Nightmare Fuel Discussion - Television Tropes & Idioms

kalessaradan: I didn't mean for my artwork to be taken down from this page. If it works for this page, please use it, all I ask is that credit is given for my artistic property.

From YKTTW

Violet: Do we really need that picture? It is a good example of nightmare fuel and I don't really want to see any at the top of the page.

furbearingbrick: replaced with an image of Backbeard, which is a bit less nightmare fuel-ish.

Tacitus: Okay, I've managed to cobble together the formatting to make the (latest) page picture align on the right, so that it no longer screws with the bullet list underneath. I also tossed the "When you see it, you'll shit bricks" caption, which is used to refer to a disturbing optical illusion or hidden image, not, for example, an abstract blue eyeball thing. And the two captions right under each other were annoying me.

Now, I say we keep the current image because it is not an example of Nightmare Fuel, which is always subjective and therefore prone to editing and replacement, but is instead almost a personification of Nightmare Fuel as a concept. Let's save the example images for the lists of Nightmare Fuel by media, yes?

If someone was so inclined, they could round up the images that formerly graced the top of this page for storage on the Image Links Page. I am not, so I shall not.

the "Lampwick painfully turning into a donkey while crying for his mama" segment from Pinocchio probably ranks as one of the scariest transformation sequences in all of film.

Harpie Siren: I concur, Pinocchio scared the crap out of me as a little girl. I still consider it my least favorite movie. (though paradoxilly I'm anxiously waiting for the Platnium Edition DVD)

Seth: I was always slightly freaked out by the scene in Dumbo where he gets drunk. Don't know why, just was. (Also i love that you just used "Paradoxilly" in a sentence)

Andyroid: Ah yes, the "Pink Elephants on Parade" number. That was a pretty freaky one, too. All those early Disney films seemed to have Nightmare Fuel scenes...

Tabby: Funny, "Pink Elephants on Parade" is the only part of that movie I liked.

Ununnilium: Took out:

Before the rise of anime, cartoons were generally considered "for kids." Imagine a first grader's shock after seeing "Watership Down", a cartoon movie with rabbits ripping each other to bloody shreds.

...because it wasn't meant for kids that young.

Robin Goodfellow: This issue seems to keep cropping up in this discussion, as to whether a cartoon is "meant" for children. That's perhaps not the point; regardless of what the intent was, there is indeed something of an assumption (at least in the US) that if it's animated, it must be for kids. This leads to all sorts of trouble, from the aforementioned nightmares for a child who saw something not meant for her, to potentially good animated works being weakened in order to make them kid-suitable. This was in part what sabotaged two Disney films that could have been real groundbreakers for the studio: Atlantis and Treasure Planet. Arguably, it's also true of the somewhat earlier (and even more disastrous) The Black Cauldron.

Corvus: The examples given of this trope are so contradictory it's becoming meaningless. The trope specifically states "elements in a kiddie series ... meant to amuse, entertain, ..." but then includes examples from cable shows for adults (MST 3 K), PG-rated movies (Transformers), or sequences specifically designed to shock (sequences from The Wizard Of OZ, Willy Wonka, the Scion XD ad, et. al.) Whether someone thinks 'all cartoons are for kids' is irrelevant; was the cartoon designed to "entertain or amuse" a preschooler? If not, it can't be Nightmare Fuel. Otherwise I may as well add Fist Of The North Star.

Nezumi: I think elements that are intended to be shocking or horrifying, but take it too far for the supposed intended age group are also valid entries. And I also think the Scion XD example is valid, as well. Yes, it's intended to be shocking... but it's pretty clearly intended to be shocking in a cute or amusing way, when it's just disturbing and horrifying. And the MST 3 K entries you complain about are from MST 3 K doing things originally intended for children. The fact that they're being replayed on a cable show for adults shouldn't make a difference. And I'm not sure where your complaint about a "PG" movie comes from. PG is still marketed for kids. If it has horrible, nightmare-inducing stuff, it's still Nightmare Fuel... and that robot that's used appears to qualify from the picture, though I'd have to see him in action to be sure. Not to mention that if we include "intended to be amusing or entertaining" as a strict qualifier, the archetypal Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders doesn't qualify—it was a collection of Stephen King short stories converted to film, then repackaged as a family movie when they couldn't sell it as horror; they were supposed to be scary, just inappropriately marketed to children. Ultimately, I think that things that are nightmarish but not intended to be belong here, regardless of target age group; as do things that are "too scary" for the intended age group.

