I wasn’t a scaredy-cat when I was young, but there were some things I was deathly afraid of, and most of them were pretty strange. For instance, I liked spiders and I wasn’t really afraid of the dark, but when I think about it, most of my strange fears came from stories people told me. Here are two weird and unconventional fears I had as a kid.
#1 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Don’t even judge me. The Johnny Depp Charlie and the Chocolate Factory movie should be rated R because I was absolutely terrified of it. Let me explain why I feel this way before you think I’m being overdramatic. I haven’t read the book, so I’m purely focusing on the movie here.
First of all, when they arrive at the factory, a boy literally drowns in a river of chocolate while his mother is hopelessly screaming for someone to save her only son. Then, a bunch of tiny men decide to stand at the edge of the river and start singing while this poor boy is drowning. Imagine dying in a swamp of chocolate while wearing a red and white striped shirt. Yes, this might seem more amusing than horrifying, but again, I was five years old.
Then, there’s a poor girl who has a horribly strict soccer mom forcing her to be a top-tier athlete. Sure, she’s a brat who chews way too much gum, but then she gets turned into a gigantic blueberry and has to be rolled around. The tiny men return and sing while she’s exploding. Even at the end of the movie, she remains blue, which implies that this event will have permanent effects.
The next girl ends up getting attacked by squirrels with advanced intelligence and is
dragged down a garbage chute. Plus, she’s not even wearing any protective clothing: just a dress and tights. I don’t think I need to repeat that the men enter and sing while she’s screaming for her dad to help her.
The last boy ends up getting shrunk, but then we see Willy Wonka’s perspective. His dad was a dentist who never let him eat chocolate. I don’t know why, but as a kid, I really thought this was the most tragic thing a person could possibly endure. This was the final straw. I was absolutely horrified that his dad wouldn’t let him eat chocolate, even on Halloween.
#2 The Closet in the Closet
This one requires some context. In my house, we have two of what my family calls “the-closet-in-the-closet”. One is in my brother’s room and the other is in the guest room. It’s exactly what it sounds like. Inside the closet is another closet. However, they aren’t normal walk-in closets, they sort of look like unfinished basements. The floors are wooden and they are super cold. My brother keeps all of his old school supplies in his.
For some reason, when I was younger, I didn’t like sleeping in my own room. Usually, I’d go to the guest room. My dad would sometimes tell me a story, and then I’d go to sleep there. One day, I had a lot of pent-up energy, and before going to bed, my brother walked into the guest room in the dark and told me a secret. He said that there was a man named “Injun Joe” who lived in the guest room closet-in-the-closet, and he was there right now. I suddenly froze with fear, and he continued with a serious look on his face. He told me that if I was too loud at nighttime, Injun Joe would come out to get me.
I was terrified, but I also wasn’t sure whether or not to believe him. Just then, my grandma walked in and told me to go to sleep. So, I asked her if there was really a man living in the closet-in-the-closet named “Injun Joe”. But here’s the thing you should know. My maternal grandmother is deaf. Meaning, she cannot hear. So when I asked her whether or not there was a man living inside, she looked me dead in the eye and probably thought I was asking for food or something, because she responded yes. For the next couple of years, I was terrified. I ended up migrating back to my room and I stayed away from that closet at all costs.
Flash forward to sixth grade, and I’m sitting in Language Arts class while our teacher instructs a kid to read the next chapter of Tom Sawyer out loud. And bam, he gets to the line “it’s Injun Joe,” and I had to have misheard. I thought it was my mind tricking
me, but again, he said “Injun Joe” and I was shocked. How did this book know about the man living in my closet? Suddenly, it hit me like a ton of bricks that my brother had been around my age when he first told me about Injun Joe. And then I realized I had seen a copy of Tom Sawyer on his bookshelf, and it all made sense.
The bottom line is, if I ever become a parent, I will never show my kids Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and I’m not messing around with closets. If anyone else has anything they were irrationally afraid of as a kid, let me know.
