These spooky Halloween episodes haunted as children... and adults too. Welcome to MsMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the creepiest, scariest, and darkest throwback Halloween episodes and specials.
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00:00 Listen, kids, you're 8 and 10 years old now.
00:02 I can't be fighting all your battles for you.
00:04 Welcome to Ms. Mojo.
00:06 And today, we're counting down our picks
00:08 for the creepiest, scariest, and darkest throwback episodes
00:12 and specials that featured spooky themes fit for Halloween,
00:16 whether or not they actually aired for the occasion.
00:19 I don't think--
00:19 [SCREAMING]
00:20 [LAUGHING]
00:21 You're funny.
00:23 Number 10, Filet of Soul, Dexter's Laboratory.
00:27 After Dexter and Deedee demand too much of their creatively
00:31 named goldfish, Fishy, the poor thing expires.
00:34 What can we say about our beloved Fishy?
00:38 Not much.
00:39 We only had him for one day.
00:41 Their mom tells them, very creepily, we might add,
00:44 to flush the dead pet down the toilet.
00:46 But the siblings leave it for the next day.
00:48 This proves to be a big mistake, because Fishy's ghost
00:51 visits them that night.
00:53 Good night, ghost of dead Fishy.
00:54 [SCREAMING]
01:01 In addition to the slimy, spooky specter,
01:04 Deedee's pulled into the sewer beyond
01:07 and gets attacked by a giant tentacle.
01:09 We're not sure if it's the crossed out eyes or just
01:12 the possibility of the toilet being
01:14 a portal to another dimension, but we definitely
01:16 steered clear of nightly bathroom visits
01:18 for a while after this episode.
01:21 How many times have I told you?
01:25 Early morning is daddy's special bathroom privacy time.
01:29 [LAUGHTER]
01:33 Number nine, sugar frosted frights, Rocko's modern life.
01:38 Rocko and Heifer are hyped for Halloween
01:40 and ready to spend the night out trick or treating,
01:43 but Filbert, not so much.
01:45 Filbert?
01:47 Please go away.
01:49 Filbert, what's the matter?
01:50 Leave me alone.
01:52 Given his neurotic nature, it's no surprise
01:55 that he's afraid of the holiday.
01:57 It only takes one piece of delicious candy still
02:00 in the wrapper to send the usually sane turtle running
02:03 around feral in O-Town looking for more.
02:06 It's your first piece of Halloween candy.
02:08 You eat it.
02:09 Go on.
02:10 Mm.
02:13 Tasty, eh?
02:15 The psychedelic Fantasia-like trip
02:17 conjures up some eerie images, and the idea
02:20 of the hopping Hessian coming to steal legs is just chilling.
02:24 But the source of Filbert's fear might be the most disturbing.
02:27 Candy, candy, candy, candy.
02:29 Come drop, come drop, come drop, come drop.
02:32 Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow.
02:35 Years of Aunt Gretchen's lies about poisonous candy
02:38 left Filbert traumatized.
02:40 And to be honest, the few minutes
02:42 she appears on screen left us that way, too.
02:45 Number eight, what scared Sue Ellen?
02:47 Arthur.
02:48 Season four's The Fright Stuff is one of the few Arthur
02:52 Halloween episodes.
02:53 It follows an ongoing prank war between the boys
02:56 and the girls, which comes to a head at Muffy's haunted mansion
02:59 costume party.
03:01 Vinky, if you just got here, then who is--
03:06 [MUSIC PLAYING]
03:09 [SCREAMING]
03:11 While season three's What Scared Sue Ellen
03:14 came out in December, it packed enough spooky moments
03:17 to earn a spot on this list.
03:19 Sue Ellen is uncharacteristically
03:21 afraid of a strange sound in the woods.
03:23 Vinky, Buster, Arthur, if you guys are trying to scare me,
03:27 it's not going to--
03:28 [HAUNTING MUSIC]
03:30 --work.
03:32 In a dream, the Baba Yaga tries to devour her,
03:35 then pops up at her bedroom window.
03:38 Later, she wonders if the sound is from a banshee,
03:41 giving us another haunting visual.
03:43 [HAUNTING MUSIC]
03:47 [SCREAMING]
03:49 With both of these urban legends being their own kinds of scary,
03:53 how is this not a Halloween episode?
03:56 Number seven, Scaredy Pants, SpongeBob SquarePants.
04:00 Halloween in Bikini Bottom is a tough night for SpongeBob,
04:04 because he's incredibly easy to scare.
04:06 So he intends to do the scaring for a change
04:09 and becomes the soul-stealing Flying Dutchman.
04:12 What do you think?
04:14 Great.
04:14 You're going as my trick-or-treat bag.
04:17 No, no.
04:18 I'm the ghost of the Flying Dutchman.
04:21 He enlists Patrick's help.
04:22 And as always, the nautically nonsensical pair
04:25 do the most, with Patrick going all out
04:28 to really shave SpongeBob.
04:30 It worked, Patrick.
04:31 I scared everybody.
04:33 It's a cursed image forever burned into our minds.
