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...shocking public information films...

I remember a particularly bad one where a young lad gets his feet cut off by a train. The policeman knocked on the door and, holding up the lads football boots, says to the mother "He won't be needing these any more!". Dark stuff!

Cheer

That was a lovely little public information film called 'Robbie', presented by Peter Purves in full-on Alan Partridge mode!

Hello all,

I just wanted to let everyone know about a new book by myself and co-author Dave Lawrence, Scarred For Life Volume One.

It's a 740 page tome about growing up with all of the wonderfully dark pop culture of the 1970s: scary kids' shows (The Owl Service, Sky, Children of the Stones etc)  to, bleak adult dramas (Callan, Doomwatch, 1990, Survivors etc), sci-fi & horror (from Blakes 7 to Sapphire and Steel, A Ghost Story for Xmas to The Omega Factor), shocking public information films, violent kids' comics, horror-themed toys, games, sweets and crisps, pulp horror novels, savage horror films and the paranormal boom of the decade!

2000 AD, Action, Misty, brutal girls' comics... They're all in there, and many more besides.

It's huge: 740 black and white pages for £16.99, or a full colour eBook for £5.99. Every physical copy comes with a free eBook (the instructions for downloading it are on page 2 of the hard copy).

Here's the direct link to the hard copy, if anyone's interested:

http://www.lulu.com/shop/stephen-brotherstone-dave-lawrence/scarred-for-life-volume-one/paperback/product-23116461.html

And for the PDF:

http://www.lulu.com/shop/stephen-brotherstone-dave-lawrence/scarred-for-life-volume-one/ebook/product-23116544.html

I think it'll be right up a lot of forum members' streets. Hope you enjoy it!

Bums. Thanks for the heads up, Fungus!

This should work:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1027049759/the-pan-book-of-horror-stories-scrapbook

Hi guys,

Just wanted to let everyone know about a particularly brilliant Kickstarter project by UK horror author / editor Johnny Mains, The Pan Book Of Horror Stories Scrapbook.

If you grew up loving those Pan Horrors, as I did, then this is essential; the only in-depth history of the entire range, with contributions from the surviving authors.

There's only a week to go and Johnny still needs 2K or so, so I'm spreading the word as far and wide as possible!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects...ries-scrapbook

I've just thought of a 2000AD story that scared the shit out of me - 'SHOK!' from the 1981 Dredd annual.

The story that *ahem* 'inspired' the film Hardware. with some of Kev O'Neill's most unsettling artwork, it was the final panel that did me in as a 10 year-old: the war robot, wearing the main character's wife's hair, with that jutting spike sticking out of it's throat. Dunno why, but that image stayed with me for ages!

Anyone remember a tv show on BBC called The Enchanted Castle? Some children put on a play and made an audience of stuffed dummies who all came to life and chased them. That absolutely scared the bejeebus out of me.

Woah. Thanks for that scan, Gypsum - chilling indeed. One of the things we'll discuss in the book is the carefree way that creators actively encouraged scaring and shocking the bejeezus out of little kids back in the 70s and 80s. Take 'Action', for instance. I was only 5 when it came out, and never read it at the time. Reading the scans now, at the ripe old age of 43, genuinely shocked me. My jaw was dropping open, it seemed, at every other page. But it was EXACTLY what kids wanted!

I'll have to try and find out about the Enchanted Castle, it sounds great. And the book will feature a mix of the obvious (Doctor Who, Tomorrow People, Sapphire and Steel) and the more obscure (Sky, King Of The Castle, Beasts, The Changes, etc).

I remember standing in a newsagents reading through Starlord - the sequence where the woman bites into the fruit and then drowns in its juices horrified and fascinated me in equal parts. I remembered it vividly long after I'd forgotten where I'd read it...

Oh God, that SERIOUSLY freaked me out as a kid. I can still see her, the juices running out of her mouth like a river as she drowned. *shudder*

Stegram, here is my amended recollection:

Comics have rarely scared me or freaked me out, but I will always remember some panels by Jose Ortiz.  I am reliably informed these were from 'The House of Daemon', which ran in The Eagle in 1982.

The owners of a newly built house get stuck in a nightmarish maze created by 'Daemon', a supernatural entity, who creates horrible worlds for them to live through or (more often than not) die in.  The freaky panels of one particular story saw a group of unfortunates trying to escape goblins, which reached up from under the sand or mud and pulled them under.

The horror of either suffocation under the earth or being torn apart by subterranean humanoids was too much for me - I've treated mud flats and sandy beaches with suspicion ever since.

Lovely stuff, Shaolin, thank you! I'd forgotten about House Of Daemon completely - Doomlord, Sgt Streetwise and (of course) Nu Dan Dare are seared into my memory, but Daemon managed to slip through the cracks.

I can feel an addition or two to the comics section coming on... 

'The Unexplained' magazine used to have much the same effect on me - I'll never forget their article on Spontaneous Human Combustion, or the accompanying photos *shudder*

Was that the first issue with the free flexidisk of 'voices from the dead' - supposed recordings of ghosts randomly picked up on old recordings? That was very disturbing.

Yup, that's the one - I made it about halfway through that flexidisc before switching it off. Never went back...

The storyline from Sapphire & Steel set in a train station about the WWI soldier. So creepy and atmospheric in fact that when bought them on dvd fairly recently it still made me uncomfortable. Thinking about it, every episode of Sapphire & Steel made me feel that way...

