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Nightmare Fuel / Harmony & Horror

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https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ice_cream_man_jumpscare.png
"Remember kids, dreams can be forgotten, but nightmares last forever."
What makes Harmony and Horror so scary? Well, it's an Analog Horror series, it's inspired by the works of Squimpus McGrimpus, and instead of killer animatronics, it's focused on evil clowns and creepy dolls. Oh, the potential...

As a Nightmare Fuel page, all spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

    open/close all folders 
    Season One 

    Season Two 
  • H4PPY_N3W_FRIEND5! pulls no punches in the horror department. A toy called "Magical Sofia", presumably the successor to StSM, is absolutely disgusting. Where as Sofia the Singing Marionette looked skull-like, and even cute in her unpossessed form, Magical Sofia has a very human face while maintained doll proportions give her wide eyes and a stretched, wrinkled grin.
    • Sofia/Macy has broken out of her storage locker containment and she crawls around like a spider presumably trying to break out other cursed M+A Harmony toys.
    • To make things EVEN WORSE, the video now has captions and Macy-Sofia is listed as "MS Recall #5", which means that Martin experimented on FOUR OTHER LITTLE GIRLS before he transformed his daughter. Then it doubles down, with the hindsight reveal with the Magical Sofia that speaks and jump scares the camera earlier in the video is listed as "MS Recall #12 ". Showing that Martin, being the egoistical maniac that he is, didn't just only make the single Magical Sofia we see in the commercial, he has continued to experiment on little girls and transforming them into Magical Sofias, with with a confirmed six more after Macy.
    • A commercial for "Magical Sofia" has distorted pictures of children on screen as they give "testimonials" about how much they love Martin's toys. They sound distressed, as though they're being held at gunpoint or worse. One girl says "Please, I promise I won't run again. Please, just fix my legs!" and another has no testimonial but a girl's scream and then the banging of a body hitting the walls and floor repeatedly as if it's being thrown around, ending with a final, wet bang, followed by something roaring. That something is listed in the subtitles as "Uif Foe",note  and nothing else.
      • The implication that Martin kidnapped those kids to make the commercial.
    • Sofia/Macy's skull-face appears at the end of the video, twitching and covered in blood with what can be inferred to be Macy's real human jaw fully visible. She glitches, "Hi—I'm So-Sofia, would you li-like to play a game?". Her prehensile mandible splits as the top of the doll shell's skull splits open, and the long, red demon that remains of Macy Greywhinder crawls out.
    • The fact that Martin was likely watching his own family with cameras even before his more murderous tendencies came out is enough nightmare fuel. It clearly shows just how much Martin is willing to go to keep everyone in line. The way he bluntly tells his daughter about how she can't go with him and how he'll "miss her." doesn't help matters.
  • THE_PERFECT_PET: A man by the name of Franklin Norway is running an arcade, with games of his own creation featuring creepy clowns, and these games are shown to children. What's freakier? The guy making these arcade machines is the good guy here! He's making these games to make these kids scared of Harmony Toys and stay away from it, for very obvious reasons, in desperation after repeatedly being disbelieved about the things that happen involving that store. You even get to see one of these games in action, showing Martin driving down a dark road right into Bonzo. There's even backwards text at the beginning of the game that says "Stay away from this man."
    Officer: Why'd you make the games, Frankie?
    Franklin Norway: None of the parents believed me when I told them about the things that happen in this town, in THAT store-!
    Officer: So you figured the kids would?
    Franklin Norway: Yes!
    Officer: So you made these games, let these kids play them, just so you could keep them away from going to that store?
    Franklin Norway: It was the only way they would listen. I-I-I- I didn't mean anything bad, I but- I just needed them to be afraid!
    • After the conversation wraps up, we see the conclusion of this game, which has the clown suddenly look into the rear-view mirror right at the player/viewer with disturbingly realistic eyes, as the music slows down, all while the game's gas-meter is empty, yet the car still drives. A bit later, the music changes to a more ominous tune, as the headlights flash and flayed bodies litter the street ahead, and then a red face that could very well be the Demon Martin made a deal with slowly and silently moves into view, before it all ends by the car ramming into Banzo. How much of Harmony Toy's horrid secrets did Franklin find out!?
    • And after all that, we see an advertisement for the new Fuzzy Buddy model, he dances, he speaks, he watches over you all night long, and he's every bit as user-friendly as the last Banzo toy. And the original Banzo gets to speak too, but that scene is a different kind of creepy...