Harpie Siren: I took out ....

This editor's mother never got to Night on Bald Mountain; she had to be carried out of the theater during The Sorcerer's Apprentice.

I realize that the examples are pretty subjective, but just what is scary about The Sorcerer's Apprentice? Later - .... I put it back in ... but I still don't see what's scary about it.

Ununnilium: It's very subjective. Personally, I was traumatized by the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz.

Harpie Siren: Which is why I put it back... We need to mention the Wicked Witch, she gave me nightmares, too.

Tabby: Because the unstoppable army of brooms was trying to kill Mickey. Completely mundane household object turns homicidal and the target is a character who can usually handle pretty much anything? That's nightmare fuel.

Harpie Siren: I figured it was the brooms, which I never found scary. It never occurred to me that they were trying to kill Mickey... were they trying to kill him? I don't think so... they were just following orders, fill up the bucket and pour it into the tub, repeat, ad nauseam... But like it says in the article... "Not all Nightmare Fuel will be scary to all kids".

Morgan Wick: All of a sudden, I realize that the brooms in SA are a lot like KARR.

Harpie Siren: Really, how so?

Boobah: Because each was a sort of Literal Genie, I'm guessing. The brooms were ordered to bring in the water; KARR was ordered to protect itself. Of course, my memories of KARR are almost completely replaced by things I've read of it here, so take that with the usual grain of salt.

Amethyst: I may have thought of another example of intentional Nightmare Fuel — the Itchy and Scratchy cartoons from the Simpsons. They were basically made to lampoon the violent, gruesome nature of many kids cartoons (particularly earlier cartoons, like Tom and Jerry) but the shorts themselves are so over-the-top gruesome that I find them impossible to watch. (Would this qualify as Nightmare Fuel or as something lese?)

Seth: I just found them funny, were you really disturbed by Itchy and Scratchy? I suppose its possible, my cousin used to be terrified of Gremlins.

Ununnilium: Gremlins, oh yes. x.x

Seth: I've just remembered a nasty one, i always used to listen to stuff like Alice Cooper and Iron Maiden as a kid but at the end of one AC song Wind up toy there was this line, really fast and with a kind of echo on it of Alice going "It's time to go now, its bedtime" followed by a really quiet girls voice that said "Stephen" in a drawn out way. That freaked the living hell out of me for years.

Ununnilium: Do the Star Trek examples actually count? They were meant to be scary.

Later: Because of this, and because the show wasn't really a kids' show, I'm pulling them out:

Star Trek The Original Series had many aliens that turned out surprisingly scary to children.
- The giant Planet Killer machine in "The Doomsday Machine". Imagine a planet-sized greenish-blue horn-of-plenty that consumes everything in its path, and not even the mighty USS Enterprise can stop it.
- That creepy Balok puppet they showed at the end of the second season credits also did quite a number on this editor's psyche.
- The Horta from "Devil In the Dark" had this editor hiding his face every time it appeared despite being rather clearly a man under a rug.
- The Salt Vampire from "The Man Trap" hangs out directly in the bottom of the Uncanny Valley.
- The flying plastic vomit parasites in "Operation: Annihilate!"
- The giant space amoeba from "The Immunity Syndrome".

Viewer: I tried uploading an image of a closeup of Bane's face from Batman The Animated Series, but it turned out to be way too big. Is there a way to compress that on the site, or does it have to be edited before uploading?

Ununnilium: Edited before uploading, I think.

Seth: It's best to edit it before uploading in a program like photoshop first, but if it is too big on the server the code %height=(Image height)% placed next to the image can resize the image on the server.

Harpie Siren: Took out:

While a bit more intentional than most of these example, Watership Down still deserves a mention. This editor can remember very few of the details from the film because he was so traumatised that he has been unable to bring himself to re-watch it. Every single scene or image that springs to mind, though, is disturbing in some way.

For the same reason Ununnilium removed a reference to it a while ago... Watership Down is not a kids movie! <rant> Do some of you people think that just because it's animated means it's a kids movie! Just because it's animated doesn't mean it's kiddy fair! Should a little kid be allowed to watch Neon Genesis Evangelon? It's animated!</rant>

Oh, sorry about that...

The Defenestrator: That could be a trope in itself. I still remember a slow pan across a room full of corpses from an anime I rented from Blockbuster as a kid because it looked like a kid's action show.

Harpie Siren: I propose we call it Animation Is Not Always Kid Stuff

Ununnilium: Good idea.