Hey Sruthi! I don’t believe I ever commented on your blog before, and once I saw your blog concept I was immediately interested. I’ve never actually seen this version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, I saw the one with Gene Wilder from the 1970s. Still, the descriptions of events do seem pretty horrific. When I read the response that your grandmother gave you, I literally laughed out loud. Looking back at the situation, it’s a little funny, but bringing myself back into the mindset of a child, ohhhh shoot. I would have been terrified, although I never had a closet within a closet, I was afraid of some sort of creature who ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in my basement. I was afraid of many things as a kid, like when you turn the lights off before going upstairs. I would run upstairs because I always imagined something grabbing at my ankles. The only mindset that got me over this fear, or I am sure I would still have it to this day, is that, since my rational mind knows that it is not real, that if I can create it with my mind, I can also destroy it with my mind. I don’t even know if that makes sense, but it makes sense to me and if it helps me not be afraid of the dark then I guess it works. I really enjoyed your blog, I will keep a lookout for your next one!
Sruthi, I wanted to tell you that your fear of Charlie and the Chocolate factory was completely valid. First off, Johnny Depp in that movie looks absolutely terrifying. He fulfilled the role of “ominous and unpredictable candymaker” very well, and something about his hairstyle always rubbed me the wrong way. Secondly, the plot has always concerned me. Now that we’re older it makes sense that it was so shocking- we weren’t used to characters getting booted off so quickly. However, even thinking about it now, each “death” is unsettling and unwarranted. And honestly, Willy Wonka got on my nerves. Who did he think he was? Seems to me that he was on a power trip, and pretended that he could get away with anything.
I’ll be honest when I say I was caught off guard by your second fear. I was expecting a typical creepy room where you allowed your imagination to run wild. However, after reading how the fear developed, I would’ve also been terrified. Your brother had completely set you up for that one, and I would’ve fallen for the same trap.
Anyway, it’s interesting to think about our past irrational fears, and how they came to be. We can be so gullible as children, and misinterpretations can turn into extreme fears.
Hey Sruthi! I never watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory because I was terrified and honestly I still am! All the characters have unique designs that quite honestly make me uncomfortable. Now after reading your description of the plot I think it’s worse. The oompa loompas were weird and me seeing like a second of them was enough. I feel like another thing in this category would be Cat in the Hat. For such a popular kids book you would think the movie wouldn’t be so horrifying.
I also used to be terrified of closests. Just closets, it didn’t even have to be a closet in a closet. I hated the fact I couldn’t see everything in bright light whenever I looked in one and if I ever saw a closet with another closet that looked unfinished, my nervousness would just shoot through the roof. I don’t know if I could really count this fear but I hated opened grand pianos. Closed ones were okay but the open ones where you could see the strings I tried to stay as far as possible. Once in a lesson this huge bug was crawling right in front of me and I did not know what to do and since then I’ve been scared another one will pop out and wiggle it’s little antennas at me.
Hi Sruthi! I had a great time reading your blog post this week — your brother did you wrong with the door story, I would have been petrified.
I think Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a totally understandable movie to be afraid of — it’s dark!! My personal equivalent as a kid was Toy Story 3 (I think this is the right one) — I saw it in theaters and was completely terrified by the incinerator scene. I think I might have had nightmares. I’m a fairly easy to scare person, so I think I had a decent amount of irrational fears as a kid (and now! I still can’t do horror movies), including old dolls and going to the basement alone.
Writing this is bringing back memories — there was a popular book series called Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children that I picked up one day in middle school, saw some sort of unsettling illustration (I can’t remember what, maybe some kind of supernatural one?), and immediately put back down and never picked up again. Maybe someday I’ll try to make myself read it. Like I mentioned, I lose my mind watching horror movies, so that’s also something I’ve been meaning to get better at, since I know there’s a lot of really high quality ones that are worth watching once you get past the fear.