"The most obscure Disney film" is a creepypasta originally posted on r/nosleep by Reddit user SummerAndTinkles.
The story involves a narrator reminiscing over an animated Disney film they saw as a child called The Pathway to Hell, which is so obscure that there is nothing about it on the internet. The film is dark and frightening enough to make the “Night on Bald Mountain” segment from Fantasia seem lighthearted in comparison, which makes one wonder if there's a reason it's been erased from history.
The original story can be found here
. It proved to be popular enough that multiple readings can be found on YouTube.
This story contains examples of
- Ambiguous Gender: The narrator is unsure of whether the Devil in the film is male or female.
- Art Shift: The first few minutes are described as resembling the typical cheery Disney style, but Hell is described as looking like it was drawn by Stephen Gammell.
- Clothing Damage: The girl protagonist has her dress ripped off by the first demon she encounters, leaving her in her underwear for the majority of the film.
- Eats Babies: The Kitten Eater is a monster that gruesomely devours meowing kittens, and tries to eat the girl protagonist.
- Evil Sounds Deep: The Kitten Eater's voice is described as lower than any real life human voice.
- Eyeless Face: The first demon that the girl encounters in Hell in the film is described as being eyeless.
- Fat Bastard: The Kitten Eater is described as being horrifically obese, to the point that he outsizes the chair he's sitting in.
- Forbidden Fruit: The two children in the film are told not to visit the well on the far side of the farm by their grandfather. They do so anyway, resulting in the boy's head being stolen by demons.
- Hell: The main setting of the film, described as being mainly gray with reds and blues scattered throughout.
- Hell Is That Noise: All of the demons' voices are horrific, but the Devil's takes the cake, being described as sounding like the screaming of a red fox.
- Keep Circulating the Tapes: In-Universe, the narrator mentions that The Pathway to Hell is extremely obscure, and wonders if their copy is the only one in existence.
- Losing Your Head: One of the child characters has his head stolen by demons, but both the head and the body are still alive independently of each other, with the head being able to speak, and the body being able to walk.
- No Ending: The narrator's mother saw how frightened they were watching it and so stopped the film and took it back to the store before they could see how it ended. With how obscure the movie is, it's unlikely we'll ever learn how exactly it concludes.
- Off with His Head!: The inciting incident of the film is a demon emerging from the well and stealing the boy's head, which prompts the girl to travel into hell to get it back. Both the boy's head and body are still alive, with the body wandering around back on the farm, trying to
- Satan: This film's version of Satan is a skeletal corpse-like being with fangs and an Ambiguous Gender.
- When Trees Attack: The trees in Hell resemble hands, which bend over and try to grab the young girl protagonist.