    • The advertisement mentions how the new model can eat things like real dog. Jumpcut to a blurred video of the new Fuzzy Buddy model munching on something bloody, while a baby hysterically cries in the background, implicating that the Fuzzy Buddy is eating something of the baby. And Fuzzy Buddy's dialogue throughout the snippet doesn't help matters; unless you have a morbid sense of humor of course.
    Fuzzy Buddy: Num num. Um num num. That's tasty.
    • The shot of the seemingly harmless puppets from the commercial before now crawling down a dark hallway. Notice how one looks a lot like the Toymaker...
    • And this video also ends with choice for the viewer, will Ava and Banzo face release or rebirth? The first option isn't really creepy, bittersweet is more accurate. The latter option on the other hand.
  • THE_MIRACLE_CHILD: The third episode released nearly a year after THE_PERFECT_PET, and it’s brings a lot into the field of nightmare fuel presented so far. The video is mainly split into 8 segments, each taking place in different points in time and all of them being connected in one way or another.
    • “The Tragic Truth”: The video begins with this segment, consisting of Martin expressing frustration towards Gloria about a recent visit to the doctor, where he learned he would be unable to have any children of his own. When Gloria brings up adoption as a choice, Martin lashes out at her for the suggestion, saying that if it wasn’t his own “flesh and blood”, he wouldn’t even bother. Knowing what we know about Martin, it carries a sinister aura about how he is very intent on only having a kid he knows is his own.
    • “Home Invasion”: This segment consists of a boy named Eddie Miller trying to stay up late and capture what he believes is Santa coming onto the roof of his house, switching between stills of drawings he writes and the video of the camera he is carrying with them. However, things already start uneasy when, while he is waiting for “Santa” to land on the roof, we can hear something land on it, but with how loud the noise is, one could mistake it for something crashing through it instead.
      • Eddie then starts to go near the stairs, trying to get a view of “Santa” by the Christmas tree… except what we see is very much not Santa, looking more like a gigantic, blob-like creature. Eddie doesn’t notice this, and snaps a picture of the creature, which makes it turn around to face him. Immediately after, we see him running down the hall back to his room, with the monster right behind him, giving us a lovely view of the face of the creature.
      • Eddie makes it back to his room, retreating into what appears to be his closet to hide, while the monster slowly looks around for him. And then we see a shadow run up to the closet door, Eddie gasping, and the video cutting out. And the last drawing still we see of the segment?
        THAT'S NOT SANTA
    • “Reliving Memories”: The 3rd segment, which is focused on a new building called the “Harmony Arcadia”, being built by none other than…
      • Arthur, who is appearing in person to give a speech about his return and the building, and seems to be healthy and alive like nothing happened… seems to be. His speech consists of him expressing his sadness and sympathies to all those that have been affected by Martin’s massacre and murders, with him bringing up the fact that he is not wholly flesh, having sustained scars on his face that required him to wear plastic to hide them. He even expresses how when looking in the mirror, he can’t recognize himself through the disguise he has to wear.
      • He then gets to the main point of the speech, his “repaid favor” of “Harmony Arcadia”, with plans to include the basics such as an arcade, toy store, and play area, he mentions more ambitious bits, such as a place to foster animals and a daycare center to take care of kids. These all seems like great things to include in the building… until one has to remember that the toys that Martin was stuffing his family and other kid’s souls into were planned to be mass produced.
      • Perhaps the most eerie and nerve-wrattling part about this is the simple fact that Arthur is here, and is speaking to a live crowd. The Arthur we know is well and truly dead, turned into a demonic monster that attacks and tries to eat what it sees. And yet, the one we see here is perfectly fine, aside from his left side of his face being scarred. So just who are we seeing and hearing?
      • Another bit of the building plan is to include a cafe, named the “Ice Cream Man Parlor”, with the titular mascot standing in the middle of groups of tables with a welcoming gesture. Innocent at first glance, but remembering that the only Ice Cream Man we have seen so far is one currently being possessed by supposedly the person in front of a live audience, and one that doesn’t hesitate to kill when it can, which further adds to the foreboding atmosphere that the entire speech has.
      • The last we see of the presentation showing what will be a part of the Arcadia is a “Henry Security v2.5”, a doll that appears to be a recreated version of the Henry puppet, except in the details, it says it’s height is 5’4, the average height of a person. Imagining a doll that tall, while still possibly being haunted and harm those near it is not a pretty thought.
      • The conclusion of Arthur’s speech involves him bringing back the 8 missing children last mentioned in “Local 13” in Season 1, having apparently been found and their remains healed together to make them alive. However, the faces of the victims presented all have their faces being covered with distorted blocks of pixels, with the eyes darkened out as well. One of the faces even appears to have a needle in one of its eyes. Oh, and to add to this and the above point of Arthur’s identity, he says this while thanking the parents of the children for attending the speech.
