I grew up the youngest of three, with brothers who are ten and twenty years older than me—which means that I watched a lot of things at a younger age than I shouldn’t have. But the two movies I can think of that have traumatized me beyond anything else are The Exorcist and Leprechaun. Also, I can’t forget the time my mom thought she was putting on a movie about lawyers, and it was, in fact, A Nightmare On Elm Street 2, and I woke her up screaming.
So, when one Twitter user started to share the movies that scared them as kids, it slowly became a glimpse into all of our our childhood traumas.
Oh this is a good one.
I’ll start: Jumanji pic.twitter.com/q9aVSi1Grq
— Ashley Bower (@loudandfearless) February 18, 2020
While I personally did not fear Jumanji, I can understand why that would be a film that terrifies the youths and gives us anxieties about ever playing a board game again in our lives. Part of me wonders if my fear of sharks is rooted in watching Deep Blue Sea and watching a shark just strategically try to murder Samuel L. Jackson, but many of us have now started to revisit those sources of trauma from our youths and look back at the movies that haunted us then and still torment us today.
As expected, many have trauma connected back to Disney movies, and can you blame us? We literally watched Scar murder his own brother, and we were just supposed to be okay with that!
This scene in Pinocchio haunted me for years. Thanks a lot, Disney. pic.twitter.com/VPqkPSREIH
— DC (@dcb97) February 19, 2020
The CHILD CATCHER from Chitty-Chitty Bang Bang. CHILD. CATCHER. Literally. pic.twitter.com/0rABv6DyrK
— Mulled Whine ~ The @GOP is fascist garbage. (@OGintheOP) February 19, 2020
— Gamma Bomb Survivor (@Banner7997) February 19, 2020
But then, there were other childhood movies that clearly left some reeling.
Wizard of Oz. When those feet curled up underneath Dorothy’s house… 😳 pic.twitter.com/lqHLDQmxe7
— Lisa Bee (@leebee4life) February 19, 2020
— preach (@preachdnb) February 19, 2020
Bro the zombies in Scooby-Doo on zombie island were literally real and the gang lost the camera that had proof on it bro THE ZOMBIES WERE REAL https://t.co/IsO3sywUQ5
— 🐈 skala can have little a skalami (@pochowek) February 19, 2020
Wizard Of Oz: aren’t these flying monkeys scary?
Return To Oz: THIS LADY COLLECTS HUMAN HEADS AND THEN WEARS THEM
— TheRetroCritic (@TheRetroCritic) February 19, 2020
And then there’s the movies that we probably shouldn’t have watched prior to being 21 and able to drink afterward.
— cookiebreath (@noodletrain) February 19, 2020
(This one was very hard for me to include because it meant looking at a gif of a shark on a loop, and I started crying.)
No doubt about it:
Jaws
I’m a San Diego native and seeing this with my older sisters when it came out made me give up Boogie Boarding for like a month 😏 pic.twitter.com/pH5usvsoyv
— RRP at Law (@RRPatLaw) February 19, 2020
The only correct answer is ‘poltergeist’.
— Damion Schubert, Dark Warlord of Game Design (@ZenOfDesign) February 19, 2020
My dad made me watch Clockwork Orange when I was 12
— Red Lori Bright Eyes (@RedloraineV) February 19, 2020
I was absolutely TERRIFIED of this movie. To this day, I won’t go near a big gathering of birds.#TheBirds pic.twitter.com/gMhLFtXWTn
— DebbieDoesResist (@DebraReaves9) February 19, 2020
Saw The Shining when I was 8. Why?! pic.twitter.com/Af5vPIUApl
— Jody Sherron (@jodysherron) February 19, 2020
Psycho. Specifically that Universal Studio ride that recreated the shower scene.
Scarred for life. pic.twitter.com/J8a8JUXmjg— Mayumi Yoshida (@immyyoume) February 19, 2020
I was told to mention that our Kaila Hale-Stern and Jess Mason were both terrified of E.T., so this is that mention.
What movies frightened you while you were growing up? Something that still makes it hard for you to watch? Let us know what you think in the comments below!
(Editor’s Note: Willow—the scene where everyone gets turned into pigs, specifically. Thanks for the lifelong body horror ramifications!)
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