YYZ: We ought to have another trope for the opposite end of that particular spectrum. Anime Is Not All Violent Porn Cartoons.

Thunder Phoenix: It's funny how much this entry has grown. I think people are using it as some kind cathartic dump for bad memories.

Space Ace: It seems to be consensus in The Netherlands and many other European/Western countries that animation automatically means it's for kids. At least, when I was young (I did see Watership Down when I was a kid, but didn't find it too scary). It seems to have abated a bit with the popularity of things as South Park and The Simpsons, which are aired at "adult" times (I just watched the Danish Cartoons episode at midnight, actually).

Bob: We already have a trope for people assuming that animation equals kids stuff: Animation Age Ghetto.

Harpie Siren: It seems that with 13 examples, Disney is the undisputed champion of Nightmare Fuel...

Ununnilium: Took out:

Doctor Who started out as an educational show for children, but with the introduction of the evil Daleks in the second story, it quickly became Nightmare Fuel and stayed that way for over 30 years, giving nightmares to generations of children. The new series is similarly designed to be scary for kids (and, let's face it, some adults).

...because, again, unintentionally scary, or, at least, more scary than intended.

Shire Nomad: Someone seems to have gone through and removed all personal commentary ("this editor had nightmares..." became "Some viewers had nightmares..." and that sort of thing). Is that standard?

Janitor: Actually, there is some discussion of whether or not it should be "standard" in Good Style Discussion. I'm afraid I jumped the gun on the issue, as this entry was cited as particularly given to that second-person thing.

Robin Goodfellow: That's not second-person, it's third-person. Second-person would be something like "You had nightmares..."

And removing personal commentary (or any commentary, for that matter) is not standard, I hope.

Janitor: Yeah, I make the person-number mistake fairly routinely. Personal commentary will be removed from entries. That is standard. Ducking around it by going "this editor" is actually sort of a problem.

Riona: I thought the 'this editor' comments seemed quite appropriate here, as it's very much a trope about the viewers' personal responses. Of course, this is probably just because I'm a bit silly and sentimental and comments with a more personal tone make me smile to myself, which perhaps isn't the best basis for an argument.

Ununnilium: I agree with Riona here — this trope (and many things on the wiki) are about subjective responses.

Robin Goodfellow: In that case, then contributors may as well say "I" instead of the more pseudo-objective-sounding "this editor." Since they are personal responses.

Janitor: I disagree that the article has to be couched as personal experience to be silly and sentimental, which are good things. "This editor" is just a dodge around using "I". Neither are necessary.

Amethyst: You know, I think this trope is a special case. I look upon it as a form of therapy, a place where ancient demons are exorcised. To take out all of the subjectivity and make it all bland and non-personal would do this page a great disservice, methinks.

Janitor: Well, maybe if it is going to be discussion-like, the personal examples could "signed" by handle. A big stack of "I feared ..." is going to be as impenetrable as to who is speaking as would be a stack of "this editor feared...". It could even be on a specially-built discussion page (Nightmare Fuel Personal Picks Discussion, say), with a pointer link in the examples section of actual article.

Look, here's the issue. Someone comes to the wiki for the first time ever by way of a google search for "Nightmare" or "Nightmare Disney". (By and far away the most frequent way we are found.) They land on the article. That searcher has no idea who "I, me, or this editor" is, and has no way to resolve it. My take is that removing that unimportant bit of vagueness makes for a better reading experience.

Ununnilium: They don't need to know, IMHO; they just need to know that there's a specific individual who had that experience. Saying "If someone watched this, they could feel woogly" isn't the same as saying "I watched this and I felt woogly". (And "this editor" is still correct for the third-person perspective wiki entries use.)

screw-the-duelists-i-have-money-in-america: does "salad fingers" count? or does it have to be intended for kids to count as Nightmare Fuel?

Harpie Siren: YES! It must be "Family Entertainment"! ... That being said... The Undead Pirates from Pirates Of The Caribbean? Yea or Nea? I'm torn on this one... because it is "Family Entertainment" ... but they're supposed to be scary... thus the PG-13 rating...

screw-the-duelists-i-have-money-in-america: they would count, but i don't see how they're scary

Ununnilium: They're no creepier than they're supposed to be, IMHO.

screw-the-duelists-i-have-money-in-america: if play with me counts, then why doesn't salad fingers count?

Andrew Leprich: I hope my Ocarina of Time example isn't considered too personal, but from what I've read online, such feelings about those enemies seems to be quite commonplace.

