History Trivia / AreYouAfraidOfTheDark

* ReReleasedForFree: The entire series, in addition to its various payed methods of being watched, has been released for free in its entirety on YouTube for free courtesy of Creator/WildBrain.

* DuelingShows: With R.L. Stine's ''Series/{{Goosebumps}}''. ''Are You Afraid of the Dark?'' tends to be more well-known, though ''Goosebumps'' has [[Literature/{{Goosebumps}} the book series]] to fall back on. ''AYAOTD'' also had a book series, but those were tie-ins to the TV show and not remembered as much now. As one reviewer put it, ''Goosebumps'' tended to be lighthearted, but most books ended with a DownerEnding (the TV adaptation sometimes toned this down.) ''Are You Afraid of the Dark?'' was the opposite: episodes tended to be creepy as sin until the end, with most episodes having a happy ending. Hilariously, in a combination of the anthology nature of the series and [[OnlySoManyCanadianActors Canadian acting unions]], many Canadian child actors who appeared in the tales would later play characters in ''Goosebumps'' (such as Ryan Gosling, who was on ''Are You Afraid of the Dark'''s "The Tale of Station 109.1" and the TV adaptation of the ''Goosebumps'' book "Say Cheese and Die"[[note]]though not "Say Cheese and Die Again"[[/note]]).

** Samantha Chemerika played the Jill in "The Tale of the Final Wish" and Sharon in "The Tale of the Chameleons".

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* ReferencedBy: The collective of creators that includes Myuuji and Mr. Creepypasta, among others, calls itself "WebVideo/TheMidnightSociety."

* RealLifeWritesThePlot: Kristen's departure and the introduction of Sam as a replacement was because Rachel Blanchard personally called the producers and said she didn't want to come back.

* ReferencedBy: The collective of creators that includes Myuuji and Mr. Creepypasta, amomg others, calls itself "WebVideo/TheMidnightSociety."

* DoingItForTheArt: "The Tale of the Pinball Wizard" was so hard to film, creator DJ [=McHale=] had to beg the crew to break union rules and work for an extra day to get it finished.

* TroubledProduction: Any episode that had scenes in a forest - as they were shot in an arboretum. Due to it being a protected wildlife area, they couldn't use pesticides for mosquito control. As such, many takes were used solely because they were the only ones where the child actors weren't swatting away bugs.

* WorkingTitle: The original title was ''Scary Tales'' as a pun on FairyTales, but Nickelodeon execs didn't like it.

* ReferencedBy: The collective of creators that includes Myuuji and Mr. Creepypasta, amomg others, calls itself "The Midnight Society."

** The original series was broadcast on YTV in Canada, which also broadcast the 1999 revival. The 2019 revival is streaming on Family Channel.

* ActorAllusion: In Curse of Shadows when the Midnight Society has to [[spoiler:figure out what to do with 'Connor' who just [[CameBackWrong came back from the shadow world]]]], Hanna quips "What are we, babysitter?"–both Beatrice Kitsos (who plays Hanna) and Malia Baker (who plays Gabby) were on Series/TheBabySittersClub2020.

* HostilityOnTheSet: Mildly with Bobcat Goldthwait, who played the Sandman in "The Tale of the Final Wish", because he had a lot of trouble remembering his lines.

* UnintentionalPeriodPiece: Some of the tales wouldn't really work in modern times due to TechnologyMarchesOn. The biggest "offender" is probably the Tale Of The Phone Police. When the kids are making prank call the protagonist's big sister warns him about the Phone Police and how they locked up "Billy Baxter". They don't believe her at first but look in the phone book and find his number. Despite having only six digits, it works, and they hear Billy begging for help, which eventually leads to them getting caught by the Phone Police. Nowadays, they could just look up Billy Baxter on Snopes or the like to see if it's true (though, for added horror, if this were done today, the Phone Police could expand to the Internet[[note]]like how most phone companies also specialize in Internet[[/note]], and make it so that way Billy Baxter and the stories about him are kept hidden or filled with misinformation about what really happened to him).
** "The Tale of the Virtual Pets" also didn't age well, as the episode is one big TakeThat against Tamagotchis and other virtual pets that were all the rage back in the late 1990s into the early 2000s. Unless modern viewers were alive when Tamagotchis were a thing, most of the episode's satire falls flat. Although it could likewise just work as a satire on fads which is pretty universal.

** "The Tale of the Virtual Pets" also didn't age well, as the episode is one big TakeThat against Tamagotchis and other virtual pets that were all the rage back in the late 1990s into the early 2000s. Unless modern viewers were alive when Tamagotchis were a thing, most of the episode's satire falls flat.

* ActorAllusion: In Curse of Shadows when the Midnight Society has to [[spoiler:figure out what to do with 'Connor' who just [[CameBackWrong came back from the shadow world]]]], Hanna quips "What are we, babysitter?"–both Beatrice Kitsos (who plays Hanna) and Malia Baker (who plays Gabby) were on Series/TheBabySittersClub2020

* {{Jossed}}:
** It's a long standing rumor that the series was cancelled due to low ratings. However, it was always intended to last 65 episodes. But when Cinar was selling it to international buyers, they thought it best to package it with new episodes. Nickelodeon was less involved with the revival, so the budget was significantly lower (hence less Midnight Society members).
** Another rumor was that the fire was always shown already lit so as not to show children how to start a fire. If you watch "The Tale of the Ghastly Grinner", it opens with Gary lighting a match.

** Aron Tager (Dr Vink) and Richard M Dumont (Sardo) were only supposed to appear in one episode each. However, they impressed producers enough to make them recurring characters.

* DuelingShows: With R.L. Stine's ''Series/{{Goosebumps}}''. ''Are You Afraid of the Dark?'' tends to be more well-known, though ''Goosebumps'' has [[Literature/{{Goosebumps}} the book series]] to fall back on. ''AYAOTD'' also had a book series, but those were tie-ins to the TV show and not remembered as much now. As one reviewer put it, ''Goosebumps'' tended to be lighthearted, but most books ended with a DownerEnding (the TV adaption sometimes toned this down.) ''Are You Afraid of the Dark?'' was the opposite: episodes tended to be creepy as sin until the end, with most episodes having a happy ending. Hilariously, in a combination of the anthology nature of the series and [[OnlySoManyCanadianActors Canadian acting unions]], many Canadian child actors who appeared in the tales would later play characters in ''Goosebumps'' (such as Ryan Gosling, who was on ''Are You Afraid of the Dark'''s "The Tale of Station 109.1" and the TV adaptation of the ''Goosebumps'' book "Say Cheese and Die"[[note]]though not "Say Cheese and Die Again"[[/note]]).

* FakeBrit: Hermione in "The Tale of the Walking Shadow" was played by Canadian actress Sheena Larkin.