History Main / TheDollEpisode

[[folder:Anime & Manga]]

* In "Demon Road", Dacre Shanks is a serial killer who shrinks humans that look alike and places them in a dollhouse to look like a happy family.

* In ''Series/AreYouAfraidOfTheDark'' the episodes "Crimson Clown" and "Dollmaker" were doll episodes.

* ''Series/BarRescue'' featured Royal Oaks, an 81-year-old bar whose owners had littered the place with ''disturbingly'' creepy giant mutilated dolls on nooses. The rest of the decor was equally as unsettling and offensive.

** Creator/MarkGatiss' episode [[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E9NightTerrors "Night Terrors"]] had an alien RealityWarper kid who [[PowerIncontinence couldn't control his powers]] accidentally creating a nightmarish realm populated by giant dolls that ''[[TheVirus turned other people into doll versions of themselves]]''.

* ''Series/InspectorRex'' had Der Puppenmörder, featuring Christoph Waltz as the doll-obsessed villain of the week.

* ''Series/NightGallery'' had an episode simply called... "The Doll".

* Referenced in an episode for ''Series/LastWeekTonightWithJohnOliver'', where Creator/JohnOliver claims that the only thing making an old, racist woman's statements bearable is the fact that she will be taken away into the night by her shelf full of creepy clown dolls.

* [[WesternAnimation/{{Wakfu}} Noximilian the Clockmaker]] has a clockwork replica of his [[spoiler:long lost family]], significant in that his whole life goal revolves around [[spoiler:getting his family back.]] It's simultaneously [[{{TearJerker}} heartbreaking]] and downright terrifying.
* ''WesternAnimation/JimmyTwoShoes'': The episode "A Present for Jez", where a reprogrammed mechanical doll tries to take over Miseryville.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'' episode "[[Recap/AvatarTheLastAirbenderThePuppetmaster The Puppetmaster]]", Sokka finds a cupboard of puppets in their innkeeper's cupboard. This foreshadows the puppet-like waterbending skill that Katara learns from the innkeeper by the end of the episode.
* ''WesternAnimation/{{AmericanDad}}'' had a variant of this, without the horror tropes. Steve meets a [[MyGirlIsASlut loose girl]] who is interested in him, but needs him to bring another boy along for her "friend." He brings Snot, only to discover that this "friend" is a doll which the girl treats like a real person. Things only get weirder when (in the girl's mind) Snot gets the doll pregnant and has to bring her for an abortion.

* In the each of the ''VideoGame/ShadowHearts'' games, there is always an optional "Doll House" dungeon. While not necessarily difficult (though they can be), they are pretty much guaranteed to make you feel depressed or give you nightmares. The only somewhat-exception is [[spoiler: in the second game, when Gepetto gets to learn that [[HeartwarmingMoments Cornelia was with him all along]].]] Still completely screwed up, though.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': the season four Treehouse of Horror ("Treehouse of Horror III", production code 9F04, for you rabid fans) where Homer gets Bart a cursed Krusty doll from a Chinese man's curio shop filled with cursed and weird objects from around the world. The doll [[spoiler:wasn't even cursed, despite coming from an occult curio shop run by a strange Chinese man. The doll had a [[MoralityDial "good/evil" switch]] on its back that someone flipped on "evil".]]

* In the ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'' episode "[[Recap/AvatarTheLastAirbenderThePuppetmaster The Puppetmaster]]", Sokka finds a cupboard of puppets in their innkeeper's cupboard. This foreshadows the puppet-related waterbending skill that Katara learns from the innkeeper by the end of the episode.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Ameri}}'' had a variant of this, without the horror tropes. Steve meets a [[MyGirlIsASlut loose girl]] who is interested in him, but needs him to bring another boy along for her "friend." He brings Snot, only to discover that this "friend" is a doll which the girl treats like a real person. Things only get weirder when (in the girl's mind) Snot gets the doll pregnant and has to bring her for an abortion.

* ''Franchise/FatalFrame''
** In ''Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly'', you meet the ghost of a girl whose sister was [[spoiler: killed as part of the Crimson Butterfly ritual]]. Her father, a skilled dollmaker, made her a doll [[ReplacementGoldfish that looks exactly like her deceased sister.]] At first the girl is overjoyed at "getting her sister back." However, things quickly start going downhill when the doll starts getting a little [[DemonicPossession too realistic]]...
** ''Fatal Frame V: Maide of Black Water'' also has dolls. An entire shrine of dolls. Creepy enough thanks to the ridiculous amount of them, but then the symbolism behind them kicks in, and there's that entire area where they are set to look like they hanged themselves. Oh, and some ''attack'' you and you can only dodge...