Scrounge: Hey, is sure seems like a good example to me. Then again, I'm the one who put the entry on the upcoming Transformers movie in here. Can you blame me, though? Frenzy looks like H. R. Giger and H. P. Lovecraft collaborated on a hybrid nutcracker/lawn gnome/voodoo totem. Can't sleep, boombox will eat me.

Tanto: ReDeads are freaky, right enough, but the Forest Temple was and is pure awesome. Among the best dungeons in the whole series, when everything is taken into account.

Amethyst: Okay, this page seemed to be getting a little big and unwieldy, so I decided to create a few subtropes which will cover most of the main categories of Nightmare Fuel: Scare Em Straight , Dark Side Of The Mouse , and Happy Fun Death Hour Let me know if you have any comments or any more ideas on how to organize this. Thanks!

Ununnilium: I like Scare Em Straight and Dark Side Of The Mouse, but Happy Fun Death Hour isn't different enough from this entry to split, IMHO. Also, you should put your tropes in indexes.

Scrounge: With Ununnillium on this one... Happy Fun Death Hour seems to just generally be the same thing as this trope is saying. What makes that specific subset different?

Amethyst: Okay. I've phased out Happy Fun Death Hour and returned all of the children's program examples to Nightmare Fuel. (I'm not sure how to delete pages so if anyone wants to delete Happy Fun Death Hour, go ahead, but feel free to put the title in the Title Bin, if you wish.) I also didn't put the subtropes I created in an index earlier, since I wasn't sure how people would react to them. (No point in indexing a page if you're just going to delete it a day later, was my way of thinking.) Feel free to index them now if you wish.

Looney Toons: Amethyst, to have a page deleted, put it at the top of the Cut List page.

would music count? if it does, we have seth's example earlier and i found about half the doors' songs rather disturbing (not to say i don't like it, i just find it disturbing) and basically every roger waters song that i got around to listening to is extremely creepy (and yet...)

Harpie Siren: Only if it was intended for kids...

the doors' music was aimed at anyone who would listen and alice cooper has a surprising amount of younger fans (i admit, i was one of them), i can't say much about roger waters though...

Cassius335: The GTS track is scary?

Later: Better Question: Why is Dark Side Of The Mouse now a redirect?

Ununnilium: Hey, yeah! That was its own whole trope, and the material from it wasn't put back in here!

Fast Eddie: The material still there: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DarkSideOfTheMouse?action=diff

if someone wants to do a merge.

The sequence "There's no Earthly way of knowing" from Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is very much intentionally disturbing. The lyrics are straight from the book, word for word, and the context is much the same.

Heh, only the voice of Tim Curry could make a cloud of toxic gas sound sexually charged

well, he did manage to make transvestitism sound like an awesome subject for a rock song (richard o'brian may have wrote the song, but only tim curry could sing it still sound cool)

I think Tim Curry in the movie Legend counts as Nightmare Fuel. Not because he's a giant devil monster, but because at some point, he gets this I-gonna-get-laid look that just freaks me hell out. And I didn't see the movie until I was a teen.

I need some help with a title... There was an animated movie where a child wished for talking dinosaurs. He got them, but quickly realized he couldn't afford to feed them. He then signed a contract in blood with a creepy old man to send them to the circus, where they became mute beasts. I think there was a happy Twist Ending, but it's hard to get past all the horror.

WE'RE BACK!: A DINOSAUR'S STORY I believe, in addition to the above it contained the truly disturbing mention that the Big Bad went mad after losing an eye...in Vietnam.

Ack Sed: BoingBoing

has discovered this. There's apparently a rich vein of Nightmare Fuel in 70's Sesame Street. Someone want to go and tell them,"We've been there,man."?

Nezumi: Thanks for

''All Dogs Go to Heaven" had a disturbingly well-animated dream sequence where the ship the protagonist is on slowly descends into a lava lake, as he chased by demonic cats. He wakes up, as, covered in demon cats, the pointy end of the ship slowly descends into the lava.

I'd finally managed to forget that sequence, which is the only reason I didn't add it myself. x.x;;;

Nevrmore: I won't add this to the trope itself because I'm pretty sure I'm the only one who thinks this, but as a child (and still as an adult) I am extremely freaked out whenever John Goodman as Fred Flinstone in the 1994 live action Flinstones jumped into the air, floated for like 3 seconds, and knocked his heels together while he exclaimed "Yabba dabba do!"

Were Josh Peck Prince: You're kiding right? I loved John Goodman in that movie!

