19 Moments From Children's TV That Were Actually Really Fucking Traumatising
"I had a dream he murdered someone and I always believed it happened in an actual episode."
We recently asked members of the BuzzFeed Community to tell us the TV shows that scarred them as children. Here are some of the best responses.
1. A Looney Tunes cartoon where Tweety falls into Dr Jekyll's formula and becomes a Mr Hyde–style monster.
"It's almost ridiculous to think about it now. Totally creeped me out for months!"
2. An episode of Pingu where Pingu has a nightmare that he is being chased by a giant walrus.
"His smile unnerved me so much that I hid behind a pillow on the sofa and for years after I would watch Pingu from behind a pillow in case he appeared again.
"To this day he still scares me. Even searching for a picture to add to this message almost brought me to tears."
"We had it on video from before it was banned so my sisters and I saw it quite a few times (and were scared half to death every time)."
– Rosemary, Facebook
3. Whenever the bear in Bear in the Big Blue House put his nose close to the camera.
"I’m not lying when I say this, but in every episode of Bear in the Big Blue House when Bear put his nose on the screen was a NIGHTMARE for me when I was like 2 years old."
"He used to sniff the screen and say “I can smell you!” My sister used to scream and run away shouting 'turn it off, turn it off!'"
4. The Sesame Street sketch where Bert thinks Ernie has been taken away by Martians, Ernie reassures him that he's fine, then Martians come through the wall.
"The thought of anything, even Muppets, entering my bedroom through the wall, terrified me."
5. The fact that in Teletubbies televisions light up in their stomachs and feature children waving out.
"The very fact that they had televisions in their stomachs on which they watched children was disturbing enough."
6. Oh, and a giant mechanical lion and bear that rolled around Tellytubby mountain on a large set of wheels.
"It was nightmare fuel."
7. When Arnold has a dream in Hey Arnold that he's an old man, and then sees his grandfather decomposing at the back of the bus.
"His jaw fell off. I used to make myself watch when this episode came on but it never got any less scary!"
– rvtaylor
8. The appearance of the Green-Eyed Monster in the usually quaint cartoon The Berenstain Bears.
"I used to LOVE this show, until one day when I was about 6 and saw this episode. I still haven't watched that show since."
"I couldn’t watch the show for months because of constant nightmares."
9. The style of animation and voice of Angela in the Canadian cartoon Angela Anaconda.
"WHY IS THE REALISTIC-YET-TOTALLY-NOT ANIMATION STYLE SO TERRIFYING?
And Angela’s voice is like nails in a chalkboard."
– kaonab
10. The Mr Smartypants "Dance in Smarty Pants" song and puppet from the educational show Between the Lions.
"There was just something about how he looked that always creeped me out, not to mention his chorus of backup singers."
11. Truth or Scare, a kids' spooky stories show, and in particular the episode about an invisible ghost that taunted a man until he died.
"The Bell Witch is only depicted through sound, a voice unattached to a physical presence, which meant that she could be anywhere, at any time. Absolutely not okay."
– ryanperr
12. The Demon Headmaster, a British kids' show about a headmaster who would hypnotise his students every time he took off his glasses.
"Even the music sends chills down my spine even now!"
13. The absolutely huge lion who managed to play the guitar from the 1970s show Animal Kwackers.
"I remember hiding behind furniture and wailing. I'm not far off doing that again now, tbh."
– @Rhodri
14. Goosebumps, and in particular the episode where the puppets come alive and get increasingly bigger.
"To this day I don't watch films with dolls that come alive."
– lajaaaam
15. The "Attack of the Slime Monster" episode of the US kids' series Ghostwriter.
"It scared my little brother so much that I got in trouble for letting him watch a show that was on PBS!"
16. The episode of the Canadian kids' show Mr Meaty where Parker has a tapeworm taken out of him.
"Recently I reminded a bunch of my friends of that show and when I showed them a picture they all remembered at once and had the same reaction."
"Mr Meaty gave me so many nightmares."
"In an episode one character deep-fried their own hand, the other character ate it. Hot mess."
17. The Chuckle Brothers, two British slapstick comedians who in ChuckleVision always used to say "to me" and "to you" to each other.
"They did and still do give me nightmares. They chase me around a castle."
18. Every single one of the animal deaths in the super-bleak European children's television show The Animals of Farthing Wood. (Watch the video – it is so grim.)
View this video on YouTube
"That show was BRUTAL."
– Joanna, Facebook
19. And finally, Mr Blobby, a giant British monster who would smash everything up while shouting: "BLOBBY BLOBBY BLOBBY."
"For those lucky people out there that are unaware of Mr Blobby, he’s a British children’s TV personality from the ’90s. HE IS SCARY AF."
"Mine was Mr Blobby mainly because once he jumped out of a wardrobe."
"I had a dream he murdered someone and I always believed it happened in an actual episode."
"I had a really irrational fear that Mr Blobby lived in my toilet when I was younger."
– 1488
"How anyone could have ever thought this would be funny or entertaining for CHILDREN must have been out of their mind."