I like the implication the uncle was considered a weirdo because people kept disappearing in town, but the cops couldn't blame anything on him. Then one day he ran out of people to feed the creature and got nommed himself.
Something I found disturbing, for lack of better word, was the implication that Koda is abused. So we don't simply have a bully eaten alive; we have a bully who is abused by his father, so in turn hurts others as part of a vicious cycle, and THEN gets eaten alive.
I don't remember seeing this episode, and that was my first thought as well. It's probably telling that I need to revisit the series, but was implied child abuse a reoccurring thing?
I mean, the main character straight up murdering someone (and turning into a vengeful pshycho) is also pretty disturbing. How common is that in children horror? It seems most of them try to avoid having completely amoral endings.
Anthony Naranjo yeah! And I’m pretty sure that the carnival scene when the door opened is an Easter egg from a previous episode called ‘laughing in the dark’
It just occurred to me, part of the brilliance of Are You Afraid of the Dark? in keeping the horror okay for kids is the fact that in the show it's a story being told, so not even in the fiction of the world is the story true. No matter how scary something gets or if someone dies or is stuck forever in a pinball machine, they pull out to the Midnight Society and remind you that its all fake. Brilliant use of a framing device when you think about it.
@Aspiring Marauder Let's be honest, the son was on borrowed time once mom got a new boyfriend. Being a single parent to one child is tough, two or more has got to be a lot more difficult. Maybe mom thinks that if she kills the kid that Dave will stay? But guess what? Dave doesn't hang around for women that wear salmon.
The whole "creepy backstory" trope is very adult horror. But seriously, who tells their children details of a relative's mysterious death? Perhaps she was confessing to her involvement in it? Being a murder mystery fan, that is where my mind went.
I think the mom sacrificed her brother to the doorway monster. It was a strong implication to me that that was the case. She probably anticipated that ONE of her kids would end up getting taken.
A friend of mine met “Koda”, or rather the actor “Leif Anderson” in real life. He’s actually really nice. Also the bratty little sister Christina was same actress who played the “Lonely Ghost”, that little mute ghost girl who haunted the house next door in the eponymous episode.
4/20 is a common marijuana term, usually on the 20 April its sort of a day to smoke weed and get super blazed This year since its 2020 meant it was 04-20-20 so we can all get high
"And don't give me no lip!" I feel like when you're dressed that way, you just kind of expect incoming lip at all times and take preemptive measures against the inevitable mockery. Just look at that guy.
That kid was a decent little actor. He sold the hard turn into the whole incipient school shooter sociopath angle by the conclusion. This episode upset me as a kid. I was unprepared for a protagonist becoming unambiguously irredeemable. Up to that point, I had never really considered such a thing to be possible.
@@Omicron9999 It's a fictional story and a fictional frame narrative, so you don't have to accept what the storyteller said as canon, especially when the implied ending shown on screen is a lot more impactful.
@@Omicron9999 The axiom "show don't tell" is even more important when it comes to Children. What was shown in the story made a far greater impression than what was said afterward. Clearly, as I totally didn't remember the epilogue. My child brain just tuned it out lol
I think one of the darkest elements of this story is a human feeding people to a monster. A human actively killing brings up much more impactful emotions compared to a monster acting on it's own, especially for children's horror.
This episode hits so many phobias. The dark, basements, dolls, clowns/carnivals, skeletons, confined spaces, things that are bigger than they should be...
Are we just gonna brush over the fact he was 100% planning on “feeding” his little sister to the monster at the end? Since lock down happened I’ve been rewatching these are you afraid of the dark episodes and I did watch this one. His little sister annoyed him a lot through out and 100% that look at the end when she comes home means she’s toast.
oh no, no, no.... it wasn't until Roses pointed out how the UNCLE was dealing with it that made me think of all the implications. Like how long did the uncle know about the basement, what he DID about it.... so many questions and so much potential to be horrifically fleshed out! LOL!
