History Main / NightmareFuelColoringBook

If a CreepyChild draws pictures, they will be this trope. If it's the MonsterOfTheWeek the child has been drawing, expect the Nightmare Fuel Coloring Book to come in handy when the heroes come along - after all, now they've got a wall full of pictures of their enemy.

** A more realistic (and possibly more horrific because of it) from ''Law & Order'' where a girl draws a picture of herself on a sports field, with an imposing and scary man standing off to the side in a football jersey. Initially, they think it's [[spoiler: the coach- her uncle- who's been molesting her, but it turns out he was falsely accused and loses his job because of it. It was actually one of the high-school students on his team.]]
** One episode had a little boy who witnessed [[spoiler:his father]] bash his stepmother's head in with a lamp. He trusts Olivia the most, so she's the one who sees the picture he drew of the attack. Lots of red crayon there...
** There's the episode where Benson and Stabler are called in because a little girl is drawing some rather ''interesting'' pictures, and her teacher is concerned. Turns out she saw her (underage) big brother and her stepmom doing it.
** One episode with a young bullied boy with apparent split personality disorder, who draws a comic-style picture of basketball-playing kids lying dead on the ground with a shadowy figure holding a gun standing over them. The scary guy is "Zoltar", the kid's alter ego that he insists killed the boys when [[spoiler:it was the kid himself in response to intense bullying that he couldn't take anymore.]]
** One of the saddest example from SVU: a little boy who [[spoiler:accidentally]] shot a little girl on the playground at school, draws himself while being interviewed in the squad room. When he's asked what he thinks should happen to him, he draws flames engulfing him because he believes he should burn in hell.
** One girl had her throat slit but lived. She couldn't talk afterwards, so she drew her attacker. She drew the Devil. [[spoiler:It gets revealed that the man who attacked her was just nicknamed the Devil.]]
** An episode of ''Series/LawAndOrderCriminalIntent'' did an interesting variation. Creepy childlike drawings at a crime scene lead the detectives toward a suspect with a child's room in his house, but no proof the man actually ''has'' a child. He actually had a dissociative identity disorder and did the drawings while in the personality of a child, but committed the crime in an adult personality, and didn't have a clear memory of what was going on.

** One episode had a little boy who witnessed [[spoiler:his father]] bash his mother's head in with a lamp. He trusts Olivia the most, so she's the one who sees the picture he drew of the attack. Lots of red crayon there...

** One episode with a young bullied boy with apparent split personality disorder, who draws a picture of basketball-playing kids lying dead on the ground with a shadowy figure holding a gun standing over them. The scary guy is "Zoltar", the kid's alter ego that he insists killed the boys when [[spoiler:it was the kid himself in response to intense bullying that he couldn't take anymore.]]

* The trope appeared a few times in ''Series/{{Millennium}}'', most notably in the episode "Wide Open". A little girl watched a man murder her mother and father, and she drew the scene many times, with one iteration giving the "bad man" a large red X across his chest. [[spoiler:It turns out she recognized the killer as the crossing guard from school. The "X" represented the lines of the reflective safety-gear he wore.]]

* From ''{{Webcomic/SaturdayMorningBreakfastCereal}}'' - [[http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=606#comic loosely classifiable as an inversion?]]

Compare RoomFullOfCrazy, NightmareFuelStationAttendant. Also related to TroublingUnchildlikeBehaviour.

* ''VideoGame/{{Omori}}'' keeps a sketchbook in White Space with various disturbing drawings that change over the course of the story, eventually foreshadowing Something's true nature and its effects on Sunny and Basil.

* WebVideo/Fred: The titular character gets into trouble at school for drawing bad pictures.

** Speaking of art therapy, [[http://radaronline.com/photos/michael-jackson-secret-drawings-lauryn-hunter-art-therapist-los-angeles-joe-brat-florida-analysis/photo/816201/ these]] recently released drawings by the late Music/MichaelJackson, while not quite nightmare fuel, are definitely disturbing.