* In ''Ghost Radio'', one of the show's callers speaks of a dollhouse that a child she sat was always playing with. When she got close, she saw that the dolls and their dismembered pieces were alive and moving. [[NightmareFuel Some were even screaming in agony.]]

* ''Manga/ShinryakuIkaMusume'', usually rather light and fluffy, featured an episode about an old doll recovered from a storage shed, toward which it seemed to mysteriously move by itself, overnight. It's revealed that that's a feature of the doll: it and it's counterpart, still in the shed, automatically rotate to face each other via magnets. [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane Probably]].

* ''Series/BarneyMiller'' had a 1981 episode simply titled "The Doll". It's a valuable antique that was stolen from a shop window and later recovered. The proprietor is a middle-aged LonelyDollGirl -- she knows her dolls are not real but it's difficult not to speak of them as persons. The thief confesses that the stolen doll seemed to be watching him. Harris [[DeadpanSnarker quips]] "You won't have to see her again -- not until she testifies at the trial."

* ''Series/TheBradyBunch'': Played straight for the most part, particularly when Bobby is annoyed at Cindy over her being overly mothering to her beloved doll, Kitty Carry-All, and wished that it would go away forever ... which it does shortly after Cindy leaves the room and leaves the doll on the couch (for Tiger to swipe). Throughout the duration of the episode, while Kitty is missing, Cindy worries with sickness what has happened to/is happening to her, particularly when she isn't immediately found.

* ''Series/KamenRiderDouble'' has the two-parter "The P's Game", which is PlayedForLaughs (and [[TearJerker tears]]) rather than screams. Akiko encounters a doll that she sees as a real girl, but when the doll starts killing people Akiko is the one implicated. Eventually the MonsterOfTheWeek is revealed to be a childrens' book author who is killing the critics who panned his latest book, which was dedicated to his deceased daughter. The doll, which belonged to the girl, "tells" Akiko that she doesn't want her father to cry anymore, and she relates this to the man after Double defeats him.

** The episode "Playthings" had a little girl who lived in a hotel and had a large antique doll collection. Individual dolls were being positioned to mimic someone hanging themselves or breaking their neck ... after which, of course, someone would hang themselves or break their neck. Sam and Dean pretended to be antique dealers, and needed to get access to the dolls. Dean got a lot of fun by telling the girl's mother that Sam just ''loved'' dolls and had a huge collection of his own, so could she please let Sam take a look?

* Bixlow of ''Manga/FairyTail'' uses Living Doll Magic, in that he owns 5 dolls inhabited by human souls. He uses these for attacks. Not only that but he can posses any doll in case one of them gets damaged.

* ''Film/Magic'' features a very young Anthony Hopkins as Corky, a ventriloquist who slowly manifests his psychosis through his dummy.

* ''Series/WizardsOfWaverlyPlace}}'':

* Referenced in an episode for ''Series/LastWeekTonight'', where John Oliver claims that the only thing making an old, racist woman's statements bearable is the fact that she will be taken away into the night by her shelf full of creepy clown dolls.

* In the ''TabletopGame/CurseOfStrahd'' module from ''{{TabletopGame/Ravenloft}}'', Izek Strazni is the sociopathic henchman to the Baron of Vallaki and has an entire room full of creepy dolls resembling Ireena Kolyana, the MacGuffinGirl of the story the party is trying to keep away from [[BigBad Strahd]]. This turns out to be because [[spoiler:Ireena is actually his biological sister, and the two were separated when they were both quite young, with Ireena eventually ending up in the village of Barovia and adopted by the town's Burgomaster with no memory of who she really is. Izek however remembers her and is obsessed with finding and protecting her.]]

* In ''Manga/NatsumesBookOfFriends'' episode "Unchanging Form" Natsume is seen by a youkai that stole a doll from a little girl years ago (it was initially planning on keeping ''her'') and is mistaken him for his grandmother Reiko who defeated the youkai and took the doll to return it to its owner. It declares it will take something precious from him as recompense, implying that this will be a person, without informing him of what he supposedly took from it and needs to return in order to prevent it from taking its revenge. When he finds the doll it has been sitting in the forest for decades and looks it and he needs to restore its appearance in order to convince the youkai it's the same doll.