04:36 Though the appearance of the real Flying Dutchman
04:38 spooked us, too, a bigger fright comes in the graveyard shift.
04:42 It wasn't the hash-slinging slasher that
04:44 sent chills down our spines.
04:46 No, that credit goes to the Surprise Count Orlock cameo.
04:50 The shockingly hideous Nosferatu might have actually
04:53 been our first jump scare.
04:55 Then who was flickering the lights?
04:57 Nosferatu!
05:06 Number six, the Headless Horseman of Halloween,
05:09 the Scooby-Doo Show.
05:10 No matter how it's told, the legend of Sleepy Hollow
05:13 is one of those stories that will always
05:16 provoke a sense of unease.
05:17 And we think Mystery Inc. would agree.
05:19 [HORSE NEIGHING]
05:22 Zoinks!
05:28 A headless horseman!
05:30 While attending an All Hallows' Eve party at Crane Manor,
05:33 the gang comes face to pumpkin with the headless horseman.
05:36 I want a head!
05:41 Zoinks!
05:42 Zoinks!
05:43 It's true.
05:44 The headless horseman has come back.
05:46 Bunch, get out of here!
05:48 It doesn't help that the mansion grounds are thick with fog,
05:51 creating the ultimate horror atmosphere.
05:54 True to Scooby-Doo form, the ghoul was just some guy
05:57 dressed as the horseman to commit a crime.
05:59 Slap the ghoul in my face.
06:01 Cousin Elwood!
06:03 Cousin Elwood?
06:06 Nope.
06:07 He was after Aunt Gertrude's diamond all along.
06:10 And it would have been the perfect crime
06:12 if you kids hadn't crossed me up.
06:14 But that doesn't make watching the previous events any less
06:17 hair-raisingly zoinks worthy.
06:19 Number five, Angelica's worst nightmare, Rugrats.
06:24 While the Rugrats Halloween specials were creepy and fun,
06:27 the real horror comes in episodes
06:29 like Angelica's Nightmare.
06:31 Honey, there's really nothing I can do about it.
06:33 Please, Mommy, pretty, pretty, pretty, please!
06:34 Angelica, I told you there's nothing I can do.
06:37 When the baby comes, it comes.
06:38 And that's all there is to it.
06:40 Her anxiety over gaining a sibling
06:42 is so strong that she has a deeply disturbing night terror
06:46 about the baby's arrival.
06:47 It's bad enough that she's ignored
06:49 by her parents in the dream.
06:50 But then her baby brother grows to a monstrous size
06:54 and eventually eats her.
06:56 I wonder what a toy car would taste like.
06:58 No, please!
06:59 I'm your big sister!
07:00 Well, now you're num-num!
07:03 We may or may not have been a bit weary of babies after that.
07:06 Chucky had his fair share of dreadful dreams
07:08 and hallucinations, too, like the scary green monster
07:11 under his bed.
07:12 There's nothing living under my bed.
07:15 Nothing at all.
07:22 Hiya, Chucky.
07:24 For a show about the adventures of babies,
07:26 Rugrats gave us plenty of source material
07:29 for nightmares of our own.
07:31 Number four, The Haunted Mask Goosebumps.
07:34 The iconic anthology series Goosebumps,
07:37 based on the equally popular books,
07:39 was a staple in most people's childhood,
07:41 acting as a gateway into the horror genre.
07:44 You know, I think you're right.
07:47 Somebody's out there.
07:49 Somebody or something.
07:51 [SCREAMING]
07:53 [LAUGHING]
07:54 That was totally not funny.
07:56 I'm sorry.
07:57 In The Haunted Mask, we meet Carly Beth,
08:00 who, like SpongeBob, is tired of being the resident
08:02 scaredy pants, always the victim of cruel pranks.
08:06 Seeking revenge, she steals a grotesque mask
08:08 and sets out to instill terror in her tormentors.
08:12 Who are you?
08:13 Yes.
08:14 Do we know you?
08:15 Oh, yes.
08:17 You're Carly Beth, right?
08:20 You really scared us.
08:21 We've been looking for you.
08:22 But after a little too much torturous fun,
08:25 Carly Beth realizes it won't come off.
08:28 Putting ourselves in her shoes or mask,
08:31 we can't help but feel the claustrophobia and sheer panic
08:34 of the idea of this monster face fusing with our skin.
08:37 There's no line.
08:38 There's no line here.
08:40 I'm going to tell my mom.
08:41 Those eyes.
08:42 Those eyes in the mirror.
08:44 What about them?
08:46 They're not my eyes, Sabrina.
08:48 My eyes don't look like that.
08:49 This is some serious body horror,
08:51 and it freaked us out more than we'd like to admit.
08:54 Number three, King Ramsay's Curse.
08:57 Courage the Cowardly Dog.
08:59 The entirety of Courage the Cowardly Dog
09:02 was the definition of nightmare fuel.
09:04 So really, every episode felt like Halloween.
09:07 From the first episode, A Night at the Cat's Motel,
09:10 we realized this wasn't just any cartoon.
09:12 And by the time we reached the mask,
09:20 we were well and truly traumatized.