        “You have no idea how hungry it makes me to see these beautiful people make it back to arms of their brave families…”
      • The audio of the audience's applauses and cheers is distorted enough so it instead sounds like they're screaming in terror at seeing the victims.
      • And for one last kick, the final of the 8 victims comes with the caption of “Remains Never Found”, before the screen glitches into blackness, the face being the only thing remaining and now covered in blood as it distorts into a scream, while the victim’s corpse starts slowly fading in, the face of it censored but blood being seen pool around it, before the screaming face gives one last Jump Scare and the segment cuts to black.
    • “A Boy Ripped Apart”: A throwback to a pre-rebrand Harmony Toys interactive tape, which itself starts with a throwback to the “I Want a Toy” tape, by showing him with his eyes missing.
      • As Henry describes it, he was playing a game of tag with Stitchbuddy when the former “tripped over a rock” and fell apart. Sounds like a reasonable explanation, but considering the series we’re watching, the history of this character, and the forced tone he has at the end of the sentence, you’d be forgiven for finding it hard to believe.
      • The constant cuts to eyeless Henry and his constant jokes are simultaneously charming and uncomfortable.
      • When attaching the final leg, the background behind Henry suddenly transitions to red as the music cuts out. It gets worse when the eyes are left, as good old Martin in his crazy clown costume appears to the left, strange humming begins to play, and Henry’s voice lines go from creepy waiting prompts to frighteningly implicative statements.
        “Come on!”
        "Use your peepers to find the peepers!”
        "Where’s it hiding?”
        "He’s hiding.”
        "Hide.”
        "Are you scared?”
      • Eventually the viewer finally selects the eyes, then it's a smash cut to black, and when we return? We’re treated to a bloody, battered, and of course, eyeless Henry, strapped to some kind of operating table, made worse by what can only be Martin taking freshly plucked human eyes and inserting them into Henry’s socket’s. You’re given no hint as to where or who these eyes came from either.
      • We cut to what is presumably Thomas’ room, confirmed by Martin popping in with his clown costume and calling Thomas’ name. Martin is here to follow through on his promise to Thomas that he'll "surprise him at night", and tells him that it's time for his "surprise"...a twisted electronic theme starts looping, and as it does we see various images of Henry, in and out of his shell, showing a visage of the monster from the 2nd segment, Gloria back when she was still alive and human, a redesign of Martin’s clownified portrait from “_Rebirth_” , and… an article describing the grave robbing of the two victims of the Harmony Broadcast Incident, whose names are also the 2 child victims seen back in “Are You Happy?”.
      • What this is supposed to mean in the context of this scene is unknown, but between the fleshy Henry from “Are You Happy?” getting a backstory in this episode, the return of Detective Stewart and Franklin’s Fun Arcade in the previous episode, and now this, it seems to indicate that this incident is more crucial to this season’s narrative, and Martin’s spiral into madness, than we previously thought.
      • Following these fun visuals, we finally find out how Thomas died... and it's horrifying. And was implied in the early episodes of Season 1, Thomas' killer was indeed the newly built murderous Ice Cream Man animatronic, who is revealed to have been hiding in the boy's closet. Martin then sics the monster on his own son, who calmly leaves the closet as Martin disappears from the doorway to leave Thomas to his fate; and the animatronic stares down at the bed, before he suddenly roars and lunges at the boy. Oh, and did we mention that this whole scene is shown from Thomas' point of view? And while we don't see what happens, we certainly get a good long look at the aftermath: Thomas is reduced to nothing but a gigantic, child-sized smear of blood on his bed.
      • Listen very closely to the audio just before the Ice Cream Man attacks Thomas. It sounds like a distorted cry of "Martin, no!" - which implies that Arthur was fully aware of what he was about to do, but unable to stop it.
    • "Friends in Disguise": A continuation of the "Home Invasion" segment, following Eddie - who, as it turns out, survived! Even more good news: the monster from before is actually friendly, and is only trying to protect him, with it now being all but outright stated that this creature has a deep connection with the Henry dolls and is possibly a new form of sorts for Thomas. A brief scare is given when Eddie tries to get a picture of it again, causing it to fly into a rage and give a Nightmare Face to the camera, however it seems more like the camera is the specific cause, as the next drawing from Eddie says he doesn't like being photographed implying that is the reason it got angry and chased him before.
      • This moment however is torn down when a Henry doll (having been brought by the creature, now nicknamed Mr. Handy by Eddie, when he entered the child’s home) asks if it can tell Eddie a story. He obliges… and the story creates a firm mix between Nightmare Fuel and Tear Jerker.