* In the book ''Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ'', there was a story about a mother and her son who were abducted by the mother's ex-boyfriend. The kidnapper made the kid hide under a blanket while he beat the mother to death. Later, a psychologist asked the son to draw a picture; the result was a race car driver with a pair of humongous eyes.

* In ''Manga/YuruYuri'', Chinatsu's coloring book shows her TrueColors. Unlike most other examples in this page, this is PlayedForLaughs. Also, Chinatsu isn't a kid, she's in junior high.

* The somewhat unusual 1988 psychological fantasy/horror film ''Paperhouse'' is in some respects a strong example of this trope- the plot is based around the drawings of the lead character (an 11-year-old girl), and the strange events associated with them. In other respects, it's less typical, as the drawings aren't horrifically gory or scary in themselves, so much as they're disturbing in the context of the rest of the film.

* In the ''Film/SilentHill'' movie, Sharon draws many pictures of Silent Hill.

* The mountain from ''Film/CloseEncountersOfTheThirdKind''.

* ''VideoGame/PowerProKunPocket7'': If the player is defeated in the baseball match against Red, the protagonist and his team are turned into [[BrainwashedAndCrazy braindead baseball lovers]] to conceal the terrible truth behind the Pocket Heroes. The game portrays the state of mind as a rather creepy off-model crayon sketch, with a [[GettingSmiliesPaintedOnYourSoul "HAPPINESS"]] caption and to the sound of a sinister bell. This scene made it to the [[https://twitter.com/pawa_app573/status/1364862699839000580 2021 adaptation in the mobile app]] on account of how infamous it was among fans.

* ''VideoGame/PowerProKunPocket7'': If the player is defeated in the baseball match against Red, the protagonist and his team are turned into [[BrainwashedAndCrazy braindead baseball lovers]] to conceal the terrible truth behind the Pocket Heroes. The game portrays the state of mind as a rather creepy off-model crayon sketch, with a [[GettingSmilesPaintedOnYourSoul "HAPPINESS"]] caption and to the sound of a sinister bell. This scene made it to the [[https://twitter.com/pawa_app573/status/1364862699839000580 2021 adaptation in the mobile app]] on account of how infamous it was among fans.

* ''VideoGame/PowerProKunPocket7'': If the player is defeated in the baseball match against Red, the protagonist and his team are [[AndIMustScream imprisoned inside a sketchbook]] to conceal the terrible truth behind the Pocket Heroes. The game then displays the rather creepy off-model sketch in question to the sound of a sinister bell. This scene made it to the [[https://twitter.com/pawa_app573/status/1364862699839000580 2021 adaptation in the mobile app]] on account of how infamous it was among fans.

* ''VideoGame/PowerProKunPocket7'': If the player is defeated in the baseball match against the Pocket Heroes, the protagonist and his team are [[AndIMustScream imprisoned inside a sketchbook]] to conceal the terrible truth of the heroes. The game then displays the rather creepy off-model sketch in question to the sound of a sinister bell. This scene made it to the [[https://twitter.com/pawa_app573/status/1364862699839000580 2021 adaptation in the mobile app]] on account of how infamous it was among us.

* ''FanFic/WithPearlAndRubyGlowing'' shows [[WesternAnimation/MonstersInc Boo]] and [[{{WesternAnimation/Villainous 5.0.5.]] (here a human child) drawing pictures of the abuse they endured.

* ''{{Webcomic/Homestuck}}''[='=]s popular "stabdads" AU gives us "[[http://aeleusienzo.deviantart.com/gallery/?q=tavros#/art/Daddy-s-work-trash-279297352?_sid=2a609d24 Daddy's work trash]]".

* ''WesternAnimation/ABugsLife'': The ant children present the "warrior bugs" with a mural showing them violently fighting the grasshoppers in an extremely bloody battle, followed by a school play where all the characters die dramatically. The "warrior bugs", who are in fact circus performers who had no idea they had been mistaken for warriors until this moment are horrified.