Childrin R Skary is a series of Web Animations by Katy Towell about...well, scary children. It has featured, among others, a child spreading a plague and a child who everyone treats as a pariah but it turns out she is the only one keeping the real monsters from killing everything.
There are also tons of illustrations that keep in line with the site's rather macabre theme.
The series can be found here
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Ms. Towell has also published her first novel, Skary Childrin and the Carousel of Sorrow
The series provides examples of:
- Affectionate Nickname: Nanny Anne refers to Genevieve as "Genie".
- Asshole Victims: The teenagers who get destroyed by Shawnee's vampire parents. Also the mayor of the zombie-infected village, after he refuses to pay Casilda for her service.
- Badass Adorable: Several of the characters, but particularly Stella from Cupid's Last Stand and Ida, who presents a heroic example when she stands up to and defeats an Eldritch Abomination armed only with her favorite song.
- Berserk Button: Emmeline's is pressed when her parents reveal they're going to have another baby, after years of completely ignoring Emmeline herself. She absolutely snaps.
- Berserker Tears: Emmeline, after she finds out that her mother is pregnant again and asked Mr. Creazil what he thought about it.
- Bilingual Bonus: The word "bruja" is scrawled on the wall of Casilda's house, said word is Spanish for "witch". Likewise, the title of her short is "El Despertar", which translates to "The Awakening".
- Bittersweet Ending: For a few animations, but especially in The Mockingbird Song. Shawnee's parents kill the teens that broke into their house, and show a sign that they never stopped recognizing their daughter by reviving her, but they commit Suicide by Sunlight shortly after and their rescue was at the cost of Shawnee's own humanity.
- Black Bead Eyes: The standard eye design in The Mockingbird Song.
- Body Horror: You see intestines in The Mockingbird Song. Also abundant among the zombies in El Despertar.
- The complete vampire transformation in The Mockingbird Song is also quite graphic and horrifying, particularly given that the viewer knows it awaits Shawnee after the end of the animation.
- Bookends: Emmeline sets the plot of her story in motion by wishing on a star. At the end, she makes another wish - on the same star, no less - for herself and Mr. Creazil to fade from existence.
- Also the leaf in parts 1 and 3 of Death & Elsie.
- Burn the Witch!: The villagers of Caterwaul try to drown Ida. Her mother was also shot to death by a similar Angry Mob.
- Creepy Child: This series uses it left and right, though Shawnee (from The Mockingbird Song) is rather cute despite being a vampire by the end of the animation.. Sometimes played straight, sometimes subverted.
- Creepy Doll: Genevieve enlists the help of an army of specially -designed dolls and toys to help her in her quest for global domination. One of those dolls survives the battle.
- Deliberately Monochrome: Generally, the shorts are usually in black and white (or in the case of Ida's Luck, shades of blue), with little splashes of red. However, this isn't the case with The Autumnal Collector, which has muted colors, and the Mockingbird Song, which is in full color.
- The Dead Can Dance: El Despertar and they do, in a nice little samba march.
- Deal with the Devil: Discussed in The Autumnal Collector, although the Collector himself has a much more direct way of obtaining souls.
- Despair Event Horizon: Emmeline goes through a horrific one that wipes out her entire town. Yes, even the postman.
- Don't Fear the Reaper: The Childrin may indeed be skary, but Death, despite the skeleton-in-a-cloak-with-a-scythe look, is a kindly and benevolent figure (and a bit of a Woobie too):
- Death 'n' Elsie.
- An Elephant's Memory.
- A Parting Gift.
- This trilogy now has an animated adaptation as well, and the three installments can be watched here, here, and here.
- Also remarked upon in Agony, when the narrator, a personification of pain itself, says that Death, while feared, delivers people from Agony and is troubled by his actions.
- Death 'n' Elsie
- Dramatically Missing the Point: Nanny Anne tells a disappointed Genevieve that, "When I was a kid we only got toys twice a year." Genevieve takes it to mean that Nanny Anne simply didn't understand the value of getting new toys when she was a child.
- Driven to Suicide: Poor, poor Emmeline apparently wishes herself out of existence at the end of her story.
- Eliza in ''Don't Go Near The Old Ash Tree" fears the worst when her grieving mother goes missing.
