Nightmare Fuel / Ultraman

Nightmare Fuel in Ultraman.

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• Jamila from "My Home Is Earth" used to be a man who went missing during a space mission sent by "the other guys"^note implied to be France, as his memorial plaque was written in French. What got back to Earth was a vaguely human monstrosity with a desire for revenge against Earthlings and pyrotechnic powers to match. His wail, created by pitching down a baby's crying, is unsettling, terrifying, and otherworldly at the same time. His death by drowning is heartbreaking.

• Mummy Man and his feral face with white eyes was more angry ape than Imhotep. Lucky for the Science Patrol, it didn't last long.

• Dada, three Nightmare Faces and all. It got worse when his main face got burnt by Ultraman's Spacium Beam. Also, that roar! DAA-DA!

• Keylla, especially in the dark setting of its episode highlighting its literal Glowing Eyes of Doom.

• The Reveal of the Underground People, and the Impostor!Anne's Evil Laugh.
  • The sepia-toned interrogation and torture of Hayata

• Zetton, while cool, is a very unsettling foe, with its emotionless, robotic movements, No-Sell of Ultraman's skills, lack of a true face and the creepy beeping sounds and Pokémon Speak in a deep voice creating the effect of an unstoppable, merciless killing machine. The monster would traumatise many Japanese children, including future Ultra Series writer Hirotoshi Kobayashi, who would base Greeza on his traumatic image of Zetton.

• Ultraman's Disney Death at the hands of Zetton: Eye Lights Out, standing still briefly, then passing out with a blinking Color Timer, screen in monochrome, dramatic music, sun overhead. Speaking of overhead, there's a bird's eye view of our dying hero to make it all worse. He got better, though.
  • It was originally meant to be even worse: Zetton would kill Ultraman by trampling his Color Timer, rather than by reflecting his Spacium Beam back at him.

• Ragon in general due to its Nuclear Mutant status, as well as the fact that for most of its fight with Ultraman, there's a nuclear bomb hanging off its shoulder.
  • Aside from that, its design for this show is much scarier^note no eyelids! It's looking at you all the time!, like the Creature from the Black Lagoon. ^note It was Bin Furuya himself in the suit in Ultra Q! Ultraman Orb made it much more sympathetic, if no less monstrous looking.

• Ultraman with his Type-A mask was the stuff of nightmares, the elongated, wrinkled face and mouth agape made things worse. This is not helped by how the suit lacks padding, making him seem unnaturally lean and alien. Compare and contrast his later appearances, especially the Type-C mask with the more muscular body.

• The Ultraman knockoff (Alien Zarab in disguise) with sinister, wasp-like orange eyes and a Thin Chin of Sin who tried to hurt Hoshino after he saved a captured Hayata.

• The death of the Mad Scientist under Jirass' giant paw.

• From "The Ruffian from Outer Space": A human for once, this one (pictured above) used a Wishing Stone to summon Gyango, then used him to prank people for laughs. Then it grew to giant size... Who's the monster now? Thankfully, Gyango's a Fighting Clown even in giant size.

• In-Universe. Terrified shoppers and policemen call the Science Patrol to report a horrible monstrosity at a department store, a kaijuu who ended up being... a sleeping Pigmon who went in the store and dozed off, fascinated by his wind-up toy likeness! Even more hilarious, the kid who points out Pigmon looks a lot like Hideki Yamaguchi AKA Jiro Sakata.