Artful: Removed

Love Hina references the Show Within A Show Liddo-kun & Friends, a cartoon about Cute Annoying Things that go on adventures. Unfortunately, every recollection is derailed when they go into detail about the apparently horrible deaths of the characters in every episode.

Since 1) Liddo-kun & Friends does not exist on its own 2) Love Hina is very clearly not aimed at children and 3) The sequence was of many intentionally disturbing sequences the show used to highlight the faulty memory of The Ditz

Semi-Known Troper: Is the series referred to in the 'Land of Confusion' example Spitting Image, with the puppets being political caricatures?

Bob La Rice: It is indeed. Goddamn, them scary. I don't know how anybody watched that show without attempting self-asphyxiation.

Fern Gully - I remember that there was something about that movie that really creeped me out when I saw it in grade school, but I can never remember what it was. I'm sure that it belongs on this list, though, if I've blocked it from my mind. Kudos to whomever added it.

grendelkhan: I can't believe nobody added Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. That's prime creepy stuff, and looking back, I can't believe those are actually children's books.

Yo Adrian: Augh, I'd almost blocked that out. I had to cover the illustrations when I read it, and I was 16 at that point. The stories weren't so bad, but the pictures? Yikes.

crapface: who took out my doom example It fit.

Semi-Known Troper: Doom is deliberate horror, Nightmare Fuel is when its accidental.

Lale: I'm pretty sure all that Yu-Gi-Oh GX stuff must have been deliberately creepy. This is anime.

Scrounge: There seems to be enough Nightmare Fuel cropping up in things that weren't intended for kids that I think we should start trying to rephrase the page to reflect that things like the Judderman still count. I tried but didn't quite know how to say it. Are people with me on this, or should there be a separate trope for Nightmare Fuel for grown-ups?

Cassius335: Nightmare Fuel Unleaded? Go for it!

Bob: I think we need another trope for grown-up nightmare fuel. I've already have some examples for it, we just need a snappy name. I've personally used the termEmotional Death for movies that makes me feel like the world is a cold, unforgiving place. The Saw films, Old Boy and Conspiracy

comes to mind.

Here

, see if you missed anything.

Zubon: Added to Kingdom Hearts category regarding Kingdom Hearts's Ansem. I almost threw the controller and hid under my sofa at that bit. Goddamn you, Zane-voiced man.

Semi-Known Troper: Agreement of Daarrrknesss!

Scrounge: Took out:

The entirety of Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, an M-rated Mind Screwy adventure game on the Nintendo Gamecube. Yes, that Gamecube. But then, this is most definitely a game not intended for children. It is, however, more than enough to frighten some adults. Well presented cthulloid horrors and madness will do that.

There's no way in hell that this one wasn't intentional.

Silent Hunter: I remember Through The Dragon's Eye. I'd say it's memorable enough to warrant an entry here.

T Servo 2049: Some great, albeit obscure, examples of potential Nightmare Fuel. Don't worry, they're all from kids/family-oriented films, and they're actually weird enough to be Nightmare Fuel, not just "stuff that scared me as a kid":

Raggedy Ann and Andy: A Musical Adventure, Richard Williams' trippy adaptation of the classic children's characters, which includes such madness as a giant taffy-blob monster named The Greedy, who is constantly shoving globs of *himself* into his mouth. There's also a scene involving a character who inflates whenever he laughs, and is subjected to forced tickling which causes him to swell to immense size. Not to mention...well, watch for yourself and find out: [1] I never saw it as a kid, but if I had, I bet it would have scarred me for life.
Nelvana's 1978 Halloween cartoon special The Devil and Daniel Mouse, synopsis here: [2] Again, I didn't see this until just recently, but I bet I would have been terrified by it as a kid. There's Jan being chased by the Devil when he comes to collect her soul, the entire trial scene, and the Devil's nightmarish transformation at the end.
Balloon Land, with the infamous Pincushion Man. I did see this one a kid, or at least the excerpt shown in the old Pee-Wee Herman HBO special, and it definitely qualified as Nightmare Fuel for me. Watch it here: [3] (Additionally, a clip from Balloon Land quite appropriately shows up in the infamous Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders, whereupon, in the MST 3 K version, Tom Servo says "Okay, now we're in Hell. It finally happened.")

thatother1dude: now that I think about Courage The Cowardly Dog has a lot of Nightmare Fuel. Besides the ones already on the page I can think of:

Uncle Fred- a G-rated version of Sweeney Todd who's flashbacks include a very freaky looking shaved hamster, has a creepy musical theme, and speaks in verses that ends every fourth line with ...naughty
"The Great Fussili" - has a lot of full-sized human-shaped puppets which are always creepy, that turned out to have been real people (that were never changed back)
"The Magic Tree of Nowhere" a magical tree growths that has a human mouth that sticks out very unsettlingly. After it's introduced it turns out to be friendly which mitigate the creepy factor... until it gets cut down with the face still on it.
"Human Habitrail" which was all kinds of crazy and ended with a reference to Moonraker no one would get
"Car Broke, Phone Yes" which had a strange, circular talking short figure in a fedora and trench coat that turns out to be a brain with tentacles that go up people's noses and into there brain to suck out "kindness in liquid form" and his boss, a giant malformed brain with really creepy eyes
"Evil Weevil" were a giant bug sucks something out of Eustace and Muriel turning them into dry husks

Were Josh Peck Prince: The weremole episode too- especially when Muriel mutated into a weremole.

JM Fabiano: T Servo...let's also include Devil and Daniel Mouse's big cousin, Rock & Rule, which also had a scary demon that appears in the film's climax. And it is conjured by a rock song with Angel (singing voice by Deborah Harry) singing indecipherable words, almost sounding like backwards masking. That too might be unsettling to some people.

And while we're talking about rock operas, let's include lots of the trippy animation from Pink Floyd: The Wall.

Nezumi: I removed the mention that some things were obviously the product of Tim Schafer's mind in the Psychonauts entry, as I think it was the result of someone getting confused about who he was. He's a former Lucasarts employee who was a writer and programmer for the first two Monkey Island games, was a co-designer on Day of the Tentacle, and was the lead on Full Throttle and Grim Fandago. "Silly and lighthearted" is more his style than "disturbing and nightmarish."

Certain game show elements were prime targets for being scary for younger viewers. Many involve sound effects used on the shows, including: - The roar of the Dragon "villain" on the bonus game board of Tic-Tac-Dough. (He also can pop up at any moment, which makes it worse) Roughly the same goes for the "bad guys" in the bonus games of Barry-Enright shows; referring mostly to the Devil from The Joker's Wild (cause, well, he's the Devil), and the Lightning penalty on Bullseye. - The "tacky buzzer" that signified the end of the game on the nighttime version of Hollywood Squares, as hosted by Peter Marshall. It was a very loud, very harsh noise that could catch you by surprise. One time it almost shocked the feathers off of Big Bird! - Other harsh buzzers such as one heard on some NBC shows, especially Scrabble and Card Sharks (Jim Perry) when you busted for good on the Money Cards. - Odd sounding losing horns: heard on The Price Is Right, Blockbusters, and Classic Concentration...often, it starts as a piece from the theme song's melody, then it "collapses" with a downward horn, kind of like the song's distorting.

T Servo 2049: Yes, but that's not really Nightmare Fuel. Nightmare Fuel is stuff that's scary because it's bizarre, freaky, disturbing, etc.

Hey, some kids can make ANYTHING bizarre, freaky, etc. As for your definition, if it comes up on Page-O-Clips, look up the Dragon Finder game and That Podium ;-)

Citizen: How about the two guys behind Luna

◊? Pretty scary, huh. :p

The Burger King King is so NOT scary. I'd gladly set a lunch date with that sociable chap.

I would just like to congratulate grendelkhan for putting Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark on this list. The stories themselves aren't so bad, but Stephen Gemmell's illustrations are primo nightmare fuel.

Fast Eddie: took out

Actually, I thought he was awesome.

.. as no-one knows who "I" is referring to. Also, it is not a discussion thread.

Tragic The Dragon - (Looks at how the Nightmare Fuel page has reverted back to it's pre-Index madness. Cries.)

Yes, yes, it's good that it's back at all and with most of it's samples intact but still...

Major thanks to the people (or one person) who categorized them again. Frankly, I always liked the "by media" better than "by type" format best.

Demetrios: Ah, thanks, Tragic. *blushes*

Jibar - I can't believe the Child Catcher gets such a passing mention. Even the kids admit that now they're grown up the Child Catcher still scares them. I'm also adding a bit about Jabu Jabu, because God knows that was pure Nightmare Fuel.

Darkmind - (I mentioned this on one of the lists discussions as well, but I figure it's more likely to get answers here.) Is there any good way to comment on ones of these that have in certain sections of the population a, um, decidedly 'non-nightmare' reaction? Some of the scenes mentioned on a couple of the lists get passed around as fairly erotic images, in the right circles...

