As small children we tend to do what we’re told. We don’t always like it but we listen. We eat our veggies and put on a jacket before leaving the house and generally don’t question things.
As small children we’re also easily entertained. Chuck us in front of a television with just about anything on and we’ll shut up and watch.
As adults, however, none of this is the case. If I want chocolate instead of my veggies I’m going to have chocolate, I am certain I don’t need a jacket thanks (I’m always wrong) and I’ve come to realise that kids shows are almost always weird as hell.
Looking back on some of the shows I loved as a child I have lots of questions, but the main one is “what the heck?”. Some of the most iconic shows, like Barney The Dinosaur and Round The Twist, were so crazy and downright terrifying that I don’t understand how they got cleared for production in the first place.
Seriously, in what universe is a giant talking purple t-rex with a full set of human teeth not nightmare material?
But Barney The Dinosaur is just the tip of the WTF children’s shows of decades past. There’s a concerning amount of animated and real life shows that had questionable characters and plot lines.
I present you with the worst of the worst:
Round The Twist
A.K.A the cooked shows of all cooked shows feat. a man who could snort ice cream from his nose, an episode where Pete falls pregnant by peeing on a tree and gives birth through his nose, bouncing human brains, green cabbage patch babies, and this human-bird hybrid monster thing:
Yeah, no thanks.
Under The Trap Door
This is a show about the monsters that lurk beneath a trap door in a castle. Just the premise is terrifying. It’s like they deliberately tried to think of an idea that would stop kids from sleeping. Just the opening theme song is enough to make me want to curl up under my blanket.
The main characters are stop-motion claymation creations including worms, a talking skull, a spider and weird looking monsters. Basically, it’s a whole lot of scary.
In The Night Garden
Is this show could speak it would say, well, nothing because the characters talk only in baby babble.
I honestly have no words for this. Which works just fine, I guess.
Johnson And Friends
I apologise in advance for the PTSD the next photos are going to cause. If you don’t think you can handle it now is your warning to look away.
Even as an adult, Johnson And Friends scares me.
Just the plot of the show makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up:
“Johnson and his friends are toys that belong to a boy named Michael, unseen except for when he sleeps in his bed. They reside in his bedroom, but do not move or show any signs of life until he has left the room or has fallen asleep.”
It’s like Toy Story except the toys are exceptionally more creepy and definitely not the kind you want watching over you while you sleep.
No no no no no no no.
Lift Off
Specifically, the faceless doll known as EC.
The concept behind EC is kind of sweet. Speaking to ABC Throwback, Luke Carroll (who played Paul on the show) explained:
“EC represented ‘Every Child’ so if you wanted EC in your imagination to have brown eyes or brown hair, it could be anything that you wanted it to be. Looking back on it, it was very, very clever.”
Clever? Try terrifying.
As well as EC, the show also had talking backpacks, a magical lift and a group of lizards who spied on the human characters. Totally normal stuff.
The Ferals
A show about feral animals who all live in the same backyard shed.
If there was a way to get a kid to pet a dog with rabies or pick up a rat if they ever saw one, this show was it. Which is exactly the type of stuff parents wanted their kids to learn. Ah early 1990s Aussie TV, gotta love it.
CatDog
I’m not sure why but, as a kid, I loved watching CatDog.
As an adult, it’s giving me human centipede vibes and I am not okay with it.
Bananas In Pyjamas
As beloved as this show is you got to admit, it is kind of weird. Think about it. It’s a show about human-sized talking bananas who wear striped pjs and are friends with anthropomorphic bears.
The show itself isn’t exactly terrifying. In fact, it’s quite positive and fun and joyful. But there’s no denying the concept is pretty weird.
Plasmo
One word: NO.
The Book Place
Because kids don’t hate reading enough, this show decided it was a good idea to bring a giant book worm to life.
But this thing doesn’t look like it’s going to make reading fun – it looks like it’s going to swallow me whole in my sleep.
There’s only one explanation for all of these children’s shows: someone was on acid. Heck, maybe everyone was on acid. Maybe that was the creative process in the 1980-90s: “Hey let’s all meet at 2pm, take a trip and jot some notes down!”*
Or maybe there are adults out there who are just naturally this crazy. Who knows. All I know is that there’s no normal logic that can explain these kids shows.
*This is almost definitely how Teletubbies was created. They’re talking bear-alien things who don’t speak, live in a land where the sun is a baby’s face and only eat custard and toast.
Yep, right out of an acid trip for sure.