@@cbennett7480 that's what fanfiction is for... but if this happened in an alternate timeline that I've been working on... well... the kid would be getting a talking to with some heavily armed MIB-like guys... ... OR one young adult that is mostly cybernetic with the soul of a baron of the Order of the Teutons as his vassal/familiar/companion finding out and paying the kid a visit for some POINTED questions.
I want a sequel story. I want to see Andy, 20 years later, after he's been constantly feeding people to this creature in the basement. I want to hear about how damaged he's become as a person, slipping into greed and psychopathy. I want to know what he asked for in return for human sacrifice. I want to learn more about the being behind the door. And, at the end, I want Andy to fall victim to the monster himself. Then, the upstanding main character gets too tempted to resist that kind of power, and starts inviting real nasty people over for dinner. "They deserve to die" they'll reason. "I remove a horrible person from the world, and I get rewarded at the same time. I can justify this!". And then the cycle starts again, because humans are flawed and corruptible.
I love this episode for the ambiguous ending. It raises more questions than answers and ends when things are going in a certain direction. They set up this monster in a brilliant way and leave the viewer guessing what happens afterwards.
10:25 Not showing the monster makes it _more_ terrifying. People are scared of the unknown. That's what makes horror effective: the parts that you do not understand.
The ending was *almost* disturbing. That goofy skeleton minutes before ruined it for me. Also not sure why the skeleton went "OH YEAAAHHHH" like Macho Man Randy Savage, but it was pretty funny.
CrispyDragons i’m just here waiting for the “Really You” haunting hour episodes to be done-they’re in 2 parts but i’m really excited if she does do them
@@pushinguproses MURRAY! Yes! I wish they'd make more MI games or else re-release the other games in the series on modern consoles... I've only played 1 & 2 and the 5 episode Tales games... T_T
@Frizzurd I think I heard something about an Are You Afraid Of The Dark reboot, actually. Not sure what channel or anything, and coronavirus probably caused it to be delayed, but I swear I heard they were doing it.
that sounds so really cool. i used to watch this show i believe it came on every saturday, my older sister would turn off all the lights and we would watch it down in the basement, sometimes during the winter we would make a fire in the fireplace.
The infinite pink shirts were the result of Andy’s family never learning not to mix red and white laundry. Truly, the most horrifying tale in this episode.
I’m from the U.K. We had a few AYAOTD playing on Nickelodeon. One episode that always stands out to me was where a female student at a school gets pushed backwards in time to witness another student from the 60s die in a Bunsen burner accident. She then gets taken back to modern times to prevent the same accident happening again. The kicker; my dad is a science teacher, so I always got paranoid this was gonna happen to him.
You forgot the scene where the mom says that somehow the uncle was wealthy even though he rarely left the house, hinting that the uncle was up to no good seeing as how the thing gives gifts.
That fake punch almost made me cry laughing, dear god. And immediately after the skeleton just,,, vaguely jiggling in the background 😂😂😂 this episode is next level
I wish you would do the “So Weird” show from 1999. I vaguely remember it, and I think it was along the same line as “Are You Afraid Of The Dark” not an anthology but a horror kids show.
I'm not afraid of the dark I'm more afraid of the shit that comes WITH the dark. Like stepping on a LEGO brick or tripping over something and falling flat on my face cause THAT'S fun.
This plot really could turn into a whole "Dexter" type situation. I mean aside from the implications behind Koda. Andy could just figure out his uncle kept the monster happy by bringing in / kidnapping awful people and feeding them to the monster. And he could continue that himself and could explore similar themes as Dexter did but also the issue behind the monster itself and the consequences of feeding it.
6:03 As a child, my mom had a decorative porcelain doll sitting in our entryway. I was scared to death of this doll. I thought she was going to come alive and attack me if I had to go through there by myself. For some reason my child brain decided the best option to ensure she didn't come to life was to... poke her in the face when I had to run by. I don't know why that made sense to me. But this is exactly what she looked like including the blue dress, except, you know, an actual doll. Adult me is just re-feeling all those moments of horror now.