@pack Up Your Travels In Your Old Kit Bag' never had the same meaning to me after that story. And as for the story about the entity that could hide in old photos, but had no face... Terrifying.

It looked something like that Star Trek photo Steve Green posted!

[Scream]

2000AD had a huge effect on my early life, but as far as genuine horrifying moments go, I can't bring any to mind.

There was a short lived sister publication called Scream that contained a one-off that shook my young soul to the core: 'The Punch & Judy Horror Show' (from Scream number 7).

It can be read here on fellow forum member Ghastly McNasty's website:

http://www.backfromthedepths.co.uk/thetheatreofterror/2011/comic-scans/the-punch-just-horror-show-from-scream-7/

The sheer terror in the eyes of the tales protagonist, brilliantly illustrated by Brendan McCarthy, haunted my nightmares for weeks. It's a superb one-off tale in its own right too, with a terrifying yet simple denouement.

One other comic tale struck a black chord; Marvel's 1st issue of 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' (1989).
I was known in my primary school class as being a comic & horror fan, and a classmate who'd been on holidays in the states brought me back an illicit copy of this.
I think I was genuinely unprepared for the content within, the most shocking moment portrayed a man being coldly murdered by a young couple who had invaded his home, with the female carrying out the act ("Burying the knife in his chest").
I think it was the first time I realised that 'real life' horror was far scarier than any fantasy story, and worse, a similar grisly fate could feasibly befall my Dad any night of the week.

There'll be an article about Scream in the book - I'm lucky enough to still own my full run from when I was a teenager. Brilliant, brilliant comic, and I vividly remember that story. Great stuff.

Not sure I've ever been scared by a comic but I remember a children's book about the paranormal (the title escapes me but the cover had a montage of Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster a UFO and strangely Lon Chaney as the Phantom Of The Opera iIrc) that scared the crap out of five year old me. Reading a piece about a haunted house the line that tipped me over the edge was
'He looked up and saw a severed hand covered in blood, floating above his head'.
That shat me up to the point of hallucinating a decapitated head in a whicker basket in our bathroom. Needless to say the book was confiscated from me by my mum. I don't think the threat of Nuclear war or A.I.D.S had as profound effect on me as that book, whatever it was called.

If anyone out there knows what that book is, please post the title here! I'd love to look into that a bit more. And hallucinating a decapitated head? Blimey...

'The Unexplained' magazine used to have much the same effect on me - I'll never forget their article on Spontaneous Human Combustion, or the accompanying photos *shudder*

It's strange looking back at the things that, as a child, had us cowering behind the sofa. With time and maturity, they lose their power to terrify us in that unique way where we are as excited as we are frightened. And yet there's something about a puppet that still makes me feel...

Well, on the tv side I can remember being totally freaked out by The Singing Ringing Tree. It was an East German production and as creepy as hell. It was as if Cocteau had made The Never-Ending Story while high on crack and LSD!

Bizarrely that was my first experience of the painful longing of unrequited love - I was only about 3 but I remember being totally besotted with the vision of that blonde princess *sigh*

However the one thing that did scare me was Hector's House - I was okay with Kiki the frog and Zsazsa the Cat, but apparently whenever Hector spoke in his deep booming voice, I'd burst into tears.

And the opening music to Tomorrow People still gives me the willies today.

Whenever I have that common dream of trying to run away or hide from something that you just KNOW is going to catch you, it's Daleks every time, always has been.

We've already written a little box-out on the Tomorrow People title sequence and music, funnily enough...

Bursting into tears at Hector's voice - that's going straight in the book. If it makes you feel any better, my co-author used to cry at the whistling at the beginning of the Skippy The Bush Kangaroo theme music... 

[TV:]

TV: I remember visiting family & having to miss an episode of Dr Who because my cousin (3 months older than me) was scared of it. That scarred me, missing an episode due to someone else's terrors!!!

2000ADFlesh (book 1) really engaged with me, I loved feeling a bit scared for Earl Reagan & young Joe. Old One-Eye didn't scare me but the huge spiders under the machines did!

Film There is a film that left a huge mark but I haven't seen it as an adult & can't recall the title... (anyone giving me the title will be popular) an alien being is on a train and takes the appearance of people, killing them. I was reminded of the plot by Doomlord when I read Eagle... So it was well before the Eagle reboot that I saw it... Creepy! I was convinced that if I slept with the cover over my head no such beastie could ever harm me.

I run a blog and I'm happy to publicise this project for you if you have a website, FB Page, etc. let me know.

Some great memories there, Bat King (I didn't like those spiders in Flesh, either).

We have a FB page (search for 'scarred for life book') - if you could give us a mention on your blog, it'd be much appreciated!

That is it!!! Woop!

That film really scared me... no idea how old I was. Trying to remember which house I lived in but can't. My Dad was in RAF if I remember 'I lived THERE when THIS happened I can hone in on an age a bit better.

I think 1977 is a possibility, left alone in the house with 12 year old brother when I was 10... very possible... No way my Mum woulda let me watch it, Dad maybe... Dunno. But it was SCARY!

I remember Horror Express! Christopher Lee! Peter Cushing! Telly Savalas! And it was pretty gory, if I remember correctly...