Join as we head once more into the breach to face the spooky movies that terrorized us as children
Spooky season is upon us, and this year we’re launching a new series of reviews sure to frighten and delight. Following on the heels of 2024’s First Scare, where members of the flock dove into films of the horror canon they’d somehow managed to avoid thus far, Déjà Boo will send us back to revisit the movies that scared us as kids.
For some, this will mean movies that have since become comfort watches, as growing up often enables you to put things in perspective and recognize that boogeymen and monsters are creatures of the imagination more than anything. Grownup life has a way of bringing other, more mundane frights to the forefront—things like cancer, job loss, and broken hearts.
For others, though, it will be the opposite. Sometimes, scary moments experienced at an impressionable age can get installed in the software of your soul, forever leaving a trace of fear and squirminess that even decades as a rational adult can’t shake.
My family was very much a movie family, and growing up, I had a rich education of sci-fi classics, ‘80s action, and the regular rotation of HBO contemporary hits. When Halloween came around, we enjoyed the usual seasonal favorites and spooky comedies, but classic horror wasn’t really on the menu. Think Monster Squad, My Best Friend Is A Vampire, and Elvira: Mistress of the Dark. Those cult gems were more my speed.
I didn’t even partake of the Universal Monster series until well into my 30s. I did, however, spend a lot of time at the local video store, Video South, on Wilmington Island in Savannah, Georgia. My first real exposure to the terrifying world of horror cinema came through perusing the scary movie section at said store. There was no way on Earth that any such film would make it to the checkout clerk, but walking around and taking in the spine-chilling covers was a spooky treat in itself.
Those gruesome VHS covers were how I began microdosing horror as a kid, as I walked alphabetically down the aisle through the spine-chilling art of Basketcase, Dead Alive, Hellraiser, and Puppet Master. Back then, I couldn’t imagine a world where anyone would enjoy being horrified, let alone myself.
Fast-forward 30 years and here I am, the kind of person who goes to new release scary movies by myself and then casually analyzes the spooks and jump scares. I do not get scared, I do not leave the theater checking for ghosties, and I don’t have nightmares (well, not about slashers). Yet still I crave them and the ghastly vibes they provide.
Strangely, I can still remember the memories of actually being scared as a kid, and they are vivid and real. They’ve somehow outlasted all of the truly spooky moments from hundreds of movies since. I’m hoping that other members of the flock can articulate these types of moments in their own formative films, as well.
I’m going to kick off my viewing with 1987’s The Gate, about a group of kids who have to battle demons after a fallen tree unseals a hellmouth in their backyard. There are images and scenes in this one that have stuck with me for decades, and I’m excited to go back and see how hard they hit as a 43-year-old.
Also on my list are Poltergeist III, Killer Klowns from Outer Space, Child's Play, and The Witches(which isn’t really scary but good lord did it scar me). I know a fellow flock member is doing Event Horizon, which is up there in foundational sci-fi horror that made the HBO rounds in the ‘90s.
One thing I’m eager to see is if other aspects of these movies will stand out to me now that I’m too mature to get scared by brief glimpses of body horror or unnerving scary movie-theme musical earworms. That’s the beauty of time and perspective on childhood memories, though.
At the very least, diving back into the classics will be a fantastic time to hang out with baby Haley in the best month of the year.
POSTED BY: Haley Zapal, NoaF contributor and lawyer-turned-copywriter living in Atlanta, Georgia. A co-host of Hugo Award-winning podcast Hugo, Girl!, she posts on Instagram as @cestlahaley. She loves nautical fiction, growing corn and giving them pun names like Timothee Chalamaize, and thinking about fried chicken.