* One episode of ''WordGirl'' was actually about Mr. Big forcing everyone to buy thousands of WordGirl dolls that can control their minds.

** It gets even better: the main reason Asuka hates [[{{Kuudere}} Rei]] so much is that she reminds her of a doll. Asuka also regards Unit 02 as ''her'' doll which is ironic, considering whose soul is in the core.

* ''Series/TheBradyBunch'': Played straight for the most part, particularly when Bobby is annoyed at Cindy over her being overly mothering to her beloved doll, Kitty Carry-All, and wished that it would go away forever ... which it does shortly after Cindy leaves the room and leaves the doll on the couch (for Tiger to swipe). Throughout the duration of the episode, while Kitty is missing, Cindy worries with sickness what has happened to/is happening to her, particularly when she isn't immediately found.

* ''Series/{{Wizards of Waverly Place}}'':
** An episode where action figures come to life.
** An episode where Alex shrinks herself and a little girl thinks she's an actual doll and plays with her.
* The ''Series/TheXFiles'' episode [[Recap/TheXFilesS05E10Chinga "Chinga"]]. Noted for being written by Creator/StephenKing (and set in Maine, of course), but ''not'' being as scary as most of the other episodes!
* This is obscure and perhaps not belonging here, but one of the early ''Series/TheWaltons'' episodes--or maybe the pilot--has a bit where Elizabeth gets a doll from a church gift giveaway, and it is used and cracked in the face and freaks her out.
* ''Series/CriminalMinds'' Inverts this, one episode is about a cracked unsub who abducts women, chemically paralyzes them, and dresses them up as living dolls, to replace the dolls her evil doctor father took from her. It's even called "The UncannyValley."

* ''Series/NightGallery'' had an episode simply called... "The Doll"
* In ''Series/AreYouAfraidOfTheDark'' the episodes "Crimson Clown" and "Dollmaker" were doll episodes.