09:22 But in this show full of supernatural threats,
09:25 one of the standout villains was King Ramsay's.
09:28 Return the slab, or suffer my curse.
09:34 He just wanted his ancient relic back.
09:37 But Eustace became money hungry and held the slab hostage,
09:41 leading the ghostly pharaoh to unleash three plagues.
09:44 Return the slab.
09:47 Let go.
09:53 Maybe it's the entity's oddly calm voice
09:56 or the visual contrast between animation styles,
09:59 but King Ramsay's still gives us the creeps.
10:02 Number two, Haunted Train.
10:04 Hey Arnold.
10:05 From Four-Eyed Jack to the Headless Cabbie,
10:08 Hey Arnold really knows how to tell a killer ghost story.
10:11 It was too late.
10:13 The horse kept pulling the carriage.
10:15 Only now the reins were held by the Headless Cabbie.
10:20 Oddly enough, the actual Halloween episode
10:23 isn't one of them.
10:24 In fan favorite episode Haunted Train,
10:26 Grandpa Phil cures Arnold and Gerald's boredom
10:29 with the terrifying tale of Engine 25,
10:32 a train that went off the tracks and vanished 40 years ago,
10:36 along with the Engineer.
10:37 40 years ago, old Engine 25 was heading for the station
10:44 when the Engineer went mad and drove his train off the tracks.
10:48 The haunted caravan makes an annual return,
10:51 collecting unwitting passengers for a final trip
10:54 to the fiery underworld.
10:56 Even though Arnold, Gerald, and Helga
10:58 believe it's all a hoax, the ghoulish Engineer
11:01 appears at the end, implying the story is true.
11:04 You can hear it in the soul, but as good as great
11:10 as how it ends.
11:11 His ominous song and maniacal cackling
11:14 still gives us goosebumps.
11:16 And why isn't Brainy the least bit terrified?
11:19 Before we unveil our top pick, here
11:21 are a few honorable mentions.
11:23 The Ghost of Suite 613, The Suite Life of Zack and Cody.
11:28 This episode did not have to be as frightening as it was.
11:30 Either the table is getting higher,
11:33 or the floor is getting lower.
11:36 She's here.
11:40 Terrifying Tales of Recess.
11:42 Recess.
11:43 Did we know what miscreant meant?
11:45 No.
11:46 Did zombie finsters creepy voice burrow
11:48 into our little kid brains?
11:50 Absolutely.
11:51 Everybody, hold the door.
11:52 It's no good.
11:53 There's too many of them.
11:54 We've got to do something.
11:56 The Day the World Got Really Screwed Up, The Angry Beavers.
12:00 This B-movie homage delivered some truly spine-chilling
12:03 visuals, including Man Servante, a face that plagued
12:07 our nightmares for years.
12:08 I am his man servant, Man Servante.
12:11 How may I help you?
12:13 Night of the Day of the Dead, Lizzie McGuire.
12:16 We love to see Kate Sanders get her due,
12:19 but those skeletons were downright terrifying.
12:22 [SCREAMING]
12:28 The Tale of the Twisted Claw.
12:30 Are you afraid of the dark?
12:32 Lessons learned.
12:33 Be careful what you wish for, and don't take
12:35 vulture claws from strangers.
12:37 I wish it could beat Boss again to 600.
12:40 Whoa.
12:41 It moved.
12:43 I told you, that thing's alive.
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13:00 Number one, Treehouse of Horror 5, The Simpsons.
13:05 While we're able to appreciate the humor as adults,
13:08 The Simpsons' yearly Treehouse of Horror episodes
13:11 often kept us up at night when we were kids.
13:13 Our parents didn't want us watching it,
13:15 which made the experience extra thrilling.
13:18 This year's Halloween show is very, very scary.
13:22 And those of you with young children
13:23 may want to send them off to bed.
13:26 Oh, my.
13:28 It seems the show is so scary that Congress
13:30 won't even let us show it.
13:32 The disembodied voice in Bad Dream House
13:34 urging everyone except Marge to kill
13:36 was unnerving, to say the least.
13:38 But the fifth installment was the most memorable.
13:41 Nightmare Cafeteria felt particularly morbid,
13:44 because who wouldn't shudder at the thought
13:46 of cannibalistic teachers?
13:48 You might even say we just ate Uter,
13:50 and he's in our stomachs right now.
13:53 [LAUGHTER]
13:56 Wait, scratch that one.
13:57 But before we even knew about the Stanley Kubrick classic,
14:00 seeing Homer's descent into absolute madness
14:03 in The Spoof of The Shining had us ducking under blankets.
14:07 All I need is a title.
14:10 I was thinking along the lines of no TV
14:13 and no beer make Homer something something.
14:16 Go crazy?
14:18 Don't mind if I do.
14:19 [SCREAMING]
14:24 Marge did warn us at the beginning.
14:26 We should have listened.
14:28 What Halloween episode still haunts you?
14:30 Share the scares in the comments below.
14:32 I'm going to scare those kids so bad they'll never sleep again.
14:35 Do you agree with our picks?
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