There are four things that truly terrify me. Chill me to the bone:
1. The thought that one day MICHAEL JACKSON's children might breed with BRITNEY SPEARS' kids.
Okay, really I'm just kidding there. It's really three things:
1. Fast speeds. I hate them. I get panic attack when attempting to drive on freeways – when someone else is driving I'm okay, however. I refuse to go on roller coasters. I don't even like to watch car races. I can't drive over 55.
2. Those ear bugs from STAR TREK 2: THE WRATH OF KHAN. *shudders* To this day I can barely stand to watch any scene involving them. I can still remember hiding under the blanket at the movie theater when we saw that and my brothers making fun of me for it. I still worry that bugs will crawl into my ear and take over my brain – and I'm 34 years old!
3. This one ending scene of an episode of TOM & JERRY. Jerry makes friends with a baby duck Tom wants to eat. The end of that episode shows Jerry and the duckling at the beach when suddenly Tom POPS out of nowhere and slams a bucket over them. He's laughing evilly as his head lowers down and he starts to raise the bucket just enough to get them. That's the end.
Even as a small child who still thought that babies came from the stork, I never thought Tom would actually eat them. No, I thought of my parents' warnings of strangers and their BAD TOUCHES. To beware of the man in the trench coat offering little girls and boys candy. In that moment Tom, the ever hungry and thwarted cat, became the Evil Stranger looking to kidnap children to sate his unnatural lust.
Wow – my parents really screwed me up there, didn't they?
Tom and Jerry never gave me any scares. I did find that scene in "Wrath of Kahn" with the "ant lion" coming out of Chekhov's ear a bit sickening with the blood. I did notice how fake the ear was. The original series freaked some of us out here. I have a Traumafession about "The Empath" and "The Lights of Zetar" while another person commented on those aliens that attach themselves on one's back. Yep, the Trek Universe can be scary for us kids!
First of all – OOOO! LAURA PALMER AVATAR!
Okay, now that I got that bit of Twin Peaks Geek out of my system…. (though I do often find myself wonder who would win in a fight, Bob The Skull from The Dresden Files books or Bob The Evil Spirit from Twin Peaks.)
I was a little kid when I saw the ear bug scene. I mean still wearing footie pjs little. I was the one who wanted to see the movie, however, as I had a huge crush on Mr. Spock.
And like I said with the Tom & Jerry – I was actually thinking of Tom as "The Evil Pedophile In The Trench Coat" my parents always warned me about. That laugh…. *shudders* Still creeps me out.
I was in my footie pjs when I saw those original series Star Trek episodes (early 70's) which would explain my traumas with that era. I was a teen when "Wrath of Kahn" came out. I guess it didn't freak me out that much as I was fresh from a string of traumas starting in 1977 ("Suspiria" TV trailer) right up to the Grady Twins in Kubrick's "The Shinning". I was ages 10 to 13 in that time frame.
The only animation that really gave me the creeps was the scene in "Pinocchio" where the cigar smokers turned into donkeys (I think that's been mentioned here by others several times).
Oh, BOB from "Twin Peaks" has the distinction of being the only fictional character to have given me nightmares (think walking by a mirror and seeing his reflection instead of yours) and I was in my early to mid 20's when the TV show & movie were out. Oh, my real name is Bob so I guess my Laura Palmer Doppelganger avatar means I'm here in drag.
One Tom and Jerry episode really got me angry. It was the one in the French Revolution, where Tom was the king's guard…and ends up getting guillotined! (we only see the blade descending) Did not care for that.
See, I've had a lot of nightmares about fictional characters. Lore from Star Trek: The Next Generation shoots me with a phaser while in the middle of a snow storm. I get kidnapped by some guest of the week bad guy from The X-Files. I get raped by Dracula. That sort of thing.
However, I've had dreams involving Freddy Kruger and I just laugh at him. He just does not scare me. In fact, the last nightmare I had involving him I was both a vampire and a descendant of Lilith, first wife of Adam, concubine to demons – and I beat the crap out of Freddy.
The Tom & Jerry with the "bad end" is "Southbound Duckling," found in full here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITatvGX51Tw
The one where Tom gets the guillotine (well off-screen, of course, but still pretty nasty in every respect they could get away with) is "The Two Mouseketeers." It's also on YouTube, but you have your choice of lousy aspect ratio, or annoying video-length watermark.
But the perfect cartoon "bad end?" That would be "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" acted out by CGI Yogi Bear and Boo-Boo. It is awesome parody, but you have to watch the climactic scene from "Jesse James" first to enjoy it fully.
"Jesse James" death scene:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPIivI1K6f0
"CGI Yogi Bear" parody (shut off the annotations):
We happened to watch the T & J duck episode New Years eve on my wife's new phone.
Ohhh yes, the Wrath of Khan ear bugs! I saw that scene for the first time when I was about four or five and it scared the ever lovin bejabbers out of me. It's disturbed me ever since *shudder*.