* ''Series/{{Seinfeld}}'' had a rare comedic Doll Episode (though, [[UncannyValley still kinda creepy]]). In one episode George Costanza finds out Susan has a rather large doll collection, and her favorite doll happens to look exactly like his mother. Susan is the only one who can't see the resemblance and dismisses all of George's claims, telling him he's being ridiculous. HilarityEnsues as for the rest of the episode whenever the doll is around George hears the nagging voice of his mother in his head and starts to believe the doll is speaking to him.
** At the end of the episode, his father sees the doll and also imagines it speaking to him. He briefly argues with it as if it were his actual wife, then he pulls its head off.
--->'''George:''' ''[to Susan]'' I told you it looked like her.
** Mr. Marbles, too.
* ''Series/KamenRiderDouble'' has the two-parter "The P's Game", which is PlayedForLaughs (and [[TearJerker tears]]) rather than screams. Akiko encounters a doll that she sees as a real girl, but when the doll starts killing people Akiko is the one implicated. Eventually the MonsterOfTheWeek is revealed to be a childrens' book author who is killing the critics who panned his latest book, which was dedicated to his deceased daughter. The doll, which belonged to the girl, "tells" Akiko that she doesn't want her father to cry anymore, and she relates this to the man after Double defeats him.
* ''Series/GhostWhisperer'' has an episode involving a haunted dollhouse.
* There was a ''Series/{{CSI NY}}'' episode about the owner of a doll hospital being murdered. The opening featured a creepy scene of the hospital filled with broken dolls, various doll limbs and eyeballs, and actual blood from the murder. It was enough to make the person who found the body run screaming.
* ''Series/AmazingStories'', "The Doll" (without much of the creepiness usual for this trope). A man buys a doll for his niece in a little shop. It turns out later that [[spoiler: the shopkeeper uses the doll to help the man finding his true love, and it works]].
* ''Series/DoctorWho'':
** In the episode [[Recap/DoctorWhoS28E4TheGirlInTheFireplace "The Girl in the Fireplace"]], the main antagonists are life-size clockwork dolls seeking to [[spoiler:disassemble Madame de Pompadour and use her body to fix their spaceship]]. Since Creator/StevenMoffat wrote the episode, [[NightmareFuel terror ensues]].
--->'''The Doctor:''' [[OhCrap If this clock's broken]], and it's the only one in the room, [[TerribleTicking then what's that ticking?]]
** In the classic series, The Master had a weapon called a Tissue Compression Eliminator which would shrink people down into doll-sized versions of themselves, killing them in the process.
** Creator/MarkGatiss's episode [[Recap/DoctorWhoS32E9NightTerrors "Night Terrors"]] had an alien RealityWarper kid who [[PowerIncontinence couldn't control his powers]] accidentally creating a nightmarish realm populated by giant dolls that ''[[TheVirus turned other people into doll versions of themselves]]''.
* In one episode of ''Series/{{Charmed}}'', the villain is a man who shrinks people and turns them into porcelain figurines.
* ''Series/InspectorRex'' had Der Puppenmörder, featuring Christoph Waltz as the doll-obsessed villain of the week.
* ''Series/TheMiddleman'' had one episode featuring [[{{Dracula}} Vlad Tepes]]' very own ventriloquist dummy Little Vladdie, who naturally comes to life and obsesses some of the cast.
* ''Series/SabrinaTheTeenageWitch'':
** An episode with an evil doll.
** An episode where Sabrina is turned into a doll.
* In season 7 of ''Series/DesperateHousewives'' Gaby grows attached to a doll [[spoiler: who bears a close resemblance to Grace, her long lost daughter who was switched at birth with Juanita.]]
* The old Chilean SoapOpera ''Lost titeres'' ("the Puppets") has a very creepy OP featuring marionettes that are modeled after some of the characters. In-story, these dolls also exist... [[spoiler: but they're not creepy or enchanted: they're normal marionettes used by a schoolteacher (an old friend of the series's bigBad) to tell stories to the kids she teaches to.]] The theme is justified as people are seen in-story [[YouCantFightFate as dolls and puppets controlled by destiny.]]
* ''Series/MurdochMysteries'': In "Murdoch in Toyland", Detective Murdoch is the target of devilish CriminalMindGames. He's taunted by receiving dolls with recorded messages that give him just enough clues to find the next one, and also to make him overanalyse things and miss more blatant clues.
* "The Doll" in ''Series/CurbYourEnthusiasm''. Larry cuts a girl's doll's hair, only to find it's a rare collector's item and is made to replace the head, swapping one from Jeff's daughter's collection for the one he cut. At the end, the girl thanks him for fixing it and hugs him, but feels the water bottle he put in his pants to sneak into the theatre and runs out screaming [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-B3oC6yWY0A "Mommy! Mommy! That bald man's in the bathroom and there's something hard in his pants!"]]
* ''Series/{{Suits}}'' had an episode with a client who made custom dolls in Season One. She made Mike one that looked like him at the end, and it was brought back for at least one ContinuityNod later.
* ''Series/BarneyMiller'' had a 1981 episode simply titled "The Doll". It's a valuable antique that was stolen from a shop window and later recovered. The proprietor is a middle-aged LonelyDollGirl -- she knows her dolls are not real but it's difficult not to speak of them as persons. The thief confesses that the stolen doll seemed to be watching him. Harris [[DeadpanSnarker quips]] "You won't have to see her again -- not until she testifies at the trial."
* ''Series/BarRescue'' featured Royal Oaks, an 81-year-old bar whose owners had littered the place with ''disturbingly'' creepy giant mutilated dolls on nooses. The rest of the decor was equally as unsettling and offensive.
* ''Series/TheHauntingHour'' featured Lilly D, a doll who tries to become Lilly, the girl she was given to. Lilly D gets Lilly into more and more trouble, while Lilly's mother starts to treat Lilly D as her daughter. Lilly D is in the pilot two-parter "Really You" and returns in "The Return of Lilly D".
** Not to mention the Worry Dolls, who appear whenever Jordana worries about something or makes a wish.

* In one chapter of ''Anime/GhostSweeperMikami'' (both, manga and anime), a possessed doll starts attacking a little girl whose doll had gone missing. [[spoiler: It turns out it was all the doing of Mikami's old doll (which got animated thanks to Mikami's spiritual powers) and had started to fell alone]]. Somehow subverted, with the fact that [[spoiler: at the end, the little girl's doll is the one that helps everyone to defeat Mikami's doll]]

* Played for laughs in a chapter of ''Manga/KeroroGunsou'', where Keroro and Giroro try to exploit Natsumi's childhood fears of her Hinamatsuri dolls by bringing them to life. Then one of the dolls starts moving by itself... fortunately, it turns out to be possessed by the Hinata household's friendly CuteGhostGirl.

[[quoteright:216:[[Film/{{May}} http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/MayDoll.jpeg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:216:May and her closest friend. She'll make more.]]

-->- '''Gehrman''', ''VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}}''