew up with THEM, TARANTULA, many HARRYHAUSEN films, the CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, PETER CUSHING, CHRISTOPHER LEE and HAMMER. GODZILLA was my personal hero, and now we had a film that billed itself not as a monster movie but as "THE MONSTER MOVIE." The incredible print ads featured the three step evolution of a hideous thing in a womb sac, the slug lines read "Don't move, don't breathe, she is alive, and she will find you." The last picture was of a monstrous, toothy, deformed thing that just screamed, "cool monster." It was supposed to be about some kind of creature spawned by pollution, a mutant grizzly bear I heard. Good Lord, I had to see this.

Be careful what you wish for.

I begged the folks to take me, and we settled into a comfy theater for a night of monster goodness. By the time the lumberjack put the chainsaw near ARMAND ASANTE's face, I began to grow very uneasy. Maybe, just maybe, this would be too intense for me. I started to squirm. I had no clue it would get worse. Momma Bear's attack on the campers seriously scared me. Although we never got too good a look at her, it was obvious that this was one seriously messed up creature. Not cool by any means, but utterly disgusting. The exploding sleeping bag scene has gotten a lot of derision over the years, but to my 8-year-old eyes, it was quite nasty. It only gets worse when they talk later about the evidence of the dead campers, evidence that was at the hospital in buckets! Ick. It was becoming plainly obvious; PROPHECY was not what I expected. Then it happened. The scene that burned itself into my retinas like the stare from a Gorgon. I closed my eyes as quickly as I could, but it registered, it was too late. My childhood was over, at 8 years of age no less. The scene that scarred me for life and began years and years of nightmares.

The mutant baby bear in the trap.

The sight of that uber-disgusting, slimy, deformed thing, squealing in agony was too much for me to take. Up there, on that screen in Atlanta, was the single most disgusting, disturbing, grisly sight I ever saw. I could take no more, this was simply too much. I begged my folks to take me home. Dad was ticked off (the old, "we payed our money" line), but Mom (thank God for Mom, God bless Mom!) overrode him. She hated the film anyway and could have cared less to stick around. Besides, no way was her baby boy going to be traumatized by this damned thing (well, too late for that, but you know). We went home, the fate of the characters and the beasts a mystery to me for many years. I always felt that PROPHECY's PG rating was a fluke. This was an R film if ever there was one, and had it been given it's true rating, I would never have asked my folks to take me.

As I grew up, I suffered from many a PROPHECY induced nightmare. The bears, or some variation thereof haunted the old dreamscape. I still have them from time to time. The kicker is this, in the ensuing years; I have become one of the films only supporters. Yes, it is heavy handed at times, but it has a good message about pollution and how it affects us and the land. It's scary, well shot and acted. And the FX work is in no way sub par. Maybe I remembered that terrified 8 year old in terror, cowering in the seat, maybe that colors my perception, but I always rise to defend TOM BURMAN's creatures when folks slag them off (as an aside, I must note that BURMAN provided superb effects for a film that is a major favorite of mine, THE BEAST WITHIN). I have just about seen all of the film too. I can actually look at the main bear. I don't like her, still find her quite upsetting, but can look at her. But not the baby. When PROPHECY plays on TV, and if I catch it, I look away, change the channel or cover my eyes. As a grown man nearing 40, I still cannot let the fear go and look at the stinking thing. Now I have seen some of the most disturbing, disgusting, upsetting, bloody, gory horror films of all time in the past 30 years. Movies that make many folks react the same way I reacted to PROPHECY. I watched them without batting an eyelash, loved every minute of them, and added them to the DVD collection. But PROPHECY cut me too deep. The scar is still there and will never heal. All due to a mutant bear squealing in a trap.

The summer ended on a high note. THE BLOB played on TV one night. Thank God for STEVE McQUEEN! But PROPHECY was not done with me yet. Back home in Charlotte, my brother and sister came back from the mall. They promised to pick me up some comic books or something. They came back with Fangoria #2… cover story and feature?

PROPHECY.

I cried for about hour after that.

To read more by David, be sure to check out Confessions of an Anxious/Depressive.