Definitely recommend The Tale of the Dollmaker, especially if the doll in this one freaked you out. Sometimes the idea of somethin happening to you super slowly and you being powerless to stop it is really powerful, especially when you're a kid
Fantastic choice, this was easily the scariest episode for me when I was a kid. That doll scene especially scared the living shit out of me. I also used to experience paranormal shit at that age, especially when alone in old creepy basements, so this really set the tone for me trying to grasp that delicious yet fleeting taste of supernatural fear that we lose as boring and experienced adults
Kid's horror pushing the envelope to adult horror. This didn't stand out to me as a terrifying episode, but as an adult it does. It's kind of cool to have been able to watch most of these as a kid and compare them to my adult brain. Episodes that were meek and tame had more darker themes and definite many layers weaved beneath the surface. Love this show!
Oooooooooooo this episode is one of my favorites. I really love the dark tone with this episode especially the ending. Plus I think we can all agree that the doll is definitely the scariest part in this episode.
It is definitely quite indicative of her style. That's one of the reasons I like watching her episodes about AYAotD (that, and I actually watched the show a lot as a kid).
This was my favorite AYAOTD episode by far. I think what made it so enjoyable to me was that it followed a very "90's adventure kid movie" structure: you have a bully abusing a nerdy main character, and then the nerd outsmarting the bully by inventing an unnecessarily complex contraption/trap to get revenge. On top of that, the light eldritch horror elements of the story turned out to fit really well into that story arch. I saw this episode many times and never got bored.
Also, what I love about this episode is how inscrutable and unknowable the horror is: you never know if the entity is a ghost, a demon or something else (maybe other-dimensional?). Yep, we see a pair of red eyes, that f*ck¡ng creepy doll and the circus barker skeleton, but you even don't know if they are avatars of the same being or simple minions/emissaries. The only who seeing it was the bully, and don't lived to tell. We only know that music invokes it and needs to be feed.
1:10 Hey Roses just letting you know the Stephen King book isn’t titled *Stand By Me.* The movie was called that but the book is called *The Body.* just figured you’d appreciate knowing that. Keep up the great work UwU
That was a steven king movie? I thought it was a young teen movie of kids journeying to find a body.they have like kids from the sand lot in the movie i think.their also i think the stand by me movie of a black teacher or principal thats thrust anf want to help this class of trouble teens.so i think that pop in my head when i hear the name stand by me.
@@zerokura Stephen King has written a lot besides horror. He's written a lot of great drama and fantasy/science fiction. Shawshank Redemption (Titled "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption") and The Green Mile were also adapted from his stories.
The Red Eyes moment, gave me a cold tingle I used to get when I was a kid, & I was around 25 at the time, I forgot why I never watched AYAOTD, as opposed to Goosebumps.
"The Tale of the Quicksilver" is the one episode that gave me nightmares for years. It's wonderfully creepy and occult and I'd love to hear your take on it.
Is that the one with Tatyana Ali and there’s chalk involved and a fire? If so, that’s the one that stuck with me from my childhood. Creeped me out so much as a kid.
I swear, I watched this series multiple times over the years, since they first aired. Every few years, I'll binge a few seasons. I have never, ever, seen this story. Not a single bit of it. So yeah, you're not the only one. Maybe it really did upset the censors?
I remember seeing it several times, but I had never seen the Silent Servant. There was quite a few of them that I had never seen, so it's interesting to figure out what ones were played the most and the least.
Yup, I remember having seen this episode multiple times as a kid, and each time it scared the hell out of me. Even now remembering it make me shiver, the red eyes in the dark, and that voice... Brrrrrrr...
I remember seeing this as a kid and being very disturbed by it; however, the only episode I couldn’t watch more than once was that vampire silent film one, Tale of Midnight Madness
I replayed that "What's the matter, Andy? Afraid of the dark?" clip about five times. That little girl's delivery of the line was hilarious. The eye roll completed it. I also found it weird that the mom looked directly at the camera around the 5:30 mark. That's usually a big no-no unless you're in a documentary style series or doing some sort of fourth wall break. It felt creepy.
