Year: 2008

SOUTH PARK has been a favorite of mine since I was a kid. It was always edgy, rude, and grossly entertaining, even if I didn't get some of the more sexual jokes as a kid. However, at about twelve years of age, I saw an episode that will haunt me forever.

Now, all fans of the series know that Kenny dies fairly regularly. At twelve years old, it was an accepted fact of life: Kenny was made to make muffled sounds, wear a pimpin' orange, white trash hoodie, and die. However, it was always O.K. when he died, because it was usually in some silly, comedic way, followed by the famous line
"OH MY GOD! YOU KILLED KENNY! YOU BASTARD!". Kenny would be back next week, and we all knew it. He was like Freddy or Jason; no matter what you did, you could never kill him for real… until the second to last episode of Season Five.

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My parents weren't the type to take my brother and I to Disney movies. I am scarred for life; I'm 34 and still sleep with a night light. My parents took us to the movies to see films like THE AMITYVILLE HORROR, THE LEGACY, PSYCHO 2 and AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON. I will never forget when we got our first VCR. The first two movies we rented were THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE and CREEPSHOW, try eating a bowl of chili and drinking a Malta while watching those movies. I lost my appetite and never ate chili again.

The one movie that really traumatized me was SALEM'S LOT. The scene where the vampire shows up at that kid's window was torture for me. My bed was up against the window in my room. My father would say, "Good night kids. God Bless you and remember if the guy from SALEM'S LOT shows up, don't open the window." Then he would shut off the lights. I'd put the blanket over my head and it would be 90 degrees out and I'd be sweating. I swear those nights I must have only slept because I passed out from heat exhaustion.

UNK: After an exhausting day of playing croquet with Mr. Canacorn and Roz "Pinky Tuscadero" Kelly, Aunt John and I decided to hit the hay (we actually do sleep on a pile of hay). Suddenly we heard a loud banging on the Kindertrauma Castle door (My bad, I left the drawbridge down again!). I can't tell you how surprised we were to find none other than THE Tenebrous Kate of the seriously spectacular blog LOVE TRAIN FOR THE TENEBROUS EMPIRE standing before us looking as smashing as usual. She informed us that her COFFIN DRAGSTER had run out of gas right outside of Kindertrauma territory and she wondered if we would be so kind as to supply her with a refill.

I was too star struck to respond but Aunt John, always the haggler, was quick on his feet belting out a Rankin & Bass inspired ditty that was mostly nonsense, but whose chorus contained the following proposal, "If you want some gas today…a TRAUMAFESSION a tank is the price you pay!" Kate was unmoved by the actual song, but visibly impressed by the plethora of clay-mation woodland creatures who sang back up and agreed to this fair exchange of goods. Plopping herself down on the best beanbag chair in the conservatory, she began to spin the tale of a young, pre-Tenebrous Kate who unhappily discovered that toddlers and eighteen wheelers don't mix…

TENEBROUS KATE:

No one seems to believe me when I tell them that I was an incredibly fragile child. Perhaps this story will serve as proof positive that it was only time and harsh experience that built up the thick skin that now protects me from various and sundry cinematic grenades…

Picture, if you will, Wee Tenebrous Kate at her gal pal's Halloween party in Seventh Grade (I was dressed as Alice Cooper–narrow gender definitions be DAMNED; I wanted to wear a top hat and greasepaint). The decision was made by the other party-going kids (all of whom were doubtless composed of far sterner stuff than I) that the film de la nuit would be "Pet Sematary." To underscore: STEPHEN KING's PET SEMATARY. I was quaking in my tiny-yet-undoubtedly-fabulous boots, let me tell you—STEPHEN KING books were only to be approached by daring souls, inured to the ordeal of blood and guts. I'd been exposed to the Universal horror films since I was a tot (Tenebrous Dad does a most impressive on e-man impersonation of the Van Helsing-Dracula confrontation from the Tod Browning film) and I looked forward to "Disney's Halloween Treat" on teevee every year, but I had a notoriously delicate constitution with regards to all matters gory. I steeled myself as the lights dimmed and the VHS was popped into the player…

Needless to say, when that semi comes barreling down and smooshes li'l Gage right on through to the other side, it was more than I could take. I started sobbing and ran out of the room—I was placed in a separate room with the one other girl whose parents didn't allow her to watch R-rated movies (at least SHE had the excuse of having lame parents). To this day, the very mention of PET SEMATARY brings tear-flavored memories of my pre-teen shame. One might make a compelling argument that the reason I'm willing to hurl myself repeatedly at über-gruesome movies is to fully banish the laughter of my classmates from my mind.