Wrybread: Funnily enough, this troper had a nightmare last night (something about a macabre puppet show) during which he actually used the phrase "Nightmare Fuel" to dismiss the creepy puppets, at which point one of the puppets attacked him for laughing at them. I must have some issues...

TTD: Don't make me say it...

Were Josh Peck Prince: Ya know, same thing happened to me once. Being quite the thespian i've been in lots of plays (i'm not kiding here people) one of them was a children's play about Egypt. My character was supposed to be the Sand People commander (Sand People were described in the script as strange humanoid creatures that rise out of the sand) who works for the main villain the priestess, and the script said something about a big battle scene between my character's army and the good guy one- and that my army was supposed to lose. The scary thing is that I was supposed to die in some horrific overdramatic fashion, upon finding that out I was horrified so I decided to turn the role down and give it to some other poor unfortunate sap.

Demetrios: Bad news. Somehow, Nightmare Fuel Examples Part Nine got turned into Big Bad.

Re: Never mind; it's back to normal.

Demetrios: I don't mean to toot my own horn or anything, but in the speech class I'm talking, I'll be telling my class about Nightmare Fuel. Wish me luck!

That Other 1 Dude: I'm watching The Batman Vs Dracula, and wondering under what category the following things done by the Vampire Jokerfit:

Constant wailing and moaning
Crawling all over the place
Drinking several viles of blood, and then seeing it smeared all over his face
The part where the shelf full of blood samples falls over, showering him in it, which he proceeds to start licking all off the ground

TTD: For some, Nightmare Fuel, animation examples (forgot what page). For others, Fetish Fuel (and that, in itself, is Nightmare Fuel for me).

Demetrios: Good news, everyone. My nightmare fuel speech got a round of applause. And because I'm a nice guy, I'll tell you what my finishing line was: "Sometimes not even the MST 3 K Mantra helps".

TTD: Applause, applause.

Couldn't the numbered example sub-pages be named instead? Like Nightmare Fuel Examples In Advertising, Nightmare Fuel Examples In Movies, etc?

TTD: Ehhh... yes, actually. But it's a hell of a lot easier to keep them the way they are.

Austin: It might be easier, but it's less practical, and it breaks the standard for the rest of the wiki, where every other trope that's split apart is neatly divided up by media.

theorc: Went ahead and did it. Figured someone had to.

Andyroid: Okay, is it too much to ask that people not just slap a title onto the list without any explanation as to what part of that particular film, book, game, or whatever is Nightmare Fuel, and why? It's starting to bug me like you wouldn't believe.

Were Josh Peck Prince: Funny. In Dungeons and Dragons a nightmare is a hellish firey horse. So I'm guessing that if this was d and d- all this Nightmare Fuel would be a nightmare's favourite food. Does anybody remember being disturbed a little bit by the Beyondo segment on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno?

Austin: Tell me, is this trope meant to be stuff that's particularly scary or disturbing? If so, then the articles need a lot of trimming. Now people seem to be putting in examples based on whether they could, in any conceivable way, be the least bit creepy.

Mr X: Somebody should really define the proper meaning of Nightmare Fuel once and for all... some of this stuff is 'scary and is supposed to be', whereas the description is 'scary but not exactly supposed to'.

Robert: Anything that is intentionally scary doesn't belong here, and should be purged.

Dyle: This isn't The Other Wiki. I find a good portion of this stuff interesting, and it's very hard to define "what is" and "what isn't" supposed to be scary. Even a horror movie can have moments that are far more notably disturbing than the rest of the film.

Robert: I've largely reverted the last edit by Tragicthe Dragon for two reasons. The categorisation of nightmare fuel types is useful - it says something about the nature of nightmare fuel, and it can help divert example to the subtropes. Secondly, this page is an index page for the subtropes. Removing their links from here breaks the index, as well as hiding them.

I do agree soemthing needs doing about this page, but let's talk it out first.

Lord Seth: Too many of the examples are really not that scary; we need some weeding done, honestly, especially given how long the example pages are.

Dyle: And now Tragicthe Dragon has done a completely senseless hack job of the Western Animation Film examples.

Caswin: Where is the page picture from? I'm a bit relieved to see something that isn't actually liable to keep me up at night, but... now I'm curious. What is it, and is it as scary in context as the hype would have us believe?

The Gunheart: According to the Anime section under Memetic Mutation, it's Backbeard, the villain of Ge Ge Ge No Kitaro. I have no idea if he's as scary as the caption would have us believe, though.