I used to be obsessed with Megadeth (hence the character in my icon). Every time you made a reference to them, it sent me right back to when i would lose my mind whenever someone would just acknowledge them. unexpected, lol. thank you for that!
Me too, especially when Koda went into the basement, he must've been *sweating bullets* I bet he felt like he was in his *darkest hour* praying it was just a nightmare, but even then he might *wake up dead*
This episode scared the hell out of me when I was a kid and watched it and made me afraid of basement closets/root cellars for ao long lol. Then as an adult I realized the implications of the ending... good stuff.
@@Mafon2 April 20th is a pretty big holiday for potheads. She waited to release the video until that day in order to make this joke, and it seems from reading these comments you're the only one who didn't like it. 🙄
@Frizzurd That always just randomly appear in mid air wherever the guy goes, and also they can talk for some reason. They don't say anything too scary though, they're just kind of a jerk.
Just discovered your channel and am really enjoying it so far. This episode of Are You Afraid was always one of my favorites, so it warms my heart to see it get a little recognition. Would absolutely love to see an updated version of this story, feel like it could work well if it were expanded a bit. Likely never, but a man can dream. Keep up the great work!
This is one of my all-time favourite episodes of the series... JUST because of the ending. It was so much darker that other episodes, and ending it on an evil note (no pun intended) really appeals to me. That said, I'm not someone who likes just straight up "Ha! I'm evil and win!" BS endings, but ones that have that sort of ambiguous and implied evil end to it. Another prime example is the theatrical ending of Little Shop of Horrors... where you don't SEE Audrey II and its offspring destroy the world, but when the heroes think they've won, and get their happy ending, the camera pans down to one single offspring nestled between the flowers in their garden, and it just smiles... and you KNOW that the horrors are just beginning...
I always found that episode "The Tale of the Hungry Hounds", 7 from season 1 to always really stick with me...something about its melancholy vibe - a tragic past that keeps resurfacing to really get me a lot in horror and this episode's tone just really hit the creep factor hard on me as a kid. Haven't watched it in years and don't know if it would hold up today but wow... I think I remember opting to not watch this one again when it would come on as reruns as a kid because I just didn't want to...and I loved R u afraid of the Dark, but this episode was a one and done for me, it shook me up.
a good episode to review of Are You Afraid of The Dark? that is like a Stephen King novel would be the three part episode The Tale of the Silver Light which details the societies origins
I was just thinking about that one. It was a good 3 parter and had me hooked by the premise. The funny thing is I forgot all the details but what stuck with me was that creepy little vagabond child and when he turned evil looking. I was legitimately scared of that little kid when I was 10 or 11 when I saw it.
I remember this episode and yes it was one of the scarier episodes. I also loved the episode with the jester with gel coming from it's mouth, that scares 4 year old me.
I was a huge scaredy-cat as a kid and couldn’t even watch the intro of this show without being terrified 😆 and now 20+ years later I am a huge horror buff as well haha
dear roses, i came back to this channel after a while to watch some more videos. this time even about a series i have never ever seen or heard of, because it never ran in germany afaik. but your humour and writing is so nice, it makes me smile and feel comfortable.
Hey just wanted to say I really enjoy watching your Horror kid show reviews! Used to watch these shows all the time growing up, to the point that I got together with my cousins and we made our own fan episode of Goosebumps trying to pay homage to as many classic episodes as we could. Tried to capture the campy low-budget 90's tone as best we could. Was a lot of fun to do after binging all the Goosebumps episodes together on netflix.
I dont care what people say this is one of the best episodes of *Are You Afraid Of The Dark* Yeah its pg and some is cheesy but that monster that feeds on the humans blood and all is insane in exchange for wishes feels relatable to me for some reason I also loved the ending part with the smile one of the best 💀👻
I saw this one on TV when (I assume) it originally aired. I bailed out after the doll scene. I never saw it aired again either, so it became pretty legendary for me.