      • To give a brief version, the story is about the person inhabiting the doll when they were alive, presumably an employee of Harmony Toys and Martin, and how they were placed backstage of a show and told to wait for something. This something ends up being a lullaby, which immediately causes the person to freeze up, and feel “something had made [their] body its home. After that, they feel their body begin to melt, leaving the person screaming for any help, and having to crawl away as it sees a tall figure it describes as having black and white stripes over its body and a blood red grin. Finally, the person presumably runs into Martin, and when he consoles them for a brief moment, making them think they will be safe, only for Martin to finish them by ripping…something, but it isn’t said what due to the last page running out out of space.
      • Considering the story seems to be from the perspective of an employee, Eddie refers to the doll with female pronouns when it asked to tell the story, and the final sentence mentioning something being “ripped” from the narrator, it’s likely that this Henry doll contains the soul of Amy Willson, Martin’s intern who hasn’t been mentioned much since Season 1, with the only other info being what was given in “Are You Happy?”, where the caption of her picture says “She stopped screaming when her spine came out.”
    • "Play. Protect. Command." gives us a presentation of the Henry Security Puppet, who blueprints were seen back in the “Reliving Memories” speech, showcasing it as an upgraded Henry model that acts as a security guard for the Arcadia.
      • In this case, the horror comes from how incredibly dangerous these things are if they end up malfunctioning or become possessed. They possess kevlar-infused shells that makes them Immune to Bullets; Extendable Arms that can extend up to 50 feet and allow them to jump over tall obstacles; and enough physical strength to tear someone's heads off their shoulders.
      • And how do we get a glimpse of the above strength? During a demonstration of the puppet’s built in criminal database to identify criminals who try to enter the building. When the puppet notices a test dummy with a face of a criminal, it does not hesitate for even a moment before it grabs it by the neck and rips the head off while the screen starts getting covered in static and what sounds like a scream plays in the background before cutting to the next scene.note 
      • On top of the above, there's three different versions of this thing. "Playtime Henry" and "Trooper Henry" monitor children and adults respectively, with the former looking like a shopping mall clerk and the latter like a soldier. And then there's "Commander Henry", which sports glowing red eyes, a military officer uniform, and a vague Nazi-esque vibe. Oh, and he also manages what looks like an actual prison... and he's the one in charge of choosing how rulebreakers get punished.
      • The commercial ends by encouraging customers to "stay out of trouble" and "let your guard down" because the Henrys will protect them. At this point, the writer of these scripts is barely trying to be subtle anymore.
      • In short, these are stronger, deadlier versions of the Henry dolls from before... and improved with bulletproof bodies AND in an environment where firearms and concealed weapons are forbidden, meaning shooting them like Detective Stewart did won't work anymore. It gives the horrifying implication that Martin (if he's still running the show) is not only as twisted as he's proven, but also capable of adapting his toys to be deadlier.
    • “The Tragic Lie”: We finally learn exactly what transpired the night of the Greywhinder family massacre, and it's not pretty.
      • As it turns out, none of Martin's children are actually his - while it’s not explicitly stated how Gloria conceived them, it’s heavily implied that she had an affair with his brother Arthur, either out of a desire to get pregnant and try to help Martin get out of his depressive slump due to his infertility, or, more spitefully, because of Martin's neglect and abuse towards her. The sheer betrayal he experienced in that moment, combined with him being demoted to a humiliating position in his own company due to the “Harmony Broadcast Incident”, and whatever effects the Faustian Bargain he had struck no doubt had on him, all together caused what little sanity he had left to completely vanish, and from there... we already know the rest.
      • By the time Gloria comes home that night, she's tearfully demanding Martin to explain what happened to their son Thomas (as Martin apparently told her he had dropped Thomas off at school earlier that day, but she got a call telling her he was missing and hadn’t shown up at all)... and Martin is just sitting on the bed, humming to himself, without a care in the world. Gloria demands him to say something, and in response, he calmly explains how he was demoted by his own brother due to the incident, and that he's figured out all the secrets about her affair with Arthur. He then tells her that Arthur and Thomas are already gone, and that Arthur won’t be coming back to pick up Gloria and the rest of the kids. Then, he picks up a gun, and tells Gloria that she has thirty seconds to get her daughters and go, coldly telling her to start running, before slowly and methodically counting down. Gloria runs. Smash Cut to credits.
