consumption addict

“people said his brain was infected by devils.“
–the shogun assassin

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my parents are great people, but when i was a child they made the mistake of allowing our television to act as my babysitter (and don’t even get me started on how they let a 4 year old jay watch the movie scarface from the front row). because of this i have a great deal of useless popular culture trivia lodged deep within the recesses of my brain. certain shows and films i watched made greater impressions than others, and some of the data passing through my fledgling mind would manifest itself in my dreamlife. every once in a while my thoughts would transform those images into nightmares.

a recent discussion thread on fark made me think about all the cartoon characters or creatures in general that used to bug me out when i was a wee lad. i believe the demons that used haunt my subconscious have been well repressed by now… but who knows? maybe one day i’ll be channel surfing and will randomly burst into tears at the sight of one of these critters. or i’ll chop off somebody’s head. consider that something for you to think about the next time we kick it.

in case you see me losing my shit, bare in mind that i may just be having an adverse reaction to being reunited with one of these:

5. marjory, the trash heap from fraggle rock
look… this may not make much sense to you, but i grew up in a big city. garbage lying about in piles was just a part of life. the idea that the pile of used diapers and chicken bones on the street could come alive and impart incomprehensible advice is too much for me to bare. plus, the trash heap sounded like an old lady who lived in my building (mrs. wisch). thank goodness all the buildings in co-op city had incinerator shafts…

4. large marge.
holy hell. in the movie pee wee’s big adventure, pee wee herman hitches a ride with a lady trucker who proceeds to tell him a ghost story about a car wreck. the whole tale is only lightweight spooky until she drops the line: “and when they pulled his body from the smoking wreckage, he looked just like…THIS!” when i look back on it, this gag is fucking hilarious. however, the first time i saw that transformation i was SO not amused.

3. the sleestaks.
creatures that don’t blink bother me. whenever i would watch land of the lost, these lizard looking bastards made my arm hairs stand on end. mostly that was because they never closed those giant beady eyes. that, and they had pincer hands to hold their crossbows. claws? unblinking eyes? consider me freaked right the fuck out.

2. the music from jaws.
my skin used to crawl when i heard the song. you know the one i’m talking about. it’s the song you hear when you know that big ass shark is about to chomp somebody’s ass… and it used to reduce me to tears when i was a bambino. my outright fear of this song was nullified once i had a real run-in with a shark, but the tune still haunts me a bit to this day.

1. the hulk-out.

when i was a shorty i would watch the old incredible hulk show with my dad and squeeze my eyes shut whenever david banner would get angry. the sight of his eyes bulging out and turning yellow would instantly strike fear in my heart. what’s worse is that my dad has the ability to make his own eyes bulge like that on command. one good hulk-stare from him and it was a lock that i would run for the exit. sadistic bastard… love you, dad.

honorable mention:
the sarlac pit from star wars
pennywise the clown from “it”