- Dumb Struck: In Ida's Luck, this is the fate of the kindly Mrs. Pea, after she sees the monster in the barn. She never recovers.
- Emotion Eater: Mr. Creazil draws power from Emmeline's rage and apparently it's enough for him to obliterate an entire town. Whether he can eat any other emotions is unknown.
- Enfant Terrible: Genevieve is three years old.
- Eldritch Abomination: These are everywhere in this series but it's especially prominent in Ida's Luck.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Though the rest of Jimmy's gang only shows signs of this after he attacks Shawnee. And it's certainly not enough to save them.
- Evil Is Petty: Genevieve is the best example here. No new toys? Looks like it's time to Take Over the World!
- Evil Stepmother: Present in the House in the Snow. She sends Natsu and Haru into a blizzard to die where they encounter the Yuki-Onna. In making amends with the kids, the Yuki-Onna gets rid of her.
- Extremely Protective Child: Shawnee does everything she can to take care of her vampire parents and live as normal a life as possible. She's eight years old.
- Eye Scream: Genevieve's monocle-wearing toymaker is revealed to be missing that eye when the monocle falls off, as he and the others are looking over her plans.
- In Candy, after she gets attacked, all that's left of the poor woman is her eyeball. The little girl quietly drops it into her candy bucket.
- Gallows Humor: In abundance. This is especially the case with The Black Halloween, where the kid gives everyone the bubonic plague so she could get all the candy for Halloween
- Ghost Town: The Little Girl Who Was Forgotten takes place in "a town that doesn't exist..at least, not anymore."
- Harmful to Minors: The tag around Ida's neck is stained with blood. This implies that she witnessed her mother's murder.
- I Have Many Names: Agony states this twice during his speech, once at the beginning and again at the end.
- Jerkass: The kid in the Black Halloween has absolutely no qualms about unleashing the black plague on people just to get more candy.
- Jump Scare: Candy.
- Killer Rabbit: Surely a cute little imp like Mr. Creazil can do no harm, right? Wrong. Absolutely wrong.
- Last of His Kind: The quiet little girl named Ida is specifically stated to be the last of the monster hunters.
- Lonely Rich Kid:
- Emmeline. It's established early on that she has "everything a child could want", save of course love and attention from her parents.
- Genevieve can be implied to be this, as she had "everything in the world" and a nanny to look after her, but her parents never spent any personal time with her.
- Looks Like Cesare: Several of the female characters, although Ida notably receives this description in the narration.
- Looks Like Orlok: The later stages of vampirism in "The Mockingbird Song". Shawnee's parents are described as having sunken eyes, no hair, pointed teeth, and hissing "like angry opossums".
- Make a Wish: Mr. Creazil is "born" after Emmeline wishes on a star.
- My God, What Have I Done?: The villagers of Caterwaul, immediately after throwing Ida into the lake to drown. And then all hell breaks loose...
- House in the Snow: The Yuki-Onna realized that the kids were innocent, apologizes, and so makes amends by killing the kids' wicked stepmom.
- One-Winged Angel: Mr. Creazil grows to ginormous size when Emmeline becomes enraged, and turns into an absolutely terrifying demonic being. The poor town doesn't stand a chance.
- Our Demons Are Different: Mr. Creazil looks like a little devil, cloven hooves and horns and all. Of course, he is nice and friendly and adorable... until Emmeline gets really, really angry. Also, he is implied to be little more than a soulless slave to Emmeline or a rather a creature that thrives on her emotions.
- Papa Wolf / Mama Bear: Shawnee's parents in The Mockingbird Song, after the teenagers attack Shawnee. They don't stand a chance.
- Parental Abandonment: The Mockingbird Song contains probably one of the most heartbreaking examples of this trope ever. At least until the very end, where it's revealed that Shawnee's parents never did stop recognizing her as their daughter even as they slowly lost their humanity.
- Parental Favoritism: In The Little Girl Who Was Forgotten Emmeline's rage is triggered by her parents excitedly announcing the mother's pregnancy of a second child, after having ignored Emmeline herself for a very long time.
- Parental Neglect: Emmeline's parents. The poor, poor kid.