    • And then there's the credits. Starts off quiet and slow, footsteps then silence. But around halfway, all hell breaks loose. Though muffled, Martin's familicide is heard in full. Barking is suddenly heard, as Macy and Gloria scream in horror at the sight of Banzo/Stitchbuddy, who then crashes through something, Macy's screams can be heard getting more distant, implications being her getting dragged off by Stitchbuddy, and Gloria barely has time to scream for her, as a gunshot followed by a heavy thump is heard, Martin caught up with her. He then seems to empty a couple more shots into her on top of it. Stitchbuddy continues barking in the distance as Macy continues to scream... until that too dies away, implied to be from Stitchbuddy mauling her. And then...Ava starts crying. An extended silence is heard as Ava continues to cry... before finally, right at the end of the credits, what happened to Ava is confirmed. A single gunshot and silence once more. As implied in "THE_PERFECT_PET", Banzo indeed couldn't go through with killing Ava, and Martin had to kill her himself.
  • The secret video I_Wish_You_Sweet_Sorrows Is not any better. It starts with a looping animation of Henry looking left to right while opening and closing his jaw over and over, and the he stops, looking at the camera with his mouth agape while the music skips...before he degrades and leaves us with a beautiful shot of his "Monster" form.
    • The rest of the video contains a collection of random clips, starting with a Security Henry going after someone in what seems to be a playpen, then a man running down a hallway before coming face-to-face with another Security Henry, and then we get our first glimpse of the revamped Ice-Cream-Man, showing that he has some kind of Rubber Man powers as he stretches his limbs to make his hand "walk" towards someone in an air-vent while singing... before the video glitches out and we get a better view of him

    Non-Canon Videos 
  • The Ice Cream Man Cleaning Maintenance Guide, originally the first entry of Season One, starts off as a seemingly innocent guide on how to clean the mascot of M&A Harmony Play Inc., the Ice Cream Man. But right out of the gate, you can tell something is wrong. For one thing, the lighting has the entire stage covered in shadows, so you can barely see Ice Cream Man's face. For another, the narrator slowly becomes more aggressive, going from telling you that Ice Cream Man's shoes need to be shined to outright ordering you to clean his hand. Seconds before Ice Cream Man's shoes are shined, there is a hand near the top left corner that disappears. Just before the narrator tells the viewer to clean Ice Cream Man's hand, there are two glowing eyes staring down the viewer from the darkness, which also vanish after the instructions. The horror really kicks in when, instead of his hand being clean, it ends up being covered in blood. When this is shown, some knocking is heard. After the narrator tells you how to open his face, when it says his face should now be open, "open" is cut off, and it cuts to the Ice Cream Man staring at the camera. Then the narrator says "If his face does not open", and a bang is heard. Afterwards, the footage cuts to the Ice Cream Man twitching, while a horrible gurgling sound plays. After several blank title cards, as well as shots of the Ice Cream Man gone from where he was sitting, a title card that says "Uh Oh" appears. A Jump Scare of the Ice Cream Man lunging towards the camera is shown, with the Ice Cream Man showing very sharp teeth as well. The rest of the video consists of a brief, out of focus warning card, which quickly changes to a slow zoom in on an unmoving clown. As that plays, a baby's cry can be heard in the background.
  • My Two Front Teeth - (Harmony & Horror Christmas Special), which is an animated short about Sofia and her family celebrating Christmas, with Sofia hoping to get her two front teeth for the holidays. However, their plans are interrupted when a monstrous supernatural entity (likely this special's equivalent of the devil that made a deal with canon Martin) takes them each, one by one through the last few days leading up to December 25th, with morbid and grisly results. Sofia's death is worse than the others, since the aftermath features a beautiful image of Sofia's broken jaw and sagging eye sockets. This is even worse in hindsight as her uncle Arthur suggested early on that she could wish for a bigger jaw for Christmas so she could enjoy more of her mothers cooking.
    Arthur: "Well, you could always ask for a bigger mouth like mine. That way, you can eat more of your mother's famous cooking. Ho ho ho."
    • Not too long before that horrific bit at the end, we get a bunch of seemingly random shots, including Banzo staring right at the camera in a very creepy way. But one shot that seems weird is this box with a clownish face looking back and forth, and it even shows up when the door shuts on Sofia, as if it's the one shutting her in. It seems random, but then this damn box shows up in actual canon. And not at random, mind you, no. It shows up when Macy takes over the new version of Sofia. It shows up right before Banzo and Ava unveil their new fused form, and it shows up here before Sofia gets her new look. This box seems to be an element in making these people into monsters, then making the monsters into even worse monsters.
    • Another seemingly random bit is this long sequence of security footage focusing on a bunch of dolls that look absolutely horrific, and then what appears to be a skinless child rises out from between them. Now we have season two, where we learn these dolls are the new "Magical Sofia", and Macy herself ditched her old doll suit for them.
    • "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth, so I can-" OH HI, GIANT GOAT FACE!

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