Where to begin?…..
I guess I'll go from least terrifying to couldn't-sleep-for-weeks petrification!!!!
Number one on my list has got to be none other than "Beaker" from THE MUPPETS. As a young lad growing up in the late ‘70s/early ‘80s I would wait all week for the latest installment of everyone's favourite Sunday night puppet extravaganza, THE MUPPETS. But as I sure as I am writing this, I would actually say silent prayers all week long that "Beaker" would NOT make an appearance that coming Sunday….because as soon as I would see him enter the screen, with his incessant "MEEP MEEP MEEP" and beaker-shaped head in full view, I would run screaming for the hills….of my bedroom. The fear has long passed, but the memory will always remain of that disturbing little scientist's assistant!
Number two is from ANOTHER JIM HENSON classic (what's up with me and Jim?!?!)….FRAGGLE ROCK! But this is only one specific episode where the big giants who eat Fraggles ate some weird pumpkin or cabbage and their heads disappeared. Can you imagine a 5 year old seeing a decapitated giant stumbling around? I had nights after that of sheer terror, imagining a decapitated Fraggle eater bursting out of my closest yelling "AAAAH where's my head?!?!?!"
And number three is a scene from a slasher film whose name and actors have completely disappeared from my memory…but there IS a scene with the formidable bald mutant from the original THE HILLS HAVE EYES and WEIRD SCIENCE that left me completely numb and horrified for a good decade….what I can remember is a young woman in a school(?) or hospital(?) and she is being chased. But she's not being chased by a young hot MICKEY ROURKE or ANDREW McCARTHY….no….she's being chased by the bald mutant who's got either a prison outfit on, or a hospital gown….or something…and he has a chainsaw….and he's hell-bent on using her as firewood. I proceeded to leave the room faster than the spinning teeth of his saw…..please help me find the name of this one????
Thanks guys, I absolutely LOVE your site, and have gone back on a weekly basis to check on all of my fellow kindertaumatics and their traumafessions…..
Cheers for now,
Eskimoposh
UNK SEZ: Hmm, I have a feeling that MICHAEL BERRYMAN probably has grabbed a chainsaw in more than one film, but in VOYAGE OF THE ROCK ALIENS he actually played a character named "Chainsaw" (pictured above) who escapes from a mental hospital. The obscurity of V.O.T.R.A. makes me have my doubts though. Another possibility is 1978's THE FIFTH FLOOR; in that movie he plays another mental patient but having not seen it, it's only a guess. Can anyone out there verify if it's either of these two stabs in the dark? Even if I'm wrong on both counts I have to say both films look like must see viewing to me (V.O.T.R.A. even stars a pre-NIGHTBREED CRAIG SHEFFER and RUTH GORDON). Let's hope they both get the DVD treatment A.S.A.P.
NOTE: Read more about VOYAGE OF THE ROCK ALIENS at RADIOACTIVE REVIEWS and check out the clips below if you dare!
Afraid I can't help with the NTT, but I gotta say, Jim Henson managed to disturb me greatly (and doubtless traumatized many a younger viewer) with the final episode of "Dinosaurs!"
It shouldn't have come as a surprise; we all know what happened to the thunderlizards, and in retrospect it was the perfect way to hammer home the show's theme…but the horrific atmosphere of impending annihilation, the unfulfilled hopes for a cop-out happy ending, and the sheer inescapable GUILT of a man (well, reptilian man-of-the-house) facing his children knowing he has doomed them AND his entire race…
I hated that ending.
I loved that ending.
Gonna go cry and puke for a while now.
I know, it was so sad! 🙁
But Beaker's had some great moments-
His duet of "This is Me" with Demi Lovato
His supermodel girlfriend in "Letters to Santa"
Getting cloned in the Mac Davis episode of "The Muppet Show"
Helping Beauregard build the sets because he figures it would be much safer than being a muppet guinea pig for Dr. Bunsen….it's not.
Getting stranded with George Takei after their "Star Trek Cruise" liner sinks.
Personally, I think the big monsters were scary. And it's strange because it wasn't until that episode of "The Cosby Show" that it scared me. (And I was about 11…probably because it was unexpected.) But I'm getting over it. I can still watch my season sets and Muppet Vision 3D without getting TOO scared.
Ancient post, but the Michael Barryman scene in question IS from "Voyage of the Rock Aliens." During the big school dance, Barryman (who's recently escaped from the local asylum along with a fella who's hooked up to a breathing machine) stalks (middle-aged) teenager Allison LaPlaca through her high school – but just as he's about to reduce her to firewood his chainsaw goes on the fritz. Instead of running for her life, tomboyish La Placa decides to help him fix it and the two quickly fall in love. Ripping off everything from "Beach Party" to "Halloween" (randomly and often incoherently), the Curb-Records-produced "Voyage of the Rock Aliens" is the GREATEST '80s cult b-movie musical-comedy that nobody's ever heard of. Considering your love of completely bizarre and obscure movies, Unkle Lancifer, I'm surprised you're not familiar with it… though it's traumatic for all the wrong reasons!