- Genevieve's as well; they shower her with toys and personal servants but don't actually give her personal attention and discipline. This is very subtly lampshaded in the beginning of the animation - when Genevieve is in the elevator and goes to press the button for the floor she wants, the floor labelled "Mother and Father" is at the very top - well out of her reach.
- The Plague: Invoked in The Black Halloween.
- Plucky Girl: Shawnee. She takes up a pick-ax to confront the teenagers who are vandalizing her house!
- Poor Communication Kills: As we find out in Ida's Luck, Ida's a descendant of hunters that drive monsters away with their singing, however, said hunters undertook a vow of silence, leaving them unable to explain themselves when they were blamed for causing the incidents they were trying to stop.
- The Quiet One: Ida, as she's from a family of monster hunters that drive away said monsters with singing, however, said family took a vow of silence.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Stella in Cupid's Last Stand, and Mr. Creazil in The Little Girl Who Was Forgotten. Oh, and Shawnee's parents in The Mockingbird Song too.
- Silent Scapegoat: Ida. What makes it worse is the fact that her ancestors were the same way. They swore themselves to secrecy, even as they were persecuted and sometimes killed for supposedly causing strange incidents.
- Snow Means Death: House in the Snow has this a theme as the story talks about a Yuki-onna, though the story plays with it, as the Yuki-Onna doesn't wish to, quote, "take someone so young" but her presence and snow ain't a good thing, as bad luck follows.
- Southern Gothic: The setting of The Mockingbird Song has shades of this.
- Shout-Out: El Despertar is essentially a different version of The Pied Piper of Hamelin.
- House in the Snow is something of a retellin' of Hansel and Gretel in a Japanese setting.
- Space Whale Aesop: Candy. You'd better buy your Halloween candy a month in advance, or else you'll be visited by a little girl in an angel costume and her Eldritch-Abomination-in-a-Bucket!
- Stringy-Haired Ghost Girl: The Yuki-onna, true to the usual portrayals in mythology
- Spoiled Brat: Genevieve. Her reaction to not getting a new toy? Take over the world.
- Subverted Kids' Show: Most of the shorts are narrated in the style of a little kids' storybook. They feature things like mass slaughter and rarely end well.
- Suicide by Sunlight: Shawnee's parents, after turning their mortally wounded daughter into a vampire.
- Teens Are Monsters: The gang of teenagers who appear in The Mockingbird Song, although Jimmy is by far the worst.
- Too Dumb to Live: In El Despertar, the Old Woman states what the terms and conditions of Casilda's service are and the messenger is given any reason to think that she might be spawn of Satan. In a flash of stupidity that rivals any in the series, assuming that the messenger made them aware of her terms, the townspeople (the mayor especially) don't oblige this, so she brings the zombies back.
- Troubling Unchildlike Behavior: Let's see. We have little girls under the age of ten taking over the world, killing people and Cupid, and controlling zombies. And that's just in the actual films.
- Tyrant Takes the Helm: The entire premise of When Genevieve Ruled The World.
- Undead Child: Shawnee, at the end of The Mockingbird Song.
- Unstoppable Rage: Mr. Creazil, fueled by Emmeline's fury. He stops rampaging after she calms down.
- Villain Protagonist: Genevieve, as well as Stella, who kills Cupid.
- Emmeline could count to some extent, in a much more tragic kind of way - although it's Mr. Creazil who destroys the town, it's her hatred for everybody that powers him.
- The Voiceless: Almost all of the main characters in the animations. Subverted with Ida, who sings to drive back the monsters attacking her village.
- The Von Trope Family: Genevieve's full name is Genevieve Von Gier.
- Weirdness Magnet: Ida appears to be this, according to the people of Caterwaul. However, it is because she was driving the monsters away with her singing, like her ancestors.
- When Trees Attack: Don't Go Near The Old Ash Tree. Really, don't because it'll drag you under its roots and keep you there.
- Would Hurt a Child: Jimmy, who attacks Shawnee, and the Angry Mob who throws Ida in the lake.
- Yuki Onna: Present in House in the Snow
- Zombie Apocalypse: The setting of El Despertar depicts one of these in a small, rural Spanish village.
- A more apocalyptic example occurs in After the Stars Fell, when a meteor shower causes an outbreak of violent laughing madness with similar effects to the parasite in The Last of Us.