My pain–it makes for good comedy sometimes!

UNK: After T.K.'s tale concluded, we made good on our end of the bargain. With her tank full of petrol, our Kate sped away with promises of returning again. I thought it ironic that somebody whose TRAUMAFESSION concerns vehicular disaster should drive so recklessly across Aunt John's prize winning Venus Flytrap patch and straight through a recently mended fence at approximately 200 miles an hour, but that's our Kate, and we wouldn't have her any other way! We don't even mind that we found most of the Baklava Aunt John served her politely hidden in one of our best napkins only partially chewed, we just want her to visit again and soon! Trust me, after spending a day with the P.D.A. twins, Mr. Canacorn and Roz "Pinky Tuscadero" Kelly, that Kate was quite a burst of fresh air!

When I was around four or five years old I watched a movie called MAGIC starring ANTHONY HOPKINS. The plot, as I remember it, involves HOPKINS giving in to the will of his evil ventriloquist dummy after which murder and mayhem ensue. The visuals alone are enough to, even now, make me panic. The dark seventies era cinematography coupled with the hideously creepy dummy have warped me for life. I have nightmares of a dummy, dressed in his little tuxedo, walking around the house of his own volition ready to overpower me. Sometimes he is armed with a knife. Even while typing this letter, my heart rate has increased. Of course, once my older brothers discovered my irrational fear, they used it against me as much as they could. I can remember my older brother holding a ventriloquist dummy while chasing me around the house as I screamed and cried. Recently, when the movie DEAD SILENCE (about a woman and her creepy dolls) was released, I had to change the channel every time the commercial appeared on T.V. My psyche will never be the same.

UNK SEZ: Emily you are not alone in your distaste for ventriloquist dummies, many folks seem to share your point of view. For a quick overview of the cinematic history of these little wooden terrors, I suggest you check out the wonderfully named blog THE UNHEIMLICH. On the surface these tales seem akin to the killer doll sub-genre, but they actually have a consistent psychological subtext all their own. Often the ventriloquist dummy is used to represent the dark side of their master's nature, a shadow identity bent on gaining absolute control. Coincidentally, I recently came across just such a tale in the unlikeliest of places, in an episode of FANTASY ISLAND! The one and only ANNETTE FUNICELLO played the ventriloquist "Maryanne" whose meek personality begins to get overtaken by that of her brassy MAE WEST-talking, moxie-filled puppet named "Valerie" (I swear to God, I'm NOT making this up!). Bizarrely, Mr. Roarke's solution is to turn the doll into a real person and let the two cat-fight it out. After some crazy strobe light effects that include ANNETTE shooting lasers out of her eyes, the dummy turns into none other than the most beautiful woman in the galaxy, BATTLESTAR GALACTICA's MAREN JENSON, strangely clad in top hat and pantless tuxedo. Now alive, Val point blank informs Roarke that she means to kill Maryanne the first chance she gets. On evil Val's actual to-do-list, murdering Maryanne comes AFTER screwing Maryanne's boyfriend and humiliating her in front of a room full of swirling, laughing phantom faces like the kind found at the beginning of NIGHT GALLERY. Luckily, sweet Maryanne gets the upper-hand before "De plane!, de plane!" comes back to pick her up. I can't say the show was all that scary, but last night I made a vow to myself that Mr. Roarke must be honored as an Official Traumatizer in the near future. That guy is nuts!!!!!! Plus you all DO realize he's got some serious magical powers, right?

Cool dummy pix swiped from HERE