Cassy: Love it, it cracks me up X-D. Though I think I can see how it could be scary in context.

Man Withotu A Body: Having read this list, I'd just like to take this moment to say that %90 of you guys are wimps.

Anima: I've been wondering. What about stuff that you saw in childhood and it was normal, but you watch it again now and it scares you shitless?

...Damn you, Teddy Ruxpin.

Cid Pollendina: I have a problem with the High Octane Nightmare Fuel pages. Real Life is listed in there. How is reality intentionally scary? Is there something I don't know here? Or do people think High Octane Nightmare Fuel means Nightmare Fuel, just scarier? But anyways, there would be no harm in merging the High Octane Nightmare Fuel page for Real life into the standard Nightmare Fuel page.

mrcolj: Darth Maul?

Where would a documentary go? "Life after People" scared the crap out of me.

Thebobmaster: What, exactly is the current picture?

Shadow Queen: Hey! Where did Zero Two go? That was an excellent picture if I do say so myself. It's in a kids game, yet it gives nightmares!

The Pein: I'm thinking Zero Two would rather belong in High Octane Nightmare Fuel. There's just something about him that screams "this is supposed to scare you", especially since it's in a kids game. Just my humble opinion, though.
- Thnikkafan: Kid's game. That (probably) qualifies it instantly for standard Nightmare Fuel rather than High Octane Nightmare Fuel.

The Pein: Regarding the new picture, it is (somewhat?) justified in that NGE was clearly not intended for younger audiences, but was still distributed thanks to the Animation Age Ghetto. I for one, and I'm sure I am not the only one, saw Neon Genesis Evangelion when it was relatively new and it led to many sleepless nights.

The Gunheart: Actually, Eva [4] was a kids show. At least until the infamous episode 18, anyway.

Thnikkafan: Oh, come on. It's like a giant zombie robot! That thing is a slightly more intentional Nightmare Fuel then the page picture needs. Get something from... I dunno, Care Bears or something instead.

Mr D: Could somebody make a Nightmare Fuel Vanity Plate page? It seems that there isn't a person alive who isn't unsettled by at least one.

Mr D: Awesome work, Luc! :)

Lime: Why has this been cutlisted? I don't see any reason for it to be.

Inkblot: Sorry about that, I cutlisted this when I probably should have gone to the forums before doing something so hasty.

KrisMahai: Thought I should mention, Neon Genesis Evangelion has its own article for both Nightmare Fuel and High Octane Nightmare Fuel. I'm pretty sure it should only have one Nightmare Fuel article, and personally, I think High Octane is more what Evangelion would be. Why does it have two articles, anyway?

Here's the link to Nightmare Fuel Neon Genesis Evangelion and High Octane Nightmare Fuel Neon Genesis Evangelion

Midna: That picture of the guy in the freaky bunny costume made me die a little bit on the inside.

Ganondorfdude11: That image is perfect! Now I'm wondering who in their right mind would make a costume that freaky...and the kid looks happy?!

macroscopic: Agreed. Absolutely perfect - can we stop changing it now?

wikkit: is it just me or in the bottom-left hand corner of the picture do i see a leg with a sneaker on it?

Man Without A Body: I like the picture too. It doesn't rely on prior knowledge or privilege any one fandom over any other, which are perennial problems with images.

TsundeRay: So we have Nightmare Fuel for unintentionally scary works for kids, and High Octane Nightmare Fuel for intentionally scary works for adults. But where do intentionally scary works for kids or unintentionally scary adult works go? The hell between Nightmare Fuel and High Octane Nightmare Fuel?

Man Without A Body: Intentionally scary works for kids go under Defanged Horrors.

So um... why is Serial Experiments Lain here? It's intentionally scary, and definitely not for children. —Lesath

Seconding the above statement. Also, Sandman? It's even noted on the example that every single instance was intentionally scary. I'll just cut them.— Melloncollie.

Some Sort Of Troper: Cut? No way Jose. I've been through the ass end of a lot of shitty examples here but let me tell you, there's a trope in here, decent examples and a way without This Troper. Fact is nobody ever cleaned up properly but once you do, it gets better.

Passerby - Do you not get the fucking "SUBJECTIVE" logo on top of the page? Why is it that people are running around, screaming bloody murder every time Tropers use something subjective? I'm tempted to use Tropers Law legitimately, that's how bad it's getting to...

Shrikesnest: Do not cut. Absolutely not. Ridiculous.

Insanity Prelude: We still have't moved as far from the meaning of the trope as IANMTU did.

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