posted December 31, 2013 01:42 AM            

quote:

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Originally posted by PixieJane:
When I was 9-10 I saw Return to Oz which showed a horrid asylum where Dorothy was going to be given shock treatments, among other things. And it got worse from there. I had nightmares for a long time of the headless witch after me while her bodiless heads shrieked when they saw me so the body knew where to look in order to steal my head. Still, when I saw it again as an adult it was too absurd to scare me. Here, the scene that seared itself into my brain:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnIdI8iiK1M

Can't forget this from WFRR?:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADrojCw6amM

I was 5 when I saw that in the cinema. I came real close to freaking out. I think if I'd been alone I would've ran.

But there's a book series called Everworld that came out roughly 2000 by Applegate and published by Scholastic (children's books). No one at Scholastic could've read those books or they'd have never put them in the children's section (though Young Adult would be good). In addition to a great many political and pop cultural references (which date it and which most little kids aren't going to get) it got so intense and gruesome that I, an adult, was getting scared reading them (and sometimes I could even smell the blood and reeking corpses from the descriptions). And there weren't only sexual references (including homosexuality) but issues of child molesting, castration, and a ruthless sorceress leaving her sister to be raped by trolls just to be cruel (not that such succeeds) are included. Dysfunctional families, teen drinking, white supremacists, and OCD (that gets cruelly manipulated by the sorceress so that the one afflicted with it goes from washing the dirt from his hands to clawing his own face to a bloody mess "to get the dirt off") are other aspects that those who labeled it for children missed. Still, I liked it, though I think it was closer to Stephen King than Animorphs. And so did the children because I've never known a library that could keep the entire series for long before the books were stolen (and typically the most disturbing ones in the series). I don't know if I could've handled it as a child, however (though I can see why many other young kids would love it, both my generation and the one it came out for).

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posted December 31, 2013 05:45 PM            

Anyway, even read any poems like these?

The Ghoul

The gruesome ghoul, the grizzly ghoul,
Without the slightest noise,
Waits patiently beside the school
To feast on girls and boys.

He lunges fiercely through the air
As they come out to play,
Then grabs a couple by the hair
And drags them far away.

He cracks their bones, and snaps their backs,
And squeezes out their lungs.
He chews their thumbs like candy snacks,
And pulls apart their tongues.

He slices their stomachs and bites their hearts and
Tears their flesh to shreds.
He swallows their toes like toasted tarts,
And gobbles down their heads.

Fingers, elbows, hands and knees,
And arms and legs and feet.
He eats them with delight and ease,
For every part's a treat.

And when the gruesome, grizzly ghoul
Has nothing left to chew,
He hurries to another school,
And waits, perhaps, for you.

--Jack Prelutsky, The Ghoul, from Nightmares: Poems to Trouble Your Sleep

The Zombie

Upon your bed you sleep in pain,
For nightmares swirl within your brain.
You waken with a fearful start
As horror grips your heart.
You sense a presence standing there,
And all at once it meets your stare,
A zombie waits within your room,
And with it dwells your doom.

And you shiver, and you scream!
And you hope it's all a dream as the Zombie nears your bed.

The Zombie, spawn of voodoo's charms,
Has come to take you in its arms.
It longs to crush, it yearns to clutch,
And lethal is its touch.
It does not live, yet is not dead.
Two sockets burn within its head.
It does not see, it does not hear,
It does not heed you fear.

And you shiver, and you scream!
And you hope it's all a dream as the Zombie nears your bed.

Closer, Closer to your bed,
Closer comes this thing undead,
It nears you at a steady pace,
And oh, its awful face.
Closer, Closer, Closer still
The Zombie nears with icy will.
Its face remains expressionless,
As you feel its cold caress.

And you shiver, and you scream!
And you hope it's all a dream as the Zombie nears your bed.

posted February 11, 2014 11:20 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by PixieJane:
When I was 9-10 I saw Return to Oz which showed a horrid asylum where Dorothy was going to be given shock treatments, among other things. And it got worse from there. I had nightmares for a long time of the headless witch after me while her bodiless heads shrieked when they saw me so the body knew where to look in order to steal my head. Still, when I saw it again as an adult it was too absurd to scare me. Here, the scene that seared itself into my brain:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnIdI8iiK1M

Can't forget this from WFRR?:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADrojCw6amM

I was 5 when I saw that in the cinema. I came real close to freaking out. I think if I'd been alone I would've ran.

But there's a book series called Everworld that came out roughly 2000 by Applegate and published by Scholastic (children's books). No one at Scholastic could've read those books or they'd have never put them in the children's section (though Young Adult would be good). In addition to a great many political and pop cultural references (which date it and which most little kids aren't going to get) it got so intense and gruesome that I, an adult, was getting scared reading them (and sometimes I could even smell the blood and reeking corpses from the descriptions). And there weren't only sexual references (including homosexuality) but issues of child molesting, castration, and a ruthless sorceress leaving her sister to be raped by trolls just to be cruel (not that such succeeds) are included. Dysfunctional families, teen drinking, white supremacists, and OCD (that gets cruelly manipulated by the sorceress so that the one afflicted with it goes from washing the dirt from his hands to clawing his own face to a bloody mess "to get the dirt off") are other aspects that those who labeled it for children missed. Still, I liked it, though I think it was closer to Stephen King than Animorphs. And so did the children because I've never known a library that could keep the entire series for long before the books were stolen (and typically the most disturbing ones in the series). I don't know if I could've handled it as a child, however (though I can see why many other young kids would love it, both my generation and the one it came out for).

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Never seen return of oz but yeah, that's pretty disturbing.

posted July 09, 2015 11:10 PM            

quote:

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Gammel's black and white monsters and images of exploding spider nests burrowing under your skin make children everywhere cry. They're beautiful and horrifying at the same time (and still haunt some of my most spectacular fever dreams even to this day). But now, to celebrate the 30th anniversary of this book trilogy, the publishers have decided to take a giant dump on Gammell's spooky legacy and replace his illustrations.

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Example:

posted October 06, 2015 01:46 AM            

Zoobilee Zoo used to creep me out..

posted October 31, 2016 01:40 AM            

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Most parents encourage their children to overcome their fears; not transform them into reality. That’s not the case for Joshua Hoffine, who spent years bringing to life the nightmares of his children.

Hoffine, based in Kansas City, Mo., and a self-proclaimed “Horror Photographer,” is interested in the psychology of fear. In his project “After Dark, My Sweet,” Hoffine’s surreal and staged images render these fears visible with the “visual grammar of a child.” Through elaborate sets, costumes, makeup and fog machines, Hoffine’s children act out these terrifying scenes in front of his camera.

Hoffine wanted his work to capture the perspective and vulnerability of being a child. “We are born with certain inherent and instinctual fears,” Hoffine told In Sight. “The images stress danger and depict an amoral world where innocence is under constant threat.”

His new book, “Horror Photography,” illustrates this dangerous world with visceral intensity. In Hoffine’s words: “The experience of horror resides in this confrontation with uncertainty. Horror tells us that our belief in security is delusional, and that the monsters are all around us.” The book is accepting preorders after it was funded by a successful Kickstarter this summer, and will be available in early 2017.

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